Part 5 (1/2)
”Stop them!” Boncyk called, galloping up, waving his crossbow.
”My pigs!”
”d.a.m.nit, Wayne, you've been told year after year to get those pigs out of here before sp.a.w.ning season!” Don snapped.
”The sows are farrowing this month! I can't move them when they're birthing; they're too set in their ways.”
”They're not the only ones,' Don grumbled under his breath, but Kelly heard him and grinned.
The stockman and his retinue galloped after Team One, haranguing Todd all the way. Todd had one object in mind: to stand between the threatened sties and the onrush of snakes, firing to turn them away.
It was unlikely that they could save all the animals, but he meant his team to try.
The wooden enclosures were too far apart and too big for the Hunters to surround. The team hauled their horses to a halt, giving them a breather as they a.s.sessed the best vantage points before the swarm arrived.
Todd and Hrriss decided that they'd best guard the narrow path between the two barns that lay between the snakes and their prey.
Bottling them up in that s.p.a.ce would make them easier to turn, with some scud bombs to halt them and give the ones behind pause. The older and bigger snakes were smart enough to sense the danger of such tight quarters and turn back to look for easier pickings in the marshes.
Wayne and his family flanked the edges of the buildings, concentrating on the reptiles who would avoid the main route and try to slip around. Still watching the way the wind blew, Kelly realized that the wind carrying the pigs' scent was blowing directly toward the worn pathway, and not back into the main ma.s.s of reptiles. If the wind s.h.i.+fted, they'd be surrounded in minutes. And goodbye, Boncyk Bacon.
The defiant screams of the team's horses echoed off the high walls to either side of them. The slower-moving snakes were nearly there.
Kelly had never noticed before what a terrifying sound their bellies made, slithering on the dry gra.s.s. Oh, a single snake could be silent when it was sneaking up on its prey, but dozens and hundreds of them made the gra.s.s hiss beneath them.
”Don't worry about tiddlers,' Todd cried. ”It's the big ones that we need to turn back. They can swallow a sow whole.”
”Here! I need help here!” Anne Boncyk shouted from behind the grain barn. She galloped into sight, waving an empty crossbow. ”There's a mess of them sneaking around the barn!” Kelly swiveled her head. Two of the infiltrators were lying contentedly in the gravel, engulfing the bodies of their deceased comrades without a care for the crossbow quarrels sticking straight up, but half a dozen others were making straight for the farrowing pens.
With a sharp command, Hrriss sent his ocelots to Anne's rescue.
Gathering their haunches, the spotted cats pounced onto the back of the two largest reptiles, four meters long, and dragged them thras.h.i.+ng like severed air hoses out of the pens.
With a quick bite behind the flat heads, the cats dispatched their prey and went for two more. The respite gave Anne time to reload both her crossbows.
A young reptile, only about three meters long, whipped between the team's horses. Three spears jabbed for it all at once, but all missed their mark.
”d.a.m.n!” groaned Don, and shouted over his shoulder, ”Anne, a three-meter coming through!”
”No, I'll take it!” Jilamey said. ”I gotta get two.
He wheeled his horse about and pursued the young snake.
Rolling his eyes at such bravado, Todd gestured for Kelly to follow Landreau. If the boy had been sent to embarra.s.s Doona by getting killed in the Snake Hunt, Todd was determined the plan would fail. Jilamey had managed the first catch, somehow, but anything could happen here, with snakes all too dose to valuable stock.
At first, the snake was too intent on catching its meal to realize it was being pursued. Jilamey drew his miniature gun and shot at its back. He hit it square, but the low-caliber slug just bounced off the scaly hide. But the snake felt the impact and turned to see what had hit it. Seeing Jilamey bearing down, it slowed a trifle.
Encouraged, Jilamey galloped at it, trusty quarterstaff poised above his head. ”Yeee-hah!” he yelled, bringing the long stick down on the snake.
It was a good, solid hit. The snake stopped dead and compressed itself into a hurt knot. Jilamey had learned a lesson during his previous misadventure.
Before the snake could get a coil about the staff, he discarded it and reached for the crossbow.
He never got a chance to use it. The snake sprang around the horse's leg, las.h.i.+ng out with its tail to encircle a hind leg and bring the animal, and rider, down. The horse, instinctively las.h.i.+ng out behind, then reared and stumbled, falling across a young Mommy Snake which had broken through the cordon. The Mommy was stunned and the tiddler got mashed. Todd and Gypsy came round the corner, chasing the Mommy, Todd with his crossbow c.o.c.ked. If Jilamey fell now, the Mommy would take him in one gulp.
But Jilamey's mount was an old campaigner, and once he felt his legs free, he danced backward as fast as he was able until he was stopped by the rails of the sty, where once again he reared, striking out with his front legs. The Mommy reared up, too, just as Jilamey, roanng commands at the rearing horse, slid off its rump, over the rails and straight into the sty, landing with a splat on his back in the muck.
”Augh!” the youth cried, flailing his arms and legs. ”Help me! I can't get up!” Jilamey couldn't see the danger he was still in, with the tiddler rousing from its mauling, and the Mommy equally interested in this convenient quarry. Todd shot a defensive charge under the Mommy's tail: pain and noise alarmed it enough to divert its path so that it swerved into the tiddler. A second explosive burst in front of them, and both shot away, Todd in pursuit.
Trying very hard not to laugh, Kelly swung off Calypso and, keeping a good hold on the reins, reached through the fence rails into the pen. It took an effort, but she got the young man to his unsteady feet and guided him back onto solid ground.
”You're out of the race, Master Landreau,' Kelly said, trying not to take a deep breath. The sour miasma of pig excrement made her gag.
Calypso kept backing away from the stench, pulling Kelly's arm nearly out of the socket. ”Unless you can clean up real quick someplace.” As Jilamey, disgust and horror contorting his features, tried to sc.r.a.pe muck off his body, Kelly managed to catch his horse and then had trouble getting the horse to approach its erstwhile rider.
”My snake? My second snake? What happened to it?” And to Kelly's surprise, he started to run back to the place of his near demise, darting about, looking for the reptile.
”That one's long gone, Jilamey.”
”But what'll I do?” Jilamey looked so pathetic that Kelly nearly laughed aloud.
”What we do is get you to the nearest blind and check you for cuts. You don't want muck-infected wounds, I a.s.sure you.
”But I've got to get the second one, Jilamey insisted.
”Like that?” He tried to approach his horse, who kept backing away snorting.
”It's not far to the nearest blind, Jilamey. We'll clean you up and maybe then the horse'll let you on him.”
”But they're all going that way!” he said, dazedly looking back at the melee in the Boncyk yard.
More riders were reinforcing Team One by that time, and the pigsties were well cordoned off from the snakes. ”I must have my second snake.” ”You're lucky you got one!” she said, beginning to lose patience. ”And we've got to clean you up.
Then at least you can ride back to town.” The prospect of walking that far clearly won his attention. So, while Kelly on Calypso led his horse, they made their way to the nearest snake blind, which was not far away, but back in the woods away from the Boncyk farmyard. As she led him, she hoped that his stench would not entice a tiddler or Mommy to investigate his delightfulness. On the way, they met the backup riders who were going out to help Todd.
”He took a fall,' Kelly said, over and over again, as her friends threw her puzzled glances. ”Good hunting! Good hunting!” Wish I could finish it with you, she thought. Nerd-sitting is such a nuisance.
Having to sit a Landreau was close to insult in her lexicon.
Once the four spectators inside the tiny building got a whiff of Jilamey, there was no way he would be given room. Not even the heavily scented hunting box could overcome the odor clinging to the young man.
There was, however, a barrel of rainwater just outside and it was the will of the many that Jilamey might have use of all of it. As there was no window on that side of the blind, he went outside and stripped off his sodden clothing.
When he was safely inside the barrel, Kelly took a shovel and scooped up the stinking remains of the once sporty outfit. She left the knee boots because her brother knew how to neutralize the odor on leather. Spare clothes were donated and a sort of a towel, and pretty soon, Jilamey, smelling considerably more like a Human, was allowed back into the blind.
Then Kelly could check for wounds. Once the muck had been sc.r.a.ped off, she found several.