Savage Boy. Nick Cole

them. Horse turned as if to snarl, but when his large nostrils caught the scent of the predator he gave a short, fearful warning. The Boy patted Horse’s neck, calming him.

      I’ve never heard an animal make a sound like that. Sounds like a big cat. But bigger than anything I’ve ever heard before.

      He scanned the dusty hills behind him.

      He saw movement in the fingers of the ridge he’d just passed.

      And then he saw the lion. It trotted down a small ridge kicking up dust as it neared the bottom. For a moment the Boy wondered if the big cat might be after something else, until it came straight toward him. Behind the big lion, almost crouching, a smaller lion, sleeker—­no great mane surrounding its triangular head—­danced forward, scrambling through the dusty wake of the big lion.

      He wheeled Horse about to the west, facing the place once called Reno, and screamed “Hyahhh!” as he drove the two of them forward.

      Chapter Seven

      THE IDIOT, THOUGHT the lioness. She’d only made him come along so he could roar at just the right moment and drive the horse into her sisters and the young lying in wait ahead. Instead he’d cried out in hunger at the first sight of the meaty flanks of the horse. She could hear the saliva in his roar. The cubs would be lucky to get any of this meal.

      His cry had been early and she knew from the moment the horse began to gallop that her run would never catch the beast. For a short time she could be fast. But not for long. Not in a race. Her only hope now was that her sisters and the young were in a wide half circle ahead, and that the horse would continue its course into their trap.

      The idiot, she thought again, as she slowed to a trot. He’s only good for fighting other males. For that, he is the best.

      THE BOY RACED down alongside the ancient crumbling highway, but Horse was slowing as the ground required caution. A broken leg would be the death of them both. He reined in Horse hard at an off-­ramp and sent them down onto an old road that seemed to head off to the south. Ahead, a slope rose into a series of sharp little hills, the ground smooth, windblown sand and hardpack. He spurred Horse forward up onto the rising slope. At the top he stopped and scanned behind him.

      In the shadow of a crag, he could see the big lion doggedly trotting along the ridgeline. Ahead of the lion, crouched low and crawling, the sleeker lion had stopped. The Boy could feel its eyes on him.

      “It’s us they’re after, Horse. I don’t think they’re going to take no for an answer.”

      Horse snorted derisively and then began to shift as if wanting to turn and fight.

      That’s jes big talk, Boy! Those lions’ll kill him dead and you with him. Don’t pay no attention to him, Horse’s jes big talk. Always has been.

      Ahead to the west he could see a bleached and tired city on the horizon. But it was too far off to be of any use now.

      And it could be poisoned, Boy. Radiation. Kill you later like it did me.

      The Boy turned Horse and raced below the ridgeline, skirting its summit. They rounded the outmost tip of the rise, and beyond it lay a vast open space, empty and without comfort.

      The ground sloped into a gentle half bowl and he could see the Freeway beyond.

      I should never have left the road. We could have found a jackknifed trailer to hide in. Sergeant Presley said those were always the best places to sleep. We did many times.

      He patted Horse once more on the neck whispering, “We’ll sprint for the road beyond the bowl. We’ll find a place there.”

      Horse reared impolitely as if to say they should already be moving.

      Halfway down the slope at a good canter, watching for squirrel and snake holes, places where Horse could easily snap one of his long legs, the Boy saw the trap.

      There were five of them. All like the sleeker, mane-­less lion. Females. Hunters. They were crouched low in a wide semicircle off to his right. All of them were watching him. He’d come into the left edge of their trap.

      You know what to do, Boy! Barked Sergeant Presley in his teaching voice. His drill sergeant voice. The voice with which he’d taught the Boy to fight, to survive, to live just one more day.

      Assault through the ambush.

      Horse roared with fear. Angry fear.

      The Boy guided Horse toward the extreme left edge of the trap, coaxing him with his knee as he unhooked the crossbow, cocked a bolt and raised it upward with his withered left hand.

      Not the best to shoot with. But I’ll need the tomahawk for the other.

      The sleek females darted in toward him, dashing through the dust, every golden muscle rippling, jaws clenched tight in determination.

      This is bad.

      The fear crept into the Boy as it always did before combat.

      Ain’t nothin’ but a thang, Boy. Ain’t nothin’ but a thang. Mind over matter; you don’t mind, it don’t matter.

      The closest cat charged forward, its fangs out, and in that instant the Boy knew it would leap. Its desire to leap and clutch at Horse’s flanks telegraphed in the cat’s wicked burst of speed.

      The Boy lowered the crossbow onto the flat of his good arm holding the tomahawk, aimed on the fly, and sent a bolt into the flurry of dust and claws from which the terrible fanged mouth and triangular head watched him through cold eyes.

      He heard a sharp, ripping yowl and kicked Horse to climb the small ridge at the edge of the bowl. On the other side he could see frames of half-­built buildings below on the plain before the city.

      Half-­built buildings.

      Construction site.

      Maybe houses being built on the last day of the old world. Houses that would never be finished.

      If I can stay ahead of them for just a moment …

      Horse screamed and the Boy felt the weight of something angry tearing at Horse’s left flank.

      One of the female lions had gone wide and raced for the lip of the ridgeline. Once on top, it had thrown everything into a leap that brought it right down onto Horse’s flank.

      The Boy cursed as he swiped at the fierce cat with his tomahawk. But the lioness had landed on Horse’s left side and his axe was in his right hand. The Boy batted at the lioness with the crossbow. Its mouth was open, its fangs ready to sink into Horse’s spine, the Boy shoved the crossbow into the cat’s open jaws. Gagging and choking, the lioness released Horse’s torn flesh as its paws attempted to remove the crossbow. It fell away into the dust and Horse continued forward. Already the Boy could feel Horse slowing. His own feet, bent back onto Horse’s flanks, were dripping with warm blood.

      “Don’t slow down,” he pleaded into Horse’s pinned ears, doubting whether he was heard at all. “Just make it into those ruins.”

      When Horse didn’t respond with his usual snort, the Boy knew the wound was bad.

      Chapter Eight

      THE BOY DROVE Horse hard through the drifting sand of the old ruins. Rotting frames of sun-­bleached gray and bone-­white wood, warped by forty years of savage heat and cruel ice seemed to offer little protection from the roaring lions now trotting downslope in a bouncing, almost expectant, gait.

      They wove deeper into the dry fingers of wood erupting from the sand of Construction Site. The Boy heard the crack of ragged wooden snaps beneath Horse’s hooves. He hoped they might find a hole or even a completed building to hide in. But there was nothing. Behind them he could hear the cats beginning to growl, unsure how to proceed through the rotting forest of ancient lumber. The Big Lion gave a roar and the Boy knew they would be coming into the maze after them.

      Near