‘Come on Jen,’ I said, putting my arm round her.
From the end of the barn we heard a small cry from Rosie’s daughter. I wondered if we should do something. But Rosie shook her head and I think gave a smile. I thought that was a good sign. Perhaps they would survive. One of the Petas rolled over and gave a loud snore.
I chucked a piece of wood on to the fire. ‘What is it?’ I said and poked at the ashes with a stick.
‘What is what?’ Jenna wasn’t making this easy.
‘What is the thing you’re not telling me?’ I turned to look her in the eyes. Perhaps that didn’t really work in the dim light, but Jen must have understood.
‘I don’t know,’ she hesitated.
‘Go on.’
‘It’s just that we all left in such a hurry. After your mum …’
‘After she died, yes.’ I was getting scared and angry now. ‘Jen, what could you have done, I know I should have buried her, but she was dead.’ Suddenly it felt as though nothing existed in the barn except me and Jenna in a bubble of silence. It rang in my ears. I could feel my heart start to pound. ‘Wasn’t she?’
When Jenna said nothing I grabbed her and started shaking her. ‘Wasn’t she?’ I shouted, loud enough to wake them all. Van was on his feet in seconds. The rest were all asking what had happened.
I shouted again, ‘Wasn’t she?’
Jenna fought off my arms. ‘Yes. I think so.’
‘You think so? We left her there with a pack of murdering Neanderthals and she wasn’t dead?’
Jenna hung her head.
Mary came over. ‘Of course she was dead. Didn’t you see that terrible wound?’
‘Then why does Jenna think that’s not true?’
‘I didn’t say that. I just don’t know.’ Jenna was crying now. ‘I just don’t know. I had this awful feeling as we left. Suppose she hadn’t died, suppose I’d seen her move just as we left in the tunnel. I don’t know if that’s true, it’s just stuck in my mind.’
‘We have to go back.’ I stood up as though that would be easy. I knew it wasn’t. I pulled the key and chain from Jenna’s wrist and went for the door.
I was through it and walking out before I’d any chance to think where I might go. I stormed off. I made for the open space near the fire where they had burnt the dead bodies. The only light came from the moon. I pushed on, over the grass. There was no gate this way, the village went straight on to the lower part of the moor. I stumbled and fell to the ground. I couldn’t see any point in getting up. Where was I going? Why would the tunnel be open now? And even if it was it might take me anywhere. I lay on the ground, too angry to cry, too exhausted to do anything. I wanted it to all go away.
Then I felt something warm. Someone holding me.
‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ Jenna said over and over again.
Tithe
-9-
Jenna had led me back to the barn before the night ended and left me to sleep on my own. I woke to hear the others talking in hushed voices and snatching sidelong glances in my direction. I heard some of the conversation: Mary didn’t believe Mum could have survived, Jack agreed. Jenna said she didn’t know why she had even thought it possible and wished she hadn’t said anything.
‘Did you see her move or something?’ Jack asked.
‘I don’t know now,’ Jenna answered miserably.
‘Is it because we didn’t get back home?’ Jack said. ‘I mean, if she was alive then we didn’t take everyone into the tunnel.’
I joined them. ‘You mean she must be alive because the tunnel didn’t take us home?’ I said. ‘Mum told us it wouldn’t be over until we took everyone. We didn’t take everyone, so we end up here.’
Jenna shook her head. ‘I don’t know, I don’t know … perhaps.’ Tears fell down her cheeks and she choked. ‘I can’t tell anymore.’
There was no way to find out. Jenna didn’t know and I was helpless. ‘We have to get Zach and Demelza out of the bailiff’s house and drag them to the Hanging Stones,’ I said, but I didn’t see how we could make that happen.
‘We put them leg irons.’ Kan didn’t seem to care if Zach came with us or not.
‘What makes the tunnel open?’ Van asked the question that was always on our minds.
‘Maybe it happens when we are all there?’ Jack was finishing off his bowl of boiled barley. It took some eating. ‘That’s what happened last time.’
I thought he meant that Mum must have been nearby as well – nearby and alive. But that would mean we were stuck in this place – no tunnel because someone was missing.
‘And see where it took us.’ Mary had started mixing up some more of her pills with the barley stew to give to Rosie.
‘I think Miss Tregarthur still has something to do with it,’ Jack muttered.
‘Crazy woman? You tell she does something?’ Kan said. I had no idea why he kept speaking that way, but we had become used to it.
‘But it’s not really a tunnel, is it?’ Mary said rather slowly.
‘What do you mean?’ Jenna snapped through her tears. I knew Jen wouldn’t like to be told of something so important that she didn’t know, especially from Mary. ‘It was a tunnel when we opened it up to let you run back home.’
‘Jen – easy,’ I said because that was a bit unfair suggesting that Jack and Mary had run off. We’d decided to stay, that was our fault.
‘Sorry,’ Jenna mumbled. ‘But what do you mean?’
‘The tunnel seems to make its own way, you sort of float in it, nothing feels solid after a while and then it just disappears – tunnels don’t do that.’
Did Miss Tregarthur have something to do with the change even though we knew she was bed-ridden? Jack and Mary had been to see her. She wasn’t going anywhere. But could she control what happened in some way? Control where it started and where it went?
‘The tunnel did change colour,’ Mary said. ‘I mean, it was blue and then it went red.’
‘And hot,’ Jack had burnt himself in whatever we were in.
‘But Sam and Ivy?’ Jenna said and that made us stop.
‘They went into a blue haze,’ Mary spoke loudly as though she had solved the problem. ‘It was blue when they went in. I was going to follow them but I stopped for my backpack.’
‘You think they got home?’ Van asked. ‘Blue goes home, red is dead?’
‘Zach was ahead of us when it went red,’ Jenna said. I thought she wanted to make sure we didn’t start talking about Mum again. She went on, ‘Maybe it goes red because of Zach.’
I’d like to think that was true, that the tunnel decided it didn’t like Zach and sent him here because of what he’d done, but I didn’t believe it. I didn’t believe it because I felt pretty sure that whatever happened was because of me and not Zach.
There wasn’t any time for more discussion. Oakes and his friend opened the door. I wondered if we should refuse to go with them. I didn’t think there was much the two soldiers would do. There was no sign of Smith.
‘Come on,’ shouted Oakes.
‘We come,’ shouted back Kan and the two Petas solemnly marched in step out of the barn but burst out laughing when they passed Oakes. Jack and I followed and we went down to the field. Elsa and the other women had already started cutting the crops.
‘That Smith’s up to something,’ said one of the younger women as we arrived. ‘What do you know, Oakes?’
‘Oakes? Know anything?’ Elsa sneered.
‘I do know something.’ Oakes sounded indignant and cross that they were laughing at him. ‘Smith’s heard from the valley. There’s someone important coming. That’s why we haven’t seen him around. He’s been checking on the horses.’
‘Who’s coming?’ I asked. ‘Aren’t they the king’s horses?’
‘He sent those knights to hunt last year, didn’t he Oakes?’ called the younger woman. ‘They had you two running all over the place looking after them.’
All the women started laughing again.
Oakes went red and banged his spear on the ground. ‘Enough. Get on with the work or …’
‘Or what?’ said Elsa and several of the other women laughed.
Oakes went red and had nothing more to say. We went back to work. The women said they wanted to finish cutting the barley in the first field today. They wanted us to hurry up.
Elsa said they needed to sow this field again before something she called All Saints’ Day. ‘But there’ll be no church this year ’cos there’s no priest, they’re all dead.’
Suddenly a rabbit ran out of the uncut grain. It shot straight towards Kan, who hurled his digging tool at it. It caught the animal on the head and it fell, stunned but still moving.
‘Mine,’ said Oakes who ran to the rabbit, killed it with his spear and picked it up.
‘Not so fast.’ Van stood in his way.
‘Leave it.’ I pushed Van out of the way. ‘Wait until later.’
Van grunted at me, and he let Oakes walk off with the rabbit. We hadn’t had any meat while we had been here. Even Mary’s gold bracelet hadn’t managed to buy any meat. I wondered why they didn’t eat the sheep. They were just dying on the moor. Shouldn’t we eat them before they all died?
I tried to find out the answer from the women. They said the sheep belonged to the lord of the manor and that was enough. You didn’t touch anything that belonged to important people.
‘Death if you use the king’s horse and death if you eat his sheep,’ I muttered.
‘That’s right,’ called out a girl called Posy, hearing my words.
‘What happens if you use his toilet?’ I said feeling annoyed about all these stupid rules.
‘Toilet? What’s a toilet?’ asked Elsa.
‘It’s a pot,’ said Jack and he turned to me. ‘Posh toilet here is a wooden seat with a hole in it over a trench. Better than the hole we’ve been crouching over.’
‘What happens if you use the king’s pot then?’ I was still annoyed.
‘Someone sticks a red hot poker up your bum.’
I couldn’t see who shouted that out. It didn’t seem to be a joke and it made everyone go quiet.
‘Who said that?’ shouted Oakes. No one owned up but I saw one woman looking scared. ‘Who said that?’ he demanded again and raised his spear as though it gave him more authority.
No one moved and no one spoke.
Finally one of the women went over to him. ‘Forget it,’ she said. ‘She didn’t mean anything and we need to get on with the work.’
That was when I looked over at Elsa and saw the expression on her face – scheming. Maybe it was right not to trust her.
Oakes appeared confused but he let it pass and we went back to hacking the ground.
‘What was that about?’ asked Van.
I shrugged. ‘Another one of their rules, I guess.’
The day warmed up, the ground seemed harder and we were all sweating. Van talked about needing a JCB or a digger.
‘None of those around for a few centuries,’ Jack said.
I was still worried, last night had left me with terrible feelings of guilt. Had I left my injured mother alone with the Neanderthals? Thinking that made me take it out on the ground. The other three moved away from me as I wildly thrashed at the stubble and stony soil. Van had to grab hold of me when we stopped for food and water. I slumped down on the ground. Posy joined us, she sat down quite close to Kan. She had brought us some bread.
‘Why did Oakes get upset about the poker story?’ Jack asked her.
‘Shhh.’ Posy looked round, but Oakes wasn’t near enough to hear. ‘It’s not allowed.’
‘Why? Stupid rules,’ I muttered.
Posy whispered, ‘There’s a rumour that the last king was killed like that. On the pot – died when someone crept into the trench underneath and …’ Posy giggled. ‘We can’t talk about it. Probably not true anyway.’
‘Sticky end,’ Kan snorted loud enough to bring Oakes over, looking suspicious. ‘What you do with this stuff.’ Kan changed the subject quickly and gnawed at the stale crust.
Posy poked him with another piece of bread. ‘You’re lucky to get anything. The baker went off with the other men to find his fortune. We baked this last night by the fire. No oven.’
I didn’t understand what she meant or how they made their bread. The cheese was quite tasty but there was so little of it. Oakes wandered off again.
I moved over to Elsa. ‘So that rabbit belongs to you?’
‘Belongs to Oakes,’ she said defensively. ‘He’s the only one of this lot who’s allowed rabbits. It’s because he’s a soldier.’
‘No one else allowed them?’ I frowned, how did they make these rules?
‘No one else now. Some of the other men could take rabbits, but not us. It depends on who you are.’
‘What happens if you do?’
‘If they catch you … they cut off your hands.’
‘Who does? Who cuts off your hands?’ Jack called out. He’d been listening to the conversation. I think he’d been thinking about eating the rabbit as well.
‘It’s the lord of the manor or the bailiff here. Smith would do the cutting. It’s not happened for a long time,’ Elsa said as she moved away.
‘That why there’s lots of bunnies?’ laughed Van.
All this talk about the rabbit was making me even hungrier. ‘How does the lord of the manor or anyone else find out? There’s only us in this field.’
‘Someone will tell him.’ Posy sounded as though that was obvious. I gave her a questioning look and she said, ‘Someone always does. Then they get some sort of reward.’
‘Like a rabbit?’ I asked.
‘Yes, that’s why they tell. The lord makes it worth their while.’ Posy looked around her. ‘Elsa’s usually the first to tell – but don’t say anything to her.’
‘Not like home,’ muttered Kan. ‘We’d cut off hands of grass.’
‘Grass doesn’t have hands, silly,’ Posy giggled again.
‘Grass means the person who tells on you,’ Jack explained, he liked explaining.
That can’t have made sense to her but she went on talking to Kan. I heard her ask him where home was and he said he didn’t know, which must have been even more confusing, but then Oakes said it was time for more work. He kept a tight hold on his rabbit.
By midday the women had moved on to the next field. All the fields were pretty small but doing this work by hand took such a long time. Working together was, apparently, quite a new thing for them. Usually they kept to their own small strip of land. But with the men gone things had to change. I thought this plague had changed a lot of things – how would they survive?
With the women further away I thought we might have a chance of catching more rabbits and keeping them but Oakes stayed with us. The rabbits just escaped, with a few of the kids running after them. One child had a sling and tried to hurl stones at the animals. He managed to hit one of the other kids on the bum. We were laughing at that when I heard voices. Male voices coming from the next field. Did that mean the men had returned? I started walking towards them.
‘Stop,’ Oakes whispered loudly as he sank down behind a bush. ‘Stay down.’
It was too late. I saw the group of men and they saw me. There were five of them and they looked rough. The man at the front had a long straggly beard and his clothes were covered in mud. Rough and hungry.
‘Com
e for the tithe.’ I heard him say. ‘That it?’ He pointed to the loaded hand cart.
Both Oakes and the other soldier had disappeared. The four of us were standing a few feet from the men. The women had clustered together, fear showing on their faces.
‘Well is it?’ the man raised his voice.
‘It’s all we have.’ Elsa eventually moved to the front.
‘It’ll have to do,’ he said. ‘For now.’ He turned to the other men. ‘Tom, Adam. Get the cart.’
‘That’s more than the tithe,’ Posy called out.
‘It’ll make up for us not coming before.’ The leader stepped forward. Put his arm round Posy, gave her a rough kiss. ‘And you’ve got a lot more to give.’ The other men jeered.
Someone should have told the man about Kan. The Petas weren’t people who let things slide. Too many years of fighting their way out of problems. My dad had mixed with them several times. You didn’t cross the Petas.
Posy had shown an interest in Kan. That was enough for him. Perhaps I should have stopped him, perhaps I couldn’t have stopped him because he was so fast.
Kan sprinted across to the group, his hacking tool swinging viciously into the air, as he screamed a roar of violence. The man holding Posy turned to the noise and flinched, a lucky move because Kan only connected with his shoulder. The force of the blow knocked the man to the ground. It had been aimed at his head. That could have killed him.
The other men stood back. None of them were armed. Kan glared at them. Van had joined him and the two of them stood shoulder to shoulder. They might be outnumbered and younger than the other men, but no one was going to mess with the Peta twins. The other four men looked terrified.
The man on the ground was groaning. Elsa bent down to help him. I think his arm might have been broken.
Elsa glanced at me. ‘We’ll pay for this. There’s no way out of it.’ She turned to Kan. ‘Why did you have to do that?’ She pulled the injured man to his feet. ‘Take it,’ she said, pointing to the grain loaded onto the wooden cart.
Tregarthur's Revenge: Book 2 (The Tregarthur's Series) Page 8