Antagonist - Childe Cycle 11 (24 page)

"John,
are
you
ready
to
go?"
Henry
directed
his
question
at
the now-open
window.

"Yes,
Henry,"
John
Colville
said.
Bleys
happened
to
know
that John's
father
had
fought
beside
Henry
years
ago,
when
they
were both
Soldiers
of
God.

"Rolf
and
Kamala
have
had
their
wounds
treated
and
are
in
the rear
compartment,"
John
was
continuing.
"They
can
shoot."

"Bleys,
you
get
in
beside
John,"
Henry
said.
He
turned
slightly and
raised
his
voice.

"Mary,
can
he
be
moved?"
he
called.

"Yes,
Henry,"
the
medician
replied.

"Move
over
there,
John,"
Henry
directed.
"Bleys
and
I
will
walk over
there
in
a
moment.
Leave
the
front
seat
open
for
Bleys,
and put
Dahno,
Toni
and
Mary
in
the
middle
compartment.
Who's
driving
your
escort?"

"Richard
Nelson,"
said
John;
"and,
yes,
I've
made
sure
he
knows where
we're
going.
He
has
Ben
and
Eli
with
him,
as
well
as
our other
wounded."

He
moved
off
toward
the
ramp,
and
Bleys
and
Henry
followed
on foot.

"How
many
have
we
lost?"
Bleys
asked
after
a
silent
moment.

"I
don't
know
that
yet,"
Henry
replied.
"We
had
to
scatter
our people
to
all
sides
and
try
to
coordinate
our
attacks,
and
there's
been no
time
to
get
the
details.
That's
another
thing
I'll
have
to
tell
you later."
He
paused
to
think
for
a
moment,
still
walking.

"God
willing,
I
believe
we
have
done
better
than
I
feared,"
he went
on.
"Those
people
were
not
properly
alert
to
the
possibility
of trouble
coming
upon
them."

They
had
almost
caught
up
with
the
vagen
now.

"God
gives
us
a
lesson
in
these
people,"
Henry
said,
"one
we would
do
well
to
heed:
be
prepared
for
the
possibility
of
trouble. Thus,
you
must
go
ahead
of
us,
now."

As
Bleys
still
hesitated,
Henry
spoke
more
sharply:
"Go!
Get
in!"

Abandoning
argument,
Bleys
moved
around
the
vehicle
to
its passenger
side.
Henry
began
to
give
more
signals
to
those
of
his Soldiers
who
had
held
their
positions
farther
out
from
the
bunker.

By
the
time
Bleys
opened
the
door,
Dahno
and
the
rest
had
been loaded
into
the
vagen
from
its
far
side,
a
process
facilitated
by
the fact
that
the
vagen
was
riding
higher
on
its
idling
fans
than
did
more usual
vehicles.
Bleys
climbed
in,
finding
that
a
deep
well
under
the dashboard
provided
plenty
of
room
for
his
legs.

As
soon
as
Bleys
was
in,
John
put
the
vagen
into
motion,
heading back
the
way
he
had
come.
Another,
similar
vehicle
appeared
from somewhere,
to
fall
in
behind
them.

Looking
back
as
they
went,
Dahno
fidgeting
and
complaining
beside
her,
Toni
saw
Henry
watching
them
go.

It
must
be
tearing
him
up
inside,
she
thought.
I
know
he
loves
Bleys like
another
son—enough
to
risk
his
very
soul
to
try
to
keep
Bleys
out
of
Satan
s
hands.
But
to
do
that
he
had
to
kill,
which
he
believes—no,
he
knows, to
the
depths
of
his
soul—is
wrong.

As
a
curve
in
their
path
put
Henry
out
of
her
sight,
she
faced
forward,
then
leaned
back
in
her
seat.

She
had
never
forgotten
that
Henry
had
once
admitted
to
her that
he
was
prepared
to
kill
Bleys
himself,
rather
than
let
him,
as
he put
it,
fall
into
Satan's
hands.
She
herself
had
resolved
that
would never
happen.

At
the
same
time,
she
had
grown
fond
of
Henry
herself;
and
she recognized
that
if
Henry
ever
came
to
that
point—regardless
of whether
he
succeeded
in
killing
Bleys,
or
not—it
would
come
as the
result
of
an
almost
inconceivable
state
of
pain
and
despair.

Spare
him,
Lord!

As
she
heard
her
inner
self
say
those
words,
she
knew
she
meant her
prayer
to
encompass
both
men.

By
the
time
the
local
sun
set,
their
vehicle
had
made
a
rendezvous with
a
long-haul
cargo
carrier.
Hidden
inside
one
of
the
containers inside
its
streamlined
shell,
they
almost
backtracked
the
way
they had
just
come,
now
traveling
along
a
paved
trafficway
that
passed about
twenty
kilometers
to
the
west
of
the
bunker.
While
they
did
so, the
vehicles
from
which
they
had
parted,
now
functioning
as
decoys, crossed
the
Nightfish
River
on
their
fans—avoiding
the
bridges— and
sped
toward
Abbeyville,
a
city
large
enough
to
host
a
Friendly consulate.