No matter how many times we fought there, or how much blood was spilled, the rock remained white and smooth.
It was like the island swallowed up that blood and pushed it out again as magic, magic that kept us boys forever. It was a fanciful thought, but no more fanciful than that of the pirates thinking we drank from some magic spring for eternal youth.
Nod and Fog and Crow and Ed and Kit ran across the meadow and into the bowl, whooping and dancing in circles. Nod and Fog promptly bumped into each other and a heartbeat later their fists were where they always were—in each other’s faces. Crow couldn’t bear to be left out. He jumped on top of Fog and soon the three of them were doing what they did best. Kit and Ed ran around the three of them, shouting encouragement.
“It seems like it would be exhausting,” Sal whispered to me. “To fight like that all the time.”
“Strangely enough, they seem to get more energy out of it,” I said.
Peter settled himself right at the center of the rim on one side, so he could have a good view of the proceedings. Peter always judged Battle; he never participated.
I put Charlie and Sal a little away from Peter, on the side of the arena that had the security of the mountain wall rising behind it. It would be far too easy to knock the two of them off the open side if anyone (like Nip or Peter, I thought) had such things in their mind.
I drew Del’s sword out of my sling-bag and handed it to Sal. He took it with obvious reluctance. Charlie watched with some jealousy in his eyes. He enjoyed learning how to use a sword far better than Sal did.
“What will I need this for?” he asked.
“You keep yourself safe,” I said. “You and Charlie.”
“I won’t have to,” he said. “Because you’re going to win, aren’t you?”
“Jamie always wins,” Charlie said.
“But in case I don’t,” I said. “You keep yourself safe.”
I bent down then, and whispered in Sal’s ear the thing that I hadn’t let myself think. “If Nip kills me, then you and Charlie won’t have a chance here. Peter will find some way to get rid of the two of you. You go as fast as you can to the door to the Other Place and you go back, you understand?”
Sal looked at me, stricken. “I . . . don’t know if I can find the way back. We came here in the night. I don’t remember the way.”
“Then go to the pirates,” I said.
“The pirates?” Sal was horrified. “After what they did to the others?”
“You’ll be safer with the pirates than you will be here with Nip alive.”
I wasn’t certain of this at all. It was only a hope. If they stayed with Peter and Nip, then Sal and Charlie would die. If they went to the pirates, then they might live. That was all I could give them, if I didn’t make it.
chapter 11
Peter stood and clapped his hands then, and the wild boys running and rolling in the center came to a halt.
“It’s time for Battle to begin. Fighters, bring your weapons here to be inspected.”
Nip had been lurking on the dirt track behind Peter, just at the edge where the meadow dipped down to the arena. I wondered if he was having second thoughts about Battle. He kept glancing back over his shoulder like he was calculating how quickly he could run away.
When Peter called us he trudged—with some reluctance, I thought—down to the arena to join me.
The other five collected on the seats between Peter and Sal and Charlie. Charlie’s legs swung back and forth in excitement. Sal gripped the scabbard of the sword and couldn’t disguise his worry.
I took my slingshot and the rocks out of my bag and placed them on the bench for Peter to look over. He carefully checked each one like he was searching for treasure hidden inside, and then took my bag and turned it inside out to make sure I wasn’t hiding anything.
“Leave your dagger here,” Peter said.
I took it out of my belt and placed it on the seat. Then I collected all my rocks and slingshot in the bag again.
“Here, why’s he leaving his dagger?” Nip asked.
“Because we don’t use bladed weapons in Battle,” Peter said.
“Nobody told me!” Nip shouted. “All I’ve got is bloody bladed weapons.”
He turned out his own bag, and a clatter of knives and axes spilled out.
“You’re telling me I’m not to use any of this against him? I thought this was a Battle to the death!”
“It is, but we have rules about how you’re allowed to kill each other. This is about skill,” Peter said; then he gave Nip a sly sideways glance. “You had thirty sleeps to ask any of us about the rules. Why didn’t you?”
Nip’s face turned a kind of blotchy red, like there was a thunderstorm in him about to burst.
I peered more closely at the pile of metal that Nip had dumped out. “Where did you get these?”
Some of the objects were quite new and shiny, but most of them were rusted. The axe handle looked like it might rot away from the blade at any moment. There was something about that axe . . . something familiar . . . It looked like an axe a boy called Davey used to carry when he was alive.
“Found them,” Nip said defiantly. “There was this field with all these pointed sticks in it and I saw this knife in the dirt so I took it. Then I thought there might be pirate treasure buried there so I dug around some more and found these other things. Found a lot of bones too.”
“That’s because it’s where I buried the boys,” I said, anger blossoming in my chest, turning into a red haze before my eyes. He stole from the boys, my boys, my boys that I carried in pieces and covered in dirt. “You took all of these from dead boys, you damned grave thief.”
“You stole these from graves?” Peter said, looking appropriately horrified.
I knew Peter didn’t give a toss where Nip got the weapons. He just wanted to wind Nip up even more.
The other boy seemed torn between fury and embarrassment, especially when Nod and Fog and Crow chimed in.
“That’s not right, Nip.”
“Yeah, there should be respect for the dead.”
“Respect for the dead. That’s what Jamie always says.”
“And that means you don’t go taking things from dead bodies.”
“That’s against the rules.”
“Sod you and sod your bloody rules!” Nip shouted. He pointed at Peter. “I only came here because he said there wouldn’t be any rules! And all he’s done is lie and make me look a fool.”
“Peter didn’t make you a fool, Nip,” I said. “You did that yourself.”
“I’ll show you who’s a fool,” he said, and grabbed the axe.
I wasn’t ready for this, though I should have been. Somehow I’d thought he’d take his anger out on Peter, whom he blamed for his troubles. I didn’t know that he blamed me just as much, or maybe more.
He swung out at me with the axe and I only just got away, though my movement took me toward the center of the arena and away from my dagger, which waited on the bench because I’d been ready to follow Peter’s rules.
If I had my dagger, it would be over in a thrice, for I was certain I could hit him even while he was swinging that axe in a wild rage. But I didn’t, and I didn’t have time to load up my slingshot while I was dodging the axe.
But I had the big rocks, the ones that fit just inside my fist. I reached into the bag, feeling around for the spiky surface, and my hand closed around one. Nip charged at me again, the axe held high like he wanted to bury it in my head.