‘Well, this is very nice, isn’t it?’ he said bitterly and they turned to him, the laughter dying on their faces. As was inevitable, Jenny was the first one to recover.
‘Horace! You’re here at last!’ she said. She started towards him but the cold look on his face stopped her.
‘At last?’ he said. ‘I’m a few minutes late and suddenly I’m here “at last”? And just too late because you’ve already pigged out on all the pies.’
Which was hardly fair to poor Jenny. Like most cooks, once she had prepared a meal, she had little interest in eating it. Her real pleasure lay in watching others enjoy the results of her work – and listening to their praise. Consequently, she hadn’t had any of the pies. She turned back now to the two that she had covered in a napkin to keep for him.
‘No, no,’ she said quickly. ‘There are still some left! Look!’
But Horace’s pent-up anger prevented him from acting or speaking rationally. ‘Well,’ he said, in a voice heavy with sarcasm, ‘maybe I ought to come back later and give you time to finish them as well.’
‘Horace!’ Tears sprang to Jenny’s eyes. She had no idea what was wrong with Horace. All she knew was that her plan for a pleasant reunion with her old wardmates was falling in ruins.
George stepped forward now, peering curiously at Horace. The tall, thin boy cocked his head to one side, to study the apprentice warrior more closely – as if he were an exhibit or a piece of evidence in a law court.
‘There’s no call to be so unpleasant,’ he said reasonably. But reason wasn’t what Horace wanted to hear. He shoved the other boy aside angrily.
‘Get away from me,’ he said. ‘And mind how you talk to a warrior.’
‘You’re not a warrior yet,’ Will told him scornfully. ‘You’re still only an apprentice like the rest of us.’
Jenny made a small gesture with her hands, urging Will to drop the matter. Horace, who was in the act of helping himself to the remaining pies, looked up slowly. He measured Will up and down for a second or two.
‘Oho!’ he said. ‘I see the apprentice spy is with us today!’ He looked to see if the others were laughing at his wit. They weren’t and it only served to make him more unpleasant.
‘I suppose Halt is teaching you to slink around, spying on everyone, is he?’ Horace stepped forward, without waiting for an answer, and fingered Will’s mottled cloak sarcastically.
‘What’s this? Didn’t you have enough dye to make it all one colour?’
‘It’s a Ranger cloak,’ Will said quietly, holding down the anger that was building inside him.
Horace snorted scornfully, cramming half of one of the pies into his mouth and spraying crumbs as he did so.
‘Don’t be so unpleasant,’ George said. Horace rounded on the apprentice scribe, his face red.
‘Watch your tongue, boy!’ he snapped. ‘You’re talking to a warrior, you know!’
‘An apprentice warrior,’ Will repeated firmly, laying stress on the word ‘apprentice’.
Horace went redder and looked angrily between the two of them. Will tensed himself, sensing that the bigger boy was about to launch an attack. But there was something in Will’s eyes and his ready stance that made Horace think twice about it. He had never seen that look of defiance before. In the past, if he’d threatened Will, he had always seen fear. This new-found confidence unsettled him a little.
Instead, he turned back to George and gave him a heavy shove in the chest.
‘How’s that for unpleasant?’ he said as the tall, thin boy staggered back. George’s arms windmilled as he tried to save himself from falling. Accidentally, he struck Tug a glancing blow on the side. The little pony, grazing peacefully, reared suddenly against his bridle.
‘Steady, Tug,’ Will said and Tug quietened immediately. But now Horace had noticed him for the first time. He stepped forward and looked more closely at the shaggy pony.
‘What’s this?’ he asked in mock disbelief. ‘Has someone brought a big ugly dog to the party?’
Will clenched his fists. ‘He’s my horse,’ he said quietly. He could put up with Horace sneering at him but he wasn’t going to stand by and see his horse insulted.
Horace let out a braying laugh.
‘A horse?’ he said. ‘That’s not a horse! In the Battleschool we ride real horses! Not shaggy dogs! Looks like he needs a good bath to me, too!’ He wrinkled his nose and pretended to sniff closer to Tug.
The pony glanced sideways at Will. Who is this unpleasant clod? his eyes seemed to say. Then Will, carefully hiding the wicked grin that was trying to show on his face, said casually:
‘He’s a Ranger horse. Only a Ranger can ride him.’
Horace laughed again. ‘My grandmother could ride that shaggy dog!’
‘Maybe she could,’ said Will, ‘but I’ll bet you can’t.’
Before he’d even finished the challenge, Horace was untying the bridle. Tug looked at Will and the boy could have sworn the horse nodded slightly.
Horace swung himself easily up onto Tug’s back. The pony stood, unmoving.
‘Nothing to it!’ Horace crowed. Then he dug his heels into Tug’s sides. ‘Come on, doggy! Let’s have a run.’
Will saw the familiar, preparatory bunching of muscles in Tug’s legs and body. Then the pony sprang into the air off all four feet, twisted violently, came down on his front legs and shot his hindquarters high into the air.
Horace flew like a bird for several seconds. Then he crashed flat on his back in the dust. George and Alyss looked on in delighted disbelief as the bully lay there for a second or two, stunned and winded. Jenny went to step forward to see if he was all right. Then her mouth set in a determined line and she stopped. Horace had asked for it, she thought.
There was a chance then, just a chance, that the whole incident might end there. But Will couldn’t resist the temptation to have one last word.
‘Maybe you’d better ask your grandmother if she’ll teach you to ride,’ he said, straight-faced. George and Alyss managed to hide their smiles but, unfortunately, it was Jenny who couldn’t stop the small giggle that escaped her.
In an instant, Horace scrambled to his feet, his face dark with rage. He looked around, saw a fallen branch from the apple tree and grabbed it, brandishing it over his head as he rushed at Tug.
‘I’ll show you, and your damned horse!’ he yelled furiously, swinging the stick wildly at Tug. The pony danced sideways out of harm’s way and, before Horace could strike again, Will was on him.
He landed on Horace’s back and his weight and the force of his leap drove them both to the ground. They rolled there, grappling with each other, each trying to gain an advantage. Tug, alarmed to see his master in danger, whinnied nervously and reared.
One of Horace’s wildly flailing arms caught Will a ringing blow across the ear. Then Will managed to get his right arm free and punched Horace hard in the nose.
Blood ran down the bigger boy’s face. Will’s arms were hard and well muscled after his three months’ training with Halt. But Horace was being taught in a hard school too. He drove a fist into Will’s stomach and Will gasped as the air was driven out of him.
Horace scrambled to his feet but Will, in a move that Halt had shown him, swung his own legs in a wide arc, cutting Horace’s feet from under him and sending him tumbling again.
Always strike first, Halt had dinned into his brain in the hours they’d spent practising unarmed combat. Now, as the other boy crashed to the ground again, Will dived upon him, trying to pin his arms beneath his knees.
Then Will felt an iron grip on the back of his collar and he was being hauled in the air, like a fish upon a hook, wriggling and protesting.
‘What’s going on here, you two hooligans?’ said a loud, angry voice in his ear.
Will twisted around and realised that he was being held by Sir Rodney, the Battlemaster. And the big warrior looked extremely angry. Horace scrambled to his feet and stood at attention. Sir Rodney released Will
’s collar and the Ranger’s apprentice dropped to the ground like a sack of potatoes. Then he too came to attention.
‘Two apprentices,’ said Sir Rodney angrily, ‘brawling like hooligans and spoiling the holiday! And, to make things worse, one of them is my own apprentice!’
Will and Horace shuffled their feet, eyes down, unable to meet the Battlemaster’s furious gaze.
‘All right, Horace, what’s going on here?’
Horace shuffled his feet again and went red. He didn’t answer. Sir Rodney looked at Will.
‘All right, you, the Ranger’s boy! What’s this all about?’
Will hesitated. ‘Just a fight, sir,’ he mumbled.
‘I can see that!’ the Battlemaster shouted. ‘I’m not an idiot, you know!’ He paused for a moment, waiting to see if either boy had anything further to add. They were both silent. Sir Rodney sighed in exasperation. Boys! If they weren’t getting under your feet, they were fighting. And if they weren’t fighting, they were stealing or breaking something.
‘All right,’ he said finally. ‘The fight’s over. Now shake hands and be done with it.’ He paused and, as neither boy made a move to shake hands, roared in his parade ground voice:
‘Get on with it!’
Galvanised into action, Will and Horace reluctantly shook hands. But as Will looked into Horace’s eyes, he saw that the matter was far from settled.
We’ll finish this another time, the angry look in Horace’s eyes said.
Any time you like, the apprentice Ranger’s eyes replied.
The first snowfall of winter lay thick on the ground as Will and Halt rode slowly home from the forest.
Six weeks had passed since the Harvest Day confrontation and the situation with Horace remained unresolved. There had been little chance for the two boys to resume the argument, as their respective masters kept them busy and their paths seldom crossed.
Will had seen the apprentice warrior occasionally, but always at a distance. They hadn’t spoken or even had the chance to acknowledge each other’s presence. But the ill feeling was still there, Will knew, and one day it would come to a head.
Strangely, he found that the prospect didn’t disturb him nearly as much as it might have a few months ago. It was not that he looked forward to renewing the fight with Horace, but he found he could face the idea with a certain amount of equanimity. He felt a deep satisfaction when he recalled that good, solid punch he had landed on Horace’s nose. He also realised, with a slight sense of surprise, that the memory of the incident was made more enjoyable by the fact that it had happened in the presence of Jenny and – this was where the surprise lay – Alyss. Inconclusive as the event might have been, there was still a lot about it to set Will thinking and remembering.
But not right now, he realised, as Halt’s angry tone dragged him back to the present.
‘Could we possibly continue with our tracking, or did you have something more important to do?’ he inquired. Instantly, Will cast around, trying to see what Halt had pointed out. As they rode through the crisp, white snow, their horses’ hooves making only the smallest of sounds, Halt had been pointing to disturbances in the even white cover. They were tracks left by animals and it was Will’s task to identify them. He had sharp eyes and a good mind for the task. He normally enjoyed these tracking lessons but now his attention had wandered and he had no idea where he was supposed to be looking.
‘There,’ Halt said, his tone leaving no doubt that he didn’t expect to have to repeat such things, as he pointed to the left. Will stood in his stirrups to see the disturbed snow more clearly.
‘Rabbit,’ he said promptly. Halt turned to look sidelong at him.
‘Rabbit?’ he asked and Will looked again, correcting himself almost immediately.
‘Rabbits,’ he said, stressing the plural ending. Halt insisted on accuracy.
‘I should think so,’ Halt muttered at him. ‘After all, if they were Skandian tracks there, you’d need to be sure you knew how many there were.’
‘I suppose so,’ said Will, meekly.
‘You suppose so!’ Halt replied sarcastically. ‘Believe me, Will, there’s a big difference between knowing there’s one Skandian about and knowing that there are half a dozen.’
Will nodded apologetically. One of the changes that had come over their relationship lately was the fact that Halt almost never referred to him as ‘boy’ anymore. These days, it was always ‘Will’. Will liked that. It made him feel that somehow he’d been accepted by the grim-faced Ranger. All the same, he did wish that Halt would smile once or twice when he said it.
Or even once.
Halt’s low voice snapped him out of his daydreaming.
‘So … rabbits. Is that all?’
Will looked again. In the disturbed snow, difficult to see, but there now that Halt had pointed it out to him, was another set of tracks.
‘A stoat!’ he said triumphantly and Halt nodded again.
‘A stoat,’ he agreed. ‘But you should have known there was something else there, Will. Look at how deep those rabbit tracks are. It’s obvious that something had frightened them. When you see a sign like that, it’s a hint to look for something extra.’
‘I see,’ said Will. But Halt shook his head.
‘No. All too often, you don’t see, because you don’t maintain your concentration. You’ll have to work on that.’
Will said nothing. He merely accepted the criticism. He’d learned by now that Halt didn’t criticise without reason. And when there was reason, no amount of excuses could save him.
They rode on in silence. Will strained his eyes at the ground around them, looking for more tracks, more animal signs. They went another kilometre or so and were starting to see some of the familiar landmarks that told him he was close to their cottage when he saw something.
‘Look!’ he cried, pointing to a tumbled section of snow just off the path. ‘What’s that?’
Halt turned to look. The tracks, if they were tracks, were like no others that Will had seen so far. The Ranger urged his horse closer to the edge of the path and looked more closely.
‘Hmmm,’ he said thoughtfully. ‘That’s one I haven’t shown you yet. Don’t see too many of them these days, so take a good look, Will.’
He swung easily down from the saddle and walked through the knee-deep snow towards the disturbance. Will followed him.
‘What is it?’ the boy asked.
‘Wild boar,’ said Halt briefly. ‘And a big one.’
Will glanced nervously around them. He mightn’t know what a wild boar’s tracks looked like in the snow but he knew enough about the creatures to know they were very, very dangerous.
Halt noticed the look and made a reassuring movement with his hand.
‘Relax,’ he said. ‘He’s nowhere near us.’
‘Can you tell that from the tracks?’ Will asked. He stared, fascinated, at the snow. The deep ruts and furrows had obviously been made by a very large animal. And it looked as if it were a very large, very angry animal.
‘No,’ said Halt evenly. ‘I can tell it from our horses. If a boar that size were anywhere in the district, those two would be snuffing and pawing and whinnying so hard we wouldn’t be able to hear ourselves think.’
‘Oh,’ said Will, feeling a little foolish. He relaxed the grip that he’d taken on his bow. However, in spite of the Ranger’s assurances, he couldn’t resist taking just one more look around behind them. And as he did so, his heart began pounding faster and faster.
The thick undergrowth on the other side of the track was moving, ever so slightly. Normally, he might have passed the movement off as due to the breeze, but his training with Halt had heightened his reasoning and his observation. At the moment, there was no breeze. Not the slightest breath.
But still, the bushes continued to move.
Will’s hand went slowly to his quiver. Moving slowly, so as to avoid startling the creature in the bushes, he drew an arrow and placed it on the string of
his bow.
‘Halt?’ He tried to keep his voice down but couldn’t prevent it from quaking just a little. He wondered if his bow would stop a charging boar. He didn’t think so.
Halt looked round, his gaze taking in the arrow nocked to Will’s bowstring and noting the direction in which Will was looking.
‘I hope you’re not thinking of shooting the poor old farmer who’s hiding behind those bushes,’ he said seriously. Yet he pitched his voice so that it carried clearly across the track to the thick clump of bushes on the other side.
Instantly, there was a scuffle of movement from the bush and Will heard a nervous voice crying out:
‘Don’t shoot, good sir! Please, don’t shoot! It’s only me!’
The bushes parted as a dishevelled and frightened-looking old man hurriedly stood up and hurried forward. His haste was his undoing, however, as his foot caught in a tangle of underbrush and he sprawled forward onto the snow. He scrambled awkwardly to his feet, hands held out, palms first, to show that he carried no weapons. As he came, he continued a nonstop babble of words:
‘Only me, sir! No need for shootin’, sir! Only me, I swear, and I’m no danger to the likes of you!’
He hurried forward into the centre of the track, his eyes fixed on the bow in Will’s hands and the gleaming, razor-sharp tip of the arrow. Slowly, Will released the tension on the string and lowered the bow as he took a closer look at the interloper. He was skinny in the extreme. Dressed in a ragged and dirty farmer’s smock, he had long, awkward arms and legs and knobby elbows and knees. His beard was grey and matted and he was going bald on top of his head.
The man stopped a few metres from them and smiled nervously at the two cloaked figures.
‘Only me,’ he repeated, one last time.
Will couldn’t help smiling to himself. Anything less like a ferocious, charging wild boar, he couldn’t imagine.
‘How did you know he was there?’ he asked Halt in a soft voice. The Ranger shrugged.
‘Saw him a few minutes ago. You’ll learn eventually to sense when someone’s watching you. Then you know to look for them.’