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It seemed a lifetime before Dev saw movement again. He knocked on a tree, hoping it would alert the others if they had grown hypnotized by the boredom of waiting.
The men were not on horseback, but they were leading their horses. In fact, the horses formed a wall around them. The horses were cooperating, but animals didn’t march as neatly as people, and here and there a shift in their gait opened a brief window for Dev. It would be hard to hit the men through that.
But killing two or three horses would work nearly as well. That would expose them.
Dev nocked an arrow. “Ready,” he said, in a normal tone of voice, which he knew the girls could hear. “Now!” He stepped out, shot an arrow at the mass of horses, and stepped back, not bothering to see if he’d done any damage. He dashed to another spot.
The dummies popped up, one, then another. The movement drew fire.
Only a single round. They were being more careful with their ammunition. Dev nocked another arrow.
The girls were on the move. One pulled a third dummy’s rope. It sprung up, and Dev stepped out again, shot, and ducked back. The fourth dummy went up. Another round was fired.
“They got the dummy in the head,” Yasmin said.
Better him than me.
He moved again, circling around, then coming up from a different angle. He lost sight of the enemy for a moment, but then there they were again. He had hit one of the horses but not killed it. It was away from the rest, standing there, the feathers of the arrow sticking out from its shoulder.
Vargas and his men had shifted the horses to keep the wall intact and left the injured horse behind. It was still hard to get a shot at the men. There were four of them in there, he thought.
He stepped out and shot another arrow. He had another dozen, most of them homemade. The distance and accuracy was better with the old commercial arrows made of fiberglass. He had one more of those. He nocked it, moved to his left, a few steps more into the neighborhood, and the girls went through the routine with the dummies.
No one fired this time, not at him, not at the dummies.
“They might have it figured out,” he said to the girls. “Georgia, Wanda, you get on down to the house or wherever you’re assigned. Yasmin, stay up here and operate three of the dummies, just in case it’s still fooling them.”
“Going,” Georgia said.
“Stay low at first,” he said. “I need to get closer, Yasmin. Give me two minutes to find a good spot, and then trigger them again, one by one, as fast as you can move, okay? Keep going around, triggering them in a random order until I tell you to stop.”
“Got it,” Yasmin said.
“And keep your head down.”
Dev slid down the hill, feet first, keeping to a spot behind some dense bushes. It wasn’t well protected, but the men weren’t firing back at the moment.
Also, he didn’t seem to be doing them much damage.
He heard one yell. Had someone else shot at them? Who? Maybe Curt.
He’d do better this time, wait for his chance. He’d end up closer to them, but from a worse angle. He stopped, crawled around the bush he was behind until he could see them, and watched them march forward. They were moving slowly, trying to keep the horses bunched tight around them. But there was an opening now at the rear, and there was a man sitting on the ground. He’d sprung a trap and was struggling to open it.
Dev could wait until they passed him and take his shot then. He might be able to get one of them.
He heard one of them say, “Whoa.” The horses came to a stop. There’d been a little window as they hadn’t all stopped at once, but it was gone now. He saw a rifle come up over a saddle, not aimed at him, but up at the dummies. He could see the man’s arm, but he was keeping his head low. That his shot was angled up was helping him protect himself.
He fired over Dev’s head.
Dev heard a sound above him, a human sound of pain or surprise. Had the man managed to hit Yasmin?
Damn them all. Dev aimed at the shooter. The men made noises to get the horses moving, and the instant he saw two of the horses shifting, he anticipated the opening and fired an arrow into it.
“Scooter,” someone said. “He’s down.”
“Leave him,” Vargas said.
They kept moving, but the injured man on the ground disturbed the horses. Without changing position, Dev nocked another arrow and let fly. Then another, quickly on its heels.
A burst of three shots was aimed his way. He hit the ground, wishing he had better cover.
“Got him, I think,” a man said. The firing stopped.
“It’s not the one with the crossbow,” a new voice said. “That’s a regular arrow.”
So Curt had gotten some shots off. Good. But from what he’d glimpsed, there were at least four men in this bunch alive, one of them injured. Plus the one with the trap, who was out of it for now.
“Shut up,” Vargas said. “He might be alive and moving again.”
Dev stayed where he was, hardly breathing, not risking making any noise at all. They’d missed with all three shots, but if they sprayed this area again on full auto, he was dead.
Nothing happened for long minutes. When he dared to look again, they were out of sight. The one he’d shot had gone with them. The man in the trap had managed to get out of it and was crawling back along the road, toward the highway, out of range. Dev scurried back up the hill.
Yasmin had been hit. Goddamn it. She was lying on the ground on her back, her breath coming rapidly. Her face was glazed with sweat. She reached one hand for him as he knelt by her.
“You’ll be okay,” he said, taking her hand.
She grimaced. “Don’t think so. My own fault. I stood up too far.”
“Not your fault at all,” he said. “Where are you hit? Are you bleeding?” He saw no sign of the wound.
“Chest,” she said.
“Sorry about this,” he said, and he ripped her shirt open.
She had been shot, high in the chest, but as she breathed, he could see a bloody froth oozing out of the wound. It had come in at an angle, and her lung was punctured. There was little chance they’d be able to treat this. The horror of it was, they didn’t even have any drugs stronger than willow bark to offer to ease her pain.
“It’s not too bad,” he said, tearing off his own shirt and wadding it into a makeshift bandage. “Hold this on it if you can.”
“Feels bad,” she said, and then she coughed weakly and he could tell by her anguished face that it hurt her to cough.
“Open your mouth,” he said, and she did. “Stick out your tongue,” he said, and she did. It wasn’t bloody. He had expected it to be. So it could have been worse. But it was bad enough.
“I wish Misha were here,” he said.
“Not sure,” she said. And she didn’t finish the thought.
“I’m so sorry,” he said, gripping her hand tighter.
She managed a brief smile. “Better this than what—” a shallow breath “—they had in mind for me.”
He shook his head. It was better to stay alive, always. But that wasn’t for him to judge, was it? “We’ll take care of you. I have to go. I’ll send someone back to help you the first moment I can.”
“I know,” she said. “Go.”
He dropped her hand and ran down the hill toward his house, trying to push worry for the girl from his mind. He’d make his last stand down there.