Laura sat apart, staring out of the window blankly. Church found it impossible to read her; the impassive expression could have been hiding a sense of deep betrayal, or something he didn't want to consider, but which was nonetheless licking at the back of his mind. He hated himself for thinking it, though when he looked around he could tell the others felt the same. The thing he had dreaded had come to pass: a cancerous suspicion was eating away at them all.
Beyond that he found it almost impossible to cope with the raw emotion searing his heart. At times, if he allowed himself to inspect it too closely, it reminded him of those terrible feelings that had consumed him after Marianne had died, and that surprised him; had he grown so close to Ruth so quickly? So much had changed over the past few weeks, bonds materialising on a spiritual level, others being forged through hardship: he hadn't even begun to get a handle on what was happening inside him.
As the first rays of dawn licked the rooftops across the street, the intermittent, stuttering conversation told him what he feared: that the others were looking to him to make a decision. Before Beltane, he would have wanted to tell them he wasn't up to it, he didn't have the resilience or tenacity of leadership within him. But his failure had made him face his responsibilities, and he would take the difficult decisions however much they might corrupt his essential character and beliefs. That, he told himself, is what it's all about. He had to make sacrifices for the greater good. He just hoped the sacrifices wouldn't be so great that there would be nothing left of him by the end of it.
"We need to move on to Edinburgh rapidly," he said eventually.
"We are going to look for Ruth, right?" Veitch asked.
"Of course."
Veitch eyed him suspiciously. "What would you have done if she'd been taken in the opposite direction?"
Church didn't answer.
None of them could decide how they should dispose of the finger so they wrapped it in a handkerchief and buried it in the depths of Church's bag. They packed quickly and checked out, despite the obvious concern of the hotel manager who wondered why they were leaving so early, without breakfast and one travelling companion short.
The last building of the town was barely behind them when a police car came screaming by, lights flashing, forcing them to pull over. The driver was a man in his mid-forties with greying hair and the wearied expression of someone who had been pushed to the limit, while his eyes suggested he'd been dragged out of bed to catch them. Veitch wound down the driver's window as he approached.
"You're going to have to accompany me back into town, sir." His eyes were piercing, but Veitch didn't flinch from the stare.
"No can do, mate. We've got business down south."
"I don't want to have to ask you again, lad. Since the martial law was brought in, I've been run ragged. They don't think it's the rural areas that need the help, so we have to fend for ourselves. So don't push me around because I'll push back harder if it makes my life easier."
As Veitch bristled, Church hastily leaned across him. "What's the problem, officer? We were driving okay-"
"You know what the problem is." There was a snap of irritation in his voice. "A certain matter of blood on the carpet."
"Oh, that. A bit of horseplay that got out of control. If the manager wants us to pay for cleaning-"
"Get out of the van. Now." The policeman's body grew rigid with tension.
Shavi tugged at Church's jacket from the back. "He thinks we killed Ruth," he whispered, too low for the policeman to hear. There was something in his voice that suggested he wasn't simply reading the policeman's mannerisms.
Everything seemed to hang for a second. Church saw Veitch's eyes narrow, his forearm muscles tense, and an instant later he had snapped on the ignition and popped the clutch. The van roared away, leaving the policeman yelling furiously behind them. Veitch drove wildly until the police car was out of sight, then he slammed on the brakes and reversed up a rough foresters' track which wound through ranks of pine. When the trees obscured the road he killed the engine.
"Big macho idiot," Laura said coldly from the back. "Now we'll be on everyone's most wanted list. We won't be able to travel anywhere."
Veitch glared at her. "You haven't got any right to talk. We wouldn't be here if not for-"
"Leave it out," Church ordered.
Veitch grew sullen. "The moment he got a look at my record we wouldn't stand a chance of getting out of the area for days," he continued. "We can't afford to waste that time."
"You did the right thing, Ryan." Church put his head back and closed his eyes wearily. "If things are as bad as they seem… if things are going to get as bad as we expect… the cops will have too much on their plate to worry about us. It might make things a little more difficult, but if they're not putting a dragnet out, I reckon we'll be okay."
"You better be right," Laura said gloomily.
Church recalled Shavi's apparent knowledge of the policeman's thoughts and turned to him. "You can read minds now?"
Shavi shrugged. "It was empathic."
"But you can get into heads, you've shown us that." Shavi wouldn't meet Church's gaze.
"What are you getting at?" Laura asked.
"I think Shavi should try peeling back the layers of your memory so we can find out what you really did see last night."
Even Laura's sunglasses couldn't mask her concern. "Not in my head."
"What have you got to hide?" Veitch asked coldly.
Laura's face froze.
"Ruth and I went through something similar when all this mess started." Church tried to be as reassuring as he could, for Shavi's sake as much as Laura's. "It wasn't so bad. And it really helped us to get all those trapped thoughts out in the open."
Laura moved her head slightly and Church guessed that behind her sunglasses she was looking at Veitch, weighing up his words and her options; his barely veiled accusations made it impossible for her to back out.
"Okay, Mister Shaman. You get to venture where no man has been before." Her voice was emotionless.
Church clapped a hand on Shavi's shoulder. "It'll be okay."
Shavi smiled at him tightly.
They locked up the van and ventured into the pines until they found a spot where the sun broke through the canopy of vegetation, casting a circle of light. Laura and Shavi sat cross-legged in the centre, facing each other, while Church, Veitch and Tom leaned on tree trunks and watched quietly. Shavi had already eaten some of Tom's hash to attune his mood. He spent a few moments whispering gently to Laura; after a while her eyes were half-lidded, her movements lazy.
The atmosphere changed perceptibly the moment Shavi leaned forward to take Laura's hands; the birdsong died as if a switch had been thrown, even the breeze seemed to drop. There was a stillness like glass over everything.
When Shavi spoke, the world held its breath. "We are going back to last night, Laura. To the hotel, after the dance. You and Ruth had gone to bed early."
"I wasn't in the mood. I'd had enough of Miss Prissy. And too many people were looking at my scars."
"You both went into your rooms. And went to sleep?"
"I lay down on the top of the bed. I was tired, the booze was knocking me out." Her voice was soporific. "I don't know how long I was asleep. Couldn't have been long. I heard a noise-"
"What was it?"
"I can't remember."
"Try."
She thought for a moment. "It was Ruth. She cried out."
"What did you do then? Tell me, step by step."
"I got up. I felt like someone had beaten me around the head with a baseball bat. I walked to the door… Actually, it was more of a stagger. I thought, `I'm glad Church isn't here to see this. I'd never live it down.' There was another noise. Sounded like a lamp going over. I thought I could hear voices through the wall. I stepped out on to the landing…" Her breath caught suddenly in her throat.