The Killing Rule

“You’d better tell them up front we’re going up against a Lord of the realm, and that arrest and incarceration for life are a real possibility.”

“I know, I’ll—”

“And you’d better tell them we may be going up against Aegis employees.” Bolan locked eyes with the Welshman. “If they aren’t salty for any of that, then we don’t want them.”

“Aye.” Lunk nodded slowly. The enormity of the undertaking hadn’t escaped him. “I will.”

“Well, I’m to bed, then.” Lord William rose with a wince. “Bring the dogs in, will you, Lunk? And have Tommy and Carrick spelled by Rooney and Todd. They’ve been in the weather for hours.”

“Aye, m’lord.”

Bolan watched Lord William limp toward the stairs. He’d been limping since Amsterdam. Worse, he’d been coughing since the gas, and it occasionally descended into an ugly, wet rattle. “He’s not well.”

“No. He’s not.” Lunk’s face went stony. “Damage accrues.”

Bolan was all too aware of the accumulation of battle damage. He’d had access to the very best doctors, surgeons, physical therapists and alternative medicine the planet had to offer. But he’d still been strenuously warned by all and sundry against suffering any more of the battering that was unavoidable in his profession. In the end he was a soldier in a war that was everlasting. The war would take his life. He’d accepted that long ago. But in the dark of night, in those contemplative moments, he sometimes wondered what he would do when even he himself had to admit that time, tide and damage had reduced him to ineffectiveness.

He watched Lord William pull himself up the stairs one stair at time and knew the old man wouldn’t accept being sidelined, and that was the rub. He needed the old soldier. He needed his connections both military and with the English peerage. Bill could open doors. Bolan grimaced. There was another thing Lord William had told Clive Jennings that wasn’t a lie.

This was his last hurrah.

BOLAN AWOKE to the tube noise. His feet were in his boots and the folding stock of the Sterling snapped open and the bolt racked on a live round heartbeats before the first mortar bomb struck. By the sound Bolan figured it was a pair of 81 mm’s firing in tandem. He was surprised not to hear the blast and shake of high explosive. Instead he saw a flash. Outside the window yellow-white fire snapped and hissed in the rain and streamers of gray smoke fell in arcs. The enemy was hitting them with white phosphorous. Shotguns roared downstairs in quick double booms and were met by automatic weapons fire. The enemy’s plan was fairly obvious. They were going to burn down Lord William’s manor and shoot anyone who came out. Anyone who stayed inside would be burned alive.

Bolan slung a web belt with six spare magazines around his shoulder and charged out into the hall. Lunk was pounding up the steps with a Sterling in hand. “We’re afire!”

“Get the baron!”

“The baron is here.” Lord William was shrugging into his hacking jacket and had his Sterling. “Lunk, go find our friend Carl.”

Bolan knew Glen-Patrick meant the Carl Gustav recoilless rifle.

Lunk pounded back down the stairs.

The yeomen had made a strategic retreat into the manor. Spot and Starkers were lunging on their leads and almost out of control. The blond man Bolan only knew as Todd was breaking open his shotgun and plucking out spent shells as he shouted up the stairs. “Tommy’s dead! Carrick’s injured.”

That left four yeomen.

Bolan cocked his head as the mortars thumped again in tandem. They were close, by the sound. The lag time between firing and detonation implied they were firing nearly straight up, which meant a lot of hang time. “They’re right on the other side of the hill. The riflemen will be in the hedges front and back, waiting for us to make a break for it when the fire drives us out.”

Lunk returned with the antitank weapon hanging from one hand and a crate of rounds perched on one shoulder.

The second salvo hit the manor. They all crouched as rifle fire began cracking in a steady stream outside, punching out the windows.