Then a foot came out of nowhere and smashed into her face. An inky black cloud formed in her vision and took her away.
JAK SPILLED the empty casings from the .357 and slammed home a fresh 6-round load as bullets continued chipping away at the tree and boulder he was using as shelter.
Footsteps pounded at him, and he knew enough of a team had reformed to set a trap for him. He glanced around and sized up the terrain. His position wasn’t ideal, but neither was it without resources.
He fisted one of the leaf-bladed knives and waited.
The running man hesitated for a moment. Jak’s keen ears could detect the break in the rhythm. He guessed the man was puzzled by his prey not trying to flee or fight. The albino slid the .357 into leather and flipped the restraining thong over the hammer, securing it into place.
The hunter came around the boulder cautiously.
Jak was flattened back against it, the knife low and ready in his fist. He waited for the man to notice him, depending solely on his speed and skill.
Jak took in the bolt-action Remington in the man’s hands at a glance. Uncoiling lithely, the youth batted the rifle barrel to one side with his free hand and slid up behind his attacker.
“Help me!” the man yelled.
The albino pressed the teen edge of his blade over the man’s carotid artery. He used the man as a shield, blending in to his back like another layer of skin. He was only a couple inches shorter than his victim, and holding him in that position was uncomfortable.
“Move with,” Jak warned in a low voice, “not against. You choose against, you die.” He pulled the knife in meaningfully.
“Yes,” the man said. “By Lugh Silverhand, I shall not try anything. Just please don’t kill me.”
“Like you didn’t kill my friend?” Jak asked. He’d seen Mildred go down and stay there. Men had swarmed in on her position, then vanished. There’d been nothing he could do to help. They’d been overrun too quickly.
Beyond the boulder, eight green-clad men stood up, keeping their eyes and weapons on Jak. Several of them were talking to one another, and a few made what had to be religious gestures.
“I didn’t kill her,” the man said.
He held his hands up to the others. He raised his voice to plead. “Don’t shoot, he’ll kill me.”
For the moment that seemed to be working as fine as Jak could have hoped. Trouble was, it left his back unprotected. He tugged backward, making the man walk with him. He’d chosen his spot deliberately. Here the terrain butted up against a flat face of the mountain range, and there was no way up for almost twenty feet. Jak was hoping that it would buy him enough time to rejoin Ryan and the others. The gunshots couldn’t have gone unnoticed.
“What you want with us?” Jak asked. The green-clad men were staying back, their weapons trained on them.
“Looking for a boy,” the man gasped. “Tarragon.”
“Don’t know him.”
“He came this way,” the man insisted. “Spent all night out looking for him.”
As the other men started to follow, Jak kept the blade at his hostage’s neck and drew the .357 with his free hand. Without hesitation, he put a round through the heart of the man nearest him. The others dropped back into hiding.
“Oh, blessed, sweet Lady,” the man whimpered, touching his forehead with his fingers, “be gentle as you take me into your embrace.”
“Ain’t dead yet,” Jak said, pulling back again. “Just him.” A quick glance at the mountain face behind him told him he was less than twenty feet away. “Who are you people?”
“Celts.”
“Not heard of you.” Jak slid the .357 away. He glanced back where he’d seen Mildred go down, but he still wasn’t able to see her fate.
“You’re poaching on our lands,” the man said. “That deer you took wasn’t yours to have.”
Jak didn’t waste his breath arguing. Anyone claiming to own such obviously free land had to be out of his mind. Even the most power-hungry baron never tried to lay claim to a bigger ville than he could control. That was triple stupe. So was the man’s thinking.