Freedom Star

Chapter 13

"Take cover!" he shouted, diving to the ground. Pretty well everybody already had, anyway; but as several minutes passed and no more bullets followed the first, they slowly raised their heads. "Keep down!" Jon yelled. "Kira, Ellia, did you see where it came from?"

"No!" Ellia yelled back.

"Is it soldiers?" piped up a little girl not far to Jon's right.

"I don't know," he said.

"I don't want to go back to the work camp."

"Neither do I." Jon lifted his head, then got to his hands and knees and finally dared to stand up. Nobody shot at him; but he heard mocking laughter from the forest, and gritted his teeth with rage. "Dar!" he shouted. "I meant what I said! Come back and we'll kill you!"

For answer, bullets raked the ground at Jon's feet again, spraying his legs with stinging particles of dirt. "I don't really think you're in a position to threaten, are you?" Dar shouted. "But don't worry. I'm not rejoining your pathetic little band of refugees. I just thought I'd let Kira know that her ruse didn't work. The soldiers are on your trail."

"That's impossible!" Kira scrambled to her feet, shrugging off Ellia's attempt to keep her down. "They were going the other way."

"Well, that was before they found the trail I made for them."

Jon stiffened. "You put them on our trail?"

"Exactly."

Jon had never felt anything like the red-hot anger that flooded him then. If Dar had been within reach he would have ripped him apart with his bare hands. "They'll kill us, Dar! They don't want prisoners any more."

"Then I guess you'll have to kill them, first."

Jon's hot rage went cold. "You've set us up."

"Congratulations. I didn't think you'd get it so quick."

"Get what?" Kira was still furious. "What is he talking about?"

"We don't have a choice, now. We have to ambush them. We have to take the battle directly to the soldiers following us. Just like Dar wanted all along."

Dar's triumphant laughter answered him from the forest. Ellia, with a defiant glance in that direction, got to her feet, took Kira by the arm and brought her over to Jon. "Jon, we can't," she said in a low voice. "We have no weapons."

"Only the same weapons we've always had. Spears and knives and our wits," Jon growled. "It's not my choice, either, but Dar hasn't left us any alternative."

"Yes, he has," said Kira. She glanced over her shoulder at the jungle. "You can lose them on the river-and I'll make a false trail again to lead them in the wrong direction."

"We can't cross the river here," said Jon. "And even if we could, Dar would set them on the right trail soon enough. He wants us to fight them, just like he always did-only now he's got even less reason to care how many of us get killed in the process."

"Especially if you're one of them," Ellia put in.

"I didn't say lose them by crossing the river, I said lose them on the river," Kira said impatiently. "If you build rafts and ride the river downstream, there will be no trail for them to pick up except the one I leave."

"You can't ride that river in rafts!" Ellia protested. "It's too wild."

"No," Jon said slowly. "No, it's not. It's fast and deep, but we won't be trying to fight the current-we'll be riding with it."

"And it's got rocks in it," Ellia pointed out.

"Upstream, yes. But it looks pretty clear downstream from here," Jon said. "And even if there are rocks, there's enough water flowing over them the water itself could cushion us from them."