From The Ashes (Life After War) (73 page)

Lee's thin frame bobbed to the surface and was grabbed, hauled up.

“
One more!” the man gasped out, face an alarming shade of red.

“
Where's Doug?” Angela asked.

Adrian saw the water start to settle and responded accordingly. He dove back through the narrow opening.

“
No!”

“
Get him back!”

Angela grabbed Kenn before he could jump in. “It's okay.”

Adrian's head broke the surface as did Doug's a second later. The leader sucked in a quick breath and then dove back under to push.

Doug coughed heavily, clinging to the side, and Eagle hands gripped him anywhere they could get a solid hold.

Adrian heaved from the bottom, Doug's ass centered on his shoulder, and the big man shot out of the water and flopped onto the concrete.

Adrian joined him seconds later, gasping. “We're not... going back... that way.”

Eagles chuckled.

Conner left them alone for a moment, but he never stopped watching the water. He wasn't concerned about the dark tunnel behind him, the one they had to traverse next, but standing water was dangerous. His group hadn't been underground for an hour before learning that brutal lesson.

Eagles were drying off, but they didn't change clothes. Angela followed their lead, despite the way some of their eyes were going over her wet shirt and pants, and then darting away. They couldn't view much through the front, the vest prevented it, but the sides of her clothes clung to damp swells that even in the dark, marked her different than the rest.

“
We should go,” Conner stated.

The scold in his tone was evident, and Angela was a bit surprised when the Eagles responded. Apologetic looks were thrown, and men took steps back.

Adrian swallowed his pride and motioned to the door. “You're the guide.”

Conner immediately took up a double-time run into the darkness.

“
Shit!” Adrian darted after him, catching Angela's wrist to be sure she was next.

Kenn again provided the security sandwich, and the others hurried to catch up.

4

“
This way.”

Conner stopped suddenly, bending down to pull on a moldy piece of wood. A gaping black hole appeared, and the teenager disappeared down into it without a word, making the Eagles frown.

Adrian shined his light as Kyle and Kenn descended ten feet to find Conner standing to the left of the ladder. They were at an intersection where dark, wet and dripping tunnels branched out in four directions.

Conner waited until they were all down and ready, staring at Angela instead of the father he’d begun to lose faith in.

Angela delivered the message silently.
“Always take the farthest tunnel to the left. Those to the left are mostly flooded.”

Angela stopped searching the floor and began looking down the other tunnels they were passing. The bones down here could fill two cemeteries.

“
How many people are down here?” Kenn asked.

“
That depends on what you mean,” Conner said, winding them through stacks of supplies in crates and buckets. Each of these had a large red X on them that the team took to mean ‘spoiled’.

Angela passed these items in curiosity, wondering why they weren't rotting and reeking.

“
We’re not the only ones, but me and the kids don’t have anything to do with most of them.”

His firm statement was accompanied by his footsteps starting into the dimness. “There are thirty-one kids and at least twice that number of adults in our sector, but like I said, we’re not part of their group, and we don’t help each other.”

Adrian was busy noting things. The boy hadn’t been corrupted despite being abandoned. In fact, he was clearly stronger. That protective tone was impossible to miss.

“
You'll take me to talk with them?”

Conner agreed reluctantly, still unable to deny that timbre anything. “Yes.”

There was heavy bitterness in that one word, and Angela’s mind went to the child’s words on the tape.

“
The grownups left us.”

How could they do that? Would Adrian let them into Safe Haven?

“
No, I won’t, but I can’t leave them as hunted animals either.”

Understanding and agreeing, Angela walked between Adrian and Conner so that she could play mediator if it were needed.

“
And because he makes you feel safe,”
the Witch stated.

Angela didn't deny it. Adrian was the light.

“
I have to make a stop,” Conner informed them.

Adrian slowed when Conner did, not arguing.

Behind him, grunts and groans of relief echoed. They'd kept the fast pace for the better part of hour.

“
You guys should be quiet,” Conner stated uneasily.

Angela stayed at Adrian's side as Conner tapped three times on a huge stone door. Set into the wall, Angela thought she would have missed it if Conner hadn't stopped.

“
Who isss it?” a female voice called.

“
Conner–for trading,” Conner replied.

The door immediately began to roll open.

The mission team stared in surprise at the underground market. Shelves and tables, crates and boxes–those were what they picked out first, but the clerks running this bonanza caught and then held their attention.

The women wore some sort of shiny decoration–their boots and long gloves were covered in them. The small sequins caught the light of homemade candles anchored to the damp walls, and cast eerie forms along the tables. The shiny decorations were in their hair and covering the packs they wore on their backs. A few of them even had the decorations sewn over their gray trousers and shirts, giving a sensual, frightening impression of a room full of glinting, dangerous women.

Angela classified them that way for many reasons, not the least of which was the blowguns and rows of needle-darts on their belts. These females knew how to survive, clearly, but the way they'd adapted was amazing.

Conner eased into the room and the adults followed slowly, staring. There was an assortment of fresh fruits and vegetables, and even producing plants for sale, but the 5-gallon jugs of clear water drew Angela over. Apparently Conner needed the same, because he went straight for them, too.

As the team came closer, they realized those decorations were scales and the respect went up. The team hadn't seen the sewer snakes yet, but the size of the skins and the amount of scales the women were using implied that the reptiles were large and numerous.

The clerk behind the low table stepped closer to her stock as she got a look at the hard-asses lingering by the slowly closing door.

“
Three gallons,” Conner instructed.

The clerk's eyes swung back to Conner, and Angela wasn't able to place exactly what it was about these merchants that she didn't like. They wore the same mismatched clothes covered in dirt; they even had the same abused auras, but there was something else...

“
Let'sss see your cash.”

Angela gaped. The clerk sounded like a snake!

Conner pulled the gun from his jacket pocket and slid it onto the plank. “Five bullets left. Use 'em in good health.”

The clerk made the gun vanish before Angela could blink.

“
Deal. Anything elsesss or change?”

Conner pointed toward a basket of dried apple slices. “Use the rest on those.”

“
No meatsss?”

Conner shook his head. “I don't like snake meat. I trap coons and badgers, a rabbit or two when luck's with me.”

The clerk nodded. “As do most since the mutations began showing up in reptiles.” Cara grimaced miserably. “Until we broke free of the prison, rodents and the like were all we had.”

Conner reached out, putting a hand on the woman's arm. “Thank you for the trade.”

She smiled hotly at him, burning with a slightly feverish light she knew he could see, if not sense. “You won't reconsider my previous offer?”

Conner flushed. “No.”

Snake woman took a step back, making his arm fall. “Then stop touching me or the choice will no longer be yours to make!”

Eagles stepped closer at the threat, but Conner only laughed. “Pretend for them, but don't bullshit me, Cara. You're Garret's girl. You won't sacrifice that.”

Cara glared in defeat. “No, but it doesn't stop the want.”

She tried to get herself under control. “What about your friendsss?”

Conner raised a brow.

Adrian opened his hand, revealing a number of small gold and silver ingots. “Whatever you need.”

Conner sneered, but didn't refuse the generosity. “My friends only want to own me, not supplies. Load them up. My father's buying.”

The room went still... and then cold as the snake clerks glared. This was the one who'd left the gifted boy to rot here.

Adrian faced them without anger, but also without guilt. The only one he had to answer to was his son.

5

“
The Major’s coming.”

About to hit his favorite romance scene, Hudson marked his place in the book. It was one of three intact paperbacks he owned–liked to use to make the other bounty men jealous. The Major didn’t want too many of his crew acting smart or thinking, and Hudson was the only one allowed to keep the materials. The fact that Hudson had them booby-trapped and was lethal with his knife had helped that choice.

“
Say it again.”

Despite the fact that he couldn't see much of Embry's face through the bandana he wore unfolded, Hudson disliked it immensely. If not for those sharp brown eyes that were so good at recognizing risky opportunities, Embry would have been placed lower in Garret's crew. Then, Lenore would already be in Hudson's cot at night. Those wide hips and thick legs would be perfect for passing the long nights of waiting for Mitchel to show.

“
Major Garret is coming to talk to you.”

Hudson was instantly uneasy.
He must think the new people are a real threat,
Hudson deduced. Most groups that had come through Little Rock had stayed low and quiet, but this one was the opposite. They had to know they were being followed, but they showed few signs of worry. They might be a harder caliber, and Hudson became glad the Major was on top of things.

“
He's here,” Embry whispered in awed admiration.

Hudson gestured rudely. “Get lost, Em, while we talk.”

Embry spun, sputtering in protest, and the Major supported his XO.

“
Get lost.”

Embry flushed at the order and vanished into the lines of snickering, elbowing bounty hunters that made up Garret's personal guard.

The Major signaled for the lines of men behind him to fall out of sight, and then leaned toward his top explosives man. “Get up to the dam and set a surprise for dawn.”

“
We floodin’ this shit-hole?” Hudson asked. He’d wanted to do that when they’d first arrived here.

Garret confirmed it. “Yes. We’ve been here for months. It’s time to finish it and go.”

“
But our men...” Hudson stated to protest.

“
Have served their time. Give them an honorable discharge. It’s time to roll.”

Garret hated Hudson's way of rubbing his fat, crooked nose when he was deep in thought and switched his attention to something more pleasant–like the blood on Hudson's army boots.

Hudson understood. The Major never left before he got his man, not once in the twenty years they'd been together. “That's Mitchel down there! We're in the homestretch.”

Garret was pleased, but also uneasy at the intelligence. “And that's why you have my right, Hud. Now, do as I said and do it right, like usual.”

Hudson swelled at the praise and went in a fast trot. Life was good.

The line of hunters taking up perimeter places and lying low around the Major didn't react to the order. Garret was as apt to kill as to sleep, but they were wired the same. Sympathy and empathy were things the Major's chosen guards didn't have.

6

It took a little while for the clerks to fill the order. Conner kept pointing to things, and the clerks kept loading the team up. Only Kenn and Kyle weren't given a pack–at Adrian's orders. Those lethal hands needed to be free for protection.

Conner saw the clerk approach Adrian. Cara was glowering despite the nice chunk of profit she and her girls would get from this transaction.

“
If you leave him here this time, he will die,” she stated, scales on her wrist glinting in bright warning.

Shorter than the rest, it was still clear that Cara was in charge. Her scales were brighter–almost golden–and her braids were woven around the top of her head in a coil. Her painted face–heavy blue around both eyes and black lipstick–glared out to make her different. Her marking said ‘pay attention, I'm the leader.’

Adrian took the heavy bag without complaint or answer. He had no intentions of it.

Annoyed at the silence and worried for Conner, the clerk lowered her voice. “The hunters are coming for him!”