Renegade (3 page)

The water and full night’s sleep seems to have cleared everyone’s exhaustion but Faith knows something is wrong.

‘We have to go,’ I say, as everyone turns to face me. ‘There’s at least one Kingsman out there. I’ve dealt with him but there could be others. We found tins of food
and there are a few houses we can raid clothes from. We’ve got to move quickly and then get out.’

I already knew Imrin, Faith, Jela, Pietra, Bryony and Hart before we escaped but there are five other Offerings with us who I don’t really know. One of the boys, Frank, asks where we are
going.

‘We have to make a decision,’ I reply. ‘We know roughly where the resistance movement is. We can either try to find them, stay here and hope for the best – or we can all
go our separate ways. We have to decide now because there is a dead Kingsman out there and sooner or later he’ll be noticed.’

I am forcing my hand not to shake at the memory of the blood and notice Jela looking at me knowingly. The reaction of the others is mixed. Faith is already by my side as Hart slowly pulls
himself to his feet. Frank looks as if he wants to ask more questions but everyone else has flocked towards me and he is left with no choice. They have made their collective decision to follow me
in the same way that I have allowed myself to become their leader. I’m not convinced it is any of our preferred choices.

Being outside during the daytime is what I wanted to avoid but we have to move in case more Kingsmen are on their way. If anyone is watching, it will be better if we’re not a single
target, so we separate. I tell Faith about the tins of food in the kitchen, knowing she will have the stomach to ignore the Kingsman’s body, and send her to the pub along with Hart and the
other boys.

The streets are as empty as they were before but they feel more dangerous as the cool autumn sun begins to burn through the mist. I lead Jela, Pietra and two other girls to a row of houses on
the far side of the pub. We ignore the properties that are damaged the most and target the ones where the roofs have not fallen through.

The first home is a mess of shredded furniture, curtains and carpets: a family’s life destroyed by war, famine or both. After wrenching some wood away from an inner door, I tell Pietra and
the others to try their luck upstairs as Jela and I move to the next place.

The rejuvenating effect of the water is wearing off as I drag my weary limbs over the fence and kick a pile of bricks away from the door.

‘Did you sleep?’ Jela asks, her voice soft and concerned.

‘A little.’

‘You look so tired.’

I shunt a piece of wood to the side and slide into the house, reaching for Jela and pulling her through with me. Despite our escape and lack of nourishment, she is somehow as naturally pretty as
she always was. Her long blonde hair is tied in a loose ponytail, framing her high cheekbones and smooth skin. Her brown eyes shine with a hope I’m not sure she should have. I am almost
envious until I remember the way she was taken by the King before being returned to us as the shell of the person she was. Somehow, even with everything that has happened, she has come out the
other side.

‘We’re looking for clothes, bags and blankets,’ I say firmly, being the leader. ‘Anything that is light and easy to move.’

Jela nods as we skim through the house, climbing across shattered frames that hold photographs of other people’s memories, battered furniture and remnants of technology long since
forgotten. We help each other to climb the stairs, hopping across splinters in the wood and balancing precariously in the areas where the handrail has collapsed. The bedrooms are surprisingly
intact and the layer of dust is the only thing indicating everything is not as it should be. First, I check a wardrobe, finding a pair of rucksacks at the bottom, plus rows of woollen jumpers and
trousers hanging tidily above.

Jela is looking over my shoulder and reaches for one of the sweaters. ‘What do you think happened to the owners?’

‘My mum told me there were evacuations during the war where everyone had a few minutes to grab anything they could before having to leave.’

Jela puts on a green jumper that looks good with her eyes. I hand her a different one. ‘This is darker,’ I say, and then pass her two others. ‘Put those on underneath.
It’s going to be cold.’

She nods acceptingly, taking the first sweater off. ‘How long do you think we’re going to be on our own?’

‘I’m hoping we can find one of the resistance groups.’

‘What then?’

I pull out a similar selection of clothes for myself, taking the smallest pair of jeans and four tops which I layer over each other. ‘I don’t know. If things went to plan, everyone
should have seen on screen exactly what the King is like. They will have watched him forcing Imrin and me to fight, taunting us with food and generally abusing the people everyone thinks had gone
off to serve the country. Anything could be happening out there.’

Jela opens a second wardrobe and pulls out a pair of heavy walking shoes that are far too big for either of us. ‘Did the Kingsman say anything?’

I’m surprised by my own coldness: ‘I didn’t give him the chance.’ Do I mean it? I’m not sure.

As we continue hunting through the clothes, stuffing the rucksacks full of anything that could be useful, there is an uncomfortable silence until Jela breaks it: ‘Is this what it’s
going to be like?’ The gentle way she speaks reminds me of the girl I was, not the woman I am becoming.

I stop for a moment, taking a breath. ‘I hope not.’

Jela is fascinated by the contents of the second bedroom, where there is a selection of soft toys in the shape of various animals. Inside the wardrobes are children’s clothes far too small
to be of use but she isn’t focused on them. Instead, she sits on the bed and begins to sort through the dust-covered creatures. At first I want to take charge and tell her we don’t have
time but there is a part of me that wants to forget our problems and enjoy the simplicity of a different age.

‘That’s a giraffe,’ Jela says, handing me something with brown spots that has a long neck. I turn it over in my hands, before noticing something else at the bottom of the
pile.

Jela smiles as I pick it up. ‘What’s that?’

‘It’s a tortoise. There was one in the King’s zoo at the castle. Imrin told me a story about one. He wanted me to take things slowly and not rush in but I couldn’t stop
thinking of how the King had taken you. The fact it could happen to anyone made me want to get everyone out as quickly as I could.’

Jela nods but there is a telltale swallow and I wish I’d never mentioned what happened to her. ‘What’s happening with you and Imrin?’ she asks. ‘Are you . . .
?’ I try to stop myself showing surprise at her question but it is too late as she adds: ‘Sorry, you don’t have to answer . . .’

I stumble over my words, embarrassed at how uncomfortable I feel. The truth is that she probably deserves to know who I am. She and the others have entrusted their lives to me, after all.

‘It’s complicated,’ I reply.

‘Is that because of your
friend
back home?’

I have told Jela all sorts of things about life in Martindale but have always been careful not to be specific about people. I suppose it didn’t take too much to put two and two
together.

‘He’s called Opie . . . Opie Cotton,’ I stammer. ‘We grew up together but then there was the Reckoning and the Offering.’

Opie and Imrin are opposites in so many ways; their skin and hair colours are different, Imrin thinks first, Opie acts. But they both look at me with the same desire to take care of me. Opie and
Imrin: I am the only person who knows the full extent of the mess I have got myself into.

‘You won’t tell Imrin, will you?’ I add.

Jela pushes the giraffe into the top of her bulging rucksack, smiling. ‘Of course not.’

I run my fingers across the softness of the tortoise, rubbing away the dust. ‘I didn’t plan it like this. I didn’t think I’d ever get out of the castle and then, with
Imrin, we started planning together and everything happened from there. Now we’re all outside, I don’t know . . .’

Jela takes the tortoise and puts it into my rucksack. ‘I knew you wouldn’t take it otherwise.’ I stand but she stops me, placing a hand on my arm. ‘I don’t think I
ever said “thank you”. After everything with the King, no one wanted to talk to me but you not only did that, you got me out too.’

Before I can reply, she is on her feet, heading for the door. It is a good job because I had no idea how to respond.

As Jela leads us down the stairs, I spot a dark red hat buried under a collapsed banister and crouch to pick it up. The dead Kingsman’s final word was ‘you?’ It doesn’t
take a lot to guess how he recognised me. I scrape my hair with its distinctive silver streak backwards, pulling the hat down tightly and checking with Jela that it is out of sight. The hat is made
of wool, with flaps that cover my ears, and I tie it under my chin before we head out into the cool morning, our bags full of supplies for the journey ahead.

Between us, we check a few more houses before returning to the pub, where Faith and Bryony have been organising all the boys, including Imrin. I am barely through the gap in
the wall when she hisses at someone to push a piece of board into place across the opening. The tins of food have been neatly divided into different stacks and Faith points to one underneath a
boarded-up window.

‘Those are all fruit,’ she says, before pointing to other spots around the room. ‘We’ve got meat there, beans and vegetables there and everything else on the far side.
It’s all out of date but it’s better than nothing. We can open them with knives. I also found a few plastic containers at the back of the cupboard and we’ve filled them with
water.’

I tell her she’s done a great job as the rest of us begin to unpack clothes from the bags. In only a few minutes, we are all wearing clothes more suited for the weather. Hart is a
completely different person in clothes not spattered with blood. Faith is transformed – entirely in black, looking ominously like a smaller version of the Kingsman who lies dead around the
corner.

After one final glance towards the man I killed, one more gulp in which I tell myself I had no choice, we leave the pub together and head towards the woods at the edge of town. Once we are
beyond the initial line of trees, I stop to check my thinkwatch. The orange face swirls into a map but the screen is so small that it is not easy to understand the lines and shapes. The position of
the sun reveals the east, from which I can figure out the broad direction we should be taking.

As everyone passes around a container of water, I take a deep breath and talk loudly enough for them to hear. ‘I don’t want any of you to think I’m forcing you into something.
If you want to, you can take food, water and the clothes you have and head off with no problems.’

No one moves.

I nod largely in relief and then continue: ‘We are heading roughly north west. The map I have shows rivers and the old roads, so we should have some idea of where we are. We’ve got
around twenty miles to go but we can’t be seen. I’m going to scout ahead with the rest of you hanging back. I need someone to . . .’

Before I can finish, Faith cuts me off. ‘I’ll do it.’

Her eyes are fixed on me, utterly serious.

‘. . . I need someone quick to come with me who can run back to the rest of you if necessary. We’ll try to stay out of sight in woods and along hedges.’ I turn back to Faith.
‘Are you still happy to do that?’

‘Yes.’

I turn back to the others. ‘Everyone else has to stay together. Faith and myself will make sure we regularly check behind, so if you have any problems, find shelter and stop. Don’t
call out and don’t do anything stupid.’

‘How do you know the rebels will want anything to do with us?’ Pietra’s question is so quiet, it is almost lost on the breeze. ‘I don’t want to cause
trouble,’ she adds nervously.

‘It’s fine,’ I say. She isn’t asking anything that I haven’t asked myself. ‘Honestly, I don’t know – but I don’t have any better ideas. The
only other thing we can do is continue to hide and hope we eventually find a safe place.’

It is not the answer everyone wanted but it is truthful.

When there are no other questions, we pack the water away and Faith and I begin to head through the woods. The only sound is our feet cracking the frost-covered twigs and the faint rustle of
animals somewhere in the undergrowth. In Martindale, Opie and I taught each other how to catch the squirrels and other creatures that lived in the woods outside the village. It is where I felt most
at home but this is more of a densely packed forest. There are a few berries clinging to the bushes and trees which are alien to me.

‘You should probably take this,’ I say, pulling out the kitchen knife from my pocket and handing it to Faith.

She glances sideways at me and it is only then I realise how quickly her legs are moving to keep up. She grins and reaches into a pouch that is clipped to her belt and pulls out a knife of her
own that is sharper and longer than the one with which I killed the Kingsman.

‘I got this from the kitchen,’ she says. ‘There’s another in my sock, too.’

It makes sense, but it is hard to forget the sweet girl who once told me how she had been ill and that was why she had been categorised as a Trog. Somehow I have helped to turn her into the
soldier she now is.

* * *

As the day wears on, the faint wisps of fog continue to hug the ground as the sun does nothing other than threaten to break through. We avoid any areas that look as if they
could be filled with civilisation, mostly staying in fields.

The rest of the group remains a steady few hundred metres behind us, with Faith and I keeping a careful watch. Each hour, we stop for a brief respite that allows me to check the direction in
which we are heading and gives the rest a chance to have something to drink. I had been worried about how Hart might fare but he seems to be holding up and we are moving quicker than I imagined. I
am fairly certain we are on the right course but don’t know for sure. Even though Faith is from the Southern Realm, she says her home is much further north than where we are right now –
closer to Middle England where the four Realms of the Kingdom intersect.