Ryan sat up, feeling bone weary but for the first time, realizing that he was safe and well. They'd given him warm soup and a light brown alcoholic liquid that tasted of burned wood and blazed in his throat as he swallowed it.
'I recall you tellin' me how you and J.B. fought your way clear, killed three or four of them Russians, then headed here and met up with Henn. The two buggies are both runnin' okay now, right?'
Krysty nodded. 'Yeah. I wanted to stay and look for you. J.B. said no.'
'He was right. In that sort of situation, I'd have left him.'
'He's up with Okie and Doc. They radioed they'd found a town in a valley by the dam. They've got a missile up there.'
Ryan swung his legs over the side of the bed, standing unsteadily, waving away the girl's helping hand. 'No, I'm... Missile? What sort?'
She shook her head. 'J.B. said it was experimental. Reeled off a load of reference letters and numbers that didn't mean anything to him.'
'Can it be?..'
'Blasted off? Yeah. There's a launcher. Oh, an' J.B. says there's a dummy one, as well, without any launch motor or explosive — just a shell.'
'Is he comin' back here today?'
'No. Said you was up. We've got food and heat and all. Lori's been sniveling with a cold. I think we should have left her at the redoubt, Ryan.'
'She'd have died, She saved us from that bloody-minded old bastard Quint. She's not used to the outside, that's all.'
'You figure those killers are comin’ after us, Ryan?' asked Krysty.
'That quake must have scattered their ponies. It'll take 'em a day or more to get together. But... yeah, I guess that yellow-eyed shitter was interested enough in us to come this way. Round about tomorrow noon, we could have us a real firefight. It'd be better if we were all together, so let's go join the others.'
The severe quakes that had opened the earth around the camp of the Narodniki, delaying them in their southerly push, had barely been felt by the pursuing militia, who were on the far side of a range of low hills.
It had enabled them to close the gap on the guerrillas. And the closer they got, the faster they moved.
Major Zimyanin sat on his horse, peering ahead. Ice hung from the stiff points of his long moustache. He removed his fur cap with its single silver circle and wiped his bald head with a fur glove. His pockmarked face was less gloomy than usual.
All the signs indicated that they were catching up with the band of killers. They'd found the raggled, frozen corpses that Uchitel and his group had left as silent testimonials to their brutality: bodies so torn by the wolves and other scavengers that it was hard to tell the manner of their passing. But some still showed the marks of burning or of the knife or the bullet.
The cavalry patrol had seen identical marks in the hamlet of Ozhbarchik on the other side of the frozen Bering Strait.
During a day-long blizzard, the major had felt the unhappiness of his troops, many of whom were muttering for a return to their homes in Magadan. But he had urged them on with promises of extra pay all around and hints that the best troopers might be promoted and transferred to the West. He knew from bitter experience that it was pointless to appeal either to their religion or, even worse, to their loyalty to the party.
But now they were close, anticipating an actual sighting of their prey within the next twenty-four hours.
Aliev, the Mongolian tracker with the hideously mutilated face, was excited. Jumping, green snot dripping from the raw hole where his nose should have been, he held up his right hand, showing only one finger, indicating a single day. Then he chopped at it with the edge of his left hand, showing he thought that the Narodniki were even less than a day ahead of them.
Zimyanin stood in the stirrups, using one of his most valuable possessions — a pair of scratched and battered binoculars with the name Zeiss engraved on the side. He knew of no other officer of his rank who possessed such a wonderful tool. Many had cheap telescopes or binoculars, but nothing to compare with these.
Tothe south, in a cleft in the mountains, he could see a great wall of concrete, with a stream of water gushing from near its top. It had to be some sort of dam, he figured, blocking a river that was kept ice free by some underground source of heat.
He moved the glasses to the right and inspected a series of sharp-edged valleys. He thought he could see a trail worming into one of the valleys. For a moment, Zimyanin thought he could even see signs of life: a plume of snow, as though men on horseback moved there, and tiny black specks against the whiteness.
Bat his hands began to tremble, and the glass blurred with his breath. By the time he wiped the lenses clear, the figures had gone.
If they'd ever been there in the first place.
Avalanches had destroyed virtually all of the little mining town that had once flourished high in the ravine near the looming dam. Now only a few roofless shacks remained.
Ryan and the others had discussed their plans, finally agreeing that the Russian guerrillas were too dangerous to ignore. In the morning they would take the buggies and return to the redoubt. Then they would use the gateway to leave the ice-bound desert of Alaska behind them.
Chapter Eighteen
Okie was on guard, walking cautiously around the ruined houses at the neck of the valley. From below she heard the river tumbling over the rounded stones at the foot of the dam's spillway. To her right, she could make out the great dam, with its towers and pumping stations. The moon gave only a pale, spectral light, not enough to illuminate the trail that clung to the mountainside, dappled with patches of ice and snow. It hadn't been easy to negotiate that trail, even with the tracked buggies, but there was no other way up or down.
Her low-heeled tan riding boots clicked on the loose stones. The Mini-Uzi was safely in its holster on her belt; the M-16 carbine cradled in her arms. Looking behind her, she saw the tiny ruby glow of the fire that smoldered at the center of their camp between the two parked buggies. Straining her eyes, the blaster could see the gravelike mounds that were her sleeping comrades. The larger one was Ryan Cawdor, and the mutie girl tangled together.
Okie spat, her sullen face showing her dislike for Krysty Wroth. Ryan had shown interest in her before the redhead had appeared. If anything happened to the mutie?..
There was always the strong possibility of a nasty accident.
She turned slowly, feeling the wind tugging at her long dark ponytail. Behind her she caught the sound of stones shifting, as if a piece of frozen earth had slithered down the hill. Okie whirled, finger on the trigger of her carbine.
For a few moments, she stood there, still as a statue, ears straining for any odd sound.
It was repeated.
It came from her right, where an old concrete sluice hung perilously over the side of the valley, stretching up into the darkness. If anything were to happen to it, then the whole tangle of stone and metal would come grinding down on the sleeping camp.
Okie moved slowly, keeping to the shadows, gun questing ahead of her. She placed each step with utmost care, as silent as a lover's touch on velvet skin.
Her ears caught the frail scraping of metal on metal. She stopped, letting her eyes rake around the ghost town — drawing a slow breath as she saw them. Three. No, four. One stooped over by the foot of the sluice's main support girders. The others ringed him, facing her.
