The first bolt missed. It was fired by the Genovesan Will had picked as a target and in the second before he squeezed the crossbow's trigger, Will's arrow slammed into his side. He lurched sideways, jolting against his companion and throwing him off his aim. Then Halt's arrow slashed into his chest and he jerked the trigger with dead fingers as he toppled backwards. A branch jutting out from the trunk caught him and held him sprawled half erect across it.
Will cursed as he realised they had made a dangerous mistake. He and Halt had wasted both their shots on the same man, leaving the other crossbowman uninjured, and partly obscured by his fallen comrade. Will saw the crossbow swing towards him now. He snapped off a shot, knew he had missed and pivoted back into cover, behind the tree next to him. He heard Halt shoot again, heard his arrow glance off an intervening tree. Then a bolt gouged a long furrow out of the hardwood that sheltered Will, spinning harmlessly away to clatter among the deadfalls.
Two crossbows. Two shots, he thought exultantly. Now they had him!
He stepped clear of the tree, continuing the pivoting movement so that he emerged on the opposite side to the one where he had gone into cover, and his mouth went dry as he saw the Genovesan aiming another crossbow towards Halt, heard the dull smack of the cord again. Halt had warned him that they might have more than one bow apiece and he'd been right.
Then Will's heart froze at the most chilling sound he had heard in his young life: Halt's brief cry of pain, followed by the sound of his bow dropping.
'Halt!' he screamed, all thought of the Genovesan forgotten for a moment. He searched vainly, looking to where Halt had risen into view. But there was no sign of him now. He was down, Will thought dully. He had been hit and he was down.
He heard a sudden movement, swung back and saw the Genovesan disappearing through the screen of tightly packed tree trunks. He was no more than a blur of movement, a brief glimpse of the purple cloak. Will shot three arrows after him, heard them all strike against the intervening trunks and branches. Then he heard the dull hammer of a horse's hooves. The assassins had obviously left their horses tethered back among the trees and there would be no chance of catching the survivor now.
There was no need for silence or stealth any longer. He rushed to the spot where he had last seen Halt, snapping branches and twigs underfoot, shoving through tendrils of the damned stay-with-me vines as they swung into his face and snatched at his cloak to impede him.
His heart pounded as he saw the Ranger doubled over, turned away from him. Wet, red blood stained his cloak. There seemed to be a lot of it.
'Halt!' he cried, his voice breaking with fear. 'Are you all right?' Twenty-three For a second, there was no reply and Will felt a dreadful darkness steal into his heart. Then it was instantly dispelled as the bearded Ranger rolled over to face him, his right hand clenched over his left forearm, partially stemming the flow of blood. Halt grimaced in pain.
'I'm all right,' he said, through gritted teeth. 'That damned bolt only scraped my arm. But it hurts like the very devil.'
Will went down on one knee beside his master and eased Halt's hand away from the wound.
'Let me see,' he said. He moved Halt's hand, tentatively at first, afraid that he'd see the jetting, pulsing spurt of blood that would tell him a major artery had been severed. He gave a sigh of relief when he saw there was just a steady welling of blood. Then, reassured, he took his saxe knife and cut the Ranger's sleeve away from the wound. He studied it for a moment, then reached into the wound pack that every Ranger carried on his belt and took out a clean piece of linen, wiping the blood away so he could see the extent of the damage.
'He nearly missed you,' he said. 'A centimetre to the left and he would have missed you completely.'
There was a shallow score across the skin of the forearm – about four centimetres long but not deep enough to cut muscles or tendons. Will unstoppered Halt's canteen and flooded the wound with water, wiping with the cloth again and clearing the blood away momentarily. It quickly welled back again and he shrugged. At least the wound was clean. He applied some salve, took a field dressing from his pack and wound it around Halt's forearm.
'You ruined my jacket,' Halt said accusingly, looking at the neatly slit sleeve that now dangled down either side of his arm. Will grinned at him. The grumpy, complaining tone of voice did more than anything else to reassure him that the Ranger was only slightly wounded.
'You can sew it up tonight,' he told him.
Halt snorted indignantly. 'I'm wounded. You can sew it for me.' Then he added, in a more serious tone, 'I take it the second one got away. I heard a horse.'
Will took his right arm and helped him to his feet, although really there was no need to. Halt was only slightly injured, after all. But the older Ranger recognised that Will's mother-henning was a reaction to the worry he'd felt when his teacher had been hit, so he accepted his ministrations without resisting. By the same token, he allowed Will to retrieve his fallen longbow and hand it to him.
'Yes,' Will said, in answer to the question. 'Seems they'd tethered their horses a little further back in the trees. I shot at him but I missed. I'm sorry, Halt.'
He was downcast, feeling that he'd let his mentor down. Halt patted him gently on the shoulder.
'Can't be helped,' he said. 'This forest makes accuracy almost impossible. Too many branches and trees in the way.'
'We made a mistake,' Will said, and when Halt raised an eyebrow in an unspoken question, he continued, 'We both shot at the same man. That left the other man clear to shoot at you.'
Halt shrugged. 'That couldn't be foreseen. I've told you over and over, something always goes wrong in a fight. There's always something you can't plan for.'
'I suppose so. It's just…' Will stopped, unable to articulate his thoughts. He sensed that somehow, he could have done better, could have saved Halt from the pain of this wound – and the fact that he had come so close to death. Halt put a hand on his shoulder and shook him gently.
'Don't worry about it. Look at the result. One of them is dead and all we have to show for it is a scratch on my arm. I'd say that's a pretty fair outcome, especially when you consider that they started with all the advantages. Wouldn't you?'
Will said nothing. He was picturing Halt lying on the forest floor with a crossbow bolt buried in his chest, eyes staring sightlessly up into the stark branches overhead. Halt shook him again, a little more vigorously than before.
'Well, wouldn't you?' he repeated and Will slowly allowed a tired grin to show on his features.
'I suppose so,' he agreed.
Halt nodded in satisfaction, although secretly he wished they had managed to kill or capture the second Genovesan as well. Their task would certainly be a lot easier if that had been the case. 'All right, let's get back and find Horace. He's probably going crazy, wondering what's become of us.'
Horace was, in fact, on tenterhooks. He had set up a small camp site, but then was too wound up to sit and relax in it. He had paced anxiously up and down, waiting for some sign of his friends, and had actually worn a furrow in the knee-high grass. The three horses were less concerned, idly cropping grass around them.
Naturally the Rangers caught sight of Horace before he saw them. Even approaching a friendly camp, they tended to move unobtrusively, allowing themselves to blend into the background. Will whistled shrilly. Tug's head shot up instantly, ears pricked, and he whinnied in reply. Horace saw them then, and ran through the grass to meet them. He stopped a few metres short of them, seeing Halt's torn sleeve and the bandage around his arm.