Chapter twenty

West of Portalis

 

The next morning Rem was up early, searching for food. He brought back a brace of ducks and cooked them as expertly as he had cooked the bony fish the night before. They ate one of the ducks and placed the other one in a pot with a screw lid. ‘From Amansk’ he explained.

After they had eaten he covered their traces and they set off. Using the sun to guide them, he plunged south-east and they travelled like that for an hour or so, heading towards the old main west road. Every now and then he would stop and sniff the air, or smell the earth. Nothing he sniffed or smelled, however, seemed to make him very happy.

‘Everywhere elves – from Portalis’ he grumbled, pointing downhill to what had been a smudge to Kath the night before, but was now clearly the vague outline of a small city. ‘Hard move as two. You human, very noisy. Rem very quiet.’

Kath said that she was sorry, but that was too loud for Rem too. He held his index finger up sternly. 

They moved on from copse to tall grass, using whatever cover they could find. Each foray was faster and more frenetic than the last. Rem was increasingly distracted, looking over his shoulder, muttering to himself in his own language.

Eventually they arrived at the ruins of a small town, with boulders and bits of wall strewn across the terrain. Rem had them crouch down inside a ruined building, so that they were completely hidden from view. The building had numerous holes in its wall.

‘This once market’ he said

‘Really?’ whispered Kath, ‘it’s not much to look at now. What was this place called?’

Rem shook his head. ‘Elf town. Don’t know. Don’t care’

‘We wait until followers not following’ he continued.

Kath looked shocked.

‘What followers?’

‘Elves – on trail. You fight?’ 

‘No’

‘Then I fight if must. Only four. Rem fight four, no problem. But best not. Do not spill blood if no needed’

‘Agreed…’ whispered Kath, wide eyed, shocked by the thought of violence.

They waited in their hole. The sounds of the day buzzed in their ears: flies and birds, and for a while Kath hoped that no-one was coming. Then they heard something else – the faint sound of voices and horses.  Rem tensed in their hiding place, head raised up, his long arms reaching inside his bag.

The horses were closer now and elven voices could be heard, speaking in a dialect of Visneorian that she could scarcely understand. They were certainly looking for something.

Kath started to whisper, but Rem frantically pointed to his lips and made a huge silent ‘shhh’ signal. They crouched down among the rubble. Rem now held in his fist a slender wooden club, not much broader at its tip than its base, and he was shifting it from hand to hand. He was smiling, but it wasn’t a happy smile.

They were getting closer. The sound of footfalls came ever nearer. Then Kath could see some slender feet, with brown sandals, through one of the larger holes in the wall that opened up at ground level. As the owner of the feet knelt down to look inside the hole, Rem gave out a cry and smashed the club down on his knee  – there was a crunch like splintering matchwood and a cry of anguish and pain. Then there was an unmistakeable dragging sound of the injured elf being pulled away.

‘Maim not kill’ Rem whispered savagely. ‘Maim gives more trouble them, less trouble us’

There was a lot of swearing going on outside and Rem was up on his feet, looking through another crack in the masonry.

‘They have bows – no use against wall!’

As he spoke they heard the thwack of arrows against the sides of the ruined house. One arrow struggled its way through a hole in the wall and dropped harmlessly to the ground in front of them. Kath crawled to the far end of their shelter, shivering with fear.

‘Need one more. Get half, get all,’ murmured Rem.

‘Now – you lie by hole – here!’

Kath looked at him aghast. She couldn’t move from where she was, she was far too terrified.

‘Come – now!’  he hissed. She still couldn’t move.

Rem looked at her again and a strange and startling change came over his face. His sneer turned into a distant look of deep concern and he knelt by her.  She suddenly realised that he had eyes of deep grey.

‘Hurt and fear, very bad.’ He said, quietly.

He reached into his bag and brought out a greying piece of cloth, like a very old and neglected flannel, which he held up against Kath’s forehead and said two words in his own language. Kath thought for a second that she felt something, like a surge of strength flow through the cloth, and then, completely unexpectedly, she felt warm and calmer.

Outside the bowing had stopped and there was the sound of cautious footsteps moving toward them. Kath was still terrified but everything seemed just a little less impossible.

‘Now?’ he growled, his face returning to its usual shape.

Kath nodded very slightly.

‘Now you help! Three against two not good odds. Need one more’

Kath dragged herself up and lay against the side of the hole close to where the elves were approaching.

Rem scrabbled in his backpack and pulled out a vial of red liquid.

‘What’s that?’ mumbled Kath

‘unreal blood – for tricks!’ 

Rem opened the vial and poured it over her right arm. 

‘Now -  stick arm through wall!’ Rem commanded softly. She obeyed.

Rem grabbed the arrow that had come through the wall and stuck it through the hole so that the feathers pointed towards the elves. It now looked like Kath had been shot through the hole.

‘Not too far’ whispered Rem, pulling Kath’s arm inside so that only the tips of her fingers stuck out but also so that her bloodied arm and the arrow could be seen by someone crouching down low.

‘Keep still. When I you prod, pull arm out quick’ he ordered

Kath lay still, her heart pounding so fast that she was sure that the elves would be able to hear it. This surely wouldn’t work… There were a thousand things that could go wrong. 

She could sense the elves just next to her. Rem was crouched above her, waiting. His gaze was concentrated on a point just in front of her fingers. 

‘groan!’ Rem commanded in a whisper just a hairsbreadth above silence.

Kath let out a small but very audible cry of pain. One of the elves bent down to inspect her fingers. There was a brief conversation, and then one of them put his hand through the hole to grab the fingers. Rem prodded her and she pulled her hand away violently. Rem brought his club down on the tips of the elf’s fingers. It was a glancing blow, but more than enough – Rem was fearfully strong. There was a gasp of pain, an agonised oath and then a hasty retreat.

For the next few minutes there was the distant sound of angry debate. The argument clearly shifted backwards and forwards between staying to fight and retreating. The air grew warm and rather stifling inside their bolthole, but they were happy to wait, silently hoping that the elves would leave. After another few minutes they heard the sound of hooves galloping away from them. They were left with the flies and the chirruping birds.

Rem cautiously made his way to the ragged exit to the building, looked around, and then disappeared for about five minutes. During that time Kath wandered round the inside of the ruin too scared to look outside but too tense to sit still. When he did come back she was intensely relieved.

‘They gone – but will back be – with more than four’ Rem said. He sat for a second among the rubble and looked thoughtful – once again his face softened. Kath thought this creature very strange, but very interesting.

‘Glad that work. Not good in hole. Thought Rem and Kath in trouble’

He looked at her eagerly, laughing.

‘How say that in real Human?’ he asked

Kath momentarily failed to understand what he meant, and then it clicked.

She laughed too, despite herself.

‘I’m glad that worked. Being in that hole was very dangerous and we might have been killed’ she carefully translated.

‘Good Human! One day Rem speak like Kath!’

Rem grabbed his bag and slung it over his shoulder. He stood up and it seemed to Kath that he was untangling his legs. He looked intently at her, calculating something.

‘We run now. Run until too far to find. Run from elves – always run from elves! When cannot fight it no shame to run’

Rem propelled himself out of the bolthole and Kath sprinted after him. They hurried through the old ruins and out into the countryside. Kath felt an extraordinary elation from having survived and having escaped.

They ran on and on through the stones and grass until the darkness made them stumble.  By then Portalis was ten miles behind them and Rem felt safer. They camped a mile or so to the south of the Great West Road, hidden among the brambles. They were one day closer to Melloreis and their route was now clear.