Excerpt from Crisis in Fire and Snow

 

 It's been a long weekend. I'm tired. So tired. You needn't suffer. Feast upon this excerpt from Crisis in Fire and Snow:

Hugh ran through trees and brush along a narrow trail. Leaves and branches passed in a close green blur, occasionally grabbing at his clothing or slapping him in the face. Two braves followed close behind. One of them whooped from time to time, and Hugh renewed his flagging efforts at the unnerving encouragement.

He broke into a clearing. A little field of wheat stretched between him and a rail fence. A log cabin rose beyond the fence. Hugh leaped into the wheat, still running at top speed. He went faster without the leaves and branches clawing at him. The wheat was pale and mature, but not tall, and offered little resistance. Fifty strides into the field, he heard the whoops of two warriors. He didn’t look back.

Hugh leaped the rail fence without slowing. He had doubted for a moment that he would clear the obstacle, but the memory of jumping over crates and barrels in London under the threat of arrest persuaded him. While the natives might spare him a stern lecture, experience informed him that they would surpass the London police in both general unkindness and specific intent to harm.

...

H

ugh lunged against the door. It fell open and he tumbled inside as the tomahawk passed through the space his head had occupied a moment before. Hugh sprang to his feet and dropped the bar across the door as he pushed it closed. The windows were already shuttered.

“Sweet England, I never should’ve left ye,” he muttered.

He took rapid account of his resources. He had his musket and his pack along with his knife, tomahawk, and one stone cat antler—he had lost the other antler somewhere. Before he could begin an inventory of the room, war cries and pounding came from outside the door. Tomahawks bit into the wood like teeth into a ripe apple. Fortunately, the door hung on metal hinges and not wood or leather. He scanned the room. A table and three chairs, an empty fireplace, and a bedframe were the most notable features. There were two windows in the wall opposite the door and another in the wall opposite the fireplace, above the foot of the bed.

The pounding and chopping continued at the door.

A muzzle pushed through the loophole in the shutter by the bed. Hugh raised his firearm and fired as a painted face became visible at the other end of the intruding weapon. The musket thundered and the warrior fell away. The native’s firelock remained stuck in the loophole. Hugh dropped his own weapon and dragged the musket into the cabin. He confirmed that it had powder in the pan before placing it on the table. He removed his pack and slung it into the corner beneath the leather straps of the bed.

He began reloading his own weapon and grumbled, “Lee can have his magic hat. Maybe the magic is all gone or only works for him.”

He completed the reload and swiped the hat from his head. “There’s no point in breaking the hat’s streak of good luck on my account.” He threw the cap into the fireplace before taking a musket in each hand to face the splintering door.

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Hugh is a character that became more interesting as the series progressed. He began as an odd man in the troop of dragon hunters. He was a complainer and had designs on Alex's stone--he was a criminal, after all. A lot of things happened to file down the greedy edge on Hugh's character and he has decided to become a frontiersman like the indispensable Lee. He's in the thick of it now with hostile Indians, stone cats, dragonlings, and the other denizens of the frontier out to relieve him of that burden called life.