The Left Hand of God

9

Climbing down in the deep black, Cale’s two worst fears became real. First, his feet hit the large knot he had made at the end of the rope still leaving him in midair with no idea how far he had left to fall. Second, he could feel that the strain had been too much for the iron hook holding his weight in the cranny at the top of the wall. Even at this distance he could feel it begin to give. “You’re going to fall anyway,” he said to himself, and with one push out with both feet from the rock face, he raised his arms to protect his head and began to fall.

Fall, that is, if a drop of less than two feet can be described as such. A delighted Cale stood and raised his hands in triumph. Then he pulled out one of the candles he had stolen from the Lord of Discipline and tried to light it with dried moss and a flint. In time he got a flame and lit the candle, but as he held it up to the vast darkness, its light was so feeble he could barely see anything. Then the wind blew it out.

The dark was absolute, with thick clouds blotting the moon. If he tried walking, he would fall, and even a minor injury that slowed him down in the course ahead would mean death. It was better to wait the two hours or so until dawn. With that decision made, he wrapped his cassock around himself, lay down and went to sleep.

Nearly two hours later he opened his eyes to find that the dark gray dawn had given him enough light to see by. He looked back at the rope hanging from the walls, now showing the place where he had begun his escape like a huge pointing finger. But there was nothing to be done about it, or about his regret that he was leaving behind something that had taken him eighteen months, and much retching, to make. It looked, although Cale had never seen such a thing, like a two-hundred-foot ponytail. He turned and in the rising light made his way down the rocky, pathless slant of Sanctuary Hill, happy that it might be another hour before they found the body of the Lord of Discipline and, with luck, another two before they came across the rope.

He had luck on neither count. The body of Redeemer Picarbo had been discovered half an hour before dawn by his servant, whose hysterical screams had the entire Sanctuary, enormous as it was, awake and in ferment within a few minutes. Quickly every dormitory was roused and roll call taken, and it soon became clear that three of the acolytes were missing.

Pathfinder Brunt, dog ostler and the Redeemer charged with catching the very few acolytes who were foolish enough to escape, was sent immediately to Redeemer Bosco and for the first time in his life was shown into his offices immediately.

“I want all three of them returned alive, by which I mean you will do everything in your power to do so.”

“Of course, Lord Militant. I always-”

“Spare me,” interrupted Bosco. “I’m not asking you to be careful, I’m telling you. Under no circumstances, not at the price of your own life, is Thomas Cale to be harmed. I suppose if Kleist and Henri are killed, then so be it, though I’d prefer them alive as well.”

“May I ask why Cale’s life is so precious, Lord?”

“No.”

“What shall I tell the others? They won’t understand and they’re in a powerful rage.”

Bosco realized what Brunt was driving at. Holy rage could overcome even the most obedient Redeemer faced with an acolyte who had done something so unthinkably dreadful. He sighed with irritation. “You may indicate that Cale is working on my behalf and has been forced to go with these murderers while attempting to uncover a most terrible conspiracy involving a plot by the Antagonists to murder the Supreme Pontiff.” It was, thought Bosco, pitiful stuff, but good enough for Brunt, who instantly went pale with distress. He was exceptional for his brutality even by the low standards of Redeemer dog ostlers, but the deep protectiveness of Brunt’s feelings for the Pontiff, like that of a child for his mother, would have been plain to anyone.

Cale’s rope of hair was quickly found, its scent given to the Dogs of Paradise, and then the great doors were rolled open and a hunting party was on its way with Cale less than five miles in front of them. But in its most important respect his plan was a success: it had not occurred to anyone that only one acolyte had made his escape, and so no search of any kind was made inside the Sanctuary. For the moment, Vague Henri, Kleist and the girl were safe. Assuming, of course, that Cale kept his promise.

Cale had moved another four miles by the time he heard the faint sound of the dogs drifting on the wind. He stopped and listened in the silence. For a moment there was just the cold wind scratching over the sandy rock. Distant though it was, it was clear enough that he was in for trouble, and sooner rather than later. It was a strange, high-pitched noise, not like the usual yelping of pack hounds but a constant squeal of rage that sounded something like a pig having its throat cut with a rusty saw. They were hefty like pigs too, even more bad tempered than a boar and with a set of fangs that looked as though someone had poured a bag of rusty nails into their mouths. The sound died away again as Cale looked to see if there was any sign of the Voynich oasis. Nothing stood out from the endless stretch of crusty, diseased-looking hillocks from which the Scablands got its name. He started running again, now faster than before. There was a long way to go, and with the hounds this close, he knew he would be lucky to make it past midday. Move too slowly and the hounds would have him, too fast and exhaustion would give him up. He shut all this out and listened only to the rhythm of his own breathing.

“How long have you been here, Riba?”

For a moment she seemed not to have heard Vague Henri, then she looked at him as if trying to bring him into focus.

“I’ve been here for five years.” The boys looked at each other in astonishment.

“But why are you here?” said Kleist.

“We came here to learn to be brides,” she said. “But they lied. He killed Lena, that man, and he would have killed me. Why?” It was a bewildered appeal. “Why would anyone do that?”

“We don’t know,” said Kleist. “We don’t know anything about you. We had no idea you existed.”

“Start from the beginning,” said Vague Henri. “Tell us how you came here, where you’re from.”

“Take your time,” said Kleist. “We have plenty of it.”

“He’s coming back for us, isn’t he, that other one?”

“His name is Cale.”

“He’s coming back for us.”

“Yes,” said Vague Henri. “But it might be a long wait.”

“I don’t want to wait here,” she said, furious. “It’s cold and dark and horrible. I won’t!”

“Keep your voice down.”

“Let me out-now-or I’ll scream.”

It was not that Kleist had no idea how to treat a member of the opposite sex, it was that he had no idea how to deal with anyone behaving in such an emotional way. Expressing uncontrolled anger usually meant a visit to Ginky’s Field and a three-foot hole. Kleist raised his arm to shut her up, but Henri pulled him back.

“You have to be quiet,” he told Riba. “Cale will come back and we’ll take you somewhere safe. But if they hear us, then we are dead things. You must understand.”

She stared at him for a moment, looking as if madness itself were whispering in her ear. Then she nodded her head.

“Tell us where you came from, and as much as you know about why you’re here.”

In her great agitation, Riba had stood upright, a tall and shapely girl, if plump. She sat down again and took a deep breath to calm herself.

“Mother Teresa bought me in the serf market in Memphis when I was ten. She bought Lena as well.”

“You’re a slave?” said Kleist.

“No,” said the girl at once, ashamed and indignant. “Mother Teresa told us we were free and we could leave whenever we wanted.”

Kleist laughed. “Why didn’t you, then?”

“Because she was kind to us and gave us presents and pampered us like cats, and fed us wonderful food and many rich things and taught us how to be brides and told us that when we were ready we would have a rich knight in shining armor who would love us and take care of us forever.” She stopped, almost breathless, as if what she was saying were actually happening and the horrors of the last day just a dream. That she stopped was just as well, because very little of it made sense to the boys.

Vague Henri turned to Kleist. “I don’t understand. It’s against the faith to own slaves.”

“None of this makes sense. Why would the Redeemers buy a girl and do all these things for her and then start to butcher them like-”

“Be quiet!” Vague Henri looked at the girl, but she was lost in her own world for the moment. Kleist sighed with irritation. Vague Henri pulled him away and lowered his voice. “How would you feel if it was you who had to watch that happening to someone you’d been with for five years?”

“I’d thank my lucky stars that there was a half-wit around like Cale to rescue me. You need,” he added, “to spend more time worrying about us and less about the girl. What’s she to us or we to her? God knows we all get what’s coming to us, no need to go looking for it.”

“What’s done is done.”

“But it isn’t done, is it?”

As this was true, Vague Henri lapsed into silence for a moment.

“Why would the Redeemers, of all people,” he said at last in a whisper, “bring someone who was the devil’s playground into the Sanctuary, feed them, care for them, tell them wonderful lies and then cut them into pieces while they were still alive?”

“Because they’re bastards,” said Kleist sullenly. But he was no fool and the question interested him. “Why have they increased the numbers of acolytes by five, maybe even ten times as much?” Then he swore and sat down. “Tell me something, Henri.”

“What?”

“If we knew the answer-would you feel better or worse?” And with that, he shut up for good.

Cale was urinating over the edge of one of the Scabland hillocks that had half-collapsed. The screaming yelp of the dogs was close and continuous now. He finished and hoped that the smell would attract them away from his true line for a few minutes. His breathing was labored, despite the rest, his thighs heavy and beginning to drag him down. By his calculations from the map he had found in Redeemer Bosco’s bureau, he should have been at the oasis already. But there was still no sign, just the hillocks and rocks and sand stretching as far as he could see. It was now that he faced the possibility that he had carried with him since the moment he found the map-that it was a trap set for him by the Lord Militant.

There was no point in pacing himself now; the dogs would be on him in a few minutes. That there had been no letup in their noise meant that they had missed or ignored the smell of his urine. He ran as fast as he could now, although he was too exhausted after four hours to increase his speed by much.

Now the dogs were baying fit to kill, and Cale was beginning to slow as he knew that he could never outrun them. His breath rasped as if sand were being scraped inside his lungs, and he began to stumble. Then he fell.

He was on his feet in an instant, but the fall had made him look at his surroundings. Still the same hillocks and rocks, but now the sand had lanky weeds and grass in clumps. Where there was grass, there was water. Immediately there was a surge in the howls of the dogs as if they had been lashed with a nailed whip. Cale raced off in search of the oasis, hoping to God he was heading for it and not just skirting its edge and heading only for more desert and death.

But the grass and weeds became thicker, and as he leapt over a ridge and nearly took a fall, there in front of him on the other side was the Voynich oasis. The dogs were screaming now as they sensed their hunt was over. Cale ran on, stumbling as his body began to rebel. He knew not to look back, but he couldn’t help himself. The hounds were pouring over the lip of the ridge like coals from a sack, yelping and howling and screaming in their desperation to tear him apart, getting in each other’s way and snarling and biting.

He scrambled on as the dogs bounded toward him, all hunched shoulders and teeth. Then he was into the first few trees of the oasis. One of the dogs, faster and more vicious than the others, was already on him. The creature knew its task and clipped Cale’s heel with its front paw, throwing Cale off balance and sending him sprawling.

That should have been that-but, too eager for its prey, the dog had overbalanced as well. Unused to the damper and looser surface of the oasis, it could find no grip and went headlong, tail over head, and crashed into a tree, fetching a hefty wallop to its spine. It screamed in rage, but its desperation to get to its feet only made things worse, as it scrabbled to gain a purchase on the unstable ground. Cale ran toward the lake at the center of the oasis and was already fifteen yards ahead before the animal was on its feet and after him. But it would not be a long chase at four times the speed of the exhausted boy. Quickly the dog gained and was about to leap when Cale leapt before him, a long arc in the air and then a huge splash as he hit the surface of the lake.

A scream of rage from the dog as it stopped shy of the edge. Then another dog found him, and another, all of them baying at him with a sound like the end of the world-hatred and fury and hunger.

It was five minutes before the pathfinder and his men arrived on their ponies to find the dogs at the edge of the water that fed the oasis. They were still barking, but there was nothing to be seen. The pathfinder stood on the bank for some time, looking and thinking-his face, never a pretty sight, black with frustration and suspicion. At last one of his men spoke.

“Are you sure it’s them, Redeemer? These imbeciles,” he said, looking at the dogs, “it wouldn’t be the first time they’ve taken chase after a deer or a wild pig.”

“Be quiet,” said Brunt softly. “They could still be here. They’re good swimmers, by all accounts. Set guards and the better dogs around the perimeter. If they’re here, I’ll have them. But Cale’s not to be harmed, by God.” In fact, Brunt had told his men nothing of Bosco’s fantasy of a plot against the Pontiff. He had not exactly lied to Bosco about the rage of his men. They were angry all right, but they would do as they were told simply because he had told them. To be the only ordinary Redeemer to know about the terrible threat to the Pontiff made him feel an ever deeper love for His Holiness, and this love was not to be squandered by sharing it with others.

He gestured-a slight nod, no more-and in a moment the men around him began to move. Within the hour the oasis was shut up tighter than a mouse’s ear.

In the secret corridor in the Sanctuary, Riba was asleep. Kleist had gone hunting for rats, and Vague Henri was watching the girl, intrigued by her strange curves and feeling puzzling new impulses along with the hunger and fear. He did well to be frightened. The Redeemers never stopped looking for escapers until they were caught, no matter how long. When they were recaptured, an example would be made of them that would freeze the blood in the veins of every acolyte for a thousand years, make their hearts miss a beat, their hair stand on its end like the quills upon a fretful porcupine. The cruelty and agony of their punishment and eventual death would become a legend.

Despite keeping himself busy with the rats, Kleist was feeling much the same. The other feeling they shared was a growing suspicion that Cale was halfway to Memphis and never coming back. In fact Kleist was certain of it, but even the loyal Vague Henri was unsure of what Cale would do. He had always wanted to be friends with Cale, although he could not really say why. Fear of the Redeemers’ anathema to friendship kept the acolytes cautious of each other, not least because the Redeemers set traps. Certain boys, those with charm and a capacity for treachery, were trained by the priests to be even more charming and treacherous. Known as chickens, these boys would tempt the unsuspecting into exchanging confidences, talking, playing games and other signs of friendship. Those who responded to their overtures were given thirty strokes with a spiked glove in front of their entire dorm and left there to bleed for twenty-four hours. But not even such dire consequences would prevent some acolytes from becoming the strongest friends and allies in the great battle to keep themselves alive or be swallowed up by the Redeemers’ faith.

But when it came to Cale, Vague Henri was always unsure whether theirs was a real friendship. Henri had gone out of his way to intrigue Cale by going through his insolent routines in front of him with various Redeemers, hoping to impress with his wit and reckless daring. But for months he had no sense that Cale realized what he was doing or, if he did, that he couldn’t care less. Cale’s expression was always the same: a laconic watchfulness. He never expressed an emotion, no matter what the circumstances. His victories in training seemed to give him no pleasure, just as the harsh punishments for which Bosco often singled him out seemed to cause him no pain. He was not exactly feared by the acolytes, but neither was he liked. No one could make him out; he neither rebelled nor was he one of the faithful. Everyone left him alone, and Cale, insofar as it was possible to tell, preferred it that way.

“Penny for your thoughts.” It was Kleist, back from his rat hunt, the tailless results dangling from a string at his waist. Five of them. He undid a loop and dropped them on a stone and started to skin them.

“Better get them sorted before she wakes up,” said Kleist, smiling. “I don’t suppose she’d take to them baked in their skins.”

“Why don’t you leave her alone?”

“You know she’s going to get us killed, don’t you? Not that we’ve got much of a chance anyway. Your friend’s got twelve hours to get back or-”

“Or what?” interrupted Vague Henri. “If you’ve got a plan, let’s hear it. I’m all ears.”

Kleist sniffed as he started gutting. “If I couldn’t look forward to eating these,” he said, gesturing at the rats, “I’d be feeling really bad by now. About our chances, I mean. Our chances of ever seeing Cale again.”

Having emerged from one of the reed beds at the side of the lake, Cale had moved about five hundred yards into the diggings. For fifteen years the Redeemers had been coming to the oasis and carrying away tons of the rich loam that formed under the tree canopy. It was magical stuff, capable of enriching even the dead earth of the Sanctuary’s vegetable gardens. So fertile was it that its use alone had allowed the Sanctuary to expand the numbers of acolytes it trained more than tenfold. But Cale had discovered that the soil of the oasis had another property. Working in the gardens one day and being guarded by the dogs who were set on any acolyte who stole, Cale had stopped during a short break and taken out a piece of dead men’s feet he had found on the floor of the refectory. As soon as he sniffed it, he realized it had not been dropped but discarded: it was rancid and completely inedible. He noticed one of the dogs sleeping nearby, with his handler looking the other way. He threw it to him, not out of kindness but hoping the creature, who, like all the hounds, would eat anything, would gobble it down and be sick-and serve the shit bag right. The piece of dead men’s feet landed just near the dog, on a small pile of oasis loam just by its head. The dog raised himself up at the sound-alert and ready. But despite the fact that there was food lying under its nose, and it was a nose that could smell gnat’s pee at a thousand yards, it didn’t look at the food at all. Instead it glared at Cale, yawned, scratched itself, then settled down and went back to sleep. Later, when the guard and his dog were gone, Cale picked up the piece of dead men’s feet and sniffed it. It stank to high heaven. Puzzled, he picked up a handful of loam and wrapped it around the morsel. Then he sniffed again, and all he could smell this time was a rich, dark, peaty smell. Something in the loam had done more than mask the smell of rotten fat: it had made it vanish. But only as long as it was in contact.

Over the next few days in the garden he tried out an experiment with the dogs as the piece of dead men’s feet grew more and more fetid. Not once did the dogs smell a thing. Finally, he dropped it, wiped free of loam, on the flint path, and in a couple of minutes one of the dogs, drawn by its stink, scarfed it down. To Cale’s great satisfaction, ten minutes later he could see the dog hurling up its prodigious guts in the corner.

It was more dangerous than difficult to find references to the source of the loam in the library archive. There were maps and files in there he often fetched for the Lord Militant, and all he needed to do was be patient for an opportunity to take the right file and even more patient for the chance to return it. If getting caught doing this was unlikely, the consequences of being so would have been nasty, perhaps fatal if the Redeemers worked out that his interest in the documents about the oasis was inspired more by a plan to escape than, say, an enthusiasm for gardening and fertilizer.

Shortly after he emerged from the lake, a soaking wet Cale was still able to hear the baying of the hounds. Once into the trees, he could not be seen or smelled, but he knew that would not be the case for long. Almost immediately after he began walking, he was into the Redeemers’ digging grounds. The harvesting of the loam had left a long field of hollows rather than straight trenches, because the loam was too soft to sustain straight-sided walls like ordinary earth, though not so soft that it couldn’t trap and asphyxiate a man by collapsing on top of him, as the records from the archive made clear. A satisfying thought when Cale had read it, given that a dozen Redeemers had died mining the stuff; not so satisfying as he looked for something to dig in and hide himself from sight and scent.

Picking his spot, a light hollow at the base of one of the hillocks, he scooped out as deep a hole as he dared, gathered some loose loam from around about so the searchers would not detect signs of recent digging and eased himself into the deepened hollow, pulling the loam around him and carefully dragging it down from above. It did not take long and he felt vulnerable so near the surface, but he dared not dig deeper and risk a collapse. What he tried to keep in mind was that he only needed not to be seen or smelled. The Redeemers’ confidence in their animals was their weakness-to them, if their dogs didn’t smell anything, it wasn’t there. They wouldn’t bother with even a simple search, because it wasn’t necessary. Cale lay back and tried to sleep, aware that there was nothing else to do. He needed the rest. And, in any case, it would not be a deep sleep. He had taught himself a long time ago to be awake in a moment.

Fall asleep he did, and woke up in an instant also, alert to the sound of dogs and Redeemers, barking and shouting. They came closer and closer, the barking settling down to a snuffling yelp as the dogs concentrated on the slower search and not a chase. Closer and closer came the sound until one of them must have started sniffing a few inches away. But the dog didn’t stay long. Why would it? The loam did its job, blotting out everything but itself. Soon the snuffling and occasional bark faded and Cale allowed himself a moment of delight and triumph. He had, however, to stay where he was for hours yet. He relaxed and went to sleep.

When he woke again, he was stiff from the effects of his long run, and his left knee in particular, pained by an old injury, throbbed. He was also freezing. He eased his right arm through the loam and cleared away enough to see it was dark. He waited. Two hours later he could hear birds singing, and soon after came the lightening of the sky. Slowly he emerged, ready to vanish back into his hole at the first sign of the Redeemers. But there was nothing but the sound of the birds in the tall trees and the rustle of small creatures in the undergrowth. He took out the linen bag he had taken from the Lord of Discipline’s room and began shoveling in loam, pressing it down so he could pack in as much as possible.

Then he swung it over his back and went off in search of the Redeemers and their dogs.

He found them about three hours later. It was not difficult-there were twenty Redeemers and forty dogs. Besides, they had no reason to cover their tracks: no one within two hundred miles would by choice go near even a lone Redeemer, let alone a score of them with dogs. They searched for others; others did not search for them. For ten minutes after he caught up with them, Cale considered whether he should forget about the three waiting for him in the Sanctuary and make his escape to Memphis while he still could. He owed Kleist nothing, Vague Henri only a little, and he had saved the girl’s life once already. As when the octopus changes its colors in the face of tooth and claw, reds and yellows sweeping under its skin like waves, Cale’s urge to leave or stay swept over him, back and forth, muddy and clear and mixed. Reasons to vanish now were obvious, reasons to return were hazy and obscure, but it was the undertow of the last that drove him, with great reluctance and much blaspheming, back toward the searching dogs and priests.

Even though he was covered in dirt from the loam, Cale stayed downwind of the dogs, approaching no closer than half a mile. Two hours later, as he’d hoped, they halted the search and turned about, heading for the Sanctuary. Cale knew they hadn’t given up. This was only the primary search, sent out to catch a fugitive quickly. Usually it worked, but if they lost the trail within thirty hours, the first search would return and be replaced by as many as five secondary teams, fully equipped and self-sufficient, who would stay on the hunt for years if necessary. They had never had to. Two months was the longest anyone had evaded capture, and his punishment when caught had been infandous.

Still keeping his distance and still downwind, Cale shadowed the Redeemers for the next twelve hours, moving gradually closer and closer, waiting for any sign of the dogs catching his scent. He followed them all the way back to the Sanctuary and was so close by then that all he had to do was join on the end of the now exhausted group and, hood up over his face, follow them as they went, in the now pitch dark, through the great gates. There was no security check. What madman, after all, man or boy, would ever try to break into the Sanctuary?

After a day’s wait in the secret corridor, the three sat in the dark, each with their own thoughts, always similar, always grim. When they heard the light tap on the door, they went to it desperately hopeful, but also possessed by the fear that it might be a trap.

“What if it’s them?” whispered Kleist.

“Then they’re coming in one way or another, aren’t they?” replied Vague Henri. They both set to and began to pull the door open.

“Thank God, it’s you,” said Vague Henri.

“Who were you expecting?” said Cale.

“We thought it might be those men.”

It was the first time that Cale had been spoken to by a woman face-to-face. Her voice was soft and low, and if his expression had been visible in the dark, it would have shown intense surprise and fascination.

“If the Redeemers come for us, they won’t knock first.”

“We’ve had enough,” said Kleist. “Tell us what you’ve been doing and if we can get out of here alive.”

“Light a candle, we’ll need it.”

In two minutes they could see each other as the gentle light made the scene almost beautiful-the four huddled together.

“What’s that smell?” said Vague Henri. Cale dropped the bag of loam on the floor. “The dogs can’t smell you if you rub this over your body and clothes. I’ll explain what happened while you get on with it.”

In other places in the world, what followed might have been awkward. Riba, shocked by this, was about to protest that she must have privacy, but the three boys all turned their backs to her and to each other. To be naked in the presence of another boy was an offense that cried out to heavens for vengeance, as the late Lord of Discipline was fond of saying. There were many offenses for which heaven bawled for noisy reprisals.

The boys moved into the darkness to undress as a matter of ingrained habit. Left standing on her own, there was no one Riba could see to protest to. So she grabbed a handful of the pungent loam and she too went into the dark.

“Are you ready?” mocked the voice of Cale. “Then I’ll begin.”

Five hours later, as a grubby dawn bled through the murk, Brunt ordered his five secondary search parties, each comprising a hundred men with dogs, out of the main square. As the last group left, four others hooded against the cold tacked themselves onto the end of the column and followed them out of the gates, down the cinder road and to the arid plain below. Here the five hundred Redeemers split into their separate groups and headed out to all points.

The four kept behind the column heading to the south. For an hour they kept pace with them as the preceptor chanted the marching song of shame:

“Holy Redeemer!”

“BANISH OUR SINS!” came the groaning response from a hundred and four voices.

“Holy Redeemer!”

“CHASTISE OUR CRIMES!”

“Holy Redeemer!”

“SCOURGE OUR LUST!”

“Holy Redeemer!”

“THRASH OUR…”

And so it went on until a sharp bend around the first hillock of the Scablands, when a hundred and four voices became merely a hundred.

From the battlements the Lord Militant watched as the five hundred emerged from the low fog and after a mile or two began to split into five. He stood until the last one was out of sight and then turned back to go to breakfast, his favorite-a bowl of black tripe and a hard-boiled egg.

The boys would have made forty or even fifty miles before night but for the fact that Riba was a liability. Beautiful, plump and pampered, she had in the last five years barely moved at all, walking only from massage table to hot bath and from there, and four times more in a day, to a dining table filled with stuffed vine leaves, pig’s feet in aspic, spice cake and anything else fattening you could think of. As a result she could no more walk forty miles than she could fly thirty. At first Kleist and Cale were just irritated and told her to move herself, but when it was clear that bullying, threats and even pleading could not push the poor girl to go another step, they sat down and Vague Henri began to get her to tell them about her daily life in the hidden realms of the Sanctuary.

It was not just a wonderful story of luxury and comfort, of body spoiling, of care and warmth. It was also incomprehensible. Every time Riba added a new detail of a way in which she and the other girls were petted, mollycoddled, pampered and indulged, the three acolytes became more mystified about why the Redeemers would behave in such a way to anyone, least of all to creatures who were the devil’s playground. And how did this astonishing kindness make any sense at all in the light of the hideous practices performed on Riba’s friend Lena, a cruelty so grotesque not even the boys would have credited such a thing to the Redeemers. But it would be a long time before any of them could begin to put together the terrible story of which the three acolytes, Riba and the Lord Militant were now a part-and not least since Cale had put the sweet-smelling object he had found in the dissecting dish in one of his rarely used pockets and forgotten all about it.

But they had more pressing matters than the fate of mankind to deal with: how to stay alive while hauling along the beautiful but hefty Riba. They made ten miles that day, something of a tribute to Riba’s willpower, as the most strenuous work she had done in her life before this was to raise a piece of fried chicken to her lips or turn over on a massage table to have rich foams and unguents stroked into her smooth skin. Needless to say, this determination on Riba’s part was not much appreciated by the three boys. Exhausted, she fell asleep on the ground as soon as they stopped for the night. Then as they ate the dried meat prepared by Kleist, the boys discussed what to do with her.

“Let’s leave her here and run away,” said Kleist.

“She’ll die,” said Vague Henri.

“We’ll leave water. Let’s face it,” said Kleist, scanning her overfed body, “it’ll be a long time before she dies of starvation.”

“She’ll die anyway if we move at this rate, and us with her.” This time it was Cale who spoke, not so much forming an argument as pointing out a simple fact.

Vague Henri tried flattery. “I don’t think so, Cale. Look, you’ve fooled them completely. They already think we’re miles away. They’ll probably think we had help to get away that easily.”

“Who the hell would help us against the Redeemers?” said Kleist.

“What does it matter? They think we’ve got away. And we have. They’re not going to realize for a long time how we did it, if they ever do. We can afford to go slowly.”

“It’s a lot better if we don’t,” said Cale.

“They’ll catch us at this rate,” said Kleist. “It’ll take more than a trick and some badger shit to keep them off our trail.”

“We’ve gone through all of this to save her. We can’t let her die now.”

“Yes, we can,” said Kleist. “The kindest thing is to cut her throat while she’s sleeping. Best for her and us.”

Cale let out a brief sigh, not especially regretful.

“Henri’s right. What’s the point if we let her die now?”

“What’s the point?” shouted an exasperated Kleist. “The point, stupid bastards, is that we get away. Free. Forever.”

The other two said nothing. It was true enough.

“Let’s vote,” said Vague Henri.

“No, let’s not vote. Let’s use our brains.”

“Let’s vote,” said Cale.

“Why bother? You’ve made up your minds. We keep the girl.”

There was a bad-tempered silence.

“There’s something else we should do,” said Cale at last.

“What now?” groaned Kleist. “Go and find enough goose feathers to make that fat beezle a mattress?”

“Keep your voice down,” said Vague Henri. Cale ignored Kleist.

“We have to decide who’s to do it if the Redeemers catch us.”

It was an unpleasant thought, but they knew he was right. None of them wanted to be taken alive back to the Sanctuary.

“We’ll draw straws,” said Vague Henri.

“There isn’t any straw,” said Kleist, miserable.

“Then we’ll draw stones.” Vague Henri searched for a minute and came back with three stones of different sizes. He showed the others, who nodded their agreement. “Smallest loses.” Henri put the stones behind his back and then held out his left hand, fist clenched in front of him. There was a pause-suspicious as always, Kleist was unwilling to choose. Cale shrugged and held out his hand, palm up, eyes closed. Without letting Kleist see, Vague Henri dropped the stone, and Cale closed his fist around it. He opened his eyes. Then Henri brought out the remaining two stones, one in each fist. Still Kleist was wary of making a decision in case he should, in some way he couldn’t quite put his finger on, be taken advantage of.

“Get a move on,” said Vague Henri, unusually irritable. With great reluctance Kleist tapped Henri’s right hand and closed his eyes. Now they all had one stone each.

“On a count of three. One, two, three.”

The three boys opened their fists. Cale was holding the smallest stone.

“Well, at least you know it’ll be done properly.”

“You needn’t have worried, Cale,” said Kleist. “I wouldn’t have had any problems slotting you.”

Cale looked at him, but the trace of a smile was still there.

“What are you doing?” Riba had woken up and had been watching them. Kleist looked over at her.

“We’ve been discussing who we eat first when we run out of food.” He looked at her meaningfully, as if to suggest that the answer was pretty obvious.

“Don’t listen to him,” said Vague Henri. “We were just deciding who’d take the first watch.”

“When is it my turn?” said Riba.

All three of the acolytes were surprised at the defiant, even irritable note in her voice.

“You need all the rest you can get,” said Vague Henri.

“I’m ready to do my share.”

“Of course. In a few days when you’re more used to this. For now we need you as rested as possible. It’s best-you can see that.”

It was, of course, hard to argue.

“Would you like something to eat?” said Vague Henri, holding up a piece of dried rat. It did not look appetizing, least of all to a girl raised on cream and pastries, chicken pie and delicious gravies. But she was very hungry.

“What is it?” she said.

“Um. Meat,” said Vague Henri vaguely.

He moved toward her and shoved it under her nose. It smelled very much as a dead rat might be expected to. Her delicate nose wrinkled in involuntary disgust.

“Ugh, no.” Though she quickly added, “Thank you.”

“Going without for a bit won’t do her any harm,” muttered Kleist under his breath, but loudly enough for the girl to hear. Riba, however, was not aware that she was in any way less than perfect. She had been told so all her life, and as a result Kleist’s remark, although she was aware it was hostile, conveyed no specific insult to her at all.

“I’ll take first watch,” said Cale, and with that he turned and walked to the top of a nearby scab. The two remaining boys lay down and within minutes were asleep. Riba, however, could not settle and she began to sob quietly. Kleist and Vague Henri were dead to the world. Cale, however, on the top of the scab, could hear the sound of her crying and considered it carefully before finally she too fell asleep.

The next morning the boys woke at five as usual, but there was no point in striking camp, such as it was. “Let her sleep,” said Cale. “The more rested she is the better.”

“Without her we could be eighty, perhaps a hundred, miles from here,” muttered Kleist. A knife thudded point-down at his feet.

“I took it from Picarbo. Cut her throat, if you like. Anything, so long as you stop whining.” His tone was matter-of-fact, not angry at all. Kleist stared at Cale, eyes cold and full of dislike. Then he turned away. Vague Henri wondered if he had really been ready to kill the girl or perhaps use the knife on Cale-or whether he just liked having something to complain about. Cale, at any rate, was wise enough not to imply any kind of victory when he spoke again.

“I’ve an idea. Perhaps we can make use of the problem with the girl.”

Kleist turned back, sullen-but he was listening. “If we can’t put distance between us and the search parties to east and west of us, it’s best if we track them to make sure we don’t cross them by accident.”

He bent down and picked up the knife and started drawing in the sand. “If Henri and the girl move south in a straight line and don’t do more than twelve miles a day, then Kleist and me will always know where you are, pretty much. Kleist goes west, I’ll go east, and find the two nearest search parties.” He gestured to the straight line he’d drawn for Henri and Riba. “If we think they’re going to hit the search parties as they zigzag, then we return and take them off in the other direction.”

Kleist looked thoughtful as well as dubious.

“Suppose you come back and take them off somewhere. How am I supposed to find you when you’re not at the meeting point?”

Cale shrugged. “You’ll have to decide whether to track us or make your own way to Memphis. Wait for us there as long as you think best.”

Kleist sniffed and looked away. It was an agreement of sorts.

“Does that suit you?” asked Cale, nodding to Henri.

“Yes,” said Vague Henri. “There are a lot of things I want to find out from the girl.”

Within five minutes, having split the food and water, Kleist and Cale were moving off to east and west. In five minutes more they’d vanished from sight.

Vague Henri was sitting down eating his breakfast and looking at the girl as she slept, observing the beautiful pale skin, the red lips and the long eyelashes, the sense of beautiful peace. He was still watching, fascinated, an hour later when she woke up. She was startled at first to find Vague Henri looking straight at her, not more than three feet away.

“Didn’t anyone ever tell you it’s rude to stare?”

“No,” said Vague Henri truthfully.

“Well, it is.”

Henri looked down at his feet and now felt awkward.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to be so harsh.”

At this, Vague Henri forgot his awkwardness and burst into laughter.

“What’s so funny?” she said, angry again.

“For us, being harsh means dragging you out in front of five hundred people and the Redeemers stringing you up.”

“What do you mean?”

“Hanging you by the neck. You know, like the Hanged Redeemer.”

“Who’s the Hanged Redeemer?”

This shut him up. He looked at her as if she had asked what the sun was, or if animals could talk. He said nothing for some time, but there were hammers beating in his brain about what this could possibly mean.

“The Hanged Redeemer is the son of the Lord of Creation. He sacrificed himself to wash our vile sins away with his blood.”

“Uuugh!” she said. “Whatever for?”

His look of astonishment made her instantly regret her reaction. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to offend you. It’s just such a strange idea.”

“What is?” he said, still openmouthed.

“Well… what sins? What did you do?”

“I was born sinful. Everyone is born full of revolting sin.”

“What a ridiculous idea.”

“Is it?”

“How can a baby have done anything wrong, let alone anything dreadful?”

Neither of them said anything for a moment. “And why would you wash something away in blood?”

“It’s a symbol,” he said, defensive and wondering why.

“I’m not stupid,” she replied. “I can see that. But why? Why would you use blood as a symbol of something like that?”

Vague Henri was, by nature, someone who thought carefully about everything. But these ideas had been so much a part of him and for so long that she might just as well have questioned the point of his arms or the meaning of his eyes. “Where are the others?” she said. Still reeling over what he had heard, his answer was distracted.

“Oh, they’ve gone.”

“They’ve left us?” she said, eyes widening in alarm.

“Only for a few days. They’re going to track down the searchers on either side of us and make sure we don’t walk into them.”

“How will they find us again?”

“They’re very good at tracking,” Henri said evasively.

“I don’t understand,” she said. “I thought you said you hardly ever left the Sanctuary?”

“Um… we better get going. I’ll explain as we go along.”

Redeemer Bosco raised his walking stick and rapped twice on the door.

It was nearly thirty seconds before it opened, but he did not show any sign of impatience, or indeed any sign at all. Finally the door opened and a tall man, another Redeemer, stood in front of the Lord Militant.

“Do you have an appointment?” said the tall man.

“Don’t be foolish,” replied Bosco, terse and dismissive. “The High Redeemer asked to see me. Here I am.”

“The High Redeemer commands, he does not ask any-”

Bosco pushed past him. “Tell him I’m here.”

“He’s displeased with you. I’ve never seen him so angry.” Bosco ignored him as the tall man went over to an inner door, knocked and went in. There was a short pause, the door opened again, and the tall man returned, smiling, though nothing pleasant was intended.

“He is ready to see you now.”

Bosco walked into a room so dark that even the gloom-accustomed eyes of the Lord Militant found it hard to see. It was something more, though, than the small shuttered windows and the dark tapestries murkily retelling stories of ancient and hideous martyrdoms. The center of the darkness seemed to come from the bed in the corner. A man was sitting up, propped by at least a dozen uncomfortable cushions. Bosco had to move very close before he could make out the face, the skin pale to the point of being white, and hanging down from cheek and neck in endless scrawny folds. The eyes were watery, as if the mind had long gone. But when he caught sight of Bosco something bright flashed there, a light full of hate and great cunning.

“You kept me waiting!” said the High Redeemer, the voice distant but sharp.

“I came as soon as I could, Your Grace.” He was not believed, nor did he expect to be.

“When I summon you, Bosco, you drop everything instantly and damned quick.” He laughed. It was a particularly unpleasant sound that only, perhaps, Bosco in all the Sanctuary would not have been unnerved by. It was the sound of something dead, animated only by an intense malice and anger.

“What did you wish to see me about, Your Grace?” The High Redeemer stared at him for a moment.

“That Cale boy.”

“Yes, Your Grace?”

“He’s made a fool of you.”

“How so, Your Grace?”

“You had plans for him.”

“You know that I did, Your Grace.”

“He must be brought back.”

“You and I differ on nothing, Your Grace.”

“Brought back and scourged.”

“Of course, Your Grace.”

“Then hanged and quartered.”

Bosco did not respond at first.

“He murdered a Redeemer. He must become an Act of Faith.”

Bosco looked thoughtful for a moment.

“My investigations have made it clear that it was the two other acolytes who were responsible. It seems likely that they coerced Cale into leaving with them. They were armed; he was not. If this is true, then Cale should be punished merely as an example. The quartering, however, seems unnecessary to me. The others will do, given the fault is theirs.”

There was a snort of contempt that might have been mistaken for choking.

“Ha! Pity is nothing of kin to you, Bosco. This is just your vanity talking. It doesn’t matter whether Cale or these other two killed Picarbo. By God, I’ve half a mind to burn the entire dormitory along with them.”

The High Redeemer had allowed himself to become rather too excited and was now choking on his own spittle. He gestured toward a mug of water on his bedside table. Taking his time, Bosco handed it to him. He drank noisily. Finally, he handed back the now sloppy wet mug. Bosco replaced it on the table with a look of fine distaste.

Gradually the High Redeemer’s sucking breath began to slow and return to normal. The light of malevolence, however, had only increased.

“Tell me about this business with Picarbo.”

“Business, Your Grace?”

“Yes, business, Bosco, the business of the Lord of Discipline being found in his rooms with a disemboweled slut!”

“Ah,” said Bosco thoughtfully. “That business.”

“You think because I’m old and sick that I don’t know what’s going on here? Well, not for the first time, you’re wrong. Sick as I am, you still can’t get up early enough to catch me out, Bosco.”

“No one of any intelligence would underestimate your wisdom and experience, Your Grace, but…” He let out a regretful sigh. “I had hoped to spare you the revolting nature of what we found in Redeemer Picarbo’s rooms. It would be a pity if a reign as distinguished as your own should be overshadowed by something like this.”

“I’m too old for that flannel, Bosco. I want to know what he was doing with her. It wasn’t just fucking, was it?”

Even Bosco, a man apparently unmoved by anything, was unsettled by the use of the term. Such direct reference to the sex act was never heard, it usually being spoken of only using such circumlocutions as “beastliness” and “uglification”-though, even then, rarely.

“Perhaps his soul had gone bad. Evil is always at work, Your Grace. He had perhaps taken pleasure in the just punishments meted out to the acolytes. It has been known before, I think.”

The High Redeemer grunted. “How did he get hold of a girl out here?”

“As yet I have been unable to find out. But he had many keys. You and I alone would be permitted to ask questions of a Lord of Discipline. It will take time.”

“He couldn’t have done this without help. This could be about more than beastliness-it might be a heresy.”

“The thought had occurred to me, Your Grace. There are twenty of his cronies in isolation in the House of Special Purpose. The more senior deny-so far-that they knew anything, but the ordinary Redeemers admit they created a further cordon around the convent under Picarbo’s orders by sealing up farther layers of corridors so no one would suspect anything. The convent was already completely isolated from the Redeemers, after all. No one was ever supposed to see the brides’ faces. Picarbo disguised their activities in and out of the place by moving the kitchen and laundry used for higher Redeemers inside the cordon. Everything goes in and out by a great drum. Because Picarbo had the Lord of Vittles and the Master of the Laundry as part of his little set of heretics there was no problem drawing off food or anything else.”

“But we’re opening up the old corridors by the mile. Molloy would have found them sooner or later.”

“Unfortunately the Master of Reclamation was one of them.”

“My God! That sanctimonious pismire Molloy was helping turn the Sanctuary into a whorehouse?” The High Redeemer lay and gasped at the horrible enormity of it all. “We need a purging, we need Acts of Faith from here to the end of the year… we must disem-”

“Your Grace,” interrupted Bosco, “it is by no means clear that uglification was the purpose of this harem. I’m not sure it was a harem at all, more a place of isolation. From what I have been able to decipher from his writings, mad as they are, Picarbo was looking for something, something very specific.”

“What would he find in the bowels of some fat slut?”

“I can’t say as yet, Your Grace. Purging may be required, and a great deal of it, but we should wait until I’ve got to the bottom of this before we start lighting the candles to God.” Lighting candles to God had nothing to do with wax or wicks.

“You watch out, Bosco. You think that you’re the better for knowing things, but I know… ” He jabbed a finger at Bosco and raised his voice, “I KNOW that knowledge is the root of all evil. That bitch Eve wanted to know things and that was what brought sin and death down upon all of us.”

Bosco stood up and moved to the door.

“Redeemer Bosco!”

Bosco turned and looked at the shriveled old priest.

“When you bring Cale back here, he is to be executed. And I will issue an order to that effect today. And you forget about digging into that shit Picarbo’s debauchery. You cleanse everyone who had dealings with him. I don’t care if they might be innocent. We can’t take the chance of heresy-burn them and let God sort them out. The blameless will get a better reward of eternal life.”

An observer of the kind on whom nothing was lost might have seen the Lord Militant blink as if he had considered something and made a decision. But it might merely have been a trick of the lack of light. He stepped forward and bent down as if to plump up the pillows around the High Redeemer. But instead he took one of them and placed it carefully and firmly around his tiny old face, all of it done with such speed and so little fuss that it was only in the fraction of a second before the pillow closed over his mouth that the Lord High Redeemer realized the horror of what was happening.

Two minutes later Bosco emerged from the bedroom and saw the tall Redeemer instantly stand up to go into his master.

“He fell asleep while we were talking. Not like the High Redeemer at all. Perhaps you should take a look at him.”

Bosco had not only murdered the High Redeemer, he’d lied to him. He had not told him the true extent of Picarbo’s collection of young women or of his growing suspicions about the aims of the late Lord of Discipline’s disgusting experiments. There would need to be a period of assessment concerning what to do with the women, but in due course they would make an extremely useful pretext for his next move to take complete control of the Sanctuary and an object lesson for Cale on his return.

By the third day Cale had caught up with the Redeemers and had watched them turn west, taking them away from Vague Henri and Riba. And after another day they turned east, which would have taken them dangerously close to the pair. It was while following and hoping they would turn again that the only truly unusual experience of his watch took place.

He was approaching the end of one of the Scabland hillocks, one that had collapsed and formed a jagged edge. As he turned the corner, he bumped into a man coming the other way. Cale was so surprised he almost lost his feet on the loose gravel, but the man, standing on a steeper section, could get no purchase and crashed onto his back with a hefty thud.

It gave Cale time to pull the knife he had stolen from the Lord of Discipline and stand over the man with him at his mercy. The man, however, quickly got over his surprise at the strange sight and groaned as he started to get to his feet. Cale waved the knife at him to make it clear he should stay where he was.

“So,” said the man with weary amiability, “first you bump into me and now you want to cut my throat. Not very friendly.”

“People do say that about me. What are you doing out here?”

The man smiled.

“What everyone does in the Scablands-trying to get out.”

“I won’t ask you a second time.”

“I don’t think that’s really any of your business.”

“I’m the one with the knife, so I’ll decide what’s my business or not.”

“A good point. May I get up?”

“You’ll do where you are for the moment.”

The man looked as if he’d seen a few odd things in his life, but he was clearly puzzled by the presence of someone so young and so self-possessed in the middle of the Scablands.

“You’re a long way from home, aren’t you, boy?”

“Never mind about me, Granddad, you need to be more worried about where you’re going to buy a walking stick all the way out here.”

The man laughed.

“You’re a Redeemer’s acolyte, aren’t you?”

“What’s it to you?”

“Nothing, really. It’s just that on the few occasions I’ve seen an acolyte they were in rows of two hundred and there were a couple of dozen Redeemers watching them with whips. Never seen one on his own before.”

“Well,” said Cale, “there’s a first time for everything.”

The man smiled.

“Yes, I suppose there is.” He held his hand out. “IdrisPukke, currently in the service of Gauleiter Hynkel.”

Cale didn’t take his hand. IdrisPukke shrugged and lowered it.

“Perhaps you’re not as young as you look. It’s wise to be careful out here.”

“Thanks for the advice.”

IdrisPukke laughed again.

“You don’t compromise, do you, boy?”

“No,” said Cale flatly. “And don’t call me boy.”

“As you prefer. What should I call you?”

“You don’t need to call me anything.” Cale nodded toward the west.

“You’re going that way. Try to follow me, IdrisPukke, and then you’ll see just how uncompromising I can be.” He gestured that he should get up. IdrisPukke did as he was told. He looked at Cale for a few moments, as if carefully considering what he would do. Then he sighed, turned round and went off in the direction Cale had signaled.

For the next twelve hours Cale remained intensely suspicious of the meeting with IdrisPukke. Was he a Redeemer in disguise, for example? Not likely. Too much liveliness of soul came off him for one of them. A bounty man? Again, not likely. The Redeemers kept things like this to themselves. On the other hand he had killed a Lord of Discipline, a sin of such foulness that they might be ready to do anything to get him back. So it was on this thread that he stayed while he tracked the Lord Redeemers and hoped they would change direction. A day later they did so, heading west again. Usually the hunters would stay that way for at least twenty-four hours. It was time to get back to the others. If he could find them.

Twelve hours later he was on the line they had planned for Henri and the girl to take. But ten miles ahead, just in case. Then he started to walk back down the line to make sure he didn’t miss them, all the while keeping as hidden as he could so that the Redeemers Kleist was supposed to be spotting didn’t blunder into him or he into them. It was only a few hours before he found all three of them standing in a large hollow surrounded by some twenty mutilated bodies, some cut into small pieces. The others saw him from a hundred yards away and waited, without moving, as he walked through the scatter of dead bodies. He nodded to all three of them.

“The Redeemers have gone to the west,” he said.

“Last time I was with mine, they’d turned east.”

Then there was silence.

“Any idea who they are?” said Cale, nodding at the dead.

“No,” said Vague Henri.

“They’ve been dead for about a day, I’d say,” said Kleist.

Riba had something of the same stunned look about her Cale had seen when he rescued her from Picarbo-a look that said: this isn’t happening.

“How long have you been here?” he asked softly.

“About twenty minutes. We met Kleist on the way here a couple of hours ago.”

Cale nodded. “We’d better search them. Whoever did this hasn’t left much, but there might be some salvage.”

The three boys started to search among the remains, finding the occasional coin, a belt, a torn coat. Then Vague Henri spotted something shiny in the sand next to a severed head and quickly brushed the sand away, only to discover it was a brass knuckle duster. He was disappointed, but it was at least useful.

“Help me,” groaned the severed head.

With a cry Henri leapt backward.

“It spoke to me, it spoke to me!”

“What?” said Kleist, irritable.

“The head. It spoke.”

“Help me,” groaned the head.

“See!” said Vague Henri.

Carefully Cale approached the head with his knife and poked it in the temple. The head groaned but did not open his eyes.

“They’ve buried him up to his neck,” he said after a moment of careful consideration. The three boys, familiar with human atrocity, realized now that nothing supernatural was involved. They all looked down at the buried man and considered what was to be done.

“We should dig him out,” said Vague Henri.

“No,” said Kleist. “Whoever did this went to a lot of trouble. I can’t see they’d take kindly to us ruining their efforts. We should leave well alone.”

“Help me,” whispered the man again.

Vague Henri looked at Cale. “Well?” he said.

Cale said nothing, thinking carefully.

“We haven’t got all day, Cale,” said Kleist. By now Cale was looking into the distance.

“No, we haven’t.” Cale’s tone of voice was odd, alarming. The other two looked up, following his flat gaze. At the top of the nearest hillock, about three hundred yards away, a line of Redeemers was looking down at them. Then the line began to move.

The boys, all three of them pale, stood still. There was nowhere to run. Riba moved first, running forward to get a better look at the line of men marching toward them.

“No. No. No,” she said, over and over again.

Vague Henri, white as flour, looked at Cale.

“You drew the small stone,” he said.

Cale stared at his friend, eyes expressionless. There was a moment’s pause, and then Cale took out his knife and walked quickly toward Riba, who was still staring at the line of advancing men. As Cale moved to grab her hair and expose her neck, Kleist called out.

“Wait!”

At this Riba turned round. Cale had lowered the knife, but even in her terrified state she could see that something odd was happening.

“They’re not Redeemers,” said Kleist. “Whatever they are. Best just to let’s see what happens.”

As they watched, more men came over the top of the hillock, but they were on horses and leading behind them thirty more. The riders caught up with the men on foot, who then themselves mounted, and within less than a minute, fifty or so bad-tempered cavalrymen surrounded the four of them. Half of them dismounted and began examining the remains of the bodies. The others, swords drawn, just stared at the four.

One of the cavalrymen looking at the bodies called out: “Captain, it’s the Embassy from Arnhemland. This is Lord Pardee’s son.”

The captain, a large man on an enormous horse nearly twenty hands high, moved it forward and dismounted. He walked over to Cale and without pausing fetched him such a hefty blow to the face that the boy crashed heavily to the ground.

“Before we execute you, I want to know who ordered this.”

Dazed and in pain, Cale did not answer. The captain was about to add a kick of encouragement when Vague Henri spoke up.

“It was nothing to do with us, Lord. We only came on them just now. Do we look as if we could have done this?” Henri thought it best to tell the truth. “We only have one knife between us. How could we?”

The captain looked at him and then back at Cale. Then he delivered a hefty kick to Cale’s stomach.

“Fair enough. We won’t cut your throats for murder-we’ll do it for looting.”

He looked over at the small pile of things they had collected from whatever the killers had missed-a bag, a plate, some kitchen knives and dried fruit as well as the brass knuckle duster. Henri could see that it looked bad.

“One of them’s still alive. We were just about to dig him out,” Henri pointed to the now unconscious man who, more than ever, looked like a severed head in the dust.

Quickly the soldiers surrounded him and began digging at the sand and gravel.

“It’s Chancellor Vipond,” said one of them. The captain waved them to stop and knelt down, taking out a flask of water. Gently he poured a little into the unconscious man’s mouth. He coughed, spitting all the water back.

By now one of the soldiers had brought forward a pair of shovels, and within five minutes they had eased the man out of the sand and laid him on the ground. There was much listening to his heart and checking him for wounds.

“We were going to save him,” said Henri, as Cale looked at the captain malevolently from his pitch in the dust.

“That’s what you say. All I know for sure is that you’re a bunch of thieves. No reason not to sell the girl and kill you three.”

“Don’t be unreasonable, Captain Bramley, darling,” called out a man’s voice from behind a mounted cavalryman’s horse. That he was not one of them was clear from the fact that he did not wear a uniform and that both his hands were tied and hung from a rope knotted to the saddle of the horse in front of him.

“Shut your big gob, IdrisPukke,” said the captain.

But IdrisPukke was clearly not a man to do as he was told.

“Be wise for once, Captain, darling. You know that Chancellor Vipond and me go back time out of mind. He wouldn’t take kindly, I’d say, to you killing three young men who’d tried to save him. What do you think?”

The captain looked uncertain for the first time. IdrisPukke dropped the mocking tone. “He’d want the chance to make up his own mind. That’s for certain.”

The captain looked down at the unconscious man, now being put onto a stretcher with a rolled blanket under his head. He looked back at IdrisPukke.

“One more word out of you and, I swear to God, I’ll disembowel you where you stand. Understand me?”

IdrisPukke shrugged but wisely, thought Vague Henri, said nothing. “Grady! Fog!” the captain called out to two soldiers. “Stay close to this gobshite. And if he even looks like he’s going to try and escape, blow his bloody head off.”