Another of the men jumped from above, landing awkwardly, close to Doc. He turned his ankle as he fell, with a dry crack, audible above the bedlam. He shrieked once, showing a completely toothless mouth. Doc was holding the Le Mat in his right hand, but he hesitated to waste a valuable shotgun round. Quickly holstering the commemorative cannon, he drew the trusty swordstick.
The attacker reached up and grabbed at the honed rapier blade, but Doc tugged it away from him, cutting the man’s palm clear to the bone. Blood spouted over the wet timbers.
“Chill him!” Ryan called.
Doc stumbled, steadying himself for a moment against the low roof of the cabin, and two more men dropped onto the raft, one of them slashing at the old man with a billhook with a vicious beaked blade.
There was a high twanging sound, and the bridge suddenly collapsed into a tangle of broken ropes and splintered wood, tearing away from both sides of the gorge. It fell into the Tennessee just astern of the raft, dumping the last of the doomed men into the river.
Released from the restraint, the raft shuddered like a hound dog ridding itself of fleas and began to race downstream once more, slowed only by the snarled weight of the wrecked bridge.
Three of the enemy were aboard, one with the broken ankle and horribly cut hand, and two others, one attacking Doc who was parrying for his life, the slender Toledo steel ringing against the clumsy cleaver.
The last of the locals had dropped to hands and knees, a slender dagger gripped in each hand, and was crawling toward J.B., who was still wrestling at the back with the long, clumsy oar.
Ryan was vaguely aware that there was white water ahead, with jagged boulders sticking above the roiling surface of the river, threatening further disasters.
Doc finally slip-parried a powerful thrust from the billhook, and turned quickly to thrust the needle-tipped blade of his sword between his opponent’s third and fourth ribs, slicing through heart and lungs as he twisted his wrist before withdrawing the blood-slick steel.
Mildred had managed to find her balance long enough to put a bullet through the forehead of the man with the wounded hand, blowing away half the back of his skull, emptying a grue of brains and blood into the waiting river.
Which left the man with the pair of knives, making his way toward the rear of the raft and the helpless Armorer, unable to let go of the steering oar as they plunged into the raging rapids at the heart of the shadowed gorge.
Ryan snapped a shot at the man, but the craft was tilting and rocking and he was forced to throw himself down onto the bloodied logs and hang on for dear life.
Jak saved J.B.’s life.
Not trusting to his own lack of skill with his big Colt Python, the albino went for his beloved throwing knives, drawing one of the leaf-bladed, weighted weapons from its hiding place in the small of his back, gripping it by the taped hilt and throwing it in a snapping underarm motion.
Despite the shifting platform, the teenager’s aim was as accurate as ever.
The knife hit the crawling man on the side of his throat, clinging there like a glittering insect that suddenly spouted bright crimson from the severed artery. The doomed attacker pulled it out with his right hand and threw it down with a curse, not realizing that he was already dying.
He spotted Jak and threw one of his own knives at the red-eyed youth, who ducked away at the moment that the raft, despite all of the Armorer’s efforts, struck the fanged spur of a submerged rock and tipped sav agely to starboard.
Jak was thrown into the icy water of the Tennessee River.
Mildred and Ryan both saw the accident, the woman scuttling to the rear of the raft, ready to try to help the teenager if he surfaced from the churning maelstrom.
Ryan faced the last of the surviving attackers, who was standing in a stooped crouch, arterial blood gushing from his throat, glaring from side to side like a stubborn beast trapped in the shambles.