James Axler – Cold Asylum

Ryan had been around Deathlands long enough to know that there might be a reasonable explanation for the way the man had been chased and butchered.

“Man who jumps to conclusions sometimes ends up jumping into his own grave,” Trader had said.

One of the sec men had a short copper bugle that he put to his lips and blew a series of brief, yipping notes. The dogs all jumped up and began to bark.

The woman they called Mistress Marie had heeled her mare across the clearing until she was directly beneath the bunch of ferns, some twenty feet above her.

Ryan could have spat into her hair.

The pack of hounds was already leaving, streaming along the trail toward the north, the powerful force of sec men readying themselves to follow. The four elegantly attired men, all of whom Ryan saw were only in their early twenties, were still talking excitedly among themselves, carefully avoiding the eyes of the woman.

Nobody was taking any notice of the corpse, lying discarded on its face, arms spread like a supplicant. From above, it showed no signs of the hideous injury to the abdomen. The puddle of congealing blood was already attracting the interest of a number of mottle-winged blowflies.

The woman sighed. “I’m bored already,” she said. “An hour or so of exercise and then a few seconds of delight. And then” She snapped her fingers. “It’s over. Just like that.”

She kicked the spurs into the mare’s flanks, making it rear. Dean had been leaning farther and farther forward and the sudden movement of the horse made him jump. The loose, wet earth gave way and, before Ryan could snatch at the boy, Dean rolled helplessly down the slope, landing almost under the hooves of the woman’s horse, flat on his back, arms lifted to his face to protect himself.

“That tears it,” J.B. said.

Chapter Seventeen

If Dean hadn’t been winded by the fall, there might have been some hope. Slender, admittedly, but there could have been the possibility of escape. A quick burst of shooting to bring down some of the armed sec men and panic the horses, then up and away into the surrounding woods.

But even that had drawbacks.

It would mean keeping together at the speed of the slowest member of the group, which was Doc, by a goodly margin. And there might be other hunting parties around the forest, all on their home turf, knowing the shortcuts and the streams.

A man on a horse could easily ride down a running man, even in a woodland like this one. And the sec men looked disciplined and tough.

Half a dozen blasters were pointed at the breathless boy, and Ryan knew that this was one of those times for talking rather than shooting.

He stood, showing both empty hands.

“No danger,” he said. “There’s six of us here. Okay if we come on down?”

The woman seemed least affected. She had looked up in surprise as the boy appeared from thin air and spooked her mare. But she had regained control, pulling on the bit, again using her spurs. Now everyone waited for her to speak.

“Why didn’t you kill us, outlander?”

“Not our way.”

She smiled thinly. Now that Ryan could see her more clearly he realized that she was older than he’d guessed, possibly a couple of years into her thirties. Her eyes were a dark brown and looked curiously up at him.

“That’s a nice rifle and a quality handblaster at your belt. SIG-Sauer. The rest of you got weapons of that quality?” Dean had managed to stand and was staring intently at his father, waiting for a signal to dart for cover. The woman touched him with the braided tip of her quirt. “Don’t, lad. Don’t even think about it for Ah, I see the resemblance.”

She looked at Ryan. “Your son?”

“Yeah.”

“I see. I could have shot him, just by nodding my head. And you, too.”

“Then you’d be chilled in less than a heartbeat, and half your pretty sec men with you.” J.B. had shuffled silently a few yards to his right, still keeping in the dead ground behind the brow of the small hill.