Honor Road Jason Ross (any book recommendations .TXT) 📖

would have to reset the leg. With new food in the larder, now would be the time.

By the time Cameron shuttled the buckets to the homestead, Ruth was cooking sweet, fresh rice over the cook fire alongside the porch. Isaiah lay in bed on the porch obviously in pain, but happy the trade had finally come through.

“No trackers?” he asked Cameron.

Cameron shook his head, set the buckets beside Ruth, and climbed the steps to Isaiah’s bed. He lifted the sheet back and smelled the raw, not-quite-rotten odor of the leg. Isaiah had been the brains behind the trade, and he’d sacrificed himself against the marauders. Cameron owed him this much.

“We need to reset the leg,” Cameron said. “Now.”

Isaiah’s eyes widened. “Can I have a bowl of rice first.”

“No.” Cameron shook his head. “You’d probably just puke it up. Let’s do this now while both of us have empty stomachs.”

“Do what, exactly?” Isaiah worried.

“You’re going to have to trust me on this.” Doubt flashed across Isaiah’s face. It made Cameron wonder: does he know about Ruth and I?

Cameron closed his eyes and explained. “I’m going to pull your leg in-line, straighten it out, try to push all the pieces where they belong, then re-splint it straight. I can see that it’s crooked and I doubt it’ll heal like that. It needs to be re-broken and re-set. I’m sorry, bro, but this is your best shot at ever making it out of this bed.”

Isaiah hesitated, then nodded. Cameron hurried to remove the splint around his leg—a hasty amalgam of boards and rope. He needed to do this fast, before he lost the nerve.

“Ruth!” Isaiah shouted. “My bride. Come hold my hand. Gosh darn it.” Even the removal of the splint caused Isaiah’s eyes to roll back in his head.

Cameron steeled himself for the big moment. He’d be lucky if he didn’t faint. Ruth ran to her husband’s side and glanced from one man to another, confused.

“Just hold my hand, please,” Isaiah repeated. “Cam’s going to fix my leg.”

Cameron wrapped one hand around the lower calf and the other hand around the ankle. Then he pulled hard and steady toward the foot of the bed.

The rotten flesh and chips of bone tore free. The lumpy meat around the wound undulated like a troubled sea. Isaiah shrieked to raise the rafters and the children rushed in from the pasture. The boneless leg popped and ground, shattered bone against gristle. Hidden cysts of watery blood and pus gave way inside the wound and on the surface. The sound of evulsing tissue didn’t so much reach Cameron’s ears but radiate up through his hands. Wet bone, scarcely healed in a gnarled caricature of a leg, tore apart like cooked sockets of barbecue ribs.

Cameron swooned.

Isaiah went suddenly silent.

Cameron watched in a fugue state as his hands shoved knotty lumps back into place. His hands worked on their own recognizance, reshaping his friend’s shin bone. They finished, as best they could, and went to work re-tying the splint. His hands cinched the compression rope tighter than before, but hopefully not so tight as to cut off circulation.

With the operation complete, and Isaiah passed out, Cameron staggered down from the porch, around the corner of the homestead, and retched. His head lolled on his shoulders and his stomach heaved, over and over and over. He puked up a thin, acrid bile that burned his throat on the way up. It felt like the bile had been with him a long time, maybe since escaping Los Angeles three and a half months before.

Eventually, his stomach quieted. Cameron wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and stood upright.

The clouds overhead had thinned, and some slight blue sifted through the gaps. The sun was still obscured by the rainless gray, but a little color filtered down upon the ghost town and its desperate, barely-living guests.

17

Sage Ross

Border of Union County and Wallowa County

Wallowa, Oregon

Sage led The Five into Wallowa County on the same route he’d used before. He could even see his old snowshoe dimples from the last time under the new-fallen snow. The six men waded across the Minam River, dried their feet, replaced their socks and cut across the foothills of Sacajawea Mountain. It wasn’t long before they ran into trouble.

All wore snowshoes, and Sage compacted the trail ahead of the group. Depending on the freshness and structure of the snow, cutting trail meant about thirty percent more work, but it left a much easier path for the rest. Even so, on the first big rise out of Minam River, Sage dropped all five behind. The fattest guy, Reggie, fell back more than a hundred yards. He heaved for air with his hands on his knees.

Captain Chambers had called their visit into Wallowa a “look-see” but every man carried an AR-15 on his back, except for Sage, who carried his 30-30. The plan was to scout the southern edge of Wallowa Valley to prepare for a snatch-and-grab mission in the near future. The solution to their woes would be to kidnap Commissioner Pete. With Pete out of the way, safely locked up in La Grande, Captain Chambers could roll Union and Wallowa counties up into one, big, happy family.

Captain Chambers caught up with Sage, on the rise overlooking Minam Canyon.

“Sorry about this,” he apologized to Sage, which seemed a strange thing to do. “Too much coffee and donuts.” He looked back over the struggling men on the climb.

Chambers had climbed the hill without a struggle. His deputies looked like they might have coronaries. Sage had seen Captain Chambers jogging the streets of La Grande, just as the sun came up, many times on his way to work. The captain had been breathing heavy on the slog up the mountainside, but he’d kept within a few dozen yards of Sage. His respiration recovered within a couple of minutes. It reminded Sage: this was a formidable man. He had the force-of-will to stay in shape, even