Rocking Horse War (5 page)

Pearl didn’t wait for Thomas to lead the way through the mountains.

She studied the range before her, matching it to her memory of Peter’s maps. The most direct way through the mountains was the saddle-shaped pass cutting low between the Anvil and the Keystone Peak: the pass called the Grey Men’s Grave.

Pearl marched up the edge of the gully, heading for the curved line of the pass, harsh and dark against the bright sky. She walked faster than she normally would on steep heather, determined not to let Thomas get ahead, determined to reach Emmie before him.

Her feet moved across land she had only traced with her fingers on maps before today. She knew the names, the heights and the contours of these mountains, but she had never breathed their air.

To the east, the Anvil was a massive wedge of a mountain, scarred by gullies and corries, weeping with burns and waterfalls. It cast a thick cold shadow over the whole pass.

The Keystone Peak, on the west side of the pass, was higher than the Anvil, its sharp summit soaring up into the sunlight from a long narrow 
ridge and a silver plateau.

Pearl saw the Keystone Peak’s elegant summit every day from her bedroom window. It was only sketched on Peter’s maps, with very little detail. Perhaps it was the only one in the range he hadn’t climbed. Would she ever climb it herself?

Pearl wasn’t afraid of the mountains’ grey shadows, though she’d never climbed with so little equipment, nor without a companion she could trust. But if Father wanted to take Jasper into the mountains instead of her, she’d better get used to climbing alone.

She glanced behind her at the moor. To the north, she saw the square grey box of her home, with a pair of swans circling the roof. Over to the northwest, almost hidden in the wrinkles of the moor, she saw an older, darker house, with many more stable buildings. Horsburgh Hall.

Pearl sometimes felt Mother didn’t care where her eldest daughter wandered, but now she realised Mother cared enough to warn her about the Horsburghs. And Pearl had just sent Jasper to their Hall.

She imagined the wreckage at home as Mother scrubbed and rearranged, and she strode even faster up the slope. She had to get all three triplets home soon.

Pearl moved like a gamekeeper or a shepherd, in long smooth strides. No effort wasted, nothing disturbed, hardly any noise.

When she heard Thomas break into a
ground-smashing
run to catch up with her, she grinned, but hid the smile before he reached her shoulder. 

He said, “So you know the way to the Laird’s home, do you?”

“I know the way through the mountains.”

She speeded up, but with his longer legs, Thomas kept pace easily. “And how did you get out of your garden, jewel of the deep?”

Pearl hesitated before answering. Was every question from this boy a trick question?

“Over the wall.”

“Very resourceful. How did you find Jasper and his horse?”

Again, she gave a short but truthful answer. “I followed the rolling ring.”

“You followed it. How clever. From where?”

“From the woods.”

“Why did you think it would lead you to the triplets?”

Pearl numbered the reasons on her fingers. “Because they’d left the garden on horseback, because I noticed the ring by some hoofprints, because it was obviously a piece of tack, and because it was rolling uphill all by itself, which seemed a little mysterious.”

“Only a little mysterious? Do you find me a little mysterious?”

“I find you very irritating.”

She could see him trying hard not to react to this insult.

“Don’t you have any more questions for me?” he asked. “You were interested enough in my private business when you were eavesdropping.”

“There’s no point in asking questions if you can’t trust the answers. Let’s just find Emmie and 
Ruby. So long as I get them home safe, I’m not curious about your feuds with your neighbours.”

“It’s not a feud. It’s a battle to the death,” Thomas said grimly. “And now you’re involved, ignorance won’t protect you.”

“Then why have you involved children? Why pick my sisters and brother?”

“I didn’t pick them. They were involved before they were born. It’s their destiny.”

“And they have no say over it?”

“Of course they do,” Thomas insisted. “I want them to embrace their destiny willingly. That makes it much stronger. Jasper loves the idea of displaying his powers at a crowning ceremony.”

“The girls will have much more sense.”

“Will they? Don’t they love being important too? Won’t they want power and glory? Do you really know them better than their brother does? You don’t sing their songs; perhaps you don’t know them at all.”

Pearl couldn’t answer. She loved her sisters and brother. But Thomas was right: she didn’t sing their songs, and she wasn’t one of them. Perhaps they would listen to this charismatic stranger rather than their boring big sister. Perhaps they would want a destiny, even a dark one, because destiny sounded more exciting than going home for hot buttered toast.

So Pearl concentrated on the land, her gaze moving smoothly between the brittle heather at her feet and the route ahead. Thomas’s eyes were moving too now, but he was glancing up and around and behind. 

Pearl preferred the silence to his awkward questions and worrying answers. But as they broke away from the side of the gully to angle right towards the pass, she saw Thomas glance yet again at the sky.

She blurted out, “What are you scared of?”

“Scared? I’m not scared of anything!” he snapped.

“Then why do you keep looking round? You’re like a rabbit who scents stoat.”

“I’m just being careful. We’re in the mountains now.”

Pearl snorted. “Of course we’re in the mountains! We’ve been climbing a mountain for the last fifteen minutes!”

“Yes, but we’ve crossed the line: the boundary between our land and the mountains. We could be attacked at any time.”

“Attacked? Why? Is this the Laird’s land already?”

“No, this is no one’s land at the moment: not his, not ours. But he sometimes attacks us when we try to climb here.”

“And do you attack him if he climbs here too? Or are you always the innocent victims?”

“Well, we can’t let him have a chance to search for the …” He stopped, glancing up and behind again, his eyes flicking about fast.

Pearl laughed. “Stop looking round like that!”

“Don’t you like to know what’s going on around you? I thought you were proud of reading the land.”

“You see movement more easily out of the corner of a steady eye than if your gaze is flitting around 
like a butterfly. Tell me what you’re looking for and I’ll find it for you.”

“I’m looking for the Laird’s spies.”

“His swans? I think even you could see a swan on a heathery hillside without all that peering and staring!”

“Not swans. He uses other birds too.”

“You had pheasants dancing for you earlier. Aren’t you afraid they might have been his spies?” Pearl didn’t hide the scorn in her voice.

“I didn’t make the pheasants dance. Jasper’s song did.” Thomas frowned. “I knew the triplets’ powers would be different from ours, but I didn’t expect dancing pheasants!” He shook his head. “Anyway, pheasants are too dim for the Laird to use as spies.”

“Do you really believe that if some birds see us, they’ll tell the Laird and we’ll be in danger?”

“I believe it,” he said firmly. “Perhaps you should believe it too, along with all the other things you’ve believed this morning, like rings rolling uphill.”

Pearl turned round slowly. A thin scattering of tiny meadow pipits darted about to her left, and she remembered hearing the distinctive sound of a startled grouse not long ago. Tipping her head up, she saw two specks high in the sky, probably crows swooping in the air currents.

“Pipits? Grouse? Or crows?” she asked.

Thomas stopped a pace above her and shrugged. “Most likely crows, they’re the cleverest and they fly furthest.”

Pearl couldn’t believe they were being spied on 
by birds, but she had spent the morning hunting rocking horses, so perhaps it would be wise to be cautious. She looked at herself and Thomas. Her clothes had been dull enough when she put them on, and now they were camouflaged with mud. But Thomas was far too bright.

“Button your jacket to cover your red waistcoat,” she instructed, “and pull the lapels up to hide your ridiculously clean shirt. If we’re being hunted, we should use the land to hide ourselves, and we should stop arguing so loudly.”

Thomas frowned, but he did close his jacket before they set off again up the slope.

Then Pearl’s steady eye glimpsed a dark movement ahead of them. Instantly, she dropped down into the low heather.

“Stop! Down!” Pearl whispered hoarsely.

Thomas stared at her, flat on the ground at his feet.

“Get down!” She tugged the hem of his jacket so he landed in the dirt, and she almost smiled as she realised that might finally take the edge of his dangerous tidiness.

Before he could yell at her, she put a finger to her lips, pointed up the hill and mouthed, “Deer.”

“Deer?” He responded in a whisper because she’d spoken in a whisper. “We don’t need to worry about deer. He never controls anything that doesn’t fly. Come on, and stop being scared of
everything
!”

She leant close to him to whisper, “I’m not scared of deer. But if
we
scare the deer, they’ll run. Then anyone, or an
ything
, watching, will know the deer have been spooked and might guess we’re here. So stay down and stay quiet.”

He glowered at her, but nodded once.

Now he was persuaded, she stopped using words and gestured that he must stay where he was. He rolled over and lay back casually in the heather with his arms behind his head like someone having a nap, but Pearl noticed he did it very quietly and 
he was careful to keep below the tops of the sparse heather.

Pearl crawled upwards, checking the wind. Even on a still day, there were always air currents around the peaks. Pearl felt a gentle current coming down the side of the Anvil. She was downwind of the herd, if they were there.

And they were. The red deer were grazing just over the next rise, hidden on the hillside far better than people with bright clothes and silver rifles. Pearl edged closer and saw a skinny stag with ten fragile points on his antlers, in the middle of his harem of eleven thin hinds and five stunted calves. This small herd wasn’t as impressive as the ones she hunted on the northern mountains.

The stag kept lifting his head, sniffing the air and glancing round. The movement she’d seen was the tip of an antler swinging up and down. But his vigilance was mostly for show. Pearl searched for the oldest hinds, so old their hides were greying. They had protected many years of young, and would be the first to bolt if they suspected danger. The most alert hind was on the top edge of the herd, keeping watch with her wide-set eyes and swivelling ears.

If Pearl and Thomas were to get round the herd unnoticed, they would have to stay under the line of sight, stay silent, and stay out of the downward air current above the herd so their scent didn’t reach that alert hind.

If they took the easy path, back to the left and up the side of the burn, they would be hidden by the gully, but eventually they’d have to cut across 
through the air current. So instead they would have to go to the right, with nothing to use as cover except the thin heather. They would have to move very slowly. Would Thomas have the patience to do that?

She crawled back towards him. He was no longer lying on his back like a cat in the sun; he was low on his stomach, his dark eyes watching her. Alert, but not like the deer watching for danger; like a predator waiting for its prey to come close.

Was she his prey?

Pearl was accustomed to being the hunter, to tracking and stalking, shooting and gralloching. She wasn’t used to feeling watched and afraid.

She urged herself forward. She may not be on familiar land here, but she was used to being outdoors. Thomas spent nine months of the year at an English school. He couldn’t possibly be as comfortable and skilled on moors and mountains as she was. He was no danger to her.

She moved slowly towards him, staring back at him until he blinked. Then she lay down beside him, and put her mouth to his ear. “There’s an alert hind at the top of the herd, and the air is moving down the Anvil. We have to go back down a hundred yards, and up the glen to the right of them. We have to be slow and quiet.”

He shook his head. She turned away so he could whisper in her ear. His breath was hot. “That will take far too long!”

“Any other way will startle them,” she insisted.

“If you know so much about deer, can’t you just cast a spell on them so we can walk right through 
the herd?” he whispered through gritted teeth.

“No. This isn’t magic, it’s skill. If we don’t do it right, they’ll tell the whole mountain range we’re here. If you want to blunder through them and crash on over the pass, that’s fine. You’re the one who thinks we’re being spied on by swans and conspired against by crows.”

Thomas glared at her. Maybe he’d never been given orders by a girl before. Or maybe he’d never been given orders by someone who couldn’t sing before. She shrugged and shifted slightly as if to stand up.

Thomas put his hand on her arm. “Alright. This is your lore. You got close without startling them. I probably couldn’t have done that. So you lead.”

They turned round and slid away from the Grey Men’s Grave.

Pearl knew the best stalkers could move so carefully and so close to the ground that a deer grazing ten feet away wouldn’t see the heather twitch.

Though she was well trained by Father, she wasn’t an expert yet, and neither she nor Thomas were wearing proper stalking gear. But they were both slim, both supple, and both deadly serious.

So they moved slow and silent as sundial shadows, and the deer didn’t notice them. But Pearl noticed growing frustration in Thomas’s face every time she glanced back at him.

Pearl could move like this for hours, but Thomas was already tiring. He was having to drag his gun and that huge twisted branch along with him. Pearl considered offering to help, but she’d be 
delighted if he left the stick or the gun or both behind, so she just kept going.

After twenty minutes creeping through the ground cover, Pearl reached the mouth of the pass. She sat up and smiled at the deer grazing calmly below.

Then Thomas emerged from the heather beside her. He wiped his hands on the lining of his jacket and ran his fingers through his hair, picking out bits of grit and heather. He raised his silver gun and aimed at the alert hind. Then he lowered the weapon and looked at Pearl.

“Did you enjoy that, then?” he demanded.

“I enjoy a challenge.”

“But who were you challenging? Yourself or me? This isn’t a game.”

“Are you sure it isn’t a game?” She raised her eyebrows. “Aren’t we playing for the future of the triplets?”

“If we are, you’ll win the crawling-like-a-snake competition, but I have many other talents up my sleeve.”

“Actually, you have a beetle up your sleeve.”

He jerked his arms, flicking his hands at the ground, and when nothing fell out, he scowled at her.

Pearl grinned. She was truly happy for the first time since she’d heard Father’s voice last night. Then she glanced behind her at the Grey Men’s Grave. Still in the morning shadow of the Anvil, it looked deep and dark and cold.