The bison's rode like aroused stallion's during mating seasons; fierce and full of spirit yet the Yurks mounted them like docile mare's.
"Is it true y'all invoke fear to tame them beasts?" Jerocobish asked, riding a tanish horse they'd found down by the station.
"Yurk secret," Hrok said, patting the beast between his legs.
Warfrok eyed the older man, "best not to speak to the invading folk...They're full of lies and deceat."
Jerocobish, kicked the horse into a trot, "And you people a'int? Hell, I maybe old, but I ain't blind and deaf. You folks are a mess; ain't no men with their heads on their shoulders going to attack a train as heavily gaurded as the Mayors."
"And yet we had," snarled a gangly, skinny Yurk who nose was curved sharp as the dagger on his hip.
"And you got one of yours captured…" Jerocobish shook his head.
"And we've got you…"
Jerocobish shrugged, "you won't get much back for me I'm afraid — an old man with few years ain't worth the loves of many men. Might as well let me go and I'll get you yours back safely."
Warfrok whipped graying, braided hair over to his left shoulder. "You boy will come — a son always comes for his father."
Jerocobish chuckeled, "then you don't know my Jostice. He ain't the kind've son your boys may be...Trust me, I know. He's done more trouble than good…"
Hrok pulled a pistol from his belt and pointed the barrel in Jerocobish direction. "Then there's no need in keeping you around."
"Probably not...Just wasting the little water y'all have on a weary man."
Hrok cocked back the hammer.
Jerocobish squinted, "but I sense that I am not some weary, older man to you. I have a suspicion you attacked that train not for anybody but my own Kin, am I right?"
"You talk too much, old man." Hrok flicked the hammer close and holstered his weapon. "And after all these years you still haven't realized that."
Jerocobish adjusted his long-tailed coat. "Or I had, just forgotten...I told you I'm old."
Hrok bucked his Bison a few paces away to gain distance from the old man, E'krek followed closely. Face wrinkled with intrigue.
"What's the man hooting about? We was to kill everyone...was that not the deal?"
Hrok kept his eyes on the vast sea of sand that swallowed the lands to every horizon around them; it was golden, hot, and endless with few stops in-between.
Hrok took a slow breath then exhale harshly. "There were targets, but I didn't want our men getting caught up in figure out who. Yurks kill the men closets to them...No need to change our ways."
E'krek looked between shoulders until certain no Yurk was in ears reach. "And who gave you the hit—"
"That doesn't matter…"
"It does if your contact was expecting a precise kill and not a massacre...That was no simple train." E'kreks bison began to wander and he yanked him back. "That was the Mayors train...And if you get on the wrong end of the Mayor that is bad for us all...There will be no revenge on the Kallri for this—"
"Who do you think will take the blame? Yurks…"
E'krek's eyes widened, "you would allow our people to be…"
"To go to war with the Mayor, yes." Hrok nodded. "Once the Kallri has fallen it will be much simpler to take ones place."
"This is not the way," E'krek bared his teeth. "We are to kill with honor...not behind ones back as the invaders had—"
"Look around you!" Hrok said. "The invaders have already won...we must evolve if we are to one day defeat them."
"The Yurks will lose many men…"
"And the Kallri will fall on the battlefield; he is too stubborn to give into invader demands."
E'krek shook his head, "yet he had after the War of Nations…"
"No...The invaders were not after the Prairelands but the golden lands of the southeast — Corodite they call it — our Kallri was spared but not for long—" Hrok winced, grabbing his wrist where blood seeped.
"You're injured," E'krek said.
"I'm fine...The old mans boy got me good with a knife." He smacked his chest. "The iron plate protect my chest."
"We need to find rest or you'll bleed out—"
"I'm fine," the Yurk waved.
"My Kallri… If you die then this will all be for not." He pointed off towards the east. "There. Shade. We will stop…"
"Are you giving orders now," Hrok grumbled, smirking. "A boy Yurk."
"If you force me...yes."
Hrok laughed and swore and then kicked his bison, pulling the reins and guiding him towards three trees basking in the sun.
Hrok climbed down slowly while E'krek took a swig of his flask, walking over to his side. He extended an arm, "drink...the numbwillow will do good to numb your wounds."
Hrok stumbled forward; E'krek ducked and brought his head under his arm, carrying his weight. He guided him to the trees and sat him down gently. Once seated, Hrok snatched the flask and brought it to his lips, quenching the thirst he didn't know he had.
Jerocobish pulled the reins on his horse than climbed down.
Warfrok rode behind him, "Nobody said you could dismount…"
"I need a rest, as does he." He tied the reins to trees limb. "Or do you want me to falling dead?"
"Wouldn't be any hairs off my back."
Jerocobish chuckeled and flopped over, leaning against one of the skinny tree trunks, with large umbrella limbs filled with dried brownish-green leaves.
"You are not to sit near our Kallri!" Warfork snarled, his eyes were narrow and black. Nose wrinkled. Chest extended.
"Let him sit.." Hrok said.
E'krek pulled a rag from a satchel on his horse then wrapped it around Hrok's gaping wound. He winced while the rags tightened.
"That ain't going to do much good." Jerocobish chuckled. "He needs Melding Remedy — if we had the right supplies I could make it."
"We don't need your sorcery." Warfork said, pointing to a Yurk with much more gray and wrinkles than he had; on his bison were jars filled of herbs and spices. "Froak will making a healing spell."
"Better make it quick," Jerocobish said, watching E'krek and Warfrok walk over to help and the old witch doctor.
Hrok tilted his head upwards, looking upon the limbs that shielded him from the sun. "What kind of trees are these?"
Jercobish said, "Acarhobs..."
"And tell me, Alchemist, do they hold wat'ta?"
"Look around," Jerocobish said, pointing at the dry, flaky ground. "These trees roots spread for a thousand paces in every direction... nothing around us is alive..."
Hrok eyes looked upon the ground and then the trees: the center stood up tall and strong while the other two were arched, limbs sweeping the ground.
"And?"
"These trees are consumers; they consume all of the nutrients from the earth."
Hrok frowned. "No wat'ta... No good tree..."
"There were likely twenty of them in the beginning — as many Yurks as you have in your gang.
"We are no gang!"
"Tribe," Jerocobish said with sarcasm. "He threw his hands back behind his head, tossing a boot over the other. "As I was saying...there were twenty of them and now there are three; this here tree betrayed the others." He glanced at E'krek who drank his flask, watching Froak grind herbs and spices in a clay container. "Without any of the others knowing."
Hrok glanced at the man, vein snaking and buldging from his neck. His hands were tight as mallets and he was ready swing…
"You best watch your tongue, old man—"
"And you best open your ears." Jerocobish tilted chin towards the young Yurk. "As a leader you have to recognize two kinds of men; the one who's close because he's loyal and the one who's close because he needs you — that is, until your time with them has expired."
Hrok squinted and ears perked. "You speak lies—"
"I speak truths. Always have and always will, like it or not, you always have one that's a betrayer. And usually it's the one you least suspect." He looked towards the south where Sundown City rest somewhere beyond the horizon. "I know all to well."
"Then do tell…"
The old man flicked the sand, "my Jostice was the betrayer…And I ain't never forgive him for that."
Jerocobish pointed to the trees. "You see, this tree was at time the smallest out of the group — the runt — but his roots were what grew. And they extended beneath the sand, taking the nutrients of the others; First the trees furthest away to keep from suspicion...then he took the rest of them down, one-by-one, until only three were left." He pointed to the leaning trees. "But they never had a chance, because by the time they realized it the runt jad already won."
Hrok looked between the warriors posted up by their bisons; drinking water, cleaning guns, and patting their beasts. All standing without a care in the world. He spat.
"Why tell me this story?"
"Because…" Jerocobish said. "I've already identified the runt in your tribe."
"Who?"
"Well...that's for you to figure out."
Hrok grabbed his chest and chuckeled. Jostice joined him. Suddenly Hroks eyes furrowed and his elbow raised sharply, connecting with the aces jaw. The old man collapsed.
Hrok laughed, "I told you to hold your tongue…"