James Axler – Road Wars

“No need, Ellie. Both me and J.B. are spoken for. Your girls are safe.”

She laughed, tapping the whip against the side of her boots. “You give me a pocketful of jack for every spoken-for man who’s tried to get close to me or my girls, and I can retire for life.” Her cold smile vanished clean away. “And there’s men pushing up the daisies who thought a widow and three little girls would give them easy pickings.”

“We hear you,” J.B. said, stepping slowly out of the trees, keeping both the Smith amp; Wesson M-4000 and a careful eye on the lion.

“My, but you’re a pocket hurricane, aren’t you, J. B. Dix? That blaster fire flechettes?”

“Yeah.”

“Appreciate taking a look at it after we’ve all been properly introduced and wrapped ourselves around some meat. One thing about having Balthazar with you. Not many things on four legs can get away from him. Nor two legs, neither.”

THERE WERE THREE WAGS, one with an extra trailer. Blazoned across the sides, in ornamented gold and crimson lettering, were the words Satana’s Animal Show.

“Me,” Ellie said, pointing at the name. “If I called it Ellie’s Show I reckon it’d sound more like a ladies’ class in home cooking.”

Ryan was a good judge of people. In a world filled with strangers, any of whom might want to take your life, it was a useful skill. A vital skill. Meeting up with Ellie Kissoon’s three daughters, he realized that the woman hadn’t been joking. Not at all. He’d rarely encountered three more self-sufficient young ladies in the breadth and length of Deathlands.

Julie had the shoulders and upper arms of someone who worked with weights. She had a long-barreled nameless revolver strapped to her waist. Nell wore crossed leather belts across her chest, decorated with a dozen throwing knives, each with a colored silken tassel. Katie still carried the remnants of adolescent puppy fat, but the twin tomahawks with honed steel blades on either hip belied her chubby smile.

They all shook hands with Ryan and J.B., making them welcome to their camp.

There was the delicious smell of a rich stew, bubbling in an iron caldron over a well-built fire. Balthazar was led through into his cage that he shared with his mate, Rosa.

“We got us a Bengal tiger,” Ellie said. “Rajah. Handsome looking and he’ll roar up a storm when you give him the signal. Trouble is, he’s old and lost most of his back teeth. Getting blind as well.”

“What other animals?” J.B. asked. “I see a black bear in that cage there.”

“That’s Brutus. Him, and his brother, Cassius.”

Ryan didn’t let his hand move far from the butt of his SIG-Sauer. “Where in Deathlands did you get the lions and the tiger from?” he asked. “I’ve seen most creatures, norm and mutie, but never anything like them.”

Nell answered. “Then you never got to visit Loren Engel and his spread in the Cats. During skydark most of the zoos and places like that folded up. Animals got slaughtered for food. But not all. Loren’s grand-daddy went into the mountains with some good breeding animals. Place is still there.”

“Running down, though,” Katie said. “Inbred stock and they get weak. Rajah’s the last of the tigers.”

“How do you train them?” J.B. asked.

Ellie laughed, followed by her daughters. “Family joke, J.B., you understand. Way to train them is to start by being a mite cruel, then you can get more kindly. I tell the girls to work on the same system when they get them husbands.”

Julie opened her hand, then clenched it into a fist. “Ma says it’s the same method. Buckle a tight strap round their balls and chain them to a tree. Whip them eight times a day until they do what you say. Easy as that.”

Ryan shook his head. “And you told us not to do any harm to your daughters, Ellie! Sounds to me like the warning works the other way.”

BEFORE JOINING the four women for supper, Ryan and J.B. walked back to the LAV-25, checking that it was secure against any passing intruders.

“What do you reckon?” the Armorer asked.