Wintercraft (6 page)
‘Gotcha now, girly.’ He raised his hand to throw the blade and the bright glint of metal flashed again.
Kate ducked. The dagger flew over her head and thrummed into the door. Then Kalen was in front of her. He reached out and clamped his cold hands around her neck, pinning her back hard against the door handle.
‘Such a pretty girl,’ he grinned, breathing out a cloud of stinking breath. ‘I’ll teach ya to go pokin’ around in other people’s business.’
Kate kicked out, stamping hard on the man’s ragged feet.
‘Arrrgh!’ he snarled and tightened his grip.
Kate stamped again and scratched his arms with her fingernails, fighting him off so she could catch a breath.
‘Let go of her!’ Edgar’s voice filled the inn. There was a loud crack. Kalen’s eyes bulged, his knees buckled and Edgar stood behind him with one of the bar stools raised high, ready to hit him again.
Kate clutched at her throat, coughing her lungs back into life as the old man arched an arm across his face for protection. Only he didn’t look afraid. He was
smiling
.
smiling
.
‘J-just leave us alone!’ said Edgar, switching his gaze nervously between Kate and the old man, and in that moment, Kate saw something odd in her friend’s eyes. There was fear there, but there was anger too. Deep anger that she had never seen in Edgar before. It looked like he wanted to hurt that man.
Really
hurt him. And he was more than ready to do it.
Really
hurt him. And he was more than ready to do it.
‘Edgar,’ she said carefully. ‘Don’t.’
The atmosphere in the inn bristled. Edgar’s fingers clasped tightly around the leg of the stool and his hands shook a little, betraying the uncertainty behind his rage. He bit his lip and forced his muscles to relax.
‘Leave. Us. Alone,’ he said, lowering the stool. ‘We haven’t done anything to you.’
Kalen glared back at him and shook his head. ‘What’re ya doin’?’ he bellowed, spraying globs of brown spittle into the air. ‘You know better than that. Don’t ya, boy?
Never
yield to an enemy.
Never
give ’em a chance. Do it, why don’t ya? Finish me off!’
Never
yield to an enemy.
Never
give ’em a chance. Do it, why don’t ya? Finish me off!’
Edgar faltered under Kalen’s stare and the old man laughed.
‘You won’t last five heartbeats out there,’ he said. ‘The world is changin’. You know what’s happenin’. You know what that little wench is. You’ve seen ’er kind before. Nothin’ but trouble. Just hand ’er over an’ maybe I’ll forget I saw you ’ere, eh? You know what Silas’ll do if ’e catches up with ya.’
‘Shut up!’ said Edgar.
‘There’s those who’d pay fine gold to ’ave this little bird locked up, good and tight. What’s she worth to a fine young man like yerself? Bet you could do with a few coins in yer pocket. And ’oo knows? Hand ’er over quick and the council might even be willin’ to forget a few things. Make yer life a bit simpler, wouldn’t it?’ Kalen smiled deviously. ‘Every man ’as ’is plan,’ he said. ‘What’s yours, eh? How’s it goin’ so far? What’s that little voice inside yer ’ead tellin’ ya to do next?’
‘Edgar? What’s going on?’ asked Kate.
‘Nothing. The stupid old guy’s crazy, that’s all.’
‘Not so crazy that I forget a face, boy. And I’ve seen yours before. If you ’ad any sense, you’d let me do it. You’d let me snap that girl’s sweet little neck right ’ere and save Silas the trouble. Or maybe ya want to do it yerself? Please, be my guest. I won’t stand in yer way.’
Edgar’s foot kicked out and slammed hard into Kalen’s chest, sending him sprawling back. ‘I said,
shut up!
’
shut up!
’
‘That’s better! Ha! Much better,’ coughed Kalen, wheezing and chuckling on the floor. ‘Makin’ it look real. Wouldn’t want ’er to know what you really are, now would we? Careful, boy. Think! The life of a traitor’s ’ard enough, but when they catch ya the dyin’s always slow and cruel. Do ya want to know what hell looks like? Silas’ll show ya things that’ll make my life ’ere look like a rich man’s blessing. You mark my words.’
‘Edgar, just leave him,’ said Kate. ‘We have to get out of here.’
Kalen turned towards her.
‘It’s too late for that,’ he said. ‘Silas won’t let ya. You’ve got something he needs. That spark inside ya. You think he won’t see it? You think he won’t know what you are? Silas is the kind of man ya don’t ever want to meet. He’ll walk around inside yer pretty little mind leavin’ footprints that’ll never go away. He’s a devil, see. Just … like … me.’
Kalen’s hand whipped down to his belt where the hilt of a third dagger jutted from the cloth. Edgar was ready. He swung the stool as hard as he could, smashing it against the man’s skull.
‘Quick!’ he shouted. ‘Run!’
‘You won’t stop ’im!’ roared Kalen, grasping a bleeding nose as Kate threw herself out of the inn’s front door. ‘You’ll jus’ make ’im angry!’
4
Murder
Kate fled out into the market square and saw Artemis being pushed roughly into a cage. She forced herself to turn away and kept close to the inn’s outer wall, hoping that no one would see her. There were too many wardens for her to risk helping him there. She had to find another way.
The sun shone straight into her eyes, leaving no shadows in which to hide, so she kept running, leaping over bird bodies and piles of wood and tools, and squeezing past a row of traders’ horses that were tied to a fence, eating hay from a rack. She considered stealing one of them, but she didn’t know how to ride and, even if she could, a girl travelling on horseback would look far too conspicuous in the town.
She ducked amongst their warm bodies and headed for one of the gaps between the buildings instead, where a pair of open gates led her into a barrow alley: a road just wide enough for two horses and carts to squeeze past each other on their way to and from the market. There was a high wall on one side and a few tiny shops on the other, but everything looked abandoned now. Kate checked behind her. Edgar was pushing his way past the horses, making one of them stamp and snort, but there was no sign of Kalen. She knocked hard on the first door she could find and the wood swung back limply against the weight of her hand. The lock had been smashed and there was no answer from inside.
‘Come on,’ she said quietly, stepping forward as the door creaked open and Edgar followed her through into the dark.
The air smelled of sage and rosemary and the floor crunched with scattered dry leaves. Edgar lit a match from a box in his pocket. Tall jars sparkled from shelves lining the walls and a pair of weighing scales had been knocked off the curved wooden counter, left dented and broken where they fell.
Kate stepped over the scales and crept to the window. The curtains were closed, but she could see the front pane had shattered, covering the floor beneath them in fragments of green glass. She pulled the fabric carefully aside and peered out into the alley.
‘You don’t think they’re still in here, do you?’ whispered Edgar, shivering as the match went out and he began to light another.
‘Who?’
‘Whoever lives here.’
‘The wardens have already been here. What do you think?’
‘I think this is all crazy,’ said Edgar, crunching his way over to her. ‘First those birds, then Artemis gets taken. There are mad guys underground and wardens everywhere else.’ He looked at Kate and then lowered his eyes. ‘That old guy. Kalen? What he said back there. It was all crazy talk. You do know that, right? On a scale of sanity that guy is completely out of his tree.’
‘I know that,’ said Kate. She tried to sound confident, but the truth was she did not know what to think. Even if Kalen had been lying about knowing Edgar, his behaviour towards the old man had made her realise just how little she really knew about her friend. ‘
Does
he know you?’ she asked tentatively.
Does
he know you?’ she asked tentatively.
Edgar looked away, refusing to meet her eyes. ‘He’s probably just seen me around somewhere,’ he said with an awkward smile. ‘Like I said, crazy.’
Kate wanted to believe him. ‘That’s what I thought,’ she said.
Kate had known Edgar for three years, since the very first day he had arrived in Morvane. He had moved there from somewhere in the south and spent all his time lurking in the bookshop talking to customers until Artemis had finally agreed to give him a job. He had never really talked about his life before he had come to the town. All Kate knew was that he lived alone in a basement room two streets from the market square and his family were all gone, just like hers. It had never crossed her mind that he might have something to hide. He was just Edgar. Anything else … she was not sure she wanted to know any more.
The shouts of the people gathered in the market square carried down the barrow alley while Kate looked around their new hiding place. She knew the people who had owned that shop. They had been regular customers at the bookshop and two of the few people her uncle counted among his friends. Now they were out there with the wardens - with him - and everything was falling apart.
‘We should hide here,’ she said, trying to sound confident. ‘If we stay out of sight no one will find us.’
Edgar pushed the front door back into its frame and pressed his hands against it when the broken lock would not catch. ‘This door’s useless,’ he said. ‘We need something to push against it.’
‘No,’ said Kate. ‘Leave it. The wardens won’t expect anyone to hide in an open building. They’ll think it’s empty and won’t search it again.’
‘What about Kalen?’
‘I don’t think he’ll follow us. Not with everything that’s going on. We should be safe in here until we decide what to do next.’
The next hour in that shop was the slowest of Kate’s life. They hid behind the counter, side by side, and Kate sat in silence while Edgar concocted plans for their escape. He was whispering something about heading back into the warrens, dodging Kalen and finding their way into one of the other quarters, but Kate was only half listening. Her own mind was filled with thoughts, confusion and half-made plans to free Artemis from the wardens, which all seemed to end with them getting captured. Edgar must have known she was not listening, but he kept talking anyway, peering over the counter now and again to check for any movement outside.
‘Maybe you were right,’ he said, ducking down as the shop’s clock rang out the hour, making them both jump. ‘Maybe they won’t find us in here.’
‘Maybe,’ said Kate. ‘Just wait.’
Then the noises came.
First there was a shuffling sound and a sharp tapping noise from somewhere close by, though neither she nor Edgar were moving an inch. Then it came again.
Shuffle-shuffle-tap
.
Shuffle-shuffle-tap
. Kate tensed. Someone was outside, in the alley. Someone was walking along the cobbles.
Shuffle-shuffle-tap
.
Shuffle-shuffle-tap
. Kate tensed. Someone was outside, in the alley. Someone was walking along the cobbles.
‘Did you hear that?’ she whispered.
‘What was it?’
‘Wait here.’ Kate crept around the side of the counter and crouched low, making her way over to the curtained window. Edgar was not about to stand back and do nothing again and he followed close behind, peering out silently into the alley beside her. Neither of them spoke as a limping figure shuffled into sight, but both held their breath.
Kalen was back.
The old man’s shoulders were hunched and his muddy face was stained with trails of blood. Kate crouched quickly beneath the window and peered over the window frame. Kalen’s tight lips were drawn back in anger, his sharp eyes searching every shadow for movement, his ears scrutinising every sound. Seeing him there, it was hard to imagine how they could have got so close to him in the tunnels and survived. Out there in the open he looked more vicious than ever.
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