But Logan had a few surprises planned. Midway between the far bank and the forward defenses were trip wires that would trigger dozens of cluster mines designed to shatter any assault. A line of flamethrowers secured to the bridge trusses just in back of the mines could be ignited from behind the defenses. Snap spikes—wicked spring teeth secured to the bridge planking—were layered all across the two dozen or so yards right in front of the forward defenses.
If all that failed, banks of weapons were mounted three-deep behind the forward defenses in small redoubts where the defenders would make their last stand. When the defenders were overrun at last, the charges that would blow the bridge, packed in place beneath the steel spans and all along the cross-ties, could be detonated from a command station situated just at the edge of the north bank. When the bridge went up, it would take everyone with it and stop any advance in its tracks.
Logan shook his head, thinking it all through. It wasn’t the greatest plan, but it was the best he could come up with. Maybe Michael, if he were there, could have come up with something better. He was always smarter than Logan when it came to battle tactics. But like so much else, that was all in the past.
The defenders finished their preparations and took their positions, watching the demon-led army advance out of the mountains. Attackers continued to flood down out of the broad slopes all afternoon and into the night, gathering on the south riverbank, where their leaders began forming them up for the attack. Logan watched impassively. The attack wouldn’t come until dawn; this sort of full frontal assault required a reasonable amount of light to coordinate and maneuver, and the glare from the rising sun would be in the eyes of the defenders. A flat-out strike relying on strength of numbers alone would work, too, but it would sacrifice an awful lot of men and risk mistakes that could cost the demons possession of the bridge. So they would wait.
At one point, with the sun already sinking behind the mountains, Logan went looking for Catalya, thinking to speak with her again about searching for the missing children. But no one had seen her, and his efforts to ferret her out failed. After a long, frustrating hour searching, he was forced to admit the obvious. She had ignored his advice and once again gone out alone.
Darkness settled in, and watch fires burned all across the far bank, their glow visible for miles in all directions. There were so many attackers by now that the defenders were growing disheartened. These were tough-minded men and women, guerrilla fighters from outside the compounds, experienced fighters. But even these could be intimidated by what they were seeing. Logan went out with Helen Rice to reassure them, to point out that only so many of the enemy could crowd onto the bridge at any one time and there was reason to hope that they would get in one another’s way when they did so.
Afterward, he spoke alone with Helen about what to expect. She was not battle-tested, had never faced an adversary of this size, did not have the training in tactical combat that he had. Fortunately, some of her lieutenants did. They would take command of various units when the attack came. But even though Helen would cede authority on the battlefield, she would still be the one nominally responsible for deciding when it was time to give way. Logan would advise her, of course, would do his best to prepare her, but as leader of the camp the decision would be hers.
He stood down by the bridgehead after that, thinking through how the battle would be fought, searching for loopholes in his defensive plan, for possibilities he might have overlooked. Mostly, he decided, it didn’t much matter. He had so few men and women fighting to hold the bridge that if they could hold the demon army off even for a single day, it would be a miracle.
He thought, too, about that old man in the gray cloak and the slouch hat. The demon Kirisin had seen in his vision. The one Angel had fought against in Anaheim. The one that kept sending its minions to kill them. The one to which Logan had lost his family twenty years earlier. He could still see the old man’s face, smiling at him approvingly as he fired the Tyson Flechette into a horde of once-men attackers.
He had been promised a chance to right things with that demon if he fulfilled his mission to find and protect the gypsy morph. He thought he had done that. He had kept his bargain, and now he was beginning to wonder if the Lady intended to keep hers.
“Logan.”
His thoughts scattered as he heard his name called. He turned around to find Catalya standing behind him, holding Rabbit in her arms. She was a mess. Her clothes were torn and filthy, her face streaked with dirt and sweat, and her eyes haunted. Her cat was hunched down in the cradle of her arms, eyes wide with a mix of fear and readiness. Something had scared them both badly.
“We found them,” she said.
He knew at once. “The children?”
She nodded. “Rabbit and me. Rabbit, really. He led me to them. They were hidden behind some rocks and earth, half buried in a ravine. I might have walked right by them yesterday, but it was dark by then so I can’t be sure.”
“All of them?” He didn’t want to ask, but he couldn’t help himself. “All those that were missing?”