A Company of Heroes Book One: The Stonecutter (16 page)

“It is all that I have to give you; more than you can possibly carry yourself, but your friend’s powerful back will not notice it. You have far to go and there is no place you can stop for food or shelter with safety. You must carry all that you need. Without your friend, you can not go far.”

“Without Thud, I suppose I wouldn’t have gotten even this far.”

“I am glad that you appreciate him. Here are your clothes, and a fresh suit, and a coat, see? It is lambs wool inside, because the cold will be as steel needles in the mountains, and two blankets, one for each of you. You can carry these things in this pack. That is all that I can offer.”

“It’s more than enough!” she says, but is distressed that it is not more.

“Do not worry yourself so, though your honor flatters you. I will be repaid. Gypsies always are. Ah! Here is your friend.”

“Princess,” says Thud as he joins them, “I can hear horses!”

Bronwyn doesn’t want to believe it, but when she listens, she too can hear a faint vibration, as though the hills are muttering among themselves. She turns to the gypsy with panic in her eyes.

“They’re almost here!”

“No, they are still an hour away. The valley is like a hearing trumpet. We will be at the lock in a few minutes. There is time.”

Bronwyn changes from her gypsy costume, reluctantly, replacing it with the rough clothes Thud had found for her. She is wrestling into her pack when Thud returns. He is wearing the great, shaggy fur coat in which he had masqueraded as the late Gretl; the massive sack of supplies on his back makes him look humpbacked, like a buffalo.

She makes certain her precious satchel is well strapped across her shoulders. Just then, a cry from one of the boatmen announces, “Lock ahead!”

Ahead is a low grey stone wall blocking the canal. In the middle is a wooden gate. On the bank is the rustic log cottage of the lockkeeper and beyond that Bronwyn can just see the thin blue line of the pond that supplies the lock with water. The lockkeeper is standing on the wall, signaling the barge with a small red flag. The mule driver brings his animals to a halt and disconnected the cable that attached the team to the barge. One of the bargemen reels this in, coiling it neatly on the deck. With their poles, the bargemen center the big boat in the canal, which is here more than three times the width of the barge, and begin to push it ponderously toward the gate. The lockkeeper meanwhile is spinning a massive wheel and the gates begin to swing inward. The water must have been at a slightly lower level in the lock for there is a rush of water into the stone basin. This made the work of the bargemen easier, since the water carries the boat with it. Bronwyn suspects this is probably intentional. There are one or two bumps as the barge squeezes through the gate. The lockkeeper immediately spins his wheel in the opposite direction and the gates begin to shut behind the boat.

“Now,” says Janos to Thud and Bronwyn, “is the time for you to leave us.”

“I’m sorry to say goodbye, Janos.”

“No more than I. I hope Musrum speeds you. Perhaps we will someday receive an invitation to perform at one of the magnificent royal houses? Then we might meet again.”

“I promise!”

“See what I told you? Now, up that ladder. Cross the dam and you will be on the west bank of the canal. Not far is the Moltus, but you will have no trouble finding a place to cross it. It is still broad but it is very shallow this far north. You will easily find a ford; follow the trails the shepherds use. Do not follow the river very far: it will take you too close to Biela-Slatina. You will have to bear west. It will take you away from the most direct route to the border, which will delay you, but it will also take you away from the main roads, which will be much safer. You will soon find a road that will lead you through the mountains. I cannot tell you what to do beyond that.”

“I suppose we’ll make our way,” she answers glumly.

“Be careful, Princess, of your confidence, you are much too sure of yourself; these are new things ahead of you!”

The water from the reservoir has been pouring into the lock, raising the barge to the level of the canal beyond. Bronwyn steps to the ladder, one foot on a mossy rung, straddling the gap between boat and wall.

“Goodbye, Janos.”

“Musrum be with you, Princess. And farewell to you, too, my big friend.”

“Thank you for the coat. I’ve never had one like it.”

“You are more than welcome! Now, please, you must hurry.”

Bronwyn scrambles up the slippery ladder like a monkey, Thud following like a sloth. She pauses for a moment, to turn and wave to her friends, Janos, Hottl, Juditkha and...where is Henda? There is no sign of the boy and she feels a little saddened.

“Look,” says Thud, pointing downstream.

From the vantage of the high stone dam, Bronwyn can see far down the valley. She is horrified to see that the plume of dust signaling the approaching horsemen is so close. The muffled rumble of their hooves is as clear as her own heartbeat.

“Quick! We have to hurry!”

Without another look back, she races across the top of the dam, Thud close behind. The floor of the valley is a broad, grassy meadow, crisp and brown now from the frosts that have been heralding winter. High hills wall it in on both the east and the west; a blanket of dark, shaggy pines cover them. Beyond the hills are mountains. The Moltus is less than a mile away to the west, flowing at the base of a steep slope. The forest comes to the water’s edge. Once they are across the river and into the woods they will be relatively safe. She would certainly feel safer not being as visible as she and Thud are on the open flood plain. She feels like a bug on a wall.

It would be terribly close: under the best of conditions Bronwyn’s long legs can carry her three or four miles in an hour at a brisk pace. At that rate she could cover the mile to the river in less than twenty minutes. But unlike the manicured lawns and playing fields she had grown up with, or the scrupulously-leveled paved walkways, the deceptively smooth valley floor is booby-trapped with pits, crevices, hummocks, rocks, gravel, marshy pools surrounded by glue-like mud, and a thorny vine that hugs the ground in convoluted tangles that resemble nothing so much as barbed concertina wire. Its loops lasso their legs, lacerating their ankles and shins and bringing both crashing to the ground more than once. They are forced to stop, untangling themselves when the vine snares them, or take time to watch with care where each step is placed, either action slowing them maddeningly. Worse, sharp thorns have their pants legs in shreds and blood runs down their calves in a dozen rivulets. Their progress is little better than a casual stroll.

Bronwyn tries to not pay any attention to the approaching banner of dust, or to the sound of hooves thundering from the hills around them. It no longer seems possible that they will be able to reach the river, and cross it, before the pursuers reach the lock and see them.

The Moltus, when they arrive, is more or less as Janos had described it. It is perhaps three hundred feet wide but very shallow, judging by the numerous rocks that protrude from its surface; perhaps nowhere more than two or three feet deep. But the current is swift, the clear water cut into foaming ribbons by the jagged rocks. And while the river is not deep, it is deep enough. Even Thud would not be able to resist the force of the rapid stream with only rocks slippery with moss and algae for footing.

“Damn it!” curses Bronwyn, which she repeats a moment later because, looking back toward the lock, she sees that the plume of dust has disappeared. Its remnants are drifting raggedly over the hilltops, dispersed by the breeze.

“They’re at the lock! I wish I knew how far the ford is! Or which way, for that matter.”

She hopes the Guards will not be too hard on the gypsies, still, and she does feel a small pang of guilt at the thought, it
would
serve to delay the pursuit a little.

They are standing on a narrow path, little more than a deep groove cut into the bank of the river. Countless generations of shepherds and goat herders, to say nothing of countless sheep and goats, had created it while on their way from farm to mountain pasture ‘she supposes all this, having no idea what people actually do with sheep and goats). It would surely lead to a ford shallow enough for the small animals to safely cross, but in which direction is it? There is no way to tell.

On the basis that the path to the right heads north, she turns in that direction. The path, thankfully, is clear of stones and the triply damned vine and is packed almost as hard as cement. She and Thud break into a trot.

They have covered only a few hundred yards when they hear the first shot. Looking across the plain, they can see the dark figures of the mounted riders. As they watch, there is a flash and a puff of smoke. A second later comes the sharp crack of the exploding cartridge. They are either still beyond the range of the rifles or present too small a target for the charging riders. Or perhaps they were just warning shots. Bronwyn has no idea, nor does she much care, as the results are the same: they are as yet unpierced by lead; a situation, she realizes, that can change for the worse at any moment.

She and Thud break into a run, or as much of an imitation of one as their full loads, and Thud’s physique, allow. Bronwyn thinks the pain she has felt running through the alleys of Blavek is nothing compared to this. The stitch in her side has returned; the pain is bad enough, but perhaps not as bad as the frustration of trying to run upright while cramping muscles are trying to roll her into a ball. Bullets begin raising jets of dirt and splinters of rock from around them, each hard
whack
! of an impact making Bronwyn wince as though the bullet had hit her.

Then the trail suddenly makes a right-angle turn to the left and there it is: the ford, a widening of the river where the water is so shallow the princess can see the gravel on its bottom as far out as the middle of the stream. Without hesitating, she calls to Thud to hurry and then plunges into the water. The icy liquid feels like broken glass on her bare, lacerated ankles. They run, high-stepping, through the water, their feet pumping explosions of spray that drenches them. Smaller geysers erupt around them as more of the pursuing Guards find their range. She can hear them shouting. She realizes then that their intent is not necessarily to kill her or Thud, at least until the packets of letters have been retrieved. Still, she feels sure there would be few reprimands should a stray bullet find its way into the back of her head.

They reach the west bank of the Moltus at the same time the Guards reach the ford. There are ten mounted men. Their leader loses valuable seconds in allowing his men to mill about while he shouts to the fugitives to surrender themselves. He is, of course, ignored.

The west bank is steep and rugged, with piles of broken and precipitous boulders that have tumbled down the steep slopes. Black, shaggy pines, with trunks as straight as rockets and as big around as Thud, grow to the water’s edge. By the time the Guard captain realizes that he is being pointedly ignored, Thud and Bronwyn have scrambled to a position on the opposite bank well above his head and are now dodging between massive trunks and lichen-mottled rocks. The captain, followed by five of his men, charges into the river. The remaining four continue to pour rifle fire into the trees. The girl and the big man are not looking back.

The steep hillside is a jumble of shattered boulders, some as large as houses, and the fallen trunks of dead or uprooted trees with a maze of passages between them, like a rabbit warren or ant farm. They have to clamber over or crawl through these, while bullets whip through the brush around their heads like angry hornets. It is painful and exhausting; their clothing is being shredded by plucking branches and knife-edged rocks, their hands and knees are bleeding, and what isn’t bleeding is abraded or bruised. Nevertheless, the further they penetrate the forest and the higher they climb above the river, the safer they become.

Rounding a boulder that protrudes from the hillside like a charwoman’s wart, Bronwyn risks a backward reconnoiter from its shelter. Below, the captain and his men have reached the west bank, but are foiled by its steepness. The chase can not be continued by mounted soldiers. The captain regroups the five Guards who have accompanied him and returns to the east bank where the remaining four are still firing into the trees, albeit rather half-heartedly.

“They’ll be after us on foot,” says Bronwyn, “but I think it’s going to take them a few minutes to get organized.”

“Let’s keep going up, then.”

“Right you are. I don’t believe they can go any faster than we can; if we can just keep up our lead we might be all right. The leader’ll send at least one man back with the news, and he’ll probably leave one or two with the horses. There’ll be that many fewer to worry about.”

They turn from the sheltering stone and continue on up the slope. Above that point, the way became a little easier. It is as steep as ever, but less rocky and with fewer fallen trees. The short late-autumn day, however, is ending. The sun is already brushing the ridge of hills above them. Darkness will come early in the shadow of the mountains. The air is growing rapidly chill. They have gained only a few hundred feet when they hear the first crashing of the Guards behind them. The captain is shouting for them to stop.

He must think I’m an idiot!

The diagonal course they are forced to take in climbing the hill takes them in an ascending curve around its slope. Though the Guards are close behind, they are out of the line of sight. Nevertheless, Bronwyn and Thud are only minutes from being overtaken. Their path dips into a narrow gully or cleft; this makes a sharp turn and they find themselves suddenly in daylight once more. Before their dismayed eyes is a chasm: the cleft has emitted them high up on the side of a steeply sloping cliff. Or rather, now that there is a moment to observe their situation, near the rim of a vast bowl.

A boulder-strewn crater has been carved from the hill as though some monstrous hand has scooped the earth away, leaving behind a vast, canted hollow. It is perhaps half a mile or more to the opposite side. The bowl is tilted so the uphill rim is several hundred feet higher than the downhill rim. The bottom is covered with boulders of all sizes, which have undoubtedly broken from the sides over the centuries and tumbled to the lowest point. It reminds Bronwyn of a wooden bowl filled with assorted nuts.