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The man visibly calmed with the honor, and did as ordered, sipping and
spitting until Mildred allowed him to drink freely.
"Bless you all," he finally said, coming up for air. "Are the cannies dead?
There's one big man with a scar he's the leader. Watch out for him."
"The cannies are dead," Ryan stated. "Come on, I'll show you."
He took the man by the elbow and helped him walk to the front door. Daffer
paused at the sill as if a door were there, then with a determined face he
stepped over the jamb and outside the log cabin. Mildred followed them
closely, ready to catch the man in case he fell.
Blinking against the strong daylight, Daffer straggled to focus his vision,
then smiled widely as he spied the bodies sprawling in the dirt, more than one
face displaying its ghastly filed teeth.
"May the worms choke on your rotting flesh," he growled at the corpses.
Turning clumsily, he stood at attention and saluted. "As my father did before
me, I again swear my allegiance to you, Baron Cawdor, ruler of Front Royal!"
"I'm not a baron," Ryan stated, deliberately not returning the salute. "Never
was.
My nephew Nathan Freeman Cawdor rules Front Royal."
"Nathan?" the man said, slowly lowering his hand. "You don't know then, my
lord?"
"We heard of trouble at the ville," Mildred replied, putting away the canteen.
"But nothing more. Has there been a fight? Did it burn down?"
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"The ville is fine. Never better."
The soft forest wind brushing his hair, Ryan braced himself for the worst. "Is
Nathan dead?" he asked bluntly.
"Oh no, Lord Ryan," Daffer answered, confused. "Baron Nathan is alive and
well. Both of them."
"Both?"
"Got a son, does he?" Clem asked, scratching under his furs. "Good. A baron
needs them like a rifle needs powder. Ain't no use without them."
"A son?" the sec man said, his unease clearly growing. "A son? Yes, but it's
not his son. It's yours."
"Mine?" Ryan asked, startled.
"What are you talking about?" Mildred demanded.
"Front Royal is still ruled by Nathan," Daffer explained, glancing toward the
east.
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"And by your son, Overton Cawdor, come home from the Deathlands."
Chapter Nine
A layer of mist lay over the ground, with the low hills breaking the cover
like islands in a sea of smoke.
Not far from Front Royal, the companions stood amid some trees and watched the
abbreviated version of the convoy roll down the cracked asphalt of the road
winding toward the east. The truck in front was packed solid with tents,
blasters, horse tackle, crossbows, clothes, boots and other assorted supplies
looted from
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the cannies. Even the blaster racks on the walls had been taken. Not a single
item of value remained at the ambush pass.
Chained behind the truck was the cargo van, and in the rear van Sara was at
the wheel and Hector cradled the baby, as she was the one who knew how to
drive.
On the horizon was a collection of predark houses and buildings. Mixed among
the old homes were new log cabins and battered concrete structures resembling
pillboxes.
"Is that Front Royal?" Dean asked, lowering the Navy telescope.
"No, just one of the hamlets that surround the ville," Ryan replied,
compacting the scope and tucking it into a pocket. "There's a ring of small
towns surrounding the fortress River, Benton, Brown, Linden, Sherril& They act
as a buffer zone against invaders."
"The fortress at Front Royal is farther down the road," Doc said, sitting on a
log beside their small campfire. He was holding tongs and melting lead in a
tiny crucible. "Quite a sight it is, too. The stone blocks are weathered a
brownish-
yellow, so it appears to be made of solid gold, like some mythological abode
of
King Arthur and the knights of the round table."
"Wow," the boy said, impressed.
A patched canvas tent stood behind Doc, the flap wide open so the heat from
the fire could gather inside and help them stay warm at night. Before burning
down the log cabin, the companions had looted the place of everything useful,
including the tents, although the decorations on the tent poles were the first
things to go. The armory had been a treasure trove of blasters and ammo, with
enough different calibers to fit the weapons of each companion. Everybody was
fully armed again. Naturally, there had been nothing for Doc's oddball .44
LeMat, but he had convinced Clem to upgrade to a bolt-action Enfield rifle,
and took the hunter's supplies of black powder, cloth and lead for himself.
The miniballs wouldn't fit his small .44 wheelgun, but lead was lead, and he
could make ammunition from anything that melted.
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In a nearby clearing, Jak was cutting branches and using them to cover the
second truck, which was now their property in exchange for the loot from the
cannies, now riding in the first truck. With the companions staying behind,
Stephen was short on drivers, and more importantly, they would need a wag to
rendezvous with Mildred at midnight.
"The fortress is very impressive," Krysty agreed from under her blankets
inside the tent "The turrets rise so very high in the sky that " She stopped
talking and broke into a ragged cough.
"Go to sleep," Doc ordered, carefully pouring the molten lead into the
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aluminum bullet molds he always carried, and topping off the batch. "Mildred
placed me in charge of you, and sleep is the prescription for the flu. Do you
want to get pneumonia, my dear Krysty?"
The redhead buried herself under the covers again.
"Still," the boy said, unrelenting, "I sure wish we could have gone with
Mildred."
Ryan walked him to the campfire. "Too dangerous, son. They know the five of us
there."
"Even after so many years," J.B. added, brushing off his beloved fedora,
"somebody recognized your dad immediately."
"That's not very difficult," Ryan said. "I bear a strong resemblance to my
father."
"Well, they don't know me!" Dean countered, resolute.
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