Chapter Nine
TARRAS MOSS
A betraying moon cast pale light over a scene of haunting desolation, with rough heather moorland between long patches of sucking bog and the occasional stunted tree.
A hunting owl called, reminding me of my own Lethan Valley and I felt suddenly homesick for the sweet grass and friendliness of home.
Mother would be worried silly for me and Father would have called up the men of the Lethan to scour the Border for the Yorling. He would not know that I had been abducted by Wild Will and then escaped, to wander the wastes of Tarras with this man who was not ugly at all.
'Wait!' The man who was not ugly put a quiet hand on the nose of my horse.
I waited without question.
'Dismount.'
I dismounted, wincing at the pain that stretching some tender parts of me caused.
Hugh pulled his horse to lie prone and I followed.
Having a horse obey you was a thing all Borderers could do.
There was no praise in horsemanship; you either managed your horse or you died.
There was no other choice in the long hills and sweet green valleys of the Borderland.
We lay in silence, saying nothing. I smelled the acrid scent of a man's sweat, heard the low murmur of conversation and then the jingle of bit and bridle.
Fifty yards away a man rode past, followed by another, and another.
They rode soft and slowly with the nine-foot lances of the Border held ready in their right hands and the moon glinting from the steel helmets.
I held my breath, closed one hand over the muzzle of Kailzie and watched.
The riders passed, one by one, each man looking about him, each face hawk-wary, hard, and set.
Backswords swung low from their saddles, some carried a dag, the heavy pistol whose shot would tear a fist-sized hole in a man.
And then they were gone, near silent in the night.
I made to rise but Hugh's hand gestured for me to stay. His eyes were urgent.
I settled back down, aware of the insistent hammering of my heart and the sudden dryness of my mouth.
We waited as a cloud skiffed across the moon, bringing temporary intense darkness.
There was the soft scuff of hooves, the aroma of horse and a lone rider passed us, just as moonshine returned.
I looked up. It was Wild Will himself, with that livid white scar down the side of his face and his eyes like gimlets, boring into the night.
My horse shifted, the sound seeming to carry for miles in the hush, and then Wild Will passed on with the hooves of his horse strangely muffled and his aura of evil shivering my bones. I took a deep breath, gasped for air, and felt Hugh's hand reassuringly on my arm.
'Are you all right?' His voice was soft.
I nodded, unable to speak.
'Give them a few more minutes,' Hugh said.
I nodded again. I doubt I would have been able to move at that moment. I looked sideways at Hugh. He was peering into the dark, concentrating hard. I waited, listening to the sough of the wind through the heather. That owl was silent now.
'Right.' Hugh touched my arm.
We rode on, slowly, looking around us, wary, alert for every sound, every movement.
We both knew that the Armstrongs were hunting for us and Wild Will would hang Hugh without a qualm.
I quailed to think what he would do to me.
Always imaginative, my mind filled with images, each one more horrific than the last until I realised that I was scaring myself to numb futility.
'Wait…' Hugh's voice broke my thoughts. 'I've taken us the wrong road.'
I nodded. Not many men would have admitted their fault so openly. Robert would have tried to put the blame on me, or the dark, or the weather. I chased that thought away: I should not compare Robert with Hugh; they were two different people, each with good points and bad.
'Turn around; slowly now,' Hugh said.
I tried to obey, only to find that Kailzie's hooves were sinking in something softer than mud.
'We're in a bog,' I said.
'Wait.' Hugh slid from his horse and came toward me. 'Dismount.' I did so, fighting my fear as I felt the suck of peat-bog under my feet. 'Take three steps back, slowly.'
I did so and sighed as the ground was immediately firmer. I felt the spring of heather under me.
'Stay there,' Hugh spoke quietly so his words did not carry through the hush of the night.
I watched his shadowy shape move back into the bog where Kailzie was neighing in fear as she felt the ground sucking her in.
Blowing into the nostrils of my horse and fondling her ears, Hugh calmed her down before leading her one slow step at a time out of the bogland.
'Fondle her,' he ordered and returned for his own horse. 'That was an unpleasant few moments,' he said. 'We will try this way unless you can think of another?'
'No,' I said, smoothing my hand along Kailzie's muzzle, fondling her ears, and blowing into her nostrils until she nuzzled me. 'You know the area better than I do.'
We moved on again, ever more wary. Twice more we stopped as I thought I heard riders.
The first was a lone deer, the second was a riderless horse, tossing its mane as it picked its own path through the Moss.
We kept on, slowly, as the moon passed across the sky and faded, and a bright weather-gleam cracked open the eastern sky.
'Dawn,' Hugh said briefly. 'I had hoped to be out of Tarras before now.'
This time there was no friendly woodland in which to shelter from the dangers of daylight. Instead, Hugh led us to a slight ridge on which there was a peculiar rock formation. Two long fangs of rock faced each other, creating a cave-like effect except lacking a roof.
'This is the Wolf Craigs,' Hugh told me, 'because it is shaped like the jaws of a wolf.'
He was right; the edges of the rock were serrated like teeth, even the colour, becoming visible in the growing light, was ochre-red, like old blood.
Sheep and wild beasts had used this place for shelter, creating a familiar, friendly aroma.
Once again, we knee-haltered the horses, ate what little we had and settled ourselves in for the night.
I did not mention the aches in my rump: not that morning.
'It is more exposed here,' Hugh said. 'We will have to stand watches in case somebody comes.'
I nodded. We relapsed into silence that I, for one, found miserable. 'Hugh,' I said at last, 'I should not have watched you at the waterfall.'
'No,' he said, 'you should not have.'
Well, that did not help much. I had hoped that he would say it was all right, or something equally placating. I felt worse rather than better; that man had a way of saying little and meaning much, rather than most men who talk a lot and say nothing.
'I am sorry.' I had to tear the words from inside me. I was not good at apologising.
He looked at me through these steady grey eyes and nodded.
I wondered what he was thinking. 'If you knew I was watching, why did you not tell me, or cover yourself up?'
'Why should I do that?' he said at once. 'It was up to you to look elsewhere, not up to me to hide away.'
'You did not mind me seeing?' I said.
'No.' His smile was slow but worth waiting for. 'I did not mind at all. You had seen the worst of me in my face; the rest is just like other men. If you wanted to look then you may look, and no harm done.'
I wondered if he was offering to strip for me.
I hoped not. I would have expected such an offer from the boys of the Lethan, not from Hugh.
'I don't want to look just now,' I countered quickly.
I was not telling the truth. I did not tell him that he was not like other men: no other man could have affected me as he had.
'I am glad to hear it.' Hugh quietened my fears. 'You are not the first woman to see me like that.'
'Oh?' I felt an unaccountable twist of jealousy for these unknown women who had seen him naked. I did not know why I felt that way. 'I don't wish to hear of your no-doubt many amorous conquests.' The bitter words were out before I could stop them.
'I have had no amorous conquests,' he told me with surprising frankness. 'Ugly men do not.'
'You are not ugly,' I said softly, and with force.
'Others disagree.'
'Then they are wrong,' I said.
'Other men are more handsome.' Hugh seemed determined to prove his own unsuitability.
I was equally determined to disprove it. 'I do not care about other men, and I cannot tell if they are handsome or not. Nor should you.' I took a deep breath. 'You have no reason to be shy about your appearance. Or your body.'
He held my gaze. 'I have three sisters,' he said at length. 'They are the women of whom I spoke.'
I do not know why I felt a surge of relief. 'You should have said!'
'You should not have looked.' Hugh was smiling again.
'I am not your sister to be teased.' I felt the heat in my voice as I stood up. This not-ugly man was playing with me.
'I am not your brother to be watched with impunity,' he responded, calmly. 'But I'm sure the Armstrongs will be interested in your opinion.'
'The Armstrongs?' I did not understand.
'You are shouting,' Hugh explained. 'Your voice will carry right across the Moss.'
He was right of course, damn the man. I sat down again in the shelter of the jagged teeth of the Wolf Craigs and glared across at him instead.
Unfortunately, he did not seem in the slightest put out by even my most ferocious frown.
Presumably, his sisters had similar tricks.
Damn that man. Damn him for the devilry of the Veitches.
'You had best get some sleep,' Hugh said mildly. 'We have a hard night ahead of us.'
'We have just had a hard night.' I was not quite prepared for a reconciliation.
'Tomorrow we skirt Liddesdale,' he said.