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canyon, toward the pigs. Some had already turned away and were starting to
move restlessly down through the close-set pines trees at something between a
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fast walk and a lumbering trot.
It was burning more quickly than he'd anticipated, making it time to give Dean
the gunshot signal to start his own bonfire before the entire herd of pigs
gave way to panic and fled out of the box canyon.
General was snarling and grunting, more blood tumbling in gobbets from its
open jaws. The boar could see that the fire was going to surround him and burn
him alive.
Ryan saw that as well.
"All right," he said, aiming the SIG-Sauer just behind the mutie boar's left
ear and squeezing the trigger.
The crack of the heavy handblaster echoed from the granite walls. The pig's
skull jerked and a tremor ran through its body.
A moment later it was quite still, the flames already licking at its
mountainous carcass, singeing the bristles.
And Ryan was off and running.
Chapter Thirty-Four
Krysty had been resting on the double bed in the room that she'd been sharing
with Ryan. She suddenly got up and walked to the window that faced west,
peering through the slats in the shutters. Doc had been sitting with her, the
friends talking about when the brushwooders might put in an appearance. And
when
Ryan would return to them.
"What is wrong, my dear lady? Are you having one of your feelings?"
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She nodded, pushing back an errant curl of her bright red sentient hair.
"Something like that."
"How does it work? Do you see it or hear it? I find such an ability quite
fascinating."
"Like hearing the sound of a bell, very far off. Sometimes the bell's bright
and silver. Sometimes it's more like the tolling at a funeral. I don't mean
that I can really hear a bell. Just that it's the nearest I can explain it."
"What can you see?"
"Over in the direction of the sea. Looks to be about fifteen miles or so away.
Can't tell easily. Fog's coming back again. But it looks like smoke."
IT WAS WORKING.
Ryan felt his heart leap with excitement and delight as he ran as fast as he
dared down the slope of the canyon, weaving and dodging between the trees.
The main flow of the fire was to his left, raging through the conifers,
igniting the underbrush, flames reaching into the lower branches of the pines,
bursting from tree to tree. The smoke was still relatively thin, rising in a
boiling column, darkening the blue sky.
Ahead of him he could hear the constant squealing of the herd of mutie pigs,
driven into a wild panic by the pursuing flames. Every now and then Ryan would
glimpse some of the animals, scampering at speed, moving faster than he was.
For a moment he stopped, breathing heavily, wiping sweat from his forehead,
moving the patch to clear it from the puckered socket of his missing left eye.
He squinted through the drifting smoke to try to see whether Dean had heard
the signal and had managed to set his own fire going, but he couldn't make it
out from where he was.
Ryan continued to run toward the main trail.
NOW EVERYONE, including Bill Rainey, was in the bedroom with Doc and Krysty,
crowding around the window. Trader turned away first. "I say that's two
separate fires," he shouted. "It's two fucking fires."
Jak nodded in agreement. "Yeah," he said quietly. "Two fires."
DEAN WAS WAVING HIS ARMS, whooping and jumping up and down in a cloud of
choking gray dust, cheering on the stampeding pigs ahead of him.
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Deathlands 26 - Shadowfall
He saw his father emerging from the billowing smoke and the shifting threads
of fog. "See 'em go!"
The boy had his retrieved Browning in his right hand, ready to encourage any
stragglers among the animals.
His fire was burning well, completely blocking the trail to the east, forcing
the mutie creatures to funnel down the ravine to the west. "Which way we
goin', Dad?" There was a temptation to withdraw to the ville, skirting the
flames by climbing above them, but that would mean missing out on the final
act of the drama. When you had a good plan that seemed to be working, you
wanted to see it all the way through.
"After the pigs," he replied, jerking his thumb toward the camp of the
brushwooders.
"Think they'll run when they see the stampede coming?"
"Won't have much choice," Ryan told him.
MOST OF THE MEN AND WOMEN in the camp had celebrated their earlier victory by
consuming large quantities of home brew, and were rotten drunk. Some had been
sick, and others had passed out. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]