For the same reason, he'd hitched his belt around so that the buckle and his double knife scabbard were placed in the small of his back, beneath the cloak. Again, it made for smoother, quieter progress. But it also meant that if he were discovered, he would waste precious seconds trying to draw either of his knives.
It went totally against the grain to move in the presence of enemies while he was disarmed this way. He particularly regretted the need for the bow to be unstrung. As the old Ranger saying went, an unstrung bow is a stick. It had been a joke when he'd first heard it, five years ago. Now there was nothing amusing about it at all.
At last, he made it into the shelter provided by the horizontal tree trunk. He allowed himself a small sigh of relief. There had been no cries of alarm; no sudden, searing agony as a crossbow bolt buried itself into his back. He felt the tension along his back ease a little. Without realising it, his muscles and flesh had been bunched instinctively, in a vain attempt to lessen the pain of such a wound.
Rising slightly from his totally prone position – although not too much – he began to make faster progress. When he was further away from the track, he rose carefully to his feet, slid behind the largest tree he could find, and restrung his bow. He felt another lessening of tension. Now he wasn't the one at risk any more. The Genovesans were.
Halt was down on one knee, pretending to study another intentional sign left by the Genovesans. In fact, though his head was lowered, his eyes were raised as he searched the tangle of grey trunks and dim shadows ahead of him.
Briefly, among the trees to his left, he saw a slight movement, and perhaps a hint of dull purple in the shadows. He remained unmoving. Crouched as he was, he made a poor target for the crossbowman, if indeed he was out there. Odds were, the assassin would wait until he rose to his feet and gave him a larger target.
He glanced left. The trees he had been passing for the last few metres had been narrow – a new grove when they had been wiped out by the flood. Some were little more than saplings and none of them provided the sort of substantial cover he would prefer. He smiled grimly. Which, of course, was why the Genovesans had chosen this spot to leave another clue. They would know that a person following them would stop and kneel to study it, then rise to his feet once more.
And in that totally vulnerable moment, he would be a perfect target for them. Halt's eyes sought that source of movement and colour again but he saw nothing. That made sense. Once he stopped, the crossbowman would have brought his weapon up to the aiming point. That was the small flash of movement he'd noticed. Now, he'd be stock-still again, crossbow trained on the spot where he'd expect Halt to rise to his feet. Halt tensed his muscles, preparing to move.
He glanced to his left, saw one tree that was marginally thicker than its neighbours, although not thick enough to fully conceal him. Nevertheless, he thought, it would have to do. He hoped Will had got into position by now. He'd glanced far left a few times – not enough to make the Genovesans aware of it – and had seen no sign of him.
Which could mean he was out there. On the other hand, it could mean he had been delayed by some unforeseen event. He might be nowhere in sight. Then Halt felt a sense of certainty. This was Will he was thinking about. He'd be there.
Without warning, he launched himself sideways off his bent right knee, rolling smoothly into the partial shelter of the tree he had picked out. And waited, nerves tense and screaming.
Nothing.
No dull smack of a crossbow string being released. No vicious, triple-barbed bolt whirring overhead to thud into the trees behind him. Nothing. Just the eerie groaning of the dead trees as they moved and twisted and rubbed against each other. That told him something. The Genovesans weren't going to be tricked into a rushed shot by his sudden, unexpected movement. Their discipline was too good to allow that.
Alternatively, he thought, he might have imagined that small movement in the trees. There might be nobody there at all.
Yet somehow, he knew that they were there, waiting. Some sixth sense told him this was the time and the place. The combination of factors – the obvious clue on the trail, the thinning trees – told him that they were just a few metres away, waiting for him to make his next move. He lay prone behind the tree. For the moment, he was concealed. But as soon as he started to rise to his feet, he'd be visible. He glanced around. He could crawl to a larger tree but the nearest was some distance away. And the thinner growth of trees here meant he'd be badly exposed if he tried to move.
Which was, he told himself for the second time, precisely why the Genovesans had picked this spot. Because now he was certain he had seen that movement. It was a perfect ambush site. And he was in a helpless position. He was relatively safe for the moment and would remain that way so long as he hugged the ground. But he couldn't see. He knew if he raised his head to study the situation, he'd be inviting a crossbow bolt between the eyes. He was stranded here and, effectively, blinded. All the advantages lay with the Genovesans. They had seen where he had gone. His sudden movement, rolling to the side, must have told them that he knew they were there. All they had to do was wait for him to move and they had him cold.
No matter how he thought it through, the situation got no better. If he remained here, sooner or later one of the assassins would move to flank him, while the other kept his crossbow trained on the spot where he lay concealed. He thought with grim humour of the discussion he'd had with Will only an hour or so earlier.
After the first shot, all the advantages will be with us.
Except for one awkward detail. After the first shot, he'd probably be dead.
He closed his eyes and concentrated fiercely. He had one chance and that depended on Will being in position behind the Genovesans. Then he felt a fierce certainty flooding through him. Will would be there because Halt needed him to be there. Will would be there because he was Will – and he had never let Halt down.
Halt opened his eyes. Still lying flat, he eased an arrow from his quiver and nocked it to the string of his bow. Then he gathered his feet and legs beneath him and crouched. He considered his next move. All his instincts screamed at him to rise slowly to his feet, to postpone the moment when the Genovesan pulled his trigger. But he discarded the thought. A slow movement would simply give the Genovesan more time to align his sights.
A sudden movement might startle him and cause him to rush his shot. It wasn't likely, he admitted to himself. But it was possible. And that made it the better choice.
'I hope you're there, Will,' he muttered to himself. Then he lunged to his feet, bow up, arrow drawing back, searching desperately for some sign, some flicker of movement in the trees. Twenty-two The forest had seemed a lifeless expanse but, as Halt had discovered, some undergrowth had recently established itself among the grey trunks. As Will crept quietly out of the solid shelter afforded by the fallen tree, he encountered another variety.
A trailing tendril of stay-with-me vine had wound its way up one of the former forest giants, spiralled along a dead, snapped-off branch, then allowed its end to drop off into clear air. He brushed against it as he passed the tree that was its host.