Valentine looked down at a Grog pistol by his knee. The weapon looked like two revolvers joined at the bottom of the grip, with a thick trigger guard running between the two. A single lever cocked and fired both barrels.

"They're going," someone shouted. The survivors of the legworm assault sagged against the protecting logs, many with tears of relief running down their faces.

"They'll be back," Petrie said as another Wolf wrapped a bandage around his head. "They'll keep coming until they're all dead ... or we are."

They came six more times that cool spring day. Each time, like a rising tide, the Grog wave crested farther. And when they receded, they left snipers among the rocks and trees, sappers who could be silenced only by grenades and concentrated rifle fire. The Grogs wrapped their lines around Little Timber Hill like a python coiling around its prey, waiting for it to weaken and smother under its irresistible pressure.

Noon came and went, and afternoon brought a two-hour lull in the fighting. Valentine let the men leave the breastworks in small groups to steal away to the rocky crown for food and water-even a brief washup if they could get it. Although the last might be rendered moot: the rain clouds were piling up on the horizon again.

A sniper wounded Captain Beck when the Grogs came, thick and screaming, up the long slope at about three in the afternoon. Tom Nishino, not knowing what else to do, blew his captain's whistle. Valentine heard the trilling above the shrieks of the Grogs and looked up to see the boy waving to him. Valentine gestured back, outflung arm trying to motion Tom to keep down, when a slug took the youth, spinning him in one quick, 360-degree revolution to drop dead among the rocks.

Valentine left Petrie in charge and scrambled up to the command post. Two Wolves and one of the camp women knelt around Beck. The captain's left shoulder was shattered, leaving his arm dangling.

"How are the men holding?" Beck asked through pain-gritted teeth. The woman bound the wound with quick strokes, ignoring Beck's gasps. Valentine paused a moment, admiring the sure motions of her hands.

"They're holding good, sir. But I've got nine dead around the trail, and a lot of wounded."

"I don't know how long I'll be conscious here, Valentine. So I want you to take command. Hold this position; the Guards are on their way. Bring the wounded up to the rocky crown. They'll be safe there. Sooner or later they're going to figure out that the easiest way to get at us is from across the saddle, so you'd better reform your flying squads."

Valentine wished Beck would stop talking. If he was going to relinquish command, he should quit giving orders.

"Yes, sir," he said. "Let's get you up into the basin."

The two Wolves helped Beck to his feet, supporting him with his good arm. The captain's face contorted in pain as he made his first halting steps toward the rocky crown, the trio keeping hidden from the snipers at the bottom of the hill.

Valentine picked up Beck's dropped binoculars. The odor of the captain's cigars clung to their casing and strap. What had been Beck's was now his. Responsibility for Foxtrot Company's future put his stomach into a knot of Gordian proportions. He watched the ragged young woman who had bandaged the captain as she picked up Beck's bolt-action carbine, examining it. She had brassy red hair cut very short, freckles, and pretty, if angular, features. She looked like she had been on short rations for a week: her eyes had a wide, alert, and hungry look. Valentine suddenly realized he didn't know her.

"I'm sorry, who are you?" Valentine said. "I thought I knew everyone in camp."

"I've been in your camp for only a couple hours, Wolf. Are you missing about two dozen men?"

Valentine frowned. "My name is David Valentine, Second Wolf Regiment of Southern Command. I'm in charge of what's left of this company. I'd be obliged if you'd give me your name."

"I'd prefer not to be put in any official reports. My code name is Smoke, if you have to say something."

An occasional shot from below punctuated the conversation.

"Code name? You're a Cat?"

"Yes, Mr. Lieutenant. Since the age of sixteen. Normally I work the plains of here, but I'm on the trail of something."

"What was that you said about missing men? Some Wolves under a lieutenant named Caltagirone are missing."

She looked grim. "Don't expect them back. They got caught on the banks of the Verdigris. Slaughtered."

Valentine froze his features into immobility to hide his shock. Another friend gone. "Grogs?"

"No-Reapers, at least sorta." She licked her lips, like an animal that comes across an unpleasant smell.

The news sank in. Caltagirone was as canny as Father

Wolf made them. Not like him to get taken unaware. "What do you mean, sort of?"

"It's a little hard to explain. It's a band of about twelve Reapers. I've never come across a group that big just roaming before. They're also using guns, which is odd from what I've heard about them."

"I've never heard anything like that before." It didn't make sense to him. Reapers served as conduits for vital aura between the victim and their master Kurian. Unless they were close enough to touch, the psychic energies were lost. Even in battle, Reapers killed so their masters gained the aura they craved.

"Saying I don't know my own eyes, Wolf?"

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