Glass Town Wars E-Book

Celia Rees

• Herausgeber: Pushkin Children's Books
• Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 342

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2018

Beschreibung

A new novel by the bestselling author of Witch Child: an adventure story drawing on the early writings of the Brontë children All these Glass Town intrigues. No matter how long you'd been absent, how far you'd travelled, once you were back, it was as though you had never been away. Tom and Augusta are from different places and different times, but they meet in a virtual world to combine forces in battle, to save a kingdom, escape a web of deceit and find love. In a place where fictions can be truths and truths fictions, learning who to trust is about more than friendship, it is about survival. Glass Town Wars, inspired by the early writing of the Brontës, is a captivating, magical novel by the renowned Celia Rees. Celia Rees lives in Warwickshire with her husband. She is the author of the bestselling Witch Child, Sorceress and Pirates.

Leseprobe

Contents

Title PageDedicationEpigraph  CHAPTER ONE A CONJURINGCHAPTER TWO THE ECHENEIS PROJECTCHAPTER THREE THE SUMMONINGCHAPTER FOUR HIGH LAND RIDGECHAPTER FIVE THE RAIDCHAPTER SIX BATTLE LOST BATTLE WONCHAPTER SEVEN JOECHAPTER EIGHT THE JINNCHAPTER NINE THE GAPECHAPTER TEN FAIRISHLANDCHAPTER ELEVEN MCMAHON’S DANDY DOGSCHAPTER TWELVE PARRYSLANDCHAPTER THIRTEEN ROGUECHAPTER FOURTEEN THE WHITE ROADCHAPTER FIFTEEN #BOYINACOMACHAPTER SIXTEEN GLASS TOWNCHAPTER SEVENTEEN BRAVEY’S INNCHAPTER EIGHTEEN THE DUKE’S PALACECHAPTER NINETEEN GLASS TOWN INTRIGUESCHAPTER TWENTY EACH STITCH A THOUGHTCHAPTER TWENTY-ONE THE UNEXPECTEDCHAPTER TWENTY-TWO AT THE SING OF THE CROSSED HANDSCHAPTER TWENTY-THREE FIESTACHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR PITTER-POTTERINGCHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE THE FIXCHAPTER TWENTY-SIX A VISITORCHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN FLIGHT FROM GLASS TOWNCHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT GREAT GLASS TOWNCHAPTER TWENTY-NINE WELCOME TO MY WORLDCHAPTER THIRTY ZOMBIE APOCALYPSECHAPTER THIRTY-ONE ASYLUMCHAPTER THIRTY-TWO THE GAME MASTERCHAPTER THIRTY-THREE GOTHAM CITYCHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR THE TAKECHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE A LIGHT IN THE DARKCHAPTER THIRTY-SIX DARK WEB KINGPIN REVEALEDCHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN THE LIGHT WEBCHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT RETURN TO GLASS TOWNCHAPTER THIRTY-NINE SHAMANCHAPTER FORTY THE PEOPLE’S FIESTACHAPTER FORTY-ONE JOURNEYINGCHAPTER FORTY-TWO DEPARTURECHAPTER FORTY-THREE RETURNCHAPTER FORTY-FOUR “THAT QUIET EARTH”CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE THE MARGAY-THE PRETTY ONECHAPTER FORTY-SIX HAWORTH  “We Wove a Web in Childhood” Acknowledgements About the PublisherCopyright

To the memory of Emily Brontë (1818–1848) and in celebration of her bicentenary (1818–2018)

No coward soul is mine,

No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere:

I see Heaven’s glories shine,

And Faith shines equal, arming me from Fear.

“No Coward Soul Is Mine”EMILY BRONTË

CHAPTER ONE

A CONJURING

NOTHING IS STRAIGHTFORWARD. Nothing is as it seems…

As in life, so in dreams.

To bring the two together, it was important to stay still, to concentrate, not to blink. It was a ritual, a kind of seance, conducted in the early hours, when the rest of the house was quiet, when the rest of the house was sleeping. She sat on the floor, the dog stretched out by her side, his thick brass collar gleaming in moonlight that was shining bright through the window and making patterns, casting sharp, blue shadows on the wall opposite.

That was where she’d seen it before.

A tower. A glass tower, glass from top to bottom, all lit and aglitter. Other lights flashed and flowed around it, red, blue and silver, like a stream diverted. In the tower was a room, all white, a white box, a white cube. Inside the cube, a boy lay on a bed, not moving, his eyes sightless. The boy was as white as the sheets tucked about him, as white as the walls that surrounded him, but he wasn’t dead, neither was he dying: he lay somewhere between unknown and unknowing, alone between two states of being, machines keeping him alive, machines doing the breathing for him, machines that she did not know or recognize, machines such as Mrs Shelley’s doctor might have invented.

She put her hand, star shaped, against the cool, smooth glass of the window. The boy needed her help but she didn’t know how to reach him, how to give it.

CHAPTER TWO

THE ECHENEIS PROJECT

MILES. Milo Mindbender. He’d taken the name from that guy in Catch-22. Tom should have known not to trust him but what could he do? He was lying here, as helpless as a monkey strapped to a table in a lab.

He heard him from way down the corridor, boot heels clicking on the floor. Swish of the door. Nothing wrong with his hearing; it was more acute, if anything. A displacement of the hospital air, the tang of fags and Ralph Lauren aftershave added to hospital antiseptic. They say the other senses, the ones you’re left with, kick in, don’t they? He’d found that to be true.

The girl stopped reading. She was a friend of his sister’s, part of a rota of people who came in to talk, read, play music, even sing songs to him. Anything to try and get through. That was the idea but Tom found most of them tedious, what they did pointless; he wanted them to go away as soon as they came through the door. She was different. He couldn’t remember her name—there were a lot of things he couldn’t remember—but he liked it when she was here. Just her and him and the chunk, beep and chirp of the machines, as regular as heartbeats and breathing, which was what they were there to monitor and do. He liked to hear her. It gave him a peaceful feeling. He was annoyed at the disruption that Milo would bring.

Milo was tall and skinny, dressed in a black suit: slimfit, tailored with narrow trousers, narrow lapels, over a white shirt and narrow black tie. How did Tom know that? Because that was what he always wore.

He came close, casting an eye over the machines that were keeping Tom alive. He was a whizz at electronics. Tom hoped he wouldn’t fiddle with anything, or think of making a few little adjustments…

Milo walked round the bed, hands in pockets, his fingers turning over coins.

He stopped. Spun around. He always moved like that. Still, then quick and jerky. Each movement unexpected.

“Get us a coffee, love, would you?” The chink of coinage. “There’s a machine down the corridor. White. Two sugars. Get one for yourself while you’re at it.”

“Why should I?” The girl’s voice was low and even, but not because she was the mousy quiet type. There was a yawn at the back of it, as if she didn’t care a whole lot.

“Because I’m asking!” Milo didn’t like “No”, especially from girls. “Give us a bit of guy time. Boy talk, you know?”

“They’re not even sure he can hear anything,” she said.

“That right? So why are you here boring the arse off him with that book?”

The book snapped shut; the chair scraped on the floor.

“I’ve got money, thank you,” she said.

Milo pocketed his change.

The door opened. Closed.

There was just him and Milo.

“How ya doin’, Big Man? Not so good, from what I hear. Natalie’s doing a great job on social media—thought you’d like to know. You’ve got a ton of followers. I mean, Hashtag heroinacoma is going even better. She’s even raising funds. Not sure what they’re for. I’ve tried to get her to invest in MiloMindbender but so far, no dice. Here’s the thing…” he said, coming closer. Tom could smell the smoke on his clothes, the mint on his breath. There was a rustle as he took something out of his pocket. “You’re lying here not doing anything and I’ve got a little something that might fill those empty hours. It’s real small. Practically invisible. It’s called Echeneis, named after some kind of magic fish. Made from this wonder substance. Even I don’t understand the science. All you need to know is that it works like so…” He was very near. Tom felt something go into his ear. “At least, we think it does.” Tom heard the shrug in his voice. “We don’t really know.”

What is it? Tom wanted to yell at him. What do you mean, you don’t know how it works? What have you done? But he couldn’t move, couldn’t even blink, and it was in there now.

Tom felt Milo step back, watching, as if he was waiting for something to happen.

“The potential is huge,” Milo went on when nothing did. “It will take gaming to a whole new level.” He carried on talking, filling the time, waiting to see what the result might be. “I mean, we’ve been gaming since we were little kids, right?” He laughed. “Xbox and all that. I always won.”

Of course he did. He was a genuine genius. He passed A level Maths and Computing when he was twelve. He didn’t play games any more—he wrote them. He was a bitcoin millionaire well on his way to becoming a real one. He ran his own software company from his garage, MiloMindbender and Associates. There were no Associates. He made a ton of money hosting sites where people buy and sell things, although he never said what exactly: “Oh, you know, this and that.”

“Well, here’s the thing. What you’ve got in your ear, it’s gonna make the gaming we’ve got right now look like old-style Atari ping-pong. You’re always on the outside, right? Looking at your console, your computer, your tablet, or phone, or whatever. But what if you could be actually inside the game?” His voice went dreamy. “What if you could be living it? Not just hear and see but feel, smell, taste it—just like in the real world. What if it can become your real world? VR headsets? Nowhere near this… It will take you places, bro. Give you experiences…”

This thing in his ear, it was something to do with games and gaming. Milo’s new project.

“You know? I’m almost jealous…” Milo was saying.

Almost. Not quite.

“It’s, hmm, experimental. A prototype,” he was saying. “Yeah. Not one hundred per cent certain what the effect might be but I figured you might as well do something useful while you’re lying here.” His voice lost its easy, bantering tone, and dropped to a menacing purr. “Let’s face it, you’ve got nothing to lose, have you? Hey!” Tom heard the rustle of the shirt inside his sleeve as Milo reached across him. “I wonder what this does?”

Just then, the door opened.

Milo moved quickly away from the bed.

“Gotta go,” he said. “Things to do.”

“Your coffee?”

“Another time, maybe.”

Tom started fitting.

The coffee hit the deck.

Alarms went off.

“That’s very cool.” There was a laugh from Milo as the girl ran out to get help. “I like to know how things work. See you, bro.”

“You’ll have to leave now,” a female voice said—one of the nurses.

“No problem, darling. I’m off.”

A doctor came in. Adjustments were made to this, to that, but Tom wasn’t there any more. He was somewhere else entirely. Somewhere he’d never been, never seen, never known. It was something to do with Milo, he did know that. What had he done to him? And now Tom was here—wherever “here” was—how was he going to get back?

CHAPTER THREE

THE SUMMONING

THE MOON HAD GONE from the window. In the unsteady light of a candle, the drawings on the wall opposite seemed to move and flicker. The longer she stared, the more she would see, until the rest of the room became insubstantial, as easily erased as pencil on a page, and ceased to exist at all.

“Play nicely, children,” Aunt would say. “Play nicely!”

They never played nicely. They fought up and down the Parsonage stairs with sticks, broom handles, anything they could find. Then, when their roaring got too much, with Tabby shouting for them to “stop their racket” and Father complaining from his study that he couldn’t hear himself think; when the house became just too confining, they barrelled out and on to the moors, into the wind and the sun. Running, always running, over the hills, hiding in the deep glens, waiting, scarcely breathing, ready to leap out in ambush and renew the battle. They dammed the little streams and rills, creating lakes and seas. Finally, out of breath and tired, they would throw themselves down and lie in a circle, heads together, making kingdoms in the clouds, palaces and towers, white and shining, sunlit and glowing, or grey and glowering, ever-changing at the whim of the wind. They were making a world for the Twelve, for them to voyage and explore. The Twelve had long stepped from the box given to Branwell by Papa; they were no longer just wooden soldiers, as they were no longer just children. They were the Genii, creators of worlds.

They were as one then. All together. Only later did they begin to bicker and squabble over how this new world should be. The game had come back inside the house and inside the head. She and Anne, the two youngest, sided together in natural rebellion at being bossed by the older two. The game was changing in ways they didn’t like, with Branwell’s endless wars, battles and tiresome politics and Charlotte’s obsession with handsome but cruel, cigar-smoking heroes and long-suffering, simpering heroines whom she threw together in unlikely romances.

In greatest secrecy, Emily and Anne had begun to plan their own world. It would be discovered by Parry and Ross, their soldiers from the Original Twelve. Led by Emily’s character, Augusta, they would establish a new territory and call it Gondal.

Therein lies the difficulty…

The candle flame bent, as if in a sudden draught, and she knew she wasn’t the only one awake in the house. It might have begun as a game that they played when they were children, but they were no longer children and this was no game. She sensed him, felt his intention, his power seeping out like the light from under his door. Charlotte, his ally, was absent, but that didn’t matter. They had been scheming, conspiring, reading each other’s writing, spurring each other on. Emily could feel his fury, his arrogance and ambition, sense his excitement.

They’d found out about Gondal. How? Although she wouldn’t admit any such thing, Emily suspected that Anne had told Charlotte, tricked into it by her older sister’s interest. Anne would have found it impossible to resist her; Charlotte was good at wheedling and cozening and finding things out. Whatever the way of it, they knew and, now they knew, they would use every means to prevent her from leaving. They meant to crush her for once and all, and that meant war.

Anne was too young to get involved in such bloody business. She had to be protected from the wars and fighting. Emily had set her to drawing maps and making plans, sketching the characters that she’d invented. Anne was quite happy and didn’t bother Emily—well, not too much anyway. The odd “Yes, that’s nice. That’s good” sent her away satisfied. Emily’s most common response was “I’ll look at it later”, but she was always sure to thank her younger sister and, for the most part, Anne went off happy in her dreams of lords and ladies, doodling their hairstyles, designing their dresses, and left Emily to fight alone.

CHAPTER FOUR

HIGH LAND RIDGE

SHE WAS STANDING HIGH UP, under a wide sky just turning towards evening, rain blowing into her face. Fir trees grew around her, their dark needles feathered with fingers of bright new leaf. The full force of the Glass Town Federation, a mustering of the Founding Twelve, was sweeping across the plain towards her like a summer storm. Her own men, Parry and Ross, were far away in the distant North, exploring the frozen regions, their ships bearded with ice as they voyaged to ultima Thule in search of the fabled North-west Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Many had died in the attempt to find it, but she was sure they would succeed and enable her to escape for ever. She should have gone with them and braved the frozen ocean, the mountains of ice. Staying here, even this long, was a mistake.

A high ridge in a desolate landscape. Drear and drab, all browns and greys, and it was sluicing with rain. The narrow path was stony, fast turning into a stream as it wound between gorse bushes, low wiry clumps of heather, thin spiky rushes and tufts of coarse grass. He looked up through the water dripping in front of his eyes. Not far to go by the looks of it. He slowed. The ground was slippery and he didn’t know what might be waiting over the other side. His head felt heavy, strange. He was used to his body giving him weird sensations: of being too big, or too small, or not there at all, but this was different. He put up a hand and found that he was wearing some kind of furry helmet, like a bearskin, but smaller, square, and on the side was something that felt like feathers. A sodden cockade. He looked down at himself. He was wearing a uniform with frogging across the front of it, the wire threads tarnished and rusty from the rain and dampness; under his cloak, the green wool jacket was dark and soaking, the wet seeping through, meeting the sweat from his body. He pulled his collar closer to stop cold water from trickling down his neck and to keep the moisture inside, heated by his body, so that his uniform acted like a kind of woollen wetsuit. How do I know to do that?

If this was a game, like Milo said, he’d have expected to be in combats—light and comfortable, breathing with the body, water repellent—sitting in an armoured car maybe, or a hummer, riding across the desert somewhere, sorting out jihadi warriors; or in an urban landscape, some kind of futuristic scene, full of dereliction, with burnt-out buildings, broken-down bridges, smashed-up carriageways strewn with corpses, bodies in ditches on either side of the road. That kind of thing.

He wasn’t expecting this. He was on a horse, for Chrissakes, with boots up to his thighs, a rifle at his knee and a sabre hanging down by his side. He couldn’t even ride but he was managing fine and his horse, a big bay gelding, didn’t seem to mind. The horse plodded along, picking his way carefully, ears pinned back, mane streaming, enjoying the rain about as much as his rider.

Tom shook his head, attempting to get the water out of his eyes without dislodging his hat. He rode on, trying to figure out exactly who, or what, he was. Some kind of avatar, although you didn’t get cold and wet in any game he knew. He’d have to tell Milo about that. Telling would not be that easy, of course. Telling would be problematic. Telling would be the difficult thing. Which was why this was happening…

The big horse shifted under him, snorting and lifting his head, his ears flicking as if sensing his rider’s sudden fear.

“Woah, boy.” He leant forward, patting the horse’s neck, speaking into his ear. “Steady now.”

The horse’s name was Hector. How do I know that?

The path took another turn, bringing him closer to the top of the ridge. Thin streamers of mist had detached from the low-hanging cloud, wrapping themselves around a line of dark, ragged pines. It was colder up here; steam puffed from Hector’s nostrils as he took the steepness of the slope. The terrain flattened near the top and the thin path broadened out into a wider track. Smooth stones shone, slick with rain. The way was marked with rounded boulders, crusted with moss and lichen and carved with strange patterns.

Hector came to a halt, whinnying and whickering and taking dainty sideways steps, as a figure came out from under the dripping branches of the trees. A young officer, slenderly built, long hair tied back with a black silk ribbon, in highly polished boots splashed to the knee guards, buff breeches spattered with mud as though he had been riding hard. He wore a tight-fitting blue jacket, the thick epaulettes fringed and crusted with silver. A sabre hung down by his side. He was holding a long brass spyglass. As Tom rode closer, something about the slight build and the stance made him think that this handsome young chap was a girl.

“You took yer time.” A girl’s voice with a bit of an accent, like he was in the North somewhere. It seemed that he was expected and he was late, or something. She sounded annoyed, impatience masking her anxiety. “How many men have you brought?”

Her gaze went behind him.

Tom turned in the saddle. He’d been riding at the head of a troop of men, as sodden and miserable as him. They were already dismounting, unsaddling their horses, getting ready to set up camp.

Her hawk-sharp, clear grey eyes narrowed.

“Who are you?” Her look was appraising, accusing. “Get down from the horse. Take off your headgear.”

He dismounted and removed his sodden shako, tucking it under his arm. How do I know it’s called that?

One of her men took his horse’s bridle. Two more stepped forward: one big, thickset with a thatch of wheat-coloured hair; the other nearly as tall but thinner, dark and wiry. Each held a long musket armed with a bayonet edged as thin as a razor blade. They thrust their bayonets towards his belly. He put up his hands in surrender, but to whom and for what, he didn’t know.

“What’s yer name?” She stood back, arms folded. The point of a bayonet flicked a button from his jacket. “Did Parry or Ross send you? Are they back?”

He shrugged at questions he could not answer.

“You’re not one of mine.” Her eyes darkened with suspicion. “So you must be one of theirs. Can you not speak? What’s your name?” she asked again, sharp and imperious. “Answer me!”

He shook his head. There was an empty space where a name should have been…

The rain was still streaming down, wet hair falling into his eyes. The strands he pushed back were black. His hand encountered thick curls. They’d shaved his head, he knew that; the stubble growing back had itched his scalp. But his hair had been fair, not black.

Brain damage—memory loss one of the symptoms—but that wasn’t the reason his real name was gone.

As she stared, a name came to him.

“Tom. My name is Tom. Who are you?”

“Lady Augusta Geraldine Almeida,” she said with a certain pride and flourish, like he was supposed to be impressed. “I’m in command here. You are a captain?”

“How do you know?”

“By yer epaulette.”

Tom peered sideways at his shoulder. “Oh, yes. I guess.”

Augusta frowned. “You don’t know much, do you? You don’t know your name, your rank. Who are you?”

Tom shrugged. He had no answer.

“Are you one of theirs?” she questioned. “Come to deceive? Come to spy?”

“Who are they?” he asked.

Augusta stared at him a long moment, then her eyes changed colour, as if she’d made her mind up about something, turning from storm-cloud dark to a lighter grey.

“Come wi’ me.”

She led him into a small campaign tent pitched under the trees. It smelt of damp canvas and wet grass. A huge dog lay under a folding wooden table, his smooth fur yellow and brown. He lifted his massive head from his paws at their approach and came loping from under the table, his muzzle drawn back in a snickering snarl.

“Keeper, down.”

The dog subsided back on to the ground but kept an amber eye fixed on Tom and continued a low, rumbling growl.

The girl unrolled a map, smoothing it across rough wooden slats, and beckoned Tom forward.

He bent his head to look closer, sweeping back his hair to stop it dripping on to the parchment. The map was beautifully hand-drawn and coloured to show seas, countries, rivers, mountains, plains and forests, towns and villages, each place marked in small, neat black lettering. He frowned down at a country he didn’t recognize, at names he’d never seen.

“We are here, see?” She pointed at a ridge marked by little, spiky dark-green fir trees. Her thin finger moved to the plain below. “They are there.”

She took the long brass telescope from the table and left the tent. He followed her up through tall, dripping pines, their trunks bare and rough. Shed needles, like a silver carpet, deadened their footsteps.

When they neared the top of the ridge, she put out her hand.

“Far enough. If we’re watching them, they’re watching us.”

Augusta crept forward stealthily and put the spyglass to her eye, twisting the long brass barrel. She beckoned him to her.

“Come on. Take a look.”

Tom took the telescope, adjusted it to his own sight and trained it down on to the wide plain spread out before them. A vast army, as far as the eye can see. Smoke rising from innumerable campfires; little figures, miniaturized by distance to the size of toy soldiers, moved about, setting up camp. Teams of horses hauling cannon into position; men on horseback riding to and fro, bent on urgent business, delivering and taking messages to and from a command tent standing in the centre of the encampment: a grand pavilion panelled in red and blue, fluttering with flags and streaming with pennants.

“Looks like you’re in trouble,” he said.

Augusta looked at him, her eyes darkening again. Was he here to help? Or had he been sent to trick her? He’d brought men with him. Reinforcements she badly needed. To turn him away might be foolish, or worse. His men were in her camp now. The battle would be over before it had begun. She looked away, making her mind up. She would set him a test for his loyalty, his bravery, to see if he was her man or not.

“See that big tent?” She pointed.

Tom nodded.

“See them standards outside it?”

Tom nodded again, focusing on two tall military standards on an ornate golden pole, the quartered flags, flapping and snapping in the wind.

“Get them. Bring them here to me and I’ll decide.”

“Decide what?”

“Whether you live or die.”

CHAPTER FIVE

THE RAID

“KEEPER. Sit.”

The dog stayed with Augusta at the top of the ridge, settling down by her side to watch the mysterious Tom With No Name set off into the gloom of oncoming night. Who is he? She put that aside for the moment. Whoever he was, he’d brought soldiers with him. Riflemen, and she was in need of them. She’d see if he passed the test she’d set him. Her guards, Webster and Roberts, had gone with him, with strict orders to cut his throat if he showed the least sign of turning his coat. She watched them follow a snaking path down the hillside into the murk and misting rain and then moved the telescope to focus on the sprawling encampment below her.

All she wanted was to be free. She hated the city in the South; the heat; the day-and-night din from the crowded streets and the great mills and factories. The very scale of the Great Glass Town was exhausting: the wide avenues, the vast squares, the blinding glitter of soaring towers. She had grown to hate the grand palaces; the intrigues that went on within the marble walls, behind the great porticoed doors. She hated the gossip and the politics of the taverns and coffee houses. High life, low life—it didn’t interest her. All the time she was there, she longed for her own country: the oak, the ash and the bonny willow tree; to be under grey skies with cold wind on her face and rain in the air. In her own country, living her own life—but even there, they would not leave her be. They had pursued her. Declared war on her. Sent the might of the Twelve against her. To take her back to Glass Town in chains if needs be. She didn’t even have her commanders, Parry and Ross. They were far off in the Arctic Sea. Through them, she planned to escape for ever, but that dream was distant.

All she had now was a boy soldier who didn’t seem to know his own name. He hadn’t come out of any toy box, though. At least, she didn’t think so… He’d better prove useful, because her forces were few while theirs were many and this was where she’d chosen to make her stand.

She had the advantage of higher ground but her men were spread thin, even with the reinforcements brought by this Captain Tom, wearing the green of a Rifle Company. Except she had no Rifle Company—neither did Ross and neither did Parry—so who was he? He seemed real enough but he’d come from nowhere. Not hers. Not theirs, either. She would bet on it. They were clever but not that clever. They couldn’t conjure from nothing. He was brave, this soldier boy. He’d not flinched from the bayonets. And resourceful. He’d taken up her challenge without a word. He’d studied the camp and made careful preparations. He could be useful, and beggars cannot choose. She watched on, intrigued, wondering what he would do.

He’d swapped his uniform for homespun. He pulled the dark cloak round him, hood up against the weather. His mule, laden with panniers, delicately picked its way down the stony, slippery path. The two guards walked behind, similarly cloaked and hooded. Beneath their cloaks, they all carried bayonets honed to razor sharpness.

They entered from the far side of the camp, distant from the tents and campfires of the centre, an area of baggage trains and storage. They made their way past piles of sacks and barrels. There were few about, the men too intent on finding a fire, hot food, rum, a place to shelter from the penetrating rain. They plodded on past the tethered mules and horses, Webster cutting the lines as they went. They followed the mud-churned roadway, making for the heart of the camp, ignoring the growing muddle that followed them as horses and mules began to break free. Just as quickly, just as efficiently, Webster and Roberts slashed the guys that held the tents, causing the heavy canvas to collapse, trapping the men inside with outbursts of swearing and startled, muffled cries.

The bayonets disappeared back inside their cloaks as they neared the command tent. Here they split up. Tom signalled to Roberts to go left, Webster to go right, tipping braziers over as they passed. The glowing hot coals tumbled on to the oiled-silk panels, burning through to the dry canvas beneath. Flames shot up the sides of the tent; smoke began to billow. Tom held his mule steady as a big man came out, looking bewildered. He was very stout with a little pointy head. He moved stiffly, as if he was wearing some kind of corset; Tom could almost hear the creak. He was in his shirtsleeves, braces down—he must have been caught at his toilette. Equerries followed, throwing his shaving water over the fire.

While all this was happening, Tom was steadily backing his mule into the flagpoles. First one then the other toppled over into the mud. Tom took out his bayonet and severed both flags. He flung them over the back of the mule and then threw his cloak over them to disguise the red and gold. He plodded off through the shouting and spreading confusion, Roberts and Webster falling in beside him as they took the track to the other side of the camp. From there, they would work their way back to the ridge.

“Here.” Tom spread the flags before her like a carpet, like a challenge.

“That’s the easy part,” Augusta said. Nevertheless, she was impressed. She smiled, remembering the Duke running out, braces dangling. “Lions rampant, gules with cross argent and five roundels; cross argent on sable, quartered with scallops.” She walked over the flags. “The arms of my enemies, the ancient family of Wellesley. Now we have to defeat them in battle.”

She was looking at him now like she was pleased he’d passed her test. More than that—as if she was expecting something from him.

He stepped back from the standards with their lions, spots and shells embroidered in silver and gold, and knew that he would help her. She needed him, and that gave him a sense of purpose. He felt the strange, lost feeling receding. Maybe it was what he was here to do.

“Let’s have a look at the map,” he said.

She was right. Getting those flags was the easy bit. He frowned down at the blocks of colour. Red marked the enemy on the plain; her troops, along the ridge, were shown in blue. That told him very little, except how small her force was compared with theirs. He picked up the telescope and went out.

Tom inspected the lines and found a few cannon, infantry armed with muskets, plus the men he’d brought with him, but no cavalry that he could see. Then he went to the ridge to look at the army below. The weaponry, the uniforms, looked Napoleonic. From somewhere in his scrambled-up memory, a game came back to him: a multiplayer, turn-based strategy game set in those times, so he knew a little bit about munitions capabilities and battlefield tactics.

“What do you think?” she asked when he returned to the tent.

He snapped the telescope shut and handed it back to her.

The dog growled softly as if it still didn’t trust him.

You’ve got no chance, he wanted to say. What we need is some decent field artillery and some heavy machine guns. A tank or two would be nice—why not? And maybe some attack helicopters. Let’s chuck in the lot. For a minute, he could see it. That would throw a scare into the opposition. But that wasn’t going to happen. He looked down at the map instead.

“We deploy the artillery, here, here and here.” He pointed to spots along the ridge. “Muskets here, rifles there. We have the advantage of higher ground but they have the numbers. We re-enforce our flanks, set men to dig ditches, cut and sharpen stakes to foil their cavalry and we hit them when they least expect it, so we attack at first light. Meanwhile, Webster and Roberts can go down in advance with a couple of other men, use darkness as cover, do their best to sabotage things a little bit.”

She seemed impressed by his decisiveness. He was a little impressed himself.

“Sabotage?” she asked, shaking her head as though the word was unfamiliar.

“You know, mess things up. Set the horses free, make sure their gunpowder’s wet, that kind of thing, and nick—steal—whatever they can. Webster, Roberts—with me.”

These two would be his own special forces. On their little trip to steal the standards, he’d kind of bonded with them. They were big guys, strong and capable; they moved quietly and thought quickly.

“We know what to do, Cap’n.” Webster grinned. “Me and Robbo’ll tak a couple of donkeys down there, crack on. We’ve been told to move gear up the lines and help ourselves to what we can carry. We’ll open the black powder barrels.” He turned his face up to the fine rain. “Should be good and wet by morning. We’ll cut the horse lines while we’re at it.”

Tom wandered the ridge, thinking about tactics. It was boggy down there, marshy, and this constant rain had made it more so. There was standing water between the reeds and rushes at the base of the scarp. Tricky going for men and horses alike. He’d seen it in some war game, the name of which he couldn’t recall. Not set in this era—there had been knights on horseback and archers—but, just like here, a small force had faced a larger, and the terrain had meant the difference between victory and defeat. Funny how things like that came back to him, when he’d temporarily misplaced his own name. Augusta must have thought he was really stupid.

Tom’s memory was coming and going like a dodgy signal. He shook his head, as if that would rattle everything back into place. What am I even doing here, thinking about tactics and stuff? If this is a game, whose is it? Whatever the game, he was in it now. He had to play it. He didn’t appear to have any choice.

He prowled, restless. The camp was quiet. Some men tried to sleep, but sleep comes hard before a battle. Someone played softly on a penny whistle; others spoke in quiet whispers or kept their own counsel, thinking on what the next day would bring, as they busied themselves at little tasks: repairing kit by the light of the campfires, cleaning their weapons, honing blades with the patient sweep of a whetstone. Tom wasn’t above a few butterflies himself.

The light was creeping up into the eastern sky, too soon for some; for others it was a relief, as though they had thought morning would never come.

He made his way up on the ridge.

Augusta hadn’t been able to sleep, either. She joined him under the pine trees.

The rain had stopped; a thin mist was rising. The camp below them was still in darkness, little stirring.

There had been no retaliatory raid to repossess the colours, or punish their taking, although she knew that they would feel it as cruel insult and humiliation. That did not fill her with confidence. Why would they bother? They would take them back soon enough and pay any insult with interest.

Tom and Augusta gazed down, taken up with their own thoughts, both of them wondering what the day would bring and who the other might be.

CHAPTER SIX

BATTLE LOST BATTLE WON

THE GUNS WERE LOUD. They filled the air and shook the ground, the thudding carriage recoil sending shock waves up through Tom’s body. Smoke billowed in drifting clouds of white and grey, catching in the throat and bringing stinging tears. The gunners’ faces were already black with it, just their eyes showing white. The air reeked of gunpowder; he could taste it, along with the metal tang of adrenaline. No game had ever been as exciting as this.

Cannonballs flew, hitting the camp below, smashing tents, catching men as they ran out into the open. Screams and yells, thinned by distance, came on the wind. The sudden bombardment was causing just the kind of chaos that they wanted. His riflemen and musketeers were ranged across the hillside, one line behind the other. Their guns were cumbersome, loading slow, neither rifle nor musket accurate over any distance, but with one line loading while the other fired, they were keeping up a steady rate of fire. His orders were to make every shot count. Men below them were falling under the fusillade. He had the best shots next to him, aiming at the officers as they tried to organize and rally the men. The object was to harry and confuse, not to allow their enemy to form up and mount any kind of attack.

Augusta had told him to keep his sights on the big tent and wait for the commanders to emerge. There was no mistaking them. The first to come out was the fat guy with a pointy head, bursting out of his buckskin breeches, his blue jacket stiff with gold facings, with epaulettes the size of dinner plates, boots polished to mirror brightness and wearing the biggest bicorne hat that Tom had ever seen. He was joined by another, younger, in the red of a foot regiment, the white plumes in his tall hat waving in the wind. They were both making for horses that were being brought up for them. Tom had them in his sights, but with this weapon from this distance…

Before he could take his shot, the hat went flying. Augusta was standing above him, reloading, oblivious of the musket balls flying around her, cursing that she’d hit the hat not the head inside it. His own shot went wide and, by the time they were ready to fire again, both generals were spurring away—never mind the soldiers being blown to pieces around them—thundering through their own troops, the confused mess of the camp, riding over the dead and the wounded, making for the rear as fast as their horses could carry them.

The Duke and his son, Douro. She was not surprised at their pell-mell retreat. It was only to be expected.