"Somethings already happened," Trader said, cackling with laughter. "Question of what else happens."

"Button it, Trader," Krysty said angrily. "You're a poor judge of when to talk and when to shut up."

Ryan sighed. "Fireblast! Can't we just get something done for once without an argument? We go through the woods on foot and recce the camp. No point in even thinking about trying to make a plan till we've done that."

DITCHDOWN WAS SITTING in a padded chair beside the main campfire, which was always kept burning. The sunlight in the clearing accentuated the flash of white through his dark hair.

Straub stood at his side, as the two prisoners were hauled before him.

"Filthy little bastards," said the chief of the brushwooders. "Filthy."

Dean rubbed at his bruised and muddied face, making a low whimpering sound. Jamie stood at his side, silent, looking fixedly at the floor.

"You got anything to say for yourselves?" Straub said. His dark, silver-flecked eyes burned at Dean, as though they were drilling into his soul and sucking out all of his secrets. The boy returned his gaze for a few seconds, when he felt a sickening void opening in his head and he lowered his own eyes.

The shaved-headed man laughed. "We have here a young hawk and a common jaybird, Ditchdown. Yet both of these puny creatures can be of use to us."

"Which is the hawk?" the brushwood leader asked. "Neither of them fit that description, Straub, do they?"

"One is the son of the baron of this ville. His name is Jamie Weyman. The other is a common little lout. I believe he might be one of the butchering party that gave us such trouble and cost us in spilled blood."

Ditchdown stood and stared at the lads, his fists clenched in anger. "I can't say I'd recognize the spawn of that one-eyed bastard. Truth is, I can't even tell these two little rats apart."

"There was a strong enough clue in what one of them carried. But ask them, Ditchdown."

"Ask them what?"

Straub toyed with the opal in his ear, barely bothering to mask his feelings. "Ask them which is Weyman and which is Cawdor. If it's not too difficult for you. One shall remain here and the other shall carry the message of what ransom we require, back to the baron. Just ask them, Ditchdown."

"I SMELL THE SMOKE," Krysty said, "and I can feel we're close. Feel the brushwooders. Sort of dull,

brutish shape in my mind."

"How about the boys, lover?"

She shook her head. "Sorry, Ryan. Sorry, Bill. Nothing. But we reckon they were almost certainly alive when they were taken. Doubt they'll have had time to do much to them."

Trader hawked and spit, peering to examine the ball of phlegm. "Thought it might've turned yellow with

all the sulfur in the air."

The three elderly sec men from the ville were huddled together, sharing a cigarette. None of them looked as if they were enjoying the expedition.

Jak was looking at the trampled mud of the trail that led them between the trees, toward the camp. "Pigs,"

he said, pointing with a long white finger at the unmistakable marks of sharp hooves. "Not long ago." "Then let's move on," Ryan said. "Faster."

"WHICH OF YOU IS THE SON of Baron Weyman? I give you my word that he won't be harmed. Just stay and be our guest a short while. Well?"

The voice was clear and defiant. "I'm Jamie Weyman, and you're a piece of rotting shit. My father will come with all his sec men and ride you into the dirt."

Straub applauded slowly and ironically. "Brave words, little bantam. Brave words. But hollow and empty, don't you think? Now your friend will run to the ville with a message."

Chapter Twenty-Four.

The boy quickly became tired.

He'd set off from the camp of the brushwooders as though his feet had been set on fire, running with his head thrown back, arms pumping. He knew which was the trail to the ville, heading easterly. The sun, almost directly overhead, gave him a shadow that ran with him, jumping over puddles, slipping in patches of wet earth and leaf mold.

A black-masked raccoon, foraging below the tall pines, made him jump as it suddenly turned, snarling at the panting intruder into its domain. In less than five minutes the boy was out of breath, stopping with a painful charley horse that made his thigh muscles tremble and twitch.

He put his hand down to his pocket, making sure that the folded lump of paper was still safe.

The lad knew what it said, knew the nature of the message that he carried back to the distant villethat the

eleven-year-old son of Baron Weyman was a prisoner and that his life would depend on a number of conditions.

It was time to be moving on.

RAINEY HAD BEEN CONTENT for the outlanders to take over the recce and, possibly, rescue mission, admitting that his sec force hadn't faced any serious problems for many years.

"Just the occasional poacher and one or two invasions by a few pathetic scabbies." Jak had taken the lead, padding through the forest in almost total silence, occasionally scowling over his shoulder as someone else broke a dry branch or slipped noisily in the damp earth. The worst of the group for clumsiness were the three sec men, all of whom looked like they'd much rather have been sitting comfortably around a warm fire back in the ville.

The albino suddenly stepped off the path, crouching behind a clump of young junipers, waving with his hand for the others to hide.

"Someone coming," Ryan hissed when the sec men were painfully slow to react.

They all caught the sound of hurried, pattering feet, running straight toward them. Krysty was right at Ryan's shoulder, and she pressed her mouth to his ear, whispering, "Stumbling. Tired out."

"Only one," he breathed.

Jak allowed the runner to pass him before he ghosted out of hiding and seized the boy from behind, one

arm around his throat to cut off any cry for help. Though the albino teenager only stood about five and a half feet tall and weighed in just over the hundred-pound mark, he was immensely strong, swinging the prisoner clear off the ground.

The others all emerged from cover, gathering around.

For a single, heart-stopping moment, Ryan thought that the boy who hung limply in Jak's grasp was Dean.

The boy was the right sort of height, with dark curly hair.

But Rainey recognized him first. "Jamie!" he gasped. "You managed to escape. Let him go, outlander."

When Jak released him, the lad stumbled and nearly dropped to the ground, recovering himself with a

visible effort. His face was pale, mud-smeared, with several bruises and cuts, his clothes filthy and torn.

He was fumbling in his pocket.

"Where's Dean?" Ryan asked.

"Got him." His chest was heaving, and he looked as if he were about to pass out.

"Sit down, son," Krysty said.

Jamie gave her a grateful, wan smile and sat like a puppet with the strings cut. Trader offered him a drink from his canteen, which the boy took eagerly, gulping at the warm water. "Take it slow, lad."

"In your own time, Jamie," Ryan said, kneeling at the boy's side. "What happened?"

"Took ponies and followed you. Took high trail. Why are you behind us? We were a good distance behind you."

"Had a problem," Rainey replied. "Slowed us down by an hour. Guess you must've passed us then."

Jamie nodded. "I suppose that must be so. We reached the old mill. They were there."

"Who took you?" J.B. asked. "Scabbies? Or was it the brushwooders?"

"Brushwooders. We were knocked down and tied and hooded. Taken to their camp. A few ragged huts

and a fire."

"Was Dean hurt?"

The boy shook his head. "No, Ryan. Not too badly. I think they hit him harder than they hit me."

There was something going on that Jamie hadn't told them. Ryan was conscious of the way the boy's eyes

wouldn't meet anyone's face, his hands knotting and tangling in his lap, the rapid blinking, the way his tongue kept flicking out to moisten his dry lips.

Jamie hadn't yet told them the truth. Not the whole truth.

"Go on," Ryan said. "Who was there?"

"Man called Ditchdown. He had a funny white scar in his hair. And there was another one. He was in

charge of the group that succeeded in capturing us. His head was shaved, and he had funny eyes that made me feel dizzy."

"Straub," Ryan said.

"They've given me a letter to take to my father. Then they let me go."

Now the raw nerve was fully exposed. Jamie had reached the point where the deceit had to stop and the truth had to stand revealed.

Trader probed first. "I don't understand, kid. Why did they let you go and keep Dean? I mean, doesn't make any sense, does it? Like throwing out the gold and keepin' the pyrites. In a manner of speaking. Well, you know what I mean."

"Show me the letter," Ryan said. "Unless there's something else you want to tell us, Jamie. Something you haven't mentioned to us yet."