Though she knew he understood her, he still hadn’t said a word.
She sensed him moving, coming at her in a rush. She stood her ground, fending him off as he grappled with her. His hands sought her neck in an assassin’s choking grip. First falling backward, she tucked her head to protect her throat before rearing forward, butting him hard in the chest and chin. The sharp smack pushed him back, a little. Enough to make him stumble.
She whirled, tripping him with a leg sweep while he was off balance. The sweep did little good for, wily as a cat, he recovered and came at her again, clawed fingers catching in her hair.
This time she tried the old knee-him-in-the-groin trick, which seemed to earn her a little respect and teach him caution. Made him angry, too. He grunted and yelled something obscene in a furious, rapid-fire spate of words.
Not that Lily comprehended a thing he said but, in some strange fashion, she did understand he wasn’t yelling at her. About her, maybe, but not at her.
That’s when she realized he wore a speaker on his shoulder just like the one she’d chucked moments earlier. And really bizarre thing was that the voice coming out of the mic sounded identical to the one bellowing in hers before she threw it away.
Lopez?
“Kill her,” Lopez yelled in English. “Kill her now!”
The shock—stunned realization—almost paralyzed her. The bastard was a traitor. All that gunfire, earlier—was any of the team left alive, or had there been a slaughter? And now he wanted this guy to kill her. She didn’t need to speak the language to figure that much out.
Desperation lent Lily strength. Adrenaline poured through her. While the Arab bent over his abused gonads, she darted behind the altar and, miracle of miracles stepped right on top of her gun. She snatched it up in that stretched moment, all the breather she got, because when he straightened, he held a knife in his right hand. She saw him and his hurken big knife silhouetted in the strangely wavering light, and then he charged, swarming over the top of the crumbling altar.
“Shoot him!”Her mind screamed the order at her, and this time, her arm moved to obey. Too late. She tried to dodge, but his knife plunged downward, sliding along her left arm and slicing through the tough fabric of her jacket to her flesh.
Fire seethed through her, ran down her forearm. Hot blood flooded over her hand. Retaliating, Lily slugged him on the side of his head with the Glock, and if the blow lacked power, at least she managed to keep hold of the gun. He jerked aside, but she hit him again, this time connecting with a solid thud.
The blow didn’t stop him. Slowed him a little maybe. The pale hand she saw him brush across his eyes came away wet and dark. Good. She hoped his own blood blinded him.
Lunging to the side, she kicked up some of the rubble littering the floor under his feet. He slipped on a sodden spot, but nothing would hold him now. His teeth flashed in a contemptuous grin. Why could she see this? Hadn’t it been dark in here a second ago? Was that son-of-a-bitch Lopez here already, bringing more light to help finish her off?
Lily smelled the Arab as he grabbed her gun arm. Sharp, acrid sweat; an odd, cheesy odor; clothes worn several days too long.
The blade of his knife looked like watered silk as it plunged downward, toward her neck. Apparently he knew she was wearing a ballistic vest. Instructors had taught what to do in these situations. Better to take a wound in the arm or shoulder than the neck, they said. Better to taketwowounds in the arm or shoulder.
Lily dropped. Had a second in which to see the rage grow on his face, and hate glitter in his eyes before a blaze of pain lashed her senses. She kept willing her finger to pull the Glock’s trigger.
As from far away she heard Lopez screaming on a single long note.
Funny. Beyond the mausoleum walls, the sun was already rising. The marble angel stood outlined behind her attacker’s head, its wings spread against a red and orange sky. How could that be? As if that weren’t weird enough, her ears felt stuffed to bursting with foam.
Then they weren’t. Nothing could stop a gargantuan crack of sound louder than any thunder she’d ever heard—so loud it couldn’t possibly be real. And though her eyes were closed, nothing could shut out the burst of white light across her retinas.
What the hell?
The Arab bore her to earth behind the altar, but suddenly she couldn’t smell him anymore. She must have pushed him off because he seemed to have disappeared, even though she felt no lightening of the pressure on her body.
And then—nothing. Not even pain. Her last thought was that she was disintegrating.
Chapter 2
November 2, 2115
Cattle lowed mournful protest, heads swinging on outstretched necks as if sheer yearning would bring them to water sooner. Dust rose over the herd, but scenting water nearby, the parched animals drove forward through the choking cloud.
Selkirk O’Quinn, leader of the O’Quinn clan, sat his horse on a small rise. At his motion, herders and their dogs drew in closer, holding the herd back to keep it from over-running the dozen home wagons lumbering just ahead of the cattle. Under his watchful eye, the water-wagon, high-sided and filled with large round kegs stacked two layers high, broke a path around the families. Three ten-year-old boys rode on top of the load, already unwinding the hoses of hand pumps in preparation of refilling the kegs. Should the cattle beat them to it, the water would be muddy and befouled for the next hour or so, and useless to the humans.
O’Quinn whistled, the shrill sound carrying above the squeal of dry wagon wheels, barking dogs, and complaining cattle. Its lilt summoned his cousin Bannion, also O’Quinn, who reined toward him, riding a horse too tired to break out of a trot.
Bannion didn’t force the animal, most likely because he was as weary as the horse. There’d been a skirmish yesterday morning, and constant scouting since.
“Surprised you have the spit to pucker up for that whistle,” Bannion said, drawing in beside the clan leader.
“I’ve been wallowing a rock around in my mouth. Helps a little.” Selkirk grimaced. “Has Nate reported in?”
“About five minutes ago.”
“He see any sign of Harrison?”
“Said not.” Bannion removed his floppy hat, an old one made of beaver pelt, and wiped sweat off his forehead with a filthy shirt sleeve, oblivious to the muddy tracks left behind. There hadn’t been water to wash with for the last two days as they traveled through the wastelands. Everyone in the clan was suffering.
His dark eyes, never still, squinted against the dust and glaring sunlight, scanning the hills rising over the broad valley as though to see to its end. Although he bragged of keen eyesight, nothing stirred in the distance. The clan’s winter quarters were over there, on the banks of a small lake. Harrison Bell, yet another shirttail relative was the summer caretaker, holding the clan’s title over the land by right of possession. That he hadn’t showed up at the ford to welcome the nomads home was cause for worry. That they’d been attacked twice on the way, in the wastelands, no less, cause for more.
Bloodstains made dark patches on the front of Bannion’s shirt. This particular blood had once belonged to someone else, although the splatters on his leg were all his. A raw gash on his calf showed through a rent in his homespun britches.
Bannion’s gaze shifted back to his cousin who was trying to keep his concern from becoming too clear. “Don’t worry, Selkirk. He’ll be here. He’s never failed us yet.”
Selkirk cocked him a look out of red-rimmed eyes. “He’s getting old, Bannion. Too old to fight. The broken leg he had in the spring didn’t do him any good. Slowed him down too much, if you ask me. I should’ve had somebody stay with him.”
“He didn’t want anybody. Just his dog.” Bannion hesitated. “Speaking of his dog—”
Selkirk flinched, but to his relief, Bannion shook his head without finishing his thought.
“More at stake here than Harrison’s feelings,” Selkirk said, and repeated almost fretfully, “Somebody should�
��ve stayed.”
“Soon as we cross I’ll have Nate scout ahead,” Bannion offered. “Circle around the foothills and make a sweep down to the ranch from there. Just in case. This is not the time to get careless.”
“I agree. Especially after what happened yesterday. Although how we were to know the Mags were going to start a war is beyond me. The Farmers should’ve sent word after first blood.” Selkirk spat out the little stone he held under his tongue in hopes it would alleviate thirst. “Wait until dawn, Bannion. Eat and have the men rest first.” His sharp eyes examined his cousin. “Wash. Maybe Harrison will show up this evening. You’re worn out. The horses are worn out, and the troops are frazzled. If there’s more fighting to be done, it’ll go better after a night’s sleep.”
“And a decent hot meal. For all of us. Won’t hurt for the whole company to have a day of rest before the last push to headquarters.”
Selkirk had no trouble deciphering Bannion’s hint. “Don’t worry. I won’t let them head out until we have a report. No sense in walking into trouble blind.”
Their minds were traveling the same path. Nudging his horse in the ribs with his heel, Bannion nodded and rode after the water wagon, leaving his cousin to manage the cows.
***
Neila Bell, nee O’Quinn, drove the water wagon with a strength and expertise belied by her thin, almost bony frame. Selkirk’s sister, she enjoyed a status in the clan above older, more settled women. Aside from birthright, she earned the standing by her own efforts, being an excellent doctor and when necessary, a canny fighter.
Harrison Bell was her father-in-law—or he had been. A widow these last three years, her husband had been killed in a clash with Mags. Since then she’d grown harder, leaner, more militant.
Her son, along with two boys, rode atop the kegs in the wagon.
“Harmon, no fooling around up there, showing how brave you are,” she yelled to him. “Those cattle need water and the drovers can’t hold them forever. It’s your job to fill water barrels, not play. Get in and get out. Take too long and those cattle will run right up your ass—and mine. Hustle! You, too, Pak. No slacking, Benji.”
“No, ma’am. No slacking,” Benji answered for all three.
Neila delivered these reminders and instructions rapid fire, while at the same time guiding the dray horses pulling the wagon—light now, but soon to be very heavy indeed—down the incline and splashing into the ford. Neither her driving, nor her demands upon the children stopped her inner worries. Where was Harrison? Why wasn’t he here? Was he dead?
The last question moved through her mind before she could stop it, no matter how she tried to convince herself he was a tough old varmint. Tough—but not invincible.
About mid-way across the river, she pulled the horses to a halt and eased the reins, allowing the animals to lower their heads and drink. Leaning around to see behind her, she waved the following wagons around the dray.
“Chop, chop!” she told the boys, who sprang into action, climbing monkey-like over the kegs. They dropped the pump tubes into the river and cranked like their young lives depended on it, wiry muscles straining. Within moments the pumps began drawing fresh, clean water into the kegs.
“That’s it,” Neila said. “Keep it up.” Reins loose in her hands, she stretched out her back and shoulders. Give her a couple copper pennies, she thought, and watch her jump into the water right now and bathe the dirt and sweat from her body. Soak moisture in through her skin until she felt something different than a desiccated grape. But that wouldn’t be fair to the others, especially the men and boys bringing up the rear with the cattle, so she made herself a promise for later, after the kegs were filled, and everyone safely crossed into O’Quinn territory.
Between the kids’ grunts and competitive taunts to one another, the clack of pump cranks, and the liquid gurgle of the stream, she failed to hear the splash of Bannion’s horse until he showed up at her side.
His horse lowered its head, snuffling through its nose as though to clear the dust before sucking in great gulps of water.
Her cousin Bannion, head of defense and sheriff of the clan, grinned at her, his teeth very white in his filthy face. “If I looked as bad as you do, Cuz, the Techs would never recognize us as full human.”
“They prefer not to recognize us anyway, the sciffy bastards.” She reined in the horses who’d made a sudden move. Didn’t want to throw the boys off the top of the kegs, after all. It was a long way down. “And don’t remind me how I look—or smell. I’ve got a pretty good idea.” The moment of what passed for levity with her nowadays faded. “Has anyone seen Harrison? Is he here?”
Bannion shook his head. “Not a sign. I’m sending Nate on ahead as soon as we have something to eat. He’ll see what’s holding him up.”
“Nate won’t go alone.” It wasn’t a question.
“Now, Cuz. Don’t you go trying to be his mom. He’s traveled all over this country by himself. He wouldn’t appreciate your fretting.”
“I know.” She fiddled with the reins. “But I worry. I worry about you all. O’Quinns sometimes aren’t all that good about taking care of their own skins.”
“But they ain’t stupid. Not Nate and not me.”
Neila’s smile stretched thin. “I know you aren’t. You and Nate and Selkirk—all O’Quinn and a mile wide, graced by the spirits and made better than other men. Even if Nate’s last name is different.”
At this he laughed. “Finally—she admits it.”
“Yes,” she said, not smiling now, “and my son, though only half an O’Quinn, has inherited the same traits as his uncles and his cousins. It’s enough to make a woman wish she’d married into the Techs. Or the Farmers. Anything but the damn Warrior clan.”
“Bullshit,” Bannion said above the noise of thirsty cattle growing louder and more imperative. “You wouldn’t have it any other way. I don’t need to remind you that we wouldn’t need warriors if those Techs or Cits would leave us alone, do I?”
“Humph,” she said. “And Mags and who know what else.” Agreement of a sort.
He pulled his horse’s nose from the river, looking toward the bank where the herd milled in increasing impatience. “That’s it, boys,” he hollered to the three atop the kegs. “Cattle are coming. Get this wagon out of the way, Neila. Camp over there by the cottonwood grove. It’s safe enough.”
She knew he hadn’t scouted across. “How do you know?”
He winked. “A little birdie told me.”
Damn him. One probably really had. “Crazy O’Quinn shaman!” she said. “If it can tell you that much, why can’t it tell you everything?”
Her question was a reference to Harrison, which she knew Bannion caught. He merely shrugged, kneeing his horse and pushing through the river to the other side.
Aware of a strong dose of self-pity, Neila recalled her complaint had been oft-repeated during her years of widowhood. Too often, perhaps, her rant brought on by outrage against fate as she railed against her husband Caleb’s death. The O’Quinn men didn’t hold her attitude against her, or even mention it. They just tightened up and ignored it.
Besides, there was nothing any of them could do to alter what had happened. Everyone alive was what they were, and had been since the old world died a hundred years ago.
With a slight sense of shock, she realized the clan had missed the Big Bang commemoration. A centennial, she believed the old ones had called it, although the word was lost in time. They were a few days late reaching their winter homeland, slowed down by unprecedented Mag attacks as they made their way from the mountains where the cattle had grazed through the summer in the upland meadows. The event would be “remembered” a few days late, after they had settled into the safety of their winter homes. If they made it that far.
Why wasn’t Harrison here waiting for them?
Neila watched her cousin as he swam his horse into deep water, then urged it onto the river bank nearest the cottonwoods. Sure enough, a flock of small blac
k birds swarmed out of the tree tops, calling in raucous confusion. Bannion waved at them, as though saluting. Safety there, she thought, reading the signs. Just as he promised. Her unconscious tension eased.
She turned around. “You kids got your pumps stowed and secured?” she demanded.
“Yep,” Harmon yelled, grinning down at her from the top-most keg. “I was done first.”
The other boys, Benji and Pal groaned, but without denying his claim.
A proud mama feeling welled inside her. Harm was a good boy. Too serious and subdued since his father’s death, his grin just now a rarity. Too driven and doing his best to take on a man’s role. Regret for his shortened youth nagged her beyond reason. Damn those Mags. Someday they’d rid the world of the last of them, then maybe they could live in peace, get back a little of what they’d lost. If the Techs and the Cits let them.
She shook the crazy thought aside.
“Hang on, guys.” She snapped the reins over the team, their thirst quenched now, and they settled into their collars, grunting with the effort of moving the heavy load, wheels lumbering through the sandy river bottom. With her sure hand guiding them, they pulled their dripping burden up the gentle incline from the river, following the other O’Quinn clan wagons onto home territory.
Behind her, as soon as everyone had crossed, the barking of dogs and shouts of men marked the progress of the herd as it scattered out along the river bank. Though only three in the afternoon, it would be full dark before the animals settled down and folks could get to their bathing. Time enough to fix a real meal instead of a hodge podge of whatever was quick and easy.
Neila smacked her lips, planning ahead. And then, with the other women, a bath in the usual secluded cove formed before the river took a turn. They were almost home. What joy!
***
Selkirk lifted his arm and made a circling motion, signaling the drovers to push the cattle into the river. They’d take it slow and allow the animals time to slake their thirst during the crossing. From there, the herd would be hazed out of the water into the meadows a little farther on.
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