She heard the sound of steps on hard dirt, someone running away from the beast.
They needed to hide, to burrow in the hay, but the creature was coming too fast. The door stood wide open to the moonlit yard and Sugar could do nothing but watch as a misshapen thing, huge and shaggy, walked into view.
A scream rose inside her. She cried out. She could not help herself, and the beast glanced her way.
But it did not stop. It walked past the door. Then it began to run and its heavy footfalls receded from the barn.
Sugar could not move. Her heart beat in her throat. She could barely breathe.
“Those heavier footsteps, what were they?” asked Legs.
Sugar did not reply.
“It was the thing that carried Mother away, wasn’t it?”
Sugar looked at him. How could he have known that? “I don’t know.” And yet, what else could it be?
“I held the charm today, down in the cellar,” said Legs. “Do you think the creature has come to help us?”
“No,” said Sugar. Not that thing. The wisterwives created beauty. That was from some other source. Whatever it was, River could offer more protection than this barn ever would. “We need to get to the house.”
“I saw Mother. I held the charm in my hand and saw her.”
“What?”
“I saw Mother.”
“With the charm?”
“Yes,” Legs said.
“But I thought you said you didn’t trust the charm.”
“River said it was a gift.”
She had said that. “Mother’s alive?”
“She was calling. Telling me to watch and be ready.”
“This is all too confusing,” she said. “River claims the creature is not part of this Order she and Mother belong to. It’s a wicked thing.”
Legs said nothing, and she could tell he wasn’t convinced.
“We don’t have time now,” Sugar said. “Keep it away. We’ll discuss it later with River.” She gripped his hand tighter, stood, then inched to the barn door. She peered into the night. Then with all the courage she could muster, she tightened her grip on Legs’s hand and dashed across the yard. When they burst into the dimly lit house, both Talen and River looked up at them.
“It’s here,” said Sugar. “The creature from Whitecliff.”
“What?” asked River.
“It killed a man right there,” said Sugar and pointed to the wall where she’d seen him fall.
River rose and cautiously looked out the door to the side of the house. She gasped.
“I told you something was there,” said Nettle.
Moments later River shut the door up and turned to face them. She made Sugar relate everything she’d seen. Sugar told her everything except Legs’s comments about seeing Mother. When she finished, River stood looking at the floor, gathering her thoughts.
After a moment, she looked up at them. “Listen to me. You have one chance, and that is out the back window. Run as quickly and quietly as you can. Under no circumstances will you come back here. None. I will meet you at the Creek Widow’s.”
The Creek Widow was like an aunt to them. Every year Da hauled them over to help her harvest her apples. Except this year, of course, because of their feud.
“Where are you going?” asked Talen.
“To play a game,” she said, “of hide-and-seek.”
Talen set himself to argue, but before he could say a word, River slipped out the door and into the yard.
Sugar felt like her one stay had just been taken out from underneath her. She wanted to cry out, but could find no words.
The four of them stood frozen. Then Talen broke the silence. “You heard her,” he hissed. “Out the back!”
Nettle went first, then Legs and Sugar. Talen tossed his bow and a quiver of arrows through to Nettle, then he tumbled out. When he rolled to his feet, he pointed toward the shallows dozens of yards up the river and said, “We’ll go to the bank of the river and then up to the crossing.” He turned to Nettle. “We’ll take the hill road, past your house, then on to the Widow’s.”
He and Nettle dashed for the river. Sugar held Legs’s hand and followed, crouching low, the tall autumn grass brushing the tops of her thighs. At the lip of the bank, she risked one look behind her and stopped.
Beyond the house and barn, past the pigpen, out in the mule’s field, she could see River’s slender shape in the moonlight and the beast’s larger form approaching her.
River changed her course and began to walk away from the creature. It followed her, and Sugar realized River was leading it along, dragging, as it were, a broken wing like a mother bobwhite luring a fox away from her nest.
She turned and ran with her brother to catch Talen. And in that moment Sugar realized she was running again. Running as she had when Mother and Da were cut down. Running from the very creature that knew where Mother was.
Things to act. Things to be acted upon. Now was not the time to flee. She knew what she had to do. It was mad. Wild. But no more so than anything else that had happened in the last few days.
“Talen,” she called.
Talen made an angry silencing gesture with his hand, but he did stop.
When Sugar caught him, she held Legs’s hand out. “Take him.”
“He’s your brother,” said Talen.
“You don’t have time for me to explain,” she said. “Keep him safe.”
She couldn’t argue or wait. She bent low to her brother’s ear. “I’m going to find Mother.”
Legs, ever brave, reached out for her arm and gave it a squeeze.
She squeezed back then turned and ran to the house and around the corner to the moonlit yard. She glanced back at the river. Talen and Nettle ran along the bank, each holding one of Legs’s hands. Talen could have balked. He could have left Legs on the bank of the river. He could have done a great many things besides help, and a wave of gratitude welled up in her.
She faced the yard and field beyond. This was the creature that had stolen Mother. It hadn’t killed her, but taken her away. And this might be, as crazy as it seemed, the only chance to follow it and find its lair. Or its master’s. Perhaps it had fed on Mother and all she would find was a half-rotted carcass. But perhaps it had not. Mother might yet be alive. And who knew: finding the location of the monster’s lair might tip this battle.
She had no idea what she would do if she found Mother. But whatever it was, it would be more than she could do hiding in holes.
And if the monster caught her, would that be any worse than being caught by the Fir-Noy or some bounty hunter? What could it do to her that the flaying knives couldn’t?
She stole past the house, across the yard, and into the shadow of the barn. When she looked out at the field, she thanked the Creators that River had not yet disappeared into the woods.
Sugar crouched as she ran to the fence bordering the field, then it was up and over and into the field as sly as a cat hunting prey. She moved as quickly and silently as she could, and when both River and the creature finally did disappear into the woods on the other side, Sugar stood and ran.
____________________
River came within a half-dozen paces of Hunger, but then she began to walk at an angle away from him. Hunger followed, but she kept just out of his reach, like a reluctant horse that didn’t want to be harnessed.
He held his hands wide, then knelt upon the field and prostrated himself in submission. How else would she know he meant her no harm?
When he looked up, she stood still, studying him. He made one of the signs of the Order with his right arm, and stood again.
She backed away.
He motioned for her to halt. Then he made another sign. This time she stood still when he took the next step, and the next. One more and he would be able to reach her.
Of course, she was frightened. Who wouldn’t be? But he’d catch her, and when she’d calmed, he’d make her understand.