Witch Crag (8 page)

The largest pair of eyes shuttered for an instant – then floated forward. Slowly, dreadfully, a great black hound came into view in the light from their dying fire.

Then four more wild dogs materialized behind it. Crouched, menacing, they grouped behind the huge hound.

And everything waited. Held its breath.

Kita, frozen, suddenly understood that her mind was her only weapon. It had saved Quainy on the rock face; it would save them now.

She stared unblinking at the hound, mastering it, silently telling it how powerful she was. The hound stared back. She knew that if she let her mind wander, even for an instant, if she let doubt in – the dog would be on her. She gazed at it, holding its stare. Then slowly, she got to her feet and, half crouching, took a single step towards it.

“
Kita!
” breathed Raff, horrified.

“
Shhh
,” she hissed. “Trust me.”

The great dog didn't move. Its eyes were locked into Kita's, unwavering, a battle of wills. Kita filled her mind with a sense of herself – with who she was and how much they'd all been through to get this far, and she sent this thought streaming out towards the dog.
You're not going to hurt me
, she told it, silently.
I'm too strong for you. I'm not going back – you are. You're going to turn around and go back into the trees
.

Slowly she raised both hands, palms out, and held them towards the hound as she took another step towards it. Then, in a calm, almost sing-song voice, she said, “It smells good, doesn't it? The roast rabbit. Well – you can have the bones. Raff is going to pick up the bones and give me the biggest one. Then he's going to throw the rest to your pack.”

There was a tense pause; she and the dog continued to stare each other down, unmoving. Behind her she heard Raff gathering up the bones from around the fire; the pack shifted as the smell of meat strengthened in the air. Wordlessly, Raff put a small backbone and skull into her hand. “Throw the rest, Raff,” she chanted. “Behind the hound.”

Raff's aim was good. The lesser dogs leapt on the bones, snarling and fighting over them and, at the noise, the great hound dropped its gaze at last, and turned.

But Kita summoned it back to her. “Take this!” she commanded, holding up the backbone and skull.

The dog gazed at her. She threw the bone and it caught it deftly in its huge jaws. Then she took another step towards it, arms still raised, and said, firmly, “Now go. There's nothing more for you here.
Go!
”

There was a terrible frozen moment, everything hanging in the balance. Then the dog turned and melted into the blackness of the forest, its pack obediently following.

Kita stayed where she was, looking after it, looking at the black trees it had vanished into. She felt astounding. Free, full of power. Somehow, she'd known she'd subdue the dog, and that knowledge had given her power. She waited for her friends to speak, to express their wonder, to praise her – but all she heard was silence.

“Maybe you're right,” she said, loudly, angrily, still not turning round. “Maybe I am a witch. Now let's get some sleep.”

No one mentioned the dogs the next day, or what had happened. Kita waited for questions, acknowledgement – maybe even congratulations – but none were forthcoming. So she felt her friends had somehow joined forces against her, and now there was estrangement within the little group. But it was too risky to talk about it. They breakfasted on grain cake and honey, and drank deep and long from the bubbling spring. Raff tried to fashion a water carrier from a lump of wood, scraping out the centre with his knife, but the wood was crumbling and rotten and it didn't work. They'd just have to trust to finding another water source before nightfall.

Kita climbed a tall tree to see if she could get her bearings, but saw nothing but forest. As far as she could tell, though, from the position of the sun, they were on track for the ruined city. She couldn't be sure exactly where it lay – she knew it was to the east of the wastelands around Witch Crag, that was all. If they walked steadily and didn't meet any trouble, they might reach its outskirts by nightfall.

They set off walking, Kita leading as usual. Except it wasn't as usual. She knew that behind her Quainy and Raff were exchanging glances, whispered words – wondering about her and her strange powers. She wanted to tell them that the dream and the broken flowers and the way she'd mastered the hound baffled her just as much as it did them, but something steely and silent – something she couldn't put a name to – stopped her.

Once, going over some rocky ground, she looked back and saw that Raff had taken Quainy's hand to help her, and jealous rage gripped her, so fierce it frightened her.
I mustn't do this
, she told herself.
I mustn't feel this
way We'll talk tonight.
Once we've camped, we'll talk and clear the air. We'll be friends again
. Because they had to stick together to survive. To evade Arc and his determinedly searching footsoldiers, to avoid the city cannibals, and keep on to reach their goal.
Unless
my friends don't trust me any more,
she thought sourly
. Unless they think I'm in league with the witches, luring them to the crag to trap them there
.

To her horror, the idea made her smile. She quickened her pace, and Raff and Quainy quickened theirs, too.

After a few hours, thirst haunted them once again. They ate on the move, just enough to keep their energy up. Then, a couple of hours after midday, they had some luck – it started to rain. Lightly at first, then huge drops fell, thick and fast. Raff, laughing, positioned himself under a large vine leaf and tilted it into his mouth; the girls did the same. The rain pooled on the wide leaves and streamed down their dry throats. In minutes, the ground was sodden and they were soaked through, but they felt refreshed and so much better. Then the rain stopped, as abruptly as it had started.

“I wish we'd had something to collect some of that rain in,” mourned Quainy.

“I know,” said Raff. “But look at all the puddles about – look at the fork in that tree, it's full, dripping. We'll be able to drink again when we want to.”

Fortified, they set off once more, walking quickly. The sun had gone behind clouds, but Kita kept to as straight a line south as she could, and walked quickly. She was determined to reach the edge of the ruined city by nightfall. She wanted to know what faced them there.

It was late afternoon when the trees ahead of them began to thin out, and the brambles and giant hogweed grew thicker. “I think we might be getting near,” Kita muttered.

They walked on and came to a strange and frightening space. Huge, alien objects, like crazy sculptures, lay about, half buried in the long grass.

“We can't go through that,” breathed Quainy. “We'll die. Something'll get us.”

They stood in silence, gazing in terror at the harsh, brutal shapes. Then Raff said, “OK, look at that one, there. That red thing, close to us.”

It crouched malignantly on its black wheels, its monster's eyes glaring at them. Quainy shuddered. “What on earth is it?” she breathed. “There's lots of them. An army of them.”

“I – I think I know,” said Raff. “When I was a child, I heard one of the oldies talking about them. It's something from before the Great Havoc. Men used to travel in them. I don't know what made them move, what kind of life.”

“Or if it's gone from them,” said Kita. “The life.”

“No,
look
,” Raff went on. “See the way that flowering vine's twined all over it. And the grass growing up through its centre – that great fern, right up against it. It hasn't moved for a very long time. It's useless. It's no threat to us at all. None of it is.”

The three stared on. And it was true. Nature – grass, leaves, plants and vines – was slowly, inexorably engulfing all the ugly man-made metal shapes. Rubbing them out.

“You know what this is, don't you?” said Quainy, unexpectedly. “It's the road – the road into the city.” She pointed ahead. The space in the forest continued. Scattered with more harsh, disintegrating shapes, it curved away through the trees as far as they could see.

“You're right,” said Raff. “The great road from the south. I've heard the headman talk about it.”

Quainy walked into the middle of the cracked, white-grey road with its invasion of grass and nettles. “Why don't we follow it?” she said.

“
What?
” cried Kita. “And take ourselves straight into danger?”

“We only need to follow it till we see the city in the distance,” Quainy said. “Then we can skirt round behind as we planned. If we don't, we might get lost again. The sun's not coming out again today. Can you be sure we'll keep heading south without it?”

“I agree with you,” said Raff. “It makes sense. Kita?”

Kita shrugged. “You two say yes,” she said. “I'm outvoted, so what does it matter what I think?”

Raff and Quainy exchanged a glance, but said nothing.

Kita was uneasy, following the old road, but the other two sped ahead, dancing round rotting metal shapes, jumping lumps of concrete, congratulating each other on how easy going it was compared to struggling through the close-set trees.

The dull light was waning fast. Kita was worried that the road might take them all too abruptly up against the city – that there wouldn't be a chance to pull back and hide, that they'd be seen – but she sulkily didn't share her fears.

At first, she ignored the noise coming from behind them. Low, insistent – a swarm of bees, maybe. Only she knew it wasn't bees. It was like growling, like drumming, like thunder, growing louder, louder by the instant—

She knew that noise. “
Horses!
” she screamed, but Quainy had already started running, racing forward along the road at breakneck speed.

“
Quainy!
” yelled Raff, in panic, sprinting after her. “Get off the road! Get
off
!”

But now dense brambles flanked the road, banning entry to the forest. Quainy ran on like a startled hare; Raff couldn't catch her. There were no metal shapes or lumps of concrete to weave through now, just a clear, cracked surface to race along. Kita, last in line, was racing along too, wildly hoping that Quainy would see a gap to swerve into and hide. . .

The horses, hooves thundering on the derelict road, grew nearer. The road curved, the terror-stricken runners swerved with it. And then shockingly, hideously, they were running at a towering, ugly ramshackle wall of shattered jagged metal, a wall that stretched wide on either side, no way to go round it. Behind them the horses were closer yet.

As they drew closer they saw that the road led straight through a gap in the nightmare wall, and now there was no way to go but forward.

Through grotesque piles of metal, into the heart of the ruined city.

No guards on the gateway. No one watching. They sped through. Raff at last managed to catch up with Quainy and seize her arm, pulling her behind a low wall of crumbling concrete, metal poles sticking out of it like beetle legs. Kita dived after them.

And then six horsemen thundered through the gateway, and came to a jangling, snorting halt. “
Who's here?
” bellowed the leading man.

Silence in the rotting city.

“Come out,
show yourselves
!” he roared. “Thieves! Sneak thieves!
Show yourselves
!” No movement. The horses danced in place with their riders' rage. Frozen, the three friends watched and waited as the leading horseman paced closer, peering from side to side, eyes swivelling as he searched the ruins for movement. The three shrank back, breathing as faintly as they could.

These horsemen were not the long-haired warriors from the tribe the sheepmen had their pact with. They had shaven heads, decorated by three dark slashes spaced from the base of their skulls to their crowns. Their clothes were crude, ill-matched, and ragged. But they held weapons – clubs, long knives – and there was a feeling of discipline and power about them.

The leading rider suddenly let out a roar, and pointed beyond a great pile of rubble. Three of the men sprang down from their mounts and swarmed over the pile, disappearing from view. Kita's blood froze at the squeaking and scuffling that followed. Then the men climbed back again with a struggling child gripped in each hand. The children were thin and filthy – the oldest perhaps ten, the youngest half that. Quainy let out a low, desolate moan at the sight of them, and Raff seized her hand.

“
We have your young!
” roared the lead rider. “
Show yourselves!
”

Silence still, except for the cursing and whimpering of the children and the stamping of the horses.

“
Scum!
” yelled the man. “Unnatural
scum
! We take them as slaves to pay for your thievery.” He nodded to the men, who tossed the children up like bundles, one to each horse, then remounted. With harsh efficiency, the riders wheeled around and cantered for the gap in the monstrous wall of metal. As they reached it the leader reined his horse in once more and turned, his face twisted with rage, and yelled, “
Stay away from our fields!
Go near them again –
steal our food
again – and we'll be
back
again, more of us, an army of us, we'll smoke you out, we'll
destroy
you!”

Then they galloped off, back along the long ruined road.

And slowly, very slowly, heart pumping with dread, Kita turned around in her hiding place. She'd known someone was behind her – very close behind her – ever since the children were dragged out. She'd felt a zephyr of breath on her cheek, smelt a sickly, rotting odour.

A face thin as a skull with wide red lips was very close to hers. A simpering smile was on the lips, but the dirty-yellow eyes were hard and wary. A white plait sprouted from just above the left ear, balanced on the right by a long, jangling earring.

The lips parted. “Hello, strangers.
Mmm
, he was cross, wasn't he?”

Kita glared at the extraordinary man (she thought it was a man) hunkered down in front of her. His arms and legs were thin, but he had a comfortable little belly resting on his thighs. His clothes were a mad cross-hatch and patching of hundreds of different shreds of material. Some bright, some shiny, some smooth, some furry.

Quainy stared in disbelief, then blurted out, “Why did no one stop them taking those poor children?”

The man shrugged. “You don't argue with the farmers. They defend their fields with blood. In fact – a lot of folk say that's why they grow such good crops. Blood being a wonderful manure, as it were. Sweetcorn and squash and taters, they grow. We can't keep away from them.”

He thrust a bony hand towards Kita, as if he wanted her to take it. She didn't, so he spread his fingers and paddled them lightly down her arm. “My name's Geegaw,” he said. “And you are. . .?”

“Strangers,” said Raff, gruffly. “Like you say.”

“Oh, now. You're annoyed with me, aren't you? Don't feel too sorry for those kiddiwinks. They'll work the fields alongside everyone else, they'll get fed, they'll be fine, they'll be fine. Better than staying around here to be—”

“Eaten?” demanded Raff.

“Oh, you've heard the stories. Eating kiddiwinks! I don't know about that. Where are you headed?”

Geegaw hadn't taken his eyes from Kita's face for a moment, even when answering Raff. It made her skin crawl. “Straight out through that gateway again,” she said, firmly.

“Well now, I wouldn't advise that,” Geegaw said, softly. “It's nearly dark, isn't it? And after dark . . . let's just say that some of the things the city is notorious for tend to take place
outside
its walls. The roastings, the feastings. You're safer off in here, with me. I'm known, you know. No one will threaten you while you're with me.” With that, Geegaw stood upright, and strode out into the open. He glittered like an ugly exotic bird in the dusk. “Come along. I'll take you to my Manager. He's one of the main men in the city. You know, you're lucky I've taken a liking to you, because you're going to be all right.”

“What should we do?” whispered Quainy, urgently, as the three stood up too and emerged from behind the wall. “Make a run for it?”

“Where?” said Kita. “Outside? I've got a feeling he's not lying about what happens out there at night.”

“But is he lying about liking us? Maybe he likes the thought of eating us. Maybe his Manager is just code for some horrible great fire pit they're going to roast us in. . .” Quainy tailed off. A group of five youths were cavorting noisily towards them; each wore a tight black jacket with silver chains fantastically looped across it. One of them had an eyepatch; one of them limped; one of them had an arm severed just below the elbow. They reminded Kita of the wild dogs that had come out from the forest the night before, only they looked a lot meaner. And somehow she knew she'd never be able to reach minds as shut down and brutalized as theirs.

“Hey, beauty!” the youth with the eyepatch called. “You with the yellow hair, you going to come with me?”

“We like the black-haired lady. We like her a lot,” said a second boy. He was linked by a chain to a boy of the same height, with the same green-white hair.

“Oh, lord,” muttered Raff. “Quainy – Kita. Get behind me!”

“Say something, you boy?” said the first youth. “They your girls, is they? Not any longer.”

“We can waste him
easy
,” a third crowed.

They were converging on the friends as they spoke, spreading out like a pack about to pounce, two of them darting behind Quainy and Kita to cut off their retreat. Raff drew his knife.

The gang paused – laughed – and each one of them drew a knife too.

There was a brief stand-off, blade flashing murderously to blade. Then Geegaw, who'd been watching this with interest from a short distance away, clapped his hands three times, and did a kind of capering skip towards them. “Not good!” he cried. “Not good at all! They were just coming with me to see the Manager!”

The gang stopped in their tracks.

“Hoop-la!” cried Geegaw. “
Off
you go!”

And to the friends' absolute amazement, the gang sheathed their knives, and melted away.

“Follow me!” carolled Geegaw.

So they did.