Guards of Haven: The Adventures of Hawk and Fisher (Hawk & Fisher) (34 page)
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Authors: Simon R. Green
BOOK: Guards of Haven: The Adventures of Hawk and Fisher (Hawk & Fisher)
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The bullies looked at him, looked at their fallen leader, and decided he just might mean it. They shrugged more or less in unison, and moved over to work in the ruins. The local people raised a brief cheer for Hawk, surprising him and them, and then they all got back to work. The gang leader was left lying huddled in a ball, handcuffed by his ankle to a railing.
The hours dragged on, and the search turned up fewer and fewer survivors. The fire brigade’s engineers set up supports for the adjoining buildings; nothing elaborate, but enough to keep them secure until the builders could be called in. People began to drift away, too exhausted or dispirited to continue. Hawk sent most of his Guards back to Headquarters with Morgan and his people, the crates of chacal now carefully labelled and numbered, and the gang leader Hammer, under Captain Burns’s direction. But Hawk stayed on, and Fisher stayed with him. Hawk didn’t know whether he stayed because he felt he was still needed or because he was punishing himself, but he knew he couldn’t leave until he was sure there was no one still alive under the wreckage. Someone cried out they’d heard something, and once again everything came to a halt as the diggers listened, holding their breath, trying to hear a faint cry for help over the beating of their own hearts. One of the men yelled, and everyone converged on a dark, narrow shaft that fell away into the depths of the ruins. One of the diggers dropped a small stone down the shaft. They all listened hard, but no one heard it hit bottom.
“Sounded like a child,” said the man who first raised the alarm. “Pretty quiet. Must be trapped at the bottom of the shaft somewhere.”
“We daren’t try to widen the hole,” said Fisher. “This whole area is touchy as hell. One wrong move, and the shaft could collapse in on itself.”
“We can’t just leave the child there,” said a woman dully, kneeling at the edge of the shaft. “Someone could go down on a rope, and fetch it up.”
“Not someone,” said Hawk. “Me. Get me a length of rope and a lantern.”
He started stripping off his cloak and furs. Fisher moved in close beside him. “You don’t have to do this, Hawk.”
“Yes I do.”
“You couldn’t have known this would happen.”
“I should have thought, instead of just barging straight in.”
“That shaft isn’t stable. It could collapse at any time.”
“I know that. Keep an eye on my furs and my axe, would you? This is Haven, after all.”
He stood by the shaft in his shirt and trousers, looking down into the darkness, and shivered suddenly, not entirely from the cold. He didn’t like dark, enclosed places, particularly underground, and the whole situation reminded him uncomfortably of a bad experience he’d once had down a mine. He didn’t have to go down the shaft. There were any number of others ready to volunteer. But if he didn’t do it, he’d always believe he should have.
Someone came back with a length of rope, and Fisher fastened one end round his waist. Someone else tied the other end to a sturdy outcropping of broken stone, and Hawk and Fisher took turns tugging on the rope to make sure it was secure. One of the men gave him a lantern, and he held it out over the shaft. The pale golden light didn’t penetrate far into the darkness. He listened, but couldn’t hear anything. The hole itself was about three feet in diameter and looked distinctly unsafe. Hawk shrugged. It wouldn’t get any safer, no matter how long he waited. He sat down on the edge, very slowly and very carefully, swung his legs over the side, and then lowered himself into the darkness, bracing his back and his knees against the sides of the shaft. He took a deep breath and let it out, and then inch by inch he made his way down into the darkness, the lantern resting uncomfortably on his chest.
Jagged edges of stone and wood cut at him viciously as he descended, and the circle of daylight overhead grew smaller and smaller. He moved slowly down in his pool of light, stopping now and again to call out to the child below, but there was never any reply. He pressed on, cursing the narrow confines around him as they bowed in and out, and soon came to the bottom of the shaft. He held up the lantern and looked around him. Rough spikes of broken wood and stone protruded from every side, and a dozen openings led off into the honeycomb of wreckage. Most were too small or too obviously unsafe for him to try, but one aperture led into a narrow tunnel barely two feet high. Hawk called out to the child, but there was only the silence and his own harsh breathing. He looked back up the main shaft, but all he could see was darkness. He was on his own. He looked again at the narrow tunnel, cursed again briefly, and got down on his hands and knees.
The rope played out behind him as he wriggled his way through the tunnel darkness in his narrow pool of light, stopping now and then to manoeuvre past outcroppings from the tunnel walls. The child had to be around here somewhere. He couldn’t have come all this way for nothing. He thought briefly about the sheer weight of wreckage pressing from above, and his skin went cold. The roof of the tunnel bulged down ahead of him, and he had to lie on his back and force himself past the obstruction an inch at a time, pulling the lantern behind. The unyielding stone pressed against his chest like a giant hand trying to crush the breath out of him. He breathed out, emptying his lungs, and slowly squeezed past.
In the end, he found the child by bumping into her. He’d just got past the obstruction when his head hit something soft and yielding. His first thought was that he’d run into some kind of animal down in the dark with him, and his imagination conjured up all kinds of unpleasantness before he got it back under control. He squirmed over onto his stomach, wishing briefly that he’d brought his axe, and then stopped as he saw her, lying still and silent on the tunnel floor. She looked to be about five or six years old, covered in dirt and blood, but still breathing strongly. Hawk spoke to her, but she didn’t respond, even when he tapped her sharply on the shoulder. He pulled himself along beside her, and saw for the first time that one of her legs was pinned between two great slabs of stone, holding her firmly just below the ankle.
Hawk put his lantern down and pushed cautiously at the slabs, but they wouldn’t budge. He took hold of the girl’s shoulders and pulled until his arms ached, but she didn’t budge either. The stones weren’t going to give her up that easily. Hawk let go of her, and tried to think. The air was full of dust, and he coughed hard to try and clear it from his throat. The side of his face grew uncomfortably warm from having the lantern so close, and he moved it a bit further away. Shadows leapt alarmingly in the cramped tunnel and then were still again. He scowled, and worried his lower lip between his teeth. He had to get the child out of there. The tunnel could collapse at any time, bringing tons of stone and timber crashing down on her. And him too, for that matter. But there was no way he could persuade the stone slabs to give up their hold on her foot. He had no tools to work with, and even if he had, there wasn’t enough room to apply any leverage. No, there was only one way to get the child out. Tears stung his eyes as the horror of it clenched at his gut, but he knew he had to do it. He didn’t have any choice in the matter.
He squirmed and wriggled as best he could in the confined space, and finally managed to draw the knife from his boot and slide his leather belt out of his trousers. There was a good edge on the blade. It would do the job. He took a close look at the stone slabs where they held the child’s foot, checking if there was room enough to work, but he already knew the answer. There was room. He was just putting it off. He looped his belt around the girl’s leg, close up against the stone, and pulled it tight, until flesh bulged thickly up on either side of it. Hawk hefted the knife, and then brushed the little girl’s hair gently with his free hand.
“Don’t wake up, lass. I’ll be as quick as I can.”
He placed the edge of the knife against her leg, as close to the stones as he could get it, and began sawing.
There was a lot more blood than he’d expected, and he had to tighten the belt twice more before he could stem most of the flow. When he was finished, he tore off one of his sleeves and wrapped it tightly round the stump. His arms and face were splashed with blood, and he was breathing in great gulps, as though he’d just run a race. He turned over on his back again, grabbed his lantern, and began inching his way back down the tunnel, dragging the unconscious girl along behind him. He didn’t know how long he’d spent in the narrow tunnel, but it felt like forever.
The tunnel roof soon rose enough to let him get to his hands and knees again, and he crawled along through the darkness, hugging the child to his chest. He suddenly found himself at the base of the main shaft, and stopped for a moment to get his breath. He ached in every muscle, and he’d torn his hands and knees to ribbons. But he couldn’t let himself rest. The little girl needed expert medical help, and she was running out of time. He held the girl tightly to his chest with one arm and slowly began to climb back up the shaft, with only his legs and his back to support his weight and that of the child.
It didn’t take long before the pain in his tired muscles became excruciating, but he wouldn’t stop. The girl was depending on him. Foot by foot he fought his way up the shaft, grunting and snarling with the effort, his gaze fixed on the gradually widening circle of light above him. He finally drew near the surface, and eager hands reached down to take the child and help Hawk the rest of the way. He clambered laboriously out and lay stretched out on the rubble, squinting at the bright daylight and drawing in deep lungfuls of the comparatively clean air. Fisher swore softly at the state of his hands and knees, helped him sit up, and wrapped his cloak around him. Someone brought him a cup of lukewarm soup, and he sipped at it gratefully.
“The child,” he said thickly. “What have they done with her?”
“A doctor’s looking at her now,” said Fisher. “And as soon as you’ve finished that soup we’re going to get one to take a look at you, as well. God, you’re a mess, Hawk. Was it bad down there?”
“Bad enough.”
Eventually he got to his feet again, and Fisher found him a doctor who could work the right healing spells. The wounds closed up easily enough, but there was nothing the doctor could do for physical and emotional exhaustion. Hawk and Fisher looked around them. The dead and injured had been laid out in neat rows on the snow, the dying and the recovering lying side by side. A large pile of unidentified body parts had been tactfully hidden under a blood-spattered tarpaulin. Hawk shook his head numbly.
“All this, to catch one drug baron and his people. Tomorrow there’ll be a dozen just like him fighting to take his place, and it will all have to be done again.”
“Stop that,” said Fisher sharply. “None of this is your fault. It’s Morgan’s fault, for having set up a pocket dimension here in the first place. And if we hadn’t acted to stop the super-chacal being distributed, there’s no telling how many thousands might have died across the city.”
Hawk didn’t answer. He looked slowly about him, taking in the situation. Engineers and sorcerers had got together to stabilize the surrounding buildings, and people were being allowed back into them again. That should please the slum landlords. Even they couldn’t charge rent on a pile of rubble. Firemen were moving among the wreckage, shoring up the few broken walls and inner structures that hadn’t collapsed completely. A few people were still sifting through the rubble, but the general air of urgency was gone. Much of the real work had been done now, and most people had accepted that there probably weren’t going to be any more survivors. The volunteers had gone home, exhausted, and Hawk felt he might as well do the same. There was nothing left for him to do, he was out on his feet, and it had to be well past the end of his double shift. He was just turning to Fisher to tell her it was time to go, when there was the sound of gentle flute music, and the dry, acid voice of the communications sorcerer filled his head.
Captains Hawk and Fisher, return to Guard Headquarters immediately. This order supersedes all other directives.
Hawk looked at Fisher. “Typical. Bloody typical. What the hell do they want now?”
“Beats me,” said Fisher. “Maybe they want to congratulate us for finally nabbing Morgan. There are a lot of people at Headquarters who’ll fight for the chance to ask him some very pointed questions.”
Hawk sniffed. “With our luck, they’ll probably screw it up in the Courts, and he’ll plea-bargain his way out with a fine and a suspended sentence.”
“Relax,” said Fisher. “We got him dead to rights this time. What can possibly go wrong?”
“What do you mean, you let him go?” screamed Hawk. He lunged across the desk at Commander Glen, and Fisher had to use all her strength to hold him back. The Commander pushed his chair back well out of reach, and glared at them both.
“Control yourself, Captain! That’s an order!”
“Stuff your order! Do you know how many people died so we could get that bastard?”
He finally realised he couldn’t break free from Fisher without hurting her, and stopped struggling. He took a deep breath and nodded curtly to Fisher. She let go of him and stepped back a pace, still watching him warily. Hawk fixed Commander Glen with a cold, implacable glare. “Talk to me, Glen. Convince me there’s some reason behind this madness. Or I swear I’ll do something one of us will regret.”
Commander Glen sniffed, and met Hawk’s gaze unflinchingly. Glen was a tallish, blocky man in his late forties, with a permanent scowl and a military-style haircut that looked as though it had been shaped with a pudding bowl. He had large, bony hands and a mouth like a knife-cut. He’d spent twenty years in the Guard, and amassed a reputation for thief-taking unequalled in the Guard. He’d been day Commander for seven years, and ran his people like his own private army, demanding and getting complete obedience. Ordinarily, he didn’t have to deal much with Hawk and Fisher, which suited all of them.
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