CONTENTS
Dedication
Legal
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Author Notes - Craig Martelle
Author Notes - Michael Anderle
Prologue
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Chapter Thirty
Chapter Thirty-One
Chapter Thirty-Two
Chapter Thirty-Three
Chapter Thirty-Four
Chapter Thirty-Five
Chapter Thirty-Six
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Epilogue
Author Notes - Craig Martelle
Author Notes - Michael Anderle
End Times Alaska - Intro
End Times Alaska
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Chapter Forty
Chapter Forty-One
Chapter Forty-Two
Chapter Forty-Three
Chapter Forty-Four
Chapter Forty-Five
Chapter Forty-Six
Chapter Forty-Seven
Chapter Forty-Eight
Chapter Forty-Nine
Chapter Fifty
Chapter Fifty-One
Chapter Fifty-Two
Chapter Fifty-Three
Chapter Fifty-Four
Chapter Fifty-Five
Chapter Fifty-Six
Chapter Fifty-Seven
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Chapter Fifty-Nine
Chapter Sixty
Chapter Sixty-One
Chapter Sixty-Two
Chapter Sixty-Three
Chapter Sixty-Four
Chapter Sixty-Five
Chapter Sixty-Six
Chapter Sixty-Seven
Chapter Sixty-Eight
Chapter Sixty-Nine
Chapter Seventy
Author Notes - Craig Martelle
Author Notes - Michael Anderle
Michael-Scott Earle
WWDE
Nomad Supreme
Social Links
Series List - CM
Series List - MA
They say behind every great man, is a great woman,
but what if the woman is a Werewolf?
DEDICATION
We can’t write without those who support us
On the home front, we thank you for being there for us
We wouldn’t be able to do this for a living if it weren’t for our readers
We thank you for reading our books
This book is a work of fiction.
All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Sometimes both.
Copyright © 2016-2017 Craig Martelle and Michael T. Anderle
Covers by Andrew Dobell, creativeedgestudios.co.uk
Cover copyright © LMBPN Publishing
LMBPN Publishing supports the right to free expression and the value of copyright. The purpose of copyright is to encourage writers and artists to produce the creative works that enrich our culture.
The distribution of this book without permission is a theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like permission to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), please contact [email protected]. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.
LMBPN Publishing
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Las Vegas, NV 89109
First US edition, 2017
Version 1.01 (April 2017)
Editing by Mia Darien, miadarien.com
The Kurtherian Gambit (and what happens within / characters / situations / worlds) are copyright © 2017 by Michael T. Anderle.
PROLOGUE
He came from the wasteland, broken and dying.
All he wanted was a drink.
But the old lady took him in, because he had kind eyes. She gave him water, food, and a bed.
Within a day, he started helping around the house. Then he straightened her yard, made things the way they were before.
Then the others came, not to ask but to take.
They didn’t expect to find a man at her place.
Four arrived. The man walked out into the yard standing tall, giving the others a chance to leave. They didn’t. With confidence, he walked into the middle of them and made them pay. He didn’t kill them, only beat them mercilessly.
To send a message of “no more” to the other takers.
The old lady watched it all.
When it was over, she walked out to her porch and asked the man, “Why would you fight them like that?” She nodded to the rapidly disappearing group.
He answered over his shoulder, never taking his eyes off the direction the men left. “Because you gave me water when I was thirsty, and you asked for nothing in return. As long as I live—” He turned to look her in the eye. “—I will be here for you.”
“But I don’t even know your name,” she said.
“Terry Henry Walton, ma’am, but my friends call me TH,” he replied.
“How many friends call you TH?” she pried.
“Counting you?” He reached up to wipe the sweat from his forehead. “That would be one.”
CHAPTER ONE
Margie Rose wanted to believe. She wanted to believe that people could be nice again. She couldn’t take her eyes off the dark stranger who’d fought for her. She watched him fight and knew that he was never in danger. The only risk was that they would come back and attack her when TH wasn’t there.
Bullies worked that way. If they found someone who stood up to them, they’d get their revenge.
“What if they come back?” Margie Rose asked the man, the stranger who had just put himself between her and danger.
He stopped his surveillance of the area around her home and turned to her, his eyes blue…or were they green? “Don’t you worry about that. I’m going to pay them a visit long before they are in any shape to return,” he told her noncommittally.
Margie remained skeptical. “And what are you going to do then?” she pressed.
He snorted, as much to himself as to her. “I’m going to show them how unhealthy it would be to continue such a lifestyle, and not just for them, but for their families, too, if they have them.”
His voice seemed to drop a little, go deeper, but more personal. “In my life, ma’am, I’ve dealt with bullies and there really are only two ways to get them to stop. The first is to just kill them, but that doesn’t necessarily stop the next guy. The second is to make them so afraid that they run screaming whenever they think about confronting you again. Bullies can sense each other, so they’ll know. All of them will know that they don’t want to come here. Good people will feel safe where bullies are afraid.”
He paused and turned back to her. “I’m just going to go talk with them, that’s all.” Terry smiled, his teeth still straight and white, after all the years in the wastelands. His eyes sparkled as his smile lines wrinkled.
“I feel safe just for having known you. Thank you, Mr. Terry Henry Walton. Dinner’s in a couple hours.” A small smile played at the corner of her lips. “If you could rustle a rabbit, then it will be that much better,” Margie Rose said, stabbing a finger toward a stand of shrub not far off.
Terry breathed deeply of the cooling air off the Colorado foothills.
When Chinese code, embedded in billions of net-connected devices, took down the internet by disabling most technology, the world fell quickly. Nukes were tossed about as a disconnected world heaved in its own death throes. Eighty-seven percent of the world’s population died from radiation, disease, famine.
Terry disappeared into the mountains once everything he cared about was gone. He swore off the human race. For twenty years he stayed away, but then the Werewolves came and he ran. He only escaped them by leaping from a cliff into a river far below. They were unnaturally fast, unerring in their ability to hunt a human, and unmerciful in their attacks.
As he ran from them, they killed deer and even a bear without hesitation, drank the creatures’ blood and resumed their casual hunt for him. Terry had never felt fear like that before. He’d battled with men, and sometimes he thought he would die at their hands, but he hadn’t been afraid. The paranormal made his skin crawl. He’d known the stories of the Unknown World from his contact with Dan Bosse of TQB, but really? Well, really deep down, he had hoped to never again have to deal with them in his life.
When he had finally crawled from the river, exhausted from fighting the currents and bashing against rocks, the Werewolves were a long ways away. Terry had staggered to a cabin on the outskirts of a small town. What drew him there were the lights. The town had power, something he hadn’t seen in twenty years.
To him, that meant civilization, if only on a limited scale.
Terry would find who was in charge of the town and help that person, even if he or she didn’t want help.
That would be Terry’s challenge.
But twenty years prior, before the fall, he was smooth, professional. He only had to dig deep and find that person, pull him past the years when he had been barely more than an animal.
Terry looked at the brush, considering his musings before he walked up to this little cabin. Maybe the new Terry Henry Walton could be both professional and a bit animal.
He felt good fighting those men. It had been too long since he sparred, too long since he led men into combat, too long since he’d made a difference for others.
Then the shame washed over him in a wave of grief, from being selfish, running away to survive on his own, letting all the others fend for themselves. He’d started to hate himself. Now he had a shot at redemption. It began with Margie Rose, then one at a time, he’d show people that if they wanted a better world, they had to help each other create it themselves. The town had power, but were they using it to help everyone?
Tomorrow would be a big day. First, he had a rabbit to kill. He pulled a well-used throwing knife, released the hunter within, and stalked upwind toward the brush. With barely a whisper of the wind, he waited. With the rabbit’s movement, Terry twisted and flicked. The knife spun through the air, driving through the rabbit’s neck for an instant kill.
Terry waited.
Sometimes he wasn’t the only predator, so he watched and listened, sniffing the air carefully for any sign. Certain there was nothing, he quickly cleaned his kill, leaving the guts within a snare just in case a coyote appeared. He didn’t want to waste good bait and tomorrow’s meal.
He hadn’t survived in the wild all that time by not shifting the odds in his favor. He believed in making his own luck. He suspected he’d have to change a few attitudes.
Just like he’d do with the trash that had stopped by earlier. Tomorrow, he’d take care of business and put this town on a new track.
* * *
Billy Spires had been the son of a nobody in a uniquely crappy trailer park full of nobodies. He was average, in both height and looks, and would never stand out in a crowd. His claim to fame was that he was street smart.
For all the good it did him growing up.
He hated that park. He stayed away as much as he could, learned to hunt and kill on his own. Some called him trailer trash, but after the fall, they begged him for help. He was the only one eating. He told them no, except for the women.
He helped them, but they paid a steep price.
Then he found that he could control people by controlling the food. He gathered followers and soon he had a small town beholden to him. Then he discovered an engineer and a mechanic.
The two of those promised him a return to technology, starting with electricity. A freezer to store his venison, his other prizes, and make the food last longer.
So he secreted the two men away, sending women to them on occasion as rewards for their successes, and started to build a real town on the outskirts of what used to be Boulder, Colorado. The mountainous backdrop kept Billy humble.
Well, in his own mind, that was.
From the hills to the west came game and from the fields to the east came grain and vegetables. Billy had evolved from being a street tough to the city planner, the mayor, and the chief justice. There were no elections, nor would there ever be. To Billy, his idea of a benevolent dictator was the best these people could hope for.
Billy sat in the great room of his mansion, looking at the boards he’d set up to track his logistics. He shook his head and laughed, looking around to catch the twinkle in Felicity’s eye. She was his southern belle. A new addition to the town. She’d come willingly to him, which made him suspicious. His only allure was power. A chance encounter with a bobcat left a scar across his left cheek, giving him a personal sneer.
The older he got, the more wary of people he became. He figured he should have killed her because she made him feel funny. He knew he was being manipulated, but found himself agreeing with her recommendations, always to see the sparkle in her eye.
“Get over here, bitch,” Billy growled, trying his best to maintain his dominance. She raised an eyebrow at him and continued to stand there, looking at him. “I said get over here!” he screamed, standing to punctuate his anger.
“Now, Billy dear,” she said slowly, letting her southern accent drag the words out as she slowly stood up. “It’s really okay to let your nice man out every once in a while. He’s such a handsome devil. Before you know it, the people will appreciate you like I do, because they’ll get to know you. Not quite like I do, though, will they, Billy dear?” She smiled shyly and walked casually, sideways in front of him, highlighting her profile. Her curves were perfect, unlike anything he’d seen since before the fall. The way she filled out her jeans made for a perfect fit in his hand. He looked down, confused, looking at his hand and wondering why it wasn’t cupping her butt at that moment.
He was used to his orders being followed. He’d had men killed for less. But not Felicity. He tried to think back to when she simply did what he asked and couldn’t find a single instance. It was always the second time that she did what he wanted, after he had changed what he asked for. She confused him, but the rewards kept him coming back.
“Fuck me,” he finally said, throwing his hands up as he surrendered to her will. “What do you want?” he asked, rougher than he intended.
“The electricity, Billy dear. When will it flow to all the houses in town? When can we fire up the refinery? I, for one, would love to ride. Walking is so last century.” She approached him slowly, smiling. He couldn’t help himself as he smiled back.
* * *
“I feel like shit,” the oldest of the friends gasped through gritted teeth. “Fuck that guy! He can’t do that to us.” James was the largest of the bunch and had taken the worst of the beatings.
He nursed his ribs, wincing at the pain that coursed through his entire body. Beside one half-swollen eye, his face was unharmed.
The others weren’t as lucky as that.
“Shut up, Jim. He can and he did. The real question is what are we going to do about it?” Mark asked them, lisping as he talked through two loose teeth and split and swollen lips.
Mark was unrecognizable from the man he’d been just a day earlier. Terry had mercilessly pounded on the man’s head because he kept talking, insulting the old lady, and denying that he’d lost the fight. Terry sent him a personal message.
“I think my jaw’s broke,” the third man slurred while trying to rub it with bandaged fingers. He had tried taking a swing at Terry, but it was blocked and his fingers dislocated as part of the countermove that saw him put face first in the dirt. He wasn’t too proud to realize he had just had his ass kicked.
He had laid there and whimpered.
The fourth man, the leader called John, was just crawling from his bed. He moved slowly as if he were eighty-years old. “What are we going to do about it? Three days, then we go back, pay them a visit in the middle of the night, burn the house down around them. We can’t have anyone standing up to us. Billy’s been thinking he’s losing control of those on the outskirts, and we need to send a message. We can’t have people fighting back, so they need to die. The old lady and especially that man.”
“Yeah! Let’s go fuck some shit up!” Jim cheered. John looked at him and shook his head. He considered himself better than this rabble, but these were the men that Billy gave him to work with, and no one crossed Billy, not if you wanted peace in your life.
And food.
Maybe he’d let that man knock off one or two of these idiots before he was put down. That would be a win-win. John had a few days to figure out how to make that work. He knew he’d come up with something.
He always did.
* * *
The gray wolf was silent, unseen in the forest.
Nomad Omnibus 01_A Kurtherian Gambit Series Page 1