Sovereigns of the Collapse Book 2

stepping on roots or between tussocks, listening, eyes roaming all about for any signs left by people. There were deer in the area, he saw their tracks and droppings and now and again caught glimpses of them amongst bushes. The risk of ground traps left by the marsh people was something he just had to accept. It seemed to him a pit deep enough to trap deer would inevitably flood. The thought of a shallow pit with stakes nagged, kept him uneasy, and would have slowed him had he not focused his concentration on maintaining the pace. It reassured him that he had seen no evidence of people here: no paths, no faeces, no signs of fire, no remains from feasting. During his service in these fens as a trooper, the marsh people had simply not been a factor to reckon with, it was the seasonal bandits from the high country east of King’s Lynn that were the mortal enemy, those and the terrain.

A strong smell of dead animal stopped him, his natural wariness causing him to follow the smell up the wind to the scene of a kill on the margin of some bushes. It had been a deer. It had not been killed by humans—a human hunt would have either taken the prize home or cooked it on the spot. The hide was badly torn and the bones scattered about, including half of the rib cage. This was a kill by wild predation. After inspecting the immediate area, he found several paw prints in mud. They were as wide as his hand and lacked claw marks, which meant they had not been left by any kind of dog or wolf, in addition to which, they were too broad to be a dog’s. Possibly a big cat? He had repeatedly heard tales of these marshes being inhabited by big cats descended from animals that had escaped or been released from zoos during the Glorious Resolution. They were incredibly shy creatures though. He had never seen or heard one in three years’ service. It was feral dogs that filled the nights and provoked the curses of shepherds around Peterborough.

There was a bamboo grove in the vicinity. He tore out a stalk about the thickness of a broom handle and around ten feet long, sliced off all its branches and whittled the tip to a point. It was the best weapon he could make with the time and tools he had, and in any case, he found it hard to work up much concern about big cats relative to the really frightening beasts on two legs.

He estimated it was early afternoon when he sensed the wind picking up and the mist starting to shift and thin rapidly, the sun broke out above, within a matter of minutes a new landscape opening out in the sunshine. He faced grassy islands amid bog pools as far as the eye could see. Spitting curses to drive back his fears, he bound on the mud shoes and started out across the spongy ground, muddy water oozing up over his laces. He used the higher ridges to avoid the black bogs. Slowly, methodically, he zig-zagged from island to island. This was fine, until he crossed a larger island and found his way blocked by a channel of open water several hundred yards wide. He stood arms akimbo, furious and fearful, scowling to left and right. There was no way around it that he could see.

What to do? His legs were leaden tired. The thought of back-tracking to find a way around was unendurable. He decided to sit down and wait, hoping that the channel would empty at low tide. It did not occur to him to hide—this was dead season in desolation, after all. He sat down on the grassy bank of the channel and dozed, occasionally jolting awake when he started to tip sideways.

*

Grunts and yelps broke into his sleep. Dogs? He leaped to his feet, still groggy, swiping the sleep from his eyes. A canoe with three men in it surged towards him from the channel. In the first seconds of confused emergence from sleep, he yelled and waved to them assuming they must be duck hunters out of Peterborough. Then the sleep cleared and he saw their faces. On each forehead was a scarlet strip.

Marsh people.

A white-hot spear of terror skewered clean through him, he staggered a pace backwards. The canoe came on at the pace of a running man, fans of spray scooped aside by the bows. In moments they would be ashore. He had no chance of outrunning them in his heavy boots. In this moment, his back pressed against death, the warrior’s rage was like a great wave shoving him forward. He snarled at them. In his first, mindless action, he grabbed one of the stones from his pocket and hurled it at them. The three marsh warriors ceased their huge strokes and stared up, six eyes following the trajectory of the stone until it landed with a feeble splash to the left of them and they laughed and paddled on, more easily now, knowing they had their prey banged to rights.

Lawrence now pressed a stone into the pocket of the sling and worked up the action, whirling the sling around faster and faster until it was a blur. The marsh warriors watched, a kind of patient perplexity on their faces. Lawrence released. The stone hissed the gap in a blink and struck the middle warrior’s forehead with a crunch like thin ice, kicking his head back and spraying blood over the warrior behind. As their dead comrade slumped, the two others erupted into screams. The leading warrior jumped up, eyes popping with rage. Like a deer he leaped out over the water and as he was soaring across the gap to the shore, Lawrence’s second shot hit him in the stomach. He collapsed in the shallows, hissing and rolling about in agony.

The abrupt treatment of his comrades