Hooded Man (106 page)

That didn’t help Tommy, though. The Widow was no longer in front of him, where he’d just fired. She was off to one side, blowing something in his face. He coughed, spluttered; then attempted to move.

He couldn’t.

Fuck.

He heard the Widow laughing in his ear. “Time to meet yer God in person, Tommy.” She showed him the golden dagger; held it under his nose, in fact, to taunt him. Then it was gone, and Tommy felt a sharp, stabbing pain in his side as she slid it into him – holding his shoulder to stop him falling over. He would have screamed, except that his jaw had locked up completely. And he would have dropped to the ground, but his knees were fixed in position.
Should have called
me
Artair,
he thought, but there was no humour to it. He was dying and he knew that. Tommy felt the blade being removed, and then he saw why.

A blur in front of him, another crazed woman – this time out to save her man from his terrible fate. She grabbed hold of the Widow, and started pummelling her face. “Bet you didn’t see
that
coming!” shrieked Hood’s woman, her words fuelled by hatred. The Widow responded by shaking her head, wiping her nose, and lashing out with the bloodied dagger. The blood that had saved him, when everyone else had died of the virus. Tommy attempted to roll his eyes down to his belt, but Hood’s woman wasn’t looking. Thankfully, she’d thought of the same, and turned to face him, unsheathing both his claymore and his belt-knife.

Yes!
thought Tommy, now actually rooting for Hood’s woman. She was only just in time to block an attack from the Widow, bringing up both weapons she’d taken and crossing them to prevent the dagger from plunging into her chest.

The Widow was still fast, but the unexpected punches had hampered her a little. More evidence, Tommy thought, that she couldn’t really predict what was about to happen.

Unless she’d been too close to this whole thing?
a voice in his mind said.
Maybe it had clouded her judgement?
It didn’t matter now; he wouldn’t be around for much longer. But he was holding on to see who would win the grudge match between the two women.

On the face of it, that should have been obvious. The Widow had bested bigger and better opponents. But Hood’s woman was fighting with such determination and rage, he wasn’t sure. She pushed back the Widow’s lunge, kicking out at the Widow’s midriff. His former leader crumpled, taking a couple of steps backwards, but soon straightened. Hood’s woman swept the claymore around in an arc, and the Widow only narrowly avoided having her head separated from her body.

The Widow’s response was to sweep her leg up, knocking the sword from the woman’s hand and sending it spinning across the room. That left them with just knives. Both women hunkered down, trying to anticipate each other’s moves. The Widow still looked sluggish from the blows to the face, or Tommy was sure she’d have been on Hood’s woman in seconds, and her enemy wouldn’t have stood a chance. As it was when they clashed, it was Hood’s lady who had the distinct advantage, her knife slashes fast and furious while the Widow seemed to be having trouble avoiding them.

Tommy watched as the Widow began to mumble something in that unknown language she’d been using before. But whatever spell she’d been trying to muster either didn’t work or she didn’t get time to finish it, because Hood’s woman brought down the knife – forcing the Widow to grab her wrist with her free hand to stop it from entering her shoulder. Hood’s woman had to do the same to avoid getting stabbed in the ribs, and the pair staggered around like this for a few moments, each looking for an opening.

It was the Widow who was losing ground, having to find her footing again and again as Hood’s woman heaved her back, but on the very last push, the Widow used her opponent’s momentum against her, dragging her around full circle and flinging her to the ground. She struck the floor hard and Tommy looked on in dismay as his knife flew out of the woman’s hand, clattering across the stone. The Widow followed up with a kick across the jaw which sent the woman’s head whipping sideways and saw her flat on her back. The Widow laughed.

“I was goin’ tae let you watch what came next, but I suppose the time’s come for doin’ what Robert couldn’t. Killing you and that little maggot inside yer. Cuttin’ all links to ma intended.” It was then that Tommy realised how completely mental the Widow was. She was still talking as if she was going to marry Hood or something, rather than eat him. The Widow held the dagger high, ready to bring it down into the woman’s stomach.

Tommy was aware that his vision was fading as his body went numb. He’d hung on for as long as he could, but it seemed that the woman’s fate was sealed. Just like his. It would have been nice to have seen his death avenged, even if Hood’s woman hadn’t known she was doing it. But everything was growing black, even though he couldn’t close his eyes.

Then something happened that made him fight for every second he had left. The Widow was just about to strike when a pair of legs appeared, wrapping themselves around her shoulders and neck. Using all the effort he could muster, Tommy raised his eyes to see that Hood had swung over using the rope and grabbed the Widow, locking her tightly between his legs.

Again, the Widow seemed shocked – and before she could think about bringing the dagger up and into Hood’s leg, he was straining on the ropes and pulling her backwards. Tommy was amazed at the resolve he was showing – perhaps there was something to the legend after all, if he could pull victory from the jaws of death like this. Or just sheer bloody-mindedness? The muscles in the man’s taut body were bulging, thighs pressing against the sides of the Widow’s head, causing her obvious pain. But he was also pulling against the ropes, his biceps fighting against the Widow’s efforts to stay put.

With a last concerted effort, gritting his teeth, Hood pulled her backwards and off her feet. Turning, she realised too late what was about to happen and again began chanting in that strange language, as if that was going to save her.

It wasn’t. Tommy watched, with a certain degree of satisfaction, as the woman was pulled onto the pyre. It seemed only fitting for a witch to be killed that way. Hood used whatever strength remained to pull his legs and feet up out of the way of the flames as they caught the Widow’s body, drowning her in a fiery sea.

Tommy was aware of banging at the door. They didn’t have long before the rest of the Widow’s men would be inside. But Hood’s woman was already climbing to her feet, limping across to the rope that held the man she loved suspended above the fire.

He didn’t see her get him down or what happened next, because Tommy’s life was pretty much at an end. But as his vision went completely and his heart stopped, he celebrated this small victory at least. The Widow, the woman who’d killed him, had been defeated.

But Tommy also knew that this was far from the end of Hood and his woman’s problems.

T
HE VEHICLES HAD
pulled up, the driver of the largest nervously gripping the wheel.

This had been a stupid, stupid idea and was bound to fail. How on earth had he let himself get talked into it? Because the people inside there had put their lives on the line for such as him. He owed them. They all did. The least they could do was try and free them.

But Jesus, was this the wrong way to go about it. They’d never get away with it. They’d been lucky that they’d managed to get past the check-points so far, although a couple had needed taking out when they got too nosey. That, to his mind, didn’t give them much time before their subterfuge was discovered. Weren’t check-points supposed to check
in
every now and again? What happened when they didn’t? Was a radio screw-up blamed, or did it mean another ambush awaited
them
? At one of the security checks someone had mentioned radioing in, but then a guard had said that the Widow was engaged in urgent business and wouldn’t want to be disturbed. That gave him some hope, at least, that they might make it to the castle.

And they had enough captured uniforms and vehicles to make the Widow’s men think twice about firing in case they really were on the level; though reason also told him that they knew they’d been stolen a few days ago, so might be expecting such a trick. After all, Hood and his team had gone in there and never come out again. If
they
could be taken...

Matt Jamison could hear Bill’s voice even now, knew what he would say in reply to that. “Show some bloody backbone!” Well he was here, wasn’t he? When they’d been told of what had happened, about the Widow taking Robert’s group prisoner, he and his friends had volunteered to make up the numbers.

“I just heard from Nottingham Castle. Some kind of big push goin’ on in Wales,” Bill had explained, “so we won’t be getting any re-enforcements. But I’ve decided to mount some kind o’ rescue anyway, with the few Rangers we already have.”

“It’s suicide,” one of the traders had said, and Bill had flown at the man.

“They’d do the same for me, or for ye. They’ve put their lives on the line more times than I’ve trodden in cow dung. So if ye think I’m just going to wait around here playin’ with mysen, think again.”

Bill was right, of course. Whether or not Matt agreed with how they’d gone about scuppering that raid – he still said they should have warned the drivers – the Rangers had come to help at Bill’s request. They’d also saved lives that day, and who knows how many others, by taking those raiders into custody. Even now, they were being guarded in makeshift prisons by other volunteers from the trader community, most of whom now pledged their support for Bill.

Just like Matt had done.

It was then that Bill had told them about his scheme. In a way, Matt shouldn’t have been that surprised. The Rangers were known for their brass balls when it came to things like this – God in Heaven, how Robert and Mary could have gone to Edinburgh in the first place like that was beyond him.
Asking
to be killed, all of them. But they’d felt the need to do more digging, perhaps even take out the Widow quickly and quietly. That plan had failed, so what made Bill think this one would fare any better? The men at the castle were much better armed and greater in number. Bill was asking Matt and his trader friends to go up against that when most of them hadn’t seen any combat in their lives.

Again, Bill’s probable answer echoed in Matt’s head: “Then it’s about time, in’t it?” They were living in a different world these days, had been for a while. A new and dangerous world, one which Robert and his men were trying to enforce and police – as impossible as that might seem. That’s what they’d been attempting to do up here, and
that’s
why Matt had agreed to all this, he reminded himself. Now he was beginning to regret his decision.

Matt had swallowed when he saw all the vehicles on the grassland either side of the Esplanade; enough to win a small war, he reckoned – though Bill assured him Robert and co. had faced worse. He was waiting for things to kick off at any moment, as there was no way they could continue getting away with this. For one thing, wasn’t this damned Widow supposed to know everything that was happening in advance? A stupid rumour, but one that had started somewhere. Indeed, even as he thought it, Matt saw the Rangers in the jeeps up ahead being flagged down – those riding bikes pulling up also. They were dressed in the Widow’s tartan, had the same attire as those people telling them to halt, but they’d surely be marked at any time as impostors. Matt watched anxiously as one Ranger pointed down the convoy line; clearly trying to convey what a great catch they’d made and how full all the vehicles were with foodstuffs. If nothing else, the Widow and her lot were greedy beggars and might let them in purely because of what they could be carrying.

There was also the distinct possibility that the people in charge at the gatehouse were going to want to search the vehicles – which is what they looked like they were about to do. Matt spotted raiders heading down towards the armoured vehicles on the grass, perhaps getting ready to go out on a routine patrol, but maybe in anticipation of something else occurring? If their enemies chose to attack from both sides, then Matt and his friends would be caught in the crossfire to end all crossfires. And where the devil was Bill? Not here in the trenches, that was for sure. “Don’t ye worry,” he’d told them, “I won’t let ye get caught with ye britches down.”

Matt gripped the wheel even harder as the Widow’s men traipsed down the line of vehicles. If Bill had thought they could just waltz in here, he was dreaming. But then he saw something else.

Men, crawling underneath the vehicles in the convoy – Rangers who’d climbed out of the backs of carts and the other vehicles, making their way beneath to reach the gatehouse unseen; pausing if any of the raiders walked by.

As one of the guards passed by, Matt gave him an uneasy smile and salute. The man paused, and for a moment Matt thought he was going to ask something. He didn’t – just continued up along to the tail end of his truck. Matt watched him in the rear view banging on the side of the truck. “Open her up!” he called down to Matt.

“Well, Stacey,” he told his truck as he prepared to get out, fingers curling around the handle of his baseball bat, “this is it.”

From somewhere came the sound of a helicopter. Matt looked sideways and saw something black coming in fast and low: a beast of a thing that meant business. It was armed to the teeth with missiles, and – as it got closer – what looked like machine-guns.

It took just one of those missiles to cause complete and utter pandemonium. Detaching from the helicopter, the projectile whistled into the banks of armoured vehicles to the right of Matt and the convoy. He watched, mouth gaping, as a couple of jeeps flew up into the air with an explosion loud enough to almost deafen him.

Matt saw the guard at the back of his truck fling himself to the ground as the helicopter flew over them, so close he could have jumped up onto Stacey’s cab and hitched a ride. As it passed by, Matt caught a glimpse of the painting on the side door – a cartoon shotgun which had just gone off, the sound effect ‘Blam!’ written next to the red and yellow explosion.