Page 43 of Badlands (Nora Kelly #5)

S LOWLY—VERY SLOWLY THIS time—Skip rose back toward consciousness.

Each time he felt himself rise, he tried to dive down again into the safe and enfolding dark.

But it grew more and more difficult until—at last—he opened his eyes.

The scene had changed.

The tripods were still in place, and Edison still hung from one of them.

But his body looked different—a ghastly marbling of red and white—and then, as the final strands of fog fell away, Skip realized that the bastards had flayed him alive.

The group that circled Edison’s skinned body was much larger now—perhaps a dozen.

Most appeared to be women, naked and smeared with red clay as well and wearing the same masks.

As they circled the tripod, their movements were herky-jerky, as if under the influence of drugs—which, he thought, was probably true.

Skip managed to sit up, fear churning his stomach.

My God . Despite the roughness with which he and Nash had already been handled, the brutality and sadism of this act shocked him to the core.

Why is this happening?

Am I going to be next?

What did Edison do to deserve being flayed alive?

Earlier, his handler had called him a thief, a desecrator—but of what?

Were they being punished for violating some sacred place, or picking up artifacts?

It was Edison’s idea to keep this little excursion a secret.

They’d told no one where they were going.

No one knew where they were.

No one would come looking for them here.

Besides, Nora was away in Mexico—she’d promised him she would be back in just a few days, but there was no way of knowing how long she would be gone.

Another thought occurred to him: they were not going to let him live after this.

He was a dead man, for sure.

God, poor Edison… With an effort, Skip tried to force away the memory of those prolonged, soul-wrenching screams.

The group stopped dancing, stirring with excitement.

Two women appeared at the edge of the mesa, carrying a litter made of two poles on their shoulders, a platform of wooden planks in between.

Coming up behind was a tall, muscular figure painted in white clay, with handprints of black paint imprinted all over his body.

Instead of a bundle of tied grass, a pair of deer antlers rose above his head—clearly a person of authority.

Skip stayed silent, looking at them with curiosity and terror.

A person sat on the platform, cross-legged, swathed despite the heat in a woven Pueblo-style poncho blanket with a drooping hood.

The crowd fell into a hushed silence and parted to let the litter pass through and approach the pole.

This, Skip thought, must be the big boss, the man—the one that even the figure in white drawing up the rear would answer to.

The bearers circled the pole, obviously to give the hooded person on the litter a good view of Edison’s mutilated corpse.

Then the litter was borne back out of the circle and set upon a large, flat boulder nearby.

The bearers flanked the litter in ritual fashion as the figure in white stepped forward, reverently took up the corners of the blanket and, after a brief chant, whisked it off.