“Mel” The Sergeant jerked back a fraction of an inch. “But everybody knows that you are the only one who dares come inside-”
“I already told them I have a forester to help with the bait and the coursing—said you were wearing a treated coat to keep the hounds off, but it was mine and I only had the one. I also told them that you had helped on other hound hunts. The Duke did turn up some men he wanted trained, but none of them lasted long.” He laughed. “All right, we drag the duocorn carcass into this hut to work on. In spite of all Onglas’s raving, none of them is going to get up nerve enough to push in to watch. Then—we take out the Colonel, only he’ll be wrapped up in the skin. We put him in the cart. Down comes Scharn’s officer to say there has been enough of such foolishness. I say we have to get the bait out and bury it before the hounds go wild. I tell you, these men know nothing of the nature of the beasts. They are ready to believe anything one babbles about them. We take the cart back into the woods and I have a little show ready waiting to cover us out there.” “And what about m’lady here and Mattine?” “They go out now, to lay low in my place. I make a big to-do later about needing help with the cart, and bring them along. That’s the best I can offer, Colonel.”
“It is clever, Haus. But I do not want m’lady and Mattine to run a risk.”
Roane found her voice. “I run a greater staying here. I tell you, it will sicken me and I have no remedies which will help.”
He looked at her, searching, but she knew she spoke the truth.
“They will have protection, m’lord. I am taking the she hound
Surenose up to my house. She is near whelping and I always take such to snugger quarters. With her loose in the inner yard, no one is going to stick nose through the gate.”
“A lot of things can go wrong,” Sergeant Wuldon observed. “What if this Scharn does not speak up in time and Onglas makes you take the bait to the hounds?”
“I can spend a long time making it. I tell you he knows nothing about direhounds, and he is not one to come and see what goes on here. I will get the guards to protest, and, if necessary, he will find he cannot force a hunting party into the chase. Sure it is risky, but so is any game you are going to play to get the Colonel out. And I cannot promise better.”
“He is right,” Imfry said. “There is no way I am going to get out of here without taking more risk than I care to think about. And this game sounds as if it does have possibilities.”
15
Roane, her hood once more well over her face, slouched along in the wake of a bobbing cart. She was no actress and now was the time when the slightest error might arouse the suspicions of those following them on this faintest of tracks away from the village and into the forest. At least Haus had been able to prolong his bait preparations until midafternoon, and it was close to evening when they had been ordered by Scharn, come to his senses enough to take charge, to do away with the carcass. She gave silent thanks that at least there had been no further message from Duke Reddick.
The cart creaked and bumped. She would hate to lie therein, wrapped in a bloody skin which already attracted a trail of insects, as Imfry had to do. The Sergeant and Mattine pulled the shaft of that crude transport. No duocorn could be brought near the smelly cargo. Which was why the rear guard went dismounted. And how Haus, who walked by her side, proposed to get rid of those guards she could not imagine.
Thus far his plan had worked, and Roane could not quarrel with anything which brought them into the clean air, farther and farther from Hitherhow. At least she had slept away some of that period she and Mattine had been in Haus’s house, so she felt more alert. Though as long as she knew of that installation, the machines clicking away to regulate the lives of those who could not imagine they were so governed, she would be ill at ease.
Roane plodded along, trying to act the sullen role of one pressed into unwilling service. She hoped to be ready for Haus’s move, or one from Imfry.
“You—Haus!” A voice rang out from the rear. “How far do you expect to travel before you bury that carrion? We are not going to tramp all over this forest—”
“Neither do I want to worry about the hounds taking to our trail and getting a taste for duocorn the first time they are uncoupled in chase,” Haus replied. “I do not fancy having to explain something like dead mounts to the Duke.”
She heard grumbling, but no open protests. A moment later Haus’s shoulder brushed hers and he said harshly:
“Can you not even walk straight, boy? By the Arms of the Guardians, what help are you? Get up ahead there and lend a hand to pulling or we are going to be half the night going a quarter league!”
Roane pushed between the cart and encroaching brush and saplings, reaching the Sergeant, to lay hand to the shaft beside him.
“Not long now, m’lady,” he whispered. “Be ready to jump to the right when I give the word.”
Jump right— She glanced in that direction. There was a tumbling pile of stones, a trail of them, as if a wall had once stood there. But in that were frequent gaps which were filled with rank grass and matted vines. Also there were brush and trees. It was a gray day, without sun, and there was a damp feeling of coming rain in the air. Jump right—she ran her tongue over very dry lips.
The track they followed, if track it really was, took a sharp angle left. And they had the cart half around the bend when out of the brush fronting them arose a grunting which could only be a direhound! The Sergeant shouted, gave a swift jerk to the pull, and the cart trembled. Mattine pushed as if in panic and the small transport began to tip toward Roane.
“Now!”
Once more the direhound sounded. Behind men yelled warnings while Haus bellowed confused orders. Roane took the chance that Wuldon knew exactly what he was doing. She leaped for the cover of the tumbled stones, plunging on away from the track. As she went she heard the crash of the cart hitting on its side.
“Run, you lack-witted fools!” That was Haus. “They must have broken out the gate, are circling for a kill. Get away or face them!”
Roane slammed against a tree, held to it, her heart pounding. It could not be as the hound master said because Wuldon had been expecting something. But this was her chance to be free of the whole action.
She gave a sob, would have stumbled blindly on, when she heard a crashing behind her. So she backed around, the tree against her spine, half fearing to face death on four feet. What came was the Sergeant supporting a bloodstained, half-clothed man—Imfry! He must have been able to claw out of his reeking cover as soon as the cart overturned.
“Come on!” The Sergeant and his superior officer passed, Roane followed.
Though she could see no guide through this wilderness, the men before her went with as much confidence as if they were following one of those off-world homing devices. But they had not gone too far before Mattine came into view also. He was laughing.
“That Haus! He has stampeded the whole squad! They are hearing twice as many hound calls as he sends, and they are racing back to the keep, doubtless to report we have all been eaten alive. M’lord, he is better than half a regiment by himself.”
“He had better be! Were Reddick to suspect him—”
“Would not do the Duke any good. With those pets of his Haus has a better bodyguard than any king.” Mattine lost none of his cheer.
“They are mortal; a few well-placed bullets— I hope he has a tight tale for Reddick when he comes.”
“You think the Duke will come, sir?” asked the Sergeant.
“I do not flatter myself, Wuldon, that I am any great prize for myself alone. As you suggested, he will undoubtedly have me horned as an outlaw. After that”—Imfry shrugged—”I shall be meat for the shooting with a reward to top the fun of the chase. But Reddick knows that as long as I live I shall not rest until I know what spell he has set on the Queen!” There was such cold determination in that, Roane shivered.