‘By the Sacrifice I’ll see him swing and I’ll piss on his grave,’ Seeton had said, once Grymauch and the others had left.
‘No, you won’t, Boillard. You gave your word.’
‘Under duress,’ argued Boillard. ‘Don’t count.’
‘Mine does.’
‘Well, I’m not you, Harvester. You do as you wish. Nobody shoots Boillard Seeton and gets away with it. Damn, but I’ll enjoy seeing them hang.’
‘I don’t think so.’
Huntsekker had drawn his scythe and sliced it through Seeton’s heart. The man was dead before he knew it.
Just the three occasions. A stolen bull, an ambush by a stream, and a death near the cathedral. A few sentences had passed between them. No more than that. Yet Huntsekker constantly caught himself thinking of the highlander, the memories tinged with a massive regret that he had not known him well.
He walked on, cutting down through a gully and clambering up the other side. He was breathing heavily as he reached the top, and the old familiar ache in the lower back had begun.
He stretched, then looked for a place to sit. He was still some five miles from Eldacre, and was beginning to regret turning down PowdermilPs offer of a night’s lodging. Leaving the trail he found a small hollow and sat with his back to a tree. His thoughts drifted to the Moidart. Huntsekker had never liked him. He was not a man who would ever inspire devotion. Too cold, too self-contained. Too deadly.
Just like you, Huntsekker, he thought. Ah well, we are what we are.
The Moidart was troubled. Huntsekker had known the man angry, and filled with a cold, murderous rage. Never troubled, though. Always confident in his talent. What had changed? After the meeting with Powdermill Huntsekker thought he knew.
‘They float in the air.’
Huntsekker shivered and glanced around the hollow. As always when troubled he tugged at the twin silver spikes of his beard. Thoughts of magic left him uneasy. Twenty years ago the church authorities had set out to destroy magickers and witches. There were burnings across the land. Huntsekker was one of those who had kicked down doors, dragging out suspects for questioning. Dark and bloody times, with many an innocent flayed or put to the fire.
Now there were few who admitted to the dark arts. Huntsekker had come across Powdermill eight years ago. The man was known as a finder. Huntsekker had been tracking a rapist and a killer, bat the man had gone to ground somewhere. In desperation Huntsekker had listened to the advice of one of his men, Dal Naydham, and sought out Powdermill. He had no great expectation of success, but anything was better than returning to the Moidart with news that the killer had escaped him.
Powdermill went into a trance while holding a glove owned by the killer. When he opened his eyes he told Huntsekker about a cabin in a valley in the shadows of Caer Druagh, some sixty miles south. He described it, and the route to it.
Huntsekker found the man, removed his head and carried it back to Eldacre. He had earned nothing for the trip. Powdermill’s price had been exactly the bounty. Two pounds, eight chaillings. He was a canny little bastard.
His back eased, Huntsekker rose and returned to the road. Something was still troubling him, but he couldn’t put his finger on the problem.
The answer came to him just a fraction too late: why had Powdermill refused to travel with him?
The first shot struck him between the shoulder blades, slamming him forwards. The second shot hit him in the lower chest. Instinctively Huntsekker threw himself to the right, and over the edge of a steep drop. He fell heavily, then pitched head over heels, gathering speed until his body splashed into an icy stream.
The moon disappeared behind thick clouds. Huntsekker, semiconscious, dragged himself clear of the water and crawled into thick undergrowth. There he passed out.
When he awoke it was dawn. His head pounded, and there was dried blood on his scalp. With a groan he sat up, struggling to remember how he came to be there. Had he fallen? Then he remembered the shots from the darkness. With an effort he opened his bearskin coat. There was blood on his shirt, which was ripped, and the wooden hilt of his double shot pistol was dented and split. Huntsekker pulled it clear. The second shot had struck the weapon, then cannoned off across the flesh of his left side, tearing the skin.