Doc's swordstick flashed and stabbed the other sentry neatly through the center of the chest, between the upper ribs and clean through the heart. As he withdrew the delicate rapier, the man slithered to the dirt, eyes wide in shock.

"Touche, " Doc said.

Any cries of fear or pain were totally drowned by the bedlam from the front of the small hotel. By now every window in the Rentaroom had been smashed by lead.

Nobody out front heard the muffled sounds of eight of their fellows departing from this life.

It all took well below a minute.

"Anyone hurt?" Ryan asked, panting from the exultant burst of adrenaline energy. He stooped and wiped the blood from the panga blade on the long duster coat of one of the corpses. "No? Good. Then let's go down into the draw and get moving."

"Hell's bloody bells," Rick gasped. "I don't believe it. Seven, no, eight men. You just ran at them and killed every last one."

"The longer it takes before they realize we've gone, then the better chance we got."

J.B. agreed with Ryan. "And we've just brought the odds down some on our side. They find these good old chills, and they'll lose some balls for the fight. All helps."

Baron Edgar cleared his throat. "I'm not sure that I can lend the dignity of my office to this butchery. If it wasn't so dark I'd know all these men. Probably once called them my friends."

"Shut up, Baron," Ryan said, coldly dismissive of the old man.

"But this is my ville. I must insist that..."

Ryan grabbed him by the collar, lifting him up on the tips of his toes. "Shut up, Brennan. It's not your ville. Never will be again. And you don't insistanything. Not now and not ever. Just shut your mouth tight and do what you're told."

Carla took his arm. "Don't speak to him like that, Ryan. He's an old man."

"And he won't get any older if he doesn't stay buttoned."

"You got a cold heart, Ryan," she said quietly.

"Yeah. But I'm alive. Now, let's move."

The moon vanished behind a swooping bank of dark chem clouds, which brought with them a distant rumble of thunder and the threat of rain.

Visibility dropped from adequate to nil. Even Jak, with his heightened night sight, couldn't see more than a couple of paces ahead of them.

After Rick — and then Lori — had fallen on the rough ground of the valley bottom, Ryan called a halt. "Go on like this and we'll have a broken ankle. Best stop awhile."

"They'll catch us," Carla protested.

They could still hear the crackle of small-arms fire behind them. By now Ryan guessed that someone in the attacking group would have figured that the birds had flown the coop. From what he'd seen of Zombie he didn't figure the bikers' leader was a great tactical fighter. But surely they would have moved in on the hotel when there was no sign of life.

"We go on we're in trouble," J.B. said, peering up at the sky.

"If we're making for the old park, I can lead us."

"What?" Ryan couldn't believe what he was hearing. "That you, Brennan?"

"Sure is. I'm as mad as fire day about all this. Sure I was kind of shocked for a while back there. Now I want to go and beat the living shit — pardon me, Carla — out of the Motes. I used to play in this draw when I was a kid. I know every rock. Let me go first, and you keep in tight."

"I don't know, Ryan," J.B. said doubtfully.

"Me too," Jak added.

"It's not that much of a risk," the baron insisted. "I mean it. I feel like someone who has been through a long, dark tunnel. Snakefish is my ville. I can get us there. I've sat it out for way, way too long, Ryan. Not anymore."

It was a difficult decision. Ryan didn't relish hanging around only a half mile from the hotel. He wanted to move along the draw and circle around to come up behind the headquarters of the bikers. But to let the diminutive, elderly man lead them? That was something else.

The wind was rising from the north. Ryan knew that the old park was near the gas-processing plant, on ground a little higher than the ville. But in the almost total blackness he wasn't that confident of leading the group there.

There wasn't much choice.

"All right, Baron. Go ahead. I'll follow. You tell me when there's any danger. Holes, ruts, slopes... any kind of deadfall. I'll pass the word down the line. It'll be slow, but it could be safe."

"Fine, fine. I'll be doing something useful. Hit a lick at those demons, the Motes."

The wind continued to rise, whipping up clouds of dust and sand, making everyone try to cover their mouths and noses. The baron led the way with surprising confidence, picking his way along the bottom of the draw, calling out occasional warnings that Ryan conveyed to J.B. and the others.

Ryan figured that by now they would have discovered, in the center of the ville, that the cage was empty. But he doubted many of the good people of Snakefish would be enthusiastic about following the gang of outlanders into the black heart of the chem storm.

"How far to the park, Baron?" he called out, having to repeat the question twice before Edgar heard him.

"I'd say about ten minutes. If this wind gets up more we could have trouble. Folks die in these parts when the twisters start."

Above the endless noise of the wind, Ryan had several times caught the sound of distant thunder. And there was lightning — not single stabbing forks, but vast explosions of smearing light that covered half the horizon and burned purple images into the retina, causing blindness for several seconds.

The sides of the ravine had begun to close in, giving more protection from the wind. Every now and then the lightning would illuminate the area immediately ahead. But the path was winding and treacherous, with no sign that they were anywhere near a road.

It was good news that they were nearly to their destination. The combination of blackness, the chem storm and the dazzling lightning was becoming impossible to overcome.

Edgar Brennan stopped and turned around, a few paces ahead of Ryan. The static electricity in the night air had made his fringe of white hair stand out like a halo. Behind him, around a turn in the trail, was open space.

"We're there!" he yelled. "We made it, Ryan! Made it!"

A deafening clap of thunder failed to drown out the explosion of the sawed-off shotgun.

The double-barreled charge hit Edgar Brennan in the center of his back, the impact driving him toward Ryan. He fell facedown, arms spread like a star.

Chapter Thirty-Three

"Knew you'd try this way. Left the others. Came out here on my own and waited. Through the wind and the storm. Knew you'd come." The voice, a howl of delight and triumph, came from around the corner, just out of sight of Ryan and the others. "Get some good jack from the Motes for this!"

The voice was unmistakably Zombie's.

Baron Edgar Brennan had died instantly, almost at Ryan Cawdor's feet. The probability was that he never knew what had hit him, never had a split second's glimmering of the knowledge that eternity had claimed him.

"No, Pa!" Carla cried, seeing her father's slaughter in the almost continual sheets of violet lightning.

"Mine," J.B. growled, touching Ryan lightly on the arm.

Zombie, still yelping his delight, walked around the bend in the trail to examine his prize. The smoking scattergun was in his right hand. He was smiling behind the beribboned beard.

"Bastards," he said, spying Ryan and others. "Figured the baron'd done a runner alone."

"Mine," J.B. repeated.

The biker grinned at them through his jagged, broken teeth. "You're all dead. Every road's blocked. Only way out's past the snakes. You'll all die in the desert. Give up now."

"Chill him, John," Carla said quietly. "Do it to him. Now."