Major Smolst suddenly squatted next to him. “You wanted to see me, Colonel?”
“You’re good, Heinrich. I didn’t hear you coming.”
“I didn’t want you to, sir.”
“You’re ex-Troika Guard, aren’t you?”
“Yes, sir. Over twenty years.”
“Well, I’m glad you’re on our side and not theirs.” Buhrman nodded toward the rock in front of him. “How many Dená are with you?”
“A hundred and ninety-five, not counting me.”
“Any of your guys know this country?”
“Two are from Delta, and have hunted this area all their lives.”
“Perfect. I’d like to speak with them at their earliest convenience.”
Smolst nodded. “I’ll go get them now. You going to be in this spot?”
“Yep.”
13
58 miles south of Delta
Shouts of dominance and victory carried through the copse of willows and black spruce. A shot rang out and the cheering intensified. Jerry felt near panic. Where was Magda? Had they found her?
He stepped out onto the path, almost standing over the Russian captain’s body. A quick glance about found nothing and he steeled his resolve to go into their midst after her. He checked the machine pistol, making sure the safety was off.
“Lieutenant!” The whisper came from behind him and he whirled about to see Magda and the dogs deep in the willows.
“My God, you’re safe!”
“Shut up!” she hissed. “They are just down the road. If they catch us, they will kill us: you and my dogs immediately, me after they have had their fun.”
Jerry joined her in the brush. “What do you want to do?”
“What do you want to do?”
“You’re my guide, Magda. I agreed to follow your lead.”
“You saw what he did to the captain. These are rogues, without honor or discipline.”
“I think they have discipline,” Jerry said, maintaining his whisper. “But I don’t think they have any honor. Which to be honest, I considered just an abstract concept until about five minutes ago.”
“So what do we do?”
“I wish I knew what they were going to do. If they are headed for Delta, we have to take a different route—are there any?”
“Of course there are, but we’re talking about an extra day’s worth of walking. They will take the highway; we’ll have to follow the game trails.”
“Then let’s not waste any more time. I’ll follow you.”
“We need to move fast in order to warn the DSM.”
“The what?”
“The Dená Separatist Movement. That’s who you’re fighting for.”
“I thought this war was all new to you?”
“The war is,” she smiled, “but we’ve been part of everything else all along. Come now, we need to hurry.”
Frigid water swirled around Jerry’s hips as they forded yet another fast-moving tributary to the Delta River. The only good thing about being in the middle of a cold creek, he decided, was the lack of mosquitoes. The invasive insects droned in clouds all around the horizon.
Magda gave him something to rub on his exposed skin but the devils still found entry into his shirt and hovered around his face. As they approached the shore, he could see them hazing above the water.
“Do you have any more of that stuff?”
She pulled a vial from her pouch and handed it to him. “Use it sparingly; it’s all we have left.”
He rubbed it behind both ears and on the back of his neck before closing the vial tightly. Hours ago he had pulled off his flight suit and now wore his khaki fatigues.
He pulled the flight suit out of his bag, held it under water and, as they neared shore, wrapped it around his head and shoulders. Cold water cascaded over his face as he hurried up onto the shore.
“Move fast, maybe we can lose most of them,” he all but shouted.
“Make a little more noise and the Russians will bite you permanently!”
Jerry slowed and looked back at her. “I’m being eaten alive by flying needles and you’re worried about Russians? They won’t be out in this; they’re all sitting around smudge pots drinking vodka.”
“If you believe that, I’ll just let you stay here and die.”
Jerry bit his tongue to stop his heated answer. This was not the way to save Pelagian, Bodecia and Rudi. Nor was this the way to serve the Republic of California and the Dená Separatist Movement.
“I’ll try to make less noise if you will,” he said in his most jocular tone.
“Oh, now I’m the one making noise!”
He stopped moving and stared at her, watching her eyes widen and her lovely bosom heave with the emotion she felt, and appreciated the color blossoming in her face.
“What’s wrong with you?” he asked in a low voice.
She blinked and looked away. “Sorry, just edgy I guess. I didn’t mean to upset you. Let’s go.”
She followed the game trail and he followed her. For a moment he considered kissing her, and the sudden realization that, more than anything else, he wanted to do just that jarred him. He dwelt on what that would mean.
At any other point in his life he would have taken the chance of getting his face slapped. There was always another girl around the corner in California. But this girl, no, he corrected himself, this woman was different. Not to mention there weren’t many corners out here.
Alaska was so different from California he didn’t bother with comparisons. They came from different cultures, but both had completed college. Her calling seemed to be education, he wasn’t sure of his.
Casual pairings didn’t seem to be the norm here, but then his contact with locals and local mores could only be described as limited. Did he find her attractive enough to marry her? He mulled that: maybe.
“You hungry?” she said over her shoulder without looking at him.
“A little.”
She twisted and tossed him the ubiquitous strand of squaw candy. He wondered if it were possible to get tired of it. As he chewed, he thought about being married to Magda.
He bit the side of his mouth and yelped.
She whirled and was in front of him in an instant. “What’s wrong? Are you choking? Are you okay?”
Jerry held his cheek and explored the spot with his tongue, staring intently at her. “Yeah, I’m okay. Just bit the side of my mouth.”
“Oh.” She seemed disappointed, started to turn away.
“Magda, you are unlike any woman I’ve ever met and I am overwhelmingly attracted to you. I don’t know if the intensity I feel is part of the situation we’re in,” he waved his hand toward the distant forest, “or exactly what I would feel if we met in San Francisco. I just know that it’s there.”
She stared at him with her lovely deep blue eyes and listened intently as he spoke.
“You’re an honest man, Lieutenant Jerry Yamato, and I appreciate that and what you just said. I can’t even think about you and me in that way until we get help at Delta. Once my father and mother are safe, I’ll consider you again, I promise.”
“Deal. Lead on.”
“Listen,” she said and her eyes lost focus. “That’s an engine.”
Jerry cocked his head to the side and instantly heard the metallic grinding of a tank. He turned and peered toward the sound. Both dogs stared intently in the same direction. Jerry wondered if they could actually see something.
“They’re off to our left, so they’re not following our tracks. Is that where the highway is?”
“Yes,” her brow furrowed, “they’ll always be ahead of us.”
“How far away is Delta?”
“Fifty, maybe fifty-five kilometers. A couple of long days of hiking no matter how you look at it.”
He glanced at his watch. Six hours had passed since they started. Quickly he did a self survey and decided he felt pretty good.
“Can we pick up the pace and make it by morning af
ter tomorrow?”
She smiled. “I’ve been holding back for you.” Magda turned and charged down the trail.
Jerry worked to match her pace. Did she take every question as a challenge? As they moved, he kept one ear on the engine noises.
If the machines got any nearer, he had to have a plan. Mosquitoes buzzed past but Magda’s pace gave them the added bonus of moving faster than the insects could fly. Jerry swatted one off his face.
Of course you could still run into them.
14
63 miles south of Delta
Moving silently through undergrowth choked with decades of dead leaves and branches taxed Rudi’s skills and current physical abilities. Every few steps he stopped to listen intently and rest.
Nothing moved save for the constant whisper of wind across the willows and black spruce. The susurration filled the silence at the edge of his awareness and he missed the sound of teeth on foliage. He spied something dark ahead, but seeming stationary, he dismissed it.
He quietly spread the willows with his rifle and left hand and stared up into the face of a moose. A covey of thoughts flashed through his mind: moose were incredibly large; it was as surprised to see him as he was to behold it; his left hand was impossibly far from the rifle in his right hand; he didn’t know where to shoot this thing if he even got the chance, and he was totally terrified.
The animal’s eyes grew wider by half and it abruptly pulled back and centered its weight over the back legs. Rudi knew it was going to use its front legs for combat and he threw himself to the side and scrambled madly through the thicket, ignoring the lightning flashes of pain throughout his body. Behind him the moose smashed down through the haze of sweat he knew he must have left in his wake.
It crashed into the willows behind him. He turned ninety degrees to his left without slowing. The moose gained on him, snorting and slamming huge, splayed feet down on the thick gravel.
Dogs barked in excitement somewhere behind him.
Rudi turned to his left and ran through the slashing willows, desperately trying to avoid anything that could truly trip him up. Three strides later his right foot caught in the middle of a three-trunk sapling and he hit the ground hard. Unhealed wounds ripped anew and the cascading pain lofted him into the edge of shock and unconsciousness.
Cool, wet strokes brought him awake and he jerked as memory returned.
“Lie still, Rudi,” Bodecia said gently. “You’ve opened some of your wounds.”
“Where is moose?” He tried to see all around him.
“Gone. It was probably more scared of you than you were of it. Griz and Kodiak ran it off.”
“Not possible to be more frightened, would have died from fright.”
She laughed. “I’m glad you didn’t lose your sense of humor.”
He tried to smile but couldn’t find it. “I run from a beast, a man I would fight, but from beast I run.”
“If you hadn’t run it would have killed you. That was the only thing you could have done.”
“You are kind. I ran like coward. I have failed person who saved my life.”
“You are being far too melodramatic. That was a cow moose, she had a calf with her, and she thought you were a threat to her baby. If you hadn’t run you would have been kicked to death in moments. I am not presenting puffery, merely facts.”
“Da.”
“How do you feel?”
“As if I may die.”
“Here, drink this.” She held a cup to his lips and he drank deeply. The astringency of the liquid nearly caused him to vomit, but he held it back.
“What is this?” he asked with a gasp.
“Relief.”
Darkness swam up around him, rolled over him, and pulled him down into it. He surrendered without a fight.
15
60 miles south of Delta
Bodecia sat between her two mumbling patients and two drowsing dogs, listening to the birds and wondering how Magda and Lieutenant Yamato were faring. Her daughter was one of the smartest people she knew, but Bodecia had witnessed the spark between the two young people.
“Attraction equals distraction,” she said quietly to the rocks in front of her. She checked the constantly simmering stew and the low fire in a shallow pit beneath it. Her fire made little smoke and the constant breeze pulled it away from them.
She had enough to deal with here; she didn’t want to worry about Magda too. Very vividly she remembered meeting Pelagian the first time and how completely her desire for him blotted out everything else. She smiled at her sleeping husband of twenty-eight years.
Rudi mumbled something and jerked in his sleep. The man possessed devils and she suspected he had not come to terms with all of them. His total loyalty moved her.
Rocks hit other rocks somewhere on the far side of the screening willows and she quickly grabbed the rifle. Gravel crunched under a foot within ten meters of her. Blood pounded in her ears and her hands shook slightly as she aimed the rifle at the noise.
Off to her left a voice said in Russian, “Did you find anything?”
Griz growled deep in her throat and Bodecia quickly squeezed her muzzle. The dog quieted and along with her brother, Kodiak, stared intently toward the sounds, body tensing to spring.
The steps faltered and stopped. “No, Sergeant. Nothing but damned willows and rocks.”
“Come on back,” the first voice commanded. “We need to rig this tow.”
“Yes, Sergeant.” The man walked away toward the disabled armored car.
“Whoever killed them are long gone by now. Probably another DSM ambush.”
Bodecia felt her heart slow closer to normal. Rudi thrashed again and began mumbling. She clamped her hand over his mouth.
If it’s not the dogs, it’s the men!
He subsided and she held the rifle firmly in both hands, waiting to see what would transpire next. Where had they come from? She had heard no engines.
Perhaps the constant breeze had worked against her. She jerked with the realization that if the wind shifted slightly, the Russian soldiers would smell the smoke from her fire. She caved in the sides of the pit on the wispy flames and they ceased to exist with no telltale plume.
She stood as tall as she could and peered around, seeing nothing other than the vast willow forest and the rushing creek.
Where were they?
*
“Take up the tension,” a man’s voice bellowed in Russian. “Don’t snap the cable.”
Bodecia, moving as quietly as possible, continued piling dead brush on top of the parachute. After chopping off all but two thirds of a meter from the support poles, she now tried to disguise their low-profile shelter. The parachute nearly blended with the surrounding area and she stopped, listening intently.
“Make sure it’s in neutral,” the second voice said.
They didn’t like each other, she decided. Good, they both will fixate on their irritation, perhaps relaxing their vigilance.
“That’s the middle position, right, Sergeant?”
“Private Gordonin, if you give me any more shit I’ll break your arm.”
Bodecia smiled at the animosity in both voices. Her enemies were enemies.
“When I wave, you brake for both of us, understand?”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
This time she heard the engine crank up. How had she missed that before?
“We only need to go a few hundred meters, so keep it in a straight line.”
“Yes, Sergeant.”
A few hundred meters? Fear coursed down her spine. She found the strongest willow within sight and carefully climbed the slender trunk.
The Russians moved away from her toward a mass of parked vehicles about three hundred meters away, somewhere between thirty and fifty machines, she thought. Most of the machines had guns of various sizes mounted on them. Another two hundred meters beyond the vehicles squatted clusters of tents with soldiers milling about.
The whole Russian encampment w
as no more distant than the lengths of two soccer fields.
Bodecia eased back to the ground, thinking hard. If they had strayed but a few meters off the path and taken the line of least resistance, they would have walked into the middle of that. But the Russian motor pool lay between the camp and her.
How did they not hear the exchange of gunfire earlier when Pelagian was hit? Between the wind and willows, she decided, much went undetected. Or the gunfire had been ignored as commonplace.
She checked both her patients. Then, taking only her berry bag, hurried off toward the Russian encampment. She moved quickly but quietly, both dogs silently flanking her.
In minutes she saw the dirty brown of military vehicles through a screen of willows. She edged into the open and looked around. Nothing moved.
Bodecia sidled up to a small truck and saw the ignition button waiting to be pushed. But would they hear her? She felt sure nobody would see her, as the truck was much smaller than the tanks and great tracked vehicles between her and the tents.
The wind blew away from the camp, so they probably wouldn’t hear her—unless there was a patrol close by. Throwing caution to the constant wind, she climbed into the back of the truck and surveyed the area.
Nothing moved. She jumped down and swung behind the steering wheel. The engine caught immediately and she pulled out of the rank and turned sharply. In moments she was crashing through the willows.
Maybe we’ll give the kids a lift.
16
48 miles south of Delta, Russian Amerika
“Magda, I need to take a break.”
Welcoming his words, she immediately stopped and sat down next to a tree, leaned on the trunk and let her eyes close. “Okay.”
Both dogs sank to the ground, tongues lolling and eyes watchful.
“Stay where you’re at; I’ll be right back.”
Her eyes flew open. “Where are you going?”
“To add to the water table, okay?”
“Good idea, take your time.” She moved into the trees and relieved herself. She went back to the tree she had been leaning on; it seemed comfortable.
A Steller’s jay squawked irritably from high in a spruce tree, where the incessant wind kept its perch in constant motion. High, puffy clouds dotted the brilliant blue sky. The day sparkled for Magda and she wondered about herself.
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