Ryan could feel the poison start to seep into his mind
The one-eyed manâs willpower was always strong, but his mind was distracted by the need to take in air. He didnât have the immediate strength to break eye contact, and by the time he was able to breathe evenly, and devote his full attention to Ethan, the tentacles of hate were already beginning to take hold. Jak was his friend and comrade-in-arms, sureâ¦but if they took out Jak, then J.B. would be freedâ¦. No, he knew that wasnât the case, but why the hell should Jak escape this torture? What made him so special?
âChill him.â The words escaped from Ryanâs lips before he even knew it was what he felt.
Ethan stepped back and looked across the line at the three companions who were now fully under his influence. Then he caught Jakâs baleful glare.
The baron threw back his head and laughed, long and loud. This was going to be one hell of a hunt.
Other titles in the Deathlands saga:
Pilgrimage to Hell
Red Holocaust
Neutron Solstice
Crater Lake
Homeward Bound
Pony Soldiers
Dectra Chain
Ice and Fire
Red Equinox
Northstar Rising
Time Nomads
Latitude Zero
Seedling
Dark Carnival
Chill Factor
Moon Fate
Furyâs Pilgrims
Shockscape
Deep Empire
Cold Asylum
Twilight Children
Rider, Reaper
Road Wars
Trader Redux
Genesis Echo
Shadowfall
Ground Zero
Emerald Fire
Bloodlines
Crossways
Keepers of the Sun
Circle Thrice
Eclipse at Noon
Stoneface
Bitter Fruit
Skydark
Demons of Eden
The Mars Arena
Watersleep
Nightmare Passage
Freedom Lost
Way of the Wolf
Dark Emblem
Crucible of Time
Starfall Encounter: Collectorâs Edition
Gemini Rising
Gaiaâs Demise
Dark Reckoning
Shadow World
Pandoraâs Redoubt
Rat King
Zero City
Savage Armada
Judas Strike
Shadow Fortress
Sunchild
Breakthrough
Salvation Road
Amazon Gate
Destinyâs Truth
Skydark Spawn
Damnation Road Show
Devil Riders
Bloodfire
Hellbenders
Separation
â¦if we shrink from the hard contests where men must win at the hazard of their lives and at the risk of all they hold dear, then bolder and stronger peoples will pass us by, and win for themselves the domination of the world.
âTheodore Roosevelt,
1858â1919
This world is their legacy, a world born in the violent nuclear spasm of 2001 that was the bitter outcome of a struggle for global dominance.
There is no real escape from this shockscape where life always hangs in the balance, vulnerable to newly demonic nature, barbarism, lawlessness.
But they are the warrior survivalists, and they endureâin the way of the lion, the hawk and the tiger, true to natureâs heart despite its ruination.
Ryan Cawdor: The privileged son of an East Coast baron. Acquainted with betrayal from a tender age, he is a master of the hard realities.
Krysty Wroth: Harmony villeâs own Titian-haired beauty, a woman with the strength of tempered steel. Her premonitions and Gaia powers have been fostered by her Mother Sonja.
J. B. Dix, the Armorer: Weapons master and Ryanâs close ally, he, too, honed his skills traversing the Deathlands with the legendary Trader.
Doctor Theophilus Tanner: Torn from his family and a gentler life in 1896, Doc has been thrown into a future he couldnât have imagined.
Dr. Mildred Wyeth: Her father was killed by the Ku Klux Klan, but her fate is not much lighter. Restored from predark cryogenic suspension, she brings twentieth-century healing skills to a nightmare.
Jak Lauren: A true child of the wastelands, reared on adversity, loss and danger, the albino teenager is a fierce fighter and loyal friend.
Dean Cawdor: Ryanâs young son by Sharona accepts the only world he knows, and yet he is the seedling bearing the promise of tomorrow.
In a world where all was lost, they are humanityâs last hope.â¦
ââItâs a mighty long way down the dusty trailâ¦ââ
âDonâtââ
ââWhere the sun bursts hot on theâ¦â By the Three Kennedys, the next line has completely escaped me!â Doc exclaimed.
âThatâs a blessing, if nothing else,â Mildred murmured. Sheâd been pleading with Doc to stop quoting half-remembered lines, which she found more irritating than if he had been able to quote whole stanzas, for what seemed to be hours. It couldnât really have been that long, but time was beginning to drag.
The companions were seated in the kitchen area of a redoubt, the last of the dried and still-edible frozen goods in pots on top of the stove. The self-heats had been securely stowed for their journey ahead; theyâd leave when their chrons told them it was daylight up above.
A pall of gloom hung over the six friends, caused by the fact that there were only, now, the six. Ryan had veered between raging anger and deep sorrow in the time following the discovery that Sharona had jumped and taken Dean with her.
Although all of the companions had been shocked at the sudden departure of the boy, and hadnât known what to make of the circumstances, it seemed that Cawdor had been hit on a deeper levelâfrom which a scar had formed that was more pronounced than any physical reminder of his hard, raging life. Questions consumed Ryanâs mind. Had she tricked the boy? Or had he left of his own accord, without a word to his father and friends? Where were they now? What was to become of them? He had withdrawn into himself, not even wishing to share his anger, pain and confusion with Krysty. For several days he had been little more than a spectral presence, haunting the corridors of the redoubt where they were now resting.