Winter Duty Read Free

good-bye to the Bulletproof legworm clan after the battle across the river from Evansville, he had nothing but memories of Tikka’s vigorous sensuality and the musky smell of her skin. They could be revisited at his leisure. Now he had work to do.
    He had the sense that their affair was over, her curiosity, or erotic interest, or—less flatteringly—the desire to cement good relations between Southern Command’s forces and her clan being satisfied.

    He crouched in a bush, watching the young sentry, who seemed to be watching nothing but stars and the rising moon.
    Valentine checked his little .22 automatic, which he usually carried wrapped up in a chamois with his paperwork. Over the years he’d had cause to kill with everything from his bare hands to artillery fire, but he’d found a small-caliber pistol more useful than any other weapon. It was quiet, the rounds were accurate at close range, and you could carry it concealed. With the lead in the nose etched with a tiny cross so it would fragment and widen the wound, it did damage out of proportion to the weight of the round.
    He wondered if the Kurians’ death-machine avatars, the Reapers, felt the same electric nervousness when they stalked a victim.
    Of course, in a meadow like this, in open country, Reapers did not stalk, at least not for the last few dozen meters. They acted more like the big, fast cats Valentine had seen loose in the hill country in central Texas, covering the distance in an explosive rush that either startled their prey into stillness or made escape futile.
    Of course, in the city it was something else entirely. Urban Reapers were the trap-door spiders of many a ruined block, striking from a patch of overgrowth, a pile of garbage, or a crack in the ceiling. But he doubted these headhunters worked the cities. Too much law and order, even if the bad law and order of the KZ.
    He turned his senses to the camp, trying to get a sense of the rhythms of the headhunters.
    They were singing. Three of the men were passing a bottle, falling out and joining in the tune between swigs, taking turns improvising rhyming lyrics in old-style rap.
    The sentry sat in a tree overlooking the bowl-shaped field and soggy patch, within hallooing distance of the camp.
    The safety went back on the little .22, for now. Valentine guessed why they put the youth on watch. Young men had good eyesight, especially at twilight. He’d probably be relieved by a veteran for the late shift. The boy was alternately yawning and chewing on bits of long grass root, glancing back toward the camp for signs of his relief.
    Valentine balanced the chances of the young man doing something stupid against the possibility of using the kid to get into camp armed with some bargaining power. If Valentine just approached the poachers, they’d have him facedown in the dirt until they secured his weapons, at the very least.
    Valentine wormed his way up to the trunk from downwind, using a mixture of crawling and scuttling during the sentry’s frequent glances back to look for his relief.
    The relief sentry started his walk uphill to the lookout tree, holding a heavy, swaddled canteen by its strap.
    Valentine loosened his sword and pocketed the automatic, grateful that he hadn’t had to use it. He shifted to his submachine gun, double-checking the safety.
    The boy, anticipating his relief, clambered down from the scrub oak. Valentine slipped up behind.
    Valentine moved quickly, clapping a strong left hand over the kid’s mouth and elevating the kid’s wrist to his shoulder blade with the right.
    “Don’t crap yourself, kid. I’m not a Reaper. But I could have been. I want you to remember that when we get back to your campfire sing-along. I could have been. What’s your name?”
    “Trent. Sunday Trent,” the boy sqeaked.
    “Sunday? Like after Saturday?”
    “Yes, sir.”
    “Knock off the ‘sir,’ boy. I’m not some local trooper you have to polish. They call me the Last