Hooded Man (58 page)

And what would
you
do, Mark? What would you do to show her you can cut it?

Cut... cut... Mark grinned. He’d had an idea. Letting the pair he was dealing with get a little closer, though not too close, he pretended to trip.

“Mark!” He heard the anguished cry from across camp, Robert thinking he was injured. Mark didn’t have time to answer him. Instead, he lashed out at the men’s legs, catching calf muscles and shins beneath the material of the robes. One spun around and Mark took the opportunity of hamstringing him, drawing the blade across where he judged the back of the heel to be.

It had the desired effect. Both men dropped, screaming.

Mark clambered to his feet, the smile spreading across his face.

“Mark!” came the cry again, and he couldn’t understand why Robert was still calling. He’d taken down the two –

He remembered too late about the third, the one who’d been reaching for his sword. Mark pivoted, but at pretty much the same time the arrow flew past and into the fellow about to embed the sword in his head. The projectile’s tip found the tattoo on the cultist’s forehead, as if it were a bull’s eye target, and he fell backwards.

When Mark looked across he saw the base camp littered with robed figures, arrows sticking out of various parts of their bodies. Robert was running over and waving something to Mark.

“...let them commit suicide...” the Hooded Man was saying. Mark didn’t understand. Then he looked down at one of the men he’d crippled, saw him take his own machete with both hands, then ram it into his stomach. Mark felt his lip curling. The other one was doing similarly, except he was letting gravity do the work for him, lifting himself up as high as he could on his knees and just letting himself drop onto the blade.

Mark joined Robert, checking around to make sure no more were laying in wait. When he reached him, Mark saw he was crouching down next to one of the last cultists alive; the first proper rays of sunlight streaking through the trees onto the scene.

“And... and... he was cast... down,” hissed the white-faced man, an arrow sticking out of his side, “on... onto the Earth... and his angels... were cast.... cast down also...” Then he took hold of his head and snapped it sideways, breaking his own neck.

Robert removed his hood and looked at Mark. “Are you alright, son?” Mark never tired of hearing Robert call him that. He nodded. “I didn’t know there would be quite so many, or I never would’ve suggested... But, you did well today. I’m proud of you. Jack would be, too.”

“How did they find us here?” Mark asked when he’d finally got his breath back.

Robert stared down at the corpse. “I think we’ve made an enemy of these guys. They’re keeping tabs on us now, just like we’ve been doing with them. They’re worried I’m going to stop their master from making his grand appearance.”

“Master?”

“The Devil.”

“Oh... What was he talking about just then, before...”

“Tate’ll be able to tell us more about that. They seem to think they’re fallen angels or something. Explains why they’re not scared of dying. They probably believe they come right back again, fighting fit.”

“That’s scary.”

“Fanatics usually are. But that’s not what scares me the most.” He looked at Mark’s puzzled expression. “I think there could be something else coming. Something much more frightening.”

Mark didn’t ask him how he knew that, because he’d heard some of the mutterings before he’d woken Robert from his sleep.

Besides, Robert hadn’t been the only one who’d had dreams last night.

O
NE MORE SET
of eyes had been watching the camp from close by that morning, had been watching most of the night.

They’d seen the Servitors make their way through the forest, taking their positions outside where Robert and the boy were spending the night. Had seen the boy get up to go to the toilet, spot something and then rush back to Robert’s tent to warn him.

Had watched the fight with interest. More than interest: excitement. A tingling that had spread through the body until the last cultist had been defeated. It had almost been as good as being in the middle of it all, back in York.

From behind the oak, Adele let out the breath she’d been holding. And smiled. She’d enjoyed this little episode, but she knew there were tastier treats to come. And she’d be right there in the middle of those, definitely. There with the man she was after.

Right there with the Hooded Man.

CHAPTER TWELVE

H
E’D BEEN HEARING
the rumblings of discontent for some time.

Dale had debated about saying something to someone, but was faced with a dilemma. He was ‘one of the guys,’ a member of the Sherwood Rangers who fought on the streets with his friends. Buddies that he’d made since coming to the castle last year. But he was also very close to Jack and Robert. If it wasn’t for them, he might still be wandering around the country, looking for a place to fit in. A former lead singer and guitarist in a band, whose life had fallen to bits after the virus struck, and who’d drifted from town to town, city to city, with a guitar in one hand and his other hand folded into a fist.

He often thought back to those days before everyone got sick: to the gigs he’d played with the other guys – Abbott on bass, Lockley on drums and Paige on keyboards. Only she hadn’t just been one of the guys, had she?

Paige and he had formed One Simple Truth together while they were studying music in college. They’d been good mates throughout the course, and it just seemed like a sensible progression, especially as they’d just started going out. Paige had a real natural beauty, and she’d come along at a time when he’d just started to notice the opposite sex. She could be a bit serious sometimes, though, which is why, initially, he left a lot of the songwriting to her. It wasn’t that he couldn’t do it – Dale could make up stuff on the spot if he had to – but she came up with the most soulful tunes.

When they advertised on the bulletin board for more band members, they’d had all kinds of responses – some genuine, some time-wasters. But they’d really gelled with the long-haired Lockley and bearded Abbott, especially in the jamming session the first time they all got together. Jesus, how he missed them!

The first few live shows at local pubs had been the pits; Dale had almost called it a day at one point. Paige persuaded him to go on, and to his surprise they started to develop a fan base – particularly amongst the college and uni crowd.

Then came bigger and better gigs, and soon the money they were getting made attending classes seem moot. They were making it anyway, practising what their tutors only preached. It wasn’t long before a talent scout with an eye for the next big thing spotted them. They were signed to a small indie label, but that automatically meant bigger gigs, and supporting turns for artists much higher up the ladder. Local stations played a couple of their releases and they even found themselves being aired on BBC Radio.

By this time One Simple Truth – and specifically Dale – had attracted another following entirely. Girls would hang out at the stage doors after gigs just to try and get an autograph. Or a kiss. Paige said nothing because she knew, at the end of the day, he was still hers. But during the course of their journey, Dale discovered his own simple truth: he found it impossible to be tied down to just the one girl. He loved the adoration his – granted – limited fame brought him. And, girl by girl, tour by tour, he gave in to temptation.

Paige had confronted him, of course, and he hadn’t even bothered to deny it. “What can I say? I have a weakness,” he’d told her. When she’d threatened to walk from the band, he’d tried to talk her out of it, telling her she’d be slitting her own throat as well. “You’re going to hold this against me, when we could be as big as Oasis or U2?”

The decision was taken out of her hands, because that’s when the virus had struck. Dale watched his fellow band members die from that terrible disease, while he remained healthy.

Paige had been the first to fall ill, collapsing after a gig one night. She’d been rushed to hospital for tests – back before anyone fully realised what they were dealing with. “Tell me,” Paige had said to him from her bed as they’d waited for her parents to get there from miles away. “Tell me you still love me.”

He clasped her hand, but said nothing.

“Please,” she whispered.

Dale had been about to lie to her when suddenly she’d had a seizure, coughing up blood onto the bed sheets. The doctors and nurses rushed in, flitting around. There was nothing they could do. They whisked Dale outside, but he’d already seen the worst – and when they came and told him half an hour later that she was dead, he couldn’t believe what he was hearing.

He got drunk that night, asking himself what the hell was wrong with him. Why couldn’t he have felt for Paige what she felt for him? Why couldn’t he have committed to her when she’d been instrumental in getting them where they were?

His answer was to spend the night with some blonde girl he picked up in a hotel bar, someone who’d recognised him and he’d taken full advantage of the fact. He left early and hadn’t seen her again. For all he knew she’d come down with the virus too, not long afterwards. Dale hadn’t really paid it much mind.

He’d always been able to handle himself, a consequence of getting called a sissy for being interested in music growing up. The number of fights he’d been in to show them that no, he wasn’t actually a sissy at all and would happily rearrange their faces... It had served him well, after everything went to rack and ruin, and he’d had to defend himself from all kinds of dangers. He’d even stood up to gangs when he came across them, though sometimes came off the worst and crawled away to lick his wounds.

When he’d heard about what they were doing at Nottingham Castle, something seemed to click. It was a chance to be a part of a group again, something that was being talked about. A major part of him knew he could do some good here, but how much of him wanted to join so he could be applauded again? So that he’d be sought after, not for his music this time, but because he could save the damsels in distress? If he could work his way up through the ranks, perhaps he would actually be a star once more?

Which brought him back to his dichotomy. Would keeping quiet about this hamper his relationship with Jack and Robert? Should he tell them about what he’d heard?

Not that Robert was here at the moment. He’d gone off with Mark, that little git who’d given him a bloody nose a couple of days ago. Dale realised that Mark would always be Robert’s favourite – he’d heard the tales from the others about how the kid had been taken to the castle and tortured, then nearly hanged by the former sheriff. He was like a son to Robert, Dale got that. He also got that he himself was kind of a replacement for someone called Granger who’d been part of the final battle. Jack and Tate often remarked how much Dale reminded them of the guy, who’d given his life so that they could take the Castle. It was more than a bit annoying at times.

From his usual perch on the steps, Dale spotted Sophie walking through the grounds with Mary. Sophie. Now
she
was a prize worth possessing, a girl he thought he might be able to love. If he could figure out what love was. She’d shown more than an interest in him, that much was certain – but when push came to shove she’d turned him away. “Dale, don’t,” she’d said when he’d tried to kiss her the last time.

What was the reason? Was it Mark? The kid had feelings for Sophie, any fool could see that. But Dale had always assumed she wanted a real man, or at least someone old enough to vote and drink – or could have in the old world.

Sophie giving him the run around when all he wanted was... to show her how much she meant to him, suggested that she must have feelings for someone else. What right did he have to interfere with that? If he hadn’t been able to love Paige, then perhaps he couldn’t love anyone, even Sophie.

Dale shook his head. This wasn’t what he should be thinking about at the moment. The discontentment and the griping of the men; and whether he should talk to –

“Jack!” he was shouting to the large man before he realised he was doing it. “Hey Jack!” Now he was getting up and waving, grabbing his guitar and dashing down the steps to catch Jack as he came out of a side door of the castle.

“Hey Dale,” replied his superior. As always, he had his staff resting over his shoulder. “You haven’t seen Adele on your travels, have you?”

Dale hadn’t. And though he couldn’t help it, a picture of the woman now flashed into his mind: her short black hair, her full lips. How he wished he’d been the one to save her that night in York rather than Robert.

Stop it, can’t you see Jack fancies her? You just can’t help yourself, can you?

“Not to worry,” Jack said. Dale could tell he had more on his mind than where Adele was.

“Is everything okay?” he asked.

“Hmmm? Yeah. Well, no, not really. Did you want something?”

Dale thought about whether this was the right time, about whether he should even be speaking to Jack rather than Robert, but the words were escaping before he could contain them. “It’s the men.”