Immortal

43

Lopez’s dark almond eyes were fixed on Ethan’s as he turned slowly to face her, and although she did not move he saw a flicker of amusement twinkle behind her eyes.

‘Are you hitting on me?’ she whispered.

Ethan leaned in even closer to her. ‘Getting excited?’

Lopez looked at him furtively for a moment.

‘Not just yet.’

Ethan’s hand shot down to her right foot and snatched something that flashed past her face in a writhing mass. She saw his hand gripping the neck of a colorfully banded coral snake that had been coiling itself across her boot.

‘Jesus!’

Lopez leapt backwards and landed on her ass as Ethan tossed the snake away into the bushes. He made sure the snake was gone before looking at her.

‘Sorry, had to do something subtle else you’d have freaked.’

‘Christ, Ethan, you think?’ she said as she got back to her feet. ‘That damned near scared me half to death.’

‘The hitting on you or the snake?’

She looked at him, and managed a brief smile. ‘Both.’

‘Come on,’ he said, ‘we need to find out where we are.’

Lopez squatted back down beside him and pulled out their map from one of her webbing pouches. In the fading light the map was not easy to read, but Ethan did not use his flashlight.

‘We’re here, southeast of these hills,’ Ethan said. The map showed where a series of long dried-out streams had joined another, larger flow where they now were, which then split once again ahead of them. ‘They’re probably following a track each, all still heading roughly southeast.’

Lopez traced a finger along the map.

‘Dammit, Ethan, there’s nothing out here at all until Artesia, and that’s seventy miles away. We’re going to be a long way from any supply line.’

Ethan nodded, looking up toward the horizon. New Mexico was divided into life zones: lower Sonoran, upper Sonoran, transition, Canadian, Hudsonian, and arctic-alpine. Each contained its own vegetation and terrain, with shrubs and grasses giving way to piñon, juniper woodland, sagebrush and chaparral then ponderosa pine and oaks mixed with conifers, aspen and spruce forests on the higher ground. And their quarry could be hiding out in any one of those varied terrains.

‘We’ll have to move quickly,’ Ethan agreed. ‘As you just found out, we’re not the only living things out here.’

Ethan had already spotted pronghorn antelope and ring tails. He knew that black bears roamed the higher ground too, formidable creatures not averse to attacking humans if hungry or provoked. Tarantulas, coral snakes and rattlers infested the deserts wherever one traveled, and could end a life in a flash of fangs.

Ethan scanned the map directly south of their position.

‘There’s the town of Hope, but that’s almost as far. The rest of it’s just wilderness.’ He squinted up at the sun now setting behind the seemingly lifeless hills and valleys. ‘They must have another vehicle stashed out here, or horses perhaps.’

Lopez nodded.

‘Or they’re really hard core, and intend to stay on foot and take their time getting to wherever they’re going.’

Ethan was about to reply when something caught his eye, a flicker of movement up on one of the valleys, stark against the bright orange sky. He didn’t move, slowly folding the map and slipping it into his webbing pouch while looking at the ridge above with a fixed gaze. Lopez sensed his sudden tension.

‘You got something?’ she whispered, as motionless now as he was.

‘Something just sky-lined itself up there to the right of us,’ he whispered. He was about to write it off as an animal or bird of some kind when it moved again, the unmistakable shape of a human head bobbing as it hurried down the hillside.

‘There’s another one,’ Lopez said, nodding across to their left.

Ethan felt a sudden chill as he realized they were in the floor of the valley with the surrounding heights occupied by people unknown.

‘They’re trying to ambush us,’ he said finally. ‘Must have spotted us a while back when the sun was still high enough to illuminate the valley floor.’

‘What are we going to do about it?’ Lopez intoned, looking nervously up at the hills and betraying her city-girl roots. ‘We’re exposed here.’

Ethan reached slowly around and slid his Bergen off, setting it down beside a bush.

‘There’s nothing to worry about,’ he said. ‘If they were competent enough to launch an ambush, they wouldn’t have revealed themselves so easily. We’ll go and have a look.’

An instant later, the deafening report of a gunshot thundered down the pass, echoing off the hills around them as they hurled themselves face down onto the ground.