Desert Wake ✔

Ch. 13, pt. 2: The Marooned

I got some things to figure out and not a lot of time to do it. Fer one, I need to know where Callen stashed our guns. Also, I gotta know where Ro is. And finally, it'd be real helpful if I wasn't tied up in this tent.

"Callen," I call out. "Sargent Callen!"

The tent flap opens but it ain't Callen who comes in, it's one of his men. He's young, maybe even younger than me, with strange orange tinted eyes set close together. He looks a little too excited 'bout the fact that there's a young lady all tied up and helpless right in front of him.

"What do you want?"

"Oh, I'm so glad you're here." I barely remember to keep with my proper accent. "What is your name, officer?"

He closes the flap and crouches in front of me.

"Blaine."

"Blaine. I must ask you something indelicate."

He raises his eyebrow. "You've got to relieve yourself, miss?"

I let out a huge sigh. "Yes, thank you. I wasn't sure what I should do. I've never been held prisoner before." I look up at him through my eyelashes and smile.

Blaine gulps. "Sargent Callen told me not to untie you, no matter what."

"You can keep me tied up, if you'd like." I bat my eyelashes, keep my smile real wide. "Just lead me out behind the tent and turn around. Or don't turn around, if you prefer. Won't that be okay?"

"Well, I mean... yes, but." He's gittin' ready to cave, orders be damned. I'm gonna win him over, cuz Blaine's got everything I need him to have—a gun, a knife, and an overabundance of hormones.

"Maybe if we call your Sargent, he'll be able to tell you what to do."

"He's busy with those desert traders. He won't want to be bothered."

Perfect. "Then can't we go real fast? I'll be back here before he even knows I was gone. And then I'd owe you a favor. You'd like that wouldn't you? If I owed you something?"

Blaine looks back and forth like there's someone else in the room that cain make the decision fer him. But I've tempted him with something he ain't likely to resist. Finally, he comes 'round.

"I suppose I would like that." He keeps my arms bound, but unties me from the post and then drags me outside and 'round the back of the tent fer me to do my business. 'Fore we git there, I chance to look beyond the lawfolk tents to where a new one's sprung up. Must be fer the traders. Shadows pass back and forth in front of the soft light glowin' from within it. Hopefully, Callen's still inside there, occupied with Tegan.

"Here we are." He comes to a halt. "You know, I'm going to have to watch, just to keep my eye on-"

That's as far as he gits, cuz I've taken the rope tetherin' me to him and looped it 'round his neck.

Blaine chokes and sputters, graspin' at my makeshift noose with his hands. "I don't wanna kill you, Blaine. But I will unless you do exactly what I say. Got it?" His eyes bulge. Oh, he gits it all right.

Blaine nods slightly. "I'm gonna let the rope loosen just a bit." The wind roars 'round us, so I say my words real firm in order to be understood. "And yer gonna keep yer mouth shut, you hear me?"

He nods again. "You know how I know yer gonna do as I say, Blaine? Cuz while we was walkin' back here, I took the gun you was carryin'. You know, it ain't too smart to have a gun down the back of yer pants when yer escortin' a prisoner behind you. I kind of git the feelin' you'd be reprimanded by Callen fer that."