Dread Brass Shadows

42

I guessed it was just past midnight. We were a mile from Chodo's place, which was easy to see. "Party must be roaring," I observed. "Either that or there's a forest fire over there."

"We're coming in from the north, we better head over there, move in closer later."

"Yeah. Better stay behind this ridge, too. Never know who might spot us if we don't." We were in a vineyard. There were grapegrowers' houses nearby.

"You said that already."

"You said that about heading north three times, too." "You nervous, Garrett?"

"Yeah. You?"

She seemed cool. "Scared shitless."

"It doesn't show

"You learn

The sky went berserk toward Chodo's place. I said, "Sounds like the morCartha brought their show to the country." We couldn't see them, light or no, with the ridge in the way. We decided not to go over and look. Everybody at the kingpin's place would be out gawking.

We found us a comfortable jump-off place fifty yards north of Chodo's property line. The morCartha were still at it, off and on. "Those flying rats could wake the dead," I grumbled.

"We got time to kill. We're ahead of schedule." The plan was to wait for Crask and Sadler to draw the thunderlizards around front once they gave up on me and decided to take their best shot. Then we'd move, hoping my amulet still worked.

"Yeah." I tried making sense of the racket. "I don't like that." I stood up. Standing, I could see the occasional dot swoop through the light over the kingpin's house. A deadly battle over there, near as I could tell. "Why did they bring it out here?"

"Oh, sit down and sweat blood like I am."

If there was no attack by Crask and Sadler, or none we could detect, we would move about three o'clock, the coolest hour of the night, when the thunder-lizards would be sluggish. With them slow and maybe ignoring us on account of my amulet, we'd only need to worry about dogs, armed guards, booby traps, and whatever I didn't know about.

Winger laid back and stared at the stars. "Be enough light, anyway. I can handle the dogs. Better hope those morCartha clear off, though."

I grunted. Dogs make me nervous. Not afraid, just nervous.

"You got a special woman, Garrett? That little Sparky, hanging around your place?"

"Sparky?"

"The carrot top. I put the name Sparky on her in my own head."

"Oh. Yeah. I have one or two."

"One or two?"

"Tinnie Tate. The one who got stabbed. And one named Maya I kind of like. I haven't seen her lately."

"I heard some about her. People talk. Besides them two. Anything going? You got kind of a rep that way, you know."

"Highly exaggerated, I'm sure. Those things have a way of getting blown out of proportion. Nah. Nobody else special. Except maybe Eleanor."

"That Sparky?"

"No. The blonde on my office wall. She's a good listener."

"Nothing going with Sparky, eh?"

"Just wishful thinking. Why?"

"No reason. Just wondering. We got time to kill

What? "Oh." Sometimes I'm real slow. I started fumbling for excuses that wouldn't leave any hurt feelings. "I don't know. Condition I'm in .

Boy, howdy! Who'd a thunk it... ?

Winger started grabbing stuff. "Somebody coming. And we're running late."

No lie. Me, the mission-oriented old Marine, forgot why I was out in the middle of a grape orchard freezing my aching body in the wee hours. You betcha. My weakness again. When that Winger decided to be a woman, she popped and sizzled Sparky...arla Lindo had nothing on her then.

Amazing. Utterly amazing

"Easy, Garrett." Dark shapes drifted closer. "Crask and Sadler."

Winger and I finished our scrambling around. Those two settled on the hillside. Crask said, "Sneaky, sneaky Garrett. You was supposed to meet us around front. We'd've never found you, wasn't for all the puffing and snorting.

"Easy, lady," Sadler said "Easy. Ain't gonna be no trouble. I don't blame you for not showing, Garrett. Not after this afternoon."

"You heard, eh?"

"Yeah. Some. We was too late to save your ass. We did try. We figured you was gone and counted you out when we heard about the coach and the thunder-lizard."

Crask said, "Bunch of farmers took it down right after sundown, you care about that. They was still skinning it when we come out."

Sadler continued, "Along about sundown we heard from a friend what seen you talking to the sheela here. We counted you out anyhow."

Crask said, "You got to be the luckiest bastard that ever lived. We changed the whole plan when we heard about the coach. Then we changed it again when we heard you was alive."

Sadler said, "We figured we wouldn't show where you was supposed to meet us, just in case you did. But we'd watch, and then we'd follow you in when you went."

"Follow me? What made you think I'd do it on my own?"

"You got to. Chodo's after your ass. You got to get his first or kiss yours good-bye. You're mush on the inside, but you ain't stupid. You do what you got to."

Crask chuckled. What a pair of bastards. And not the least bit ashamed of themselves.Crask said, "We changed the plan again. Now we figure we ought to hit in a bunch. Something weird's going on over there."

Sadler asked, "You guys got any idea what the hell all that racket's about?"

"MorCartha wars."

"At Chodo's place?"

I shrugged. "They hold them wherever they can get enough of them together."

"Sounded like more than that to me. You miss it?" He kept a straight face Crask did, too. Those guys were inhuman

Winger said, "Ready when you are, Garrett."

No kidding. I dreaded having the Dead Man find out about tonight. I'd never hear the end. Probably deserved it, too. "You guys want to rest up first?" I wasn't going to tell them they couldn't horn in. Not here. Not now.

"We're ready," Sadler replied. "You bring the stone?"

"I'm slow but I'm not stupid. Winger says she can handle the dogs"

"They shouldn't be no problem. We came prepared." I could see him well enough to tell he thought 1 hadn't.

He and Crask carried military spears and Venageti two handed sabers. They were loaded down with enough other hardware to start their own war. "Whenever you want," he added.

"Let's do it. Winger," We started walking.