The Dark Horse (15 page)

25

Mouse had found the water. Mouse had sensed the presence of more of our tribe.

It was she who had told them where to look for the hares we ate. While the rest of us brooded over our own thoughts, Mouse seemed different.

A moment’s reflection and I knew what it was. She was content.

We prepared to sleep. We had cut armfuls of bracken before dusk, using our swords. Now we passed as much of the stuff through the smoke of the fires as we could, in an effort to get rid of the ticks lurking in the bracken’s fronds. It would be a restless night otherwise.

The ticks dropped from the bracken and crackled as they hit the fire. It would not get them all, but it might make the night a little more comfortable than the one before.

Then there was the problem with the horse. The invaders’ steed would not obey us. We needed to get it under cover, into the cave with us, but though the ceiling was high and there would be plenty of room for it to stand, it would not come inside.

I looked to Mouse for help, but she was uncooperative, too.

“Leave him outside,” she said.

“No,” I said. “We must get him inside. We can’t take any chances.”

Mouse looked at me. For a long time she said nothing but held my gaze. It suddenly occurred to me that we were having a fight, a battle of wills. I didn’t know why, but it worried me.

“Mouse,” I said quietly, “please get the horse to come in.”

And finally she relented. She went and put her hand on its neck, and after a moment or two she was able to lead it into the cave. It snorted gently.

We gathered in the smoky darkness.

“Sigurd,” someone said, “tonight is Spell-making. But we don’t have Gudrun. . . .”

She was right. It was the full moon.

“Yes,” said her sister. “What shall we do for Spell-making?”

It seemed obvious to me.

“Mouse,” I said, “will you do the Spell-making for us?”

But again she refused, and this time I could not face forcing the issue. If she made me back down in front of the others, it would do me no good as leader, either.

“I cannot,” she said, and that was all she would say. So I mumbled a few words to everyone and wished that we might yet prosper.

We slept. Or rather, some of us did, some of the time. Dawn was still a little way off as I rolled over on my bracken bed and saw that Mouse had gone. I thought she must have only just left, for I saw her moving out of the cave, a darker silhouette against a dark sky.

I got up and followed.

By the time I made it to the entrance, she was outside, farther along the series of cave mouths. She seemed to be heading somewhere, with purpose. It was clear she was not just sleepless and wandering aimlessly. Something about that made me want not to disturb her, but I followed, fascinated.

She made for a smaller cave, a little higher than the others, and went inside.

I hesitated, waiting for I do not know what. I looked out over the moonlit sea away beneath me, and I can clearly remember how beautiful it all seemed, despite the horror that had befallen us. There was not a cloud in the night sky, and the full moon shone as brightly as the sun at dawn.

I remembered Mouse. I climbed to the mouth of the cave. The moon was low in the sky now, and as I put my head up to look in, it illuminated the narrow, tunnel-like cave fully. Mouse was sitting at the back wall but was looking in, not out.

She seemed to be studying the wall. She was talking; it sounded as if she were talking to someone else, though there was no one there.

I decided she was not in any danger, and left her to her memories.

26

Next morning Sigurd sent Detlef and Mouse back up to the lookout point on the cliffs above them.

While they were gone, Sigurd spent some time organizing.

“For the time being, until we find the others, we are all that’s left of the Storn,” Sigurd said to the rest of the group.

They regarded him silently. There was no hostility, no disagreement, nor for that matter, agreement. There was nothing. Sigurd sensed that they had given up.

“Now is the time to prove ourselves. We need to relight the fire. And we need more wood so that we can keep it from going out again. We need to hunt for more food.”

“Are we going to stay up here forever?” asked Hemm.

“Don’t worry about that for now,” said Sigurd a little desperately. “I’ll work out what’s best to do. . . .”

He bade them get on with their duties, before there were any more awkward questions.

He needed to think.

Should they look for the others? Should they return to the Storn itself ? At least Detlef and Mouse might have some information that could help them decide.

Mouse.

What had she been doing last night? he wondered. He walked over to the cave where she had been. It wasn’t hard to find. It was different from the others, smaller and higher up. Looking around to see that no one was watching, he went in. He paused for a moment, letting his eyes get used to the gloom inside.

After a while his vision became clearer, and he crawled toward the back of the low tunnel.

What had she been doing?

And then he saw it.

A drawing. And then another and another.

Bold drawings made with some dark brown stuff on the smooth back wall of the cave.

Sigurd did not understand them. The first thing he recognized was a picture of a wolf. He soon identified several more. Then there was something that looked like a huge, round tent. And then, as his eyes learned to understand what he was seeing, he saw some human figures. They were only stick drawings, but Sigurd could see a group of tall men dressed in heavy cloaks, and some women with arms raised. They pointed at the last, small figure.

“What are you doing here?” said Mouse, behind him.

“Nothing!” said Sigurd automatically. Then, remembering himself, he said, “Why? Should I not be here?”

“This is my place!” said Mouse.

Sigurd could not judge her mood. He crawled toward the opening, where his sister crouched.

“You mean when you lived with the wolves?”

Mouse ignored that question.

“What are these drawings?” Sigurd tried instead.

“How did you know they were here?” Mouse asked.

“I followed you last night,” said Sigurd simply. “But how did
you
know about them?”

Mouse looked him straight in the eye.

“I made them,” she said.

Sigurd couldn’t help showing his surprise.

“You . . . ?” he began, but as so often before, he could tell the subject was closed. He left.

“Sorry,” he said as he went, “I’m sorry. . . .”

He tried to hide it from Mouse, but his mind was racing, struck by a new terror. Again the girl he thought of as his sister had surprised him. They grew apart a little every time he realized how much he did not know about her. He had seen paintings on a wall in a long-forgotten cave, and she had told him they were hers.

Sigurd found that Detlef had returned, too, and was talking to the others.

“They’ve gone, Sigurd,” said Thorbjorn as he approached.

“The Dark Horse?”

“Yes,” said Detlef. “I couldn’t see anyone down there at all. The fires are out, but there’s still smoke.”

“What about Mouse?” Sigurd asked.

“What do you mean?” replied Detlef.

“Could she . . . see anything? Feel anything?”

Detlef shook his head. “No. Nothing. They’re gone.”

A question lay unspoken in all their minds: Where?

Where had they gone?

Farther south, looking for more easy pickings?

Or had they gone back to the north, to their own lands?

Sigurd thought that was less likely. And there was another, more worrying possibility, too. Supposing they were coming to the hills? Coming to finish what they had started in the village?

Pictures and sounds from that terrifying night swept through Sigurd’s mind again. So many of them! Dark brown and black cloaks swirling around their shoulders and white-haired heads as they swung sharp iron at anything that lay in their path. Unstoppable. And so many of the Storn dead.

They could not survive another attack. It would be the end of them all.

27

We did not see Mouse for most of the rest of that day. She spent a long time in her cave. I worried about what was happening to her. The rest of us argued.

We argued about what the disappearance of the Dark Horse meant, whether it was a good or a bad sign. We argued about what we should do either way.

Some of the tribe wanted to go back to the village. Others said that was certain death. I was rapidly losing control; I was on the edge of losing my status entirely, because they could tell I was struggling.

And then, late in the afternoon, as we sat around the fire in the cave, Mouse appeared at the entrance. The horse whinnied as he saw her.

“I have seen the Dark Horse,” Mouse said. “They are coming for us.”

And that changed everything.

28

The difference between them spoke much in itself. The small foundling girl, back on her hillside, stood and spoke calmly but urgently about what she had seen. The rest of the Storn, or what was left of them, stood in a ragged bunch, weak, dispirited, and defeated. Even Sigurd’s proud young heart was failing him.

And so Mouse took charge.

“In the mind of a wolf I ran down to the Dark Horse. They are camped in the low hills. At least they were.”

“Where are they now?” asked Sigurd. He could feel his heart starting to beat stronger and faster. He looked desperately at Mouse, too scared to marvel at the change in her.

“All is clear,” said Mouse. “They have again divided into two groups.”

At this news, which indicated another attack, there were shouts and cries. Of fear, of pain.

“There is only one chance,” said Mouse firmly. “There is a narrow gully that runs inland. It is not far from here. Detlef and I saw it when we went to look for the others. I have felt my way along. It opens into a wooded valley.”

Sigurd nodded, understanding Mouse’s plan.

“From there we can hide in the woods,” he said. “And move through them far away until the Dark Horse give up.”

He tried to sound more confident than he felt. Would the Dark Horse ever give up? If they would follow the Storn once, why would they ever stop? But at least it was a plan; it was a chance of survival for the tribe.

There was still no sign of any of the others, of his mother. Sigurd shook himself.

“Right,” he said. “We leave. Now!”

And there were no arguments.

They got their few possessions together and followed Mouse out of the camp.

Sigurd thought Mouse might refuse to leave the caves, or at least find it hard to do so, but he was wrong.

She led them away from her old home and didn’t look back.