Ranger's Apprentice, Book 8: The Kings of Clonmel: Book 8

by John Flanagan

  “One thing,” he said, and they turned back to face him.“I’ve heard talk along the road of a man called Tennyson—some kind of priest?”

  The watchmen exchanged skeptical glances. “Yes,” said the leader, “he’s some kind of priest, all right.” There was a hint of sarcasm in his tone.

  “Is he—” Halt began, but the second man answered the question before he could ask it.

  “He’s here. He and his followers are at the market ground too. Chances are you’ll hear him preaching this afternoon if you’ve a mind.”

  “Chances are,” his companion put in with now unmasked sarcasm, “you’ll hear him preaching every afternoon.”

  Halt maintained a noncommittal expression, appearing to think over their words. “Perhaps we’ll listen in.” He looked at Horace. “It’ll break the monotony, Michael.”

  “Break your eardrums, more like,” said the second watchman. “You’d do better to spend your time at the inn, you ask me.”

  “Maybe,” Halt agreed. “But we’ll give the man a hearing at any rate.”

  He nodded to them again and urged Abelard on. Horace, who had been waiting a few meters down the track, fell in beside him.

  21

  WHILE THERE WAS STILL SOME LIGHT LEFT, WILL RETURNED TO Tug and retraced his steps down the trail, looking for a place to set up his own camp. Two hundred meters back from the spot where they had stopped, he sighted a small glade a short distance from the side of the path. A large tree had fallen here, some years ago judging by the moss that covered its trunk. As it came down, it had taken several of its smaller neighbors with it, clearing an open space. It was an ideal spot. Not far off the path and almost unnoticeable. If Will hadn’t actually been looking for a campsite, he would have ridden straight past. Most casual travelers would do the same, he re asoned.

  He led Tug through the trees and waist-high undergrowth that marked the edge of the trail and looked around, assessing the spot. The trail was almost invisible from here, which meant that the clearing would be the same for someone on the trail. There was an open space some five meters by four—more than enough for his campsite.

  Not that it would be much of a camp, he thought. There’d be no tent and no fire. But there was thick grass for Tug to graze on and Will’s real purpose was to find a spot where Tug would be out of sight.

  He watered the horse again and made the “free” hand signal, which told Tug he could graze if he wished to. The little horse moved around the clearing, nose to the ground, assessing the quality of the local vegetation. Apparently finding it to his liking, he began to rip bunches of the thick green grass from the ground, chewing it with that grinding noise that horses make.

  “Sorry I can’t unsaddle you,” Will said. “We may have to move out in a hurry.”

  Tug glanced up at him, ears pricked, eyes alight.

  No matter.

  Will sat, his back against the fallen tree trunk and his knees drawn up. He’d need to get back to his vantage point soon, he thought. He wanted to see when the guards were changed. He hoped that whoever relieved the man he’d selected would stay in the same spot. There was no reason why he shouldn’t, but you never knew.

  As the last light was fading, Will stood. Tug raised his head instantly, ears up, ready to move forward for Will to mount him. But Will shook his head.

  “Stay here,” he said. Then added the one-word command, “Silent.” Tug understood the command; it was one of many that the little horse had been taught when he had been trained by Old Bob, the Ranger Corps’ horse trainer. “Silent” meant that if Tug heard any movement in his vicinity—in this case along the path—he was to freeze in place and make no sound. That, coupled with the gathering darkness, would ensure that no passerby would have the slightest idea that the little horse was just a few meters from the trail.

  Gathering his cloak around him, Will moved back to the path. He paused as he reached the edge of the trees, listening both ways for the sound of anyone approaching. Then he quickly crossed the path and slid into the trees on the far side, moving parallel to the track and a few meters inside the tree cover.

  An observer, had there been one, might have thought he had seen a gray shadow flit briefly across the open ground before disappearing into the trees.

  Will regained his previous vantage point and settled down to watch. It had been barely three hours since he had seen the guards take their positions and he reasoned that the original men would still be at their posts. People were creatures of habit, he knew, and the most common term for sentry duty was four hours. Why that was so he had no idea. To his way of thinking, three hours would be a better term. By the end of four hours spent staring into the darkness, most sentries had sunk into lethargy. Of course, a three-hour term meant that more sentries would be needed through the course of the night, and as Will sensed, the posting of guards here was really more of a gesture than anything else. These raiders didn’t expect to be attacked or infiltrated.

  Which was why he had brought the half bottle of brandy from Duffy’s Ford. He touched his inner pocket now to make sure the flask was still there. If he was going to make his way into the enemy camp, he would have to remove one of the guards—probably the one he had observed earlier. Of course, if necessary, he could make his way through the sentry line undetected without resorting to violence. But it would take considerably longer. Unseen movement across an open space like the one that faced him would be a slow and time-consuming business. And he would be silhouetted by the glow of the campfires behind him.

  So the quickest and safest way was to remove one of the sentries, leaving a gap in the screen that he could slip through. But that raised another problem. He didn’t want the enemy to know he’d been here, and an unconscious sentry was a sure sign that someone had infiltrated the camp.

  Unless he was drunk. If a sentry was found reeking of brandy and sleeping peacefully under a tree, no amount of protesting on his part would convince his superiors that he had been attacked.

  Will peered into the dark shadows below him now. Earlier, he had noted a few reference points to guide him to where the sentry was based. Now he saw a slight movement near that spot. He began moving down toward the level ground, moving crabwise across the slope to bring him out at a point level with the sentry.

  There was a constant murmur of conversation from the camp. Occasionally, a burst of laughter or angry voices raised in argument would punctuate the sound. That underlined another reason why Will didn’t want to take too long getting inside the sentry line. He wanted to move around the camp while the men were still awake and talking. If he could eavesdrop on their conversations, he might pick up some idea about what they were planning. Once inside the camp, he was confident he could move freely about. Paradoxically, once he was inside, the less he tried to conceal himself, the less likely he was to be stopped and questioned. But it was the first hundred meters of clear space between the sentry line and the camp that was the main danger. There was no reason why anyone should be moving toward the camp from that direction. Those inside the tent lines, their eyes dazzled by the fires, would be unlikely to spot him. A sentry, standing in the dark and looking back to the light, could easily see him silhouetted.

  He felt the ground leveling under him now and knew he must be close to the sentry’s position. He slipped between the trees like a shadow, making a few more meters. Then he heard the sound of a man clearing his throat and shuffling his feet. He couldn’t have been more than ten meters away. Close enough, Will thought. He slid down behind the trunk of a tree, keeping its mass between himself and the sentry, wrapped himself in his cloak and settled down to wait.

  He was there for the best part of an hour. Unmoving. Silent. Invisible. From time to time he heard the sentry moving about, or coughing. Once or twice, the man yawned, the sound clearly audible in the silence of the trees. The murmur of voices from the camp formed a constant background, and Will was grateful for it. When the time came, it would help conceal any small noise he mi
ght make.

  As he sat there in the darkness, he reflected that this had been the hardest part of his training: schooling himself to remain unmoving, to resist the sudden urge to scratch an itch or to shift position to ease a cramped muscle. This was why it was so important to assume a comfortable position in the first place, and to let the body relax completely. Yet there was no such thing as a completely comfortable position—not after you had been in it without moving for more than thirty minutes.

  The ground beneath him had seemed soft and resilient when he sat down. He guessed it was formed of a thick mat of fallen leaves. Yet now he was conscious of a twig or a rock digging uncomfortably into his backside. He longed to lean to one side, reach under his backside and remove it, but he resisted the urge. He clenched his fist and concentrated on the pressure on his fingers and the muscles in his forearm to take his mind off the discomfort in his behind. The trick worked, at least for a while. When the twig made its presence felt once again, he bit gently on his lower lip to distract himself from it.

  “There you are! Wondered where you’d got to!”

  For a brief moment, he thought that the words, spoken so close to him, were actually addressed to him. Then he realized that it was the sentry’s relief, speaking to the man who’d been on duty for the past four hours.

  Of course, the original sentry had taken a spot under the trees, where he was screened from the rest of the line. The relief must have had difficulty in locating him.

  “About time you showed up,” said the sentry. He sounded slightly aggrieved. Sentries usually did. They all assumed that their relief was late. Will could make out the small sounds of the man gathering his gear together, preparing to return to the camp.

  The new man ignored the complaint. “Not a bad little nook you’ve got here,” he said.

  “Well, it’s out of Tully’s sight, that’s the best thing. And happen it should rain, you’ll be sheltered by the trees here.”

  Tully, Will assumed, was the sergeant of the guard.

  “I’ll be off, then. What’s the grub tonight?” said the first sentry.

  “Not too bad at all. The hunters brought in a few deer and some geese. For once the cooks didn’t ruin it completely.”

  The departing sentry grunted in appreciation. “Well, I’d best get to it, then. I’m famished. Enjoy yourself,” he added sardonically.

  “Thanks for your kind thoughts,” his replacement said, matching the tone. The men might be comrades in arms, Will thought, but judging by the way they spoke to each other, they weren’t friends.

  While they had been talking, he had taken advantage of the noise they made to rise and slip closer to them. He wasn’t concerned that he’d be seen by either man—his cloak and the surrounding darkness made sure of that. Now he was barely three meters from the new sentry, his face shadowed by the cowl of his cloak and a striker grasped in his right hand. In moving closer, he had gone in an arc, so that he was behind the sentry. He waited, flattened against a tree, until the departing guard’s footsteps had faded away. As he had expected, the new sentry began to make himself comfortable, setting down his gear and checking his sightlines.

  The time was now, Will thought, before he had a chance to settle in, while his mind was still distracted by the recent conversation. He risked a glance around the tree. The man was standing with his back to Will. He was armed with a spear, and a spiked mace hung at his belt. His cloak was bundled on the ground beside him—presumably he’d don it when the night became colder—and a flask and mug were placed on the ground at the base of a flat rock that stood about a meter high. As Will slipped forward, the man leaned back, resting on the flat rock, his spear in his right hand. He sighed quietly—the sound of a man resigned to four hours of boredom and mild discomfort.

  Will hit him hard behind the ear with the striker. The sigh, barely finished, turned to a strangled grunt and the man collapsed sideways off the rock, unconscious. His grasp on the spear was relaxed, and the weapon fell in the opposite direction, making barely any noise on the forest floor.

  Will stood over the sprawled form for a few seconds, the striker poised, ready for another blow if needed.

  But the man was well and truly out. His arms and legs lay at odd angles, indicating a total lack of tension in his muscles. He should remain this way for at least an hour, Will thought. That should be ample time for him to scout around the camp. He rolled the man over onto his back and, seizing him by the shoulders of his jacket, dragged the lifeless form to a tree. As ever, he marveled at how heavy a human body could become when it was completely limp like this. He propped the man into a semireclining position against the tree, arranged his arms and legs to look as if he were sleeping, then poured the brandy over the front of his jerkin. For good measure, he pried the man’s lips apart and sloshed some of the spirit inside his mouth.

  He stepped back, eyeing his handiwork. Now, even if the man regained consciousness and raised the alarm, the spilled liquor would tell its own story to his superiors. Tossing the flask down beside the recumbent form, Will gathered his cloak about him and slipped out of the trees into the open space leading to the campsite.

  He dropped to the ground and moved in a rapid crawl, dragging himself with his elbows, driving himself forward with his knees. Once he reached the tent lines, he continued to crawl until he was past the first few rows. Then, in the shadowed area between two tents, he rose carefully to his feet and waited for a few seconds.

  There was no indication that anyone had noticed him. He slipped back the cowl from his face, stepped out of the shadows and walked casually through the camp toward the large central tent. Noticing a bucket full of water standing outside one tent, he glanced around to see if anyone was observing him. Satisfied that he had aroused no attention, he hastily grabbed the bucket and continued on his way.

  A few meters on, he passed three men. Seeing the bucket, they assumed he had gone to fetch water. Always seem to have a purpose, Halt had taught him years ago. If people think there’s a reason you’re in a place, odds are they won’t bother to challenge you.

  “Right again, Halt,” he muttered to himself, and continued to make his way farther into the camp.

  22

  FROM HIS VANTAGE POINT ABOVE THE CAMP, WILL HAD TAKEN note of several of its key features. The cooking area was in the center of the untidy cluster of tents. That was only to be expected. If the cook fires were placed to one side in a large camp like this, some of the men would have to traverse the entire area to get their food. This was the most convenient position for everyone. The luckiest, of course, would be those closest to the cooks. Being just minutes from the cook fires, they’d enjoy hot meals. So the more senior members of the band had placed their tents toward the middle.

  Will headed now for the cook fires. It wasn’t hard to get a bearing on them. Fires to provide for the needs of over a hundred men would need to be big and numerous. The leaping sparks whirled up into the sky, and the glow of the flames was visible from anywhere in the camp.

  He walked into the clear space around them. Men were bustling about, preparing the meal. As the sentry had stated, there were several deer carcasses turning on spits. Another smaller fire had a brace of geese turning slowly, dripping fat with each revolution so that the flames leapt and spluttered. In addition, there were large cook pots set over several smaller fires. As he watched, a sweating attendant, his face livid in the firelight, dumped a bucketful of peeled potatoes into one, leaping back hurriedly to avoid the splash of boiling water.

  Will knew it was important that he keep moving. If he were to stand around gaping, sooner or later someone would challenge his presence and want to know who he was. He had the cowl on his cloak thrown back, of course, and in the uncertain firelight the cloak’s camouflage pattern wasn’t really noticeable. He had left his bow and quiver with Tug and was armed only with his two knives. For all intents and purposes, he looked like anyone else in the camp. Except none of them were standing still, looking at what was
going on around them. He moved forward toward the man who’d just dumped the potatoes into boiling water. The cook looked up at him, a scowl on his face.

  “We’ll tell you when the food’s ready,” he said unpleasantly. Cooks were used to being harassed by the men. Either the food wasn’t ready on time or, if it was, it was too cold. Or overcooked. Or undercooked. Or just generally not good enough.

  Will made a negative gesture with his free hand, indicating he wasn’t trying to jump the queue. He held up the bucket of water.

  “John said to bring you this water,” he said.

  Two things he was sure of. In a camp this large, there would be half a dozen people named John. And cooks were always in need of water. The cook frowned now. “Don’t remember as I asked him,” he said.

  Will shrugged and turned away, still with the bucket in his hand. “Suit yourself,” he said. But the cook stopped him quickly. He might not have asked for water, but he’d need it sooner or later and it would save him the trouble of fetching it.

  “Put it here, then. Might as well have it if you’ve brought it.”

  “Fine.” Will set the bucket down. The cook nodded a reluctant acknowledgment.

  “Tell John thanks,” he said.

  Will snorted. “Wasn’t John who had to lug it here across the camp, was it?” he said archly.

  “True enough.” The cook understood the implied message. “See me when we’re serving. There’ll be some extra for your plate.”

  Will touched his forehead. “Grateful to you,” he said, and moved away. He glanced back after a few paces, but the cook had already lost interest in him. Will, his pace brisk, headed for the central command pavilion. It was less than thirty meters away, and he could see it clearly. It stood a little apart from its neighbors, at the top of a slight slope, with a large fire in front of it. There were two sentries placed either side of the entrance and as he watched, three men approached, waited to be recognized and headed inside. Shortly after, a servant appeared with a tray bearing thick glass tankards and a wine flagon. He went inside and reappeared a minute or so later.