The War of the Grail (22 page)

Kanvar’s eyes widened. ‘Takhat received news from one of our comrades yesterday. The army have attacked Ludlow and appear to be overwhelming the rebels there. It seems they will soon take the city.’

Jack shivered, despite the fact that the sun was warming his skin. ‘If the army take Ludlow, they’ll be able to march on to Clun Valley.’ His voice was hoarse. The early morning light seemed intensely bright now. ‘When did the army attack?’

‘Takhat said three days ago.’

‘Three days? That was the day we left Folly Brook.’ He felt dizzy. ‘They could be in Clun already.’

Kanvar raised his hand. ‘They might not have defeated the rebels in such a short space of time.’

Jack clenched his jaw. ‘But they might have. And even if it took them longer, they might still be on the march right now. They could reach Clun at any time.’

‘That is so.’

Jack looked over at the stone circle, which was now bathed in sunlight. He’d wanted to try to use the power again, but he had to admit defeat at some point. The longer he delayed leaving, the longer it would take him to get back to Folly Brook. He’d planned to return within four days. Thanks to all the obstacles he and Kanvar had faced, they’d already spent three days just getting to the Great Yantra. How long would it take them to get back now, when war was spreading through Shropshire?

But he would be returning without a weapon he could use to fight the Rajthanans.

No Grail.

No Great Yantra’s power.

Damn it.

He nodded at Kanvar. ‘You’re right. I can’t waste any more time. We have to get back to Folly Brook. As quickly as we can.’

A
flock of crows wheeled in the sky above Clun Valley. Jack halted his horse and stared at the birds. His countrymen believed crows were a portent of evil – of the Devil, even. But he’d learnt long ago from Jhala that this was just a superstition. He no longer believed in witches and omens and the evil eye. But crows were still a sign, a true sign, of at least one thing – death. Wherever there were corpses and carrion, there would be crows.

Kanvar rode up beside him. ‘What is it?’

‘Not sure.’ Jack rubbed his face and looked first to the east and then to the west. He and Kanvar had approached the valley from the north and had come out of the hills a few miles west of the town of Clun. In both directions he saw pillars of smoke spiralling into the overcast sky.

A chill ran down his back. He didn’t like the look of this. The smoke could be from burning livestock, but it appeared too thick for that. A pyre would have to be enormous to produce that amount of smoke.

It looked more like burning buildings.

‘Let’s get down there.’ His voice was cracked.

He angled his mare down the incline and into the valley. It was two days since he and Kanvar had set off from the circle of stones. They’d ridden hard across Staffordshire and Shropshire, stopping only to rest the horses and avoid Rajthanan patrols along the border. Jack’s eyes burned with tiredness and every muscle in his body ached. But a feverish alertness was overtaking him.

They reached the base of the valley and struck off along the main road to Newcastle. Three columns of smoke rose ahead, and further crows swarmed in the air. Jack spurred into a gallop, his mare’s hooves battering the dry ground and sending up a plume of dust in her wake.

His heart thudded hard in his chest. Bile rose in his throat, leaving a sour taste in the back of his mouth.

Fears gnawed like rats at the back of his mind, but he did his best to brush them away.

He mustn’t think the worst. He must hold on to hope.

A crowd of people appeared on the lane ahead. Without a moment’s hesitation, he sawed at his reins to turn his horse, left the road and charged towards the nearby woods.

Kanvar followed, calling out, ‘Did you see who they were?’

Jack shook his head. He hadn’t been able to make the figures out clearly, but he didn’t want to take any chances.

He raced down a track that wound between the trees. The path curved away from the main road, but then circled back until he was close enough to be able to spy on the crowd of people through the greenery.

He halted his horse and stared. He could see around forty men carrying a mixture of muskets, swords and bows. Some seemed to be standing guard, while others were lounging on the side of the road. Several appeared to be throwing stones at what looked like a tree stump.

Kanvar handed over the spyglass. Jack gazed through it and shivered slightly at what he saw.

The stump was in fact a man buried in the ground up to his waist. Worse, Jack recognised him. He was a peasant from Newcastle – Jack had seen him several times at the Cock-in-the-Hoop Inn. From time to time, the other men threw stones at the trapped man and laughed, as if they were playing a game.

And now Jack realised something else. Several of the stone-throwers wore surcoats bearing the mark of the three boars’ heads.

‘They’re Welsh,’ he hissed. ‘That’s the sign of the Lord of the Marches.’

‘Waheguru,’ Kanvar whispered.

As Jack watched, a Welshman hurled another stone at the buried Englishman. Jack could see blood on the Englishman’s face and hands. The man was struggling to free himself, but the earth held him fast.

Jack felt his face reddening. His hand shook slightly as it held the glass.

For a second, he seriously thought about charging down to the road and trying to fight off the Welsh. But he knew he couldn’t do that. There were too many men for him and Kanvar to kill quickly – even with Lightning. And a fight was bound to attract the attention of any other troops in the area.

What was more important right now was getting back to Folly Brook.

‘Let’s go.’ He handed the glass back to Kanvar and spurred his mare into a gallop, fears whirling in his head.

He had to stay calm, had to stay focused.

Black smoke rose directly ahead, above the trees. He was sure it was coming from Newcastle now.

He slowed his horse and called across to Kanvar. ‘I don’t think it’s a good idea to ride straight into town.’ He nodded towards a slope to his right. ‘We’ll take a look from up there.’

He directed his horse up a steep track, rode through a stretch of woodland and eventually came out on a bare summit.

He leapt from the saddle and tethered his horse. ‘We’d better go carefully. There might be more Welsh about.’

Kanvar nodded and followed Jack on to the open ground.

They crept ahead, crouching low in the long grass. The smoke swirled up from the far side of the hill, but Jack still couldn’t see the town from this angle.

They drew up to a gorse bush on the brow of the hill. The wind changed direction and Jack caught a whiff of soot. The town was directly below them now. He only had to part the branches of the bush and look down in order to see it. But he hesitated. He didn’t want to do it.

Didn’t want to confirm what he already knew.

He gritted his teeth and forced aside a thorny branch with his arm. Kanvar drew his breath in sharply, while Jack felt giddy for a moment.

The town below was a smouldering ruin. The larger buildings in the centre had been decimated and smoke coiled up from the husks that remained. The inn was nothing but a pile of timbers and the smaller cottages about the perimeter had all been torched, their thatched roofs burnt away and the walls smeared with black soot. All that was left of the refugees’ camp was a muddy field.

The crows circled overhead, giving grating squawks.

Kanvar stared through his spyglass for a moment before handing it to Jack. Jack swept the glass across Newcastle and spotted several corpses, all covered in crows. Troops of Welshmen marched through the streets and searched the debris, no doubt looking for loot.

He moved the glass over to the castle, which rose from a field about half a mile from the town. The walls still stood firm and the keep still thrust up from the bailey. But as he scanned the battlements, he saw no sign of any men-at-arms. And there was no sign either of the old Rajthanan guns that normally poked out from the embrasures.

When he moved the glass down, he saw that the portcullis lay in the overgrown ditch that had once been the moat. The gate had been smashed open and lay in pieces just beyond the gatehouse.

He lowered the glass. His skin crawled and he felt the bile stinging the back of his throat again.

‘We have to get to Folly Brook,’ he said, his voice cracking.

Still crouching, they scrambled back to the horses and rode downhill. Instead of taking the route through Newcastle, Jack struck off along a little-used track that led through the hills and intersected the valley of the Folly brook.

The day was hot. Jack sweated profusely and his mouth prickled with thirst. His mare was growing weary from so many days of hard riding, and she tripped and stumbled at times on the uneven path. But Jack didn’t stop to rest or even slow the pace. He kept spurring the mare into a gallop despite the treacherous ground.

His mind was on fire. His head felt hot and full of blood.

After half an hour, the mare clambered up the final slope and then the thin valley snaked away below him. He saw the trees at the base of the incline and the brook snaking into the distance. But his eyes fell instantly upon the village. His village.

And then he found himself jumping from his horse and sinking to his knees.

Tears pricked his eyes.

Folly Brook was burning. Smoke trailed from the thatched roofs and many of the huts had been completely smashed. He could tell all this even from a distance, even without the spyglass that Kanvar was now offering to him.

Folly Brook was gone.

T
he trees flitted past to either side of Jack as his horse thundered down the track. He caught glimpses of branches and greenery, but it all seemed far away – unreal, even. All he could think about was getting to Folly Brook and finding the answers to the questions battering his head.

He heard Kanvar’s horse galloping behind him. Kanvar hadn’t spoken a single word during the ride downhill – it seemed he’d wisely decided to maintain a respectful silence.

For a moment, an image of Katelin lying dead flashed into Jack’s mind. Then he saw the corpses lying in the streets after the Siege of London. And then more bodies scattered across the battlefield outside Ragusa. So many dead people. All piling up in his mind, as if he were being buried beneath them.

His mare reached the bottom of the slope, skidded to the right and galloped down the main road towards the village. The forest and hills were intensely familiar to Jack now. He’d lived here for four years and had come to call this place home. He’d worked the fields spreading out to his left. He’d taken Elizabeth hunting with him in the woods rippling past to his right.

He spotted the ancient stone cross standing on the side of the road and the two old elms with their branches meshing into an arch over his head.

He shivered. In a few seconds he would be in Folly Brook. And then he would know …

Would there be Welsh soldiers still in the village? He didn’t care at that moment. If he saw any, he would fire lightning at them, kill as many of them as he could. If he ran out of strength or sattva, he would draw his knife and keep on fighting until he was slain …