Into the River Lands (Darkness After Series Book 2) (16 page)

A good half-hour had passed as he worked his way into the thicket and still, there were no more distant gunshots after the second blast that seemed to come from the same shotgun as the first. Mitch thought it might be safe to assume that the shots were unrelated to April’s captors and he certainly hoped that was the case. But the trail he was following was now leading closer to the creek bank, and suddenly the machete cuts had disappeared. Mitch figured the men must have been concerned about the gunshots as well and were working their way closer to the creek in case there was a problem that involved the other guy.
 

They had pushed their way through the brambles here without cutting them, attempting to step on briar vines and push them down out of the way. Mitch had to do the same, but at least the three going before him had made it a bit easier by breaking down the worst of it. Realizing it would be tough using the bow effectively in such dense undergrowth, he swung his father’s rifle in front of him on its sling and held it at the ready. He could drop the bow and bring the carbine into action at a second’s notice if needed, and he was glad he’d made the decision to go back and get it even though it meant losing sight of April. It would do him little good to catch up if he didn’t have the means to quickly and decisively eliminate the threat these dangerous men posed.

He was glad their trail was leading closer to the creek, because it might mean they would rendezvous with the canoe sooner. Every minute that April and Kimberly were out of his sight was a minute anything could happen to them. Mitch wanted this chase to be over before something did.
 

* * *

April pleaded with Kimberly in low whispers to stop crying. She had no idea what was going on downstream in the direction that Wayne had gone. There had been no other sound since that gunshot she’d heard not long after he left, and she guessed at least fifteen or twenty minutes had passed since then. Kimberly had settled down a bit, but was still whining. April could have soothed her by rocking her back and forth, but that was simply too risky in the tippy canoe.
 

She had been focused on quieting her as best she could for the last few minutes when she suddenly got the feeling she was no longer alone. Was Wayne back already? She glanced up to the top of the bank above her, dreading to see him again, but instead was shocked to see a stranger with a heavily bearded face staring down and her and her child. April was so surprised as she recoiled back in shock that she almost lost her balance. The canoe rocked hard beneath her and the rope tugged at her neck, but she quickly frozen and focused her center of gravity as low as possible to counter the roll that would have capsized it if she had not.
 

“Whoa! Be careful there young lady!”

April regained her composure and looked back up. Judging by the whiteness of the man’s beard and long hair that hung over his shoulders, he was at least in his sixties, if not seventies. In his hands, held at the ready but not pointed at her, was a pump-action shotgun. Was this the man who’d fired the shot that sent Wayne off to investigate, and the second unexplained one she’d heard since he left?
 

“How in the world did you get yourself in such a fix? And with that child too? Be still now and don’t you turn that thing over. I ain’t gonna hurt you—neither one of you. Were you with that fellow with the bow and arrow?”

“Yes! He’s the one who left us tied up. Where is he? He can’t be far away and he’s coming back any time!”

“He ain’t far away, that’s for sure. But he ain’t coming back neither, don’t you worry about that.”

“You saw him? Who are you? What are you doing out here?”

“Name’s Benny Evans. Yeah, I saw him. I saw him shoot my boy with one of them dad-blamed arrows he had! It’s the last one he’ll ever shoot though, I’ll tell you that. I hope he wasn’t your man or something like that, young lady.”

“You killed him? Oh thank God! Is your son…?”

“Yeah I killed him; deader than a stump. My boy’s okay. That arrow just got him in the arm.”

“I’m sorry he got hurt, but I’m glad he’s okay though. That man was a murderer. They came into our camp this morning. They left my husband either dead or dying, I still don’t know. They were taking me and my daughter someplace downstream.”

“Wait a minute, you said ‘they?’ You mean there’s more of them? Where? How many are there?”

“Yes! There are three more that were with him this morning, but please! Cut me loose before this canoe turns over and my baby drowns!”

April saw the man glance nervously around him as he drew a large knife from a sheath on his belt.

“Don’t worry, they’re not nearby. They’re somewhere on the other side of the creek, on foot. I turned my ankle and couldn’t walk, that’s why the one you shot was taking us down the creek in the canoe. He was going to meet up with them again where we were stopping tonight.”

Hearing this, April saw Benny relax a bit. His knife parted the line securing her neck to the branch above and she felt an immediate wave of relief wash over her.
 

“Hold on now while I find a way to climb down there. I’ll cut you the rest of the way loose in a jiffy.”

“I am so glad you’re here! I can’t tell you how afraid I’ve been for my child! I don’t know how I would have gotten away from that man on my own, and especially not all four of them.”

“There’s a lot of people turned bad since the lights went out, young lady. I don’t know where you came from or how you made it this far, but it ain’t easy staying alive with all the desperadoes running around that’ll do most anything. That’s why we’re out here. Me and my boy have been in the woods for going on six months.”

April had a good feeling about Benny Evans despite his rough appearance. She knew it was risky to trust anyone these days, precisely because of what he just said. But there was just something about him that her intuition told her was okay. He was not like Wayne and his partners, and hearing that Wayne was dead was the best news she’d had since this entire ordeal began. She wished all four of them were dead, but it was enough that she was free of him. As long as she never saw the other three again that was all that mattered.
 

With difficulty, Benny managed to get down the steep, cliff-like bank the same way Wayne had climbed up, using exposed roots as handholds. He had slung the shotgun over one shoulder to do so, and she noticed the homemade strap was some kind of animal skin, with fur on one side. He was wearing moccasins too that looked like something he’d made himself. There was no place to stand at the base of the bank and the water was too deep here to wade in, so he climbed directly into the canoe, taking care not to upset it as he lowered his weight to the rear seat Wayne had occupied before.

“I hope you don’t mind me coming aboard,” he smiled, looking at her first and then at Kimberly, who had quieted down now that she could feel her mother’s touch again.

“We’re delighted to have you aboard, I can assure you,” April smiled back at him as she extended her trussed-up hands so he could slice the binding that held her wrists together. When his blade freed her, she threw the cut lashings overboard and asked to use the knife herself to cut away the rest of the ropes holding her ankles, which would have been difficult for him to get to without risking the balance of the canoe. Benny gladly obliged, handing it to her handle first. He kept a respectful distance in the other end of the boat, watching patiently as she finished freeing herself.
 

The knife was perfectly balanced in her hand, and April couldn’t help but notice that it was beautifully crafted and clearly hand-made by a skilled blade artisan. Her father had passed down to her his appreciation of well-made blades through the hundreds of hours of martial arts instruction he’d shared with her, much of it knife-focused. Though Ben’s knife wasn’t a fighting-style blade and was closer in design to the skinning knife Mitch favored, it was still perfectly balanced and in her trained hands she knew it would be highly effective. That this stranger trusted her with it in the close confines of the canoe made her feel even better about him, though she had already chosen to trust him and believe his story of his encounter with Wayne as soon as he related it. She knew that in part, it was a natural reaction to feel better about
anyone
after being at the mercy of a man like Wayne for most of the day.
 

With her hands and feet free and Kimberly held close against her breast with one arm, April passed the knife back to Ben. She assumed he would leave now; after all, his son was injured and needed his help and she wouldn’t presume to ask more of him. It was enough of a miracle that he came along when he did. She shuddered to think how things would end if no one ever came and she could not find a way to get free of Wayne’s ingenious restraint.
 

“Where were you going, you and your husband, before those fellows came along and did what they did?”

“We were looking for a friend,” April said. “A good friend of mine who helped me back when the blackout first happened. He lives on a remote farm not too far from here, but I couldn’t find the path that connects it to the creek. He is the son of a game warden, and a real expert in hunting, tracking and everything else to do with the woods. We would be safe there, and he would welcome us in, but I think we came too far downstream.”

“Sounds like the kind of fellow that would be a good friend to have in times like these. Me and my boy have been making do okay out here for ourselves. But we haven’t been any farther upstream yet. We were planning to go, looking for better hunting. In fact we were breaking camp this afternoon, looking to move out before dark. I killed a hen turkey just a while ago, before that fellow with the bow showed up.”

“That was the shot we heard then,” April said. “That’s why he stopped here, because he didn’t want to paddle around the bend and run the risk of being seen.”

“I reckon not. It wouldn’t look good to nobody to be seen paddling down the river with a young woman and her baby girl all hog-tied like that. Say, our camp is just right around the bend. This is a hard place to get out of the boat right here anyway. Why don’t we paddle down there and I’ll introduce you two to my son. I need to check on him, and then we can talk. Me and Tommy have a canoe too and we can help you get back upstream if you like. We were going that way anyway and I’d hate to think about you and that little girl out here alone. How far up do you think it is to the place they left your husband?”

“I don’t know how far in miles, but we’ve been in the canoe for hours. It’ll take a long time to paddle there against the current, if it’s even possible. I don’t know if he’s alive, but if he isn’t, I need to bury him. You’ve done so much for us already, killing that monster, especially. I’d hate to put you and your son at more risk. Those other three are just as bad as he was, and when he doesn’t show up where we were supposed to meet, they’re gonna be looking for him. And they were probably close enough to hear your shots anyway. If they did, they could be heading this way right now.”

“Then we’ll get Tommy and throw our stuff in our canoe and go. We’ll take both of the boats and head upstream right away. They won’t be looking in that direction I don’t suppose.”

“No, I think you’re right. It would be the last place they would look. They’re gonna think Wayne took us and kept going downstream to wherever that camp is they were taking us to. They were already unhappy about splitting up, and they thought he wanted to keep us for himself. If you’re sure you want to do this, we’ll go, but we need to get out of here fast.”

Twenty-four

G
ARY
H
AGGARD
CURSED
UNDER
his breath as he battled the nearly impossible thickets of briar vines that slowed their progress to a crawl. If not for the two nearby gunshots, he would have hacked his way through these thickets without hesitation, taking a chance of a random encounter rather than creep along at this excruciating pace. But the chances of trouble were more than random now. Two gunshots in the direction of the creek that Wayne was traveling with their prize was simply something that could not be ignored. Whatever he had to do to get there, Gary was determined to reach the banks of Black Creek again and stick to the stream course until they were all back together.
 

But these briar patches that grew up in these areas of blow-down were worse than any he’d ever seen. Patches of blackberry and other thorny vines grew ten feet tall or more, their long, grabby tendrils reaching out in all directions and twisted together in impenetrable tangles. They grabbed at his BDU trousers and shirt, and raked the exposed skin of his face and hands, drawing blood as he impatiently forced his way through them. The worst ones required coming to a complete stop, delicately lifting the vines free of his clothing by grabbing them between thorns as carefully as possible. He would then pass it to Jared, who would duck under and pass it in turn to Paul. It was infuriatingly slow, but the only way to traverse this mess without making noise.
 

“How did we ever wind up getting this far from the creek?” Jared whispered, equally exasperated and tired of dealing with the briars.

“It’s easy to do in woods like this,” Gary whispered back. “The way it bends and all these sloughs that run into it. It’s hard to follow the lay of the land; a lot harder than in the open country over there. At least in the mountains and desert, you can see where you’re going.”