The two warriors lowered their spears and thrust, forcing Logan to duck and roll between them. One of his claws sliced the shin of the enemy on the left. The man leapt back, yelping. A painful wound, but not crippling.
Lupo held back. Momentarily free of the chaos, he lifted his head and howled.
More howls answered him from the jungle shadows.
The pack had been downwind. Logan hadn’t detected
x-mm
them earlier. He’d hoped the two-legged enemies would be the only ones involved in the light. Oh, well. This just made it more interesting. He’d just have to be efficient.
The man with the wounded leg was still stumbling back. Logan went for the other one.
The bugger was fast, he had to give him credit. The spear tip came straight at his guts too quickly to avoid getting poked.
So Logan didn’t even try to evade. He twisted just enough to take the impact in his side, where his adamantium-laced ribs deflected the spear. The maneuver brought him inside of his attacker’s guard. One punch to the solar plexus took him out.
Logan whirled. The gash in his side burned. Blood poured dowh, a streak of crimson from ribs to knee. He’d survived much worse, and his mutant healing ability would take care of the wound soon enough. Without slowing down, he charged the final savage.
This man wasn’t as fast. His spear thrust missed. He was stronger, though. His punch to Logan’s jaw landed like a sledgehammer. Logan returned the favor. His opponent’s jaw, not being enhanced with unbreakable metal, didn’t hold up as well as the X-Man’s had. Logan kicked him away. Four down. •
His skull still rang. Stars twinkled across his field of vision. Lupo raced in, knocked Logan down, and chomped his forearm. Before Logan could jab, the mutate was rolling past, into the clear.
“Afraid to dance up close?” Wolverine taunted. He shut out the pain of the bite as he had the spear wound, though both were still costing him blood. He pretended the blow to his head hadn’t happened.
“I will serve your flesh to my pets for dinner,” Lupo snarled. He pranced through the fems, just out of Wolverine’s range, eyes glittering.
Logan paused, expecting another charge, and realized his error. Lupo wasn’t intending to follow up. He was stalling for time.
The wolves! Vines and shrubbery erupted. Four huge dire wolves vaulted toward the X-Man.
Logan went to ground, covering his exposed face and elbows. Sharp canine teeth savaged him, seldom penetrating thanks to his uniform, but subjecting him to a world of hurt.
The beasts were fast, and accustomed to taking down creatures larger than humans. Logan entered an eye-of-the-hurricane calm—the clarity of pitched battle. Decisions came to him so instantaneously, as effective as any meticulous calculation, but without the need for self-debate.
Too many snapping jaws. Too fast. Couldn’t slash at them, because they’d be somewhere else by the time his claws got there. Had to strike where they would be.
He tilted his head back, exposing his throat. Then he slashed. Tchuk! The animal had been unable to resist plunging into the opening. Now its side was gashed, and though the wounds were survivable, it wanted only to get away.
Logan grabbed the suffering canine and used its body to block the healthy wolf on his left. That left two on the right. He jabbed at the first, kicked at the other. They yelped and darted backward.
Another momentary opening. Logan flung the bloody one into the pair that had retreated and charged the solo animal. One, two. Blood spurted from the target’s snout and from its front shoulder. It screamed and bolted.
The other two jumped Logan from behind, locking teeth into his legs. He went with the impact, rolling and lashing out with his talons. The lovely, wet sound of sharp points penetrating meat echoed off the jungle fronds.
The wolves tucked tail and ran. Red blood stained the ferns as they pelted past.
Lupo turned as if to follow, but Logan shrugged aside the disorientation of head blows and lost blood and caught him in three bounds. They tumbled over a rotting log, littering the air with fungi spores and humus.
Wolverine came up on top, knee on Lupo’s stomach. He pressed a closed fist under the mutate’s jaw. “Snikt,” he said, mimicking the sound of his claws extending.
Lupo’s feral eyes went wide. “Don’t kill me!” he blurted.
,His plea wasn’t quite desperate enough. Without relaxing his hold, Logan glanced behind.
One of Lupo’s human accomplices—the one with the pile driver punch—was charging forward, still alive despite a broken jaw and capable of delivering one last, potent spear thrust.
Before Logan could react, a tomahawk whirled in from the side, caving in the attacker’s head behind his ear. His spear burrowed into the log. Logan took the impact of the stumbling body, but it didn’t knock him off of Lupo. He flung away the spasming remains with a shake of his torso.
“Yer late,” he called. “Y’almost missed the fun.”
Gelm and Aben emerged from the vine-laced trees. Gelm picked up his hand-axe and began wiping off the blood, dirt, and brains from its edge. The two men nodded and flashed the Lake People sign of vengeance—a closed fist held inside the other palm.
“You knew him, eh?” Logan said. That eased his mind about the death. The man apparently had been doing bad
things for a while—long before Sauron could possibly have coerced him. The skull crushing had been deserved.
No smiles from either tribesman, Logan noted. Right. Gotta save the smiles for enemies who were still alive and awake to appreciate it.
Like this dogsled whelp here.
Logan leaned down, staring eye to eye at Lupo’s Lon Chaney Jr. face. “I’d love t’finish the job, but I need you alive for the time bein’. Tell me where to find green beak. The X-Men need to have a few words with ’im.”
Lupo growled.
Wolverine held up his right hand with its projected claws, then twitched his left, the one under Lupo’s jaw, as if to skewer his captive through both carotid arteries.
“I don’t know,” Lupo said through clenched teeth. “Wrong answer,” Logan said. “How couldja not know? Yer workin’ for ’im, ain’tcha?”
“I meet with the master at places and times of his choosing. I am not privileged to know where he lurks the rest of the time. I stay in the jungle. He—I don’t know where.” “Don’t sound likely,” Logan muttered. “I think you’re lyin’.” He pressed harder on Lupo’s larynx.
“I’m not.” The mutate coughed. Wolverine reduced the pressure. A little. “Only Brainchild is with him.”
“Where’s the next rendezvous? When?”
“I don’t know!”
“Bull!” Logan spat. “How could you not know thatT’
‘ ‘The master hypnotizes me. I only know where to go, and when, after I’m there.”
Logan scowled. He glanced at Gelm and Aben, who wore rapt gazes of anticipation. They probably thought they were going to witness the execution of one of their people’s most infamous tormenters. Logan would have liked to accommodate them. Unfortunately, Lupo’s story was believable. Sau-ron’s powers of hypnotism were easily strong enough to do the job. The X-Man lifted his hand away.
“We’ll get what we need out of you one way or another,” Wolverine promised. He dragged Lupo toward a fallen tree, where the jungle canopy was open enough for his flight-capable teammates to land, and coded his wrist radio to transmit.
CHAPTER 5
yrjfT^ he bathing facilities were everything that Ka-Zar
III promised. The Savage Land could pamper a woman
B after all, once she knew her way around.
Psylocke stood beneath a misty, ten-foot waterfall, rinsing the shampoo—no going native there, she’d brought her own—from her long, dark hair. A stone’s throw away, two village women relaxed on a natural stone shelf in knee-deep water near the banks. A trio of adolescent girls were swimming in the center of the pool, giggling at the fish tickling their ankles.
Apparently midday baths were a popular custom here. A way of combating the heat of the jungle. Betsy exchanged smiles with the women from time to time, but didn’t speak. To communicate would have required her to telepathically borrow knowledge of their language. For the moment, she preferred mental solitude. She wanted to partake of the loveliness of the setting as much through her own perceptions as possible.
The women were all fit and strong. The rigors of life in the Savage Land didn’t encourage flabbiness. Betsy knew her ninja-trained body compared well in the buffed-and-beautiful department, but she was envious nonetheless. They could gambol about in a place such as this every day, unassailed by holier-than-thous insisting they had to sequester their loveliness inside swimsuits, denature their skin with layers of sunblock, swim only where insurance companies allowed.
The water poured down over her bare skin. Glorious. She slipped into deeper water and paddled over to a side pool. There a natural hotspring bubbled to the surface. She found the spot where the scalding water and the cool river mingled to produce just the right temperature to soothe her muscles without parboiling them. She sighed and reclined, lower body and back in the water, her head and chest floating just above the waterline. "•
No men around. In a way, that was peculiar. The tribeswomen didn’t let modesty get in the way of mixed company in the village itself. A loincloth was apparently complete or even excessive attire for anyone but chieftains, elders, and shamans. Perhaps the center of the day was simply ladies’ hour at the spa.
• She would have to lure Warren here if they had a chance once the mission was over.
A figure did appear through the rhododendrons that bordered the end of the path from the village.
“You look very relaxed,” Shanna declared in a critical tone. She put her hands on her hips.
Betsy sank down until the water covered her to her neck. “A little revitalization will make the afternoon’s interviews go better.” People who couldn’t read minds never understood how draining the effort was.
“I see,” Shanna said curtly. “Well, if you’re done recharging your batteries, you might want to hurry back to the lodge. While you’ve had your wrist radio off—” she gestured with not a little irritation to the pile of garments and accouterments lying on the bank “—Wolverine called in. He’s captured Lupo. Storm and Archangel are bringing them in. Ka-Zar said to tell you you’re wanted to help with the interrogation.”
“Of course. On my way.”
The She-Devil vanished into the shrubbery before Psy-locke reached the pool’s edge. Betsy pursed her lips, but decided it was just as well Shanna had declined to serve as escort. Betsy knew she wouldn’t have been able to resist tossing a little grease on the fire of their relationship. She had glanced deeply enough into Shanna’s recent memories to know that Ka-Zar had not sent his wife with the errand, as had been implied. Ka-Zar had been going to deliver it himself, until Shanna had heard that Psylocke was located at the bathing pool.
Psylocke arrived at the center of the village just as Storm landed with Wolverine. Archangel sailed in moments later, carrying the bound-and-gagged mutate.
“Quick work,” Betsy complimented Logan. She winced at the bloodstains on his side and the swollen arms dotted with teeth marks. No wounds, though—they had long since healed over. “Looks like you need a breather.”
Logan grinned. “Nah, I’m on a streak. Wanna go back out.”
“Logan .. .” said Ororo.
“I’ll stiffen up if I stop now. I’m good for the rest of the day if I get back to it.’ ’
“The drums just reported that the Swamp People spotted warriors on pterosaurs over their territory,” Ka-Zar said. “They landed briefly. When they took off again, the reptiles weren’t carrying as many riders.”
The X-Men leader nodded her head. “Very well, old friend. I can’t argue with success. I’ll take you there shortly.”
Psylocke leaned over Lupo. The mutate glared back. Lord, what a vile mind. He was fantasizing what he would do if the tables were reversed. Especially if he had her or Storm or Shanna helpless and staked out on the ground. Beneath the bravado simmered a thick streak of fear, because he understood that the tables were not turned, and he was worried that one or more of his captors would prove as unprincipled as he.
Psylocke sent out a sharp mental whipstroke, disrupting the ugly images, reinforcing the fear, demonstrating in reduced measure what her psychic knife would feel like. Lupo yelped.
Storm turned to Psylocke and raised her eyebrows.
“He needed that,” Betsy explained. “That and a lot more.”
' ‘“I’m sure he did. You’ll have an opportunity to, ah, ‘reeducate’ him this afternoon. We need your telepathy to find out what he knows.”
“Logan couldn’t make him talk?” Betsy said wonder-ingly.
Wolverine shrugged. “Sure he talked. Not enough.”
Storm explained. “Sauron has apparently placed a hypnotic block upon any knowledge of his hideout. Lupo can’t tell us what he doesn’t consciously recall. But given time, you can reach in deeper than he can himself, true?”
“I certainly can.” Betsy said it forcefully, so as to intimidate her enemy. Internally she was cringing. She hated having to delve into minds as unappealing as that of the mutate.
“Good. If it turns out Lupo genuinely has no knowledge of Sauron’s hideaway, he must know where they are next scheduled to rendezvous. We want to be able to be there at that time and place to ambush Sauron.”
“You can depend on me,” Psylocke said.
“The rest of us will continue our searching. If you learn anything, call us in by radio.” Storm turned to Logan. “I’ll take you to the location the Swamp People mentioned. You can search the jungle while I scout the vicinity by air to see if the pterosaur riders reappear. Warren can proceed with the broader air reconnaissance.”
Ororo grasped Logan, summoned her winds, and vaulted them both aloft. Psylocke watched them shrink into the distance. Leaning back against Warren affectionately, she said to Ka-Zar and Shanna, “Logan was pushing the limit like that even when his healing factor was down to banked embers. Sometimes I think the only thing that could ever slow him down is having no pain to overcome.”
‘‘You speak as if you envy him,” Shanna said. “Not enough suffering in your life?”
Betsy sighed. “That’s not what I’m saying.”
“Shanna knows precisely what you’re saying. She’s just being rude,” Ka-Zar said. He ran his fingers along a pale white scar that ran down one of his forearms. “We all know there is something compelling about a life of challenges. Otherwise we’d all be lolling about on chaise lounges right now, listening to the latest Lila Cheney hit on our boom-boxes and contemplating when to take the cat to the vet for a check-up.”
Shanna didn’t correct Ka-Zar, but she gave him one of those you-didn’t-support-me-in-the-argument scowls that came so easily to her features. She took him by the elbow and drew him away. “We have to check in with some of our scouts down by the lake. Good luck with the captive.” By the time Ka-Zar, Shanna, and Zabu were out of the stockade, the villagers had finished stuffing Lupo in a cage.
x-mm
They put him to one side of the circle, on packed ground, and erected a quick bamboo scaffold, placing cut palm fronds over it as a canopy.
Psylocke knew from a mental glimpse that they were going to all this trouble to secure him in the open because they didn’t want the mutate in any of their huts or in the lodge. According to their beliefs, their enemy’s spirit could contaminate the structures. Betsy had no objection to the arrangement. Outdoors, the sodden air didn’t cling so much, thanks to the breeze.
Warren examined the junctures of the cage. ‘ ‘For primitives, they know how to make sturdy enclosures.” He shook the scaffold. As rapidly as it had gone up, it, too, was sound. One good whack with his metal wings might chop through the bamboo, but Lupo, for all his feral strength, would not be
breaking out, even assuming he freed himself from the leather bindings that enclosed his wrists and ankles, or from the muzzle over his snout.
“You needn’t fret over me, lover,” Betsy said, caressing his waist. “But you are welcome to stay and guard me if you like.”
“No. You’re safe enough here. I can’t stay.”
She understood. If he remained, it would reinforce Logan’s suggestion that Warren lacked the backbone to face Sauron. He needed to be up in the sky, actively searching, not down in the huts with his woman.
“Take care, then,” she said, and kissed him. He savored it, hugged her close, and then he was flapping his way toward the unbroken ceiling of mist.
She really loved him. She was still amazed after all these months to find that this was true. And she would keep loving him, Ka-Zar’s appeal notwithstanding.
“Now,” she said, settling down in the shade near the cage—but not so near that Lupo could reach her, “We’ll see what information you have to offer.”
Lupo snarled and wriggled across the packed earth, trying fruitlessly to avoid her psychic probe. He could roll himself all the way to the river and it would do him no good. His memories opened to her.
The boy’s tears made muddy tracks down his cheeks. He cowered from Monom ’s kicks. Monom, at least thirty years old to his own eleven. Monom, heavily muscled and in his prime. And he, scrawny, undernourished, and sickly.
“She’s dead, Rat-Tail. Look closely. Mama’s not here to whine about me giving you what you deserve. You’re an 'orphan now.”
Rat-Tail peered out through eyelids nearly swollen shut from the blows Monom had delivered to his head. His mother, a bony, ill-groomed woman whose dirty hands and sharp tongue had rained abuse upon him marly every day of his life, lay staring sightlessly at the entrance of the family cave, flies already buzzing around her gaping mouth.
Rat-Tail hated his mother. Not for the beatings and scoldings. For dying. Bad as she was, she was his only advocate and protector. She had found one last way to betray him to the enemy.
‘ ‘On with you, ’ ’ Monom roared, kicking him toward the cave opening. The boy stumbled forward. He paused under the last of the overhang, shivering at the pelting thunderstorm outside.
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