Climbing up, he inserted the stick into the opening, found the centre of the nest and prised. The stick stuck in the wax. He prised harder and the bees swarmed toward his face.
He fell out of the tree, picked himself up and raced toward the water. They followed. One stung him on the back of the neck, another on the arm. He splashed into the creek, down to a shallow pool and ducked under. He felt more stings across his neck and shoulders. He must have carried the bees down with him.
Nish tried to brush them off, ran out of air and came up. The swarm, hanging low over the water, went for him. He swam underwater across the pool, coming up on the other side of a log. He clung on there, watching the swarm, which showed no signs of going away.
It was half an hour before he finally emerged from the water. The bees were gone. He did not feel good at all; he had been stung in at least a dozen places and there were lumps across his back, shoulders and neck.
Sitting on the bank, shivering and trying to warm himself in the sun, Nish noticed that there was something on the end of his stick. It was a large wedge of comb, golden honey oozing from it. He picked off a few dead bees and crammed a chunk into his mouth. As the sweet honey trickled down his throat it felt like a very good day. It did get better after that. He came upon a solitary nut tree whose bounty from last season, long fallen, had begun to sprout. Nish stuffed his belly to bursting with the mouldy fruit and filled the sleeves of his coat. His stomach ached all night but it kept him going until, after five more days of walking, he reached a fringe of the forest. There he hesitated.
He did not see how Minis was going to find him, one solitary individual in a wilderness. However, the constructs could not readily travel through the dense forest so he'd better keep to the edge.
He crept along the borderlands for another four days, staying to the shadows, heading south. He was wary of being seen, for lone travellers were vulnerable. Nish found enough food to subsist on: a sick rabbit one day, several crayfish in a pond the next.
On the thirteenth day after fleeing Morgadis he was rising from his bed of bracken when a horse whinnied not far away. Taking up a stout stick, he went to investigate. That proved to be a bad decision.
A detachment of soldiers was riding in his direction. They wore a uniform different from Troist's army and were leading a double file of prisoners, looped together. These looked like yokels; farm labourers and the like, all dressed in ragged homespun. It must be a conscriptors' gang, the land equivalent of a naval press gang. Any man between the ages of fourteen and sixty who lacked the necessary papers could be taken by force for the army, and conscripts were the lowest of all soldiers. They began their lives in chains and usually ended them in the belly of a lyrinx. They were paid nothing but their clothing and keep, and once taken, even if in error, were seldom freed.
Nish had experienced enough of the army. He ducked behind a tree but the movement must have caught someone's keen eye. A shout rang out. He ran toward the forest, which unfortunately was thin here. It would be hard to find a decent hiding place. He darted between two trees, turned sharply left behind a screen of pungent pepperbushes and ran on tiptoe across the grass, trying not to make a sound or leave a trail.
At least two mounted soldiers were after him; he could distinguish the hoofbeats. Ahead, the land was flat, though to his right it sloped down to the creek where earlier he had found the crayfish. It was not deep enough to hinder his passage, much less the horses, but the water would hide his tracks if he could get far enough ahead.
They were too close. They would run him down. Nish rolled over a great fallen tree and ducked down behind it, creeping along to the other end where there was space enough underneath to hide.
The horsemen came pounding out of the trees. 'Where's he gone?' cried one, a tall man with long trailing locks and a bushy red beard.
'Not far,' yelled the other, a nuggetty man with a mean look in his dark eyes. 'He couldn't have gotten away. Must be hiding.'
They walked their horses forward, the nuggetty one heading for the fallen tree while the other approached a clump of wiry shrubs. He had a solid stick in his left hand and looked as though he would enjoy using it.
Nish edged back under the trunk. He might just get away from the other side if the man was not too careful in his search. Unfortunately he proved to be meticulous. It was as if the soldier knew Nish was there, for he worked his way along the trunk, leaving nothing to chance. Should he attack the fellow and try to bring him down, or run for it?
If Nish attacked he had to succeed, else the other horseman would have him in seconds. Nish studied the soldier. The fellow looked strong and mean. Backing under the nest of branches, he waited until the man went past, then leapt out at him. The soldier must have seen him from the corner of his eye for he whirled the horse in its tracks. There was no time to run; Nish sent the stick spinning through the air with all his strength.
His aim was high but his luck held. The horse reared, the heavy end of the stick took the nuggetty fellow in the face and he went off backwards. Before he could recover, Nish caught the side of the saddle, threw himself half onto the horse and screamed 'Go!'
The frightened horse bolted through the trees towards the water. As he pulled himself into the saddle, behind him Nish could hear the roars of the unhorsed soldier.
'He went that way!'
The rider came after him. The other fellow would be running for help. When, if they caught him, they would beat him senseless for this affront, and to give the other prisoners a lesson they would never forget. No one cared about the fate of a conscript.
Splashing into the water, Nish rode up the centre of the stream. Unlikely it would make any difference with his hunter this close behind, but he needed all the help he could get. The man was not yet in sight but Nish could hear him. Breaking away from the stream, he walked the horse into the deep forest. The trees were closer together here, and it was darker; easier to hide, though the ground was moist and he left clear tracks.
After riding for a good while, he turned into another gully and stopped. He could hear nothing. Had he lost the fellow? It did not seem likely. Perhaps he was waiting for Nish to move.
Walking the horse up the other side, Nish wondered at the unnatural silence. There was not a sound to be heard. He continued up the steep slope, the horse's hooves breaking through leaf litter and slipping on clayey yellow loam. Nish felt vulnerable. The horse was panting as it struggled up the slope.
Nish reined in, cocking his head. Feeling uncomfortable without knowing why, he turned across the slope, and as he did a pair of riders rose up on their stirrups and came at him. Another few steps and he would have walked right between them.
Nish kicked his horse into a run, slipping and sliding across the greasy slope. Passing beside a black-trunked tree, so close that his knee struck it a painful blow, he turned sharply on the other side, angling toward the creek. Going around a tilted standing stone shaped like a tooth, he pounded along the edge of the creek. One rider was close behind. Nish caught occasional glimpses of the other, at the top of the slope.
No use trying to get up that way. He shot by a copse of trees as dark and dense as a wall and looked back. The soldier was gaining. Nish turned sharply along the line of trees, splashed across the creek and up the other side, coming out into open woodland, though the forest continued beyond that. He was halfway across when two more horses appeared on the far side. Nish turned away. The pair who had been following him came out of the trees.