It was difficult to see how Krysty was going to beat her larger, stronger opponent.
In the front row a skinny young guy, with a heavy mustache, wearing the tall white hat of a chef, called out in support of Krysty, but was instantly hushed by all his neighbors.
Sprite pretended to stumble, landing on hands and knees in the piled leaf mold close to the footpath through the ville, waiting a moment and shaking her head as if stunned. Ryan was about to shout a warning, but it wasn’t necessary. Krysty wasn’t a person to let herself get faked out just like that.
She backed away, half turning to grin reassuringly across at Ryan.
And Sprite struck.
The breath died in Ryan’s chest, and his good eye blinked shut in a reflex of utter dismay.
Nobody that big, especially a woman, had the right to be that fast.
As she straightened, Sprite had thrown two handfuls of the powdery leaf mold, mixed with sharp pine needles, directly into Krysty’s face following it up with the frightening speed of a charging buffalo.
Krysty staggering backward, stumbling clumsily, hands trying to clear her blinded eyes, opening and closing them to try to see through the sudden flood of tears.
Too late and way too slow.
Sprite was on top of her, screaming with a fervid delight, clasping her muscular arms around Krysty’s chest, crushing her to her own body as both women fell to the earth. There was a dull thud as Krysty’s skull hit the dirt, followed almost simultaneously by a sickening crack as Sprite drove her forehead into her face. Blood gushed from Krysty’s nose and cut mouth, and she lay still and helpless.
“Chilled, bitch!”
Sprite straddled the inert body, her knees gripping Krysty’s chest, holding her motionless, while the woman’s big butcher’s hands grappled for a hold on her throat.
There was a collective sigh of delight from the watching Children of the Rock. Out of the corner of his eye, Ryan noticed that Jim Owsley’s right hand was caressing the tight front of his jeans and his mouth sagged open with a morbid, obscene delight at the killing spectacle.
“Krysty!” Ryan yelled, his voice cracking. He took a step forward, stopping as he felt the sharpness of the barrel of a pistol jammed into his spine, not even seeing who held it. He was aware that several of the ville’s sec men had leveled their revolvers and rifles at the outlanders, preventing the possibility of interference from any of them.
“Watch and enjoy,” Wolfe whispered to Ryan. “Payment of debts.”
Sprite grinned at her shrieking supporters, showing her broken, stained teeth. She leaned forward, putting all her weight into the strangulation, her fingers digging into the soft flesh of Krysty’s neck.
Krysty thrashed her head from side to side, her emerald eyes staring wide, white rimmed, threaded with blood. Her mouth was open, rasping breath struggling for release, her tongue protruding and purpled.
Brother Wolfe was rocking back and forth, his hand on the butt of his blaster, grinning broadly, his eyes locked to Ryan’s face.
“Yes, Brother Cawdor,” he crowed. “A dish best eaten cold, wouldn’t you say?”
Ryan didn’t say anything. If there hadn’t been so many blasters trained on him and his friends, he would have made a grab for Wolfe’s pistol and risked holding him for ransom—the life of the leader of the Children of the Rock in exchange for the life of Krysty. But it would have been a hopelessly suicidal gesture. All that seemed left to him was the ultimate possibility of wreaking a bloody revenge.
Sprite was toying with her victim, releasing her grip and allowing Krysty to draw in a couple of tortured breaths, then closing off the air passage again.
“She’s dying, bro,” J.B. said very quietly.
Mildred turned to face Wolfe, her fists clenched tight with anger. “She’s butchering her,” she said accusingly.
“So she is, Sister Wyeth, so she is.”
Krysty was fluttering in and out of consciousness, her hands beating feebly at Sprite’s broad shoulders, making no impression on the woman.
“Use the power, lover,” Ryan shouted. “Use Gaia! You fucking well have to.”
It was a grim decision.