Though she resisted, a small smile escaped.  “Idiot. I’ll have to check my calendar.  With all these new men around, I’m considering my options.”

Covering his heart with both hands, he staggered backward.  “My lady!  You wound me!” Turning to stagger toward the door, he made gasping noises.  “I fear… it may be a mortal wound.”   He listened carefully as he exited and turned to lean against the wall outside.   A wide smile broke across his face as he heard the two women laughing.

The woman whose name he didn’t remember said, “Lucky you.”

Amanda sighed and said, “Yes, lucky me.  He’s young, strong, not completely stupid, and he doesn’t snore.  Such a prize.”  He rolled his eyes and crept away, stepping carefully so as not to alert her that he was still within earshot.  When he cleared the building and entered the crafting hall, he got another notification.

You have learned the skill: Sneaking!

He didn’t bother to read the rest.  Waving it away, he went to see if he could improvise a new weapon with his recently acquired skill increase.

*****

Another week passed in relative peace.  Allistor took a party of five back to the RV lot to retrieve three more.  One luxury model, and two more functional ones.  They also filled more steel drums with gasoline.   A drive-by of the Stronghold showed the gates still closed and no sign of activity.  Allistor was glad – he hoped to reclaim it as part of their territorial expansion. Luther had come to him more than once, asking about the fate of the Stronghold, and whether Allistor planned to claim it for himself.  The situation was awkward.  Luther was a prideful man who had been strong enough to gather a larger group than Allistor’s and create a stronghold.  If not for the interference of Evan and his men, Luther might well be the stronger of the two.   Allistor reassured Luther that the Stronghold was his anytime he wanted to void his oath and separate from Allistor’s people.

Foraging parties of three and four went out daily, ranging farther and farther.  They’d found a distribution warehouse off the interstate that was full of mostly useless items.  The foragers did find several dozen winter coats, including some small enough for the children.  Another container held thousands of bags of peanuts, like you’d find at a ballpark or on a plane.  They tossed a few fifty-pound bags of dry dog food onto the truck for Max and the rabbits.

A howling sound cut short their exploration of the multi-acre warehouse.  Rushing back to the truck, they closed the roll-up door and exited the area.  Standard procedure was to avoid a fight if a group was potentially outnumbered.   And the canids were roaming in larger and larger packs.