James Axler – Road Wars

They had weirdly elongated skulls, tapering almost to points, and their eyes were stretched to slits. Neither of them showed any sign of emotion.

Abe tripped and nearly fell, recovering to follow the rapidly disappearing Trader.

Behind them, the dogs were howling like banshees.

THE NEXT COUPLE of hours were a blur of exhaustion for Abe.

As they reached the top of the trail, it opened onto a broad plateau. The ruins of a stone-built church dominated the space, surrounded by dark trees. A herd of twenty or thirty wild ponies were driven close to panic by the sudden appearance of the two panting humans. They rushed clattering past Trader and Abe, heading for the beginning of the path down.

“Give the bastards something to think about when they fetch up with them horses on a narrow twist.” Trader laughed, dropping to his knees to recover his breathing.

They heard the noises of the meeting of horses and posse. The baying of the hounds changed its note, sliding up the scale to a frightened howling. Men shouted in alarm, horses whinnied, and someone fired a couple of shots.

After that, the sounds of the lynch mob’s pursuit seemed less pressing.

Trader picked his way around the far edge of the plateau, until be discovered an almost invisible trail among the bracken that took them steeply down the northern flank of the bluff.

It was slippery and dangerous, with the roaring of water from somewhere below them, among the trees.

“Fuckers won’t find it easy following us with their dogs.” Trader was leaning against the tilted trunk of an aspen, waiting for Abe to catch up.

“Think there’s a falls down there?” Abe asked. His breathing was painful, rasping and burning in his chest. His eyes kept watering and his mouth was dry. He had always been unlucky with wounds, and several of them were reminding him of their existence. Particularly his damaged knees and lower back and right shoulder. One of the bottles of pulque had broken when he fell against a tree, and his coat and pants stank of the fiery home brew.

“Sure to be. Once we cross that they’ll lose the trail and give up on us. Must admit, Abe, that I’m surprised they keep on after us. You swore they wouldn’t bother.”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Sure did, Ryan. I mean, Abe.”

“If you say so, Trader.”

While they recovered, ears straining for the pursuers, they divided up the stolen food, saving some of it for later. Between them they managed to get through two-thirds of the remaining bottle of pulque.

“FOLLOW IT until we can find a way over.” Trader eased the Armalite across his back. “Going faster than goose shit off a greased shovel.”

The river was in full spate. A dozen yards wide, it was crashing over tumbled rocks, foaming and frothing, drowning out any other sounds.

It made Abe nervous, knowing that the hunters could be within ten feet and they’d never hear them.

Trader led the way, following it upstream, knowing from experience that pursuers would automatically assume that they’d gone the other, easier way.

“There.” He pointed to a place where the jagged tips of two huge boulders were just breaking the surface of the racing, peat-colored river.

“I’d never make it,” Abe said, feeling dizzy from a dangerous combination of fatigue and the effects of the potent alcohol.

“Course you can.”

“Can’t, Trader.”

The older man turned to look at him, his eyes suddenly cold and dead, sending a chill of fear through Abe. He knew that expression from the old times.

“I say you can do it, Abe.” His voice was like ice, velvet and steel.

“Then I guess I can.”

His reward was a broad smile and a pat on the back so hard it nearly knocked Abe over.

And, as it turned out, Trader was right. Apart from a slip in midstream that soaked him to the skin, Abe made it across, blowing freezing water out of his mustache.

Trader followed him, hopping from stone to stone with the agility of a man a third his age.

“There,” he said, grinning. “Keep moving and you’ll soon dry out.”