Crik (58 page)

‘I thought my mother would listen to me. We were very close; best friends as well as mother and daughter. I thought if anyone would listen to me, it would be her. She could then speak on my behalf to the Elders. They respected her. You know how that ended.’ The light fell from Isabelle to reveal her ash grey skin; she looked forlorn at Inara. ‘We will be your friends. Come back with us and you can exercise your gift without fear of persecution.’

‘You can bring back life to the Wold. It does not have to remain only a place of metal and dust,’ said Justice. ‘With your power you can give the land back to nature.’

With hands clammy with sweat, Jack clutched the top of the wall. Gripping the rough-hewn stone with his leg pressed against sharp protrusions, he bit back a cry of agony. He had to shift his weight, or his leg would go numb, and up this high that could be disastrous. Gritting his teeth he pushed the pain away, he needed to hear Inara’s response. She could not seriously be contemplating the Ghost Walkers’ offer. The Red Sisters had sent Justice to Crik Village for revenge; they had used Grandma Poulis as an excuse to come, a smokescreen to commit murder. Inara had told him at the Red Wood that she had given the animals a second chance of life. Blind to the desiccated husks that roamed aimlessly across barren fields; to her the animated rabbits lived. That day, her Talent, which Inara had seen as something perverse, had opened up with new possibilities. Now she could create life, sustaining it with her will alone. That is what Justice offered, a chance to use her Narmacil, to bring the Wold’s dead heart to life.

Inara’s pain wracked body livened as the Ghost Walkers laid out their plans for her. Her face had regained some of its colour, and her back straightened. ‘I am a part of each creature I bring back,’ she said. ‘They open themselves up to me. To others, the animals I raised in the Wold displayed no conscious thought,’ she regarded Justice with a cool expression, ‘they were wrong, I sensed their needs, a place to shelter, something to eat. It doesn’t matter whether this instinct is biological or memory induced, it is part of them, proof then of life. They were attempting to reconnect with what they once were, before the Red Sisters came. I gave them a chance to find themselves, to inhabit new homes, and experience life others had stolen from them.’

‘We will help you to help them,’ said Isabelle, her smile widened as light wrapped her body.

Feeling dread, Jack eased forward. His leg shifted away from the wall; despite the movement being slight, it was enough to send his foot shooting into the open air. He wanted to cry out, he was falling, and his mind did shout with alarm; perhaps his mouth gave vent to that horrible encompassing realisation. His fingers scrabbled across the slick stone, breaking fingernails as they skittered over the rough surface. The fall would kill him. Trailing his fingers to the lip of the wall, the pressure turned his flesh white, and then he felt hands catch him under his elbows and lift him up. Yang? Cold seeped into his joints. Twisting against the grip, he saw Kyla, not Yang holding him. Her face crowded over his, her visage carved into a hateful mask of decay and corruption. She carried him up over the ancient wall and into the basin, where the others watched him. Horror stamped Inara’s face. Closer now, he saw how she had aged since their parting.

‘The trespasser has become a spy,’ said Kyla.

Jack wanted to cry out, it felt as though the Ghost Walker had sank her digits into his elbows, twisting his nerves around shards of ice. ‘Don’t listen to them, they want to use you,’ he shouted. Kyla tightened her hold on his arm, making him scream.

Justice drifted close to Jack, her expression one of compassion. ‘Don’t hurt him. He is Inara’s friend.’

‘Jack,’ said Inara.

Her renewed strength had abandoned Inara, as sudden as a stone shot from a sling. Cradling her shoulder, her once vibrant eyes clouded over. ‘Don’t worry about me,’ he said. ‘Because of you, we are winning the fight.’

‘The fight is over,’ said Inara. ‘We have taken the hill.’

Both Isabelle and Kyla bristled at this revelation. Jack sensed Kyla’s doubt and anger like a poisonous fume. Only Justice retained her composure to say, ‘This village is a monument to death. The graveyard has expanded its boundary, in time it will cover everything. Depart this place; share your Talent so that we may put the past behind us.’

‘You brought death to my home,’ said Jack. ‘Those creatures were yours to command. You took people from their beds, driving them to the tree.’ His finger shook with venomous accusation. ‘You had every intention of hanging every soul in Crik.’

‘The people who live here are a pestilence,’ said Kyla. ‘If they will kill us, their own children, then no one is safe from them. The Hedge Wall could only shield us for so long from the torches that would eventually come.’

Jack realised the terror that lived within Kyla. She constantly relived the night the villagers had killed her. Even behind the Hedge Wall, she did not feel safe. Her entire existence was one of expecting hunters to find her, and finish the job their fathers had started. How many years has that fright festered, warping everything, until nothing remained but it and the need to survive. An unpleasant thought occurred then, had Miss Mistletoe been party to the executions. The old woman had been old enough to have witnessed the cruelties, and perhaps agree with the sentence. Had Mr Hasseltope drawn the noose around Kyla’s neck while she watched from the woods? Isabelle, who had died so young, had she dated Mr Gasthem, or someone else Jack knew? Crik collected secrets like shipwrecks at the mouth of a harbour. Desperate, he wanted to tell them that they were safe from any reprisals for this night. He just wanted them to go, to leave them alone to rebuild their homes and their lives. Only, he knew, he could not promise anything. Fear made the Ghost Walkers return here; would fear in turn make the people of the village turn their weapons toward the Wold? Imagining snaking torchlight, winding through the woods, snagged in his mind. Another vision came crashing through, of armoured Myrms trekking through the same woods on their way to finish the job they had started here tonight. Next time they would not give the villagers a chance to defend themselves; they would murder everyone in their beds, including his mother. It’s them, or us. Whoever made the first strike would survive. The realisation made him want to weep.

‘Prove to me that you are better than them,’ said Inara. She lifted a finger to point at Jack. ‘Release him.’

Kyla tightened her grip sending waves of pain up Jack’s arm. ‘Next time this one comes to the Wold he will bring others.’

‘Jack will not harm you,’ assured Inara. ‘He turned away from his home, when he had the chance to return, because they had kept secrets from him. He values the power of truth, if he promises not to return to the Red Wood in vengeance, you can believe him.’

The dead woman’s cold bosom pillowed Jack’s head. Revulsion at the touch clutched his stomach. He would never feel warm or safe again.

‘We do not wish him harm,’ said Justice.

‘No,’ Kyla hissed through withered lips. She forced Jack tighter against herself. ‘This child brought the others. They know the secret of our sanctuary. If we allow him to live, we will never be secure. We must kill them all; even the girl must die. The Myrms have failed us; we are wasting time. Kill the children and then the rest of them.’

‘There will always be others,’ said Justice. Her light grew brighter, swallowing her sister’s light in her brilliance.

The feeling of love Jack had felt within Grandma Poulis’s blue light crept into him, warming his body. Traces of blue now mingled with the cold amber surrounding the Ghost Walker.

‘We can’t trust them.’

‘Come to me.’ Justice spoke to Jack, ignoring Kyla’s protestations.

The cold fingers slipped reluctantly from Jack’s arms. Free, he stumbled from Kyla’s grasp. Justice stood to his right and Inara to his left. Hesitant with indecision, he cast about for a solution. Should he run to Inara, or to the woman who now exuded such warm love? His foot trailed to the right, and his eyes lifted to Justice’s eyes, that were so like his mother’s own. Through her colour, he spotted the red haze of the fire, still burning, and thought of Bill. Bill now stood over a woman who had refused to listen to the Ghost Walkers’ offer, a woman who could have died for her decision. Refusing to love someone who had caused so much misery and death, he turned from Justice and ran to join Inara.

Kyla laughed. ‘He rejects you sister.’

Jack hugged Inara. Her body felt so frail, like an old woman. Afraid his embrace would hurt her, he let go, and patted Black’s shaggy head. Beside him, Yang appeared in the likeness of Bill.

‘Will you come with us?’ Justice asked Inara.

Jack felt a shiver course through Inara’s frame. She is so tired. The defence of the village had left her with no strength. What could he do to help her? Without any weapon he could use against the three Ghost Walkers, all he could do was stand beside his friend. Then Yang began to grow. From Bill’s chubby frame grew broad shoulders and arms as big as boulders. Yang’s chest developed while corded muscles roped his lengthening thighs. Both he and Inara stared, wondering what Yang grew into, and then they both realised.

‘What happened to Huckney after we left?’ asked Jack. He stood beside the likeness of the blacksmith. ‘He helped us escape. Did you punish him for sending Gashnite to carry us over the Hedge Wall?’

‘He betrayed us,’ said Kyla, stopping Justice from speaking.

‘We punished him,’ said Justice, drifting closer. ‘The Red Sisters do not take betrayal lightly.’

‘Is he dead?’

Inara had asked the question Jack could not bear to utter himself. His heart beat as fast as though he had just run a marathon. The idea that the blacksmith had died for them made him want to hide. Everything was his fault. They would never have entered the Wold if he had not forced them into it.

‘Dead?’ The blue had left Justice, leaving behind emptiness and a sense of something that could not last. ‘No,’ she said, ‘he lives.’

‘What did you do to him?’ Jack asked the question before it had time to form in his mind.

‘You will not believe it from our lips,’ said Justice. Her hand beaconed to the darkness, outside the ring of stone, where something stirred.

With his heart stampeding in his chest, Jack waited to see the blacksmith. Was Huckney here? Although he could not dare contemplate such a hope, someone did approach.

‘Huckney is part of the Red Wood,’ said Justice as the shape ebbed slowly closer. ‘He is part of our family, we could no more kill him than cut off a healthy limb.’

‘Lies,’ whispered Jack.

A brown blanket spread over the humped back of the skeleton that limped into the basin. The blanket gathered over something round that the desiccated body clutched to its ribs. Bone fingers, held together by the last of its sinew, cradled the object protectively.

‘Come closer,’ said Kyla with disdain.

The shambling wreck edged closer, until it spotted Inara watching him. The skeleton reeled back in alarm, almost dropping its treasure. Turning, it revealed a twisted spine. At the base of the back, a few fused vertebrae made the body hunch forward at a harsh angle.

It cannot be him. Jack reeled in distress.

Inara gasped. ‘You.’

‘Leave me alone,’ croaked Krimble. ‘Let me go, I don’t want to see you.’ The man from the marsh shied away from Inara’s stare. His hands fumbled at the blanket for a moment, before looking up at Kyla. ‘Don’t let her take it from me.’

‘You betrayed us, you tricked me,’ said Kyla. ‘When you sent the lightning to protect the children, you condemned yourself.’

Krimble whimpered under the Ghost Walker’s harsh gaze. ‘No,’ he said. ‘I knew how valuable the girl is. I told the Red Sisters that they were making a mistake in wanting to kill her. You should have left her to me. In time I would have had her power, and then the Wold would remain secure.’

‘By aiding them you compromised our home.’

Bones trembled along Krimble’s body as though Kyla hurled stones not words. ‘I wanted to help you,’ he now pleaded to Justice. ‘Don’t you see it’s not the girl you want, it’s her Narmacil; the girl is nothing without her Talent.’

‘She doesn’t need her Talent to be special,’ said Jack, balling his hands into tight fists.

‘And neither did anyone else you killed,’ added Inara. The pain lines, so deeply cut into her face, appeared like the scars that had once criss-crossed Krimble’s own features. ‘I should have sensed you.’ She shook her head. ‘Lost amongst the crowd,’ she muttered in a low rasping whisper.

‘Tell them what became of Huckney,’ ordered Justice.

‘The blacksmith, why do you want to hear about him?’ said Krimble, forming a sneer even without the lips to do so.

‘Damnit, tell us,’ said Jack, scared, but determined to hear what had happened to his friend once they had escaped.

‘He lives,’ said Krimble. ‘The Red Sisters still need him to build their forest. They did, however, take away his beloved pet.’

‘What are you saying?’ Inara hunched herself over the great wolf’s head.

Brown teeth gnashed together. The skull turned up to Justice in silent appeal.

‘Tell her,’ said Justice.

‘That infuriating squirrel of his, the one with all the riddles,’ answered Krimble, clutching his blanket tighter against himself.