The Igors had a motto: What goes around, comes around. You didn’t have to pay them back. You had to pay them forward, and that, frankly, was the bit where people got worried. When you were dying, an Igor would mysteriously arrive on the doorstep and request that he be allowed to take away any bits urgently needed by others on his ‘little litht’. He’d be quite happy to wait until the priest had gone and, it was said, when the time came he’d do very neat work. However, it happened quite often that when an Igor turned up the prospective donor took fright and turned to Nuggan, who liked whole people. In which case the Igor would quietly and politely leave, and never come back. He’d never come back to the whole village, or the whole lumber camp. Nor would other Igors. What goes around comes around – or stops.
As far as Polly could tell, Igors believed that the body was nothing more than a more complicated kind of clothing. Oddly enough, that’s what Nugganites thought, too.
‘Glad you joined, Igor?’ said Polly, as they jogged along.
‘Yeth, Ozz.’
‘Could you take a look at the rupert’s hand next time we stop, please? He’s cut it badly.’
‘Yeth, Ozz.’
‘Can I ask you something, Igor?’
‘Yeth, Ozz.’
‘What’re female Igors called, Igor?’
Igor stumbled and kept moving. He” was silent for a while, and then said: ‘All right, what did I do wrong?’
‘Sometimes you forget to lisp,’ said Polly. ‘But mostly . . . it’s just a feeling. Little things about the way you move, maybe.’
‘The word you’re looking for is “Igorina”,’ said Igorina. ‘We don’t lisp as much as the boys.’
They continued in more silence until Polly said, ‘I thought it was bad enough cutting my hair—’
‘The stitches?’ said Igorina. ‘I can have them out in five minuteth. They’re just for show.’
Polly hesitated. But, after all, Igors had to be trustworthy, didn’t they? ‘You didn’t cut your hair?’
‘Actually, I just removed it,’ said Igorina.
‘I put mine in my pack,’ Polly went on, trying not to look at the stitches around Igorina’s head.
‘So did I,’ said Igorina. ‘In a jar. It’s thtill growing.’
Polly swallowed. You needed a lack of graphic imagination to talk about personal issues with an Igor. ‘Mine was stolen back at the barracks. I’m sure it was Strappi,’ she said.
‘Oh dear.’
‘I hate to think of him with it!’
‘Why did you bring it?’
And that was the question. She’d planned, and she’d been good at planning. She’d fooled the rest of them, even. She’d been cool and sensible and she hadn’t felt more than a faint pang at cutting off her hair—
—and she’d brought it with her. Why? She could have thrown it away. It wasn’t magic. It was just hair. She could have thrown it away, just like that. Easily. But . . . but . . . ah, right, the maids could have found it. That was it. She had to get it out of the house quickly. Right. And then she could bury it somewhere when she was a long way away. Right.
But she hadn’t, had she . . .
She’d been very busy. Right, said the little voice in inner treachery. She had been very busy fooling everyone but herself, right?
‘What could Strappi do?’ said Igorina. ‘Jackrum’d knock him over the moment he thaw him. He’s a deserter, and a thief!’
‘Yes, but he could tell someone,’ said Polly.
‘Okay, then say it’s a lock of hair from the sweetheart you left behind you. Lots of soldiers carry a locket or something like that. You know: “Her golden hair in ringletth fair”, like the song says.’
‘It was all my hair! A locket? You couldn’t hold it all in your hat!’
‘Ah,’ said Igorina. ‘Then you could thay you loved her very much?’
Despite everything, Polly started to laugh, and couldn’t stop herself. She bit her sleeve and tried to keep going, with her shoulders shaking.
Something that felt like a small tree prodded her; in the back. ‘Youse two oughta keep der noise down,’ rumbled Jade.
‘Sorry. Sorry,’ hissed Polly.
Igorina started to hum. Polly knew the song.
I’m lonesome since I crossed the hill
And o’er the moor and valley . . .
And she vowed: not that one, too. One song is enough. And I want to leave the girl behind me, but it seems I brought her with me . . . At which point they emerged from the trees and saw the red glow.
The rest of the squad were already gathered round, watching it. It covered quite a lot of the horizon, and brightened and faded in places as they watched.
‘Is that hell?’ said Wazzer.
‘No, but men have made it so, I fear,’ said the lieutenant. ‘That is the Kneck valley.’
‘It’s on fire, sir?’ said Polly.
‘Bless you, that’s just the light of cooking-fires reflected off the clouds,’ said Sergeant Jackrum. ‘Always looks bad by night, a battlefield. Not to worry, lads!’
‘What’re they cooking, elephants?’ said Maladict.
‘And what’s that?’ said Polly, pointing to a nearby hill, darker still against the night. On it, a little light was flickering on and off, very fast.
There was a whoosh and a metallic ‘pop’ as Blouse pulled out a small telescope and opened it up. ‘It’s a light clacks, the devils!’ he said.
‘Dere’s another one over dere,’ rumbled Jade, pointing to a hill a lot further away. ‘Twinkle, twinkle.’
Polly stared at the redness in the sky, and then at the cold little light, winking on and off. Quiet, soft light. Harmless light. And behind it, a burning sky . . .
‘It’ll be in code,’ said Blouse. ‘Spies, I’ll be bound.’
‘A light clacks?’ said Tonker. ‘What’s that?’
‘An Abomination in the eyes of Nuggan,’ said Blouse. ‘Unfortunately, because they’d be damn useful if we could have ‘em too, eh, sergeant?’
‘Yessir,’ said Jackrum automatically.
‘The only messages passing through the air should be the prayers of the faithful. Praise Nuggan, Praise the Duchess and so on and so forth,’ said Blouse, squinting. He sighed. ‘Such a shame. How far to that hill, would you say, sergeant?’
‘Two miles, sir,’ said Jackrum. ‘Worth trying to sneak up?’
‘They must know people will see them and come looking, so I expect they won’t “hang around” for long’ mused Blouse. ‘In any case, ah, those things would be highly directional. You’d lose it once you got down in the valley.’
‘Permission to speak, sir?’ said Polly.
‘Of course,’ said Blouse.
‘How do they get the light so bright, sir? It’s pure white!’
‘Some kind of firework thingy, I believe. Why?’
‘And they send messages with light?’
‘Yes, Perks. And your point is . . . ?’
‘And the people who get those messages send messages back the same way?’ Polly persevered.
‘Yes, Perks, that is the whole idea.’
‘Then . . . maybe we don’t have to go all the way to that hill, sir? The light is being aimed towards us, sir.’
They all turned. The hill they were skirting loomed above them.
‘Well done, Perks!’ Blouse whispered. ‘Let’s go, sergeant!’ He swung himself off the horse, which automatically stepped sideways to make sure that he fell over when he landed.
‘Right you are, sir!’ said Jackrum, helping him up. ‘Maladict, you take Goom and Halter and circle round to the left, the rest go round to the right – not you, Carborundum, no offence, but this has got to be quiet, okay? You stay here. Perks, you come with me—’
‘I shall come too, sergeant,’ said Blouse, and only Polly saw Jackrum grimace.
‘Good idea, sir!’ said the sergeant. ‘I suggest you – I suggest Perks and I come with you. Everyone got that? Get to the top neat and quiet and no one, no one moves until you hear my signal—’
‘My signal,’ said Blouse firmly.
‘That’s what I meant, sir. Quick and quiet! Hit ‘em hard but I want at least one left alive! Go!’
The two teams fanned out to right and left and disappeared. The sergeant gave them a minute or two’s start, and then set off with unusual speed for a man of his girth, so that for a moment Polly and the lieutenant were left standing. Behind them, a dejected Jade watched them go.
The trees thinned out on the steep slope, but not enough for much underbrush to get a hold. Polly found it easier to go on all fours, grabbing at tufts and saplings to steady herself. After a while she caught a whiff of smoke, chemical and acrid.
She was sure, too, that she could hear a faint clicking noise.
A tree extended a hand and pulled her into its shadow. ‘Don’t you say a bleedin’ word,’ hissed Jackrum. ‘Where’s the rupert?’
‘Don’t know, sarge!’
‘Damn! You can’t let a rupert run’ around loose, there’s no tellin’ what he might take it into his little head to do, now he’s got the idea he’s in charge! You’re ‘is minder! Find ‘im!’