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could feel a warm liquid coursing down his cheek, but he didn't know if it was
tears or blood. It touched the corner of his lips and it tasted salty.
Her weight moved off him, and he blinked open his good eye. Rachel stooped and
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the blank socket.
"So much blood, brother-in-law. Such a deep scar, isn't it?"
Ryan didn't trust himself to speak, knowing that his voice would shake with
his pain and anger.
"I think I shall go and kiss my son a fond good-night. After all, I doubt you
could please me with this " she touched him contemptuously with the toe of her
dark blue shoe " this worm." She giggled, the jolt coursing through her body,
making her hyperactive for a brief few minutes. "Know what I do if I see a
worm in my path, brother-in-law? I crush it beneath my heel. Perhaps& No, it
would be a waste. If it was Harvey's pathetic worm, then& "
"Why stay with him?"
"He is the baron, Ryan. You know what that means. After I throttled your
father, Harvey stopped sleeping in the same bed as me, fearing for his
wretched life. And he is right. Now he will soon die. There have been two
attacks already, and the doctor says he cannot live through another."
"In twenty years you could have& "
The woman shook her head, bending to collect her dagger and thrust it back
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into the sheath at her belt. "Not until Jabez was old enough. This ville runs
on fear, Ryan. And now you've come back. All my life here you've been a shadow
on every wall. A listener behind every door, the poison in every dish, the
fear in every dream."
"Now I'm here."
"The older servants prayed to you. We flogged and branded them and still they
believed that one day you'd come back and save them all from& Harvey and from
me. They call me the Lady of Pain, you know, Ryan. Me! This time tomorrow
Harvey will return from the hunt. You and your friends will die in a fine
public ceremony. Soon Harvey will die, and Jabez and I will run the Shens. And
there
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Her voice soared like an eagle as she ranted at the bound man at her feet. She
kicked out at him in a vicious temper, her feet cracking into his ribs,
leaving deep purple bruises.
As quickly as it had come, the anger left her, the wild swinging of moods that
was typical of a jolt junkie. She stood panting, her face growing blank.
"There, brother-
in-law, you made me& Relatives shouldn't anger each other."
"Goodbye, sister-in-law," he managed.
"I came to see you," she said, pausing near the door, "to see if you might be
of use. You could have killed Harvey. That would have been pleasant, wouldn't
it?
All the double-poor stupes that live on our lands would have flocked to
worship at the shrine. Ryan, the miracle baron of Front Royal. You could have
had me as well, brother-in-law."
"Why not?" he asked. Behind her the last of the lamps was guttering out,
making her shadow dance, shift and vanish.
Rachel smiled. "No, Ryan. Not now. You should have been the baron. You and I
could& once& Not now. I know men, Ryan. I know you. You might agree, to save
your skin, then break my neck without a single backward glance. No. You aren't
weak enough."
She pulled at the door handle, pausing a moment in the brightly lit opening to
glance back at him. Then the door slammed shut, and Ryan was left alone in
silence and in darkness.
The blood congealed on the tips of his fingers, around the nails and on the
grazes around his throat from the tearing of the rough iron chain.
As the night wore on, Ryan managed to slip into an uncomfortable slumber,
waking often from the pain of his position. He wondered how the others were
bearing up, thinking specially of Krysty Wroth.
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Ryan also wondered about Lori and Doc Tanner.
Chapter Twenty-Five
"BY THE THREE KENNEDYS!" Doctor Theophilus Tanner exclaimed, tripping over the
gnarled root of an ancient live oak. It had rained, briefly but fiercely, and
the ground had become soggy and treacherous. The low clouds veiled the moon,
making it difficult to see more than ten feet ahead.
"You okay, Doc?" Lori asked, helping him to his feet and wiping ineffectually
at the smears of mud on his black coat.
"Yeah. Just this path doesn't run straight for more than twenty yards at a
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time."
Nate Freeman looked back over his shoulder, face a pale blur ahead of them.
"Want to get nearer than this to the ville 'fore sunup. We're close to
Shersville here, and they might have patrols out, watching for me to head
home."
The clouds parted, and the moon broke through, bathing the region in a bright
silver glow. Doc looked around him, admiring the beauty of the forest, the
rain glistening off the boles of the endless ranks of trees.
"How far?" he asked the young man.
"Sunup or the ville?"
"The dawn's early light."
"Two hours."
"The ville?"
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"Three. If we don't all keep falling over our feet like clumsy old stupes."
"You'll watch your mouth or& " Lori threatened crossly. But Doc patted her arm.
"No, my dear heart. Nathan is right. I must take more care."
"Should have fetched the fast blasters." The girl sighed.
"Safer in the wag," Freeman argued. "You go through your plan to try and get
in the ville then that mini-Uzi and the gray rifle'd have you in the moat
'fore you could say, 'Blessed Ryan spare us.' Know what I mean?"
Doc was thinking about the plan as they walked briskly through the Shens. Part
of it had been his, but he kept forgetting bits of it. He was to be a
traveling quack who was calling at the ville to treat any minor ailments and
to draw teeth. But he'd lost his bag of tools. He could remember all of that.
But Nathan hadn't liked the idea.
He'd wanted to wait and see, to try to sneak some news from those in
Shersville who were still loyal to him. But even the young man had admitted
that there had to be a real risk that Ryan's cover had been blown inside the
ville. Doc had asked how long he thought Ryan would live once Harvey knew who
he was.
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