Carry the Flame (26 page)

“Burned Fingers?” the Mayor interrupted. “We have the one called Burned Fingers?”

“Don't worry, you'll get your bounty.”

The Mayor shrugged like he didn't care. “Is he the one with the burned hand?”

“That's right—”

“I thought he was a strange one. He is in my special pit, so I do not think you can have him.”

Hunt, undeterred, pointed his finger at the Mayor. “We must have him
and
the demon. The same goes for the oil tanker and van—it's all ours. Nothing stays with you. You did your job in taking the caravan, but nothing belongs to you.”

The Mayor laughed heartily. Esau thought he sounded genuinely amused. But a distant beastly roar brought the black man to his feet at the same moment a spindly Asian guard burst into the Oval Office, yelling, “Chunga's breaking out.”

The Mayor darted from behind the table, surprising Esau with how fast a big man could move.

“This will have to wait,” the Mayor said to Hunt, “but you may come with me. You might see something you will never forget. Chunga is very hungry.”

Hunt and Esau followed him.

The City of Shade became a maze, as dizzying with its sudden enclosures and darkly shadowed paths as the desert was daunting with its vast reaches and burning sky. They made a series of rapid turns, coming quickly to an open arena with a wide round pit. The Mayor slowed. Then he stepped between guards holding torches, their gazes fixed below. The slave inched closer. A creature roared again. “Get us out of here!” a female screamed.

Esau watched a tall woman with a dark braid back into the wall. About twenty feet away a monstrous lizard had jammed his head between the top of a wide wooden gate and the end of a tunnel ceiling. The beast's efforts broke off great clods of dirt and clay from the wall, and his long claws raked the top of the boards. With a sharp
crack,
two of them snapped off, and the reptile jammed a shoulder into the opening. Esau felt weak just watching.

Next to the woman stood a man. Burned Fingers, the slave figured. He noticed both of them held knives close to their legs, and wondered where they got them.

“So you are Burned Fingers, I hear,” the Mayor said in a voice the slave found too jovial for the circumstances. “What did you do to my Chunga?”

“Nothing,” Burned Fingers shouted, “but he sure looks hungry.”

The Mayor chuckled, which Esau could barely hear over the lizard's roars. “Oh, yes, he is a hungry boy. I want him to be hungry, but you must have done something to him because—” He stopped short and turned to a guard. “Take your torch over there and hold it over Chunga.”

The lizard, drooling copiously, crashed his heavy body against the gate. The boards sounded like they were breaking apart.

Jesus,
Esau said to himself. Quickly, he begged the Lord's forgiveness for such a blasphemy. And surely the Lord would forgive him because the creature's next powerful thrust wedged
both
of his shoulders between the rupturing gate and the top of the tunnel. Seconds later, when the guard held the torch out over the beast, Esau saw the battered boards actually bowing. The Mayor saw even more.

“Why does poor Chunga have bloody saliva?” he demanded.

“Gingivitis?” Burned Fingers shouted. “Who the fuck cares? Get us out of here.”

“I care,” the Mayor said staunchly.

“Yeah, you want us fighting tomorrow, you better get us out.”

“Do not tell me what I want. What I want right now is a true answer. I do not lie, and I promise you that I will let him eat you right now if you do not tell me what—”

Another hard
crack
silenced the Mayor as the lizard slammed his front leg through the top half of the gate. Then the beast lunged hard enough to force most of his upper body into the enlarged opening. His claws raked the wood again, shaking it violently, before he smashed his other leg through the last unbroken board on the top part of the barrier. The chunk flew through the air, landing in the middle of the pit, not far from the prisoners.

The Mayor resumed speaking in the same steady voice. “I want to know what you did to my pet.”

Esau found the Mayor's tone maddening. The animal wanted to
eat
those two people, and if someone didn't move fast, he
would
eat them.
Jesus,
Esau said to himself again, not bothering to beg forgiveness.

The woman spoke hurriedly to Burned Fingers, but Esau couldn't hear her over the lizard's exertions. When the slave looked back at the creature, he edged away from the pit in horror. The beast had climbed halfway out of the pen, and his long abdomen was tented over the wrecked gate. With another mighty effort, the saurian sank his claws into the sand and looked up, probing the air with his bloody tongue.

“You're looking at it,” Burned Fingers shouted, pointing to the beast. “I cut him up with my knife.”

“You have a knife?” the Mayor asked.

Burned Fingers held it up. “Your men did a shitty job searching me.”

“What a surprise,” Hunt said.

“Bring him up,” the Mayor ordered the African guard, who lowered a chain. It was linked to a metal ring anchored in concrete.

Burned Fingers urged the woman to go first.

“No,” the Mayor declared. “There will be no gallantry from you. I did not say anything about the female.”

“I'm not coming unless she goes first,” Burned Fingers said. Only yards away, the lizard clawed up buckets of sand trying to haul the rest of his body over the beaten boards.

“You are a fool.” The Mayor lifted his gaze to Chunga, then he eyed the woman. “Come,” he said to her.

She made it halfway up when her foot slipped and she slammed against the hard wall.

Only the lizard's powerful haunches were still behind the gate when the splintering wood collapsed like tinder. The beast floundered, found his footing, and rose up.

The African reached down and grabbed the woman's wrist, hauling her from the pit and taking her knife. But it was too late for Burned Fingers. He turned from the wall and stared at the dragon. Incredibly, to Esau, the marauder raised his blade and stepped forward to fight.

Chunga charged.

“Oh, you are good,” the Mayor said. Esau thought he meant the lizard, but then the Mayor yelled, “Look up,” and tossed Burned Fingers a blazing torch.

The instant the marauder caught it, he swung the flame in an arc. The beast stopped so suddenly his front legs plowed up sand, then he lurched away from the fire. The momentum shot a gob of drool into the air that landed on the torch, sizzled, and almost snuffed the flame. Burned Fingers raised the torch above his head. Pink drool slid toward his hand. The Komodo spotted the opening and darted at him. Burned Fingers jumped aside. The flame burned up the last of the drool and flared brightly. Burned Fingers held out the torch like a sword, tilted upward. The dragon circled him.

“I want him alive,” the Mayor said to the African guard. “He is an exciting fighter.” Esau listened closely as the Mayor went on. “My guests will love him. Get the wagon backed into the pen, and find something tasty to tempt Chunga. But not too much. I want him hungry for tomorrow night. Look at him!” The Mayor pointed to the dragon circling Burned Fingers. “He really wants to eat him. Oh, this will be a good fight.” He put his hand on the African's shoulder. “Get him a leg. No, an arm,” the Mayor said after a moment's reflection. “A smaller one. Female. Just a snack to tide him over. But make sure it is fresh. And then you should help Burned Fingers.”

The African ran off, and the Mayor turned his attention back to the pit. Burned Fingers was moving in a tight circle, keeping the torch well before him. The lizard had forced him farther from the wall. The beast seemed to know what he was doing, a cunning starving creature with meat only feet away.

“How about tossing me a gun?” Burned Fingers yelled without looking up.

“You do not need a gun,” the Mayor said. “Fire is such a primitive fear. But you should feel honored. I have never seen my pet so agitated. He wants to eat you very much.”

The beast lunged forward, shooting out his tortured tongue, as if testing the air for heat. Burned Fingers stabbed the torch at the bloody organ, but the Komodo was quick and pulled it back.

“Yeah, a real honor,” the marauder yelled. “How long you want me dancing with you know who?”

“I did not hear that you were a man of such humor, Mr. Burned Fingers. Only that you were a fine killer. Are you a lover, too, in these dangerous times? Is this your lady friend?” The Mayor grabbed the woman's arm and forced her forward.

“Nope,” Burned Fingers answered without sparing a glance at him.

The African guard raced out of Chunga's pen with a torch, shouting, “We've got to get him back there. There's a wagon.”

An unseen woman in the tunnel shouted, “No, don't. Please don't do—”

Horrific screams fried the air.

The arm, Esau thought. Breathless shrieks might have confirmed this.

Chunga backed away from the torches. Then the beast turned and ran toward the ceaseless cries, as if their meaning had finally registered in his reptilian brain.

“Thanks, bub.” Burned Fingers handed his torch to the African guard and climbed up the chain. He looked exhilarated as he dragged himself from the pit, paying no mind to the overarching agony back in the tunnel. Guards closed in on him, demanding his knife. The marauder looked at their guns and handed it over.

“Take them to a cell by the sick ones,” the Mayor ordered above the screams, which began to weaken.

Two burly white guards seized Burned Fingers. The Asian grabbed the woman at gunpoint, and the prisoners were marched away.

Esau saw his master turn to the Mayor.

“You have men fighting your Komodos?”

“Yes, but most are not good fighters. They try to run and my pets eat them. I think Burned Fingers will give a good fight.” The Mayor nodded. “Come, we must finish this business of ours.”

He walked from the pit with a guard on either side of him. Another one trailed Esau and his master. The slave feared he'd be shot if he made one wrong move. Even his master did not appear so commanding in the City of Shade.

More daylight had stolen into the building. Esau saw a group of men cleaning weapons. They had brushes and cloths, and the smell of fuel filled the air.

Once in the office, the Mayor took his seat, but didn't encourage Hunt, much less his slave, to join him at the table.

“No matter what you think,” the Mayor said, resuming the conversation as if he'd paused only to sneeze, “the people on the caravan do not belong to you. They belong to us. So does the gas. But,” he raised his hand to stop Hunt from interrupting him, “we can negotiate. We want gold bullion. Do not try to pawn off sacks of dust on us,” he said dismissively. “Not for a prize so great as the caravan. We know the Alliance has bullion from the old fort at Knox. And,” the Mayor raised his hand again, “do not expect Burned Fingers or that woman. They are both going in the pit tomorrow night, and they will never leave it. I do not care about your bounty.”

“You'll care about what His Piety wants, and he insists on Burned Fingers,” Hunt said. “He led the attack on the Army of God. He killed dozens of our men. He committed horrendous crimes against our people, so there's no negotiating about him. But we'll let you keep the woman.”

“Do not tell me what I can keep. I will tell you the terms of trade, and Burned Fingers is only the beginning. We want two used-up girls for each of the virgins. If we had not stopped the caravan, they would have been blown up by now. But your used-up females are not so valuable, so the Alliance also must give us two hundred kilos of food, a Basalt rocket launcher, and five hundred grenades.” Basalt was the Russian manufacturer of the RPG and its ammo, before the factory had to shut down in the third decade of the century. “One more thing. We will take half the gas before your return.”

“No you won't, and I'm not here to negotiate,” Hunt said. “I'm here to take back everything. And that includes
all
the gas.”

Esau had never heard his master's voice harden so fast.

“How will you do that, Hunt? You are but one man with one slave.” The Mayor glanced at Esau. “And you think we will let you leave here with any of that? You are a mistaken man.”

“I will put some in chains and march them back, and I will come back for the rest.”

“You are not in a position to make such demands. The Alliance has no gas, and the Russians have taken the Strategic Petroleum Reserve.”

Esau detected the slightest tic on Hunt's face. The slave was shocked his master was learning of the catastrophe only now. Esau had overheard the news back in the chapel, but never would have admitted to Hunt or anyone else that he eavesdropped on His Piety. The Mayor must have spotted his master's surprise, too.

“Yes, that is what happened. You did not know this?”

Hunt did not reply. Esau saw tension in his master's face, neck, arms.

“Your wealth is limited,” the Mayor went on. “Your need is great, so of course you will negotiate—from a position of weakness. And do you know why? Because we can always ship the girls north, now that we have gas. We are in touch with the Dominion, too. And we control
all
migration across the Bloodlands. What do you control? Gas? Not anymore. You cast your lot with losers. We did our job. We stopped the caravan. We caught everyone with only one man killed. And we will find the girl. She could not have gone far, and Jester is highly motivated. So now you must do your job and tell the Alliance what we demand.”

“His Piety will never accept this,” Hunt said.

“But he has no choice.” The Mayor stood. “Do not confuse a stupid white man with me. We have not had so many talks, Hunt, but do not think you can humiliate me. I will kill you myself. But I am a fair man. That is my code. I will give you a child to take back, to show
your
masters that you have found their prize. But do not expect a girl. I will give you a boy. You may take him to His Piety and tell your master what I require for all the others. This is a grand gesture on my part. If he thinks he can attack the City of Shade, tell him I will hunt him down and feed him to my pets. That is not an idle threat. I have my own allies now. The Russians and I get along very well. They are not so crazy with religion. His Piety placed all his eggs—is that not what you say?—in the wrong basket. He thought the gas would last forever.”