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concerned.  “Tom never made it to your place?”
    “No, that’s why I’m here. Tom’s never been a no-show before. I came to see if something had happened to him.”
    “Any chance we could take this conversation inside?” Gale asked, cutting off Errol’s next question.  “Fine with me,” Dorsey said, then walked inside without waiting for any further invitation. Gale and Errol followed, and all three settled down at the dining table.
    “What do you think could have happened to him?” Errol asked.
    The zombie shrugged. “Hard to say. It’s the Badlands; anything could happen. I mean, there’s all kinds of magic and mayhem that goes on out there. Back during your grandfather’s time, there was a guy who went hunting one day and disappeared. Twenty years later, he walked out of the woods, looking like not a single day had passed. Moreover, he swore he’d only been gone a few hours.”
    “What happened to him?” Gale asked.
    “He had trouble readjusting,” Dorsey said. “Lots of friends and relatives had died while he was gone; his kids were all grown and didn’t know him. In the end, he just walked back out into the Badlands and disappeared again - this time, for good.”
    Errol asked the obvious question. “Could something like that have happened to Tom?”
    “Possibly,” Dorsey answered, “but I doubt it.  Tom knows the Badlands too well, knows what can happen. There’s very little out there that he can’t handle.  Now that I think about it, I’d give it a few more days before I started to worry.”
    “Here’s an idea,” Gale said, as Errol reflected on Dorsey’s comments.  “Why don’t you take three or four days to search the area near where Dorsey lives?”
    “What about the problem you’re having in your fields?” Errol asked.
    “Don’t worry about it,” she answered, pooh-poohing the notion with a wave of her hand. “It won’t kill us to have to deal with it for a little bit longer.”
    Errol contemplated the idea. In truth, Tom would have hated it. In Tom’s mind, the people he protected came first.  He would probably go into conniptions if he knew that Errol was willing to put off the needs of the community to search for his older brother. In the end, Errol settled on a compromise.
    “I’ll tell you what,” Errol stated, “I’ll give it two days. If I don’t find him by then, I’ll come by your farm to deal with your issue, and then go on with the search.”
    That seemed agreeable to Gale. At this juncture, Dorsey cleared his throat.
    “Well, if that’s settled,” the zombie announced, “I’ll be getting back to my place. I assume, Errol, that you’ll be coming with me.”  Following Errol’s nod, the zombie continued, “Then there’s just one other thing.  I have certain, uh, dietary restrictions, which is the thing that Tom usually helps me with.”
    “What exactly do you need?” Errol asked guardedly, unsure of the response he’d get.
    “Salt.”

 
    Chapter 7
     
    Errol was packed and ready to go in short order.  For food, he took about four days’ worth of dried meat, biscuits, and cheese. (He also pulled a sack of salt from the pantry for Dorsey, as it was apparently a very important part of the zombie’s sustenance, although he didn’t explain how.) For weapons, he took along his mainstays: the one-hand crossbow, his warding wand, his throwing knife, and his dagger. He also brought his axe and his staff, although the former was primarily for chopping firewood should he have to spend the night outdoors.
    Finally, almost on a whim, he decided to take the miniature blowgun. It was a small weapon - the entire thing could almost be hidden in his hand - and the tiny darts it fired were far from lethal. However, having been dipped in a paralytic ointment, the darts did occasionally come in handy.
    As soon as he was ready, he and Dorsey got under way - the former on horseback and the latter on foot.  (Dorsey, being undead, apparently had a