Saving Time

Chapter 3

Murphy’s Laws of Combat #16:

“Teamwork is essential; it gives the enemy other people to shoot at.”

On his back, Rig pointed the Beretta at the oncoming rider. The 9mm bucked twice, and his assailant flew out of his saddle, his horse nearly running Rig down before it disappeared over the rise. Close behind the other three charged like a wall, their yells and whistles piercing the thunder of hooves.

Rig rolled left and fired two rounds into the closest rider. The trooper fell forward, his horse blocking one rider. The horseman to Rig’s right tried wielding the saber across the horse. It missed, but he kicked out with his metal stirrup as he passed and caught Rig in the shoulder, spinning him around. Rig stood but couldn’t bring his left arm up to hold the pistol two-handed.

The familiar combat rage flashed through him in the wake of the pain, furious with his attackers and their senseless efforts to kill him. Who the hell are these maniacs?

The thick smells of damp dirt and horse sweat swirled in the air as the two remaining cavalrymen turned and circled quickly to attack Rig from opposite directions. He had to face one at a time. He shot the stirrup-kicking bastard square in the chest, then spun to finish off the last rider.

The man unexpectedly leaned over in the saddle, sword low. Rig dodged, but the point of the saber skewered him in the thigh. The rider’s momentum spun Rig around, tearing muscle, ripping the saber out of the rider’s hand. The Beretta went flying as Rig slammed into the ground. The fall jarred the steel blade still embedded in his thigh. A spasm of fire shot up his body as black lights gyrated before his eyes.

He rolled a bit, pulling the point of the saber from the dirt as he groped blindly for his boot knife. The rider gave a shout of victory and walked his gray up to Rig. The two remaining horses, saddles empty, stood close as though they wanted to see what would happen next.

The cavalryman gazed down with a somber expression over the gold cording across his chest. He pulled a large pistol from a holster at the front of his saddle. With a feral glint in his eye, the rider cocked the flintlock and pointed it at Rig, sparing a glance at the Beretta lying two meters away.

Rig stared up into the black depths of the muzzle. Outraged that he would die without knowing what the hell was going on, he sneered at the horseman. He held the knife by the blade ready to throw it, a Hail Mary effort at best lying on his back.

A gunshot split the silence.

The three horses flinched in unison, tails flipping. In slow motion, the cavalryman arched his back, face to the sky, and fell backward off his mount. A moment later, an acrid cloud of smoke drifted over Rig. When it cleared, he could see the girl down the slope. She lay on her back, her stocking feet toward him, a musket barrel held between them, the butt of the weapon cradled on her good shoulder. He half-smiled/half-grimaced and nodded his thanks. Wide-eyed, she didn’t return his smile, but did give him a tight nod in return.

At the sight of the blade sticking in his leg, a familiar nausea twisted his gut. It was the revulsion of having metal imbedded in his flesh, first experienced with shrapnel from an IED in Afghanistan.

He gritted his teeth and slid his keffiyeh bandana out of his pants pocket, pressing it around the blade protruding out the bottom of his thigh. Yanking the KIT torniquet out of his pocket, he was glad he hadn’t emptied his pockets for the trip to Spain. He tightened it to stem the bleeding. The sword pierced the outside of his thigh clean through with the hilt angled away from him, thankfully missing bone, and major arteries.

Torn muscles and tendons screamed at him as he sat in the dead grass, grunting out quick breaths at the pulsing pain, unsure how to remove the sword. He couldn’t reach across his body for the hilt. He absently wished he’d packed an HTS IV for shock and blood loss, which Ranger medics carried on actual missions. He crawled over to his pistol, brushed off the dirt, and changed magazines.

The woman walked up with the twelve-pound medical kit and set it by him. Amazing. She’d been paying attention when he’d used it for her. His new comrade-in-arms stood by his leg with a question on her face. He noticed her free hand still shook a bit. The kick of the heavy musket must have hurt like hell.

Saying thank you, he tossed the bandana to her. “All right, nurse, if you can wipe the blade clean, I’ll sterilize it and you can pull the sucker out.” Would she have the nerve to do it?

Her brows knotted, but she wiped the grass, mud, and blood off the blade sticking out the bottom of his thigh efficiently, with no squeamishness. She didn’t wait for him to finish opening the medical pack. She just yanked the sword free.

“Fuckin’ hell, woman!”

Gasping, Rig grabbed the bandana out of her hand to stem the bleeding. Nerves throbbing, Rig leaned back, panting, ready to read her the riot act, but her bruised face held a patient expression that stopped him cold.

He gritted his teeth against the pain and eyed her, bewildered by the vision she presented. She stood over him, calmly waiting, like some punk avenging angel, bloody saber in hand, bandaged head, her smaller body lost in his camouflage coat.

Finally, it dawned on him that he’d just cussed at her.

He took a ragged breath. This situation got more bizarre by the minute. She’d been beaten and nearly raped. Crazed, costumed men had done their best to kill him. Their dead bodies littered the landscape, yet she stood waiting. He felt sweat dripping cold off his forehead, his muscles convulsing, so he knew he couldn’t be hallucinating.

No, she appeared very real, holding herself erect, waiting for him to come to his senses.

Rig ground out “Okay. Sorry about that” in-between his gasps. Her expression subtly changed, adding skepticism. The woman’s demeanor reminded him of a female drill instructor he’d had during Advanced Training. She’d wait when her students screwed up, her expression communicating stern expectations when they needed to get their act together. He’d give even odds as to who was tougher.

He gazed at his leg for a moment, trembling, breathing hard, as the pain hammered at him.

Then unexpectedly, he grinned at the absurdity of it all. I’m going into shock. No, I’m going mad, that’s it. He made it a point never to swear around civilians, especially women—he rolled his eyes—except when they were jerking swords out of his body.

Struggling not to smile at the somber turn of her mouth, he said, “Miss Graham, please understand.” Pant. “I’m having a really bad day.” Gasp. “It just slipped out. Honest.”

Her misty, green eyes softened, hinting at forgiveness, acknowledging his sad attempt at humor. She looked hard at him for a moment, but a small smile escaped.

Ha!

She pursed her lips and nodded. “We must away. More of the devils will soon follow.”

Rig agreed, chuckling, but cut it off when he heard panic begin to color the sound.

Gesturing to his leg, he said, “I’ll take it from here.” Rig paused to steady his breathing. “You, you go ahead and get the gear collected. We’ll need the horses.” With a nod, she spun around, and with back straight, quickly gathered up the horses’ reins but not before he saw a reticent smile briefly brighten her face.

He examined his wound, and then wondered at the retreating woman for a moment. He shrugged at the mystery, undoing the tourniquet, dropped his pants, swearing to himself as he sat on the wet grass in his skivvies. What will she think of that? Clenching his teeth, he cleaned the tear along the top of his thigh, which was beginning to look like one large bruise around the ripped flesh. Pressing his bandana against the exit wound at the bottom of his thigh, he was still literally bleeding like a stuck pig.

There was no time to stitch it up because he agreed with the girl—more of these nut cases could be showing up at any moment, apparently all hunting him. Before he forgot, or passed out, he gave himself a shot of antibiotics and took two Vicodin dry.

The girl returned with a canvas bag and knelt by his leg. She took out a handful of what looked like breadcrumbs and quickly stuffed them in the exit wound. The bleeding stopped.

“What the . . .?” Without explanation, she packed more crumbs in the gash on the top of his thigh. Recovering from the electric flashes of agony, he grabbed the bag out of her hand and looked in. They were moldy breadcrumbs! Yet, for stopping the bleeding, the crumbs seemed to work as well as the army’s QuikClot.

She began wrapping his leg one-handed with gauze she’d found in the medicine kit, and then part of another French shirt. Using her finger on the knot, he tied off the bandage. She pushed herself up, and stood, looking down at him. “It will hold the bleeding till I can mend the tears.”

“Breadcrumbs, really?”

“Aye. Even the French know of such medicines.” With that, she returned downslope to filling the packs.

A legion of questions hammered his skull about these people, what he’d seen in the valley joined the agony already beating at him. He furtively watched Miss Graham picking up various objects scattered around, including a flintlock pistol and what looked like a corset. She seemed to take all this craziness in stride, shock notwithstanding, adding some of her own to the mix.

Bad vibes jangled his already tortured nerves. He was in Spain, but he wasn’t. Strangely dressed men were trying to kill him with antique weapons. It was bitter cold, instead of the morning’s milder weather. Had a stun grenade scrambled his brain? His head felt like a giant fist was squeezing it. Whatever the cause, his soldier’s intuition clamored for him to get the hell away from the unnatural scene surrounding him.

Ranger Training 101. Concentrate on the now, Starke.Painfully, he pulled up his pants. Some unwelcome feeling was returning to his bruised shoulder. He staggered upright, the torn muscles making his eyes tear. Holstering his Beretta, he counted his ammo: only two full clips left, three altogether, and three extra clips for his M125 rifle. He wasn’t sure what would have happened if the Spanish hadn’t planned live-fire exercises during the field training.

His thigh burned like a bitch just standing, but he was mobile after a fashion. He knew later it would be far worse. Stumbling stiff-legged, he grabbed a musket as a crutch. He tied his rucksack and his rifle on the largest horse, the gray beast ridden by the cavalryman who’d speared him. Whatever town he and Miss Graham needed to get to, thank God they weren’t walking.

He checked to see if all four hussar-impersonators were dead. The one the girl shot wasn’t.

Rig knelt awkwardly, bandaged leg straight, baring his teeth with the effort, and turned the man over. His blue eyes were open, his weathered face pallid. He wore braided locks at his temples and a ponytail, along with his drooping mustache. The whole effect brought up images of Attila the Hun.

The horseman eyed Rig’s uniform, then whispered in French, “Who are you?”

Rig glared at him for a moment and then pointed to the black letters over his breast pockets, STARKE, and the flag on his shoulder, U.S. Army.

When the man didn’t say anything more, Rig asked him the same question. He frowned, but answered in a stronger voice, “Capitaine Antoine LaCroix, Chasseurs à Cheval de La Garde Impériale.”

Rig just shook his head. Right. Napoleon’s Imperial Guard. This guy was probably a CPA from Lyons during the week and sunk all his money in this weekend outing and his gaudy uniform now sported a hole in it.

No. That explanation didn’t fit—at all. They’d tried to kill him. Four men were dead. His body began to constrict.

Rig controlled his breathing and silently studied the ‘Capitaine.’ The man was a weathered, professional soldier, not some hobby-mad civilian. He’d bet a month’s pay on it.

“Why are you trying to kill me?”

The man laughed, which brought on a short coughing fit. “We’re at war, n’est-ce pas?” He raised an eyebrow. “Are you with the Spanish opposition or the English?”

Translating the French, Rig sneered at his question. Just barely keeping from putting his hands around the man’s neck. “Look, you French fruitcake.” Why did he feel so close to hysteria now? He pursed his lips. He’d spoken in English. In fractured French he said, “Américain. Armée des états-Unis.”

This caused a puzzled frown. “Mais, you Americans are our friends, non? Your government would never lease troops to the English—you hate them.”

“I’m no mercenary, Antoine.” Rig despised the corporate mercenaries and Black Water gunslingers running around Iraq—even if some were ex-Rangers. The man just shook his head in confusion. Rig knew he was butchering his French. “Why are you here?”

The man closed his eyes, obviously near the end of his strength. “Your pistol. How, how many shots without reloading?”

Of course, my Beretta. He answered without thinking, “Quinze. Fifteen.”

The man’s eyes flew open, amazement evident. Rig had had enough of this nonsense. He was wasting time. He stood, picked up a coat off the ground, and covered the crazy Frenchman, slipping his fur hat under his head as a pillow. Rig figured someone would show up soon, but hopefully not too soon.

In a daze, Rig lurched laboriously to the other riders, rifling their pockets looking for identification. He found several small cloth bags which turned out to be coin purses. But no wallets, just letters and little booklets. Finding nothing familiar or that he could read, he pocketed the coin purses. This was feeling too much like a backcountry mission or a SERE exercise, where you salvaged every possible resource in escaping the enemy. Nothing made sense, but it was obvious that his survival and the woman’s were at stake.

Miss Graham believed it too. She’d found her boots, now without shoelaces, and clomped around impatiently circling a grassy area near where he’d found her, head down, searching for something, poking at the ground with the bloody saber.

He shambled over to the two cowhide packs the woman had filled as he pulled the smallest horse, knife thrusts of agony jarring his thigh with each step.

The woman appeared practiced at scavenging. With frenetic energy, she’d thrown things together, stuffing two of the three packs to bursting. Rig hauled them to the roan and tying them together, threw them over the horse. She’d also collected a cartridge case of black leather, a flintlock pistol, cavalrymen’s short musket carbine, another cartridge case, metal canteens, and haversack bags that held food. He tied them all on the designated pack horse. Another oddity, bundles of hay and grain bags hung across the chest of each mount, and a large, tube-like cloth cases were tied to the back of each saddle.

The four bodies lay where they’d fallen, dotting the yellow-brown slope, three green and red-clad corpses, and one under a gray shroud. The fifth, the Capitaine, seemed to have passed out, but Rig couldn’t bring himself to care.

He stood staring at the carnage, then one of the horses snickered, bringing him back to the present. He was taking too much time.

He recognized the floating, disconnected sensations incited by both the shock of his wounds, carnage of combat, and the Vicodin, but this situation was far more alien. He shivered with the strange fear that was beating for release. He wanted to rage at the inexplicable scene, at the mad, irrational people. He had to get away from here and figure out what the hell was going on.

The horses—he wished they didn’t need them. In ‘Stan—Afghanistan—there’d been plenty of opportunities to work with the beasts, as well as mules and donkeys, but he didn’t like them. Too contrary, too complicated. Complicated? These horses had four reins, not two. This was getting more bizarre by the moment.

Leading the three beasts with his hand around twelve leather reins, he limped his way over to the young woman, now frantic in her efforts, still sweeping the ground with the sword blade. She staggered a couple of times in her unlaced boots, off-balance with one arm tied to her body. He stopped and frowned at her performance, while the horses lowered their noses to the grass. “Miss, we need to get—”

One horse abruptly jerked its head back, yanking at Rig’s bad arm. He grunted at the burst of fire rippling down his back, then checked the spot the horse shied away from. He picked up a metallic oval and chain laying there. Bronze colored, the medallion was unnaturally warm to the touch. An elaborately coiled snake circled the bronze disc, its face covered with runes. It looked Celtic, like something he’d seen visiting Ireland. The chain was just as ornate, links resembling the bodies of snakes.

“Yo, Miss. Are you looking for this?”

She whirled around and seeing what he held, walked quickly to him. Holding out the sword for him, she took the medallion.

She closed her eyes and sighed heavily. “Thank ye.” The woman ran the hand holding the medallion over the camouflage coat and the hip-level pocket flaps, pulling at them, but not hard enough to open them. She glanced back at him with a baffled expression.

She had long, attractive fingers, but dirty, broken nails. The cold had turned her scraped knuckles red. With a shake of his head at her efforts, he pulled a pocket flap loose from the Velcro, holding the pocket open so she could drop the medallion in, and then sealed the flap.

“Och.” She looked between him and the pocket a couple of times and then began tugging the flap open, then closed, patting the Velcro together, then pulling it apart again, a little smile forming on her lips.

He reached out and touched her fingers. She flinched, snatching her hand away. He hated the reflexive panic in her eyes, so he turned away, saying over his shoulder, “We have to go. Now.”

He stuck the saber in the ground and went to stand by the bay, hands out for her foot. He cocked his head questioningly. She closed her eyes for a moment and then walked up to the horse.

Awkwardly, she stepped in his cupped hands, reached up and grabbed hold of the raised front of the saddle with her free hand. She pulled herself up to stand in the stirrup and swung her leg over the horse. She straddled the saddle with a bounce and gave a little moan, holding her head. After helping her up, Rig took a moment to let the fire in his back and leg dissipate.

He looked up at her. “Are you all right?”

Nodding, she hurriedly arranged her full skirt so it covered her legs down to her muddy boots. Her back straight as a queen’s, she asked him to tie the reins together. When he was done, she picked up the top set of reins leading to the horse’s mouth in her free hand.

“What’s with the four reins?”

She gave him a judgmental glance and said, “If you are referring to how to use them,” he nodded, “To simplify, you can use the reins for the curb bit to stop, and the snaffle bit reins at the mouth for turning.”

He half-smiled approvingly at her apparent competency with a horse. Her toes just touched the stirrups, so he unbuckled the stirrup strap on one side and shortened it until she nodded, then buckled it again. Gesturing to her boots, she said, “Please place my boots in a pack. Unlaced, I will surely lose them riding.”

He quickly stuffed them where he could. “When we get a chance, I have laces for your boots. Let me know if your feet are too cold.” She gave a dismissive shake of her head.

Swearing under his breath, Rig painfully limped to the Capitaine’s gray, the musket crutch failing to help much. He saw the top of the empty scabbard peeking out from under the long green and gold-trimmed saddle blanket. He thought for a moment, and then bared his teeth. Yeah, he’d take it. Grabbing hold of the saber he’d stuck in the ground. He wiped the blood—his blood—on his pant leg and slid the blade into the scabbard so it lay along the flank of the horse with just the hilt showing at the top of the saddle blanket. There, a souvenir of this ridiculous engagement.

Why do horses have to be so damn big? He took a deep breath and gripped the raised pommel, pulling himself up one-armed on the wrong side. Stomach across the saddle, he pushed his injured leg over the back, until he was able to finally ease himself upright and slip his feet into the too-short stirrups.

He exhaled with a ragged groan, glad the horse hadn’t objected. His head swam from the exertion, which wasn’t a good sign. He worked to ignore the throbbing aches coursing through his body as he positioned himself in the saddle, tied his two sets of reins together and spread out the bottom of his long coat which awkwardly bunched behind him.

Where were the French now? He swore, calling himself every kind of fool. He should’ve asked that question long before this. Checking his watch, it had been twenty minutes since the cavalry arrived. Worried at his stupid lapse, he walked his horse up just close enough to the top of the rise to be able to look down.

In the valley, among the long shadows, the thousands were making camp, tents, and fires now dotted the plain. He didn’t see horsemen anywhere. They could be near, he supposed, just out of sight in the folds of the slope. Even so, he blew out his breath, relieved.

Rig walked his horse up to the woman, stopping next to what was now their packhorse. He leaned over and grimaced, seizing the roan’s reins. He had no choice but to hold them with his bad arm, knowing the torture he was inviting, but he couldn’t find anywhere to secure them to his saddle and wasn’t sure it was a good idea anyway. They moved off with a quick walk.