James Axler – Circle Thrice

“Buell’s on his way north with reinforcements, but Grant’s men are being pushed back toward the Tennessee. Dusk was falling, Beauregard took over on Johnston’s shocking death and here came the sixth and biggest mistake.”

“Defeat from the jaws of victory,” Doc muttered with a smug smile.

Portillo nodded, licking his thick lips, hooded eyes glaring at the old man. “Right. He held off, and the gutless blue-bellies escaped and everyone went home.”

They stood in silence in the broiling heat of the late morning, everyone locked into his or her own thoughts.

Far above their heads a white-ruffed kestrel was riding a thermal, eyes scanning the verdant fields below it.

“That wasn’t bad,” Ryan said, finally breaking the silence. “Not bad, Judas.”

“Thank you, sir.”

J.B. fished in one of his bottomless pockets and pulled out a jingling handful of small jack, counting it with his eyes and then handing most of it over to the guide, who fingered it suspiciously, then nodded and smiled.

“It’ll do,” he said grudgingly. “Yeah, it’ll do.”

Chapter Twenty

Both Ma Jode and Judas Portillo, accompanied by eight snot-nosed, ragged urchins and three mongrel dogs, came to see them leave the landing.

The raft drifted slowly off into the current, steered by Krysty, with Doc and J.B. working the sweeps, letting the Tennessee take them away south.

“We going far?” Mildred asked. “I was sort of surprised you told them we planned to stick with the river. Way that old woman kept eyeing our blasters, I wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t find we had some company downstream.”

Ryan was sitting on the roof of the makeshift shelter, enjoying the early-afternoon weather. “What I tell them and what we’re doing is two different things, Mildred. And you’re right. I saw some skulking and whispering going on, and half a dozen men with muskets left just after we went to visit the battle site.”

“So we leaving the water?”

He nodded. “Sure are. Get us around the corner, then we’ll break away from it and strike off west.”

“I’m sure there used to be a big dam to the south,” Mildred said.

“River’s changed its course.” Ryan squinted behind them. “Ma Jode told me that. Said the actual battle was nearer the Tennessee than it used to be.”

“Whole damned country’s changed its shape,” Doc said sadly. “Sea to shining sea. California to New-york. State slid into the Pacific, most of it, and New-york had been transmogrified into the ruined haunt of ghouls and ghosts.”

They floated south, the settlement vanishing behind them into the shimmering heat haze. The sides of the river were lined with luxuriant bushes and a row of aspens that trembled in the faint northerly that rode at their shoulders.

“Man could get used to this,” J.B. said, pushing back his fedora and taking off his glasses, polishing them furiously on his sleeve.

“You’re quiet, Jak,” Ryan commented. The albino was lying on the front of the boat, chin in his hands, watching the water as it bubbled under the rough bow.

“Nothing to say. Battlefield depressed me. Didn’t want talk. Now out in open again, feel better.” He grinned suddenly. “Still got nothing to say.”

“That bruise better?” Mildred asked.

The teenager nodded. “Some.”

THEY’D TRAVELED ABOUT A MILE when Ryan pointed to the western bank and they steered into a narrow inlet.

It was lined with wild rosebushes, unusually scented, that filled the air with their fragrance. Ryan waited, the SIG-Sauer cocked in his right hand, while Jak leaped ashore with the line, tethering the raft to a sturdy dogwood.

As they started to get off, Krysty pointed behind them, across the river and a little way downstream. “Looks like we just missed the reception committee.”

A group of raggedy men had emerged from behind a raised shoal at the top of the far bank. All of them held long muskets, and they were waving their arms and shouting. But the Tennessee carried any words away.

“Bastards!” Mildred exclaimed angrily.

“Not surprised,” Ryan said. “Best surprise is no surprise, like Trader used to say.”

The woman stared across at the men. A couple had raised their blasters, and they saw the puffs of black-powder smoke. One ball hit the surface of the water about fifty yards short of the raft, and the other simply disappeared.