Battle for the Wastelands Read online

  The steps came closer and faster, faster than Andrew had reckoned. The Flesh-Eater clearly wasn’t being very cautious.

  Andrew raised his body and rifle above the rock. The Flesh-Eater was halfway between the rock pile and Andrew’s hiding place. He had his rifle up.

  CRACK! CRACK!

  The Flesh-Eater’s bullet slammed into the stone near Andrew’s face. Rock bit Andrew’s forehead. Andrew’s shot hit the Flesh-Eater in the stomach. The man sank to his knees screaming.

  Andrew grit his teeth. The man’s screams sounded like those of his mother before the Flesh-Eaters had killed her.

  Andrew’s vision turned red at the memory. He aimed at the fallen man, ready to put one between his eyes.

  “Tom!” the Flesh-Eater sheltering behind the rock pile shouted in a distorted voice. The stooped enemy rose, spraying bullets at Andrew. Andrew retreated behind the huge stone, avoiding the gunfire but not the wounded man’s screams. Andrew scrambled toward the curve, shooting as he moved. The man staggered and shouted, his cries joining his gut-shot buddy’s.

  Andrew ran until he was out of the ravine and atop a hill. There he stopped short. His eyes bulged. Though his mouth worked, no words came.

  Something huge floated in the air ahead. For the first time in years, he saw a dirigible.

  This was much bigger than those the Merrills had sent to take the census and collect taxes. Its watermelon-shaped balloon bore the Flesh-Eater red and black instead of the Merrill green. The blocky engines lining its length were bigger, as was the boxy metal gondola hanging from its belly.

  His gut lurched, but there wasn’t anything left to upchuck. He couldn’t fight this…this thing. Maybe the Flesh-Eaters had sent the troopers to force him toward the dirigible, like hunters driving birds into a net.

  A bullet punched through the side of his stolen uniform, tearing his shirt and drawing blood. Other bullets slammed into the ground nearby, throwing up dust. Andrew threw himself back down the hill, barely holding onto his rifle. A sound like fabric tearing, only far too loud, stabbed his ears. The ground where he’d been exploded. Rocks and dust rained down on him. Hot metal stung his left hand. The offending debris landed in the dirt nearby. Gray bullet fragments mixed with the dust pouring down the hill.

  His mind whirled. The dirigible had some kind of rapid-fire gun. Going up the hill meant death. He looked back. The last Flesh-Eater hadn’t pursued.

  Thank the Good Lord.

  He couldn’t see the dirigible. It probably couldn’t see him. He looked ahead. The hills ran for a long distance.

  He laughed. If he kept behind the hills, he’d stay out of the dirigible’s line of fire. He rose into a crouch and bolted. His back protested, but better that than a bullet.

  Eventually, he risked taking a gander. The dirigible floated in the distance. He was far from where it had shot at him. He looked frantically around. Gray-brown sand interspersed with the occasional plant stretched away to the horizon.

  Some of those plants were big enough to hide a man. Andrew rushed forward and threw himself behind an impressive-looking shrub. He lay on his belly for a long time. No bullets stabbed him or the ground around him.

  He looked back. Streaks of dust rose from the hills behind him to mar the blue sky. Andrew rolled over and raised his rifle. A blunt head emerged, followed by a gray, furry body.

  The ripper looked down. Its brown eyes locked on his. Muscles played beneath its fur. It was tensing to leap, it had to be.

  Andrew kept his rifle up, despite the exhausted trembling in his limbs. He could shoot the ripper if it charged. He snorted. He’d barely managed it last time, and that was before the Flesh-Eaters had run him through the wringer.

  The ripper didn’t attack. It just stared at him. Andrew narrowed his eyes. Was it waiting for him to die?

  “I’m not going to die anytime soon, you furry bastard!” he shouted. “If you’re waiting, it’ll be a right while!” His words did not provoke the beast. It just stood there waiting. “Come on! Do something!”

  The ripper eyed him for a moment longer. Then it turned and shambled away.

  Andrew’s jaw dropped. He was tired and bloodied. Easy prey. He shook his head. Now wasn’t a time to ask why. He should get gone before the ripper changed its mind, or if its mate — if it had one — showed up.

  He looked to the dirigible. It was still there. If he moved, he might attract its attention. He looked back toward the top of the hill. The ripper wouldn’t have gone far. It could still return.

  It would be better to die quickly in a hail of rapid-fire bullets than be torn to pieces by a wild animal.

  He rose to his feet. The dirigible still didn’t move. He took one step, then another. There was no reaction from the enemy airship.

  He quickened his pace. The high plains lay somewhere to the southwest.

  Sweat trickled into Andrew’s eyes. He wiped it away, again. He’d been walking for an hour beneath the sun, now high overhead. He still couldn’t see the beginning of the high plains where the Merrill still ruled. He kept walking.

  Then the ground wasn’t there anymore. Andrew’s left foot sank into empty space. His weight carried him forward. His right heel scraped against the sand and against something curving and metallic.

  The ground bit Andrew’s knees, reopening the old wounds. Andrew screamed. He sat there on the ground for a moment before looking back. What had appeared to be a small hill was really…

  A house.

  A house buried in the sand with only its front showing. Cracked as it was, the siding was still far more refined and smoother than anything Andrew had ever seen in Carroll Town. The gutters that had nearly caught his foot still held, despite being filled with sand. This had to be from the Old World.

  In the center of the structure stood a green wooden door with a tarnished brass knocker and doorknob.

  A momentary grin flickered across Andrew’s thin face. If he’d found this earlier, he and Sam could have gotten inside, found something valuable…

  Sam. Sam was dead in an alley in Carroll Town, torn open by a Flesh-Eater’s knife. Andrew would never see him again. Tears came to his eyes. He swore and blinked them back. He wouldn’t cry, not now.

  The back of his head grew hot as the sun beat down. Andrew’s hand fell to the hot doorknob. He could hide from the sun. He could rest and set off again at night. And if there were valuable artifacts — he’d heard of can openers running by themselves on something called “electricity” — he could barter them with the pikeys. They’d drive a hard bargain, but they might help him.

  He shook his head. That assumed he could get inside for the goddamned can opener. He tried the door. It was locked.

  He shook the handle, hoping time had weakened the lock. That didn’t work. He shook the door harder. The ancient deadbolt rattled, but the door still would not open.

  As Andrew worked, beads of sweat rolled down his arms and his neck. He stopped and raised his canteen to his lips.

  Nothing. He raised the canteen higher, hoping for more water, but none came. He kept rattling the door. It still wouldn’t open. With his remaining strength, he slammed the butt of his rifle into the door. His blow left no marks. He struck the door again. His heart leaped at the sound of cracking wood.

  He’d barely chipped the wood. Goddamn it! He struck the door a third time. Wood cracked, but it wasn’t the door. His gaze dropped to his rifle butt. There was a fine crack, below where he’d inserted the bullets. Not only was he not getting in but he was destroying his weapon! He was too far out for rippers, but the desert had its own perils. Twenty-foot sand snakes. Bandits pushed south by the Flesh-Eaters.

  He could worry about animal and human predators later. Right now his enemy was the sun. He grit his teeth and struck the door again and again, shouting each time. On the fourth blow the wood cracked. A manic grin split Andrew’s face.

  Sand trickled from the damaged door. The house’s roof must have collapsed, letting the desert in.
r />   Andrew screamed and kicked the door as hard as he could. He sank to his knees, the hot sand burning the exposed skin. “Damn it! Damn it, damn it, damn it all to hell!”

  He sat beneath the cracked door for a long time. He shook his head. He wouldn’t wait for death. He would keep going.

  He rose and took off walking. Maybe if he found some pikey traders, he could barter the location for food, water, or transport to where the Merrills laired. The pikeys loved their coin, but they loved Old World artifacts more.

  The house fell away behind him.

  His forehead burned beneath the merciless sun. Andrew looked down, the light hurting his eyes. He’d been marching southwest for hours and the horizon remained the same. Sweat stung his eyes. Andrew wiped it away. Dried blood flaked off his sleeve.

  He looked back. His tracks stretched out behind him, a long line reaching toward his destroyed hometown. He brought up his right hand to shield his eyes from the sun. Only desolation lay before him. He might be able to make it to the ruined Old World building. Its bulk would provide at least a little shade.

  He shook his head. He’d slump down halfway there and fall asleep. The sleep from which none woke. His only hope was to keep walking. Maybe he’d find an oasis? Maybe Merrill soldiers?

  He took another step. His foot caught on something. He jammed the business end of his rifle into the ground to keep his feet. He’d need to check it later. Hopefully he hadn’t clogged the barrel or broken something important. If there even was a later.

  Using his rifle, he forced himself up. He took a few more steps. The sun pounded on him like a hammer on a forge. His skin burned. The world around him spun. He shook his head. The world righted itself. For a moment at least. Red began creeping from the edges of his vision. He trudged on. Each step left him dizzier. He sweated less and less now. He stumbled again, catching himself once more with his rifle.

  I’m going to die.

  The thought came unbidden to his mind. He might well be the last man from Carroll Town to fall, but fall he would, abisselfa in the desert. Dead just like that Flesh-Eater boy.

  He shook his head. He’d hold onto life like the biggest goddamn leech ever spawned. To hell with the Flesh-Eaters.

  His willpower kept him going another few yards. He slumped onto his bloodied knees. His grip on his rifle kept him from falling onto his face. He put one foot under him and tried to do the same with the other, only to find he couldn’t.

  “Damnation.”

  He slid down the rifle until his cheek touched the hot sand. The world grew dark as unconsciousness swallowed him.

  Alonzo Merrill

  A line of horsemen and a few cattle stretched out beneath the tan bluffs marking where the stony badlands met the Iron Desert. Third in the line, behind two bodyguards and ahead of two more, rode Alonzo Merrill, the last man of the direct Merrill bloodline.

  A mounted man broke from the line and rode toward Alonzo. His guards stirred, hands tightening on their repeaters. As the man drew nearer, they relaxed. It was Captain Gerald Ralston, commander of one of the cavalry companies. “Sir, I think you need to know about this.” Alonzo nodded, sweat dripping from under his brown hair. “Per your orders, I’ve been questioning them about what happened at Carroll Town.” Ralston gestured toward the civilians the Merrills had rescued from the Flesh-Eater column scattered among the mounted soldiers.

  “And?”

  “From what they’ve told me, I reckon Grendel and Jasper Clark were there.”

  Alonzo yanked on the reins, bringing his horse to a dead stop. Pain lanced from his left wrist to his elbow where a Flesh-Eater saber had caught him two hours prior. He clenched his fists around the reins, the three clockwork brass fingers the Shoemaker underground smuggled from Jacinto digging into his left palm.

  “Both?” Alonzo demanded, forcing the pain from his voice. His lips pulled back around yellow teeth. Ralston recoiled but kept speaking.

  “Aye. This might be our chance. Not just Clark, but Grendel himself!”

  Alonzo’s hands shook, the pain from his wounded arm fueling his anger. Grendel, the tyrant that ground his family underfoot. Grendel, the one who’d fed his brother John to the monsters of the Blood Alchemy Host and transformed the Flesh-Eaters from a rabble of man-eating hill trash into a dangerous army. Grendel, who’d claimed his little sister as a war prize. He remembered what the one faithful soldier who returned from captivity in Norridge told him, how Grendel threatened prisoners’ lives to make Catalina spread her legs for him…

  Alonzo’s right hand flew to one of the two chest-length braids snaking from the back of his head onto his shoulder. He would cut one when he killed Clark. The other when he killed Grendel. Whenever those glorious days came.

  “How many troopers they got?”

  Ralston grinned. “Not many. The numbers don’t add up, but I’d reckon no more than one hundred. Mostly Flesh-Eaters.”

  Alonzo looked back over his men. If he abandoned the civilians and the cattle and made straight for Carroll Town, maybe he could blitz the relatively small enemy force and get a shot at Clark and Grendel. He grinned at the thought of tearing the two bastards apart.

  He forced himself to slow his breathing, to ponder the wisdom of the suggestion. Grendel likely came by dirigible. He’d need a lot more than the twenty horsemen he had on hand to face even one airship. Even at full gallop, it would take hours to get there. Grendel and Clark would be gone when they arrived. And he needed the cattle taken in the raid and the civilians.

  Alonzo shook his head. “Not risking it.” Ralston nodded. “Keep asking questions. Find out all you can. We might be able to get something out of this.”

  “Understood, sir.”

  Ralston returned to the column. Alonzo returned to his brooding. Unless the two overlords were so kind as to come visiting with minimal protection another time, the chances of him ever getting his final revenge dwindled.

  The Flesh-Eaters tightened their grip on the desert fringe every day. They increased the tribute exacted from the towns they didn’t govern directly and rounded up folk to build forts cutting the region off from the richer farmlands to the north. Many raiding parties had already been repelled and most of those getting in didn’t return.

  He looked back toward the rustled cattle. They’d help feed his people for awhile. The nails digging into the wrists and ankles of his cause had pulled away, but only just. The steel points were still there.

  A mounted man appeared ahead. Alonzo’s guards stirred once more before it became clear the newcomer was friendly. “Sir,” the horseman said. “We’ve found another group of survivors, a fair bit south of here.”

  “How many?”

  “About a dozen. They’re in a poor state and say they’re from Carroll Town.”

  “We’re right far from there.”

  “They were mounted. Women and kids.”

  Alonzo nodded. The survivors they’d rescued said the Flesh-Eater cavalry circled Carroll Town and caught the women and children leaving. Given how the Flesh-Eaters craved live women and kids, it made sense they’d burden their horsemen with prisoners. That’d allow a few mounted survivors to run.

  “Where are they?”

  “Right behind me, sir.”

  The timing brought a small smile to Alonzo’s face. Behind the rider appeared another scout, followed by several bedraggled civilians. Most were terribly sunburned. Some slumped down on their horses’ necks. The conscious ones had the wide, staring eyes of those who’d seen horrors. The horses’ nostrils flared, breathing like blowers on a forge. Their bodies glistened with sweat. If the scouts hadn’t found them, they’d probably be dead within hours.

  Alonzo winced. They’d need to get back to the refuge quickly. He gestured toward the main body of horsemen behind them. “Get them in the column. Give them water.”

  The scouts obeyed, guiding the women and children forward. As the survivors filed past, Alonzo counted out eight women and four kids. He doubted the new ar
rivals would bolster the battle line but he had other work for them. “Anything else?”

  “We also found a Flesh-Eater.” Alonzo pursed his lips. He knew how the Flesh-Eaters recruited their troopers. Perhaps he’d used the chaos of the battle to desert? “He was a lot closer to Carroll Town than the rest. He was on foot.”

  Alonzo snorted. “Definitely a greenhorn if he thought he could cross the desert abisselfa. Was he one of the fanatics?” The rider shook his head. “Good.”

  Although some would gladly kill anyone wearing Flesh-Eater duds, Alonzo knew most Flesh-Eaters didn’t want to be soldiers anymore than his people wanted to be refugees. Deserters made good rebels, and he had a harsh and, thus far, foolproof way to ensure their loyalty. Fanatics, of course, were to be killed out of hand.

  The horseman nodded. “Understood, sir.”

  This Flesh-Eater, whoever he was, would be taken care of and given the opportunity to join the Merrill army. If he refused, bayonets wasted no bullets.

  A Reason to Live

  Andrew’s eyes cracked open. His head pounded. His weight bore down uncomfortably on his lungs. His tongue felt huge in his mouth. Through vision gauzy and tinged red, he saw the yellow sands of the Iron Desert moving several feet below.

  That was strange. He didn’t know what he believed about what happened after death — beyond the fervent hope the Flesh-Eaters got theirs — but he didn’t reckon he’d drift in the desert forever. That’d be an improvement over some stories he’d heard. Legend had it those who died alone in the Iron Desert became ghosts that sought to quench their endless thirst with travelers’ blood...

  Andrew realized his mouth was wet. It had been dry when he’d slumped down to die. He licked his lips, getting the last of the moisture. His lips stung as his tongue touched the sun-cut cracks. The droplets he gleaned tasted like blood.

  Then he realized the ground below him rose and fell. It took a moment to realize he lay across the back of a horse and he was bouncing up and down. His side pressed up against something broad and hard and warm. A rider.