AllFreeNovel
Share Us
"Let me do the talking, Val," Price warned as he lit his pipe. "They're tetchy around strangers."
"Any particular reason for it?"
Sweat ran lightly down the greasy dirt on his face. Price's filth was semi-waterproof, as impervious to rain as an oilskin. "Nobody likes them much. Most folks in the civilized world-beg your pardon, but that's how Tennesseans see it, stuck between corn-likker-swilling guerillas west and east-avoid them like they carry a bad fungus.
"Even the churchies keep clear, except a few unreformed Jesus-pushers."
"Why do the Kurians let them be?"
"They get loads over the mountains, one way or another. Between the New York corridor and Chattanooga precious little moves by train; the lines are always getting attacked by guerillas, and you have to pay through the nose per pound. A legworm can haul as much cargo as a railcar. They and their brothers in Virginia are the main east-west smuggling artery for the whole Midwest. Not that they don't do legitimate runs too."
They hopped across two old wormtrails, little more than hummocks of summer-dried weeds, and entered the woods. Evergreens staked out their claims among the tough oaks and smooth-skinned hackberrys.
The two men astride the sixty-foot segmented worm wore black leathers fitted with an assortment of barbs like oversized fishhooks. A third had dismounted and stood near the front of their beast, a burlap sack of potato peelings and pig corn thrown under its nose. All three men wore their hair long, tied down in back and then flared out like a foxtail. All were on the grubby side, but didn't make an art form out of it like their guide.
Valentine had never seen a live legworm at rest. Its "legs" were hundreds of tiny, paired, black clawlike legs, running down the bottom of its fleshy hide like a millipede's. Oversized versions of the claws, growing larger even as the front of the worm grew thinner, pulled up the corn and the earth beneath, stuffing it into a bilateral mouth. Scimitar-like tusks, facing each other like crab claws, stuck out the front
"That's close enough, stranger," said the second man.
"Friendly call, high rider," Price said. "I'm Hoffman Price, friend to the Bulletproof, Worm Wildcats, and the Uttercross."
"We're Bulletproof."
"I know," Price said. "That's why I listed you first."
"Story!" the second man said. "And if it ain't, you know we don't like bums-"
"I know him, Zak," the one with the corncobs said, dropping his sack. He had a little gray in his red-brown hair, and a little more flesh around his middle. "He's no bum. He came and got that Swenson newbie. Maybe four years back. That Colt the Dispatcher carries, he got it from him."
"You wanna vouch for him, Cookie?" the one who'd been called Zak said.
"I'm just saying the Dispatcher knows him, is all."
"Where can I find the Dispatcher?" Price asked. "Is it still Dalian?"
Zak took a drink from a water bottle and passed it back. "Sure is. He's east. Soon as we've eaten we're moving on fast."
"Will you let us ride tail? Three human, two Grog. Mule in tow."
"You might be riding into trouble," Zak said. "One of our pods got jumped. The Dispatcher sent out a call."
"Our guns will secure the Bulletproof, as long as we enjoy the BulletprooPs hospitality," Price said. "You can count us on your side of the worm."
The man behind Zak pointed with a fingerless-gloved hand. "You know the words, but that don't mean much to me."
"He says he wants business with the Dispatcher, that's good enough for me," Zak said. "You can ride tail. Enjoy the music back there."
"Thank you, high rider," Price said. He touched Valentine and they turned.
"What did we just agree to?" Valentine asked.
"When you ride with the Bulletproof-any of the legworm tribes, really-you enjoy their hospitality. But you're expected to stand with them in any kind of a confrontation."
"You mean fight."
"Don't worry. When two tribes get into a feud they each line up on either side of an open field. There's a sporting match like lacrosse only with two contestants; all you have to do is cheer."
"What kind of feud?"
