The Place of Dead Kings (28 page)

Rao patted his pistol, which was now back in its holster. ‘It’s loaded already.’

‘It’s been in the snow. Powder might be damp now.’

‘You think so?’

Jack walked across, took the pistol and pointed it out towards the valley. He pulled the trigger and the hammer clicked down. The cap sparked, then . . . nothing. He tried again. Still nothing.

‘See.’ Jack handed back the pistol. ‘Clean it out.’

Jack sat back on the rock and wrenched the bullets out of his pistol with the screw tool. When he’d finished, he handed the screw over to Rao, whose own tools were either lying back in the gorge or taken by the savages.

‘We need hot water to clean out the barrels,’ Rao said. ‘We’ll have to make a fire.’

‘And what’ll we boil the water in?’

‘Ah.’ Rao rubbed his moustache. ‘True. We don’t have a pot.’

‘There is one way. But you’re probably not going to like it.’

‘What?’

Jack picked up the empty water canteen, turned away and loosened his hose. He began urinating into the canteen.

‘Ergh,’ Rao said. ‘What are you doing?’

‘Piss is a great cleaner. Trust me.’

Jack fastened his hose again, put small wooden pegs into his pistol’s touch holes and poured urine into the six barrels. He passed the canteen over to Rao.

‘Shiva.’ Rao wrinkled his face and pressed his handkerchief to his nose.

‘It’s the only way,’ Jack said.

Rao grimaced, took the canteen and poured urine into his pistol’s muzzles. He turned his face away to avoid the steam rising from the liquid.

Jack put his hand over the end of his pistol and shook the weapon up and down, swilling the urine in the barrels. He looked across at Rao. ‘Come on.’

With a look of supreme disgust, Rao put his hand over his pistol and shook. He went pale, as if he were about to throw up.

They both poured the urine out into the snow and repeated the process a few times. Rao gagged at one point, but managed to hold back the vomit.

Once the barrels were clean, they dried the pistols with rags and reloaded with greased patches and bullets. Jack used snow to wipe down the scimitar, then shoved the blade, the knife and the pistol into his belt.

‘You all right?’ Jack asked.

Rao nodded, colour returning to his cheeks.

Jack couldn’t help grinning at Rao’s discomfort. ‘Right, then. Let’s get back to the trail.’

Jack sat cross-legged on the frozen floor of the valley. The white landscape stretched away from him in all directions. A faint breeze fluttered the edges of his tunic, but the snowfall had stopped.

Rao stomped his feet to keep himself warm while he waited nearby.

Jack shut his eyes, took several deep breaths and tried to calm his mind. Worries about Saleem beat in his head. Was the lad still alive? Was he strong enough to keep going? But Jack couldn’t let these concerns distract him.

He concentrated on the cold air flowing into his nostrils, hitting the back of his throat and chilling his lungs.

The storm in his head receded.

Good. He was getting himself under control.

He focused on the Europa yantra, the intricate details appearing before him on a black background. The design circled slowly and he fought to hold it still.

He sensed the grainy texture of the sattva about him. He was in a medium stream, which was better than nothing. He reached out with his mind, dragged the sattva towards him and began smelting, the sattva exuding a sweet scent as it was processed.

He sensed the spirit realm draw close. A heavy brightness weighed upon him.

Focus on the yantra. Don’t let it slip.

Your mind is a rippling pool. Still it.

The fire in his chest flickered and pain streaked through his body. But he ignored it. He wasn’t going to let his injury put him off his task.

The yantra locked into place and he held the entire image in his mind without any other thoughts intruding. The design shimmered and then burst into dazzling light.

Warmth flooded through his body, cathedral bells and angelic singing seemed to clamour in his head and suddenly he was in the centre of a vast, interconnected lattice.

He flung his eyes open. The white ocean of snow rolled away from him. Wavelets and swells, with blue shadows, scudded across the valley floor.

He looked down. All about him, strings of lights glowed through the snow, as if hundreds of lanterns had been buried beneath the drifts.

Trails in sattva. And judging by their size and shape, they were the markings left by the four hundred or so savages.

He leapt up and Rao jumped slightly at the sudden movement.

‘Spyglass,’ Jack said, and Rao handed it over.

Jack snapped open the glass and peered through it. The luminous trails coursed away down the valley, becoming no more than pinpricks in the distance. He stared harder and noticed the tiny lights curving gently to the right more than a mile off and flowing up over a range of hills. He memorised the point where the trail rippled past a stand of trees and then allowed himself to slide out of the trance.

Pain jabbed at his chest and his breathing was shallow. But he felt better than he’d expected. Kanvar’s cure was still holding.

He handed back the glass. ‘I’ve got the trail.’

Rao stared at the ground ahead and frowned. ‘I can’t see a thing.’

‘Trust me. Let’s go.’

They jogged through the snow, kicking up flakes behind them. Their breath frosted about their mouths and ice collected in Rao’s moustache. Their footsteps were the first to mark the pristine snow.

They reached the hills and clambered up the slope towards the copse Jack had seen earlier. A herd of deer stood in the distance and watched them warily.

At the summit, they rested and munched a few dry rations. Jack checked the bag and found there were only ten biscuits left. They would have to hunt for food if they couldn’t catch up to the savages soon.

They took it in turns to scan the ground ahead through the glass. Jack saw further mountains and buckled valleys carpeted in snow, but no sign of the Scots.

He sniffed. He caught the sweet aroma of sattva and a shiver crossed his skin. They were in a strong stream – a good place to enter the trance.

He meditated again and soon spied the wide trail running down the slope and into a forest. He grasped the knapsack and led Rao downhill, remaining in the trance so that he could keep his eyes on the tracks. The incline was steep and they had to zigzag in order to stop themselves slipping. Sweat blossomed beneath Jack’s tunic and his breath was short and raspy. The trance suppressed his discomfort, but he was only too aware that he was growing weaker.

They reached the forest and paced down between the black, leafless trees. The branches clenched together over their heads and roots snaked out of the snow in front of them. Jack kept his eyes firmly on the glowing tracks speckling the ground ahead.

After around ten minutes, he spotted a distinctive set of holes in the snow. He ran down to them and crouched for a better look. They were the telltale tracks left by the savage’s shoes. Glancing around, he saw further footprints interspersed between the trees.

He looked up at Rao and grinned. ‘Found the trail again. They must have got this far before the heavy snow stopped.’

Rao paused for a moment, then swallowed and said awkwardly, ‘Well done.’

Jack skipped out of the trance. Tiredness swamped him and the pain quivered in his chest. But after a brief rest he felt well enough to continue.

They wove their way between the trees and down to the floor of a narrow valley. The tracks were so clear in the snow even Rao was able to follow them.

After an hour, Jack stopped when he saw Rao was lagging behind. While he waited, he trudged down to a nearby brook, cracked the ice, washed out the canteen and filled it with water.

Rao slowed to a walk, plodded over and sat on a rock. His face was red and he was wheezing. Jack offered him the canteen, but he crinkled his nose and turned his face away. ‘You can’t drink from that now.’

Jack shrugged and gulped down some water, which tasted fine. Rao scooped up a handful of snow and sucked on that instead.

A thin howl cracked the silence, echoing between the slopes.

Rao jumped up and rested his hand on his holster. ‘What was that?’

The howl struck up again, joined by another and then a third. The cries were eerie, but Jack knew what they were.

‘Wolves,’ he said.

Rao frowned. ‘What?’

‘Like big dogs.’

‘Oh.’ Rao searched the scarps. ‘Yes, I’ve heard of them. It’s the strangest sound.’

‘They’ll leave us alone. Come on.’

They pressed on, following the black potholes left by the savages’ feet. The wolves stopped wailing after a few minutes and all Jack could hear was the crisp crunch of his and Rao’s boots in the snow. As the afternoon wore on, the cloud congealed and darkened overhead, a chill wind whipped through the valley and flakes began to circle down again.

‘It’s damn cold,’ Rao said when they stopped for a break. He pulled the collar of his overcoat tight about his neck. He’d put on riding gloves, but had nothing warmer to wear. Flakes dusted his turban and shoulders and ice was crystallising in his moustache again.

Jack shivered. The breeze whispered through his tunic and the cold pressed against his hose. He lifted his hood over his head. ‘We’d best keep moving. Only way to stay warm.’

The wind strengthened and tossed the snow around them as they jogged on. Jack’s nose and cheeks were rubbed raw and he pulled his hands into his sleeves to stop them going numb. Blinking flakes out of his eyes, he saw the savages’ footprints were filling up with snow. Soon they would be smothered completely.

Several wolves bayed from somewhere high up to the left. The sound cut through the whistling wind and even Jack felt the hair stand up on the back of his neck.

Rao shuddered.

‘It sounds worse than it is,’ Jack said, trying his best to be reassuring.

‘What’s that?’ Rao pointed into the woods.

Jack stopped and stared. At first he saw nothing, but then spotted a grey shape flicker between the trees about a hundred yards away. Another shape followed and then three or four others. They seemed to appear from nowhere and then slip away again into the swirling haze.

‘Wolves?’ Rao asked.

Jack nodded. ‘Looks like it.’

The cries continued to wheel about them and the wind turned into a gale, blasting them with ice and dashing snow in their faces. They could no longer run and had to trudge ahead, leaning into the squalls. The cold stung Jack’s ears and face.

Soon the wail of the wind blotted out the wolves’ howling. But the ghostly creatures still flitted through the woods, appearing up ahead, then to the left, then the right.

Jack wondered whether they were encircling him and Rao.

The light dimmed, but Jack couldn’t tell whether this was due to the storm or the lowering of the sun. He’d lost track of time and the savages’ trail was completely covered over. He would have to meditate again if they were going to continue. But was it wise to continue now with the wolves following them and the temperature plummeting further by the minute?

He shouted to Rao over the wind, ‘What time is it?’

‘What?’ Rao cried back.

‘Time?’ Jack said more loudly.

Rao plucked out his pocket watch and squinted at it, wiping flakes away from the face. ‘Half past three.’

‘We should make camp. It’ll be dark soon and the storm’s getting bad.’

‘Where?’

Jack glanced around. Nowhere in sight offered much shelter, but he spotted the dark blur of a line of hills about half a mile away. There might be rocks or an overhang there that could provide some degree of protection.

‘We’ll try over there.’ Jack pointed towards the slopes and forged his way to the right through the deepening snow. Ice encrusted his eyebrows and his lips went numb. Every inch of his skin trembled from the cold.

They couldn’t last much longer out in the storm like this. They would freeze to death.

Jack paused beside a tree to catch his breath. When he looked back, he saw Rao was more than a hundred yards back and almost obscured by the snowstorm.