The Hunters

  While they were making their preparations, Stig went to the provisions sack by the cook fire and put together a package of dried meat and fruit and two small loaves of bread that had been baked the day before. He passed it to Thorn.

  ‘Ready?’ the old sea wolf said to Lydia, who nodded. ‘Then let’s get going.’

  ‘Aren’t you taking your club-hand?’ Hal asked. He’d noticed that the heavy studded club was lying with the small pile of Thorn’s possessions inside the tent.

  ‘For Rikard?’ Thorn said. ‘I don’t need it. I’ve got my saxe.’ He patted the leather hilt of the heavy knife that hung from his belt.

  Hal nodded. Now that he thought about it, Thorn wouldn’t need the heavy war club to deal with Rikard and it would simply have been more weight to carry.

  ‘Are we going to stand here talking all day?’ Lydia asked. ‘It’ll be noon before we get away at this rate.’

  Which was hardly fair, as the sun had only just slipped above the eastern horizon. Thorn raised his eyebrows to Hal in an exaggerated manner, then bowed and, with a sweeping movement of his arm, gestured for her to precede him.

  ‘Your pardon, lady. Please lead the way and I will follow.’

  She sniffed disdainfully as she strode across the clearing to the treeline, Thorn on her heels. ‘Try not to put your big sailor’s feet all over the tracks.’

  Thorn grinned at Hal. ‘It’s going to be a long couple of days.’

  Lydia ignored him. Hal signalled for the others to stop before they reached the spot where Rikard had been bound. They chorused their goodbyes and wishes of good luck. Lydia glanced back at Hal.

  ‘Take care of Ingvar,’ she said. Then she turned away. She stopped at the pine tree, casting around the ground close by. At this point, the sand of the beach was interspersed with a scrappy cover of coarse grass. But there was still enough soft sand to hold a heel print from Rikard’s boot. A few metres further on, she found another, then a third. They led directly into the tree cover.

  ‘So far so good,’ she said to herself. Then she added over her shoulder, ‘Stay behind me, Thorn.’

  Thorn was tempted to make a pithy reply, but realised her instruction made sense. He said nothing and moved quietly in her footsteps. Inside the trees, the low-lying early sun created a confusing pattern of bright glare and dark shade. The contrast between the dazzling light and the shadows made it difficult for the eye to focus. But Lydia moved confidently. Before long, a patch of damp soil showed another heel print.

  ‘He would have done better to get rid of those boots,’ she said. Rikard had been wearing high leather sea boots, with hard soles and heels. They looked quite dashing, and they were sensible enough on board ship, where waves would wash over the deck. But they were far less practical when the wearer was running through the tangled undergrowth, vines and roots that littered a forest floor. She pointed to a small indentation in the thick leaf mould that covered the ground.

  ‘He fell over here,’ she said.

  Thorn bent to peer at the mark. ‘How can you tell?’ he asked. He was amazed that she had noticed the small indentation.

  ‘That was made by the palm of his hand when he threw it out to save himself,’ she told him in a matter-of-fact tone. She glanced round to where several tree roots protruded from the ground a couple of metres before the hand mark.

  ‘Probably tripped on one of them. You might even see the scuff mark from his boot if you look.’

  Curious, Thorn stooped and inspected the tree roots. Sure enough, there was a small mark where the bark had been bruised, exposing the lighter inner wood of the root.

  ‘Remarkable,’ he said, looking at Lydia with new respect. ‘How do you know all this? How did you spot that hand print, for example? I would have walked straight past.’

  She smiled at him. ‘Which means you’d probably starve if you had to hunt for your food,’ she said. ‘I’ve been doing this for years. You train yourself to concentrate, to study every small mark and sign on the ground. If you’d noticed that dent, for example, what would you have thought?’

  Thorn shrugged. ‘I would have thought it was a dent.’

  She nodded. ‘That’s right. I try to see every small mark like that and ask what caused it. There’s a reason for everything, after all.’

  ‘But it could have been caused by a pine cone falling from the trees and hitting the ground,’ Thorn pointed out.

  ‘It’d need to be a pretty heavy pine cone to make that dent,’ she said. ‘And besides, if that were the case, there’d be a pine cone lying beside it.’

  Thorn smiled. ‘That’s true,’ he said. ‘Well, I must say, I’m impressed. Very impressed.’

  ‘It’s nothing much,’ she said. ‘If you practise anything long enough, you get good at it.’

  Despite her offhand reply, she was secretly gratified by Thorn’s admiration of her tracking skills. He had a way of getting under her skin with his teasing and his remarks to Hal about her being ‘a keeper’. He might appear to be a shabby old one-armed sailor, but she had seen him in action during the attack on Limmat and was in awe of his lightning speed and agility and hand-eye co-ordination. He was a master warrior, she knew, and such people were difficult to impress.

  She had continued pacing slowly through the forest, bent over, her eyes questing from side to side, then up and down and side to side again, as she followed the signs that Rikard had left. She stopped and straightened.

  ‘Hullo,’ she said. ‘He’s finally got smart.’ She turned back to Thorn, a few paces behind her. ‘Which way is Pragha?’

  He pointed to his left. ‘East.’

  ‘Well, he’s gone west. Must have decided he’d throw us off the track if he did that.’

  It was so obvious that she wasn’t saying I told you so that Thorn felt obliged to say it for her.

  ‘You told me so,’ he said.

  She smiled, and a very satisfied smile it was. ‘Yes. I did, didn’t I?’

  ‘So how do you know?’ Thorn asked. He’d moved forward and was searching the ground to the right for more telltale indentations. He could see nothing. She touched his arm.

  ‘Look up,’ she said, pointing. He raised his eyes to the level she was indicating – about shoulder height. Two thin branches had been pushed back and were half broken.

  ‘He headed west down this small side trail,’ she said, indicating a narrow path between the trees. ‘You can see where he pushed past this bush and broke the branches.’

  ‘An animal could have done that,’ Thorn said but she shook her head.

  ‘It would have to be a big animal. Besides, animals usually move more carefully than sailors. You can see it was done in the last few hours. The sap is still damp where the twigs are broken. I think if we check the trail a little further along . . .’ She moved into the side trail, turning sideways to avoid breaking any twigs herself. Not that they were expecting to be followed. It was an instinctive action, borne of years moving through forests like this one. She went a few metres, then called softly.

  ‘Aha! Yes, here’s our old friend the sea boot again. Bless him for wearing them.’

  She gestured for Thorn to follow her and moved further away from the first trail, eyes seeking, searching and finding more signs of Rikard’s passage.

  ‘You sailors like leaving a wake wherever you go, don’t you?’ she commented. She plucked a small white thread from a sharp branch and held it up for him to see.

  ‘Of course,’ she continued in a conversational tone, even though her eyes continued to search nonstop, ‘he was staggering through here in the dark, so he was bound to bump into things.’ She pointed to a thin, thorn-festooned creeper that was tangled around a larger branch. Thorn looked for some sign that it had snagged another piece of cloth but could see nothing. He shook his head and she explained.

  ‘There are other creepers like that around here. See? But they all hang vertically. That one’s at about sixty degrees. It got caught up on our friend’s clothes – probabl
y the leather vest he was wearing, because there’s no sign of any cloth or thread on it. He kept moving and pulled it from its normal position until he broke free and left it snagged around the branch.’

  ‘Remarkable,’ Thorn said softly.

  She shrugged. ‘You simply have to look for things that are not in the normal pattern.’ She suddenly laughed, stopping to indicate the ground at a point where the trail turned to the right. Thorn stepped up beside her. He could see a scuff of footprints around the base of a thick tree, which was obviously the reason why the path changed direction.

  ‘He was probably running,’ Lydia explained. ‘Or at least, moving as quickly as he could. And it would have been pitch dark under the trees, so he didn’t see the path changing direction. He ran straight into this tree. You can see his footprints leading up to it, then these others when he staggered back. See how the heels are more deeply indented as his weight was thrown back on them?’

  ‘Yes. I’d noticed that,’ Thorn said loftily. She turned a disbelieving look on him.

  ‘You did?’

  He nodded. ‘I did. I’m a quick learner. Now that you’ve shown me how it’s done, I reckon I could get the hang of this tracking business – if I practise for fifteen or twenty years.’

  ‘Perhaps you’d like to lead the way now?’ she offered, gesturing for him to go ahead of her.

  ‘No, no. You seem to be doing quite well for the moment,’ Thorn told her. ‘If you get into any trouble, just give me a shout and I’ll take over.’

  She shook her head at him. ‘Are you aware just how insufferable you can be?’ she said and he cocked his head to one side, considering.

  ‘Yes. But, like anything else, it’s a matter of practice. And I practise constantly.’

  ‘I’d noticed,’ she muttered, and led off again. After another ten metres or so, she remarked, ‘Looked like he hit that tree pretty hard. He’ll have a sore head when we find him.’

  ‘He’ll have more than that if he puts up a fight,’ Thorn said darkly. And this time, there was no underlying humour in his voice.

  As the day slowly passed, the members of the crew took turns looking after Ingvar.

  A sense of gloom hung over them as Ingvar showed no signs of improvement. He hovered on the very fringes of consciousness all day.

  As one person’s shift ended and another took his place, the question was always the same.

  ‘Any change?’

  And the answer was always a sad shake of the head.

  In fact, there was a progressive change. Ingvar was growing weaker by the hour, but nobody wanted to draw attention to the fact. The Herons moved about their chores – cutting firewood, airing blankets and tightening the ropes that fastened their tent in place – in an unhappy silence. If anyone did speak, it was usually no more than a few words, spoken in an undertone, as if loud voices would disturb their stricken friend.

  Hal had excused Edvin from the task of looking after Ingvar. At first, Edvin had resisted.

  ‘I’m the healer in the crew,’ he said. ‘It’s my job.’

  Hal shook his head gently. ‘There’s nothing you can do that the rest of us can’t handle,’ he said. ‘You’ve said yourself, all we can do is try to keep him cooled down and wait to see if the fever breaks. And we all know how to do that. I’d rather you went back to your job as cook. It’ll take your mind off things and the quality of food will improve.’

  In fact, Stig had been doing a creditable job preparing the meals for the crew. But everybody knew Edvin would do it better. Edvin reluctantly agreed and Hal made a further point.

  ‘I want you to get some decent sleep, as well,’ he said. ‘You’ve been wearing yourself out looking after Ingvar and I don’t want to have two sick crew members.’

  ‘I slept last night,’ Edvin protested. Hal looked at him for a long moment. Edvin finally dropped his eyes. ‘Well, I rested. I couldn’t really sleep. I was racking my brains, trying to think of something I could do for him.’ He paused and said hopelessly, ‘But there wasn’t anything. I went through the healer’s manual they gave me when I trained, to see if there was anything in there about how to treat a fever.’

  ‘What did you find?’ Hal asked.

  Edvin shrugged unhappily. ‘Nothing much. Just: Keep the patient cool and wait for the fever to break. If only there was something I could give him, I’d feel I was doing more. There was a note in there about willow bark. Apparently some of the primitive tribes from the east use it to treat fevers. But do you see any willows around here?’

  Hal dropped a hand on his shoulder. ‘So we’re doing all that can be done. And any one of us can handle that as well as you can. Get some sleep for when we really need you.’

  Edvin’s shoulders drooped. ‘I’ll try, Hal. It’s just I feel . . . responsible.’

  ‘Responsible? For this? You can’t help it.’

  Edvin nodded. ‘That’s what I mean. I can’t help it. I can’t do anything to help Ingvar. And that’s my job. It’s the one thing I really trained for and now I can’t do anything. The rest of you trained as warriors and you trained as the skirl. You’ve all done your jobs. But the first time there’s been a real task for me, I’ve failed.’

  ‘That’s crazy, Edvin, and you know it. The healer’s manual says there’s nothing more you could do – unless you count some crazy notion about willow bark. Now go and rest. We’re going to need you.’

  Edvin sighed deeply. ‘If you say. Although what you’ll need me for is beyond me.’

  He walked slowly to the main tent. Hal watched him enter, then sat down on a log by the fire. The coffee pot was keeping warm in the edge of the embers and he reached out and poured himself half a tin cup. It had been made several hours previously but he lacked the energy to make a fresh pot. He drank the bitter, grainy liquid in a couple of mouthfuls, then tossed the dregs into the fire. They hissed on the hot coals.

  ‘You look about as cheerful as I feel.’

  It was Stig. He sat on the log beside Hal and, together, they stared morosely at the grey and red embers of the fire. Eventually, Stig spoke again.

  ‘What were you discussing with Edvin?’

  Hal picked up a stick of firewood and stirred the coals with it, watching the flames rekindle.

  ‘He feels responsible for Ingvar’s condition.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous. He did a great job getting the arrow out and treating the wound. I couldn’t have done that.’

  ‘He just feels there should be something more he can do – other than sit and wait,’ Hal told him.

  Stig pursed his lips thoughtfully for a second or two. ‘Well . . . there isn’t, is there?’

  ‘Of course not. He did say something about the eastern tribes using willow bark.’

  ‘Willow bark?’ Stig frowned. ‘What do they use willow bark for?’

  ‘Apparently, they use it to treat fevers. I don’t know how.’ He poked the embers again and, when the fire flared once more, tossed the stick onto it and watched the flames begin to lick their way along the stick.

  ‘There’s a creek at the far end of the beach,’ Stig said and Hal looked up at him, puzzled by the apparent change of subject.

  ‘So?’ he said.

  Stig shrugged. ‘So where there’s a creek, you sometimes find willow trees. Maybe we should go and see?’

  They looked at each other for several seconds. ‘Can’t hurt, can it?’ said Hal.

  Stig spread his hands out. ‘We’ve got nothing better to do.’

  They made their way to the creek, several hundred metres away. Where it issued into the cove, it was narrow and fast running. But as they followed it inland, it gradually widened and the flow became more sedate. Half a kilometre from the beach, on the inside edge of a sweeping bend in the stream, stood a small grove of willows.

  ‘How do we give it to him?’ Stig asked.

  Edvin surveyed the generous pile of willow bark Stig and Hal had brought back to the camp. He scratched his head thoughtfully.


  ‘I guess I could pound it up, soak it in hot water and we could smear it on him – like a poultice,’ he said.

  ‘Let’s try that, then,’ Hal said.

  Edvin looked up at him and nodded. There was a sense of purpose about him now that he had something specific to do. He cut some of the bark, then pounded it with his pestle and mortar, adding hot water from a kettle standing in the fire coals. He scraped the resultant stringy paste into a bowl and rose to his feet.

  ‘Let’s see what happens,’ he said and led the way to the small tent. The crew, sensing that something was afoot, followed. Stig and Hal crammed into the tent with Edvin. The others jammed the doorway, peering in. Stefan was forced to move back against the canvas wall. He looked suspiciously at the bowl.

  ‘What’s that muck?’

  ‘Mashed-up willow bark,’ Hal said.

  Ulf, peering round the edge of the doorway, assumed a knowing look. ‘I thought it was.’

  His brother snorted. ‘Be the first time you ever thought anything,’ he said scornfully.

  Ulf turned to face him. ‘I’ll have you know –’

  ‘Shut up, you two,’ Hal said, without looking up from Ingvar. He spoke quietly, but there was an unmistakable note of command in his voice. Ulf opened his mouth to say something further, then thought better of it. There was a soft clop as he shut it.

  Edvin opened Ingvar’s shirt and smeared the grey-green, sticky mess of bark and water and sap onto the boy’s chest. At least, he thought, the water has cooled a little by now, so it might help. Ingvar stirred once, muttered, then let his head fall to one side. Edvin waited a minute or so, then placed his hand on Ingvar’s forehead.

  ‘Any change?’ Hal asked.

  The healer shook his head despondently. He sat back on his heels, defeated.

  ‘Maybe it’ll take a while to have any effect?’ Stig suggested.