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Doc cleared his throat. "That has always been the sign, throughout history, of
desiring a parley. It is called a flag of truce, you know."
"Yeah, Doc, I know. I also know that it could be a kind of trick. Take us off
guard." He turned to the Armorer. "J.B., tell everyone to get on triple-red."
"Sure."
THE WAG LOOKED like it had started life as half of a pickup truck and half of
an unidentifiable green saloon. Old welds showed a vivid orange around the
body, and some rusted steel plates had been clamped on at the front and flanks
to give it some measure of protective armor plating. A ragged white sheet
fluttered from a side window.
It advanced hesitantly across the dunes, through the scrub, finally stopping
about two hundred yards from the entrance to the institute. Blue smoke pouring
noisily out of its fractured exhaust.
"Make sure the watchers around the back are keeping their position," Ryan
called, getting a wave of response from Dean, who'd been appointed combat
runner.
Tomwun had joined Ryan just inside the gate, squinting through gaps in the
wall.
"What do you think they want?"
"You guess, and it'll be as good as mine. Reckon we'll find out soon."
A small metal flap opened on the driver's side of the wag, and they all heard
a loud, confident voice booming out.
"I hear that Ryan Cawdor leads the defenders of this place. True?"
The voice was rich and deep, with a hint of an accent that placed the man some
ways north up the Sippi.
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Ryan leaned against the gate, making sure that he didn't expose himself to any
snipers that Yoville might have concealed in the brush.
"You hear right. We met?"
"You rode with Trader. Soon as I heard about the one-eyed man being around, I
guessed it was you. Met up near Norleans, five, mebbe six years back. Did us a
deal over some bales of cloth and some good drinking liquor. But one of my
people got greedy and there was trouble. You recall it, Cawdor?"
"Yeah. Finished with two good men getting ambushed from the bayous. Shot in
the back of the head when there was supposed to be a deal."
A bellow of laughter. A hand waved, and Ryan glimpsed a flash of bright red
material on the sleeve. "Deals aren't for you and me, Ryan. Deals are for the
little people."
J.B. nudged Ryan. "I recall the son of a bitch now. Wasn't called Yoville
then, but he wore red shirt and pants. Should've remembered that."
Ryan nodded, raising his voice again. "What do you want, Yoville?"
"Talk."
"Why?"
"Before the blasters open up. You got no chance in there, Cawdor."
"So why talk? Just come ahead."
Another laugh. "Sure. Full of tricks like that. I'll send in my right-hand
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man, and one other. See if you can hear some good sense. For both of us."
"Send them in."
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"No tricks? We got a deal here, Cawdor? Be a blood price if you don't deal
right."
"Send them in," he repeated.
"Want me to go out and try and chill that red-clothed bastard in his wag?"
J.B.
asked.
"No. Let's hear what they got to say. Might find out more than they intend."
Yoville was getting impatient. "Hotter than the fucking hobs of hell out here.
Can
I send them in?"
"Yeah. Only two." Ryan turned to the others. "Keep them covered and make sure
the watch is alert on the other sides. Trust Yoville about as far as I could
piss molasses."
THE SENIOR OF THE TWO emissaries was a stocky man in his mid-thirties, with
slanted eyes and a totally bald head. He wore a olive green satin blouse
tucked into filthy white pants. His feet were bare. He had a superb flintlock
pistol, beautifully engraved, tucked into his belt. It was one of the oldest
blasters that
Ryan had ever seen.
His name was Kim.
The other pirate was a young woman, barely out of her teens. Her name was Meg,
and she stood over six feet tall. Her eyes were so deep a brown that they
verged on black. She wore a divided skirt in cerise cotton and an embroidered
blouse, and like Kim, she was barefoot.
In her wide leather belt she carried a nondescript automatic that had
obviously been pieced together from four or five other guns.
Meg would have been very beautiful if it hadn't been for the fact that someone
had taken a broken bottle to her face with murderous effect. The first blow
had circled her left eye, surrounding it with a vivid, puckered scar, while
the second
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had removed part of the side of her nose and gouged away the corner of her
mouth, giving her a permanent, twisted smile.
But her body had a lithe, feral grace that instantly attracted Ryan's passing
interest. The thought crossed his mind that the young woman would be just as
likely to slice off a man's genitals as to make love. She caught the
expression on his face and spit in the sand at his feet.
"Easy, Meg," Kim warned. "Cap don't like us do dat sort of thing here."
"Then he can keep he cunting pity to heself. Man scarred like he should be
caring."
Both of them had the same strange, lilting patois that the yellow-shirted man
had used, the man whose corpse had been heaved into the surf and left for the
scavengers.
It was Kim who did the talking, insisting he would speak only with Ryan
Cawdor.
"He t'man here say Cap Yoville. White coat just man him piss sittin' down like
girly."
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