‘What?’ Mrs Zimmerman asked breathlessly.
The river they were running alongside curled to the left and, where it did, the trees they were so desperate to keep a distance from ran all the way down to the river’s edge.
‘If we want to go any further, we’ll have to go through those trees.’
Mrs Zimmerman stared unhappily at them.
There was no indication whether it would be a short interlude through a thin spur of wood, or whether, from this point on, the safe margin of ground between them and the woods was gone.
Broken Wing still carried his ancient flintlock musket, a horn of powder and some shot. If there was just the one . . . thing pursuing them, he trusted the Indian’s marksmanship to take a single, quickly aimed shot across open ground, should it emerge suddenly and charge towards them. In amongst the trees, however, should they be ambushed, he suspected the gun would never get to be fired.
Ben cast a glance at the tree line to the left of them, running parallel with the riverbank, and knew it was in there somewhere, looking out at them and urging them to go forward, into the trees ahead. To their right the river flowed swiftly, swollen with freezing water that would numb them the moment they stepped into it. It would swallow them up and certainly kill them all.
Broken Wing spotted his gaze and shook his head. ‘Not cross here.’ He gestured west. ‘Down river . . . cross. Five day north, to Shoshone.’
‘What does he mean?’ asked Mrs Zimmerman.
Ben understood. ‘He can take us to the Shoshone Indians. But we’d need to cross this river and head north.’
Broken Wing nodded.
‘But’ - he turned to Mrs Zimmerman - ‘we need to carry on through those trees.’
She shook her head vigorously. ‘I can’t . . . I don’t want to go in th—’
‘Neither do I. But we can’t stay here.’
Broken Wing stabbed his finger impatiently forwards.
‘Yes, we’re wasting time,’ said Ben. He smiled reassuringly at Mrs Zimmerman and Emily. ‘It’ll only be a thin strip of woodland, and then we’ll be out in the open again. We’ll be fine.’
Emily stirred. ‘Don’t worry, Mrs Zimmerman,’ she said with a small voice, ‘Benjamin will keep us safe.’ She smiled up at Ben and tightened her grasp on his hand. ‘We should go,’ she added.
Mrs Zimmerman nodded at her. ‘All right.’
They approached the trees cautiously, huddled closely together. Broken Wing was ahead, his musket held ready, loaded with shot, and powder ready in the flashpan.
His tamahakan was tucked into a leather belt. Ben had seen how quickly the Indian could pull it out and use it, during the struggle back at the camp. He wondered, though, if he’d be quick enough this time.
Mrs Zimmerman and Emily followed the Indian, the woman’s arms wrapped protectively around the young girl, both of them staring at the trees with eyes as round as saucers. Ben walked a few paces behind them, Keats’s large knife in one hand and a thick and heavy stick, for what it was worth, held in the other. Together they stepped beneath the darkening canopy of branches, from a bed of crunching snow onto a spongy carpet of dry cones and needles.
Through the gaps in the branches he watched them move with slow deliberation, only a few dozen yards away . . . so close to him now.
His hot breath blasted back off the bone mask onto his face, warming his cheeks.
Emily.
He missed her, missed her so much. Before everything had changed there had been him and her - just the two of them. Momma only had time for Preston, never for them. Momma didn’t care about them, not as much as she cared for God. Momma didn’t want to know about the games Hearst and Vander played with the children.
It’s always been just you and me, Emily.
But there was Ben. He had shown some kindness. Sam had even let himself believe that come the spring, the three of them might leave the wilderness together: an odd family, like three siblings - big brother, little brother and little sister. Emily liked Ben. She would have adored the idea of doing that, leaving Preston’s temple and exploring the world alongside Benjamin Lambert.
You have me now.
Yes . . . I do.
Sam owed so much to the angel. He knew he wouldn’t have survived alone. He would have gone mad; he would have been stupid the day Mr Hearst came to kill them. He would have returned to the camp and tried to attack Preston. And he would have failed. Mr Hollander always stood guard, ready to protect him. He would have failed and been killed.
You need me.
Yes.
Do you trust me?
Yes.
Sam watched them moving steadily and quietly through the wood, Emily dropping back to clutch Benjamin’s hand, the Indian ahead of them, Mrs Zimmerman beside.
Do you see how she clings to him?
He did. He saw her holding tightly and peering out at the darkness in fear . . .
Of me?
You are different now.
I’m Sam.
You were ‘Sam’. You are much more now.
The thick canopy above them had kept all but the slightest dusting of snow from reaching the ground beneath. Through occasional gaps, lances of light speared down ahead of them, dappling the brown forest floor. They stepped forward in silence, the muffled crackle of dry twigs beneath their feet and the soft, muted gurgle of the river to their right the only sounds the wood allowed. Looking hopefully ahead for any sign that the wood was thinning out once more, Ben could see only an endless forest of tall lodgepole pine trunks with a high canopy of branches, punctuated by clusters of squat spruce trees hugging the ground where the sun came through.
‘I’m scared,’ Mrs Zimmerman whispered.
Broken Wing looked back at them and frowned at her.
‘Just keep going,’ Ben replied softly, ‘quiet as you can.’
They walked in silence for another five minutes before the Indian suddenly stopped and cocked his head, listening to something. Then he turned to face them, with the slightest smile on his stern face.
Ben shrugged.
Broken Wing pointed to their right, and cupped an ear. Listen.
Ben did so, noticing nothing at first.
Mrs Zimmerman frowned. ‘I hear something.’
Then he did too - the faint sound of rumbling. He felt it more through his feet than he heard it with his ears. ‘That’s the river, isn’t it?’ he whispered.
She nodded. ‘Yes . . . yes, I think it is.’
Broken Wing pointed ahead.
‘It’s coming from that way,’ said Ben.
‘Crosss riv-uhh ahead.’ Broken Wing pointed insistently. The rumble of water could only mean the river had narrowed, perhaps offering them the opportunity to cross. The sound was heartening.
Ben placed a hand on Mrs Zimmerman’s shoulder. ‘Come on, then . . . it can’t be that much further through the trees.’ She nodded and set off after the Indian, eager that the Shoshone not leave them too far behind.
Ben turned to Emily. ‘Come on, we’ll be out of—’
The girl was rooted to the spot, her eyes wide, her jaw slackened and hanging open.
‘Emily?’
Her eyes remained fixed on something above them.
‘He’s here,’ she whispered.
Ben turned round and looked up at the branches. For no more than half a second, he saw the outline of something crouching on a branch. Pale like a ghost, but with spines or spikes emerging from its silhouette, and a long skeletal face. It uncurled from the branch, dropping soundlessly down to the floor of the wood and out of sight beyond a tangled veil of undergrowth.
‘Oh God!’ he shouted. ‘It’s here!’
Broken Wing stopped and whipped round. Ben pointed towards where he’d seen it drop. ‘THERE!’
The Indian swiftly levelled his musket and dropped to one knee with practised and elegant swiftness. Mrs Zimmerman stumbled towards the Indian, sobbing with fear as she dropped to her knees at his feet and started muttering in prayer.
Ben reached out a hand for Emily. ‘Come on,’ he whispered quietly. Her small hand grasped his obediently, and they moved slowly towards the others.
‘Anyone see it?’ Ben called out, his eyes darting left and right. ‘Where is it?’
His voice echoed around the wood, then diminished. In the stillness there was only the continuous muted rumble of the river and the sound of the four of them breathing.
‘I’m right here,’ a whispered voice hissed from somewhere nearby. The sibilant hiss echoed in the silence, bouncing from tree trunk to tree trunk. Broken Wing’s aim darted swiftly from a bramble, to a cluster of ferns, to another. He muttered something under his breath - a curse.
‘This is fun,’ the voice hissed again.
Ben and Emily quickly joined the other two, and he let her hand go. Mrs Zimmerman reached out a comforting arm to the little girl and held her tight.
Ben stood beside Broken Wing, scanning the forest around them, the hunting knife and his stick held ready.
‘What do you want?’ Ben called out, hating the warbling sound of fear in his voice.
‘Emily.’ The whisper seemed to come at them from all sides, quiet yet deafening in the thick silence of the wood.
There was a long pause. He would have been happier with complete silence, but instead he could just about detect the quiet muttering of a voice coming from somewhere. A small, plaintive voice arguing under its breath, pleading with some kind of silent partner. It sounded like the insane one-sided conversations he’d heard echoing from the cells of Banner House Asylum; pathetic, quiet voices that asked nonsensical questions and moments later riposted the silent replies. He knew this was no angel, no demon - it was the pitiful sound of someone who had lost their mind.
He swallowed nervously. ‘Who are you?’
There was no answer. The question peeled around the wood, and as the echo died away, he could hear the whispered debate had ceased. Ben had been sure he knew who this was last night, but now he was not so sure. There was a timidity to that small voice that just didn’t square with the man.
‘You’re not Preston,’ said Ben. ‘I know that much.’
‘No,’ came a hissed reply. ‘The dirty man is dead now.’ The voice of the thing was changing, from a chilling hiss to something that sounded more human. ‘He had it coming!’ the voice continued to drift, gradually becoming the emotionally strangled cry of a person struggling to hold back tears of rage. ‘He was a bad man, bad all the way through. Even the angel couldn’t stand to be with him any longer!’
Ben looked from side to side, trying to work out where the voice was coming from, but the bewitching acoustics of the wood played tricks with it.
‘He let Eric Vander play his games with all the children.’ The voice laughed without joy, bitter and hollow. ‘Well, I cut it off, didn’t I? I cut his thing off and shoved it into his mouth before he died.’
There was something in the voice that Ben recognised, some signature beneath the visceral snarl of hate that he remembered from what felt like a lifetime ago.
It was a voice he had once taken pleasure in listening to; a young man he enjoyed being in the company of. ‘Sam? Is that you?’
Silence.
‘Sam? Is it you out there?’
There was no reply. A long moment passed in silence. Ben strained to listen to the noises of the wood and then he heard it: so quiet, the whispered one-sided conversation of madness once more, coming from somewhere ahead of them, somewhere behind a dense cluster of twisted and dead vines and brambles, long starved of sunlight and sustenance.
‘Sam,’ he called out. ‘Sam, we’re going to take her away from this place, take her away from Preston’s madness. The man was insane. Whatever it was he was planning to do, it was the product of a very sick mind.’
There was something Sam had once asked of him, an awkward request that, back then, he’d had to turn down.
‘Listen, I’ll take you both out of these woods with me. You and me and Emily. You and I, we’ll both look after her . . . and we’ll leave all this behind us, in the woods where it belongs.’
The sibilant, whispered conversation was at once quietened.
‘Sam, just come out where we can see you. Put down whatever weapon you’ve made and join us. It’s all over now. Preston can’t get to Emily. She’s safe.’
The silence continued. A minute, two . . . long enough that Ben was beginning to suspect the boy had left them and returned into the darkness of the wood, when a familiar voice called out.
‘Emily, please come back with us. Back to the camp.’ It was Sam, as Ben remembered him from weeks ago - a voice utterly without malice, broken with emotion, pleading.
‘Please . . . Emily . . . please.’
Emily began to cry at the sound of his voice.
‘Sam? You said us. Who else is there with you?’ asked Ben. The answer came after a few seconds. ‘She belongs with us. There is God’s work still to do back there,’ the voice replied. ‘You belong with us.’
Emily screamed at those words. ‘Don’t want to go back!’ She grasped Ben’s hand. ‘Please don’t make me go back!’
‘Let go of him!’ the voice hissed angrily.
‘No!’ Ben shouted back. ‘She’s coming with us.’
There was a rustle of movement to their right, followed by the deafening boom from Broken Wing’s musket and the startled flutter of departing birds from the branches above them. Ben spun round to look towards where the end of the Indian’s musket still pointed. As the thick haze of powder smoke around both men cleared, Ben anxiously peered into the darkness ahead, expecting to see a slumped form.
But there was nothing to be seen.
‘Sam?’ he called out. ‘Sam?’
‘Sam is gone,’ the voice hissed back.
In an instant Ben realised they were in trouble. The musket had been discharged and nothing hit.
He turned to Broken Wing. ‘Take them and go!’
The Shoshone hesitated.
‘RUN!’ Ben barked to the others. ‘Run for the river!’ Broken Wing hurled the empty musket to the ground and pulled his tamahakan out, ready to bloody its small, jagged blade. He pulled Mrs Zimmerman roughly to her feet and pushed the woman ahead of him. Turning to Ben and Emily, he beckoned to them urgently.