Roy's pack of riders raced through the night and into the early morning. But by sun-up they were stopped on the road, cold, hungry, low on gas, but worst of all, scared to death.

Bonner had vanished into the nightmare landscape. "It was him," said Buggy. "It was. I'm telling you ..."

"How the hell do you know?" demanded Roy. He had the feeling he was going to have to do some serious killing before he quelled this mutiny. "I know because I saw, asshole." "It coulda been anyone," insisted Roy. "Don't be a jerk," said Buggy hotly. "The point is . . ." began Roy. "The point is, squidbrain, that you somehow got yourself mixed up with Bonner and the man is mad. And if he's after you, he's after any poor slob—like us fucks—that happen to be with you. Now what that means, friend, is that we got ourselves an assful of trouble. And, I think, just to make myself feel better, I am gonna blow your head off and then worry about the problem," said Morty the rider as he pulled a rusty handful of gun from his belt and cocked it.

But he took two fast shots to the chest fired by Smitty. As the slugs pounded into him, his body was thrown back. He cracked his head painfully on the bumper of Buggy's Honda and lay dying quietly.

"Awwww shit," said a rider.

"Now listen up," said Roy, "Okay, I admit it, we tangled with Bonner—"

"No you didn't," interrupted Buggy. "If you tangled with Bonner you'd be dead now. Now, just what the hell did you do?"

"We fucked up his woman," said Roy.

"Well that was one real smart thing to do, dick-head. Real smart. Real smart," said a rider called Casey.

"Look," said Roy, "he hurt me. I hurt him. I'd think a bunch of big, tough boys like you would be able to understand that."

Morty gagged and heaved and brought up a pint of blood. He groaned.

"You just don't understand this, do you," said Buggy. "You just don't do stuff like that to Bonner. You fuck with anybody you please. You can go goose Leatherman for all I care, but you don't fuck with Bonner. Jeez, when are you gonna get that through your thick skull?"

"Okay, okay," said Roy, "this Bonner character is mad. I understand that. But it would seem to me that—"

"It would seem to me that the smartest thing we can do is split, man," said Casey. "All of us Chicago riders should just go back where we all come from and leave you to deal with Bonner as best you can. Got it?"

"Now who's being stupid?" demanded Roy. "If you split up now he'll get you for sure. At least with sixty of us we stand some kind of chance. Look, you're about three hundred miles into Snow territory. Split up now and if Bonner doesn't get you the Snowmen will."

"Man has a point," said Buggy unhappily.

"Damn right I do! And listen. Once we get into the mountains we'll be able to lose him. I know them mountains better than anybody."

"He's right," said Smitty.

"And once we're over the mountains we'll be under the protection of the Rich Man."

The residue of the previous night's meal provided Paulie with an involuntary answer to Roy's proposition. "Sorry," he said.

"You know you really make me sick, Paulie," said Buggy, disgustedly.

"What?" demanded Paulie, "you don't fart?"

"Knock it off, friends," said Roy.

Morty floundered in the dust a little, his mouth opening and closing like a fish out of water.

"So, I admit, we got a problem. But if what you say is true when you head down that road then you're dead. Stay together, move ahead, and you got a chance. Remember, you're gonna be making plenty of slate out there. If you make it, it'll be worth it." "If," someone stressed.

"Shaddup, friend."

"I, for one," said Buggy, "am not ready to get kilt. I'm going on with this bug brain that started this whole thing." He pointed at Roy.

A few men nodded in agreement. "Then I guess we all are, friends," said Roy.

"Uh-huh," said Paulie.

"Good," said Smitty, "let's get the fuck out of here."

Morty groaned and spilled a little more of his blood.

"Would someone kill him. Please," said Roy peevishly.

Carey called himself the Prince of the Snowstates. He insisted that his slaves call him "Your Royalness" and that his Lightning Squadsmen, popularly known as "Snowmen," refer to him as "The Commander-in-Chief." His slaves called him whatever he told them to because if they didn't, he would think of some extremely interesting and hideously painful way to kill them. The Snowmen called him The Commander-in-Chief when they were around him because he gave them a large part of his spoils and he was, after all, their commander-in-chief.

Riders from Chicago tended to forget that Carey had styled himself Prince of the Snowstates. They called him, variously, "Carey the Kook," "Carey the Cunt," or simply, "That dick that runs the Snows ..."

Of the three feudal states that occupied the territory that once was called the United States the Snowstates was the least rich and, therefore, the least powerful. Because of the Bomb, the weather in the Snowstates was worse than elsewhere on the Continent. The slaves had to work harder to produce less food than their counterparts in the Slavestates and the Hotstates; winter came down earlier and harder.

Riders figured that Carey had lasted so long because Leatherman, the leader of the Slavestates and Berger, who ran the Hots, didn't want the Snows. This irked Carey the Kook.

Consequently, Carey the Kook woke up one mom-ing with one of those genius ideas that seemed destined to insure that a lot of blood would get spilled for no real good reason. He had decided that The Snowstates was going to expand. He knew that he couldn't take on Leatherman or Berger and he knew that Chicago would be much too hard a nut to crack, so he sent riders out to find a suitable piece of real estate for him to expand into.

The riders had said, "Sure, Commander-in-Chief," and took off for an extended trek into other parts of the country, principally the West. They made it over the mountains more by good luck than anything else, and were surprised to find a pretty nice land on the other side.

There was only one problem. And that problem was the Rich Man. They took a quick look around, figured correctly, that the Rich Man was not very well equipped with men and then beat it back to what Carey called "the Princely City" but what was really the ruins of Minneapolis, and told him about what they had found.

Carey the Kook's eyes had lit up and he said, "A land flowing with milky honey" and immediately embarked on a nice, quick, hot war meant to subdue the land over the mountain.

It was a hot war. But it wasn't quick. Like many brilliant military men of time gone by, Carey the Kook made a serious mistake. He failed to appreciate that it was extremely difficult to invade a country far from his own and keep his troops adequately supplied. The Snowmen were strong in numbers, but they were low on gas and ammunition and food. The Rich Man and his "militia" were determined to beat the Snowmen, even if they had to destroy their lands to do so. Consequently, the Snowmen, thick on the ground in California, had to be supplied by columns traveling over the mountains from the Snowstates.

Now, the Snowstates didn't have much to spare at the best of times so slaves' rations were cut to support the army in the field. This made the slaves weaker and they produced less. This annoyed Carey the Kook. But not as much as he was annoyed by the dragging on of what was supposed to be a short and victory-filled war.

It was the monthly supply column that Roy and his riders spotted as they made their way westward.

He pulled his riders up to a halt on the broken highway and pointed to the long line of broken-down trucks and horse carts that were kicking up considerable dust on the road ahead of them.

"That there, friends, is a bunch of Snowmen. We're gonna go down there and trash them."

"Fine," said Buggy.

They revved up and stood on the gas. The road curved back and forth on itself as it twisted down the steep hill to the valley floor. It took the riders quite a while to get down to their foe.

The supply column had a little time to brace for the blow. The commander of the column had told his men what to do case of an attack.

"Cut the horses," he had said, "and pull the trucks in to a circle." It had seemed like an excellent plan in the calm of a morning conference, but with a bunch of fighting riders sweeping down toward them, the plan tended to get a little ragged.

First thing that everyone did was slam on the brakes and stare. Who the hell were these guys? They were in the middle of Idaho and if that wasn't the Snows, what was?

Bucky, the commander, had his pistol out and was doing a little dance on the cab of his truck. "A circle! Form a fucking circle!" He stamped his foot on the roof of his truck and his driver, thinking that was some kind of signal put the machine in gear and the truck lurched forward.

Bucky fell off his perch and the truck behind him, the driver trying to follow orders and form a circle, drove over the column commander's neck, killing him, before a shot had been fired.

"Ooops, shit," said the driver of the second truck, hoping no one had noticed. The truck behind him slammed into his rear. A couple of the wagon drivers had remembered their instructions and tried to get rid of their horses. Others, knowing how valuable their horses were, wouldn't let theirs go. The horses still in harness saw some of their number free and rushed to join them. The road was a shambles of trucks with their bumpers locked, overturned wagons, runaway horses, and frightened men. It would have been funny if it hadn't been for Roy and his riders who were closing fast.

The members of the Snowman column were hardly the cream of Carey's force. The best of the Snowmen were in the Rich Man's territory, hungry and hot, waiting for the column that was about to be destroyed. The men that were carrying the food across the mountains tended to be a little on the old side, a little sick, fat, or so stupid they were almost idiots.

Roy was right out front, head into the wind. He was looking forward to the encounter. He needed a little relaxing fighting to make him feel better. Things had not been going his way recently.

He drew his revolver and laid it arm's length in front of him, took careful aim on a Snowman wagoneer who was trying to calm his rearing horse. He squeezed the trigger.

The gun cracked and the bullet hit the man clean. His head snapped to one side and he fell to the ground, his arm twisted up in the rein he had been holding when cut down. The horse bolted, pulling the dead weight. The man's clothing was in tatters in a matter of seconds. As the clothes went, so went his skin. The horse raced him down the highway, flaying the wagoneer's flesh off his bones as it went.

The riders were on the column now and they were having a fine time. The men in the column had finally realized that the time for strategic maneuvering had come and gone. They drew what weapons they had and prepared to fight where they stood. Bullets were slapping into the metal sides of the trucks, pinging off the broken blacktop, and slicing into bodies.

Buggy wheeled his car into the panicked traffic jam like the pro he was and opened up with his big automatic rifle. A short rip of bullets from the snarling snout of his shooter reduced the head of a driver who had climbed up onto the canvas-covered payload of his truck to something that looked like bloody mud.

Roy had jumped off his bike as the first contact had been made and was chasing a Snowman in and around the parked vehicles in a deadly game of tag. Finally, tired of running all over the place, Roy dropped to one knee and fired. The bullet made a very small hole going into the Snowman's body and a very big one coming out. . . .

A Snowman was up on the cab of his truck and managing to make a pretty good account of himself. He hadn't panicked much and he knew how to handle the bolt-action rifle he carried. A bullet from his gun shattered the windshield of one of the rider's cut-down autos. Glass splashed into the rider's face shredding it into ribbons. The man fell from the car and blundered around a second or two. The second shot ripped out his throat.

"Hey," said Buggy and took down the Snowman on the truck.

There was the chatter of a machine gun from somewhere. It was an enterprising Snowman who had dug into the truck he was driving and pulled out one of the heavy weapons that Carey was sending to his gallant troops in the field.

He didn't last long. Someone—Smitty, probably— cut him in half with both barrels of the shotgun he carried. The Snowman's flesh got all mixed up in the firing mechanism of the gun.

The horses didn't seemed to be on anyone's side. Trying to break free of the gunfire they plunged and kicked and screamed in panic. Each time the steel-capped hooves clattered on the roadway, they seemed to crush the bones of a fallen rider or Snowman. The sounds of horror, the shots, the screams of the dead and wounded, the whinnying of the horses, was mixed up with the green-wood sound of bones snapping.

But the horses played a part. Buggy noticed it. A shot he fired missed its mark—a Snowman on the ground shooting at him for all he was worth—but hit a giant cart horse in the forehead. The animal keeled over and crushed the Snowman under its enormous bulk. The man's muffled cries could be heard from under the animal for a full hour after the fighting stopped.

It was during that hour that the riders got down to some serious looting. There was food, gas, ammo, a couple of guns. No one felt like cleaning off the machine gun with the guts of the Snowman worked into it, so they left it.

They all felt much better as they moved off. They had routed the Snowmen and gotten some good stuff in the bargain. Their gas tanks were full and Bonner, for the time being, was forgotten.

That night, though, they remembered him in a hurry. As they all sat around the fire, talking about the firefight that morning, bragging and ragging each other, a single shot rang out of the darkness. A slug caught Smitty in the jaw and it tore that piece of his face off and threw it into the dark circle beyond the fire.

"Holeee shit," said somone and they all dived for cover.

They lay on their stomachs, cowering in the night, for about an hour. No one had heard him start up and drive off, no one had seen him. They didn't know where the shot had come from. They couldn't figure out how he had tracked them so far without them spotting him.

All they knew was that Bonner was out there. And Bonner was mad.

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