Bones’ hollow chest swelled. His face split into a gummy grin. ‘Told you!’ he bellowed over his shoulder. ‘Told you ol’ bloodhog were a wonder! Wait till Four-Eyes sees him! Ho, we’ll feast tonight, me hearties!’
The sled rattling behind him, he loped back the way he had come, quickly disappearing into the gathering shadows.
‘May a sky serpent take the old loon!’ the haggard woman muttered.
‘Take care what you wish for, Needle,’ Cap replied mildly. ‘Who else would dare enter the Saltings and bring out the bones that keep us all alive? You?’
Needle scowled and turned away.
‘Finish here while I deal with our guests,’ Cap called to the gaping, whispering crowd. ‘Floss, will you—?’
‘Oh yes, I’ll bring your pickings along, Cap, for what they’re worth,’ grinned an old woman whose skin was so webbed with fine lines that it looked like well-used leather. ‘It’s painful enough watching you climb down the hole once a day, without watching you do it twice.’
‘So kind,’ the man replied with a smile and a mocking bow.
The exchange broke the tension. A few people laughed. Needle and her two henchmen scrambled up a large mound and crawled into the hole at the top one by one. Then Floss and the others disappeared into their own mounds, and soon only Rye, Sonia, Dirk and Cap remained above ground.
In the silence that followed, the companions became aware of an ominous growling, panting sound in the distance. Rye’s skin prickled. He felt Sonia grip his arm more tightly.
‘What is that?’ Dirk asked sharply.
‘Nothing that concerns you,’ snapped Cap, whose smile had vanished the moment they were alone. ‘Come with me.’
12 - Four-Eyes
Cap turned away from the mounds and began limping along the trail left by the runners of the sled. ‘Take care to tread where I tread,’ he called back over his shoulder. ‘The ground’s not safe.’
Rye, Sonia and Dirk followed cautiously, hands linked. By now it was almost completely dark. The panting sound was growing louder by the moment, but Cap did not speak again. Only when they had reached the track and scrambled down onto its pebbled surface did he turn to face them.
The marks of Bones’ sled continued across the track and disappeared into the darkness on the other side, but clearly Cap did not plan to take his guests any further. He had no intention of offering them shelter for the night.
Rye found himself feeling quite shocked. Even before the skimmer attacks began, no citizen of Weld would have dreamed of turning a traveller away at nightfall.
You are not in Weld now, Rye.
Indeed, Rye thought grimly.
‘This will lead you out of the Scour,’ Cap was saying rapidly to Dirk, pointing along the track. ‘Don’t stray from it or you’ll come to grief—the land on either side is studded with old jell pits. Only those who know what they’re doing can navigate it. Trust no one. There are spies everywhere.’
He glanced at Rye and Sonia then looked quickly back at Dirk, frowning with distaste. ‘And for pity’s sake, make those two cover their hair,’ he added. ‘Nothing is more likely to betray you.’
Rye found his fisherman’s cap and pulled it on. Sonia looked mutinous, then seemed to decide that the advice was good even if she resented the way it had been given. Silently she twisted her hair into a knot and snuffed out its brilliance with the ugly cloth helmet of the Keep orphan.
‘The track runs past the Diggings,’ Cap was telling Dirk. ‘If you manage to pass them in safety, which I doubt, it will take you on to where you want to go.’
‘And how do you know where we wish to go?’ Dirk asked coolly.
Cap snorted. ‘Do you take me for a fool? Even if I hadn’t heard your copperhead friend shout her feelings to the skies, there’s only one reason for people like you to have risked your lives trekking over the Saltings. You’ve come from across the sea to spy on the Master. Perhaps you even have orders to destroy him.’
Before Rye, Dirk or Sonia could speak, he held up his hands.
‘Tell me nothing! The less I know of you the better. Whatever you’re planning, whatever powers you have, you’ve no hope of defeating the Master. His sorcery is too powerful. One way or another, your mission will end in your deaths. But I daresay there’s no hope of persuading you of that, so I won’t waste my breath trying.’
He looked across the track as the panting noise suddenly stopped and a low hissing floated from the gloom.
‘Go now!’ he ordered. ‘I’ve given you all the help I can.’
‘You do not have to live like this any longer, Cap,’ Dirk burst out impulsively, gripping the other man’s shoulder. ‘You can get your people away. The other side of Dorne is safe now. We—’
‘Stop!’ Cap snarled, tearing himself free. ‘Keep your idiot thoughts to yourself, I tell you! Do you think we’d be here if there were any hope of escape? We’re watched continually. Our borders are sealed. The Saltings is death. We’re prisoners as surely as if we were behind iron bars, and we remain alive only because we’re no threat to the Master, and too old or crippled to be put to work in the Diggings.’
He glared at the companions through the tangles of his matted hair. ‘If you truly mean us no harm you’ll go, and go quickly. In general we’re left alone, but if you’re seen here you’ll attract attention we can well do without. Do you understand?’
Dirk nodded, clearly moved by the man’s plain speaking. Hoisting his skimmer hook more firmly onto his shoulder, he turned towards the dark horizon, trying to pull Rye and Sonia with him.
But Rye stood his ground. Cap’s voice had been steady but his nerves were strung as tightly as a tripwire—Rye could feel it. The man certainly did want to be rid of his unwelcome guests before they were seen. But this was not the only reason he was hurrying them away.
He was hiding something, and he wanted Dirk, Rye and Sonia to leave before they found it out. It was something to do with whatever was hissing in the darkness on the other side of the track. And it involved Sholto, too. Rye had never been so certain of anything in his life.
A terrible fear gripped his heart. ‘One thing, before we go,’ he said abruptly. ‘We are searching for one of our own who is missing—a thin, dark-haired man of about your height. Have you seen him?’
Cap ducked his shaggy head so they could not see his face. ‘I’ve seen no one of that description,’ he said. ‘Sorry.’
A weird, yodelling cry floated from the gloom beyond the track. Cap’s head jerked up. ‘I must go,’ he said. ‘Travel safely.’
Without another word he swung himself off the track and began hobbling rapidly towards the sound.
‘He is lying,’ Rye muttered. ‘Or at least he is not telling the whole truth.’
‘You are right,’ Sonia agreed. ‘He chose his words very carefully. Perhaps he did not see Sholto with his own eyes, but he knows something.’
‘Rubbish!’ Dirk snapped. ‘You are imagining things, the two of you. The man has helped us as much as he can. We should do as he asks, and leave him alone. By the Wall, is his life not hard enough, with that motley, quarrelling crew to lead and protect? The best thing we can do for him is to get away before that lunatic Bones fastens upon us again.’
He tugged Rye’s arm but Rye still resisted, shaking his head, and Sonia made no move to walk on either.
‘This is madness!’ Dirk hissed. ‘Rye, do as I tell you! Who is the leader here?’
‘No one!’ Sonia flashed back. ‘You may be older, Dirk of Southwall, and a great hero in Weld, but as you are so fond of telling us, we are not in Weld now! As far as I am concerned we are all equal in this. If Rye senses there is a secret to be uncovered, and I agree with him, then that is the end of it. Believe your precious Cap and go on alone if you will!’