by Laura Taylor
Stick, therefore, was a valued friend, and Aidan got the impression that Tom was already eyeing Dusk off for a similar role – someone he could just talk to, who would make no further demands on his time or energy.
“You have really nice sheep,” Dusk said suddenly, a wholly unexpected change of topic.
“Do we, now?” Aidan asked, not quite sure what to make of the comment.
“I went for a walk earlier,” Dusk filled him in, finishing with her rabbit bones and setting them aside. She licked her fingers in between sentences. “Just a little way west along the river, but I met Jamal. He’s the shepherd, right? And the sheep are bizarrely well trained. You can literally walk right up to them and they just stand there.”
“Yeah, Jamal’s pretty awesome,” Tom told her. “He spends a whole heap of time with them. When we first got here, a lot of the guys didn’t have much experience with animals. And if you piss off a ram, suddenly you have a real pretty set of bruises.” Stick laughed, while Aidan cringed. He’d felt the wrath of Jamal’s main ram himself, and once had been more than enough.
“Mostly, it’s just him running around in the paddock with them,” Stick took over, “but a couple of times a year, we have to get them all in to trim their hooves, or shear them, or whatever. So he’s tried to get them as easy to handle as possible.”
“He seems to have done a fantastic job of it,” Dusk said, with genuine admiration. But then she stopped, suddenly staring off into the distance. “Do you hear that?” she asked.
A moment later, Aidan did. It was a faint cry, coming from a fair distance, but…
“Aidan!” The single word carried a significant weight of urgency. “Aidan!” It was coming from the road above the village – one of the scouts most likely – and he was on his feet in an instant. He sprinted up the hill and caught sight of the scout when he was halfway up – a man in his twenties called Stormbreaker, who was staggering along and gasping for air, looking around frantically even as he tried to keep running. To look at him, one would have assumed he used to be a surfer, with his shaggy blond hair, deep tan and easy-going nature. But the truth was, he was actually more of an introvert, a bit of a bookworm and the tribe’s budding blacksmith, teaching himself to mould metal in slow lessons taken from books on the subject. But, as with most of the younger men, he was also on a rotating roster of scouts sent out to patrol the tribe’s land.
Stormbreaker saw Aidan coming for him, and in that moment of stark relief, his legs gave out, sending him crashing into the dirt.
“Fuck! Stormbreaker...” Aidan dashed over to him, supporting his body as he tried to breathe.
“Slavers,” Stormbreaker told him, between harsh gasps – from the looks of it, he’d been running like the hounds of hell were after him. “On the... western border... they’ve got women...”
Aidan felt his heart rate double at the same time as he broke out in a cold sweat. Captive women would need to be rescued with the utmost urgency. But in order to do so, they’d have to fight the slavers. And that always came with some serious risks.
“How many?”
“Ten... slavers. Three... women... Two... children.”
“Children!” Christ, Aidan thought desperately, his respect for the unknown women rising sharply. How the hell had they managed to keep children alive and safe in a world as broken as this one?
Stormbreaker finally managed to catch his breath a little, making an effort to sit up. “They’ve camped at the S-bend in the river. But they’ll be moving again at first light.”
“What about you? Are you injured?”
Stormbreaker shook his head. “I’m good.”
A few other men had seen Aidan running and had followed him up the hill, and he turned to them now. “Help him down to the village. Get him some food and water.” Without another word, he turned and jogged back down the slope, heading straight for the fire circle.
There was a bell hung on a post off to one side, and Aidan rang it loudly. Every man within earshot instantly left off what they were doing and rushed over. One of the benefits of living in a forested valley was that the sound only travelled so far – a point they’d tested extensively when they’d installed the bell – so there was a minimal likelihood that the noise would attract unwanted attention. Next to the bell was a gong – one they’d found in an abandoned house and looted – and it had an entirely different purpose. The bell was simply to call an assembly or deliver urgent news. The gong, on the other hand, could be heard up to six kilometres away, and it was a call to battle, an urgent signal that the village was under attack and every able-bodied man was to take up arms and fight. Since its installation, they’d only had to use it once, and Aidan still had nightmares about that day.
He climbed up on the platform. “Slavers on the western border,” he announced without preamble. “There’s ten of them and they’ve got female captives, so we’re going to attempt a rescue. I need fifteen warriors ready to travel in ten minutes.” He hopped down and the men scattered. They had a detailed roster system when it came to battles, and so Aidan needed to say nothing more about who was to prepare for the trek westward. The roster took into consideration not only who had gone on a mission most recently, but also who had been injured before, various people who had particular skills, and what type of mission it was. With each battle, the aim was to maximise their chances of winning without either burning out good men or leaving the village unprotected. In this case, both he and Whisper would be going. The pair of them had become the backbone of the tribe’s fighting force, and even though they’d both only just returned from killing the slavers that morning, when captives were involved, they would both want to be on hand, no matter how tired they were.
But as he was about to head for his cabin and get ready, he saw Dusk still sitting by the fire, and a new idea occurred to him. “I know you’re injured,” he said to her, “but if you think you can make it, we could really use your help. It’s a three-hour hike, in the dark. Do you think you’re up to it?”
“Why do you need me?” Dusk asked, not out of resentment, but rather just to clarify his intentions.
“I don’t expect you to fight,” he explained. “But captive women have a nasty habit of trying to kill us. I’m hoping you might be able to calm them down. I’d ask you to lead them away from the battle, find somewhere safe to wait it out, and then introduce them to the tribe.”
She stood up and tested her leg, stretching it out, jumping up and down a few times. “If I can bring some food with me, I’m good to go. I’m still starving.”
And that was it, no complaining about another hike or having to spend the night in the open, no fussing about her injury. Just a simple request for food. This woman, he was rapidly learning, was a force to be reckoned with.
Fifteen minutes later, the group of fifteen warriors slunk up the hill and spilled out onto the road like rats from a sewer. Inky shadows against the darkness, they would make the trek in silence, neither voices nor footfalls giving away their presence. Walking beside Aidan with a barely noticeable limp, Dusk was as silent and invisible as all the rest.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Dawn was a grey streak on the horizon when they reached the bend in the river where the slavers were camped. They’d walked for nearly three hours, rested in a sheltered patch of scrub, then set off again when the sky was still black.
The slavers were sprawled about near the riverbank, and Aidan crawled forward from his hiding place, carefully assessing both the men and the landscape. A lone sentry patrolled the camp. Their sleeping bags were of the design that had been popular in the industrial world – lightweight, brightly coloured, but durable enough to withstand cooler temperatures. The colours, though, implied that the men were either idiots with no idea of camouflage or extremely confident in their ability to defend themselves. The bright reds and purples stood out against the muted greens of the landscape like neon lights.
Beside him, Aidan felt Whisper shift his weight, craning his ne
ck to get a better look at the camp. He tensed suddenly, then eased to the side and waved Aidan a fraction closer. He slid himself over and saw what Whisper had already spotted. The three women they’d come to rescue were sitting against a large tree, and he made the obvious assumption that they were tied up. Sprawled across their legs were two lumpy shapes, whom he guessed were the children. It was still too dark, and they were too far away to make any guesses about their age or gender.
Carefully, Aidan slunk back to the group of waiting men. “One sentry,” he reported. “The rest of them are asleep. The women and children are on the western edge of the camp. Five of you head around to the west. Everyone else spread out across the valley and take them from the east. Wait for my signal. Dusk, I want you to head for the women and get them to safety before we start a fight. Whisper will take out the sentry, then you get the women free and up the hill – I’m assuming they’re tied up. Take shelter on the far side, as far away as you need to be to stay clear of the fighting. We’ll kill the rest of them and call you when we’re done.”
The men nodded, a few of them peering over the ridge to get a feel for the layout of the camp, others sorting themselves into a neat group who would head for the western side. All of them had pulled off enough of this type of raid to know what to expect and to understand their own roles in the strategy.
But Dusk gave him a look that said she thought he was an idiot. “That’s your plan?” she asked, clear disdain in her harsh whisper. “The sentry’s heavily armed and surrounded by men sleeping extremely lightly. You want me to just ‘sneak into camp and free the women’? Whisper’s not going to get within ten metres of that sentry before he sounds the alarm.”
He should have expected an argument, not just because it was rapidly becoming clear that Dusk hadn’t survived this long by just rolling over and doing what she was told, but also because she was new to the tribe. He’d got used to having a team of men at his back who worked together like a well-oiled machine.
“That’s the plan,” he told Dusk, attempting to sound reassuring. “If you’re not comfortable with the risks, just stay in cover until the sentry’s dead.” Then he added, a sly grin on his face, “He’s not called Whisper for nothing.”
Dusk glanced at Whisper, but he was already easing along the row of low bushes, his eyes on the camp below as he assessed the risks and worked out his angle of attack. With a sigh and a shrug, Dusk rose to a low crouch and made her way after him, another five men falling in behind them, and Aidan was pleased to note that she was every bit as silent on her feet as the rest of his warriors.
Crouched behind a thick clump of ferns, Dusk eyed the camp with a mix of fear and disgust. The slavers had chosen their spot well, with no real cover between herself and the men, a distance of some twenty metres at least. The five men who were to form the western side of the attack had disappeared into the scrub, and even accounting for the gloom of predawn, Dusk was surprised to find that she now couldn’t spot a single one of them – quite the achievement given that she actually knew where each of them was.
Whisper was slowly edging closer to the guard, coming in from the west where there was the best cover. Even so, he was going to have to cross a good fifteen metres with nothing but thin trees sprouting from the rocky ground. Despite Aidan’s assurances, Dusk was still of the opinion that this was an absurd plan that was only going to end in a bloodbath, but it was fairly obvious that arguing the point wasn’t going to get her anywhere.
While she waited for Whisper to get his part of the job done, she assessed the best way to approach the women. She was following Aidan’s suggestion that she stay in cover, with no misguided pride about proving herself a fearless warrior. She’d seen reckless bravery in the past and had learned that there was no point in being admired at the same time as being dead. A little to her left, there was a slope down to near where the women were sleeping that was relatively clear of leaf debris. That would be her path, making it easier to stay silent. There was a large tree about three or four metres from them, which would provide passable shelter and might even be big enough to stop her being spotted by any man who happened to wake up unexpectedly. Plan prepared, she returned her attention to Whisper, who had now reached the edge of the scrub and was waiting for the sentry to pass him by.
By now, the man had made several loops around the camp. He wasn’t following an exact path, but his behaviour was repetitive enough to anticipate where he might move to next – another sign that these men were either overconfident or just plain stupid. Predictability was as deadly as negligence.
The man moved past the three women and paused, casting a watchful eye over the forest. Then he turned left – an entirely expected move – and began the slow walk back to the eastern edge of the camp. It was a reliable guess that he’d keep his eyes on the forest as he went, ignoring the other side of the camp for the time being, and as she’d anticipated, Whisper chose that opportunity to strike. He moved with surprising speed, yet absolute silence. He crossed the fifteen metres to the edge of the camp swiftly, then slowed to a more cautious pace, though still closing rapidly on his target. In a move that was smooth and practiced – and unnervingly so – he reached out and snapped the sentry’s neck, catching the body before it hit the ground and woke the others. He lifted the dead weight like it was nothing, still not making a sound, and retreated back into the scrub. The rest of the men in the camp didn’t stir.
That was her cue. Making an effort to be just as silent as Whisper, Dusk rose to a low crouch, keeping the machete Aidan had given her as protection tucked closely against her side. She picked her way carefully down the slope. She wasn’t as fast on her feet as Whisper had been, but she was sure he’d have nothing to complain about as far as her stealth abilities went.
Once she reached the tree where she could take shelter, she took the time to assess the women more thoroughly. From the positions of their hands, she could easily assume they were tied to the tree. She had only a few short metres to cross in order to be by their sides and cut them loose.
But the real problem would be managing to wake them up without startling any of them so much that they accidentally woke the men. She could make out the children from here, and they seemed young, maybe five years old at the most. It was possible they were younger, but then again, without a regular supply of food, they might simply be small and stunted. Either way, the last thing she needed was to wake the children and have them start crying.
The woman nearest her looked like she was the youngest. She had dirty blonde hair, hanging to just above her shoulders, and fresh bruises on her arms. The children were lying predominantly on the other two women, so Dusk decided to take her chances with this one. She picked up a small rock and tossed it gently onto the woman’s lap.
It took a moment for her to react. Her eyes opened reluctantly, then her body tensed – a rude awakening as she no doubt suddenly remembered where she was and what was happening to her – and then she looked up and spotted Dusk.
Dusk brought her finger to her lips. The woman was no idiot – she didn’t move, didn’t even nod. Calmly, without drawing any attention to herself, she looked around and saw that the men were still sleeping. Dusk nodded pointedly at her companions, not willing to move out of her shelter until she was sure all five of them were awake and alert.
The blonde woman leaned over and murmured in her companion’s ear, an Asian woman who Dusk guessed was a couple of years older than the blonde. The same sequence repeated itself, sudden despair at coming awake, followed by an even more sudden shock at Dusk’s presence, and then the second woman was quietly waking the third. The third woman looked like she was in her early forties, with straight hair well past her shoulders that seemed to be the colour of mud. When this woman came awake, though, there was no shock, not even when she saw Dusk, a dark silhouette in the trees. Her eyes instead contained a cold despair that Dusk knew all too well, having felt that same emotion in quiet moments lying awake at two o’clock in the morni
ng. The woman glanced over at the men sleeping around the camp, and the question in her eyes was obvious: how were they going to get far enough away without being spotted?
Dusk couldn’t answer the question now. She could only hope that the women wouldn’t panic when her own tribe of men came thundering out of the undergrowth. She repeated the silent gesture of a finger held to her lips and gave them a reassuring nod.
Despite her apparent reservations, the third woman gently nudged each of the children with a careful knee, and Dusk quickly reached the conclusion that she was their mother. Both of them came awake almost immediately, and she could see their mother whisper something to them. She nodded subtly at Dusk and gave each child a stern glare. And then, in the most impressive display of obedience she’d ever seen, both children nodded silently, making not a sound, no complaint about being woken, no questions about who she was or what she was doing, no other inane comments about being hungry or cold or uncomfortable. They had clearly been trained to obey their mother without question, and must have seen enough horrors and suffered enough hardship to understand the importance of her instructions. Bloody hell, what kind of world were they living in, if childhood now ended at the age of five?
Checking that the men were still sleeping, Dusk slipped out of her hiding place, pulling her knife from the sheath that was strapped to her ankle. The two younger women leaned to the side, allowing Dusk to reach between them and cut their ropes, then she did the same for the third woman and the two children. The younger one was a girl, perhaps three years old, the other one a boy a couple of years older. Both of them watched her with cool distrust, but said nothing, and made no protest when she had to put the knife right up against their skin to cut the rope.
Job done, she hastily retreated back behind her tree.
With more furtive glances at the sleeping men, the women stood up, the older one picking up the boy and the Asian one picking up the girl. Dusk waved them towards her, pointing up the hill.