Yul chose his words carefully. “It doesn’t work that way. So no deal. My reputation’d be shot to hell. Think about it. What you think I’d be worth in the street, if I turned traitor that easily?”
The thug nodded. His red-bearded cheeks bunched in amusement as he tilted his head back. “I like that. Integrity in a man. But in truth, stupid. I think it just cost you your skin, Vrean. Hell, if I were given the choice of integrity or my life, it’d be my life.” He lifted his gun. “But some folks are just plain stupider than dengal shit.”
“Wait.” Yul spoke quickly. “Maybe we can work something out. Let me get this straight. You snagged a haul of dengals to even the score and took ’em to the glue factory?”
The gangster shrugged. “Sure, why not? Had to make it worth our while. We don’t get paid enough as it is, at least until the job’s over. Nothing wrong with a man bagging a few extra yols. Keeps the boys’ morale up, and a few extra yols aren’t going to hurt anyone.”
“Except the dengals,” Trixie said with a snort.
“What do you know, Missy? Oughta gag you and stuff you in a bag for later. Teach you something about the arts of love.”
The shorter one named Lebbie jumped in. “Why not waste this Vrean fucker and call it day? What you think, Sim?”
“Ain’t a bad idea,” said the bald brute standing near Lebbie. “Though I’m thinking we could leverage this situation a bit more, if we put our heads to it, now that we got this Yul fuck.”
“How so?” said the lead thug.
“Well, for starters, we could tie—”
The rumble of pounding hooves filled the air. The earth trembled. Yul jumped and turned around. A thousand pounds of wild dengal suddenly burst from the nearby trees.
“What the—” A high horn took Sim in the ribs, lifting him high.
“Fucking reindeer—” The lead thug’s blaster roared. Charred dengal flesh smoked, but the tide had already turned. A stampede of blood-mad beasts joined the fray.
Yul head-butted the leader, smacked the rifle barrel up.
Wild shots rang out. One grazed a dengal’s back. Beasts arched heads, bellowing. Yul twisted, elbowed the killer in the teeth. He kicked him sprawling back. Caught flatfooted between two sets of foes, the gunmen faltered, as they fired wildly.
A horn took Lebbie in the thigh, scooped him up like a bag of dirt and slammed him across its back, snapping his legs. Trix dove for cover, narrowly missing trampling hooves. Yul jerked aside as a muscled animal torso whisked inches from his face. He could smell the stink of its hide, the stench of blood as men and animals died.
He snatched up a fallen weapon, began pegging the confused murderers while dodging random hooves. Trix ducked. Her hands clamped over her ears as she scrambled deeper into the brush.
Yul turned his head at the grisly sounds of mastication on human flesh as the dengals’ sharp teeth chopped into gristle and tendon. He’d no idea the dengals were carnivores.
The poachers’ demise was not pretty.
Two were left alive, stumbling into the brush. Did they have a ship parked nearby? They must have landed somewhere.
Yul quashed the urge to chase them. No chance of hunting them down in this mist-coiled dark. Suicide if they had armed backup. Ambush and slaughter.
Vreckin lay twitching in the grass. Rifle shells had ripped into his belly and exposed the ribs. The slobbering horse mouth sucked wheezing gasps of air.
Trix ran and knelt beside her dying pet, a shaky hand on its mane. She whispered, “Vreckin risked his hide to save us.”
“Come on, Trixie. If those cretins come back with reinforcements…” More than ever they needed to get back to the lodge, report the evidence to the law.
She nodded, tears in her eyes. She did what any rancher would do. Scooping up her rifle, she put Vreckin out of his misery with one well-placed shot.
Staggering back to the edge of the glade, Yul stopped and crouched at the lead thug’s side. The man pulled shallow breaths, his square bulk lying gored out and half trampled.
“Who gave the order?” Yul gripped the man’s throat. “Give me a name!” The man lolled, unresponsive. Yul shook him. “Your mail-order courier send the package bomb?”
The man’s eyes glazed over. Weakly, he shook his head.
Yul swore and turned away. Finger on his blaster, a big part of him toyed with wasting this asshole. It’d be murder in the eyes of the local law. Veramax probably had this poor fool so wrapped up in their pocket, he wouldn’t dare squeal and get his family executed. Yul mastered his impulse and left the semi-comatose man lying there, bleeding out. He turned deaf ears to the ghastly chawing and tearing as the rest of the herd made short work of the corpses. Yul got out of there in a hell of a hurry.
He and Trixie moved on swift feet through the darkness. For a long time they traded no words as they stumbled their way along, keeping to the grass inside the fence so the thugs couldn’t track them on the dirt trail. Night insects thrummed. Crickets crik-crikked through the deep mossy spaces.
A blood moon rose, permeating the gathering mist and lighting the way. A dampness gathered in the humid air. The odd leaf rustled to the prowl of a forest animal and the agitated flap of a nightjar competed with the plaintive chirrup-chirrup of a wood gull, all forming an eerie backdrop.
Trix’s short breath reached Yul’s ears in a faint gasp. “I can’t get those men
