The Widow and the King (15 page)

Ambrose had not known if they were men or worse. The memory of his old nightmare was as real to him as the shapes he had seen in the gateway at Chatterfall. But he knew the Wolf had found him, using what he had called ‘under-craft’ and Wastelands now said was witchcraft after all. The Wolf must have told these hunters where to look for them. Ambrose wondered if he should tell Wastelands about the Wolf.

‘I think they're getting help,’ he said tentatively.

‘Ugh,’ said Wastelands. His brows slanted sharply. His eyes, Ambrose saw, had fallen on the white pebbles. Perhaps he was already guessing about witchcraft. His face was hard, and ugly.

Ambrose's courage deserted him. Speaking to Wastelands of his son might only bring the Heron Man closer. He said nothing.

‘Let us say they know we are going to Develin,’ said
Wastelands at last.

‘They'll have reached the bridge by now, and they'll know they're ahead of us. If I were them …’

Ambrose watched his face as he explored the paths before him. He did not seem to like what he found there.

‘They'll know we've left the road, and are between it and the river. They can watch the bridge, the road, and the bend where the river reaches the road. And they can sweep the banks. If there are still fifteen of them, they can do all that. They may have allies, too …’

At least one, Ambrose thought. Your son, the Wolf.

‘We cannot go to ground. We have not the provisions. We
must
reach Develin. We
must
cross the river.’

‘Can't you fight them?’ Ambrose asked.

‘We don't fight. We run.’

Crop, crop, crop, went Stefan on the hill grasses. Clouds had hidden the low sun. All the land was dimming. Somewhere just beyond the reach of eyes and ears men were hunting them with drawn swords. Somewhere, very close maybe, the Heron Man paced in the evening. And Wastelands said nothing.

And now Ambrose wished, glumly, that they had not passed so much time in silence together; although he did not know what he could have said to earn himself any friendship from this man. Maybe someone else could have done. The shepherd boy who had spoken with Uncle Adam had known how to make men listen to him. Maybe it was only Ambrose that men like this despised.

He wondered what it would have been like if it had been his own father there, resting his back against the tree; and whether his father would have helped him or handed
him over to the Heron Man. And he wondered, too, what Wastelands would do now.

Still he wished that the man would speak with him. After a while he asked: ‘What is Devling?’

‘Who?’

‘Dev … The place you said.’ It had been the first time Wastelands had said where they were going.

‘Develin.’ The knight rose and pointed into the evening. ‘Look where the river runs – you can see a stretch of it down below. Where it bends – there. They have lit the lights.’

In the distance Ambrose could see a thin pale ribbon that must have been the river. On the far side of it was a shape that bulked like a small hill, with a star upon its crest.

‘It is a great house. Larger than Bay or Trant, although not so old. There are few left in the Kingdom that can match it for wealth, and none that match it for learning – if you share your mother's taste for books.’

It was a castle – the third he had seen since leaving Chatterfall. And this one had lights, and life within it.

‘I have been thinking to ask them if they would take you as a page. They would be well able to teach what you need to know – and to bat away any raiders that come. They've no love for your name, mind you. But I have no friends in places like Bay or Velis or Tuscolo. Whereas I did once make common cause with the Widow Develin. I think she will remember.
If
we can get there …’

Ambrose waited for him to say more, but he seemed to be thinking again.

The darkness was growing. Ambrose moved the little white stones outwards to give himself room to lie down.
One, two three, and so on up to eight. Eight stones. And the Wolf had felled eight stones by the pool. Suppose he could go to the pool now, and put one pebble where each of the stones had been – would that keep the Heron Man in? Ambrose could not imagine it. They would have to be very far apart. And how could he get there anyway? It was going to be hard enough to get to the castle across the river. The pool was a world away.

He huddled within the ring, his head on a fold of his blanket.

Still the knight was silent. Perhaps he was no longer thinking, but watching. Perhaps, with the enemy as close as this, he was going to watch all night.

Hours later, Ambrose was woken by a hand on his arm.

‘Up,’ said Wastelands. ‘It is time to go.’

Ambrose thought he must be dreaming, because Wastelands's head had changed shape. Then he realized that the knight was wearing his helmet. He shook himself, heavy with sleep. It was still dark. The old moon had risen – little more than a fingernail.

‘Dawn's not far away. If we go now, we'll reach the river under cover of darkness. Then we shall see.’

Ambrose fumbled for his stones and his blanket. It seemed to take an age to bring them together. The horse was anxious. The knight tightened its girth and replaced its bit in the darkness. Then he strapped on Ambrose's roll and they climbed once more into their places. Ambrose was still struggling with sleep as they rode off into the night.

They moved slowly, in a dream-like journey downhill. Ambrose swayed and nodded in the saddle, lurching in the fringes of a doze. He wondered when they would be able
to lie down again. Stefan picked his way, following no path that he could see. The shape of the horse's head, the points of its ears, showed against the sombre land. Was it getting lighter? He thought perhaps it was. The air seemed very damp. The moon had disappeared, veiled by some cloud. The ground had levelled, and still he could see almost nothing at all. His world was sounds: the constant squeak and jingle of harness and arms; the plod-plod of the horse's feet, softening as the hooves bit into wet ground. There was water-noise; and now, and for some time, there had been the voices of birds: large water-fowl, quacking and hooting in the coming dawn. He could not remember when they had begun.

The river was there, away to their right. Wastelands was following the line of it, steering his horse as close as he could to the bank and then edging away again when they stumbled into boggy ground. Something flew
splattersplatter-splatter
away across the surface of the water, quite close. The sky was much paler, and yet the air was still thick and impenetrable. He could see the head of the horse clearly, his own feet, and a few yards of ground. And then the world was a dull grey wall of river mist. All around them birds clamoured in the unseen dawn.

On they went. He could not see the water; he could not even make out the near bank, although he could hear reeds rustling close by. He wondered what they were looking for, and when things would change. Nothing did. His neck and limbs ached with weariness, and yet he was no longer sleepy.

Sounds had a strange quality in this mist. A large waterbird exploded from under Stefan's feet in a shudder of
brown feathers and vanished into the mist, trailed by honking cries. A moment afterwards, as Wastelands brought the startled horse back under control, they heard the same noise again. It seemed to come from fifty yards behind them. The soft plod, plod of hooves, the squeak of harness and the clink of mail surrounded Ambrose as the horse picked its way along the riverbank. He wondered if the mist was so thick in places that sounds bounced off it, as they might do from a wall of rock in the mountains. Now Wastelands was checking their mount. It stilled, waiting.

The sounds of horse-noises continued. Behind them, to their left.

A voice called, and Ambrose's heart bolted.

There was a rider, at least one, in the mist some twenty yards away. The same horse-noise, the same squeak, the same clink of mail. The rider called again, a question. Ambrose could not catch the words. They were muffled by helmet or hood, and muffled again by the fog. The voice was unhurried, bored, even. Behind him, Wastelands grunted loudly in answer, and stirred his horse to move slowly forwards. His arm was a bar of iron across Ambrose's chest. He leaned forward and whispered.

‘Pick your feet up. Get beneath the cloak.’

Ambrose's eyes were straining at the mist. He thought he could just – maybe – make out the shadow of a rider over there. His heart was hammering.

Pick your feet up. In this mist, a horse and rider would be a shape and no more. The hunters had not yet realized that their prey was among them. But if they saw a second pair of legs, a second head, they would know at once. Stealthily Ambrose tried to draw up his feet and sit
cross-legged in his perch. His seat was precarious. He swayed, and almost fell. Wastelands clutched him, cursing under his breath. Ambrose swallowed, and tried again. He eased his left leg over the horse's neck and onto its other shoulder, so that he sat sideways with both feet towards the river. He bowed his head into the knight's armoured chest, and felt the big cloak draw around him. Propped like that, with his back to the loitering enemy, he could see only from the corner of his eye, to the head of the horse and the whiteness beyond it. His ears told him that there were two riders close, one now drawing ahead of them, another coming level. There were others beyond – how many?
We do not fight. We run.
They were not running. They were moving in company with their enemies, who could loom out of the mist and discover them in the time it took to draw a breath. Ambrose wanted Wastelands to urge the horse into a gallop – to carry them fleeing like a wildfowl along the riverbank, aimlessly, with the cries of the men in pursuit behind him. Wastelands did not. He was watching, letting the enemy draw slowly ahead. He must be hoping that they would not guess that he had been among them. Then, maybe, they could turn Stefan and slip back the way they had come.

How long? How long must they walk like this?

A voice called from ahead. Ambrose clenched his teeth and hunched his shoulders, but all that happened was that somewhere in the mist a horse picked up pace and rambled forward at a heavy trot. Voices came to him, conferring. They were coming nearer. Wastelands was idling his horse up towards his enemies. There were close, close. Could he see them? The lightest pull on the reins, and Stefan stilled. Another horse lumbered past – very close, this one.

Clutched under the cloak Ambrose could only see the mist over the water, and a single, thin black line curving away into it – a rope, suspended from two points somewhere out of sight, sagging under its own weight. A rope across the river.

Up ahead, somebody was dismounting. There was a slow paddling of hooves as other riders moved on into the mist. Metal rasped in a scabbard. That was Wastelands drawing his sword. What was happening?

After a moment Wastelands slid down from the saddle. Ambrose felt himself swaying as the man nudged the horse forward. Plod, plod. There was someone else moving in the mist. There was a tall structure of beams, from which the rope Ambrose had seen swept lazily off across the river. Down there, where the water must be, there was a darker shape, low and wide. A raft, or jetty.

A ferry!

At the foot of the beams, the shape of a man was stooping, sawing at something with a knife. Ambrose could hear the gasp of his breath. The other riders had left him to cut the ropes, and had gone on. As they came up the man straightened and looked up at Ambrose on the horse.

‘Heavy stuff,’ the figure said. ‘You got an axe?’ Wastelands struck. Something whisked through the air and crashed loudly into metal. The man-shape disappeared. Ambrose swayed, lost his balance, and found it better to jump than fall. He hit the ground with both feet and stumbled.

‘Quickly,’ hissed Wastelands. ‘Take his head.’

He meant Stefan. The horse backed as Ambrose reached for its bridle, but Ambrose caught it and tugged.
From the bankside the knight was grunting at the big animal. It came. Its hooves thumped loudly on the jetty of wooden boards. Slipping and scrambling, Ambrose lugged it on until the boards moved on water beneath his feet, and he realized they must be on a raft. The knight was cutting a mooring.

‘Hold him!’ the knight said.

Ambrose gripped the bridle with both hands and faced the horse, who shifted nervously, and then stilled when it realized the raft was tilting with its weight.

‘Hold, Stefan,’ said the knight to the horse.

The water noise increased. The river was all round them.

From the bank there came a cry – a wordless sound, full of pain and warning. The rope-cutter had dragged himself to a kneeling position, with his hands on his jaw and the side of his head. He cried again. In the mist ahead there were answering shouts. The raft was no more than a low platform of wood with a knee-high rail. There was a frame of poles at either end, each with a great eye through which the rope ran. The rope made a roaring sound as Wastelands began to pull the raft along it, out onto the water.

‘Easy, Stefan,’ the knight grunted over his shoulder.

There were horses, moving at a canter on the bank behind them. Wastelands heaved at the rope. They were already many yards out into the stream. Behind them, on the bank, the shapes of horsemen loomed – one, two, three. They were looking towards the raft, pointing. One seemed to set his horse at the river, but it baulked. There was a clickity-winding sound, carrying clearly across the water.

‘Get round,’ said Wastelands. ‘Get round to his head.’

Ambrose had no idea what he meant.

‘Get round to Stefan's head. Put him between you and the bank. Quickly!’

The horse shuffled uneasily, and the platform swayed as its weight shifted. Something hissed at him out of the air, and there was a dull, ringing thud from the bank that must have preceded it.

‘Drop us in the water and you'll never find us!’ shouted Wastelands at the bank.

‘Do I care?’ came the answer. ‘Come back and we'll not shoot again!’

It was the voice – the big, roaring voice from the woods of Chatterfall.