A woman tugged at his sleeve. "Sir, sir!" she implored.

Valentine turned.

She thrust a diapered baby into his arms, cocooned in a plaid blanket. "His name's Ryan. Ryan Werth. He's only eleven months. Just mash any old thing up real good, and he'll eat it," she said, tears streaming down her cheeks.

Valentine tried to give the baby back to her. "Sorry, ma'am ... but..."

The woman refused to take back the child. She put her palms over her eyes and fled into the crowd.

"Mrs. Werth! Mrs. Werth, I'm sorry, but we can't do this," Valentine called, going after her. He looked down at the baby, which was now squalling lustily. He could understand the mother's motives. The Kurians might do anything in the camp as a reprisal if they thought the inhabitants had cooperated.

He looked around for someone, anyone in the camp to hand the baby to, but they'd disappeared. He couldn't just set it down. Feeling more than a little ridiculous, Valentine returned to the pickups, trying to comfort the child. Perhaps Stafford had room for a bawling baby.

"Lieutenant Valentine, sir?" A young Wolf named Poulos stepped forward, saluting smartly. Poulos was a thick-muscled, good-looking young man who tended to keep to himself. He was one of the few survivors of the old Foxtrot Company, and wasn't going out of his way to bond with the new recruits, or else he'd have been promoted by now. Valentine understood his reasons.

"Yes, Poulos. What is it? I've got my hands rather full at the moment."

Poulos smothered the beginnings of a smile. "Sir, I have to ask your permission to take a dependent with us. Corporal Holloway told me to ask you, sir." Poulos stepped aside to reveal a beautiful girl in her late teens, wrapped up in a long coat with a bag over her shoulder. "Sir, this is Linda Meyer. She wants to come with us. Her ma was one of the ones tied up behind the house. I'll feed her off my rations. She'll keep up, she's healthy, and she can run, sir."

Valentine shook his head. "A girl already, Poulos? How many hours have we been here? I'd have thought with the Hoods afoot and the perimeter being secured, you'd have other things to do."

"She was showing me where the Terris hid the supplies, and we started-"

"Never mind the story. You know that's against regulations. Dangerous for her to be seen talking to us." Bad for discipline for soldiers to go sniffing around for companionship in the KZ, Valentine added to himself silently. Then there was the chance that she could be a plant. Two years ago, his first command in the KZ was almost destroyed by a boy leaving notes to the Reapers.

Poulos and the girl exchanged desperate looks. "But sir. Company rules do allow wives along with the commander's permission." Miss Meyer let out a small, shocked gasp.

"Not on a patrol, Poulos. I'll listen to tent-pole lawyering in camp, but not in the KZ." Valentine wondered if he had really regained consciousness. The flame-lit compound was growing more and more surreal by the moment. Even the fussing baby seemed quieter in the orange-tinged drama of the scene.

"There's a preacher here, sir. He can marry us right now. We're heading back. It's not like we're going into action, we're coming back from it. Doesn't that make a difference?"

"I can keep up, Mr. Valentine," the woman said. They took each other's hands.

"I don't want to hear another word about it," Valentine said, avoiding me hopeful eyes of the young couple. Standing orders from Regiment, enforced by the captain to the letter, discouraged the practice colloquially known as "rounding up strays." The prisoners from the yard were one thing: the Kurians might have reasons for wanting them dead, for all he knew one or more were captured Southern Command soldiers. Aid and assistance were always offered to refugees who made it to the Free Territory on their own, but unless an operation went into a region supplied and equipped to bring out people, taking on stragglers led to innumerable problems. Valentine twisted in the opposing mental winds of his humanity and his duty. He suddenly thought of the girl's mother. While she probably wasn't an Ozark POW, she certainly needed medical attention and care. A loophole, perhaps big enough to squeeze a teenage girl through, opened before him. He could also get rid of the squalling baby.

"Okay, Poulos. You got yourself a wife-and child."

He passed the babe into the girl's arms, and little Ryan quieted. "Poulos, you take them and ride with Stafford and this woman's mother. Miss, take care of this baby. His name is Ryan ... errr."

"Ryan Werth. Born April last, Mr. Valentine. Thank you, sir. I'll take good care of him."

"I'm sure you will. Hurry, or the trucks will leave without you."

The young couple hugged in as close an embrace as possible with the baby in her arms. They turned to run to the pickups even now crawling toward the gate in a chattering of diesel valves.

"Poulos!" Valentine called after them.

The Wolf about-faced smartly as the truck stopped for the Meyer girl to climb in. "Sir?"

"Congratulations."

On the banks of the Lake o' the Cherokees: Foxtrot Company waits in a forward camp. Tepees, tents, wagons, livestock, and a smokehouse cluster around a stream running down from the hills into what remains of the lake behind the breached dam. A few eagles fish beneath the ruined arches, lingering along the flight paths most have already followed north up the Mississippi Valley.

In this border country, the Wolves of Southern Command imitate the eagles, moving quickly here and there to survey the countryside and striking at prey small enough to take. Their duty is to scout the Kurian 2x>ne, pick up information, and warn the Free Territory of any impending threat to the human settlements in the hills and dales of the Ozark Freehold. Similar military camps lie scattered in the foothills of the Ozarks and Ouachitas throughout Missouri, the eastern edge of Oklahoma, Texas, and Arkansas. Beyond this uninhabited ring broods the Night of the Kurian Order.

The Kurians on the other side of no-man's-land wait for a chance, perhaps some combination of weakness and error, to engulf the Free Territory and put an end to one of the last bastions of human civilization.

"Congratulations, Valentine," Captain Beck said, emerging from his tent to receive the report of his tired lieutenant. "I hear you got four Reapers. You're a credit to the Regiment." Beck held out his right hand, back straight as a telephone pole, smiling at Valentine through clenched teeth.

Tags: E.E. Knight Vampire Earth Fantasy
Source: readsnovelonline.net