Wolves by D. J. Molles Read Free Book Online

suddenly realized they let him live, which is probably far beyond what he would’ve gotten from anyone else in this world. And the Wastelands are a big, dangerous place for a lone man. Huxley knows this from experience.
    â€œFuck him,” Jay says, and puts a hand on Huxley’s shoulders, encouraging him to turn his back on the caravanner. “He’s wasting our time now. Already wasted our water, now he’s burning our daylight.”
    Huxley refocuses himself. The slavers. That’s what you’re here for. To go east. To see where the slavers go. To find the woman with the black braid and make her pay for what she and her people did last night. And to find the man with the scorpion tattoo, and make him pay for what he did eighteen months ago.
    To find all of them, really. To make them all bleed.
    Huxley and Jay walk back to their little campsite and grab the satchel of things Jay had pilfered from the Mexican caravan the night before. Then they turn themselves toward the road again. The tire tracks are still visible on the road. Wherever the slavers camped the night before, they continued on this morning, and it doesn’t seem like they know they’re being followed.
    Good , Huxley thinks. Let them get comfortable.
    The two men put themselves between the tire tracks again, and start walking.
    Behind them, just a dark, ghostly smudge on the pale landscape, the caravanner follows.

Chapter 6
    It is several hours later when Huxley realizes he can’t see the tire tracks anymore. He stops where he is, in the middle of the road, and he looks all around. Here the landscape has actually begun to show some signs of improvement, rather than the bleak desert they came out of. Here there is actual soil, although it is a sandy loam. And there is more green growth.
    Because there is less sand, the road is less swallowed by it. Here the road stretches and Huxley can actually see the concrete, a pale river of it, across the gradually rolling terrain, running east to west. And because there is no sand to cover the road, there are no tire tracks.
    â€œShit,” Huxley says, staring down at his feet. “When the hell did that happen?”
    Jay looks down, seems to realize it at the same moment. “Oh,” he says.
    Huxley looks east and can see no sign of the slavers or their wagon. Not even a rolling mirage of the ghastly thing and its poles topped with the jawbones of people that’ve fought back. Nothing. Like they never existed in the first place.
    But they do exist. They’re out there somewhere.
    Where do the slavers go?
    Huxley looks back west to see if maybe the trail is visible behind them. When he looks west he can see the shimmering figure of the Mexican caravanner, still following them. But no trail.
    Huxley puts his hands on his hips, works some spit into his mouth. A strong wind out of the southeast has started to blow and it has been drying his mouth out, throwing dust into his eyes and chapping his lips.
    Jay is looking at their follower too, shaking his head. “What are we gonna do with this guy?”
    Huxley has no idea. “Why do you think he’s following us?”
    â€œWho knows?” Jay rolls his shoulders, stretches his back. “Probably just doesn’t want to be alone out here.”
    â€œHe is alone,” Huxley says. “He’s too far away for us to do anything if he was attacked.”
    â€œWell …” Jay looks east. “Chances are, we’d be attacked first. Maybe we’re just convenient for him. Maybe we’re clearing the way.”
    â€œMaybe.” Huxley wipes grit from the corners of his eyes. “Maybe he’s heading east.”
    â€œClearly he’s heading east.”
    â€œI mean for the same reasons as us.”
    Jay purses his lips, makes a thoughtful noise.
    They wait in silence as the dark liquid figure of the caravanner continues to plod toward them, slowly but surely. He is still far