Lynx hesitated. Trying to break in the animal seemed like a monumental waste of time. But if he succeeded, he'd get to the mambo's place that much sooner. "All right," he said, and gently lowered Eleanore down once more.
"Just climb right up," Wells advised, straining on the reins.
"Climb, hell," Lynx declared. He took two steps and sprang, his wiry form gracefully sailing through the air to come down squarely in the saddle. The horse seemed to freeze. "This might be easier than I thought,"
he remarked and took the reins.
He spoke too soon.
Saddlesore suddenly erupted into violent motion, bucking twisting like the wildest mustang that ever lived, reverting to the instinctual level of its evolutionary ancestors, neighing all the while.
Lynx clamped his legs on the horse and held onto the reins with all of his strength, his body jarred by every buck and wrenched by every twist.
He had only limited experience with horses, and none whatsoever at breaking the animals. Still, he felt confident his feline prowess would enable him to weather the equine storm.
Saddlesore moved away from the trees and into the middle of the road, his legs stiff, his back arched, bucking even harder and higher.
The world spun before Lynx's eyes, a vague swirl of shadowy contours.
He thought he heard Wells yelling at him but the words were indistinct.
His complete concentration was devoted to the task of staying on the horse. Never, ever would he allow a dumb animal to defeat him, so he clung to Saddlesore tenaciously and endured agonizing torment in the process. Time stood still. He had no idea whether he rode the horse for three minutes or ten. Gradually, his legs began to tire and his arms to ache.
Then the light appeared.
Lynx didn't know what to make of the bright light that suddenly enveloped both the animal and himself. The brilliant whitish glow grew brighter and brighter, dazzling his eyes when the horse turned in a certain direction. Somewhere, Bob Wells shouted muddied words. Lynx had about had enough. The combination of the strange illumination and the shouting convinced him something must be wrong. He prepared to vault from Saddlesore, but in the second before he leaped, the steed abruptly and astonishingly stopped in its tracks, wheezing in great sighs.
"Congratulations!" someone cried out in a gruff voice, and clapped in appreciation.
For a moment Lynx experienced disorientation. He was facing directly toward the source of the lights, which he now recognized as the twin headlights of a military-style convoy truck parked only 20 feet off. And he also perceived another chilling fact.
Tonton macoutes completely surrounded him.
Chapter Seventeen
"I don't care what you say. I'm going to kill him."
"Ferret is joking, yes?"
"Nope."
"But you can't be serious, no? Lynx is our friend."
"Some friend. He's the idiot who talked us into this, remember? Maybe you can overlook a few minor incidents like being shot at, almost being gobbled up by a jumbo snake, being beaten with a gun barrel, and then captured by refugees from a psycho farm," Ferret declared angrily. "I can't."
"Gremlin has a better idea, yes," the humanoid said. "Just punch Lynx in the mouth."
"After I skin him alive and boil him in oil."
Gremlin sighed and walked to the small barred window in their cell. He gazed out at the bayou and pier, both 40 yards from the tower in which they were imprisoned, and remembered the walk up from the boat several hours before. Night had fallen, and spotlights positioned at regular intervals along the outer wall illuminated both the inner grounds and the surrounding swamp. "Look at the bright side, Ferret. At least our wrists aren't tied, no?"
Seated on the sole piece of furniture in the ten-by-twelve-foot room, Ferret snorted. "Remind me to boil you with him."
"How much longer do you think they will hold us here, yes?"
"Who knows?" Ferret responded irritably.
"You must learn to control your temper, no? Sometimes you can be as bad as Lynx."
"We can't all be saints like you."
The humanoid looked at his friend. "Why are you being so rude to Gremlin? You're mad at Lynx, yes?"
Ferret detected the hurt tone in Gremlin's voice and glanced up, frowning in displeasure at his own juvenile behavior. "Good point. I shouldn't be taking out my anger at that turnip on you. I apologize."
"Gremlin understand."
"All this waiting is getting to me," Ferret groused. He stood and crossed to the locked steel door on the opposite side of the cell from the window.
Standing on tiptoe, he peered through the narrow slot positioned at human eye level. A limited stretch of corridor was within his line of vision.
"Still no sign of any guards."
"There's a bright side to that too, no?" Gremlin mentioned.
"How do you figure?"
"As long as they leave us alone, we stay alive, yes?"
Ferret turned, his lips curled wryly. "What's with all this bright-side stuff?"
"Do you like Gremlin's new and improved attitude on life, no?" the humanoid asked proudly.
"Is that what you call it?"
"Certainly, yes. Gremlin read a fascinating book in the Family library that has changed Gremlin's whole life around."
"Alice in Wonderland?"
"No. Gremlin has not read that one. Gremlin was referring to the wonderful book by the great man Peale. Have you read it?"
"Can't say that I have."
"You really should, yes. The book will improve your life for the better, Ferret. It will give you a new lease on living, no?"
"Do you mean I'll start thinking and acting like you?"
"Yes." Gremlin squared his. shoulders and nodded vigorously. "You will have a genuinely positive attitude about everything, yes?"
"I think I'll pass."
"But why, no?"
"If we were meant to only look at the bright side of things, we wouldn't have the capacity to cry."
Gremlin did a double take, his forehead furrowing, tremendously impressed by the statement. "That's beautiful, yes? Gremlin had no idea you are such a philosopher, no?"
"Don't start."
"Start what, yes?" Gremlin replied, then repeated the insight in a very profound manner. "If we were meant to only look at the bright side of things, we wouldn't have the capacity to cry. How wonderful, no?"
Ferret shook his head wistfully. "I think I'll shoot Lynx first, then punch him in the mouth, then skin him and boil him in oil," he muttered.
"What was that, yes?"
"Just talking to myself."
"About what, no? Gremlin doesn't want to miss another word you say, yes?"
"It's not important."
"Tell Gremlin, please?"
His shoulders slumping in resignation, Ferret gestured and stated the first thing that came into his head. "What goes around, comes around," he said.
The humanoid beamed broadly. "Wow! You've done it again, yes?"
"Give me a break. The humans say that expression all the time. Surely you've heard it before?"
"Gremlin doesn't think so, no."
"Well, it's not original. So don't make a big deal out of it."
"What goes around, comes around," Gremlin intoned solemnly. "Maybe you should write a book, yes?"
"Maybe I should stick a grenade down Lynx's loincloth."
"Why do you keep carping about Lynx, no?"
"You wouldn't understand."
"Try me, yes?"
"I don't—" Ferret began, then stopped when he heard the drumming of hard soles in the corridor. He spun toward the door. "We have company."
Gremlin moved over beside his companion. "Do we fight or not, no?"
"We'll go along with them for the time being. Maybe, if we play our cards right, we can lull these dimwits into lowering their guard long enough for us to make a break for it."
"Where would we go, yes? We're in the middle of a swamp, no?"
"Do
n't bother me with technicalities. Do I have to do all the thinking for us?"
Before the humanoid could answer, the metallic grating of the bolt being thrown sounded from the far side of the steel door. An instant later a tall tonton macoute stood framed in the doorway. He carried an Uzi, and his sunglasses were hooked into the top pocket on the left side of his shirt.
"Hello," he greeted them coldly. "I am Captain Francois."
"Is it time for our supper?" Ferret asked. "We're starved. Bring on the food."
"Cute," Captain Francois said. "Very cute." He backed into the corridor.
"Now you will be so kind as to step out here with your arms over your head. No tricks or we will slay you where you stand, Comprenez-vous?"
"What?" Ferret responded.
"Do you understand?"
"What's not to understand? If we so much as fart, your goons will blow us away," Ferret stated, and elevated his hands. He stepped into the corridor and discovered eight tonton macoutes standing to his left, their weapons trained on his chest. None of them were wearing their mirrored glasses. "Hi there, guys have you missed us?"
"Enjoy your humor while you can," Captain Francois said. "Soon you will not have much to laugh at."
"Promises; promises."
Gremlin came out of the cell and stopped next to Ferret. "Where are you taking us, yes?"
"The Baron and Majesta want to see you," Captain Francois divulged.
"They're very curious about you freaks."
"Why would they be interested in us when they already have you around?" Ferret cracked.
The officer's eyes narrowed and he scrutinized Ferret from, head to toe.
"You've got a big mouth for such a little turd."
"The better to rip your throat out with, Grandma, when I get the chance."
"Which you never will," Captain Francois assured him mockingly. He motioned at one of the men behind him. "Bind them."
Under the steady barrels of their captors' guns, the hybrids were compelled to submit to having their wrists bound with nylon cord once again.
"And now," Captain Francois said when the chore had been completed,
"you will come with us. Be forewarned that if you try to escape, you will be shot. And even if we should, by some fluke, miss you, there is no way you could cross the inner grounds without being nailed by one of the guards on the walls. So I trust you will behave."
"We don't intend to commit suicide," Ferret remarked.
"How nice. It would be a shame to deprive us of such magnificent entertainment." Captain Francois pivoted and started along the corridor.
Ferret kept silent as the tonton macoutes hemmed Gremlin and him in, with four men in black in front and another quartet bringing up the rear.
He fumed, though. Fumed at letting Lynx talk him into going on the run, fumed at being captured, and fumed at life in general. He paid particular attention to his surroundings, hoping to detect a weakness in the fortifications that he could exploit to make good his escape.
The corridor led to a winding metal stairway, which in turn brought them from the seventh floor to ground level. As they descended, passing the lower hallways en route, moans, cries, and a few screams attended their passage.
"What was that?" Ferret inquired after a high-pitched screech emanated from the third floor.
"One of our other prisoners," the officers replied.
"How many are you holding?"
"I don't really know," Captain Francois admitted with transparent disinterest. "The number varies all the time. Today I believe there are fifty-seven."
"That many," Ferret blurted.
"Our prison tower can accommodate seventy-five at full capacity,"
Francois boasted.
"Your men must be slacking off."
"As a matter of fact, they have been. But the Baron intends to whip them into shape with his speech tonight."
"A regular humanitarian, huh?"
"The Baron is the latest in a long line of illustrious leaders of the Black Snake Society. Your petty mind can't begin to comprehend the magnitude of his greatness."
"I just hope I don't step in any of it on the way to wherever we're going."
From the prison tower they walked due north toward the stately mansion occupying the very middle of the estate, a four-story white affair replete with an ostentatious portico. The glare from a score of floodlights illuminated their party with a brilliance equivalent of daylight.
"Where do you get your power, yes?" Gremlin queried.
"Generators," Captain Francois said. "We have scoured the countryside for a hundred miles around and appropriated every generator in the region."
"Appropriated? You mean you stole them," Ferret said.
"No. Some of them weren't in use when we found them. As for those that were," the officer said, smirking, "let us say the owners were quite happy to part with their generators instead of their lives. Quite an even trade in my estimation."
Ferret spied an enormous pit several dozen yards to the east. "What's with the big hole?"
"The Baron is quite a collector! In that pit are seventeen of the largest alligators in the entire bayou."
"Are they his pets?"
"He uses them for disciplinary purposes."
"I'll bet he doesn't have many discipline problems."
Captain Francois glanced over his shoulder and grinned. "You are very astute."
"If I were astute I wouldn't be here."
They followed a winding cement walk across the huge lawn fronting the mansion. Grand old cypress and oak trees dotted the meticulously tended carpet of green grass, and artistically arranged flower gardens lent a touch of elegance to the den of iniquity.
Ferret stared at the mansion. Earlier, when the tonton macoutes had escorted them from the pier to the prison tower, they had hiked along the base of the south wall directly to their cell without much opportunity to study the estate. Now he noticed a row of cages on each side of the portico and heard growls and hissing noises. "What are those?" he asked.
"The Baron's prized collection of relatives of yours," Captain Francois said, and snickered. "Beastly mutations."
Ferret and Gremlin looked at one another.
"The Baron has been collecting for over a decade," Frangois related.
"Every hunter and trapper in the bayou knows they will receive a hefty reward if they bring in the kind of creatures the Baron likes."
The animal sounds grew in volume as their party neared the mansion.
Various scents were borne to Ferret's sensitive nose by the cool night breeze: bear, bobcat, raccoon, deer, and others. Overriding them all was the tangy odor of primal fear. Ferret felt a strong sympathy for the creatures being confined.
Six tonton macoutes were posted as guards outside the front door, three on each side, and all six promptly snapped to attention when that door unexpectedly opened and out strolled a man and a woman.
Ferret sensed a change in the officer and the men in black serving as the escort, a subtle tensing of their bodies, a barely concealed air of sheer dread. Such a reaction convinced him the pair on the portico must be the Baron and Majesta, and he studied them with interest.
Majesta was a woman in her thirties, possessed of a full figure, long black hair, and features akin to chiseled marble. She wore an unusual green dress that scarcely covered her jutting breasts, the shape of the fabric resembling the twisted coils of a snake.
The Baron wore all red. His hawkish, cruel visage perfectly fit the man.
Dark, malevolent eyes regarded the approaching party without a hint of friendly emotion. From his right hip, suspended in an ornate sheath, hung a dagger with a bejeweled golden hilt. "So these are the genetic deviates,"
he declared by way of a greeting.
"You're not exactly the cream of the crop yourself, sucker," Ferret responded, and instantly regretted his rash impulse when a man in black spun and clubbed him on the right temple. He staggered but stayed erect.
"L
eave him alone, yes!" Gremlin spoke up.
"Neither of you will talk unless addressed," the Baron informed them imperiously. He came down the steps slowly, examining the prisoners intently. "Amazing. Truly amazing. You're the first mutations I've seen who are so closely similar to man."
"They not only have the power of speech, your lordship," Captain Francois stated with a slight bow, "but they can also operate firearms."
"Really?" the Baron responded. "If we're not careful, someday these deviates will rise up against us and try to take over."
Ferret had taken all the insults he could tolerate. "Who are you calling a deviate, you misfit? We're half human, and we—"
A stocky tonton macoute, at a curt nod from the Baron, began beating the hybrid on the head with a vengeance. Ferret tried to raise his hands to protect his face, but another man in black struck him in the small of the back, causing him to fall to his knees.
"No!" Gremlin cried, stepping to his friend's aid. He stepped between the stocky assailant and Ferret, using his own body as a shield.
"Enough!" the Baron commanded, and grinned. "How touching. They claim to be part human and demonstrate brotherly loyalty. But in the final analysis they are still genetic aberrations. These two are quite unique, but they would pose too many problems if I added them to my menagerie. You were right in your estimation, my dear captain, but I had to see for myself." He paused and glanced at the woman. "What do you think, Majesta?"
"Damballah would enjoy them."
"My thoughts exactly. They would be delightful appetizers," the Baron said, and faced the officer, "Very well. Take them back to their cell. It's ten-thirty now. In forty minutes bring them here so they can join our procession to the houmfor. We must be on time and commence the ceremony at midnight."
"As you wish, my lordship," Captain Francois said.
Ferret heard the words through a veil of pain. He grimaced and managed to straighten with Gremlin's assistance. Footsteps pounded on the walk to their rear and another man in black raced past them to halt in front of the Baron.
"What is it?" the head of the Black Society demanded brusquely.
"Forgive this intrusion, Great One," the man stated, and bent at the waist. "A speedboat has just arrived from New Orleans."
The Baron frowned. "I gave specific orders that the speedboat is only to be employed on special occasions. It uses too much of our precious fuel to be utilized without proper justification. Who has committed this oversight?"
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