James Axler – Demons of Eden

Demons of Eden

Demons of Eden

37 in the Deathlands series James Axler

Chapter One

Ryan Cawdor withdrew his head from the crest of the ridge and mouthed, “Trouble.”

Krysty Wroth slowly raised her head over the edge of the ridge, catching only a brief glimpse of a strange, wheeled vehicle outfitted with a white broadcloth sail before Ryan pushed her head down.

“Your hair might as well be a signal flare,” he whispered.

“Sorry, lover.”

Mildred Wyeth, J. B. Dix, Doc Tanner and Jak Lauren looked up at them tensely, holding the reins of their horses. They didn’t voice any questions. The companions were so in tune with one another’s moods from their time of traveling through Deathlands together that they instantly assessed from Krysty’s and Ryan’s body language that a triple-red situation was in progress.

Ryan tapped her shoulder. “Take a look if you have to, but keep your head down.”

Krysty cautiously poked her head up over the crest of the bluff. She stared at the scene below, barely able to suppress the utterance of horror rising to her lips.

The prairie schooneror “wind wagon” as they were sometimes calledmatched the configurations of a longboat. It was about twelve feet long from bow to stem, and a tall mast with a furled sail was set amidships, stretching upward twenty feet. A pair of maneuvering sails was folded like wings against the sides of the craft. Four spoked wooden wheels lifted the keel several feet above the ground. Mounted astern was a huge, wire-encased, four-bladed fan and a diesel engine.

Flapping from the rigging attached to the mast were clumps of human hair, finger bones and shriveled ears. A black pennant fluttered from the masthead, bearing the outline of a scarlet skull. Pirates.

Krysty recognized that emblem, if not from sight, then from tales she had heard in small western outposts, including her Colorado ville of Harmony. It was the insignia of the Red Cadre, a loosely knit group of scalphunters and marauders who preyed primarily on the Indian tribes in Montana, the Dakotas and Wyoming.

According to rumor, the Red Cadre set forth on its raids of pillage and murder in a fleet of wind wagons. The leader of the Cadre called himself Hatchet Jack, and as far as she knew, he could be one of the four freebooters below.

As if picking up on her thoughts, Ryan whispered, “Don’t think Hatchet Jack is with them, but he’ll be close by. This little raiding party wouldn’t wander far from the fleet, not in that small craft.”

The schooner stood in the center of a small cup formed by three sloping bluffs and a dry creek bed. To the left was a grove of poplar trees running raggedly between the farthermost hills. Three ponies were hobbled nearby, grazing on the tough saw grass. Two of the animals bore saddles made of wood and blankets. The third was apparently a packhorse.

A dark mound, like a huge, humped cigar, lay at the rear of the schooner. It was a buffalo carcass, waiting to be skinned. Its wooly hide was still intact, which was more than could be said for the Cheyenne man tied spread-eagled to the wooden spokes of the schooner’s rear wheel.

Krysty had heard stories of “peeling,” a torture certain marauder bands reserved exclusively for Indians. The pirates had practiced the ritual with great enthusiasm on the man. Entire strips of flesh had been flayed from his torso and upper arms. Great red, raw patches were exposed to flies and the late-afternoon sunlight.

Though she felt acidic bile climbing up her throat in a burning column, Krysty studied the victim for any sign of movement. She saw none. His swarthy face was a livid mask of dried blood that had flowed from the crimson patch atop his skull where his scalp had been torn away.

She squeezed her eyes shut as the bluff beneath her seemed to spin like a cork caught in a whirlpool. She had seen many monstrous deeds during her life in Deathlands, and had narrowly escaped similar fates more than once. Still, she had never grown accustomed to the horrors people inflicted on others simply for the sake of seeing them suffer.