Way of the Wolf

Chapter Ten

Central Wisconsin, September of the forty-third year of the Kurian Order: North of the road and rail arc connecting Milwaukee with the Twin Cities, Wisconsin under the Kurians has lain fallow. Dense forests of pine and oak shelter deer, moose, and feral pigs. Four-legged wolves prey on both, and occasionally have to give up their kills to prowling bears and wolverines. A few logging camps dot the area around Oshkosh and Green Bay, taking oak and cedar for use in the south. Menominee trappers and hunters also traverse the woods and lakes, traveling down the Wisconsin River to the Dells Country to trade pelts.
The Kurian Order begins at the traveled belt linking Milwaukee, Madison, Eau Claire, and St. Paul, Minnesota. Rich corn and dairy farms still fill the southern half of the state. Three Kurian Lords, known as the Madison Triumvirate, control the farms, mines, and lines of communication from the outskirts of Milwaukee to LaCrosse. Within the gloom of their dominant hilltop dome in the old WisconsinState Capitol building, they command Reapers from Fond du Lac to Platte-ville, Eau Claire to Beloit.
The humans under the teeth of the Kurians endure the New Order, living in the gray area between doing the minimum required for survival and full Quislinghood. Their family farms are self-controlled, very different from the brutal plantations of the south or the mechanized collectives of Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma. But recently, a new shadow has fallen over the region. Rumors spread by milk-truck drivers and road crews tell of a new Kurian Lord turning the picturesque village of New Glarus into a hilltop fortress. To the fearful smallholders and townspeople of the area, this means thirteen more thirsty Reapers taking their human toll by night.
They camped on some hills above the Wisconsin River near Spring Green. The Wolves could see miles of river valley in either direction. A few electrified farms burned porch lights, but the prominence Valentine guessed to be Tower Hill seemed shunned by the residents, for no active farm lay at its feet, or indeed within miles.
They camped a little below the hill, in the ruins of what was apparently an outdoor stage in the middle of nowhere. Valentine had explored the warped and overgrown little wooden theater nestled in a kettle in the hillside. It reminded him of a fancy version of the simple outdoor platform at one end of the public tent in the Boundary Waters, where Bobby Royce had received a prize shotgun what felt like several lifetimes ago.
He paced the footboards in thought. Were the people in the Freeholds the ones who were crazy? All the loss, all the suffering caused by the never-ending battles. A life, of sorts, was possible under the Kurians. Perhaps they should weather the storm, turn it to their advantage by bargaining for some measure of independence, rather than fighting for it. He marveled at the adaptability of his race: the Lakes Flotilla, for example. They worked at the edges of the Kurian Order, sowing seeds of destruction while turning a profit. Then there was Steiner and his enclave, trying to build something new rather than keep alive the old. Or the determination of the outnumbered and outgunned Southern Command, standing in their hilly fastness and daring the Kurians to try to enter even as they carried the fight to the Lost Lands. Even the little clusters of hidden civilizations like the Boundary Waters contributed to the fight by simply surviving.
A tingle interrupted his ruminations upon the stage. With the frozen terror of a rabbit under an eagle's shadow, he sensed a Reaper. He stepped off the stage and padded downhill to the little cluster of cabins below. The Reaper seemed to be moving up Tower Hill, bringing silence to the nighted woods. Even the crickets ceased their chirping.
Valentine entered the Wolves' overnight home. It was a two-room house with small windows that made the absence of glass less of an inconvenience. The Wolves had stabled the horses in the larger room. He placed the fingers of one hand to his lips while making the pinkie-and-forefinger hand signal to his comrades that meant Reaper. Gonzalez and Harper unsheathed their rifles and checked their parangs.
All three concentrated on lowering lifesign, sitting back to back in a little cross-legged circle. The horses would give off no more lifesign than a group of deer; there was enough wildlife in the woods to confuse it even if it passed close, as long as they were able to mask their minds properly. As he quieted his mind and centered his breathing, Valentine found he could feel the Reaper atop the hill to the west. Minutes passed, then an hour, and the Reaper moved off to the west as clammy sweat trickled down Valentine's back.
"That was a little too close," Valentine said to his fellow Wolves. "Anyone want to move camp, just in case it circles around the hill?"
"Fine idea," Harper agreed. "I could walk all night anyway after that."
They decided to move south, treating the Reaper as a tornado that you can best dodge by moving at right angles to its path. As Harper readied the horses and Gonzalez hid evidence of their camp, Valentine cautiously walked up Tower Hill, rifle at the ready. He read the trail left by heavy bootprints. The Reaper had paused for an hour on the overlook. Valentine wondered why. After a word to Harper, he found an unobstructed knoll above the stage and scanned what parts of the horizon he could.
Two or three miles to the southeast, flame lit the clouded night. A pair of buildings seemed to be ablaze behind a screen of trees; he could make out a small grain silo lit by the red-yellow glow. Perhaps the Hood had a better view from the western crown of Tower Hill, but it was unlike a Reaper to just stand and watch a fire for the drama of it. And the blaze seemed unnaturally bright. Valentine wished the winds were favorable enough for him to smell the smoke.
He rejoined Gonzalez and Harper.
"There's a good-size fire," Valentine explained. "I think a barn or a house is going up. You want to check it out? It's on this side of the river, so we can get to it easy."
"Do we want to be there?" Harper asked. "If it's someone's house, neighbors will be coming from all over. It would be just like a Hood to pick someone off in the confusion."
"I thought we were headed south," Gonzalez said.
"Yes, eventually. But I think this Reaper watched what was going on there for a while, for whatever reason. It's not like them to just look at something for the sake of the view. I think it's worth checking out."
Harper shrugged. "It's your party. I don't mind watching a building burn. But I don't like the idea of making a decision 'cause of a prediction about a Reaper's behavior. Sounds like a good way to end up drained."
"It'll be okay, as long as the lieutenant's radar is working," Gonzalez suggested.
"Hope so," Harper said. "Let's get there before the patrols wake up."
They moved through the night, leading their horses. Gonzalez walked out ahead, picking the path, followed by Valentine and Harper, each taking two horses.
As they drew close to the fire, Valentine decided the burning buildings were just another abandoned farm in a region where two out of three homesteads were empty. New forests stood in fields that had once belonged to cows.
The Wolves tied up the horses near a shallow seasonal streambed, and the horses drank from runoff puddles scattered among the rocks. They could see the flames flickering through the thin-skinned trunks of scrub beech and young oaks. They crept up to within fifty feet of the dying fire. What was left of four buildings, one obviously a barn, had already collapsed into burning debris. Without the daily rains of the past week, the conflagration would have turned into a forest fire.
Harper spat cotton. "Okay, Lieutenant, here's your fire. What now?"
"No family, no neighbors," Valentine observed. "Must have been empty. These fields sure don't look used. I haven't seen anything but a few old fence posts around with the wire stripped off. So why's it burning?"
"Maybe a patrol came through, livened up a quiet night with a little arson," Harper mused. "That east-west road we crossed yesterday by the river's got to be up there somewhere."
"Could be," Valentine agreed. "If so, they used a lot of starter. You can smell it from here, kind of like gasoline."
Gonzalez and Harper sniffed. "Reminds me a little of napalm," Harper said. "The Grogs used it at Cedar Creek. They had an old fire truck filled with it. Doused some of the buildings our guys were holed up in and then lit it."
"I'd like to take another look around in daylight," Valentine said. "We can wait a few more hours before moving on. Let's get the horses and find a safe spot to sleep."
Valentine could tell from Harper's expression that he thought getting some rest was the first sensible plan out of his superior's mouth all evening.
Daylight inspection of the ruins told the end of the story but not the beginning. While Gonzalez squatted in cover along the road, ready to run like a jackrabbit back to the fire scene at the first sign of a patrol, only a livestock-laden tractor-trailer passed along the old highway, crawling east at a safe fifteen miles an hour along the potholed road.
"This makes no sense," Valentine said to a disinterested Harper. "We've got four burning buildings, or three buildings and a shed, I guess. But what are those other three burned spots?"
Valentine indicated the blackened brush, circles of fire twelve to thirty feet in diameter, scattered around the buildings on what had once been lawn and garden.
"Weird thing number two. Look how the house is wrecked. The frame's been scattered all to hell, but only westward. Like a bunch of dynamite was set off on the east side of it."
Harper shrugged. "Maybe the Quislings were training with demolitions or something."
"Then where's the crater? And the foundation is in good shape; those cinder blocks would be gone if someone put a charge there. And look at those two saplings. They're both broken off three feet up, but the tops are lying toward the house. An explosion wouldn't do that. Weird thing number three. That hole dug in the ground by the barn."
The men walked over to the ruins of the old barn, next to the blackened column of the still-standing silo. A triangular furrow, three feet long and almost two feet deep, was gouged into the ground; a dug-up divot of earth and grass lay nine feet away, in the direction of the barn. "What did this?" asked Valentine. "The patrols brought out a backhoe? This was dug out in one clean scoop."
"You got me, Sherlock," Harper said with a shrug.
"And finally, there's no tracks. Unless that's why they burned out those patches of the scrub-to cover their tracks, or the marks of the weapons that did this."
Valentine kneeled and sniffed at the charred wood. It still retained a faint petroleum or medicinal smell, like camphor.
"Somebody's coming," Harper called, moving swiftly behind the silo, rifle already at his shoulder. Valentine threw himself to the ground, hearing footsteps from the forest. The person was not making any effort to keep quiet, whoever it was.
A middle-aged man in faded blue pants and a striped mattress-ticking shirt emerged from the forest. He surveyed the wreckage, not looking particularly surprised. He removed his baseball cap and wiped his face and neck with a yellow handkerchief. What was left of his hair, balding front and back, was a uniform gray.
"Whoever you are," the man called, "you're sure up early. Come out and show yourselves. I ain't armed."
Valentine hand-signaled Harper to stay concealed. Gonzalez had vanished, perhaps into the overgrown drainage ditch next to the road. He stood up, half fearing a sniper's bullet.
"Good morning to you, too," Valentine responded. "I'm just passing through."
"You mean 'we're passing through," stranger," the unknown rustic chided. "I saw your buddy behind the silo. Since you're not from around here, I'll ask your name, son."
"David, sir. I'm down from Minnesota. Visiting friends, you might say."
The man smiled. "If that's the case, I'd keep that repeating rifle hid. I don't know how it is in Minnesota, but around here the vampires'll kill you for carrying a gun. Among other things."
"Thanks for the tip. We're trying to pass through without attracting attention. Do you live around here, sir?"
"All my life. My name's Gustafsen. I'm a widower now, and my kids are gone. I farm a little place up the road. Saw the sky lit up and figured it was the old Bauer farm. Don't have much business of my own to mind, so you might say I mind other people's, just to have something to do."
That could be good or bad for us, Valentine thought. "Did anyone live here?"
"No, not since they took over. The Bauers all died of the Raving Madness. No one's wanted to live here since: it's five miles from nowhere."
"I wonder what started the fire? There's been a lot of rain, but no lightning."
Gustafsen chuckled. "I wonder myself. I hear from some of the teamsters, there's been a few mysterious fires this summer. Started right around the time the new Big Boss showed up in Glarus. And things have gone from bad to worse for a lot of folks around here since then. There's been disappearances in almost every town, and I'm sure you know what that means."
"I'm surprised you ask questions, Mr. Gustafsen. Most places that's frowned upon."
"My curiosity is all I've got left, David." Gustafsen thrust his hands in his pockets, speaking to Valentine while standing side by side with him as was the custom in that part of the country. They looked over the wrecked barn and house. "I've lived a full life, considering the circumstances. After my Annie got took, I quit looking for anything else from this life, and I'm settin' my heart on the next."
Valentine liked the man on instinct. He thought for a moment about asking the man to come south with them. They had a spare horse, after all, and the Free Territory could always use another farmer or rancher.
Gustafsen said, "I didn't get much formal education. They don't like schools. But I'm smart enough to know that men in deerskins carrying guns and staying out of sight of the roads means trouble for them. So if you boys want to come to my place, I'll share what I got with you. Maybe you need to spend a couple nights in a bed. I've got some spares. I'd appreciate the company."
"We appreciate the offer, Mr. Gustafsen. Really. But we've got to move on east," Valentine lied, just in case. "If you could spare a bag of oats for the horses, we'd be in your debt, sir. I'd really like information about these fires, though. You seem to have your ear to the ground."
"It beats me as much as it does you, son. One old man saw some kind of airship over a fire. I don't know exactly where or when; it's a fourth-hand story. Like the old blimps you see in pictures. He said it moved around with sails. And I got a theory about where it's coming from: somewhere around Blue Mounds. They say it's death to go within five miles of there now. Whatever's happening, they got a lot of troops. The Commissary Patrols are culling stock all over this part of the state, taking good dairy stock and hogs, mostly. It's going to be a hard winter."
"Sounds like. You say this new Big Boss is in Glarus?"
"It's New Glarus on a map," Gustafsen corrected.
"We'd better avoid it," Valentine said, lying again. He had to account for the chance that Gustafsen might be going for a brass ring.
"Smart of you, son."
Two hours later, Valentine rode up to the other two Wolves, two bags of oats for the horses across the Morgan's broad back.
"It went well there?" Gonzalez asked.
"Sure. He gave me the feed, and I looked around his place. He seems a nice enough man. I didn't want him to get a look at either of you, just in case."
"Are we going to move on now?" Harper asked.
"Sort of. It seems like the Reapers have something big going on around Blue Mounds. It's about ten miles southeast of here. Good hilly country, plenty of cover. I want to ride over there and see if we can't get a look at what they're up to."
Harper nodded. "Not too much of a detour, then. Gotta ask you straight, though, Lieutenant, begging your pardon. Do you have something against getting back to the Ozarks? Got a woman in the family way, and you want to stay out of the Territory for a while or something? We could be halfway to the Mississippi by now. We're couriers, not Cats."
"If I knew a Cat in the area, I'd ask her to do it for us. But something that flies and drops firebombs is something Command will want to know about. Especially since whatever this is doesn't make noise. You've seen the little prop jobs the Kurians use on us now and then. They're loud. We'd have heard it. And they can fly at night. Never heard of a plane or a helicopter doing that nowadays."
"Maybe they're trying to train Harpies to fly in teams or carry bombs together," Gonzalez thought out loud.
"Could be. Could be just about anything, Gonzo. The Kurians like dreaming up nasty surprises. But Southern Command is going to want facts. We're all this way anyway. When we get back, we might as well know what we're talking about."
"So what's next on the Lieutenant Valentine tour of southwestern Wisconsin?" Harper chuckled.
Valentine consulted his map and compass. "A short ride thataway. How's your nose this morning, Gonzalez?"
"Wishing it was smelling the masala in one of Patel's pepperpots right about now, sir. But it's working well enough."
"I hope so. We're going to need it."
You have to hand it to the Kurians, Valentine thought at midday, when they struck the line of fence posts. They know how to send a message with easy-to-understand symbols.
The Wolves sat their horses before the line of rust-colored pig iron posts. Atop each post, at ten-yard distances, a bleached human skull grinned at them. The warning line extended into the woods to either side of them, each skull facing outward in wordless warning to trespassers.
"Jesuchristo," Gonzalez whispered.
Grimly, Valentine performed some mental arithmetic. Gustafsen had said it was death to come within five miles of Blue Mounds. Thirty-odd miles of perimeter. That worked out to something like five thousand skulls. The one immediately in front of them was a child's.
Valentine dismounted, drawing his rifle from its leather sheath. "I'm going to have a look around. Sergeant Harper, I want you to stay with the animals. If you hear any shooting, try to break a record going west. Gonzalez, this is a one-man job, but I'd like to have your ears and nose along, so I'll leave it up to you."
Gonzalez removed his broad-brimmed hat and scratched the back of his neck. "Lieutenant, after I was invoked, I learned the Way from an old Wolf named Washington. Washington used to tell me, "Victor, only idiots and heroes volunteer, and you're no hero." But if I stay behind, it'll mean these skulls worked. I don't like to see anything the Reapers do work." He slid off his horse and began filling his pockets with .30-06 rifle shells from a box in his saddlebag.
"Lieutenant," Harper said, "watch your step now. I can see lot of tracks just behind this picket line of theirs. I'm going to take the horses down to that ravine we crossed and wait for you. Be careful; I'm going to make cold coffee for three, and I don't want any wasted."
"Thanks, Harper. No heroics, now. You hear anything, you just leave. I haven't looked at what's in those mail bags, but it's probably more important than we are."
Valentine and Gonzalez moved slowly through the heaviest woods they could find, zigzagging toward three hilltops they could occasionally glimpse through the trees. They moved in a twenty-yard game of leapfrog: first one would advance through the woods to cover; he would squat, and the other would move up past the first. They used their noses, and when Gonzalez picked up the scent of cattle, Valentine had them alter course to catch up.
It was a warm, partly cloudy day. Occasional peeks at the sun through the cumulus lightened their mood; it would inhibit any Reapers around. The cotton-fluff clouds were beginning to cluster and darken at their flat bases; more rain might be on the way. They found the cows, a herd of black-and-white Holsteins escaping the heat under a stand of trees bordering an open meadow.
"That's what we want," Valentine said. "I don't see a herdsman. Maybe they round them up at night."
"That's what we want?" Gonzalez whispered back. "What, you want cream for your coffee?"
"No. Let's get to the herd. Keep down in the brush."
They reached the cows, who gazed at the Wolves indifferently. The tail-swishing mass stood and lay in the shade, jaws working sideways in a steady cud-chewing rhythm. About a thousand flies per cow buzzed aimlessly back and forth.
"We need a little camouflage. The smelly kind," Valentine said, stepping into a fresh, fly-covered pile of manure. His moccasin almost disappeared into the brown mass. Gonzalez followed suit.
"Is this because of the tracks back at the fence?" Gonzalez asked.
"Yes. I saw dog prints by the hoofprints. Just in case we get tracked. The scent of the cows might confuse the dogs. Step in a few different piles, will you? Ah-ha," Valentine said, moving toward one of the standing milk factories.
The cow had raised its tail, sending forth a jet of semi-liquid feces. Valentine quickly wiped his foot in tlje body-temperature pool, then put each knee into it. "Keep an ear open, Gonzalez. It'd be great if one of them would take a leak for us."
Valentine's sharp ears picked up his scout muttering, "I don't even want to know, man, I don't even want to know."
Leaving the cows behind, but taking the smell with them, the Wolves began to move uphill, again keeping to the heaviest woods.
"So much for my nose, Val. I've heard of wolves in sheep's clothing, but this is above and beyond."
"Concentrate on your ears then," Valentine suggested.
They cut a trail at the base of the hills. Tire tracks informed him that vehicles passed through this area, circling the hills. Farther up the slope, they could see a metal platform projecting out of the trees, still well below the crown of the hill. It looked like a guard tower, but was missing walls and a roof.
"Maybe it's still under construction," Gonzalez theorized.
They moved up the gentle, tree-dotted meadow sideways, approaching the tower from a higher elevation. After completing the half-circle, listening all the way for telltale movement, they gained the tower base.
Concrete anchored the four metal struts supporting the thirty-foot platform. It was built out of heavy steel I-beams and was well riveted and braced. There was no ladder going up. It was new enough that scars in the earth from its construction were overgrown but not yet eroded away.
"What the hell kind of a lookout post is this?" Valentine wondered. "That's a lot of steel to hold up nothing."
Gonzalez knelt in the dirt beneath the structure. "Look here, sir. These tracks: small, narrow boots with heavy heels. Almost small enough for a woman."
"A Reaper?"
"That's my guess," Gonzalez said.
Valentine's spine bled electric tingles. A Reaper stands on that platform? he thought. Watching what? Standing guard? What the hell is so valuable that the Kurians are using Reapers as sentries?
He looked at the cross-braces. He might be able to climb it, if his fingers held out. Of course, a Hood would have no problem going up, but it presented quite a challenge to a human.
"I'm going to climb it. See if I can't get a look at the top. Maybe there's some sign of what it's used for up there."
"Sir," Gonzalez said. "I wouldn't advise that. Listen."
Valentine hardened his ears and heard thunderous hoof-beats echoing from somewhere over the hill. A lot of hoof-beats. Valentine suspected that these riders would not be scared off by the symbols carved into the butt of his rifle.
He looked at Gonzalez, meeting his scout's alarmed eyes, and nodded.
They ran.
Trained Wolves running though heavy wood, even downhill, have to be seen to be believed. They kept up a punishing pace through the thickest forest, a pace no horse and rider could match through this ground. They cleared fallen logs with the grace of springing deer. Their footfalls, like their breathing, sounded inhumanly light. The Wolves hunched their bodies atavistically forward, clearing low branches by fractions of an inch. The sound of the distant riders faded behind them, absorbed by hill and wood.
They reached the cow meadow, over a mile from the metal platform, in less than four minutes. Valentine altered the downhill course, and regained the wood. Still at a flat-out run, they were halfway to the line of skulls when Gonzalez was shot.
The bullet struck him in the left elbow as he brought his arm up while running. He spun, staggered, and continued running, gripping his shattered joint close to his body.
The sniper panicked at the sight of Gonzalez continuing straight for his hiding spot. He rose, a monstrous swamp-troll apparition trailing green threads like a living weeping willow. The sniper raised his rifle again with Gonzalez a scarce ten yards away.
The scout threw himself down at the shot. Valentine, a few yards behind Gonzalez, was breathing too hard to trust himself to shoot accurately. He shifted his grip to the barrel of the rifle and wound up as he dashed forward.
The long camouflage strips hanging from the Quisling's sleeves caught in his rifle's action. As he struggled with it, Valentine swung his gun baseball-bat style, using the momentum of his charge to add further force to the impact. He struck the sniper full in the stomach, emptying the man's lungs with the harsh cough of a cramping diaphragm. Valentine dropped his gun and drew his parang from its sheath on his belt. As the gasping Quisling writhed at his feet, Valentine stepped on the man's back and brought the blade down on the vulnerable back of his neck once, twice, three times. The blows felt good, sickeningly good: a release of fear and anger. The body, its head severed, twitched as the man's nervous system still reacted to the blow to the midriff.
Valentine moved to Gonzalez, who now sat up, shaking and swearing in Spanish.
"Vamos!" Gonzalez said through clenched teeth. "Get to the horses. I'll catch up."
"I need a breather, bud," Valentine said, and meant it. He listened to the distant horses. They were far off, maybe far enough.
"No, sir... I'll catch up."
"Let's get a tourniquet around your arm. I don't want you leaving a blood trail. I'm glad your legs are still working," he said, tearing a rag off the sniper's gillie suit, which served that purpose admirably. His hands flew into action with quick, precise movements, binding the wound. "Now hold this," he said, twisting a stick around the knot. "Does that arm feel as bad as it looks?"
"Worse. I think the bone's gone."
"Just hold it for now. We'll get you a sling once we get to the horses," Valentine said.
"Valentine, this is loco. Loco, sir. I can't get far like this. Maybe I can find an old basement or something, hole up for a few days."
"No more arguing, hero. Let's go. The posse is on its way. I'll take your rifle."
They walked, then jogged toward the fence line. Each step must be agony for him, Valentine thought. They made it past the skulls and to the ravine.
Two horses waited, reins tied to a fallen branch. Valentine's Morgan had a note tucked in the saddle. Valentine uncurled it and read the soft pencil letters: "Followed orders- good luck-God bless-R.H."
Same to you, Sarge, Valentine thought. He felt lonely and helpless. But it would not do to let Gonzalez see that.
"Harper's moving west. Let's go southwest. If they have to follow two sets of tracks, maybe it'll confuse them. I'm sorry, Gonzo, but we've got to ride hard. I'll help you into the saddle."
He tightened the girths on both horses and lifted Gonzalez into his seat.
"I'll take the reins, Gonzo, you just sit and enjoy the ride."
"Enjoy. Sure," he said with a hint of a smile, or perhaps an out-of-control grimace. v They rode up and out of the ravine, Gonzalez pale with pain.
Of all the strange dei ex machinae, Valentine least expected to be rescued by a livestock truck.
Valentine, after an initial mile-eating canter across the hills, slowed out of concern for his scout. Gonzalez could not last much longer at this rate. They spotted an ill-used road, in bad shape even for this far out in the country, and moved parallel, keeping it in sight.
The pair crested a hill, resting to take a good look ahead before proceeding farther. Gonzalez sat in his saddle like a limp scarecrow tied to the stirrups.
Valentine saw a little cluster of farms along a road running perpendicular to their path. Miles off to the west, a series of high bare downs marched southward. To his right, a small creek twisted and turned, moving south to where it crossed the road under a picturesque covered bridge. The bridge appeared to be in good repair, indicating the road might be in frequent use.
"Okay, Gonzo," Valentine said, turning his horse. "Not much farther now. We're going to walk the horses for a while in that stream. I want to pick us up an engine."
"Are we going to give up the horses?" Gonzalez croaked.
"Yes. You can't go on like this. By the way, do you know how to drive?"
"Maybe. I've worked a steering wheel a couple of times. You would have to shift, though. Can't you drive?"
Valentine shrugged. "I used to play in old wrecked cars, but I don't know what the pedals do."
"Sir, let's keep to the stream for a while. Get somewhere quiet and find an old house. Lay up for a while."
"They might know by now what direction we went. We have to assume they want us, even if we didn't see anything. Remember, we killed one of theirs. They won't brush that off. According to that old Gustafsen, they've got some manpower concentrated there, so they have the men to do a thorough search. We need to move faster than they can get organized, which won't be easy since they probably have radios. That means an engine. From the tracks Harper made, and ours, they're going to be looking for us west. If we turn east, we might get ahead of whatever containment they'll use."
Valentine hated the idea of giving up the sturdy Morgan. His horse had proved a sublime blend of speed and stamina. But the odds against them were also increasing, making a risk the only course of action giving them a chance to escape.
Gonzalez nodded tiredly, unable to argue. His scout believed in cautiousness in any maneuvers against the Reapers, discretion being the better part of survival. Gonzalez feared everything; otherwise he would not have lived so long.
The pair rode downhill. At the stream, its rock-strewn bed barely a foot deep in most places, Valentine dismounted and took both pairs of reins, leading the horses. He hoped none of the local farm children were whiling away the afternoon fishing.
They reached the covered bridge. After scouting the shaded tunnel to make sure it was unoccupied, Valentine tied the horses to a piece of driftwood and helped Gonzalez out of his saddle. The scout sank into the cool shade, asleep or unconscious within seconds of Valentine laying him down, head pillowed by his bedroll.
Valentine scrambled up the brush-covered riverbank. He found a position near one end of the covered bridge where he could see down the road a mile in either direction. The asphalt was patched into almost a checkerboard pattern, "as if tar-footed giants had been playing hopscotch along the road. The bridge was a strange bastard construction, obviously a well-made iron-and-concrete span dating to before the coming of the Kurians but now covered with a wooden roof. The added-on planks were layered with peeling red paint, and the warped wood seemed to writhe and bend as if wishing to escape from the bridge frame.
The drone of insects and the muted trickling of the stream were soothing, and Valentine fought the urge to sleep. He counted potholes in the road, clouds, and bell-shaped white wildflowers to pass the time.
A truck appeared out of the east. It was a tractor-trailer, pulling a livestock rig. It plodded along at a gentle rate so as not to bounce its aged suspension too much over the uneven road. As it grew closer, Valentine saw that the door on the cab was either missing or removed, and the windshield on the passenger side was spider-webbed with cracks.
Valentine readied his rifle and ran to the edge of the covered bridge, keeping out of sight of the truck. He heard the truck slow as it approached the bridge, and the engine noise increased as it entered the echo chamber under the roof. Valentine sidestepped out and into the path of the creeping truck, rifle at his shoulder, and aimed at the driver.
Brakes squealed in worn-down protest, and the truck came to a stop. A head popped out of the doorless side, heavy sideburns flaring out from a ruddy face.
"Hey there, fella, don't shoot," the man called, as if people pointing rifles at him were an everyday irritation.
"Step out of there, and I won't. I don't want to hurt you; I just need the truck."
A pair of empty hands showed themselves. "Mister, you've got it backwards. We've been looking for you."
"What 'we' would that be?" Valentine asked, keeping the foresight in line with the bridge of the man's nose.
"Don't have time to go into it, mister. I know one of you's named David. You're three of those Werewolf fellows from down south, right? You went to take a look at Blue Mounds. The vampires' goons spotted you, and now there's a big net out trying to snare you. I heard it on the radio, except the David part. That came across over the Lodge's code through the telephone wires. I've been crawling up and down this road for the last hour looking for your tracks."
"Who are you?" Valentine asked, lowering his gun slightly.
"Ray Woods is my name. Wisconsin Lodge Eighteen. That guy you talked to earlier today, Owen Gustafsen, he's the Lodge leader here west of Madison. You might say we're like an underground railroad. We get orphaned kids and stuff out of the state."
Valentine wanted to believe him, badly. But Eveready had warned them time and again to look for traps. "Sorry, Ray, but I can't trust you. If you are who you say you are, you'll know why. We're going to take your truck, load our horses in it, and take off. If you are who you say you are, you won't tell anybody for a couple of hours. I could even knock you out so you have a convincing bump, if you want."
Woods plucked at his sideburns, twiddling the curly brown hair. "Maybe you can't trust me. But I'm going to have to ask you to take care of a friend of mine."
The truck driver jumped out of his cab and went to a little door mounted in the side of his truck. He opened it and extracted a toolbox. He then pulled out a metal panel and extracted an eight-year-old boy from the narrow slit like a magician pulling a rabbit from a hat. The boy clung to the driver's leg, watching Valentine with hollow eyes.
"This is Kurt," Woods explained. "He's out of Befoit. His father was taken by a Reaper a week ago, and his mother just up and disappeared. We're trying to get him over the Mississippi to a little town called La Crescent. Maybe you can trust him."
Valentine looked into the eyes of the little boy, and they were filled with the hurt confusion of a child whose world has vanished in an afternoon. Valentine wondered if he had looked that way to Father Max some ten-odd years ago. Woods stroked the boy's hair.
With Gonzalez hurt, Woods was their best chance of making it out of the Kurian Zone. More like their only chance.
"Okay, Mr. Woods. I hope you know what you're doing. Maybe you can talk your way out of getting caught bringing a child from point A to B. But we're armed and wanted. If you get caught with us, the least they'll do is kill you. If you have a family, you'd better think hard about them," Valentine said, looking at the driver's wedding ring.
"Ain't got no family no more, mister," Woods said. "I don't want to be parked out here arguing all day, so what's it going to be?"
"What do you want us to do?"
Ten minutes later, the semi was moving again. Valentine sat in a second secret compartment in the truck's cabin. Concealing himself would be a matter of lying down and closing a steel panel. Gonzalez lay next to the little boy somewhere beneath him behind the false-backed tool locker.
"Of course, if they make a thorough search, we're all dead," Woods said, speaking up over the clattering engine so Valentine could hear his voice. "But I'm on the regular livestock run into Blue Mounds now. Before that, I never caused a day's trouble-at least a day's trouble that they knew about-in sixteen years, except when the old diesel gives me problems, of course."
The horses rode in the trailer, hidden in plain sight next to two other crowbait nags. Valentine hoped the horses looked worn out enough to pass inspection as candidates for the slaughterhouse. Their saddles and bridles rested inside bags of feed. A few cows and pigs also rode in the trailer, adding to the camouflage and barnyard odor.
Woods listened to the Quislings' radio calls on a tiny CB hidden inside a much larger defunct one. He explained that the only place the Quislings never searched for guns or radios was inside the dysfunctional box, its dangling wiring and missing knobs mute testimony to its uselessness. Woods simply popped the cover and turned on the tiny functioning receiver inside. "Only problem is, it's just a scanner, so I can't send. I'm going to get you boys in with a family in LaGrange. Alan Carlson's part of the Lodge, and his wife's a nurse. She'll help your man there. Seems like most of the searchers lit off after your other guy. He dumped one of his horses in Ridgeway, and they seem to think one of you is hiding there. They're tearing the place apart. So hopefully he gave them the slip. Better get hid, we're coming up on some crossroads. They might have checkpoints."
For the next half hour, Valentine rode in darkness, lulled by the gentle, noisy motions of the truck. They stopped at one checkpoint, but all Valentine could hear was the exchange of quick greetings between Woods and a pair of unknown voices.
The Carlson farm was a nice-size spread. According to Woods, Carlson was in good with the local authorities. His wife's brother was some kind of Quisling big shot in Monroe, so he rarely had trouble finding supplies and tools tb keep the place up. He even employed another family, the Breitlings, to help him farm the land. Under cover of picking up some livestock for the voracious appetites at Blue Mounds, Woods pulled the truck into the cluster of whitewashed buildings.
"Lieutenant, you can pop the box now," Woods said. "You're on Alan Carlson's place."
Valentine climbed into the passenger seat, an improvised upholstery job mummified in duct tape with a horse blanket tied over it. The door on the passenger side was missing, as well. ("The Quislings got a real bug about wanting to see all of you at checkpoints. Sucks to be me in the winter," Woods had explained.) The Wolf looked around. The truck had pulled around behind a little white house, between it and a well-maintained barn. The two-story frame house was screened from the road by trees and had the small, high-roofed look of a building trying to hide itself from the world. Three feet of foundation showed in the back, and the kitchen door could be reached only by ascending a series of concrete steps. The barn, on the other hand, looked like it wanted to take over the neighboring territory. It had grown smaller subbuildings like a primitive organism that reproduces itself by budding. An immobile mobile home stood beyond the barn, under the shadow of a tall silo. A garage with a horse wagon and an honest-to-goodness buggy parked side by side stood on the little gravel road that looped around the barn like a gigantic noose. Farther out, an obviously unused Quonset hut stood in an overgrown patch of brush, and a well-maintained shed completed the picture. Behind the house, cow-sprinkled fields ran to the base of a pair of tree-covered hills. Distant farms dotted the green Wisconsin hills.
The back door of the house opened, and a man in new-looking blue overalls and leather work boots stepped down the mini-staircase to the kitchen door. He fixed a nondescript red baseball cap over his sparse, sandy hair and turned to wave a boy out from the house. A young teen, in the midst of a growth spurt, judging from the look of his too-small clothes, emerged, as well. He had black skin and closely cropped hair and looked at the truck with interest. Carlson said a few quiet words to the boy, who scampered off to the road and made a great show of poking around in the ditch at the side of the road with a stick.
A golden-haired dog emerged from behind the barn and flopped down, panting in the shade with his body angled to observe the proceedings.
Woods jumped out of the truck and performed his trick with the tool locker again. At the sight of Gonzalez's wound, Carlson hollered back to the house. "Gwennie, one of them's hurt. I need you out here!"
"Mr. Carlson, I don't know what you've heard though this network of yours, but my name's David, and I want-," Valentine began.
"Introductions can wait, son. Let's get your man downstairs."
A red-haired woman came out of the house, moving with a quick, stocky grace. She wore a simple cotton shirt, jeans, and an apron that looked like it had been designed for a carpenter. She pressed two fingers expertly against Gonzalez's throat. Woods held the boy from Beloit in his arms. Valentine and Carlson each took an arm and helped Gonzalez. Gonzalez seemed groggy and drunk, and he mumbled something in Spanish.
They entered the house, skirting the tiny kitchen, and got Gonzalez into the basement. It was homey and wood paneled, with a little bed and some clothing that matched the kind the young teen watching the road was wearing. Mrs. Carslon put a finger into a pine knot on one of the wooden panels and pulled. The wall pivoted on a central axis near the knot. A small room with four cots, some wall pegs, and a washbasin was concealed on the other side.
"Sorry it's so dark," Mrs. Carlson said. "We're not electrified on this farm. Too far from Madison. But there's an air vent that comes down from the living room; you can hear pretty good what's going on above, as a matter of fact. Let's get the injured man down on the bed."
Carlson turned back to the stairs leading up to the main floor of the house. "Molly," he shouted, "bring a light down here!"
Mrs. Carlson extracted a short pair of scissors from her apron and began to cut away at Gonzalez's buckskins. "What's his name?" she asked.
"Injured man of average height," Valentine answered.
"Okay, Injured," she said insistently in his ear. "Can you move your fingers? Move your fingers for me. On your hurt arm."
Gonzalez came out of his trance, summoned by her words. A finger twitched, and sweat erupted on his brow.
"Maybe a break, maybe some nerve damage. I'm not a doctor, or even a nurse, you know," she said quietly to Valentine. "I'm a glorified midwife, but I do some work on livestock."
"We're grateful for anything," Valentine answered. "It looked to me like the bullet passed through."
"I think so. Seems like it just clipped the bone. There's a lot of ragged flesh for a bullet hole, though. Not that I've seen that many. I'm going to clean it out as best I can. I'll need some light, and some more water. Molly, finally!" she said, looking toward the open panel.
A lithe young woman of seventeen or eighteen, with the fine features of good genes fleshed out on a meat-and-dairy diet, stood at the entrance to the secret room. Her hair was a coppery blond and was drawn back from her face in a single braid dangling to her shoulder blades. She wore boyish blue overalls and a plain yellow shirt. The shapeless and oversize clothes made the curves they hid all the more tantalizing. She carried a lantern that produced a warm, oily scent.
"Dad, are you crazy?" she said, looking at the assembly suspiciously. "Men with guns? If someone finds out, even Uncle Mike can't help. How-?"
"Hush, Molly," her mother interrupted. "I need that lantern over here."
Valentine watched in admiration as Mrs. Carlson went about her business. Mr. Carlson held Gonzalez down as she searched and cleaned the wound. She then sprinkled it with something from a white paper packet. The scout moaned and breathed in short rasps as the powder went in.
"Doesn't sting quite like iodine, and does just as good a job," the woman said as she began bandaging. Valentine helped her hold the bandage in place as she tied it but found himself glancing up at the girl holding the lantern. Molly looked down at the procedure, lips tightly pursed, her skin pale even in the yellow light of the lantern.
Mrs. Carlson tied up the bandage, and Gonzalez seemed to sag even more deeply into the cot he lay on.
Ray Woods spoke up. "Hate to give you another mouth, but this boy Kurt here is on his way across the river. I'm not supposed to go out that far again for a few more days. D'ye think he could have a place here for a little while?"
"Of course, Ray," Mr. Carlson agreed. "Now you better be moving along."
He turned back to Valentine. "Now we can shake, son. Alan Carlson. This is my wife, Gwen. And you see there my eldest, Molly. We've got another daughter, Mary, but she's out exercising the horses. The lookout up the road is kind of adopted, as you might have guessed. His name is Frat, and he came up from Chicago about three years ago. On his own."
"Call me David. Or Lieutenant. Sorry to be so mysterious, but the less you know the better-for both of us."
"Well, Lieutenant, we have to get back to the upstairs. The other family who lives on the farm is the Breitlings. They don't know about this room. Same story: better for us and better for them to keep it that way. Their son is with Mary; he's just a squirt. Tom and Chloe are in LaGrange. I sent them there this morning when word came around about your little scrape. They're due back before dark. There's a chance, just a chance, that the house will be searched. If it happens, don't panic. So happens the local Boss is related to me, and we stay in their good graces in every way. Frat has a way of staring at our local goons; I think he makes them nervous. They never hang around long."
"Glad to hear it. You don't mind if we keep our guns, I hope?"
Carlson smiled. "I'd prefer if you did. And take 'em when you leave. Gun ownership is a one-way ticket to the Big Straw."
"Alan, I wish you wouldn't be so crude about it," Mrs. Carlson objected. "He means the Reapers get you."
Ray Woods put the little orphan, Kurt, down on a cot. "Now, Kurt," Ray said, "I've got to leave you here for a couple of days."
The little boy shook his head.
"Sorry, Kurt. That's the way it's got to be. You can't sleep with me in the cab again, and I can't take you to the place where I live. These people can take care of you better than I can, till we can get you up to the sisters across the Big Blue River. You said you'd never seen a river a mile wide, right?"
"Don't!" the boy finally said. Though whether he was objecting to Woods leaving or going to the river, he did not elaborate.
Woods looked away, almost ashamed, and left. The boy opened his mouth as if to scream, then closed it again, eyes glassing over into the wary stare that Valentine had first seen.
"We'll leave the lamp in here for you. We'll talk tonight if you want, after the Breitlings are in and the lights are out. Now I've got to get your horses hid in the hills. I'd give you something to read, but books are frowned on, too, so we don't have any," Carlson said. His wife and daughter stepped out the door, and Valentine caught the accusing look the young girl gave her mother.
As the door shut, Valentine realized the horrible danger their presence brought to the family. He admired Carlson's resolution. In a way, the courage of Mr. and Mrs. Carlson was greater than that of many of the soldiers of Southern Command. The Hunters risked their lives, armed with weapons and comrades all around, each of whom would risk anything to save his fellows. Here in the Lost Lands, this unarmed, isolated farm family defied the Kurians, putting their children in jeopardy, far from any help. Valentine wondered if even the Bears he had met had that kind of guts.
Hours later, Valentine heard Kurt whimpering in his sleep. He rose from his cot and crept through the darkness to the boy's bed. Valentine climbed in and cradled him until the boy gripped his hand and the sleepy keening stopped. Memories long suppressed awoke, tormenting Valentine. The smell of stewing tomatoes and the pictures in his mind appeared as awful and vivid as if he had seen them that afternoon. As he hugged the boy, silent tears ran down the side of his face and into the homemade pillow.