The Royal Ranger

Forty-eight

Maddie reached the top of the cliff path to find the ten former prisoners huddled together, waiting for her. She retrieved her bow from the long grass where she had left it earlier that evening. She shook her head at the thought of it. It seemed to be days since the time when she had started down the path, not hours.

“Let’s move away from the cliff edge,” she said. She was conscious that, at any moment, Ruhl might give up his pursuit of Will and return to the camp to find his prisoners gone. There was no sense in standing against the skyline so that they could be seen from the beach.

The children shuffled a few metres away from the cliff, then stood in a half circle, watching her expectantly. There were six boys and four girls. She judged their ages to range from around ten to fourteen. She scanned their faces and saw a mixture of fear, bewilderment and relief. She took a few deep breaths. The adrenaline was still coursing through her veins following the encounter with the Storyman and she knew that when she was excited or tense, her voice tended to go up into a shrill register. She had the good sense to realise that would be anything but encouraging for the children watching her.

“All right,” she said, when she was sufficiently calm. “Here’s what’s happening. You were captured by a slaving gang.”

“We were taken by the Stealer in the Night. He’s a spook,” one of the younger girls corrected her. At the mention of the name, the others looked around nervously. Unconsciously, they moved closer together.

Maddie shook her head and continued in a patient tone. “He’s not a spook and you don’t have to be frightened of him any more. He’s just a man—but he is a very bad man and he’s a slave trader. He was going to sell you all as slaves.”

“He said he was going to lock us away in a dark, dark dungeon and rats would eat our toes and ghouls would drink our blood in the night and he’d take out our eyes if we ever disobeyed him.” That was one of the younger boys. The others all mumbled agreement. Maddie made a calming gesture.

“He just said that to frighten you,” she told them. And it worked, she thought to herself. She paused, remembering the calming power of Will’s name when she had used it earlier that evening. Fight a spirit with a legend, she thought.

“Now, tell me, how many of you have heard of Will Treaty?”

Ten hands raised in unison and, in spite of the gravity of the situation, she had to smile. Everyone had heard of Will Treaty.

“Well, Will Treaty is my master, and he’s going to help us.”

Predictably, they all looked around to see where he was and she added, with a little asperity, “He’s not here now. He’s gone to chase the Stealer and his men away.”

That wasn’t exactly the way of it, she thought, but it was close enough for the moment. She decided the exact truth could stand a little colouring.

“And when he catches the Stealer, he’s going to kill him,” she told them. That seemed to give them a certain amount of encouragement. They liked the idea of the famous Will Treaty killing the Stealer who had caused them so much pain and terror.

“How will he kill him?” asked the boy who had spoken earlier. She looked at him, realising that, being a boy, he wanted grim and gory details. But she didn’t think the time was right for that.

“Never you mind. He’ll find a way.”

“I hope he hurts him!” the boy said viciously. “I hope he really, really hurts him.”

“I’m sure he will, and we’ll ask him all about it when we see him,” she said. Then she clapped her hands together to get their attention away from the Stealer and his imminent, painful demise. “Now!” she said briskly. “We have to get moving. We can’t stay here and we have to get to Ambleton as fast as we possibly can. The bigger ones can go on foot. But you smaller children can ride.”

She put her fingers in her mouth and gave out a low whistle. She heard a brief whinny in reply, then Tug and Bumper trotted out of the dark. She and Will had brought them forward earlier in the evening, sensing that some of the smaller children might need to ride.

Will had declined to take Tug with him.

“I’ll want to let Ruhl keep me in sight when I’m leading him away. If I’m mounted, he’ll give up. Or he’ll realise I’m faking if I don’t make a clean getaway. Better to leave both horses with you. They can help with the children.”

She assessed the group now, selecting the youngest of the children.

“You three,” she said, pointing to a boy and two girls who looked to be about ten years old. “Do you want to ride on Will Treaty’s famous horse, Tug?”

Tug rattled his mane and looked approvingly at her. I always knew I liked you.

But of course, Maddie didn’t hear him. The three children stared round-eyed at the stocky grey and nodded their heads.

“Come on then.” She lifted the first girl to place her in the saddle. Then she had second thoughts. She set the girl down and moved to face Tug, searching her memory for the code phrase Will had told her so casually on the day she was given Bumper. Finally, it came to her.

“Do you mind?” she said softly. She hoped the phrase would be acceptable for a third party. Tug’s intelligent eyes met hers. His head went up and down two or three times.

She had been pretty sure he wouldn’t buck off a small child, but it paid to make certain.

She picked the girl up again and boosted her into the saddle. Maddie kept one hand on her arm as she looked warily at Tug.

“Don’t do anything silly, will you?” she said. Tug turned his head to look her in the eyes. She could almost swear that if he could have raised an eyebrow, he would have. But he didn’t buck or plunge. Heartened, she picked up the second child, a boy this time, and lifted him onto the horse’s back as well. Again, Tug stood steadily and she knew it was all right. She boosted the third child up. Even their combined weight was a light load for the hardy little horse, she knew. She nodded her thanks to Tug and moved to stand by Bumper.

“Do you want to ride this horse?” she asked another of the younger ones.

The little girl nodded, then asked, “Whose famous horse is this?”

Bumper neighed. The sound was amazingly like a snigger. She thought quickly.

“Have you heard of Will Treaty’s famous friend, Sir Horace, the Oakleaf Knight?”

The girl nodded.

“This is his horse.”

I most certainly am not! I wouldn’t want a big lump like him riding me.

She moved closer to Bumper and whispered, “Just go along with it, will you? And how do you know my dad is a big lump?”

He’s a knight. They’re all big lumps. But all right, hoist her up.

“Don’t break her, all right?” She wasn’t sure if Bumper needed to hear his code phrase as well but she said it anyway.

Oh really!

She lifted the little girl into the saddle and looked around for another small child. Tim Stoker raised a hand to catch her attention.

“Miss Maddie?”

She rolled her eyes. She felt positively ancient. “Maddie will do, Tim. What is it?”

“Rob here has a bad leg. The Storyman burnt him with a hot iron.”

He indicated another boy, around his own age. Rob was shorter than Tim, and a little stockier. If he rode on Bumper, she wouldn’t be able to put a third child on him as well. But she shrugged. The remaining children were all older and bigger. She gestured to Rob.

“Up you go then, Rob. Mind that leg.”

She helped him put his foot in the stirrup. His right leg, she saw now, was heavily bandaged. He swung gingerly up into the saddle, sitting behind the girl.

She turned to face the remaining five children.

“All right, we have to go now. And we have to go quickly. I know some of you aren’t feeling well and you haven’t been properly fed for days—or even weeks. But I want to ask this one effort from you. If you become too tired, let me know and you can ride one of the horses for a while. All right?”

Mutely, they all nodded.

“Then come on. We’re going to jog for ten minutes, then walk for twenty. We’ve got a lot of ground to cover and we’ve got to do it as fast as possible. Ready? Let’s go.”

She led the way, jogging steadily, with Bumper on her right and Tug on his far side. The children hesitated, then followed in a ragged formation. Their feet rustled and shuffled through the coarse grass. Then they reached the high road and the going was easier. They had been badly treated and ill fed, she knew. But they were children and she knew that children were usually fit. They’d manage. They’d have to manage. She was aware of someone beside her on her left. She looked around and saw Tim jogging there. He was frowning.

“Maddie?” he said, his voice jerky and staccato as his feet hit the road.

“What is it, Tim?”

“If Will Treaty is chasing the Stealer, why do we have to get away from here?”

She opened her mouth to answer, then hesitated, looking round. None of the others seemed to have heard his question.

“Just keep that thought to yourself, will you?” she said.

She saw the understanding dawning in his eyes. He nodded once, then dropped back to his former place.

The night wore on, and Will continued his game of cat and mouse with the slavers, letting them get closer to him, tantalising them with a quick sight of him, then moving quietly and surreptitiously away. It was a fine line to tread, keeping them on the hook without letting Ruhl know that he was doing so intentionally. But once the pattern was set and Ruhl accepted it, there was no risk that he’d give up the pursuit.

He recalled all he knew about Ruhl. In the days following Alyss’s death, he had interviewed as many of his former victims as he could. And he’d interrogated the members of his gang that he’d caught.

He had built up a picture of a cruel, ruthless and pitiless man. Intelligent, but with a fatal flaw. He could not stand to be crossed or thwarted. If that ever happened, Ruhl would be overcome with a blind, unreasoning rage and desire for revenge.

“Much like I was,” he muttered to himself.

That rage would often cloud Ruhl’s judgement and lead him to hasty, ill-considered decisions.

This was how Will believed that if he could spoil Ruhl’s plan to get the children away, the slaver would pursue him unrelentingly and single-mindedly, intent only on revenge. And so it was proving.

As the dark hours slipped away, Will led the pursuit farther and farther south, knowing with grim satisfaction that Maddie was herding the children in the opposite direction as fast as their legs, and the two horses, could carry them.

He glanced at the sky to the east. The first vague fingers of light were stealing above the horizon. Here and there, an occasional bird began calling, predicting the coming dawn.

“Time to make myself scarce,” he said. Once daylight came, it would be more difficult, with the lack of real cover available in the area. He let himself be seen once more, hearing the shouts of his pursuers. Then he crouched, staying just below the long coarse grass, and turned hard to the right. He covered two hundred metres this way, then dropped to the ground, pulling the cloak around him. He drew the saxe from its sheath and held it ready, hearing the rustling blunder of the slavers off to his left. He’d done this so often before that he knew that they could pass within a few metres of him and never be aware of his presence. The only way they might discover him was if one of them chanced to tread on him. He gripped the saxe a little more firmly.

If that happened, it would be bad luck, slaver.

He listened as they trampled through the long grass and low bushes, passing him by. The nearest pursuer passed twenty metres away. He waited till the noise of their passage dwindled, then died. Then he rose, still in a crouch, and began to ghost his way back towards the north.