by Drew McGunn
IN HARM’S
WAY
Book 5 of the Lone Star Reloaded Series
A tale of alternative history
By Drew McGunn
All rights reserved
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are the product of the author’s overactive imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, or locales is coincidental. Fictional characters are entirely fictional and any resemblance among the fictional characters to any person living or dead is coincidental. Historical figures in the book are portrayed on a fictional basis and any actions or inactions on their part that diverge from actual history are for story purposes only.
Copyright © 2018 by Drew McGunn
All Rights Reserved. No part of this this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recordings, or otherwise, without the prior permission of the publisher and copyright holder. Permission may be sought by contacting the author at [email protected]
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V1
Table of Contents
The Story So Far
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
The Southern Cross Convention: A Short Story
About the Author
The Story So Far
There’s a scene from William Goldman’s Princess Bride, where the intrepid hero Wesley asks, “Who are you? Are we enemies? Why am I on this wall? Where is Buttercup?” To which the Spaniard, Inigo replies, “Let me explain… No, there is too much. Let me sum up.”
After four books, there is too much to explain, so allow me to sum up. Our intrepid hero, Will Travers, veteran of the Second Gulf War, finds his mind and soul cast back through time to 1836 into the body of William Barret Travis. With only weeks to avoid a martyr’s death at the Alamo, Will contemplates fleeing from San Antonio de Bexar but realizes he can’t abandon men like James Bowie and David Crockett to die at the old Spanish mission. Instead, he crafts a plan that is both daring and a little bit crazy to defeat Santa Anna long before the Mexican dictator can consolidate his army. Will manages to scrape together nearly every Texian soldier west of the Brazos River and meets Santa Anna on the Rio Grande River where Texian arms bleeds Santa Anna’s vaunted Vanguard Brigade, before strategically retreating to the Nueces River, where the Texians destroy much of the Mexican army and capture the hapless dictator.
Once independence is secured by treaty with Santa Anna, Will joins with other famous Texians like Sam Houston and David Crockett to form a constitution for the nascent republic. He helps the constitutional convention craft a document avoiding the worst of the Southern slave codes, and which allows a path to citizenship for the Cherokee.
After narrowly surviving an assassin’s bullet, Will takes command of the entire army of Texas. But he has barely begun to transform the army when the frontier erupts into violence as the Comanche ride out from the Comancheria and attack Fort Parker, on the edge of the Texas frontier.
Despite an early defeat at the hands of the lords of the Great Plains, Will eventually drives the Comanche to the peace table. In the ensuing years, he refines both the tactics his army uses as well as its weapons.
Despite a fragile peace between Texas and Mexico, the treaty signed by Santa Anna has never been enforced until President Crockett orders Will to take the army to secure Santa Fe and Albuquerque for the Republic, in accordance with the treaty from six years before. The army is more than eight hundred miles away when Santa Anna sends a force under Adrian Woll to capture the Alamo.
Total annihilation at the Alamo is only stopped by A. Sidney Johnston’s arrival with every army reservist he can scrape together, while Will is still hundreds of miles away with the regular army. After burying the dead, Texas prepares for total war with Mexico.
Total war is expensive, and a long campaign will destroy the fragile republic. Will has every expectation of a quick war. The Mexican commander is rash and headstrong, but before the campaign can begin, he is killed in a freak accident and his cautious second-in-command, Juan Almonte takes charge and changes the Mexican strategy to one of defense.
Almonte forces Will into several pitched battles, where the Texian army’s skill, tactics and superior weaponry are pitted against Almonte’s defense in depth and tactical retreats. Months drag by, and inflation and debt eat away on the Homefront as Will’s Texian army grinds down Mexico’s Army of the North.
Santa Anna, exasperated by the glacial speed of the campaign, sacks Almonte for failure to produce a victory and takes command, as he brings north another twenty thousand men. In a battle that dwarfs every previous conflict between the two nations, Santa Anna tries to overwhelm Texian defenses only to come up short. In the ensuing retreat, the dictator once again falls into Will’s hands.
Meanwhile, back in Austin, President Crockett resigns his office and turns over command of the Republic to his vice president, Lorenzo de Zavala and heads into the west with a column of Texians, which includes Will’s son, Charlie, who runs away from home to have an adventure. Crockett easily defeats the lightly defended garrisons of Mexican California, but before he can enjoy the fruits of his labor, he is gunned down, and Will’s son is kidnapped.
Chapter 1
He heard the creaking sound of wood as his eyes fluttered open. Panic squeezed his heart when he saw nothing but darkness. His heart raced faster when he tried running his tongue along his teeth and found a rag wet with his own saliva stuffed into his mouth. He twisted and realized he couldn’t move his arms. They were pulled behind him, bent around a wooden dowel rod and tied securely in place. The rod extended beyond his arms another foot to either side.
As panic set in, he tried kicking his feet, only to find his legs were tied together. He tossed and turned, but the ropes were securely fastened. The rod hit against the wooden flooring, as he rocked back and forth. He tried to cry out, but the only sound was a faint muffled moan. His heart raced as, wide-eyed, he turned his head in the darkness and saw nothing. It felt like his heart was trying to climb out his throat as it thundered in his chest. Mercifully, he slipped back into unconsciousness.
When he came to, the youth heard the creaking of wood against wood. He was on his side, rocking as the flooring beneath him gently pitched side to side. He was still tied and gagged. He breathed in deep through his nose, willing the echoes of panic from earlier to stay under control. At first, the darkness seemed complete, but as they adjusted, his eyes saw a few narrow cracks overhead where light shone through. From there, he studied the ceiling and saw an overhead hatch next to a wall. As he focused on the opening across the room, his eyes acclimated to the darkness and he saw a narrow, steep stairway leading to the hatch.
“I’m on a ship,” Charlie Travis finally managed to think.
Slowly, memories pushed their way into his consciousness. He recalled sitting at a breakfast table with his Uncle Davy. Then all hell broke loose. He remembered men crashing through the door of the hotel’s common room and t
hen being knocked to the floor. Then the room was filled with gunshots and acrid tasting gunpowder. Rough hands had yanked him to his feet, and he saw his grandfather curled in a ball as someone kicked at him. Charlie’s head had been covered in a burlap bag as he had been hustled from the common room. A moment later there was a final shot. And then cursing as he landed heavily in the back of a wagon.
A high-pitched voice said, "He shot me, and I shot him."
The wagon sagged as someone climbed into the seat. A moment later Charlie heard the crack of a whip, then the vehicle lurched forward.
The memory brought unbidden tears to his eyes. Overhead, on the ship’s deck, walked David Crockett’s murderer. Tears, especially when one is fourteen, burn. Charlie struggled against the ropes which secured him to the wooden rod through which his arms were tied, causing the ends of the rod to knock against the planks on which he lay.
Hinges groaned in protest as the overhead hatch was thrown open. Intense light flooded the hold, and Charlie turned his head away and screwed his eyes shut. He heard leather soles slip down the narrow stairs and then a voice said, “Lookee who’s back in the land of the living.”
Hands grabbed at the rod and propelled him to his feet. "Move it, kid. Give me any shit, and I'll cut your throat and toss you overboard." A moment later his legs were untied, and he was shoved toward the light.
Charlie tripped against the stairs and with the low, sibilant voice behind him propelling him forward, he stumbled upwards. Once he reached the deck, from behind, he was shoved to his knees. "Give me one good reason, and I'll gut you like a pig, boy." The tone shifted, and the voice said, "That poppy juice finally wore off, boss. The boy was rolling around below.”
Another voice, deeper and more resonant spoke. “Young master Travis. Welcome aboard the Orion.”
Charlie stayed still on his knees until his eyes adjusted to the light. He saw a man a couple of inches shy of six feet. Brown hair waved in the wind. He wore a plaid waistcoat and a white muslin shirt, with sleeves rolled above the elbows. One of his forearms was scarred, the skin appeared twisted in on itself.
He saw the scar tissue up close as the man stepped forward and removed the gag from his mouth. “That can go back in if you can’t keep a civil tongue in your head.”
The boy felt as though he had a million things he wanted to scream at his captors. But the cloying taste of the gag had left his tongue swollen, and he merely stared at the man.
“Smart, like your Pa, I’d imagine. Look around, boy,” he said, his arm revolving around the ship. “There ain’t no place to go.”
Charlie could barely see a smudge to the east. Land had to be a dozen miles or more away. Still not trusting his voice, the youth said nothing.
“You give me your word you’ll behave, or I’ll have Mr. Williams tie you back up. I’m sure you’ve noticed he can be a might rough.”
His heart raced at the thought of being cut free from the painful binding, where his forearms were bent around the rod. He hated the taste of the word on his mouth as he bobbed his head, “Alright.”
The man behind him, Williams, made quick work of the knots tying his arms around the rod. Finished with the rope, he hissed, “I’ll hurt you bad, boy, if you don’t do as Mr. Jenkins says.”
For the first time in he had no idea how long, Charlie was unbound, but as blood flowed back into his arms and legs he gingerly stepped over to the portside railing. The shore was only a speck in the distance. Despite being free from the rope’s restraints, he felt more trapped than ever.
***
9 August 1843
The taste of salt stung Obadiah Jenkins’ lips, as mist wafted over the ship’s bow. He peered over the gunwale and watched the hull cut through the choppy water. Nearly three weeks had passed since they had taken passage on Captain Palmer’s Orion, and Jenkins was ready to get ashore. In the far distance, he could see the Central American shoreline. The captain had told him he expected to drop anchor in Ciudad de Panama’s harbor later in the afternoon.
In the amidships, Hiram Williams was watching their prisoner. Jenkins had misgivings about the volatile gambler watching over Charlie Travis. But Jackson and Zebulon had already taken their turn. Williams had stolen the single greatest act of revenge Jenkins had ever considered when he killed David Crockett in the hotel’s common room back in Los Angeles. He had meant for the former president of Texas to suffer the humiliation of having his grandson kidnapped from under his nose. It was a fitting revenge for Crocket’s customs agents killing Nancy a few years before. Williams’ erratic act of violence still chafed him.
From the deck below, he heard Williams' voice. "You got no idea how lucky you are, boy, that I ain't gutted you yet like I did your grandpa."
Charlie Travis was sullen. The boy had been depressed since they had hauled him onboard. That didn’t bother Jenkins in the least. Boys his age were prone to mood swings. But they would soon be on land, and he needed the boy to understand his life was in Jenkins’ hands.
He leaned over the railing below the pilot's cabin, "Hiram, Leave the boy be. He's worth more to us alive than dead. If you damage the merchandise, it'll come out of your hide. Kill the boy without my leave, and I'll extract the ransom from your hide, you hear?"
Williams returned a knife he’d been playing with to its sheath and spat a stream of tobacco juice over the gunwales. “Yeah, boss. Just having a bit of fun with the boy.”
He turned and leered at the boy. “Right, Charlie?”
The youth inched away from him in response. Williams burst out laughing. “See, Ob, I told ya.”
True to Captain Palmer’s word, the sun still lingered over the Pacific Ocean when the Orion dropped anchor.
They stayed that evening in a derelict building passing itself off as a hotel. The room was small, made all the smaller by four men and a boy crowded together. Jenkins tied Charlie’s hands together. It wouldn’t do for the boy to escape.
Elizondo Jackson, his longtime associate from Florida, woke him up sometime after midnight. “Ob, your watch.” Jackson had taken the first watch. Jenkins tossed aside his blanket and stood. The remnants of a candle flickered. He dug another from his pack and lit it using the last of the old candle’s wick before he sat in a rickety chair and looked at his prisoner.
The boy's ginger-colored hair reflected the candlelight. At fourteen, Jenkins guessed he still had a few inches left to grow. For the moment though, the boy's chest rose and fell. As the son of one of Texas' most notable and well-off personas, Jenkins was certain William Barret Travis would pay the ransom. But much rested on his and his compatriots' ability to get back to South Carolina. If he gaged the tea leaves right, several men would shelter Jenkins' crew, merely to hurt an abolitionist like Travis.
The boy shifted, and his eyes fluttered open, revealing blue irises. After a few blinks, the boy glared at Jenkins.
Softly, the kidnapper said, “Go back to sleep, boy.”
Charlie shifted his glare to the ropes binding his hands. “You could untie me. I can’t go anywhere.”
Chuckling, Jenkins shook his head. “No. You’re too valuable for me to risk.”
“My father will find you.”
“False hope will do you no good. Now get some rest.”
Briefly, the boy’s eyes closed, but then tears seeped from the corners of his eyes. “Why did y’all kill my grandpa?”
Jenkins flinched. “That wasn’t supposed to happen. I wanted him to suffer the failure of knowing we kidnapped you under his nose.”
The boy’s voice was flat and emotionless. “Bastard.”
Jenkins laughed, the bitterness was sharp enough for his own ears. "You can't even begin to know. Your grandpa caused the death of my Nancy. She died in a fire when customs agents raided my house. They might as well have pulled the trigger."
“But you must have done something to bring that down on you.”
The kidnapper grimaced. “Just peddling a bit of paper. Folks needed titles to their la
nd, and we were happy to oblige.”
“Forger,” the boy spat out.
“What do you know about that?”
The youth said, “Enough. My pa said folks like you were the reason the courts are clogged with conflicting claims.”
Jenkins sighed. “Go back to sleep, kid.” Charlie Travis was right. Two men claiming the same land, both holding deeds they thought were valid had caused more than a bit of conflict across East Texas.
The next morning, Jenkins left the boy in the room with Bill Zebulon. The burly man had been with Jenkins since before he had first crossed the law. Although not the sharpest of the group, Bill’s size was intimidating. He was more than six foot tall and broad across the shoulders. Over the years when he needed to flex his muscles, Jenkins would send Bill in. Zebulon could lay a man out cold with one hit.
At least with Bill watching the boy, he didn’t have to worry about Williams doing any physical harm to Charlie. The fiery gambler’s temper was a liability, but his ability to ferret out information was second to none. It was that ability he was now relying on as he followed the small man down a narrow, muddy street.
Williams stopped at a run-down stable, on the edge of town. The building's wall was weathered and warped planking. The walls had once been painted white, but only curling chips remained, flaking from the wall.
A corral held a dozen donkeys. They were crowded around a long trough on the side closest to the stables. Williams waved at a man who hobbled from the dilapidated building. “Amigo,” he called out.
The man appeared as run-down as his building. He wore a scruffy beard. It covered the collar of a once white shirt. The wrinkles on his swarthy face nearly covered a long scar which stretched from his right eye down to his jawline. He shook his head. Williams had a knack for finding the right sort of men for the work at hand.
The old man said, “I hear you’re looking for passage across the isthmus. Hell of a time to go, during the rainy season, but if you’re of a mind to do it, me and my boy are for hire.”