“This is going to hurt,” John said.
“Do it,” the Marine gasped, gray-faced.
One of the others put a rifle sling between his teeth. John gripped firmly, put his weight on the hand that held the man’s wrist to the ground, and pulled. The Marine convulsed, arching, his teeth sinking into the tough leather.
The finger-thick dagger of oak slid free. John held it up; no ragged edges, so there probably wasn’t much left in the wound—hopefully not too much dirty cloth, either, since there was no time to debride it.
“Let it bleed for a second,” he said. “It’ll wash it clean.”
There was medicinal alcohol and iodine powder in the kit. John waited, then swabbed the wound clear with cotton wool and poured in both. This time the Marine simply swore, and John grinned.
“You must be recovering.” He packed the wound, bandaged it, and rigged a sling. “Try not to put too much strain on this, trooper.”
“Yessir. Ah . . . what the hell do we do now, sir?”
They all looked at him, battered, bruised, a few bleeding from superficial cuts, but all functional. He looked down the street; there was a breastwork of stones four feet high in front of them, and more behind, but the road downslope looked fairly clear. Smoke was mounting up rapidly, though; the fires were out of control; the waterworks were probably hit and the mains out of operation. It lay thick on the air, thick between him and Pia.
“First we’ll get this road cleared,” he said briskly, spitting again. “Goms”—who looked worst injured—”there’s some water in the boot of the car, see to it. Smith, check the car and see what it needs. Wilton, Sinders, Barrjen, Maken, you come with me.”
He studied the way the rocks interlocked in the barrier ahead of them. “We’ll shift this one first.”
“Sir? Prybar?” corporal Wilton said. The crusted block probably weighed twice what John did, and he was the heaviest man there.
“No time. Barrjen, you on the other side, there’s room for two.”
Barrjen was three inches shorter than John, but just as broad across the shoulders, and thick through the belly and hips as well; his arms were massive, and the backs of his hands covered in reddish hair. He grinned, showing broad square teeth.
“If’n you say so, sor,” he said, and bent his knees, working his fingers under the edges of the block.
John did likewise and took a deep, careful breath. “Now.”
He lifted, taking the strain on back and legs, exhaling with the effort until red lights swam before his eyes and something in his gut was just on the edge of tearing. His coat did tear across the back, the tough seam parting with a long ripping sound. The stone resisted, and then he felt it shift. Shift again, his feet straining to keep their balance in the loose rubble, and then it was tumbling away down the other side like a dice from the box of a god, hammering into the pavement and falling into the gutter with a final tock sound.
Barrjen staggered backward, still grinning as he panted. “You diplomats is tougher’n you looks, sor,” he said, in a thick eastern accent.
John spat on his hands. Center traced a glowing network of stress lines across the rockfall, showing the path of least resistance for clearing it.
“Let’s get to work.”
* * *
“I want to go home,” Lola said—whimpered, really.
Pia fought an urge to slap her. The other woman’s eyes were still round with shock; understandable, and she was less than twenty, but . . .
“Up here.”
The staircase was empty; it filled the interior of the square tower, with a switchback every story and narrow windows in the cream-colored limestone. Smoke was drifting through them, enough to haze the air a little. The light poured in, scattering on the dust and smoke, incongruously beautiful shafts of gold bringing out the highlights and fossil shells in the stone. Pia labored upward, feeling the sweat running down her face and soaking the nurse’s headdress she wore, thanking God that skirts had gone so high this year—barely ankle-length.