by Foy W Minson
She watched his finger on the trigger and wondered if she would see it tighten before she died. So that she would not die with hate in her heart but rather her loved ones being in her final thoughts, she wrenched her mind and thoughts away from Morgan and onto Woody and Geo and —
NO!
Another thought exploded from nearby. Although not directed to her, it struck her like a thunderbolt, almost driving her to her knees.
Again, it thundered. NO!
And in that instant, Satan launched with a promise of death even greater than the threat the man posed to Raven, Satan’s longest friendship since his first mistress perished in a slaughter he had never forgotten. Two mighty bounds, and he leaped. Two hundred and twenty pounds of bone crushing muscle and teeth fueled by terror-filled rage homed in on Morgan.
No breaths existed in the elongated micro-seconds Raven watched the coming collision. Satan’s thunder echoed in her mind, and she started to shout back at him, but how much could she say in so brief a time.
No! Do not leap into death! Do not —
Again, thunder roared, but this was not in her mind. This thunder raged across the blood-soaked field of killing ahead of a sulfuric swirl of black-powder smoke.
At the same time, another thunder swirled into her mind for but an instant, a soft rumble that diminished into the infinite distance until it was gone. In its place was a terrible silence, a hopeless emptiness.
She watched Satan’s body hit the ground and lie there unmoving. She fought for her next breath to call out his name, to command, to plead for him to get up, but knowing all the while that he would not — could not. Not ever again. Her friend, the first friend she ever had in this terrible, new world, was gone. He was gone because he took the bullet meant for her…a bullet fired from the muzzle of the gun in Ned Morgan’s hand, and which he fumbled in desperate haste to reload.
After all these years since he had caused her brother, Jamal, to be taken from her, slaughtered before her eyes, Morgan had returned to rain yet more grief into her life.
As a blood-red tint clouded her vision, she bent and snatched up the fallen flagpole. Still attached, Charlie’s flag draped over the end covering the finial. She ripped it loose to bare the tapered but blunt-tipped lance-head, but only the top came loose. The cloth still hung by a thread from its lower fastening.
With his weapon opened on one hand, Morgan fished another round from his pocket, and fumbling not to drop it, slid it into the breech.
The heavy flagpole in Raven’s hand would be difficult to throw, but she was too far from him to use it in any other way before he got off another shot. She cocked her arm back with the shaft lying horizontal past her ear like had held much lighter javelins in track and field. She sighted along its length and past its head pointed straight at Morgan’s evil heart.
Morgan snapped the barrel up to close the breech, and his thumb fumbled for the hammer as Raven’s legs drove her forward.
The barrel rose and wavered as he sought to line it up on the moving target of her chest as her legs pushed, pounded, thrust.
She drew the shaft of her lance back, holding its weight in both hands like a pole to launch her over the bar high above the vaulting pit. Powerful legs propelled her, building momentum for the heavy throw with her focus centered on the hateful face glaring back at her as his thumb found the hammer and drew it back.
She planted her right foot and twisted her body to the right. Then, in an explosive release of energy, she snapped her body back around and, with a final, powerful thrust with her left leg, hurled her weapon.
The spear’s head flew past the pistol just as the hammer fell. The pistol recoiled as it spat out roiling smoke behind the deadly ball driven from its muzzle. The ball tore through the trailing flag, ripping it free from the shaft, and followed its trajectory without veering. But Raven was no longer in its path. Her momentum from launching her weapon drove her to the ground where she kept her head up to maintain her view of the target.
The spear slammed into Morgan just below his sternum. Even with its blunt tip, the force of the throw was enough for the entire brass head to penetrate followed by several inches of wooden shaft all the way to the lower fastening for the flag until the lance point erupted from his back a full hand’s width. The impact knocked him backwards to slam against the wall of the house behind him. The pistol fell to the ground where he had been standing.
He stood for a moment, braced against the wall at his back with a look of shock replacing the judgmental scowl so common there. His gaze lowered to peer in wonder at the polished wooden shaft protruding from his chest. His gaping mouth closed into a grimace as blood pooled into it and spilled down both sides of his chin. His legs gave way, and he sagged to his knees. After a brief pause he toppled forward until the butt end of the spear hit the ground and tilted him sideways. He lay there for a moment with his hands gripping the terrible weapon, then, as they released and flopped to the ground, he lay unmoving.
Raven wiped at the tears spilling down both cheeks until she could struggle back to her feet and forward the few feet to where Satan lay next to the fallen pistol. She lowered herself to her knees then bent forward to rest her head upon his still form while her arms encircled him. Without a thought to the violence all about her, she gave in to the wracking sobs that absorbed her.
Dan stepped around the corner and almost tripped over the man he had been searching for. With a glance at Raven nearby huddled and sobbing over Satan, he had a pretty good idea who had ended Morgan’s flight. A glance back at the shaft impaling him, and he marveled at the fury and the force that had rammed the heavy weapon through the man.
Raven raised her head and gazed down at her friend. Blood discolored his chest where the hole had bled before his destroyed heart ceased to pump. The wound on his head had left a streak through his fur between his eyes and down the side of his muzzle. She knew he was gone, but she couldn’t leave the blood there. She just couldn’t.
Her first encounter with her telepathic abilities back on that first terrible day when the world changed had been difficult and confusing. But, long days later when it revealed the truth of the monster dog she had thought she faced, she began to realize what a gift it could be. In the changing world, with its taking away from her all that she knew and loved, it gave her access to a great mind and a true heart, one of only a very few she could fully connect with. Even her wonderful relationship with Woody and her children couldn’t give her the sense of oneness she could attain with Satan. Only the glluriks were able to fully communicate with her mind to mind; but with them, there was always so much held back from her. With Satan, his heart and his mind were as open to her as were Ronald Newman’s before he died. Now his, too, were closed…forever.
She picked up a scrap of cloth from the ground beside her…the silly little banner Charlie had put on his flagpole to give the village a heart. She blotted it across his chest and around the hole in the center of it, soaking up what she could from the fur. She gave up trying to stem the flow of tears that dripped from her chin onto the dusty rag.
She was barely aware of a man running at her, one of the raiders. She would have died right there in the dust with her friend if not for Dan intercepting him. She heard the ensuing fight, but she didn’t look up. She merely dabbed at the bloodied fur and wept.
CHAPTER 27
An uncounted time later, whether a minute or an hour, Raven couldn’t have said, a shadow fell across her and the still body beside her. With a wrench, her mind had her back in the midst of battle. She jerked around and started to scramble to her feet while reaching for her sword on the ground nearby. It was only when she looked up to take a sight on her foe that she recognized Woody standing before her. She then realized the din of battle had gone silent.
“It’s okay, Babe.” Woody’s voice was soft and soothing as he knelt. “It’s over.” And he reached out to take her in his arms, drawing her close and easing her tear-streaked face to his breast.
&n
bsp; “Oh, Woody! He killed Satan!” she got out between sobs. “Satan’s gone…he’s…gone.”
Woody said nothing in response; he just stroked her back and held her. What could he say?
A few feet away Dan knelt beside The Judge’s body and felt for signs of life. After long moments, he turned his face up to Jason and shook his head.
Raymond came from behind a house with a man hobbling beside him and Raymond’s supporting arm about his waist. At the first shady spot, Raymond lowered him to the ground and joined Jason.
“Did Lila come? I think she is badly needed.”
Jason turned to him and nodded. “Yeah, she did. She’s waiting upstream.” He turned about until he spotted Joe Louis, probably the strongest lungs and certainly the largest silhouette in the village. “Joe,” he called. “See if you can signal Lila to come on in. I’m sure she’s getting anxious out there.”
Jason peered about at the village and its defenders beginning to wander back to the space around where the flagpole had stood. None had any prisoners. But when three came to him together, one of them reported, “At least a dozen beat it out the road toward the coast. The way they were running and not carrying any weapons, I don’t think they’ll be back. Otherwise, I’m pretty sure it’s over. We lost a lot, though. Those that stayed behind never had much of a chance.”
“Okay, Bill. Thanks.”
He continued to gaze about at the village that had been their home, their haven since they had fled the ruins of Petaluma six years ago.
Erin moved up under his arm to take his weight and to hug him at the same time. “Enough survived…houses as well as people.” she said. “The village will go on.”
He leaned his chin on the top of her head while he absorbed her good vibes. His heart ached. “But, it was so senseless. Why can’t people just leave other people alone if they don’t like the way they believe? We weren’t hurting anyone. They probably didn’t even know where we were until Hughes got back to them. Why —”
“Oh, Sweetheart, that’s a question that has never been answered with any kind of logic. And it probably never will be; not for as long as it’s about people. But we have each other. We have the village. And we can go on. We’ll just have to be more aware of who else might be out there besides the kryls. We know what they’re like.”
Joe Louis came walking back into the village center with Lila at his side. She glanced about, quickly evaluating the villagers who showed injuries. She went from one to another, applying healing caresses to each before moving to the next. After she stopped beside Jason to treat his gashed leg, she spotted The Judge’s body and stopped moving. She stared, and the tears she had so far managed to hold back began to flow, and she buried her face in her hands. After a few moments, she raised her head and looked at Jason and Erin with a silent plea in her eyes.
“He’s gone, darling,” Erin said. “He was probably gone before we even got here.”
The girl turned to look about for others needing tending when she saw Raven and Woody beside Satan. She rushed to kneel beside Raven and rested her tiny hand on the still beast’s massive head. “Oh, no! Not Satan, too! I should have come in with everyone else. I should have —”
“No, you shouldn’t have.” Erin left Jason leaning on Bill and knelt beside the girl. “If there is one person the village cannot lose, it’s you. Just think about all these injured people here that you can help, and all those you’ll help in the future. What would happen if you were killed? Who would help them, then? No, sweetheart, you did exactly the right thing by waiting.”
“But, if I had been here when Satan was hurt…he came with us, so he wasn’t hurt before we got here. Maybe I could have saved him. Maybe he wouldn’t be dead like everyone else. Maybe —.” She stopped talking at the touch of a hand on her shoulder and turned to face Raven on her other side.
“It was a bullet in his heart that killed him,” Raven said. “Even if you had been with him at the time, I don’t think you could have saved him. He died pretty quick.”
At the sound of pounding feet approaching, everyone turned to look eastward.
Charlie led. Vonnie trailed by a few feet and the others strung out another thirty feet or so, but all coming on strong. They began to slow as they drew close enough to see the fighting was over. By the time Charlie approached Jason, he was walking.
“How bad was it?”
Jason shook his head and glanced about. “Bad enough. Most of those that stayed…”
“Damn! If only —” He stopped in mid-sentence and gaped at The Judge’s body lying a few feet beyond Jason. He walked slowly past Jason to stand over his long-time friend, and then he slowly lowered himself to his knees and then his face into his hands. After a moment he reached out and rested his hand on The Judge’s shoulder.
A moment later, Vonnie knelt across the body from him and quickly checked for life-signs. Finding none, she sat back on her heels and shook her head as tears welled up in her eyes before spilling down her cheeks.
Charlie noticed another body lying nearby. He rose to his feet and stepped over to him, being careful not to step on the shaft of the spear piercing him. “So, it was Morgan.”
Jason moved over to stand beside him. “Yeah, but you sound like you already knew — or suspected.”
Charlie turned his head to face the village leader. “Yeah, I knew, all right. We ran into Olen a little ways back hiding in the bushes like a scared rabbit. They’ll bring him along shortly.”
Charlie walked over and knelt beside Satan across from Raven who had returned to him. “I’m so sorry,” he mumbled. “He woulda made a hell of a Marine.”
“Thank you,” she responded with a half-smile as she dabbed again at the bloody fur. When a fresh swell of tears turned Charlie’s face into a blur before overflowing, she swiped the tatter in her hand across her face. And then, realizing what she held in her hand, she jerked it away and hugged it to her breast. “Oh, Charlie, I’m sorry. I didn’t even think; I just grabbed the first thing handy.” She held out the gore-smeared rag to him. “I’ve ruined it. I’m sorry.”
He took it from her with confusion shadowing his face. He un-wadded it and let it hang open before he realized what it was. A series of red stains covered the middle section of the flag in irregular blots. Gunpowder residue ringed a small, singed hole near the white spot that represented the village.
He gazed at the scrap of cloth for long moments until, with a slow shake of his head, he looked back at Raven. A melancholy smile tweaked the corners of his mouth. “Ruined it? Oh, no, Darlin’, you didn’t ruin it. You…you anointed it with the battle-shed blood and the battle-shed tears of two of Wolfehaven’s greatest heroes. You turned a silly little pennant into a flag — a real flag that a man would be proud to stand up and salute.”
The gathering remained silent for the few moments before Charlie nodded his head toward the east and indicated with his hand. “Here’s the rest of my men.”
Jason and the others turned and watched three men approaching down the road from the east. He knew both men on the outsides, and he soon recognized the smaller one in the middle.
Billy Ray walked out to meet them, got a grip on the back of Olen’s shirt collar and hauled him back to the gathering where he shoved him to the center of the circle standing within feet of Satan and The Judge. Although the man remained on his feet as he stood before Jason, he peered up from a cowering crouch.
Jason and the others remained silent long enough for the prisoner to begin to rise. Billy Ray growled, “Yeah, go ahead and stand up straight like you’ve got a right to. Give me a better target.” He drew the Claymore back and tensed his muscles for a decapitating swing. Olen hunkered back down.
After another long pause, Jason said, “This village has always been of freedom. And, while we will not hesitate to fight and kill in its defense, I don’t think we should be so ready to execute a man away from the heat of battle. So, no, we won’t kill you here and now, as much as you deserve it, nor wil
l I have you thrown into the river with a weight around your worthless neck. In fact,” He paused long enough to look about him at dirty, questioning faces, many wearing bandages, smears of blood, and a few still untended wounds. “…I’m going to leave your fate up to the judge.”
At the mention of his dear friend, Charlie’s head snapped up and around to Jason, then around to gaze at the body on the ground nearby. Had Jason forgotten The Judge was among the fallen?
Jason noted the reaction and went on, addressing the entire assembly. “Yes, Charlie, I realize Judge Woodall can no longer give us the benefit of his wisdom. However, we can’t go on in any kind of semblance of civilized society without a judge. And, if I were to take on that office as well as that of administrator, I’m afraid we would be taking a step too close to totalitarianism. A judge must be independent to be truly effective. So, we need a new one. Now, I realize Thomas Woodall left some pretty big shoes to fill, but the man, himself, gave me the answer to our dilemma some time ago. One night, during a pleasant dinner at my home, he told me he never knew a man with more honor or more respect for the office of judge than his good friend of many years, Charlie Dickerson. Will you be our judge, Charlie?”
A murmur began among those crowding around, accompanied by many nodding heads. Billy Ray verbalized what appeared to be a consensus when he raised the Claymore straight up above all their heads like a giant exclamation mark and thundered, “Yeah!”
Charlie’s dropped jaw slowly raised. He glanced around at the grinning faces and nodding heads, at Billy Ray who again held Olen by the scruff of his neck in one hand and his ready blade in the other, at Vonnie standing beside him and who met his gaze with a tearful smile and a nod. He turned back to Jason. “Did he really say that about me?”
Jason nodded and said, “He really did. And, as I recall, I agreed with him then, and I repeat it now with full confidence. So, Charlie, I will ask you again, will you be our judge?”