Another of the Sharks darted forward and kicked the two ladders away from the wall, leaving Edvin and Stefan stranded on the roof.
“You cheated us,” Tursgud said angrily.
Again, Hal felt Stig ready to step forward and he increased the pressure of his grip on the other boy’s arm. There was nothing to be gained by Stig losing his temper here, he thought. They were badly outnumbered. Tursgud had planned this carefully. Hal had no doubt that the Sharks team had waited in the tree line, watching them at work. Then they had picked the moment when the Herons were spread out and vulnerable.
“And exactly how did we do that, Tursgud?” Hal said.
The big boy shook his head angrily. “Don’t bandy words with me,
Hal Who,
” he said, contempt in his voice as he used the disparaging term. “You cheated us and we all know it.”
“I prefer to say we out-thought you,” Hal said carefully.
“And that wasn’t too hard,” Stefan put in, from his perch on the roof.
Tursgud threw an angry glance his way and Hal wished his teammate would learn when to keep his mouth shut. Tursgud turned back to Hal.
“However you put it,” Tursgud said, “you’ve earned yourself a beating. And I’m going to give it to you.”
This time Stig, his anger thoroughly roused, broke free of Hal’s restraining grip and stepped forward to confront Tursgud.
“Why don’t you try giving me a beating, you overblown bully!” he challenged.
Tursgud eyed him contemptuously. “Fighting Hal’s battles for him, are you, Stig?” he said. Then he sneered at Hal. “And how about you? Happy to hide behind your friend, are you?”
Hal felt his own anger stir then. He knew that he couldn’t let Stig take this fight for him. He had to confront Tursgud himself. He remembered Thorn’s words:
He fears you. Sooner or later, it’ll come to a head between the two of you.
“It’s all right, Stig,” he said. “This is my fight.”
Stig looked quickly round at him. “You’re always saying that we’re a team, Hal. That we should pick the best man for the job. Well, I’m picking myself for this one. I’ve been waiting to settle Tursgud’s hash for him. I’ll fight you,” he said, addressing the last words to Tursgud.
Tursgud smiled at him. “But I don’t want to fight you, Stig. You’re rather stupid and annoying, it’s true, but I can put up with that. Your Araluen friend, however, is a liar and a cheat. I hear most Araluens are like that. We don’t want his sort in Hallasholm.”
“Too bad. Because if you plan to fight Hal, you’ll have to go through me first,” said Stig. His face was flaming with anger now and he stepped closer to Tursgud until he stood chest to chest with him. The Sharks’ skirl looked at him with bored amusement.
“Oh well, if you insist,” he said, then snapped his fingers.
It was obviously a prearranged signal, Hal thought. Anyone who knew Stig would have known he would choose to confront Tursgud and the Sharks hadn’t come here without making plans. Two of them leapt forward, one of them dropping a noose of rope over Stig’s shoulders and pulling tight, pinning his arms to his body. Stig yelled angrily but the two Sharks rapidly looped the rope around him several more times, in spite of his struggles. Then one of them kicked his feet from under him and sent him sprawling. Stig cursed at them as they held him down, but to no avail.
Wulf started forward to help him. But the large boy facing him stepped to block him and shoved him back. Ulf shoved him in turn.
“Leave my brother alone!” he shouted. Then the other Shark stepped to block Ulf as well.
The situation was poised to boil over any second, Hal saw. The atmosphere was as taut as a fiddle string. Man for man, the Sharks were generally bigger and stronger than his team. They had been the first boys picked, after all. Now Stig was helpless, Edvin and Stefan were stranded on the roof, and Ulf and Wulf were both facing opponents much bigger than they were. That left him and Jesper.
And Ingvar, of course. The massive boy had just emerged from the forest with a load of pine branches. He peered around like a confused bear. He could see shapes, and he realized there were more people in the campsite than when he’d left.
“Hal?” he said. “What’s going on?”
“Take it easy, Ingvar,” Hal said. If Ingvar started throwing punches, he was just as likely to decimate his own friends as the enemy. Once again, he realized how carefully Tursgud had planned this confrontation.
He stepped forward, stopping a meter short of Tursgud, seeing the triumph in the bigger boy’s eyes as he realized he’d maneuvered Hal into accepting the fight.
Most fights are won in the first one or two punches,
Thorn had told him.
“All right,” he said reluctantly, “I’ll fight you if that’s what you want.”
And without further notice, he sent two lightning left jabs into Tursgud’s face, feeling the other boy’s nose crunch under the impact of the second, then stepped forward and hooked savagely with his right at the big boy’s jaw, hoping to end it there and then.
Unfortunately, his first two punches were too successful, and Tursgud was reeling back in surprise and pain so that Hal’s vicious right hook barely grazed his jaw, instead of making the crushing contact he had hoped for.
The watching boys, Herons and Sharks alike, howled like animals as the fight started and they hurried to form a circle round the two opponents. Several of the Sharks caught Tursgud as he staggered back and steadied him, then shoved him forward once more.
He came at Hal like a raging bull, swinging left and right in huge, arcing blows. Hal ducked under one, blocked a second with his own left hand and jabbed now with his right, hitting Tursgud once more.
He was conscious of the other boys screaming encouragement and hate. He followed up the jab and walked into a shattering right hand from Tursgud. At the last moment, he remembered Thorn’s advice to keep his chin tucked in. If the blow had caught him on the jaw, the fight would have ended there and then. As it was, it exploded against his cheekbone under the eye, feeling like a sledgehammer blow. He staggered back, felt hands stop him from falling and shove him forward again.
Tursgud was waiting for him. He joined both hands together and swung them at Hal’s head. Hal, still dizzy from that last massive blow, saw it coming and swayed back. He felt the wind of Tursgud’s joined hands as they rushed past, millimeters from his face. Then he realized that Tursgud would be off balance in his follow-through and he leapt forward, sending that left hand darting out like a snake once more.
Smack! Smack!
Two good hits, one of them above Tursgud’s eye. Blood ran from a cut where Hal’s fist had caught the flesh against the bony ridge of Tursgud’s eyebrow. He hooked right again but Tursgud had learned that trick and blocked the blow with his own right.
Tursgud snarled and lunged forward. The blow to the cheek had cause Hal’s eye to swell and close. Hal saw that big left fist begin to swing in a huge arc again. He ducked, but his depth perception was hazy and he couldn’t avoid the blow completely. It caught the top of his head and sent him reeling again. He crashed into two of the spectators. As before, he felt their hands on him as they held him up, preparing to shove him back into the fight. But this time Tursgud yelled at them.
“Hold him!”
Hal had fallen against two of the watching Sharks. Now he felt their arms lock on his, holding him helpless as Tursgud advanced, measuring the distance between them, his right hand drawing back.
Hal jerked sideways, trying to avoid the blow, lowering his head. He was only partially successful and he grunted in pain as Tursgud’s fist hit him. He tried to crouch.
“Hold him up!”
It was Tursgud’s voice. But it seemed to come from a long way away. Hal’s ears were ringing and he realized that consciousness was slipping away from him. A hand grasped his hair and pulled his head up, sending tears flowing from his eyes with the pain. He opened his good eye and, through a blur of tears, saw Tursgud drawing back that right hand again, slowly and methodically, taking his time to make sure the blow connected.
At the last moment, he lurched sideways again, feeling the fist scrape painfully along the side of his face, tearing at his ear, so that blood started to trickle down from a torn earlobe.
“Hold him, blast you!”
Now the grip on Hal’s arms tightened. Once more his head was dragged up by the hair and once more Tursgud, a blurred figure now, was measuring him for the final punch.
This must be how Ingvar sees things, Hal thought. He could hear the spectators screaming still. The Herons were screaming abuse at Tursgud’s cowardly attack but, outnumbered as they were, there was nothing they could do. The Sharks were screaming in a savage, animal hatred, urging their leader on.
“Kill him! Kill him!”
He could make out the individual voices. Stig was screaming in frustrated rage. Hal knew it was him but Stig was beyond words. Stefan was yelling abuse at Tursgud.
“You coward! Fight fair!”
“Kill him! Kill him!” That was one of the Sharks. He didn’t know who.
“Hal? Are you all right?” That was Ingvar and Hal, in spite of the situation, or perhaps because of it, smiled groggily, his bruised, cut lips flaring with pain.
No, I’m definitely not all right, Ingvar, he thought. He wondered groggily why people invariably asked that question when it was obvious that you were injured. I’m not all right and he’s going to hit me again. Any second now.
And then a tall figure suddenly interposed itself between him and Tursgud, seeming to come from nowhere and ramming his shoulder heavily into the leader of the Sharks, sending him sprawling before he could throw that final punch.
“That’s enough, you coward!”
Rollond, Hal thought. What’s he doing here?
“Get away from him!” Rollond said. Hal felt the boys holding him shoved away, their hands torn free, felt other hands coming to support him.
“Hal? Are you okay?” It was Jesper.
Hal turned and looked groggily at his teammate. “No. I’m definitely not. What the blazes is Rollond doing here?”
He shook his head to clear his vision. Tursgud, his face streaming blood, his nose at an odd angle, lurched clumsily to his feet.
“Stay out of this, Rollond. This isn’t your fight!”
But there was a wariness in his tone as he realized that Rollond wasn’t alone. His nine brotherband members were with him and suddenly the numbers were very much against Tursgud.
“It isn’t any sort of fight,” Rollond said, contempt in his voice. “It’s a cowardly attack. I should have expected you’d try something like this.”
Tursgud jabbed a finger at the semiconscious Hal, now supported by Jesper and Ulf. Or was it Wulf, Hal thought groggily. He didn’t really care.
“I’m teaching this Araluen scum a long-delayed lesson!” Tursgud snarled.
Rollond took a long moment to study Tursgud’s bleeding, broken nose before he answered. When he did, it was with a contemptuous bark of laughter.
“And how are you doing that? By hammering his fist with your nose?”
The Wolf brotherband members laughed. Some of the Herons joined in. But in the main, they were too incensed at Tursgud’s treatment of their leader. Two of the Wolves had untied Stig and he scrambled to his feet now, his face flushed with anger. He lunged toward Tursgud.
“You coward! I’ll show you!” he began, but Rollond blocked his way.
“Leave it, Stig,” Rollond said in a reasonable voice. “We’ve had enough fighting for one day.” He leaned close and added quietly, “And you should never fight when you’re angry.”
“But …,” Stig began.
“S’ig! I nee’ you,” Hal called. His voice was thick and he couldn’t form words clearly with his swollen and cut lips. Stig turned at his friend’s voice and hurried to support him, his face working as his fury at Tursgud competed with concern for his friend.
“I’m sorry, Hal! They tricked me! I couldn’t do anything!” Tears were flowing down his cheeks as he studied his friend’s battered face. Hal put a hand on his shoulder.
“Le’ i’ go,” he said. “Rollon’ ish ri’.”
“But …” Stig turned again to where Tursgud half crouched, sizing up Rollond, realizing the fight was over.
“Le’ i’ go,” Hal repeated.
Stig’s shoulders sank as the tension went out of him. “All right. If you say.”
Hal couldn’t say more. It was too painful to speak. He patted Stig’s shoulder, tried to smile and winced.
“Now get out of here, you cowardly scum!” Rollond said to Tursgud and his band. “Try this again and you’ll have two brotherbands to contend with.”
Now that the excitement of the fight had gone, some of the Sharks were beginning to look ashamed—of their leader and their own behavior. They turned and began to walk away, heads down. Tursgud, with one last glare in Hal’s direction, turned and followed them.
Stig had lowered Hal to the grass and was supporting his shoulders so he could sit up. Hal looked owlishly around him. He was still dizzy and his eye was almost completely closed. Rollond came over and dropped to one knee beside him.