The four moved off apprehensively. How many men had Montrose sent after them? Jed knew the three rifles he had with him wasn’t going to be enough to beat off the threat, and so he was going to have to come up with something extra special this time, something that nobody could possibly expect.
Rex moved in closer as they picked their way over the stony ground. “This isn’t good is it?”
“No,” Jed said bluntly. “They look to be travelling faster than we are so I figure they’ll be on top of us within the hour.” He looked back and checked their position as if to confirm his statement. “Make that less than an hour,” he concluded. “If we get into a fire fight with them we’re going to lose.”
“I figured that might be the case,” Rex confessed. “I’ve been kinda hoping you had a cunning plan up your sleeve.”
“Nope…not yet.”
Rex’s face fell. “Not what I wanted to hear.”
“Sorry to disappoint you but this may just be the one time the mighty warrior doesn’t come through.”
“Yeah,” Rex said guiltily, “sorry about dumping that mighty warrior thing on you, but the Noragin were looking for a hero when we came along and you just happened to be the one they preferred.”
“Probably would have been you if you hadn’t gone and got yourself wounded. You’d have led us on the attack at Montrose’s fortress and come back the hero.”
“Not a chance,” Rex said humbly. “I’d never have had the guts to pull that one off. No, you’ve earned that moniker.”
“It’s not really one I want,” Jed freely admitted. “And it’s not likely to be one I’ll still have after this is over either.” He nodded in Amora’s direction. “I fear what they’ll do to her if they get a hold of her.”
“We’ll come up with something. We’re not going to let anything happen to Amora.”
Easier said than done, Jed thought. Rex had always been an optimist but this time they were really in trouble, and no amount of wishful thinking was going to get them out of it. What could he do? What might he find up ahead that he could turn into a weapon to defeat Montrose’s men?
“Amora…Amora,” he called, to the pretty woman, “can you come over here for a moment.”
She walked back to where he stood waiting for her. “Yes, Jed?”
“I need you to tell me what the terrain is like up ahead. What will we encounter in the next hour or so?”
She gave it some thought for a moment. “This rocky ground goes on for at least another mile, and then just before we reach the Plain of the Giant lizards we’ll come to a big swamp.”
Jed’s ears were suddenly on alert, “a swamp?”
“Yes, but we can skirt around it if we want to.”
Jed saw a glimmer of hope. It was a long shot maybe, but what did they have to lose. “This swamp…tell me more about it.”
“I’ve only been there once before,” she confided. “My father wanted to show it to me but I was frightened by the place.”
“What was frightening about it?”
She screwed up her face at the memory. “It was full of strange animals and insects. And leeches,” she looked terrified at the mention of them. “Huge leeches the size of a man’s hand.”
“Anything else you remember,” he probed.
“The smell, I remember there was a strange and overpowering smell and there were bubbles bursting on the surface of the water all the time.”
He placed his hand under her chin and turned her face towards him. “I know it was a long time ago,” he said gently, “but do you remember if there were any small islands in the swamp?”
“Yes,” she answered, puzzled at the question, “there were many. We camped the night on one of them.” She noticed the gleam in his eye and guessed the horrible truth. “We are going into the swamp aren’t we?”
“It will be all right, Amora, I won’t let anything happen to you.”
“Please stay close to me in that swamp,” she pleaded. “It is not a place that I ever wanted to go into again.”
“I won’t leave your side for a second,” he promised her. “Now, lead us to that swamp.”
Chapter Sixteen
Jed stood at the edge of the murky water with Amora beside him. “How deep does it get?”
“It’s mostly waist deep but in some places it will go up to your neck.”
Rex sidled up. “And why are we going in there?”
“I’ll explain later,” Jed promised. “But for now I suggest we get a move on, we haven’t got much time to get things ready.” He stepped off the bank into the inky water and was surprised at how warm it was, heated no doubt by the perpetual sun that was only marginally cooler at night.
“There’s an island up ahead that’s big enough for the four of us to spend the night,” Amora said, after they had been wading through the water for half an hour or so.
“It’s not in the right spot,” Jed answered. “We have to keep moving until we come across an island in the correct area.”
Amora said nothing, instead she quietly continued on her pilgrimage through the swamp, totally trusting in the belief that her man knew exactly what he was doing.
Jed wrenched another leech off his arm. It was the sixth blood sucker to attach itself to him in the thirty minutes they had been in the water. What’s more, Amora hadn’t been exaggerating by much; some of them weren’t too far off the size of a man’s hand. Ripping a small piece of material from the collar of his shirt he tossed it onto the surface of the still water.
Rex caught him in the act. “What the dickens are you doing?” he asked in disbelief. “That’ll make it easier for them to follow us.”
“That’s the general idea,” Jed said bluntly.
“Look, I don’t get this at all.” Rex was beginning to get a little tetchy. “Why are we in this swamp, and why are you leading them straight to us?”
“If we lead them to us we can destroy them, Rex.”
“So you have got a plan then?”
“Yes, but there’s no guarantee that it’ll work, I’m just hoping it will.”
Rex frowned. “It all sounds a bit hit or miss to me.
“You could say that. If it doesn’t work then we’re all dead, so you’d better start praying that it does.”
“You’re not instilling me with a lot of confidence, Jed.”
“I’m not that confident myself. But if we do pull this off then it’ll be the last we see of this bunch of men.” Jed noted the large bubbles that were breaking on the surface all around them. “We’re getting close to where we need to be.”
“The stench around here is overpowering,” Rex complained.
“That’s where we need to be,” Jed said, pointing to a small island up ahead. Within minutes he was hauling his dripping wet body up onto the island and scanning it quickly. About fifteen feet long by twenty five wide it would do perfectly. “Right,” he said, pulling his knife enthusiastically from its sheath, “we need to dig a shallow trench about two feet deep and long enough for all four of us to lie in it.”
The others began digging without complaint, scraping furiously at the soft black dirt with their knives.
“Deep enough…?” Rex asked eventually.
“I think it’ll do. Amora, I need one of your arrows.”
As Amora drew one from her quiver and handed it to him he tore some more material from his shirt and began to wrap it tightly around the arrow head. “When I tell you to I’ll need you to ignite this with your lighter,” he said to Rex.
“He’s either a genius or he’s barking mad,” Rex muttered to Jonathon.
Jonathon grinned in response. “Maybe he’s a bit of both.”
“So what do we do now?” Rex asked.
“We wait. As soon as they get within range we can act.”
“But I still don’t get it,” Rex complained. “What’s one fire arrow going to do against thirty or more men?”
“What’s that floating above the water?” Jonathon said suddenly
, staring off into the swamp at a green luminescence bobbing gently up and down above the murky water.”
“It’s swamp gas,” Jed said simply.
Rex spun round to face him. “You cunning dog, I see what you’re up to now and it’s brilliant.”
“Only, if it actually works.”
“It’ll work,” Rex said without any attempt to hide his admiration. “And I take back all my doubts about you now I know what your plan is.”
“Well I still don’t know what’s going on,” Jonathon complained, “so will someone please fill me in.”
“You’ll see soon enough,” Rex said unhelpfully. He nodded towards the green blob. “I think I can see them coming.”
“Everyone into the trench,” Jed ordered. “Amora, get your arrow ready, Rex your lighter.”
Montrose’s men gradually came into view despite the gloomy light that had descended upon the swamp.
“As soon as Amora has fired her arrow everyone must immediately lie flat in the trench,” Jed whispered.
The Sky-Gods came on boldly, plowing through the water with a sense of purpose. Jed watched the bubbles of gas breaking on the surface around them. “Get your arrow ready, Amora.”
As Rex held the lighter close to the arrowhead in anticipation Jed could hear his friends labored breathing and knew he was as frightened of this failing as he was.
“Wait…” Jed’s eyes were riveted on Montrose’s underlings. The first few had entered the green ball and as their lungs filled with the foul smelling gas their coughs began to echo spookily out over the swamp. “Wait…” he said again.
The eerie luminescence enveloped the hunters, clinging to hair, skin, and clothing alike. “Light it now,” Jed said to Rex. “They’re all in the gas.”
As Rex flicked his lighter on, Amora’s rag bound arrow suddenly burst into flames. “Aim for the green gas,” Jed whispered gently to Amora, “then lie down immediately in the trench.”
Amora watched the arrow just long enough to be satisfied it was on target before launching herself into the trench beside Jed.
An enormous explosion rocked the normally peaceful swamp, the death dealing flames roaring angrily over the top of the trench in search of victims. At least thirty seconds elapsed before Jed braved peering out to see the results. Thirty blackened bodies floated lifeless on the water’s surface, the stench of scorched flesh mingling with the acrid smell of ignited gas.
“Brilliant, absolutely brilliant,” Rex gushed.
“I get it now,” Jonathon said. “You used the swamp gas to create an explosion. Well done, Jed.”
“We’ll need to make sure they’re all dead.” Jed climbed out of the trench and began to wade towards the carnage. “Come on,” he called over his shoulder, “we can’t afford a single one to recover and follow us, our survival depends upon it.”
“I don’t know how you came up with that one,” Rex said later, as they continued on their way through the swamp. “But that must go down as one of the most sensational pieces of military brilliance I’ve ever heard of.”
“It was just luck, Rex,” Jed said humbly. “Amora told me that the swamp emitted lots of gas so I figured if we could ignite it then we had a fighting chance.”
“Stop underrating your abilities. You came up with it under pressure when neither Jonathon nor I were thinking of anything more than trying to outrun them.”
“It was just luck, Rex,” Jed said again.
“No,” Rex was starting to get a little annoyed, “it wasn’t. It was a clever military strategy. You’ve gone from a city boy adventurer to an accomplished general in a matter of weeks. No one can deny that…not even you.”
“Oh come on, Rex, I’m no general.”
“We owe you our lives today,” Rex reminded him. “And so does every single person back at the caves.”
“You’re starting to sound as bad as the Noragin with their ridiculous hero worshipping nonsense.”
“And what makes you think you’re not a hero?” Rex asked defiantly.
“Thirty-four years of experience.”
Rex finally lost his temper. “You’re a hero whether you like it or not, so don’t ever let me catch you or anybody else saying otherwise.” He stormed off, forcing his limbs through the water in a headlong attempt at putting as much distance between himself and the object of his wrath as he could.
Jed watched the broad shoulders of his friend disappear into the mist that was beginning to form on the swamp. It was so like Rex to get hot headed, but so unlike him to lavish praise. This place had changed him, and Jed feared he didn’t really know his best friend anymore. It was as if the fellow needed to believe Jed was a hero, almost as if he had a deep seated need to look up to someone great, and unfortunately for Jed his friend had settled on him.
“Have you and Rex argued?”
Jed turned his attention to the pretty blonde who had worked her way up to be beside him. “No not really.”
“He looked angry.”
“Rex has always been a bit hot-headed, Amora. He doesn’t like being disagreed with.”
She giggled. “He will fit in well with Noragin men then.”
“How much longer before we’re through the swamp?” Jed was hoping to change the subject. If the truth be known he was starting to feel decidedly uncomfortable with Rex’s adoration of him, and so if he didn’t discuss it with anybody then maybe the whole business would simply fade away.
“About another two hours I think.”
“I’ll get you to look at that wound on my leg when we get to dry land,” he said, gingerly touching the spot through his trouser leg.
Her eyes were full of concern. “Is it hurting?”
“I think it must be the acidity of the water that’s making it ache so much.”
“I don’t think I’ll be able to find the leaves I need. They don’t grow anywhere outside the forest back home.”
“We’ll sort something out,” he said, trying hard to sound confident for her sake. “I’m sure it’ll get better once it’s out of the water and dried out.”
Rex came churning towards them at a breakneck speed from out of the mist. “Something’s in the water,” he yelled, fear having taken over from his earlier fit of anger.
“What do you mean by…something?” Jed asked calmly.
“How the dickens do I know?” Rex snapped, anger beginning to make a comeback now he was in the safety of the group.
Amora made a grab for Jed’s arm and hung on tight.
Jed tried again. “What did it look like?”
“Some sort of… crocodillie thing. Long slippery body…head with big teeth, I didn’t stick around to classify the thing.”
Jed turned to Amora, “any idea?”
She shook her head. “The creatures here are mostly different from the ones back home.”
Jed considered their options. If there was one such creature here then there was likely to be more, particularly if it was some form of prehistoric crocodile. Problem being, there didn’t appear to be any islands in this part of the swamp to make a stand from, and standing waist deep in this murky water made them sitting ducks. “Everyone in close,” he ordered. “Amora you come in the middle and the rest of us all facing a different direction.”
Jed’s keen eye swept the water in front of him for any telltale signs of disturbance. Did they hunt in packs or were they solitary hunters? Not knowing what he was up against made planning a defense almost impossible.
“Over there,” Jonathon said nervously. “Something just broke the surface and then dived.”
Rex pulled back the bolt on his rifle. “Maybe we should just pepper the water in the hopes we hit it.”
“And alert every other predator around that we’re here?” Jed pulled his knife from its sheath. “Only use the rifles if we get desperate.”
“There it is again.” The edge to Jonathon’s voice was unmistakable.
“There are two of them then because I’ve got one out my side too,�
�� Rex added.
Amora pressed in even tighter to Jed’s body and clung desperately to his arm. “Amora, honey, I know you’re frightened but you’ve got to let go of my arm. I can’t protect you unless both my arms are free.”
Her grip slowly and reluctantly lessened until he felt her hands slip from his arm. Just then a dark shape broke the surface not more than ten feet away from him. So they were pack animals, it was what he had feared, and now they had Jed and his friends completely encircled. They were obviously just checking them out before making an attack.
“No matter what we must stay in the formation we are in,” Jed advised. “If anyone breaks off and gets isolated then they’re dead.” He noticed the streak of blood in the water beside him and realized the wound on his leg was seeping. The creatures must have picked the blood scent up and now they were here, ready for a meal.
“Something just bumped against my leg,” Jonathon shouted.
“If it does it again use your knife, and for goodness sake try to remain calm.”
“That’s easy for you to say, it wasn’t you it came for.”
The situation was desperate. He had Jonathon cracking up on him on one side, Amora practically climbing up on his back in the middle, and all the while his leg oozing the blood that was guaranteed to send the creatures into a feeding frenzy.
Something banged into his leg and so he instantly plunged his knife into the dark water, the steel blade finding its target with a sickening thud. Amora screamed as the water thrashed violently and a long stream of bright red blood began to color the water around their legs.
Rex spun around immediately, stepping slightly away from the others. “Don’t do that, Amora,” he growled angrily, “you scared the daylights out of me.”
“Don’t break ranks, Rex,” Jed roared. “That’s what they’re trying to make us do.” He saw three more of the creatures moving in from his left and knew something had to be done fast. “We’ve got no choice but to use the rifles now, there’s too many of them.”
“That’s all I needed to hear,” Rex said with determination.
The Reluctant Warrior Page 15
