'Oh,' he said, disappointment evident in his voice. 'But if Kicker weren't here? Could you see me then?'
'A little hard to answer, Horace,' Will said. 'Because Kicker is there and it's hard to ignore him. He sort of draws the eye, and that goes against the whole concept of camouflage and concealment, you see.'
Horace chewed his lip thoughtfully. Will couldn't resist the temptation.
'I saw that. You chewed your lip.'
Horace made an impatient gesture. He had considered that moment to be in the nature of a time-out.
'Saw that too,' Will said relentlessly. 'If you want to remain unseen, you have to avoid chewing your lip and waving your arm. And it's best if you don't sit on top of a whacking great battlehorse while you're doing it.'
'All right. I suppose so,' Horace said. There was a slight tone of annoyance in his voice. 'But if you use your imagination…'
'You want me to imagine Kicker isn't here?' Will asked him.
'That's right,' Horace replied, determined not to be put off by the sarcasm in Will's voice. 'If he wasn't here, could you see me then?'
Will suddenly had the sense that they could be here for hours. He sighed heavily. 'Well, if I imagine Kicker isn't here, then I would find it exceedingly difficult to see you, Horace.'
'Thought so,' Horace said, with a satisfied smile.
'Particularly since you'd appear to be floating two metres in the air,' Will continued in a mutter.
'What was that?' Horace asked suspiciously.
'I said you'd appear to be not anywhere,' Will said, thinking quickly, and Horace nodded, satisfied once more. Will thought it might be a good idea to change the subject.
'Let's push on for a few more hours before we stop for the night,' he suggested. Horace shrugged agreeably.
'Suits me,' he said. Then he added an afterthought, 'Are you sure you won't lose track of me? I could just disappear in the dark…'
'I'll do my best,' Will said.
Just for a moment, he wished his friend would disappear.
They had a cold camp that night and rose at dawn to continue. They were drawing closer to their quarry now – assuming that the cave complex was Tennyson's planned destination. Horace abandoned his light-hearted attempts at concealment and became far more businesslike in his approach.
It occurred to Will, as it had to Halt in recent times, that Horace might well have been engaging in a subtle piece of leg-pulling with all his 'Can you see me now?' antics. Horace had years of leg pulling and practical jokes to make up and Will had the uncomfortable suspicion that the tall warrior had been secretly chuckling to himself the day before.
The ground began to rise now as they found themselves heading for the line of hills. The trees were fewer and farther between and they moved carefully, conscious that there could be hidden watchers observing their approach.
But there was no sign that they had been seen and eventually the ground levelled out into a plateau, leading to the foot of the hills proper. The trees grew more thickly as the ground levelled out and the two friends reined in, concealed by the shadows of a large grove, surveying the open ground that remained before them. Just a few hundred metres distant, the hills rose into the sky, steep and forbidding, a natural barrier. There was no sign of Tennyson or any of his followers.
'Nobody here,' Horace muttered.
'Nobody we can see,' Will amended. He was peering closely at the base of the hills. The sun was sinking in the west and, even though it threw direct light on the hills, the irregular folds of the sandstone created patches of light and shade and several darker patches could well have marked the entrance to caves. Or they could have been just deeper shadows.
Will had a sudden concern that Tennyson hadn't stopped here after all. That he had continued, maybe climbing the hills through some as yet unseen pass and was now heading away on the far side of the ranges.
Yet, reason told him, the Outsider leader could have done that at any time in the past few weeks. He had headed specifically for this range, where, according to the map, there was a large number of caves. If he'd wanted to simply disappear into the east, he could have done so without the difficulty of having to find a way over the hills.
And now that he could see them, Will realised they were closer to cliffs than hills and finding a way across them would be difficult indeed.
Horace nudged him with his elbow. 'Smell that?'
Will raised his head and sniffed the air experimentally. He caught the very slightest scent of woodsmoke on the air. It was faint, but it was definitely there.
'They're here all right. They're starting to get dinner ready,' Horace said.
'But where?' Will asked, scanning the cliff faces once more. Then Horace touched his arm and pointed.
'Look,' he said. 'There's a tree growing at an angle from the face of the cliff – about ten metres up.' He waited until Will nodded that he could see it. Then he held his hand out at arm's length, squinting with one eye closed, and held up first one finger, then two, vertically.
Then he folded the second finger down again. 'To the left of the tree, about one and a half fingers, there's a cleft. In the rock.'
Will mimicked the action of holding the fingers up and sighting down them. It was a simple but effective way of providing directions and he soon saw the cleft Horace had spotted.
A thin grey ribbon of smoke issued from it. The faint breeze grabbed it almost immediately, and dissipated it. But it was there. And so, he realised, was Tennyson.
'They're in the caves,' he said, and Horace nodded.
'We're going to have to get closer to take a look,' Will said, scanning the ground in front of them. There was plenty of low cover, but not enough to conceal Tug and Kicker. 'We'll have to leave the horses here and push forward.'
'You're planning to go into the caves?' Horace said, his voice very level. Will glanced at him. Since they had been small children, Horace had disliked confined spaces. It was one of the reasons that he never wore a full face helmet, preferring the simple cone-shaped cap. When they were younger, Will had used the fact to escape him on numerous occasions.
'I'll need you to keep an eye on things outside,' he said and saw Horace's shoulder slump in relief.
'You're sure?' he asked. 'I'll come with you if you really need me.'
Will reached over and squeezed his shoulder. 'I appreciate the offer,' he said. 'But it'll be easier for me to move around inside without being seen.'
'All right then,' Horace said. 'I can't say I'm disappointed.'
'Besides,' Will couldn't resist saying. 'With your newfound camouflage skills, I'd probably lose you in there.' Forty-five They waited until late afternoon. Will knew the light was more uncertain and deceptive at that time. Then, leaving Tug and Kicker in the grove of trees, they stole forward. Horace was wearing the camouflage cloak but this was no time for joking and he listened intently as Will gave him some last-minute instructions.
'Keep the cowl up so your face is shaded,' he said. 'When we stop, lie perfectly still, keeping the cloak around you. Halt's old saying used to be trust the cloak. It'll conceal you.'
'What about my legs and feet?' Horace asked. As he was a good deal taller than Halt, more of his legs were exposed below the cloak. Will shook his head in a dismissive gesture.
'Don't worry about them. The cloak will conceal your body and people don't expect to see disembodied legs lying around. They see what they expect to see.'
Horace grinned. 'Is that more of Halt's wisdom?'
Will grinned in return, nodding his head.
'One other thing,' Will reminded him. It was something the tall warrior had heard before but it always bore repeating. 'If we're moving and someone appears, just freeze. Stand perfectly still. It's the movement -'