“Also remains to be seen whether he can hold us.” J.B. glanced back at Phillips. “Or if he can chill us.”
“I like the way you talk,” the old man said. “Let’s freshen up that coffee sub and hear some more.”
“THOSE ARE plague darts.” Jak held three of the darts in his hand. Instead of feathers along the back of the shaft, vinyl triangles in red and yellow were designed to act as stabilizers. “What plague?”
Their captive licked his lips nervously. He was strapped to a tree in a sitting position, held in place by leather thongs Jak had found among one of the saddle kits. “Kirkland’s plague.”
Jak squatted on his haunches in front of the man. He flicked one of the leaf-bladed throwing knives across the fingers of his other hand with unconscious grace. He sat deliberately so the moonlight would glint off the razor-sharp edges. “He name it?”
“Yeah.” The man nodded enthusiastically, but the albino noted the glance the man flicked at the cut on the back of his knuckles.
“That all he did?”
“Yeah.”
Jak glanced at Dean. The boy looked impassive standing only a few feet away. Dean held one of the captured single-action long blasters in his hand, keeping watch over them. With an economy of motion, Jak stabbed the throwing knife into the man’s thigh. When the prisoner opened his mouth to scream in pain, the albino yanked the knife from the man’s leg and slashed his lips, cutting in a quarter inch at both corners of his mouth.
Blood gushed out with the man’s garbled screams. He coughed and choked as he breathed in and sucked blood into his lungs. Terror shone in the wild whites of his rolling eyes. He struggled against the leather thongs, then broke into choking gasps and tears when he couldn’t get loose.
“You bastard nuke-shitters!” he screamed, his voice echoing out over the forest.
With a flick of quick movement, Jak moved the knife again, burying the point in the end of the man’s nose. The captive stopped screaming, but bloody spittle flew from his mouth as he breathed like a bellows pump. The albino ignored the blood.
“Scream again,” Jak warned, “take both ears off. Understand?”
Keeping his head still, going almost cross-eyed while staring at the knife and trying to keep his tormentor in view, the man said, “Yes.”
“Good.” Jak withdrew the knife. “Kirkland’s plague. Tell me.”
The man took a long, shuddering breath, then let it out. “Kirkland made it. Come up with it somehow, from some predark book he found or mebbe just thought of it on his own. Nobody knows.”
“A plague spreads,” Dean said. “Man’s got to be rad stupe to go fooling around with something like that.”
“Not this plague. Only kills the person gets it shot into them.”
“Then it’s not a plague,” Dean argued.
The prisoner wiped one corner of his slashed mouth on his shoulder. “Only know what I was told. Kirkland and Liberty call it a plague, they tell me to call it a plague, I fucking well call it a plague.”
Jak thought about what the man was saying. He didn’t have all the words or the book learning that Dean did, but he could guess at some things himself. “Why plague?”
“To keep the ville in line. There’s a lot of people don’t like the way Kirkland runs things. They want to leave the ville, start over again somewhere else. They figure Kirkland can have this one. But he doesn’t figure Hazard is worth having without having people to control.”
“The people in the ville don’t know?” Dean asked.
“No. He always has Liberty schedule a group to keep watch out here. Anyone tries to get away, we take them down. Kirkland’s also got people inside the ville who inform on who’s thinking about slipping away.”
“Kirkland controls Liberty?” Jak asked. “Sure,” the captive said. “Did, anyway. Until you hardcases came along and killed him.”
“Does Kirkland know that?” Dean asked.
“Fucking right, he does. Knew that when you got to the ville. Nobody arrives in Hazard without Liberty sending someone along to say it’s okay.”
Jak glanced at Dean, wondering if the dwarf had deliberately set them up. “Albert know that?”