Harlen, waiting, forgotten, watched them until they were out of sight, his face unreadable. Then he turned and began to walk after them.
Marna breathed a sigh of relief. She was through. She dropped down on to the ground heavily and leaned back against a tree. As Gryss had suspected, Marna had been quietly plotting ‘some foolishness’ for a long time. She had studied the maps and notes that she had stolen from the bottom of Jeorg’s pack and, accompanying her father on his trips downland she had reacquainted herself with the now heavily guarded terrain that had once been part of her childhood playground.
Jeorg had ventured to leave the valley in cautious openness, hoping to be able to plead his way out should he be challenged. Marna planned for complete conceal-ment. Dull, colourless clothes hid her in the palely lit night, and would help to conceal her too, in the daylight. A carefully acquired knowledge of the routines of the men who guarded the valley told her that only a few would be abroad patrolling so late. This, coupled with their not being truly prepared for anyone trying to escape, her own knowledge of the terrain, and her grim, fear-driven determination, carried her successfully along stream beds, through shrub and fern, and over rocky outcrops, until finally she had passed around the guarded line and reached the woods that fringed the valley’s sides. Now, surely, only ill-fortune, or gross carelessness on her part would see her captured.
The thought reminded her that she was still quite close to the guarded line and she allowed herself only a few minutes’ respite before she clambered to her feet and cautiously set off again.
She looked up through the trees. The sky was grey-ing a little. Soon it would be dawn, then her father would wake to find her message. She felt an uneasy twinge about the errand she had left him, but she did not dwell on it. She must do what she had to do. Someone had to reach the capital and bring some form of lawful retribution down on Rannick and these people, and she could do it, she knew. Besides, fathers were invulnerable, weren’t they?
She shook her head as the memory of Garren and Katrin Yarrance threatened to return, and strode out as quickly as the darkness and the need for silence would allow.
She pondered the journey ahead of her as she walked. There was no way of knowing how far abroad Rannick’s depredations had been carried, but if she used the night for the greater part of her journeying and the daytime for careful sheltering and rest, she must surely come eventually to a place that was beyond his reach, and then what could possibly prevent her from reaching the capital?
She looked up at the greying sky again. Each step she made was carrying her further away from Rannick and Nilsson and it would be a long time after daybreak before her father could deliver her letter and some form of search for her be set in train. She must make the most of this interlude.
After a while, she paused and looked back. She was far enough away from the guards not to be too con-cerned about travelling quietly. All she had to do now was walk, and listen for any kind of pursuit coming along the road below. Then, and only then, need she consider searching for somewhere to conceal herself for the day.
She strode out, through the lightening wood.
She was still striding purposefully forward when something wrapped around her ankle and brought her crashing down heavily. As she struggled desperately to regain her breath, she felt the grip on her ankle tightening.
‘Well, well. What have we here, charging through the trees and disturbing our sleep?’ said a voice.
Startled, Marna kicked out violently with her free leg. She struck something and there was an oath as she was abruptly released. Still gasping for breath, and encumbered by her pack, she scrabbled awkwardly to her feet.
At the same time, two figures rose up out of the shadowy ground. ‘You should look where you’re going, my friend,’ said one of them. The accent was strange. Whoever was speaking was not from the valley, but neither was he one of Nilsson’s men. Apart from a note of irritation in the voice, Marna took some reassurance from this.
‘First you barge into our little camp, making us think you were a bandit or suchlike. Then you nearly kick me in the face.’
‘I’m sorry,’ Marna gasped, as she flexed her ankles and legs, instinctively testing for damage after the winding fall. ‘Who are you?’
There was no immediate reply, but she could make out the two figures turning to look at one another in the gloom. ‘Who are we?’ came the mimicking, high-pitched echo, after a moment. ‘Bless me if we haven’t stumbled upon a lady, no less.’
‘No, no. She stumbled on us, don’t forget.’
‘True. True.’ There was a pause. ‘I thought that an-kle felt… interesting.’
There was a short, unpleasant laugh, then. ‘Talking about… feeling…’
‘Who are you?’ Marna asked again, sufficiently re-covered from her fall now to begin to be frightened by the tone of the conversation she was hearing.
‘Just two travellers come to join Lord Rannick’s army. We were spending a cold, lonely night in the woods until…’ The figure shrugged and came a little nearer. ‘But who are you, my dear, wandering the woods all alone?’ he asked.
‘I’m not alone,’ Marna said, increasingly alarmed. ‘And I’m one of Lord Rannick’s women.’
But on the instant, she knew that the tremor in her voice had exposed the lie in this announcement. There was another short pause in which the two men seemed to consult one another silently, then they stepped forward simultaneously. A hand was clamped across her mouth, and she felt hands grasping for her legs, seeking to destroy her balance and bring her down again.
She lashed out wildly and staggered backward. In the melee, her pack slipped off her back on to the floor and one of the men went sprawling over it. The other, however, still held her firmly and she found herself being spun around roughly. A stunning slap across the face exploded in her head and sent her reeling.
A terrible fear rose up inside her. She had never been struck before – not like that – not with malice and power and awful, focused intent. She remembered Nilsson felling the man in the courtyard, and knew now how he had felt. The strings of her adulthood began to unloose and childhood began to reassert itself.
As she floundered under the numbing impact of the blow, she was seized from behind, powerful arms pinioning hers by her sides. Ironically, the continued assault galvanized her. She began to struggle violently.
There was a grunt of effort from her captor as he tried to restrain her. ‘Whack her again, she’s strong, this one,’ he gasped to his companion.
Marna saw the figure in front of her draw back his arm. Yoked together, fear and anger screamed defiance. She wouldn’t be hit like that again! Wildly, she lashed out with her foot in the general direction of her attacker’s groin. Insofar as she had been aiming, she missed, but her stout walking boot connected solidly with his knee.
The man cried out and staggered backwards, swear-ing foully. His partner tightened his grip around Marna, making her gasp with pain. ‘You all right?’ he called out breathlessly.
A further stream of abuse greeted this inquiry as the injured man crouched low, hugging his knee. ‘I’ll teach you, you bitch,’ he concluded, straightening up slowly.
As he limped towards her, Marna saw the glint of a knife blade in the growing light. A pounding terror rose to paralyse her, like a rabbit before a stoat. In the far distance she was aware of a voice calling out, ‘No. Don’t spoil her. We can do that after.’
The man with the knife hesitated, and Marna felt waves of gratitude towards her captor mingling with her terror. Then the man took another step forward. He lurched violently as his injured knee gave way under him. His hesitation vanished and the clear intent that rang in his cry of pain and fury brought Marna back vividly and brutally to this dawn-lit woodland and what lay ahead for her.