Ace Lone Wolf and the Hidden Fortress by Eric T Knight

Author:Eric T Knight [Knight, Eric T]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2018-10-31T22:00:00+00:00

32

Now I’m the one who’s surprised. “What?”

He looks angry. “We sent someone out to you weeks ago, asking for help. You sure took your time. What, you couldn’t find your horses?”

“No one ever showed up at the stronghold,” I say. “We only found out about this yesterday.”

“Oh.” He looks like he only half believes me. “I guess they caught Carlos then. Or he took off. He has family in Chihuahua. I bet that’s it. He was always a gusano.” He walks back over to me. “Do you have a gun for me too? I want to shoot a couple of them, the one in there especially,” he says, pointing toward the main room. “I hate him. He stole my food yesterday.”

“I don’t even have a gun for me.”

“What kind of rescue is this? You can’t do anything without a gun.” He looks offended.

“Don’t you think shooting a gun in a gunpowder factory would be a bad idea?”

“Not if you don’t miss. Where’s the rest of them?”

“It’s only me in here.”

“By yourself, without a gun, you’ll take down a half dozen soldiers?”

“Well, I have my lunch.”

His lip curls. “What kind of rescue is this?”

I’m beginning to think I don’t like this man. “I have a plan.”

“Sure you do. What is it?”

“Just keep your mouth shut and do what I tell you.”

“As long as it doesn’t include getting shot.”

“Shut up already, would you?” I say irritably. “We need to get back out there before the guard gets suspicious.”

He mutters a few things, but helps me load the charcoal onto the wheelbarrow. We go back to the main room.

“That took you long enough,” the soldier growls. He’s got one of the peasant’s food sacks on his lap and is eating the food out of it. “If you people worked any slower, you’d be going backwards.”

I walk over to him, holding my stomach. “Please. I need to go. My stomach…”

His face wrinkles up. “It’s the shit you peasants eat,” he says, stuffing the rest of the food back in the sack and tossing the sack on the floor. “It’s not fit for animals.”

He starts to say something else, but I’m tired of listening to him. I hit him. Right in the pit of his stomach.

The air goes out of him and his eyes go wide with surprise right before he folds up and topples off the chair.

I roll him onto his back. He’s still moaning softly. Not a lot of fight in this one. “You can live through this if you want. How does that sound to you?”

He nods.

“Good. Don’t give me any trouble and I’ll let you go when this is over. You understand?”

He nods again.

I take off my bandanna and gag him with it. I pull off his belt, roll him over, and bind his hands behind his back. I wish he had a gun, but apparently I’m not the only one who had the idea that guns and gunpowder factories don’t mix. I turn to face the peasants, who are all frozen in place, staring at me with big eyes.

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