Jack woke early from vague dreams where he hunted shadows. Kerry snored lightly, curled up beside the hearth. Corrie smiled in her sleep, hugging herself tight. Jack wondered what she was dreaming of. He could feel her breath on his cheek.
In the quiet of the dawn he thought about what Megrin had told him. His father had been here - might still be. But first, Jack knew he had to recover the Heartstone. It was the key to all worlds, and somehow Jack knew it was also the key in the search for his father.
Kerry snorted and woke with a start. He looked around, bewildered for a moment, then got up and went straight for the cooking pot to help himself to a ladle of broth.
"Where's the wicked witch of the west?"
Corriwen stirred, stretched and got up slowly. They breakfasted on the food while they talked about their next move. Jack was adamant.
"I'm not going anywhere without what they stole."
"It won't be easy," Kerry said.
"Nothing ever is," Corriwen said thoughtfully. "But we have met worse difficulties. They might be many, but they are not fighters."
"They've got the weapons," Kerry countered.
"Then we make our own," Jack said. "We got Corriwen out of Wolfen Castle, remember? We could sneak in to the village."
"Rune's boots had magic then," Kerry argued.
Corrie clapped him on the shoulder. "If you don't want to come….," she teased.
Kerry's face went scarlet. "I never said I wasn't coming! I was just pointing out that…oh, never mind. All for one and that stuff, right?"
By mid-morning, when Megrin had not appeared, they set out on their own.
In daylight the forest was a haven of sun-dappled glades, a far cry from the threatening shadowed place it had been at night. Searched around a sapling grove for material for weapons.. Kerry found three smooth stones in the stream and worked carefully to bind them together. Jack had seen him weave fish-traps and snares back home but it still amazed him how clever and deft he could be. In less than fifteen minutes Kerry held up the stones for inspection, each dangling from a stout braid of twine. They clacked together.
"It's what Connor used. Can't remember what he called it, but it works a treat."
He grinned. "Although I still wish I had my sling."
Jack was working on his own weapon, bending a piece of ash-wood into a curve. He already had four good arrows made from straight hazel, and although he had nothing to tip them with, he whittled their ends into points. They might do some damage if they had to. Corriwen had borrowed a big knife and used it to cut a good length of timber for a staff. She left two stubs of branches at the forked end and cut the base into a point. Jack hadn't witnessed her first fight on Eirinn when the horsemen had tried to capture Connor, the crippled boy who was the rightful king of Eirinn. When Connor had relayed the story of how she had used a staff to unseat one of the hunters, he had almost burst with admiration.
"Tooled up and ready for anything," Kerry said, swinging his make-shift bolas.
"We might not need it," Jack said hopefully. Corriwen spun her staff, said nothing at all, but she had a resolute look in her eye.
They moved out from the trees and into rolling pastures. As they passed the first coppice into which they had fled, Jack saw the trees there were in a sorry state. Leaves wilted, infested with galls and mildew. The smell of rot was rank on the air.
"Did we do that?" Kerry asked.
"Not us," Jack said. "We didn't know about the barriers, but they seem to work. Whatever these night-shade things are, I don't want them touching any of us."
"At least we know how to protect ourselves," Corriwen said. "We should carry rowan with us always."
"And hopefully it works on humans," Kerry added.
They made their way carefully until they came a hill from which they could see the village. Everything seemed peaceful and quiet.
"We should find somewhere to hide," Jack suggested. "Then sneak in tonight."
"How will we find our stuff?" Kerry asked.
"We scout around for the head man. He's got our weapons."
Silently they sneaked down the hill in single file. They pushed through a hedgerow.
And the bull that charged out from a corner of the field put paid to all their plans.
***
All Jack got was a flicker of movement in the corner of his eye. He jerked around and saw pair of horns, sharp as daggers and as wide as a two-arm span, were pointed straight at his chest.
"Freak….." Kerry blurted. Jack slammed Corriwen with his shoulder, tumbling her off to the side. Kerry vanished in a green streak. Everything blurred.
The bull hit the hedge like a train, snapping branches and twigs which flew in all directions. It bellowed as its momentum carried it forward, crashing almost through the thorns.
Kerry was nowhere to be seen. Jack found himself twenty yards away with no clear idea of how he had got there. Corriwen was half-way across the field. The last time Jack had seen her, she was rolling away on the grass. Now she was on her feet, staff held out and feet braced like a small warrior. Jack backed towards her, eyes on the bull.
It bellowed again, its feet ploughing the earth as it tried to free itself and come at them again, but somehow those big horns had wedged themselves behind the branches of the thorn-bushes. It shook them in futile fury as it twisted its head from side to side, but stayed stuck fast.
"I'm up here," Kerry called. He lowered himself from a thin tree towering above the hedge and let himself drop a fair distance to the ground, bounced lightly and came running across.
"What happened?" Corriwen asked. "You hit me and then I was….all of a sudden…here."
"Rune's boots!" Kerry jumped up and down. "The old girl must have fixed them. magicked them back."
"But Rune didn't make a pair for me," Corrie said.
"Maybe she did something to yours too."
"Good old her, then," Kerry's grin was truly ear to ear. "This is totally brilliant."
Before he could say anything more, someone bawled on the other side of the hedge. Two men came clambering over a gate, big farming types. One had a long-handled spade, and the other a hooked blade on a pole. It looked like some kind of harvesting tool.
The three of them tried to make a dash for cover, but too late.
"It's them fiend-friends." One farmer cried. "They lived the night."
"So much for the element of surprise," Jack muttered. The villagers raised their tools and came charging at them. Flight was the only option.