“Dead? Ryan and the others? All the prisoners dead?”
He smiled with a surpassing gentleness, frightening Rachel more than any rage might. “No, my pearl of the Orient. I think they all live. It is us who are chilled. Chilled forever more, nevermore.”
She shook her head, feeling a band of icy steel tight-ening around her temples. “If Ryan and the others live, then who is dead? And where are… ?”
Harvey nodded to her, still smiling. “He is clever, my little brother. Led us on and in and then… Boom!” He clapped his chubby hands together. “Boom. They all died at once. It was wonderful. Fire and noise, and they were gone. More witchery, like Jabez.”
“All dead!” she screamed, voice like a saw cutting across sheet glass. “Then we are lost? Everyone’s gone off
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and left us to die! It’s your fucking brother. Why didn’t you give him to me to kill? You fool…”
Her hand went to the dagger at her belt, wanting noth-ing more than to slit the flabby throat of her husband and then run and run.
From the basement, they could both hear the hideous cacophony of the wild boars, upset by the scent of death that filled the Shens.
“At least the old man and the yellowhead still live,” she screeched. “I can butcher them. Then we must go.”
“Go? Where? Here’s home. I’m home now, my sweet child. Ally, ally oxen free. Home and safe. I shall soon… The yellowhead girl? I had forgot her. Before I… I shall go and…”
The knife was out, flashing through the air. With a de-ceptive speed, Harvey batted it away from his neck. Bunching his ringed fist, he smashed it into his wife’s face with a casual ferocity that sent her spilling to the stone flags, blood seeping from her mouth, a livid bruise springing to her cheek.
“The yellowhead,” he said, turning away from his un-conscious wife as though he’d already forgotten her.
Doc tanner slept contentedly on the bunk, lying flat on his back, hands folded on his chest like a crusader resting in a cathedral vault. The explosion had hardly ruffled him. Lori had called out to ask him what it had been, and he had mumbled some reassurance before slid-ing again into a dreamless sleep.
Lori was also lying on her bunk, wishing that she was in bed with Doc, wanting him to cuddle her and do the nice, gentle things that made her feel all squirmy inside.
“Wop bop a loobop, a wop bam boom,” she hummed to herself, repeating the nonsense verse over and over, like
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a mantra, lulling herself with it. The girl wondered how long it would be before they were released. It was getting really boring in the little stone room with the barred win-dow. She stood up and looked out, seeing that the after-noon was wearing on. “Wop bop…”
She turned at the sound of the cell door grating open.
“Hi, there, yellowhead. Having a nice day?” Baron Harvey Cawdor asked.
“looks deserted,” J.B. said, squinting through the screen of trees at the ocher walls of the ville. There was nobody in sight, not a single guard on the ramparts or on the drawbridge.
“Trap?” Jak suggested.
Ryan turned to Krysty, raising an eyebrow in a silent question. She shook her head. “I can hear those bastard pigs he breeds. Nothing else. Feels empty to me, lover.”
“Me, too,” he agreed. “Nathan? You ever know it with no sec men showing?”
“No. Never. Baron doesn’t sleep well o’nights. Fears death. If he came back here, he’d have the bridge up and blasters everywhere. I think…” He stopped, hesitating.
“What, Nate?” Ryan asked.
“If’n I didn’t know better, I’d figure they’ve all done a runner on him. Heard of the massacre and fucked off. That’s my guess.”
“One way to find out,” Ryan said. “I can’t figure it for a trap. No reason. Let’s go see.”
Doc tanner clung to the bars, terrified that he might faint. His brain creaked with the effort of trying to do something. He knew the man was hopelessly mad, but he had to find the words that might save Lori.