James Axler – Road Wars

Baron Tenbos sipped at his soup, picked at some of the tender flesh of the fish and barely touched the main course. Twice he had a coughing fit, dabbing hurriedly at his mouth with a white napkin. Ryan noticed that it came away from the pale lips flecked with spots of scarlet.

“My apologies to all.”

“Should you go and lie down and rest, Father?” his oldest stepson asked.

Teddy whispered something in his brother’s ear at that, making him grin.

Tenbos sipped at a mug of water. “I shall be lying down soon enough.”

“Sooner the better, Father, dear,” Robby said in an extremely audible undertone.

THE MEAL ENDED early.

The brothers stood with an uncanny synchronicity and bowed stiffly to the baron, turned on their heels, one to the right and one to the left, and marched to the doors and out of the room, the sound of their boot heels ringing in unison along the corridor.

Tenbos threw his napkin to the floor and reached for his stick. “There are many days that I think deeply about following my slut wife into the long blackness.”

“Life’s better than no life,” Ryan said, finishing his last glass of beer.

“Shit it is!” Tenbos was on his feet, moving clumsily and slowly. “Don’t peddle your homespun bullshit at me, Cawdor. It insults me and demeans yourself. Life has become a grinding journey that I wish to leave. My doctor says that the road is measured in weeks now. And I’m glad of that.”

“Your collection of blasters?” J.B. said, seeking to change the subject. “Can we see them now, Baron?”

“No.” The baron closed his good eye wearily. “No, Dix, not tonight. First thing in the morning, if you are early risers. And I figure you are.”

The two friends watched him limp out, his one leg dragging behind him. “Shame,” J. B. commented. “Think we should do something about those sullen, silent little bastards?” Ryan pursed his lips. “Can’t say it didn’t cross my mind. What do you reckon?”

“Tenbos seems a nice guy. For a baron.”

“Sec men like him. Can’t say I got the vibes they like the boys.”

The Armorer nodded. “Agreed. So?”

“No.” Ryan stretched his shoulders, easing the blaster in its holster. “Tempting, but I think not.”

“Trader would’ve cleansed them, Ryan.”

“Sure. He’s not me and I’m not him. Can’t wipe up everyone’s spilled blood.”

THE HEAVY MEAL and the beer combined to make them ready for their beds at an unusually early hour.

Ryan slipped easily into sleep.

He woke just before dawn, watching the first light edging over the hills, seeping into their room, unaware that the next three hours would bring violent deaths.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Abe came around from the beating, unable at first to decide whether the vigilantes had blinded him.

He was in so much pain that he couldn’t even begin to decide what hurt most. Every inch of his body was throbbing and bruised, and his head felt like someone had levered open the skull and poured in boiling battery acid.

His tongue was swollen, his lips cracked and dry. Abe tried to lift a hand to touch what he guessed were some broken and missing teeth, but nothing happened. He got the same result when he tried to bend his legs to a less uncomfortable position.

Slowly his brain began to function again, remembering.

The rain was still pouring, but it had become full dark. Squinting through his puffy eyelids, Abe was just able to make out the sheen of the water on bare rock, feel it on his upturned face.

He remembered the chillings that had taken place, the man in the store and the posse pursuing him and Trader over the hills and down dark valleys. Then they had met by the cabin near the flooded river.

“Bullets had burst the fucking raft,” Abe muttered, hardly hearing himself. He swallowed hard and tasted the bitter iron of his own blood.

He felt cold, though it was impossible to try to work out which bits were numb with cold and which were numb from the savage beating.

The Trader had gone on ahead, clutching the battered Armalite, his long legs eating up the steep trail, vanishing while Abe was still laboring, chest bursting, two or three hundred yards behind him.