Down: Trilogy Box Set

by Glenn Cooper

  Delia woke first and sat up in her bed.

  She was about to scream when Trevor rushed forward and clamped a hand over her mouth.

  “It’s us,” he said.

  Brian held the torch high. Arabel awoke with a start. Emily wrapped her up in her arms. The children were in their own bed, sleeping through the intrusion.

  Arabel pulled away from Emily and stood before Trevor. “I knew you’d come,” she said, stepping into his outstretched arms.

  “Come on,” John said. “Everyone needs to get dressed on the double.”

  “Can I touch the children?” Andreas asked Emily.

  “Of course you can. Let’s just wake them gently first so they won’t be afraid.”

  “Come on, darlings,” Arabel said over their heads. “Wake up so we can have an adventure.”

  Dressing Belle was like dressing a rag doll but Sam hopped to it and got very excited very quickly when he saw the swords.

  “Who’s he?” he asked, pointing at Andreas.

  “He’s a friend of Auntie Emily,” Emily said. “He wants to shake your hand. Would you like to shake his?”

  Emily instructed Andreas how to shake hands and the giant extended his huge paw and squeezed down so delicately that he would not have broken an egg.

  “Her too?” Andreas asked.

  “You may pat her head,” Emily said.

  He did so and broke out a smile that showed his nut-brown teeth.

  “I like children,” he said.

  “I’m sure they would like to play with you, Andreas, but we really must get them to safety,” she said. “We have to leave the castle.”

  “Tell him we need a horse and wagon, better yet a covered wagon,” John said. “Even if we found the car it would take too long to charge and it would make a racket.”

  Arabel carried Belle and Delia toted Sam though he was wiggly and said he wanted to walk on his own and carry a sword. They retraced their steps down the stairs and through the great hall. John and Brian took the lead and exited into the bailey. It was deserted. The only signs of their struggle were puddles of blood on the courtyard stones. Brian retrieved the bows and quivers and he and John shouldered them on their free arms.

  Emily ran up next to John. “We need to find Paul Loomis,” she said.

  “We have no idea where he is,” John said.

  “He said he knew how to fix this. We’ve got to get him.”

  “Listen, Emily,” he said in a low voice the others couldn’t hear. “Our odds of getting out of here are slim. Our odds of getting out of here by wandering around this castle and looking for one man are zero.”

  “But …”

  “Think about the children. We need a wagon.”

  She nodded and went to Andreas. “Which way to a wagon?” she whispered.

  “The stables are down there,” he said, turning off down an alleyway. Trevor had the torch now and he made sure everyone could safely navigate the passageway between a palace wall and the outer perimeter wall.

  There were low-pitched noises ahead, animal-like grunting noises that suddenly stopped.

  Brian slipped the bow off his arm and nocked an arrow.

  There were whispers in German. Andreas heard his name and responded with his own whisper. Two figures stepped away from the alley wall, a rotund man and a skinny woman, both naked from the waist down.

  “Why aren’t they wearing trousers?” Sam asked.

  The man smiled at Andreas and waved.

  “Who are they?” Emily asked.

  “They are my friends,” Andreas said. “They were fucking.”

  “I see,” Emily said. “Can we trust them not to say they saw us?”

  “They will not say anything. They hate the Russians too.”

  “It’s okay,” Emily told the others while Andreas went to have a word. “He says they won’t talk.”

  “That’s going to put me off shagging for life,” Brian said.

  The stables were at the other end of the alley. The horses stirred and shifted in their stalls when they entered. John and Trevor went looking for a wagon and Brian went to inspect the horses and tack.

  The operation took longer than anyone would have liked because by the time they had hitched two horses to an enclosed wooden caravan the sky was beginning to lighten.

  With the children bundled inside with Delia, Emily, and Arabel, Andreas led the horses by their reins. Brian walked beside him, scanning the dark road, his fingers on the bowstring. John had the point, sword and pistol at the ready, and Trevor trailed behind, protecting their rear.

  The road ran parallel to the outer castle wall and led to the drawbridge gate. John knew the next steps would be difficult. The massive drawbridge would need to be lowered. There would be soldiers.

  With the gatehouse in sight, John signaled for Andreas to stop leading the horses. Delia got out to hold the reins and Emily took Trevor’s place, watching the rear.

  John, Brian, Andreas, and Trevor crept forward. They had to pass by the main barracks filled with hundreds of sleeping German and Russian soldiers spread out on cots over six packed floors. Past the barracks was the gatehouse. They snuck a glance into the gatehouse windows. The room was candlelit. A few soldiers were playing dice; others were dozing around the table, heads in arms. Andreas pointed and pantomimed moving a drawbridge windlass back and forth. They would have to get through these men before reaching the drawbridge.

  “No easy way,” Brian whispered.

  “Hard and fast,” John said.

  He and Brian nocked arrows and readied their bows. On John’s signal, Trevor pulled the gatehouse door wide open and got out of the way.

  Two arrows sliced through the air and caught two of the dice players in their chests. Brian adeptly re-nocked and fired again and while he was nocking his third arrow, Trevor, John, and Andreas piled into the room. John and Trevor used swords while Andreas just used his giant hands to knock heads together. Most of the gatehouse men were dozy and drunk. They didn’t fight like elite soldiers. They went down without much of a fight, succumbing to sword thrusts and Brian’s arrows.

  Brian entered and had a look around at the gatehouse mechanicals. He had devoted an entire episode on his TV show to drawbridges and medieval castle defense and he quickly got the lay of the land. He identified the windlass that controlled the lifting mechanism of the inner portcullis and began winching up the heavy iron grate.

  He called out to the others. “Those two windlasses over there do the drawbridge. Those chains go to lifting drums overhead and the counterweights drop through these trapdoors. Trevor, you and Andreas can start in. That windlass over there’ll lift the outer portcullis.”

  “I’ll get the wagon,” John said, leaving the gatehouse.

  The women were overjoyed to see him return. He took the reins from Delia and had everyone climb back in then slowly and as quietly as he could, led the horses past the dark barracks.

  The inner portcullis, a giant iron grate, was now fully lifted, allowing the wagon to roll underneath it into a vaulted tunnel. John could partially see into the gatehouse through a narrow observation slit. Andreas’s big shoulders were pumping one of the windlasses forward and back. He could hear the heavy chains turning on the overhead wheels and see the lightening sky of early dawn starting to appear as the massive drawbridge lowered. Once the bridge was down, the outer portcullis, a matching grate to the inner one, would have to be raised.

  Inside the gatehouse, none of them noticed one of the gatehouse men head banged by Andreas, emerging from his stupor and crawling out the door. From there he picked himself up and stumbled toward the barracks.

  “Almost there,” Brian told Trevor, “keep working it.” The ratcheting was harder work for Trevor than Andreas who hadn’t even broken a sweat. Brian gave John a thumbs-up through the observation slit and John climbed up to the driver’s bench on the wagon when the drawbridge clunked into place.

  The air filled with shouts from the barracks as the alarm
was raised and passed from cot to cot and floor to floor.

  “Get the kids down low,” John called out to the women in the wagon. He gripped the reins tightly but he was staring at a huge iron grate blocking the way.

  Andreas grabbed the windlass for the outer portcullis and shouted at Trevor and Brian, “Eile, eile, gehen!”

  They got the message and ran out the gatehouse to the waiting wagon.

  Brian jumped in the back of the caravan and took up a firing position with his longbow that also served to put a body between the attackers and the women and children. Trevor climbed up beside John on the driver’s bench.

  The grate began to lift.

  “They’re coming!” Brian shouted.

  Trevor shouted at the portcullis. “Come on!”

  Brian let an arrow fly and told Delia to keep feeding him with more.

  John watched the grate rise inch by inch. Judging by Brian’s exhortations from the rear, there wasn’t going to be enough time for it to fully lift. The moment he thought he had the minimal clearance he snapped the reins and shouted at the horses. The wagon lurched forward.

  The top of the caravan scraped loudly on the portcullis spikes.

  A mass of soldiers was swarming toward the rolling wagon. Emily lifted her head up from Sam’s squirming body and glanced out the back.

  Andreas appeared running toward the wagon, just in front of the closest soldiers.

  “Andreas is coming,” she shouted. “Slow down!”

  “We can’t,” Brian shouted, trying to get an arrow off around the hulking man’s frame. “For Christ’s sake, keep going!”

  Brian saw an arrow sail past the wagon and he swore. Then another one whizzed overhead. Then the pursuing archers went for an easier target.

  Andreas suddenly stopped running.

  Arrows pierced his back.

  He turned around and more pierced his chest. He tried to run toward the wagon but he couldn’t. He dropped to his knees.

  “No!” Emily cried.

  Andreas’s eyes locked with hers.

  The wagon was accelerating and the distance between them was increasing.

  Andreas managed one last shout to her, “Please remember Andreas!” and then he fell forward and was trampled by the swarm.

  “I will,” Emily whispered, her eyes glistening.

  John had no choice but to let the horses do a full gallop on the winding road spiraling down the mountainside.

  Inside the wagon everyone thrashed from side to side and Belle began to cry.

  “Are they coming?” John asked Trevor.

  Trevor cocked his pistol and partially stood to see over the top of the wagon. Dawn was breaking and he had a clear view uphill. The coast was clear. They’d left the soldiers behind. “We’re okay.” Then he saw a horse and rider, then another. “We’re not okay.”

  He fired his pistol and the nearest rider fell.

  “Take mine,” John shouted, passing his pistol up.

  Trevor fired again. The second horse reared and threw its man.

  Trevor sat back down.

  In the gunmetal gray of dawn John saw the Rhine’s murky waters and in the distance the wooden bridge that led to the Italian camp on the west bank.

  Horse hooves dug into the packed-down dirt road. A sharp turn was coming and he shouted for everyone to brace. The wagon swayed so hard he was afraid they were going to tip but they kept going, cheating gravity.

  The road straightened and Trevor had another look behind but Brian who was also monitoring the rear beat him to the punch.

  “They’ve mobilized the cavalry,” he shouted. “They’re coming!”

  John snapped the reins again and exhorted the horses to go flat out.

  They were down at sea level now, running parallel to the river. The bridge was looming.

  Brian kept up the spotter chatter from the rear. “They’re gaining on us!” Then, “There’s something going on up on the ramparts. It’s a bloody cannon.”

  John had to slow the horses to take the turn onto the bridge and when he’d made it he drove them back to a gallop. The wagon wheels whirred loudly on the rough wooden planks.

  “Tell Brian to fire his pistol into the air,” John shouted. “I want to let the Italians know we’re coming.”

  Trevor rapped on the front of the wagon and in a shout passed the order along.

  “I left the bloody thing back at the gatehouse!” Brian yelled.

  Boom.

  The percussion was followed by a whistling sound that John knew all too well.

  His cursing was drowned out by a shell from the Russian singing cannon exploding hundreds of yards in front of them to the west of the Rhine.

  Arabel screamed and threw herself over Belle.

  Brian saw the barrel of the cannon disappear with recoil. Then it came back into view. “They’re reloading!” he shouted.

  The only one who seemed unafraid was Sam who cheerfully parroted the boom and whistle.

  “They’ll hold their range and wait for us to drive into it!” John shouted to Trevor.

  “Take us into the fields when we’re across,” Trevor said. “We’ve got to avoid straight lines.”

  Once across the bridge the verges were too steep and wooded to get off the road. The horses galloped closer and closer to the point of impact of the last round.

  “I can’t get off the road!” John shouted.

  He saw a tree on fire fifty yards on.

  The impact point.

  A second round well timed would blow them to pieces. He thought about pulling up and stopping the wagon but Brian shouted that the Russian cavalry was approaching the bridge.

  If John were up on the ramparts, he’d be touching the fire hole of the cannon in about five seconds.

  Boom.

  John saw a flash coming from a thicket ahead followed by an unmistakable whistle.

  Garibaldi.

  The cannonball impacted the pale castle walls midway between the ground and the ramparts but it was enough to send the Russian artillerymen into a defensive posture.

  The wagon sped past the impact point.

  Ahead was a sight almost as wonderful as the cannon flash. A cavalry division composed of Italians, French, and Italians were galloping toward them and when they were nose-to-nose, they parted and streamed in single file to the right and the left of the wagon, galloping to engage the Russians.

  Trevor let out some joyous shouts as they passed the soldiers who raised their swords and whooped back.

  “Beautiful!” Trevor shouted. “Fucking beautiful!”

  “Are we going to be all right?” Emily shouted.

  “For now we are,” John shouted back, then more quietly, “For now.”

  The main concentration of German troops and the remaining divisions of the Russian army were bivouacked in a vast encampment to the east of Castle Marksburg. Stalin had been awoken and told of the escape. In a fury he sent a rider to mobilize the combined army and that army was now breaking camp.

  “Get my boots!” Stalin commanded Nikita. “And where is Yagoda?”

  “He has been summoned.”

  Yagoda arrived, tucking the last of his shirt into his pants, looking dazed from his rude awakening and the after-effects of too much wine.

  “How did this happen?” Stalin growled.

  The rat faced colonel said he didn’t know but would find out and destroy the responsible men.

  “Let us start with the man who was ultimately responsible,” Stalin said, drawing his fancy pistol and without hesitation shooting Yagoda between his closely spaced eyes.

  Stalin pulled his high boots over his trousers.

  “Let’s go, little Nikita,” he said. “We are going to have a war, a very big war.”

  33

  “How’re you doing this fine morning?” Christine asked.

  She had just removed the blonde woman’s ropes that tethered her to the toilet during the nights. Christine brandished a kitchen knife to discourage an
escape attempt.

  They had made things as comfortable as possible considering the tight space. There were duvets and pillows on the floor. There was water from the sink. There was a toilet, of course. She was provided with three meals a day and snacks if she kept her mouth shut and didn’t raise Cain. But they didn’t let her have any booze, not a drop, and predictably, she’d spent most of the week in withdrawal—not body-writhing, skin-crawling withdrawal, but it hadn’t been pretty or easy.

  The fight had gone out of her. She was calm and collected this morning and asked an appropriate question. “I’ve lost track. Is Roger back at school?”

  “He goes back Monday. This is Saturday,” Christine said, laying down a plate of eggs and toast.

  “Can I see him today?”

  “I don’t think he should see his mother tied to a toilet.”

  “He knows I’m in here.”

  “How could he not? All the ranting and raving you went through.”

  “I was sick.”

  “Tell me about it.”

  “What did you tell him?”

  “That his mum was sick with a tummy problem and needed to use the loo a lot. We told him we were nurses.”

  “He believed you?”

  “I think so. He’s a lovely boy.”

  “I know that.”

  “He doesn’t deserve the way you treat him.”

  She didn’t say anything.

  “Do you even remember how you treat him when you’re drunk?” Christine asked, her arms sternly folded.

  She teared up. “I’ve had a hard time.”

  “I know hard times. Molly knows hard times. You don’t know hard times.”

  “Ted doesn’t …”

  “I don’t want to hear it again. Ted doesn’t pay his child support. He left you for a chippy. The council’s cutting your benefits. Shut up. You’ve got a lovely son, a nice house, you’re safe, well fed, able bodied. You don’t know what bad is.”

  She rolled her eyes. “In Hell?”

  Christine hadn’t been keen to tell her but Molly, in a fit of pique responded to her “poor me” blubbering by telling her everything. The woman hadn’t believed a thing and Christine had left it at that.

  “Yeah, in Hell. I don’t give a toss whether you believe me. But here’s the thing. I don’t know if you’ve ever crossed the line enough to punch your ticket there, luv, but child abusers, child molesters and the like, well in Hell they get treated much like child abusers in prison if they’re stupid enough to talk about it. But in Hell it’s forever. We’ve got you sobered up. Stay that way and take care of that lovely little boy. If you don’t we’ll be waiting for you on the other side.”