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"Are there any more around?" Thatcher asked.
"Ope nog," Valentine said.
Thatcher took a better grip on his gun and looked warily around. "How do you know?"
"He knows," Duvalier said. "He just knows. Leave it at that." She gave him his rifle back, as though glad to give up an unpleasant burden.
"Can we sleep soon? How about in that barn?" Gail asked.
Valentine waved tiredly. "Attitude, Gail," Duvalier said.
"Stick the attitude. My feet are killing me," she said hotly.
"I think she's getting better," Thatcher said.
* * * *
It took them a while to find the trail of Dr. Boothe and Pepsa. Valentine found their marks in the long grasses. They'd cut over to a legworm trail and followed it up the hillside.
"What are they going back in that direction for?" Thatcher asked.
Valentine shrugged, resolved to communicate with hand signals. Gail groaned as they started up the hill.
They caught up to the pair, Boothe hiking along behind Pepsa carrying the gun in one hand, her medical bag slung.
Valentine elbowed Duvalier, pointed, and made a T with his hands. She nodded and slipped into the bushes, gripping her walking stick like an alert samurai carrying his sword.
"What's the matter?" Thatcher asked, keeping his voice low.
Valentine found he could whisper coherently. He spoke into Duvalier's ear.
"Something's wrong," she said. "Somebody's been giving us away."
Back in the legworm valley, Valentine heard hoofbeats. Two legworms and perhaps a dozen men on horseback were investigating events in the pit. They looked like native Kentuckians intermingled with Grogs.
"Let's catch up," Duvalier said.
They went up the hill as quickly as Gail's weary, unsteady legs would allow.
The vets must have heard them coming. Both turned around. Pepsa looked frightened.
Boothe brought up the pistol and pointed it between them.
Shit. Guessed wrong. Why didn't I just shoot the pair of them?
Because they might not be in it together.
"Hey, Doc, it's us," Thatcher said.
"Guns! Drop them," Boothe said. The gun shook in her hands as she pointed. Tears streamed down her face.
Tears? Why would a Kurian agent cry?
"Epsah!" Valentine shouted, shouldering his rifle, sighting on the first Kurian agent he had ever looked upon.
The U-gun burned. Its stock burned him, the trigger guard; he felt the flesh on his hands cook; the agony of the steam in the Kurian Tower redoubled and poured through his nervous system. Drop it, all he could do was drop the gun.
Don't~think~so, a voice in his head said.
