Kane sheltered his face from flying fragments, squeezing his eyes half-shut against the stinging particles of pulverized rock. A couple of stone splinters nicked his hands, and an egg-sized chunk of granite fetched him a painful smack on his left hip. He crouched there as the earth heaved and trembled around him.
The shuddering crash of tumbling, rolling rock slowly faded as the avalanche bled itself out. Settling stone continued to click and grate. Lowering his arms, peering through the thick pall of dust, he saw a vast, high heap of broken earth, shale and titanic boulders completely filling the gorge. He stood ankle deep in loose dirt and pebbles. Yet only a trickle of the rock-slide had reached his ledge.
Unless the Magistratesor the Cerberus personnel, for that matterwanted to undertake a major excavation project, there was absolutely no chance of getting through the pass even with the most advanced ATVs.
Of the Roamers, he saw no sign, except for a few blood-and-grit-encrusted arms and legs protruding from the litter of the avalanche. Perspiration trickled into his eyes, burning them until he blinked it out.
“Kane!”
Brigid’s voice had an odd, stereophonic quality to it, emanating from both his trans-comm and faintly, somewhere on the other side of the dust cloud.
“I’m all right,” he said into the trans-comm clipped to his shirt, squinting through the shifting planes of gray powder.
“What happened?”
He coughed, fanning the air in front of his face. His tongue was coated with dust. “Looks like we chilled two birds with about a million stones. Settled the Roamer problem and blocked the pass at the same time.”
“Do you need us?”
“Negative. Stay where you are. AH this shit is still settling. I’ll make my way to you. Stand by.”
He moved cautiously out into the rubble. His visibility was limited, and the sun was veiled by the clouds of swirling dust. The welter of chipped stone clattered loudly under his bootsso loudly he didn’t hear the crunch of feet on gravel until it was too late to evade the attack.
Le Loup Garou landed a blow on Kane’s left shoulder with the butt of his tap-pistol. Pain exploded up and down his arm, into the base of his neck. He heard the splintering of the trans-comm’s plastic casing as he fell onto sharp-edged rocks. Training and experience turned his fall into a roll so that a clubbing hammer-blow missed his skull by mere inches.
Kane came to his feet, skidding on the pebbles and soft dirt beneath him. Not truly aiming at the shadowy figure in the dusty gloom, he pressed the trigger of the Sin Eater. It refused to move, frozen in place by tiny particles of grit
Le Loup Garou hurled his pistol at Kane, but it passed well above his head, spinning end over end. He crossed his arms at his waist, then spread them out in a flourish, a knife gripped in either fist. One was a slender stiletto barely five inches long, the other a wickedly curved, foot-long kukri with a spiked knuckle-duster hand guard.
Kane pushed the pistol back into its holster and took a long backward step as Le Loup Garou took a long forward one. The Roamer chiefs clothes hung in tatters, revealing shallow lacerations on his hairy torso. His hair was plastered with sweat, and he breathed deep through expanded nostrils. Purple veins stood out on his temples like bas-relief carvings. Froth flecked his lips, the ends of his drooping mustache. Coated from head to foot in a shroud of dust, like some gray phantom of vengeance, he said nothing.
Le Loup Garou slashed the kukri in a whistling stroke that threatened Kane’s groin. As he leaned away from the mirror-bright blade, the stiletto flashed in and opened a rent in his shirt and the flesh beneath. Only his reflexes kept the knife from plunging between his ribs.
Kane backpedaled carefully, the Roamer chief following, swinging and stabbing. Both men’s movements were slowed by the uncertain footing. A stone turned beneath Le Loup Garou’s boot, and he stumbled. As he regained his balance, Kane’s right hand shot down and closed around the nylex handle of the combat knife in its boot scabbard. His fingers touched the positive-release push button.