The Bone Inspector turned at her strained voice, before grabbing her arm to propel her back the way they had come.
"Away from them!" she yelled.
"There's no cover." His voice was remarkably calm, although his body had dropped into a low, loping posture that reminded her of a hunting wolf.
He was right; their only chance was to attempt to hide and hope the Fomorii couldn't see where they were going, but there was hardly anywhere in the flat open landscape.
The only place in view was the jackknifed tanker. It offered little protection, but if they could crawl beneath it they might be able to scurry into the ditch beyond where the Fomorii would have trouble reaching them. In the heat of the moment Laura didn't have time to consider how sickeningly short-termist that was.
The Fomorii had the terrifying speed of jet fighters. The tanker was still yards away when the wash of driven air buffeted Laura and the Bone Inspector. There was a smell like rotting meat and what sounded like a power drill. Their peripheral vision was filled with constantly changing horrors; a deep, arctic shadow fell across them. The Bone Inspector knocked Laura to the ground and threw himself across her.
They both felt the breeze as the Fomorii tore through the space where they had been. Despite his advancing years, the Bone Inspector was on his feet in an instant, hauling Laura up behind him as if she weighed nothing.
Amidst the frantic activity and danger, Laura was surprised to find an area of deep serenity in which she could step back to observe herself. What she saw surprised her: just weeks ago she would have been paralysed by fear. Instead she felt calm and focused and, if it hadn't sounded so incongruous, brave.
She was thrown out of the moment by a hard impact to her right shoulder. Relieved that the Fomorii had missed clubbing her to the ground she continued a pace before an object came flying past her to skid across the road. It was an arm. Her arm.
The shock of the sight brought her to a halt. Her vision wavered a second; impressions rushed towards the front of her mind, but didn't coalesce. She was dimly aware of several shapes converging on her.
The Bone Inspector was in her frame of vision, yelling something she couldn't hear. A second later she was being lifted across his back as he ran the final few yards. They dived beneath the tanker as the road erupted at their heels.
Laura came out of her daze, aware of a dull ache at her shoulder. She didn't look at all. Shards of metal clattered across the road as the Fomorii tore frenziedly at the side of the tanker to get at them. "Keep moving," she croaked. "I'm fine."
The Bone Inspector cast a searching eye across her face, and then scurried into the ditch. Laura followed, keeping low, feeling brambles tear at her face and hair, not really caring.
The Fomorii continued to attack the tanker. "Stupid bastards," Laura said under her breath.
The two of them had managed to crawl three hundred yards away when the inevitable happened. The tanker went up in a massive explosion that rained burning debris all around them. They had just crawled in a culvert that ran beneath the road as the hedgerow disappeared in a blur of flame; trees turned to charcoal and the field beyond disappeared in red and yellow smoke. For a second or two, Laura couldn't breathe, until fresh air rushed in to fill the vacuum. Her ears rang from the blast.
She slumped back against the culvert, suddenly convulsed in tremors. The Bone Inspector was at her side in an instant, ready to bandage her shoulder with his shirt. When he paused suddenly, she gasped, "I know. Green blood."
"And not much of it." He pressed the shirt against the protruding socket joint and torn arteries. Despite his comment, it quickly grew wet.
"It had to be the right one," she said miserably. "Now I'll never beat Veitch at darts." Her attempt at humour sounded pathetic. She let her chin slump on to her chest, listening to the roar of the inferno.
"We'll rest here for a while," the Bone Inspector said. "We'll start moving again when the fire dies down."
"Good idea," Laura murmured. "I feel so tired." She closed her eyes and drifted away.
"I'm just saying it's bad strategy, that's all." Veitch finished up the last of his plate of rabbit stew hungrily and eyed the black pan on the old range with a measure of hope. Through Tom's judicious herbal treatments, he had recovered from the shock of the amputation and appeared back to his old irascible self, a piece of white cloth he washed obsessively was tied around his stump.
"Ryan is our strategist, after all." After his dinner of steamed vegetables, Shavi gnawed on a raw carrot, his dessert, much to Witch's disgust.
Tom furiously dunked his homemade bread in the last dregs of gravy. Before he could launch into a bad-tempered tirade, Davenport, the farmer who had taken them in earlier that day, poked his head round the door. He was wearing a dirty, shapeless hat and old coat, protection against the evening chill as he finished up the last of the jobs around the farm. "Everything all right, lads?"
"It was a very enjoyable meal, Mr. Davenport," Shavi said. "Our compliments to your wife. And we offer you our thanks for feeding us, when we have nothing to offer in return. We know there are shortages-"
Embarrassed, Davenport waved him quiet. "We've got enough to go round. I'd be worrying if I was one of the big boys. They won't know what to do now they can't get hold of their pesticides and chemical fertilisers. But I've been organic for a few years now, so, cross fingers, we should be all right for a while."
His wife, Rowena, pushed in next to him. She was in her late thirties, attractive, though weary looking. "Go on, Philip," she said, nudging her husband in the ribs, "ask them."
"I'm not going to ask them." Davenport shifted uncomfortably.
"If you don't, I will."
He sighed with irritation. "The wife wants to know if you're the heroes-"
She slapped him on the arm. "Don't say it like that!"
He wiped his nose with the back of his hand. "If you're-"
"Oh, get out of the way!" She pushed past him. "People are talking about a group of men and women going round the country trying to put right this awful thing that's happened. The farmers have been talking about it for weeks. They keep saying how some of these people helped out a farmer down in the West Country who'd got one of those spooks or goblins or whatever in his house. That's the story, anyway. But then we heard it from somebody else… a woman in the village. She's part of this parish pump news grapevine that's being set up to let everyone know what's going on. And one of the stories passed down the wire was about this group up in the north somewhere who fought against all those horrible things and saved an entire village. And they were doing all sorts of other… " Her voice faded away as she realised she was starting to ramble. She looked at her husband and added, "And yes, they did call them heroes. Said they could do things no other people could do. Said they were special."
Veitch tried to appear nonchalant, but he was fighting against pride. The woman noticed his fidgeting. "It is you, isn't it?"
"We are not special," Shavi said. "Not really. We are simply trying to do the best we can in a very difficult situation-"
"I told you they were the heroes," the woman said to her husband. She turned back to them excitedly. "What are you-"
Her husband pushed her out with undue roughness. "They don't want to be bothered by us!" He shuffled around uncomfortably. "We'll leave you alone now, lads. I know you'll have important stuff to talk about. But if you've got a moment before you take your leave-"
"We'll fill you in, mate." Once he'd gone, Veitch said conspiratorially, "Can you believe that? They're talking about us!"
"One should never believe one's own publicity, Ryan," Shavi said wryly. He eased back in his chair and sipped on his boiled water.