have come here to speak with.' The man the voice belonged to came forward. He had dark eyes, which bored into Granger, making him feel cold inside. He smoothed down his black and grey combats as if he were wearing a Savile Row suit.
'Get out,' shouted Granger, his voice wavering. 'Get out now or…' But he had nothing to back the threat up with.
The guy facing him, their leader – he could tell by the way he was carrying himself – smiled chillingly. 'Oh, I believe we will stay for a while. Won't we?' he said to his men, and the closest half dozen – obviously his elite – nodded their heads. 'After all, we have a lot to discuss.'
Discuss? Granger couldn't see much room for manoeuvre in that department; it was a pretty clear-cut situation. This man had them by the balls. 'What… what do you want?'
'What does any of us want?' answered the man. 'Respect, loyalty… Fear.'
They both knew he had the latter, and probably commanded the others through it. 'I'm… I'm listening,' Granger told him.
'Of course you are. All right, my proposition is simple,' explained the man, taking off a pair of black leather gloves and revealing the rings on his fingers. 'It's one I have put to several little 'operations' like yours, on the way to London and through it. Some listened. Some didn't.'
Granger raised an eyebrow. 'Proposition?'
'Yes. Un choix. You understand? A choice.' He walked past one of the girls being held captive, who was only wearing a shirt, and ran a finger down her cheek. She flinched and he gave a small laugh, revealing hideously yellow teeth. Looking back over at Granger, he said, 'You and your people can either join us or…'
'Or what?' Granger demanded, albeit half-heartedly, regretting this even as the words were tumbling from his mouth.
'Tanek?' called the leader to one of his men. The crowds parted and a huge, bulky soldier with olive skin and short hair stepped forward. Granger couldn't help thinking that he should drop the 'e' in his name and just go with 'Tank'. He held Ennis by the scruff of the neck, was practically carrying him like that, the boy's feet barely touching the floor.
'Granger… I'm sorry, I-' Tanek threw him down on the ground.
'Now,' began the man wearing the smart combats, 'show our friend here what the alternative to joining us would be.'
Tanek unhooked the crossbow that was dangling on a strap from his shoulder, and aimed the weapon at Ennis's head.
'No!' shouted Granger, raising his pistol.
There was a nod from their leader, and Tanek turned in Granger's direction. Quicker than anything he'd ever seen in his life, the larger man had fired, the bolt catching Granger's gun hand, sending the pistol flying out of his grasp and then pinning his hand to the wall. He shrieked in pain as the bolt drove itself through his palm. Tanek then turned the crossbow – so unusual in its design, not needing to be reloaded it seemed – back on Ennis. He looked up pleadingly at Granger, then the bolt was fired directly into his head.
Granger howled, the pain in his hand forgotten for a moment. His friend, his 'second in command' was dead. The girl in the shirt was shaking and crying, the other members of The Jackals – how stupid that name sounded now – gawked at Ennis's body in disbelief.
'You bastard!' Granger spat.
The man in combats pointed to his chest with one finger, like it had nothing to do with him. 'You asked. We gave a demonstration. As simple as that.' His accent grew thicker with each word. 'Now, what you have to ask yourself is, can we get past this and work together?'
Work together? He had to be joking. After what he'd just done to Ennis… But Granger knew what the option was. When this man had said there was a choice, he'd been lying. Really there was no choice at all.
'So, your answer, if you please.' The man clasped his hands behind his back, tapping one booted foot. 'I am waiting.'
Granger, still in agony from the bolt in his palm, hung his head, nodding.
'Excellent, then allow me to introduce myself. My name is De Falaise. My aim is to bring order to this country, oui? Like your comrades here, England is on its knees. I intend to offer it the same choice I gave you: a killing blow or the chance to serve.'
Granger stared at him; this guy was insane.
'Myself and my men are heading north,' De Falaise continued, visibly enjoying his speech. 'As my ancestors recognised, the seat of true power is not the capital at all. That, mon ami, is just for the tourists. It is from another place entirely that we will expand. We will reach out to every corner of this island, crushing any form of resistance. You are now a part of my army, making history, as it was once made long ago. In years to come people will look back on this moment as the start of something truly wondrous.'
He actually believes what he's saying, thought Granger. He wants to become like the King of England or something… But then, stranger things had happened. And wasn't it only what Granger himself had done on a smaller scale? Hadn't this been his kingdom until De Falaise came along? Now, instead, he was one of the subjects in another man's realm – or maybe even the fool?
De Falaise returned Granger's stare. 'So, do we understand each other?'
Granger nodded reluctantly again.
'Then answer me.'
'Yes,' Granger whispered. 'We understand each other.'
'Louder.'
Granger gritted his teeth then raised his voice. 'I said we understand each other.'
De Falaise grinned. 'Good.' He reached up and yanked the bolt out of the wall, and Granger's palm. The younger man screamed again as blood flowed freely from the wound. 'You may want to bandage that before we set off.'
Granger, breath coming in hisses, gasped: 'S-Set… Set off?'
'That is correct. We leave for the army base at Hendon within the next half hour,' De Falaise informed Granger, then told the rest of them: 'Make yourselves ready.'
As his men escorted The Jackals out, Tanek joined De Falaise standing in front of Granger. De Falaise handed the bloody bolt back to its owner, who wiped it with a cloth. 'Do you know, I can see this being the start of a beautiful business arrangement, non?'
Granger sneered at him and De Falaise laughed.
He laughed long and hard, almost until it was time to leave the council offices at Whetstone.
CHAPTER FOUR
At first he thought they had come for him, finally.
Robert was aware of voices before he saw the group of men. They were skirting the edge of that particular section of woodland, about seven or eight of them in total. He'd been checking some of his snares when the sound of their talking carried to him. Robert had frozen. He hadn't heard another human voice in as long as he could remember – not since the men in the yellow suits…
'You must be O-Neg… Completely immune, you lucky bastard…'
'He's too valuable…'
'Get him!'
Surely they couldn't have tracked him down after all this time? There would be a certain irony to it if they had. If the hunter was again being hunted.
Leaving the looping trap, and stuffing the last wild rabbit into his skin-pouch, he'd moved swiftly and silently along the edge of the wood, before climbing up a tree to gain a better view. The first time he'd tried this it had been like being a kid again, doing something forbidden, and he heard his late mother's words in his head: 'Come down from there at once, Robert, before you really hurt yourself!'
There was a part of him that wanted to get hurt this time, wanted to get hurt severely, in fact. Fall down and
