Wildewood Revenge

by B. A. Morton

  Wildewood Revenge

  Part 1 of ‘The Wildewood Chronicles’

  by

  B.A. Morton

  ISBN 1480039217

  EAN 978-1480039216

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

  'Wildewood Revenge' is published by Taylor Street Publishing LLC, who can be contacted at:

  http://www.taylorstreetbooks.com

  http://ninwriters.ning.com

  'Wildewood Revenge' is the copyright of the author, B.A. Morton, 2012. All rights are reserved.

  All characters are fictional, and any resemblance to anyone living or dead is accidental.

  Chapter One

  Freezing fog enveloped the winter trees, while underfoot the forest floor was waterlogged after a winter of heavy snow had finally begun to melt. The trees shed their blanket of snow slowly, in steady drips and unsteady falls, shaking the canopy to reveal fresh green needles on evergreen giants and silvering bare branches on the deciduous ancient woodland. It was another world. A world far preferable to the one Grace had left behind in London.

  The young woman exhaled, her breath misting in the chill air as she walked. Pulling her shabby sweater more closely around her slender frame, she ducked her head and continued. Far in the distance, beyond the forest boundary, the noise of artillery fire could be heard as the army bombarded their targets on the adjoining military range. The red warning flags were flying as she entered the forest, but Grace knew she was safe as long as she kept to the logging road. Red flags were red rags to the girl who thought risky was another word for dare.

  She came here often, drawn to the stark beauty of the woods and surrounding crags. The woods were ancient and full of mystery. Sensible folk said she shouldn’t walk alone, that strange things happened in the heart of the woods. But Grace, a girl who could never be described as sensible, merely smiled.

  “Devoid of sound judgement and self-discipline,” were the words used by the distinguished old gentleman in the wig less than a month before, and she had to admit on that particular occasion he’d been correct. She’d made one error, and her life and career were now in tatters. Now, she preferred the solitude where she could forget the past, ignore the present and invent a new life, although she wasn’t quite alone; her dog trotted a little way ahead, nose to the ground, tail in the air. Little more than a pup, animated, energetic and lacking in discipline, rather like herself or so she’d been told.

  On reaching the older part of the forest, Grace, who liked to think she was fearless, quickened her step. There was an eeriness here which did not marry well with an over-active imagination. Plantation trees gave way to ancient woodland. Gnarled trees clothed in lichen, and isolated stagnant pools reflecting images of winter’s skeletal canopy. The many flooded gurgling culverts gave this area a sound and life of its own. The forest made its own music. In summer when the water flowed more gently it held a melancholy air, heavy and humid. Today there was mischief in the rushing brooks and Grace stopped, despite herself, to listen and take in the wonder of it.

  She found her gaze drawn past the trees at the edge of the rough road and through into the gloom beyond. Weak sunlight fractured through to the forest floor casting uneven shadows, punctuating the deep darkness with unnatural light made otherworldly by the dancing fog. The dog, too, was distracted as he stood poised, wet nose tasting a myriad of scents from the damp air which swirled evermore thickly toward them. Slowly Grace turned to look over her shoulder but the way back lay shrouded in mist.

  The dog growled once, a low uncertain rumble and the rough hair on the back of his neck bristled. With typical terrier curiosity and sheer bloody mindedness, he ignored his own sense of caution and with a bark of bravado he leapt the flooded ditch at the side of the road and disappeared into the gloom.

  Grace yelled after him, her voice echoing in the stillness as it bounced from tree to tree, causing her to shudder at the strange acoustics. Damn the dog. She called again but with no real belief in his compliance, and this time her usually strong voice came out as little more than a whisper consumed by the thickness of the air. She hesitated, scuffing at the gravel with the toe of her boot. She would go after him, she knew that. She also knew despite her own bravado, there was an element of risk in the woods, not from mythical creatures, but from the very real threat of military manoeuvres.

  As the troops weren’t allowed to cross the forest boundary, she wasn’t concerned she’d be flattened by a tank, blown up by a mine, or even spread-eagled by a strapping squaddie. In fact, she pondered slyly, a strapping squaddie might actually prove a much needed distraction. It had been some time since she’d been spread-eagled by anyone, but who knew about stray rounds from the ranges? Although Grace was game for most things, playing chicken with a bullet wasn’t one of them.

  She called the dog again, trying to inject an authoritative tone, and was rewarded by excited yapping some way off. She cursed again softly under her breath. The wood was awash with snow melt. If she went after him she would soon be up to her knees. There was no knowing the depth of the flooded culverts and they were icy cold. It wasn’t a good idea to follow the dog. It wasn’t a good idea at all. What was it the magistrate had said about poor judgement? She gave an involuntary shiver and pulled the cuffs of her sweater down over cold hands and the fleecy flaps of her hat over her ears. She shot a last glance back down the road then jumped the ditch and entered the wood.

  The still, damp air clung to her clothes and beaded on the fibres of her sweater as she made her way carefully across the uneven and waterlogged ground. Her boots were quickly sodden and her wet combat trousers clung to her rapidly chilling legs. Why did a simple walk in the woods have to become so complicated? The story of her life, really. She didn’t set out with the intention of creating difficulties, but she did seem to end up with more than her fair share.

  How else could a simple favour for a friend result in the label 'forger' being attached to her name? Not discreetly either, but in big, glaring, angry font that shouted her shame to all who subscribed to the tabloid frenzy. It had been big news until something bigger came along and Grace was relieved she’d been side-lined by another more newsworthy crime.

  There were probably many labels, other than forger which could have been more appropriately attributed, and more readily accepted by Grace: 'naive fool' perhaps or maybe 'reckless'. 'Forger', however, implied a degree of dishonesty and to her credit Grace was not dishonest, merely young and not fully attuned to the dishonesty of others. She was learning however, and the experience had left her with an overwhelming distrust of her fellow man.

  Her progress through the winter forest, as she pondered on her ill luck, was laboured. Every step, involved a mammoth effort, to avoid slipping into deeper water. With each of those steps she imagined just what she’d do to the dog when she eventually caught up with him. His place in her heart was getting smaller by the minute.

  The fog’s strange disorientating properties meant she was forced to stop and get her bearings. She used the opportunity to catch her breath and call the dog again. There was no answering bark this time. In fact, she realised as she strained to hear him, there was no noise at all, no sounds of the forest, no birds and no artillery. Absolute and utter silence.

  The abnormality of that did not occur to her as she let out a sigh of relief. If the firing had stopped then so had the risk of stray bullets. All the same the silence was unnerving, and the sound of her own ragged breathing seemed odd and out of place. She glanced around, peering through the trees in an effort to catc
h sight of him. She’d surely not come far enough to lose sight of the road, but like the dog, the road was nowhere to be seen and in truth she was hard-pressed to recall from which direction she’d come.

  Grace began to feel uneasy. She felt the stirring of butterflies deep in her stomach, the prickle of raised hairs down her back and wished she’d left the dog to come home on his own. She debated doing exactly that and was about to give up and leave him to his rabbit, when her scrutiny was rewarded by a glimpse of movement ahead through the tangle of snowberry and briar.

  “About bloody time,” she grumbled. She pushed her damp fringe out of her eyes and clambered clumsily over the fallen tree blocking her path. The log was slick with moss and she paused momentarily to wipe the resulting slime from her hands, on the seat of her pants.

  It was on straightening that she heard the noise, a strange hissing sound of something travelling at extreme speed, the sound, scarcely preceding, an extraordinary explosion of searing white hot pain. The missile collided with her thigh, the tremendous force of it knocking her clean off her feet. She went down like a felled creature. Fear, burning pain and confusion coursed through her body as she hit the waterlogged forest floor, but her overriding emotion was one of absolute astonishment as she realised she’d been shot.

  Terrified, she floundered desperately in the melt water. Frantically she scanned the impenetrable barrier of trees. Someone was out there and for whatever reason she’d just become a target. She must move her position, hide, escape, anything but stay where she was, but none of these things were possible. Her leg would not respond.

  The pain caused her to suck in air in frantic gasps as she tried to clear the confusion and make sense of her situation. Someone’s aim was out. Someone’s Intel was incorrect and whoever was responsible was in big trouble, just as soon as she sorted out the jumble in her head. She cursed the army, those blasted squaddies and their stray bullets. She cursed the dog and his disobedience, but mostly she cursed her own stupidity. When would she ever learn to take advice? Red flags meant danger for a very good reason.

  “I’m here ...” she called out weakly. With a little more attitude she added, “You idiot, you’ve bloody well shot me!”

  She hoped it was a mistake. The alternative didn’t bear thinking about. She snapped her mouth shut when there was no reply. She should’ve taken notice of the red flag. She vowed in future to take notice of every warning and every piece of advice that came her way, and hoped the vow itself would bring about some miraculous turn in her fortunes.

  When nothing miraculous transpired, she struggled to a sitting position, still bleeding, heavily. She needed to stop the flow quickly and pulled at the length of rope loosely hung around her neck. The dog’s makeshift lead. If only the dratted mutt had been wearing it. Nevertheless, it would serve now as a tourniquet. The pain in her thigh increased as she tried to move to gain access to the rope. She stopped and glanced warily at her leg as it lay awkwardly just out of the water.

  Normally the sight of a long slender arrow protruding from her flesh would have initiated a sudden and extreme reaction, but her response to the enormity of what had occurred was delayed by disbelief, her mind quite unable to comprehend. This was not right, like the incorrect piece forced into a jigsaw puzzle. She gazed as if somehow removed from the event, a voyeur at the scene of a terrible accident, as the blood flowed out of the wound, through the material of her trousers and leached into the water.

  And then suddenly, as suddenly as the arrow itself, she came back with a rush and a hammering of heart beats and an overwhelming sense of panic. Her heart rate increased till it pounded like a mad thing in her chest and she tried in vain to calm herself. The quicker her heart beat the more blood she would lose. She’d read that somewhere, and was sure it was true. She glanced around wildly. Who could have done this? Not the soldiers surely, unless the British army had started recruiting archers? A madman living in the woods perhaps? Why would anyone do this?

  She struggled to grasp the rope to stop the bleeding, but her hands were cold and she began to shake uncontrollably. She found no matter how hard she tried, she was unable to co-ordinate her actions. Sweat beaded on her brow despite the cold, and the pain’s intensity increased. She would bleed to death here in the wood where no one would find her. She would slide beneath the icy melt water to lie on the bed of some stagnant pool, alone for ever. Lacking the energy or breath to scream, she began to whimper quietly with pain, fear and frustration, but mainly fear, and when the pain finally overcame her, she slipped just as quietly into unconsciousness.

  Her last fragmented thought as her mind overloaded and cut out was that someone was out there, somewhere, very close by.

  Chapter Two

  The boy came silently. A wraithlike shadow slipping unseen between trees cloaked in frost. He stooped as hoary tendrils threatened to entwine him in their icy embrace, a slender bow held tightly in one hand while the other gripped a brindle terrier by the rough hair at its scruff. The dog remained alert. Ears pricked, its tail twitched with anticipation; the rasp of its breath the only sound to be heard in the silence of the winter forest.

  The boy flicked a nervous glance around the tangle of waterlogged tree roots and eerie, stagnant pools. Afraid to proceed and unwilling to retreat, he rose slowly to his full height and peered at the body.

  Slumped where it had fallen, it lay half submerged in the icy depth, one pale frozen hand outstretched, damp hair, obscuring the face. His heart lurched within its fragile casing at the reality of what had transpired. Summoning what little courage remained he made a hurried sign of the cross and backed carefully away.

  Small and undernourished, with ragged, dark hair and clothes the colour of the forest, it was little wonder he’d remained unseen long enough to carry out such a heinous act. He paused, drawing on the strength of his natural camouflage and silently chanted the charms of protection he’d learned at the breast. The beat of his heart stilled and he stepped back through the thorny barrier of frozen bramble runners and drew close again.

  He saw the blood first, staining the melt water as it seeped from the body, trapped within the confines of the frigid pool. He watched transfixed as the slickness spread and the body slid further beneath the blackness. He felt fear, an overwhelming sense of dread that welled unbidden from the centre of his being, despite the charms. Reaching out with a hesitant hand he paused midway and drew back quickly, as if scalded by some unseen source. The dog whined and the boy cocked his head, alert to whatever sound distracted it. Then he was up and running, back into the dense woods from whence he had come.

  Light-footed, he covered the flooded ground easily. He dodged low branches and fallen trees with not a single snapped twig to shatter the silence, until, with relief as keen as a long held breath, he burst into the makeshift camp like a wild thing freed from a trap, and the phantoms he believed snapped at his heels were let loose. The horses strained at their tethers, whinnies of alarm accompanying the wild kicking at the anticipated threat. The roosting birds of the forest rose as one, a cacophony of alarmed pheasants and pigeons squawked and flapped for cover. Their noise reverberated around the small clearing and contributed to the overall commotion. The boy tripped, scattering embers from the smouldering fire, then recovered and steadied himself with an outstretched hand.

  His stunned companion lurched backwards away from the shower of sparks, spilled the contents of his cup and muttered a curse beneath his breath as the hot liquid seared the back of his hand. He staggered awkwardly to his feet, dropped the cup in the dirt and stopped the lad’s flight by grasping him firmly by the shoulders.

  “For pity’s sake, Edmund,” he growled, flicking a wary glance around the camp. “What in God’s name is wrong with you? You’ll awaken the Devil himself with that racket.”

  “My lord, I’ve done a terrible thing,” the boy gasped, glancing back over his shoulder fearfully. He took a ragged breath, his chest heaving with the effort. “I meant to take a deer, but
I have taken a boy! I fear I’ve killed him.”

  The boy shuddered and the man felt the child’s tremors through his own hands. The boy may be guilty of many things but he was not given to flights of fancy. Yet, there was no one in these woods. He would stake his life on it.

  Miles of Wildewood - knight, mercenary and sometime scoundrel - possessed tracking skills that were second to none. He’d seen no signs when they’d made camp. He’d set up perimeter markers and traps, none of which had been tripped; he would have surely been alerted if they had. He chewed thoughtfully at his lower lip, narrowed his eyes and scanned the tree line. There was no movement, nothing amiss. Crossing to the tethered horses, he hushed them with a gentle hand and a soft mutter against velvet noses. Cocking his head, he paused and listened. The only sound to be heard was Edmund’s frantic panting.

  Turning back to the boy, he reached out a hand and shook him roughly. “Been at the ale again, eh, Edmund?” The boy was a devil for the drink.

  “No, my lord, t’was a body, I swear it.” There was no mistaking the terrified look on the boy’s face. If there were any ale to be had, Miles reckoned the lad would have downed one there and then, just to quell the fear in his belly.

  Miles cast an eye out to the gloom of the encroaching forest and sighed sourly. He had no urge to trample through water-logged mires. He was cold enough. He’d forgotten just how miserable a Northumbrian winter could be. His chest tightened with the effort of inhaling frigid air, but he couldn’t afford to ignore the boy. If there was to be trouble then better he knew of it first-hand, rather than later at the hands of others. Pulling his knife from the leather sheath tied against his leg he turned back to the boy.

  “Where, Edmund? Show me where this body lies.”