70
I row fast for two reasons.
One, I want to scout out the terrain and river ahead before the other teams reach it to ensure my security is in place. Two, I want to place a little distance between Silke and the others to give her a head start.
I don’t know her all that well. Other than the couple of cocktail parties and the ball I hadn’t had the opportunity to get to know her. But I recognised that having a leg in plaster is a distinct disadvantage and could possibly make her an easy target, and that doesn’t sit well with me.
This Game is brutal enough without participating with a handicap.
“Silke,” I speak quietly to ensure my voice doesn’t carry too far across the water, “I understand your parents are industrialists.”
“Yes,” she nods, her eyes forward, presumably scanning for the tunnel she’s supposed to swim through.
“I gather you had other plans?”
“Of course,” she says, turning to look back at me, “I’m an environmentalist. I don’t support anything they do or say.”
“I see,” I nod, “hence you signing up for The Games?”
“Yes,” she nods again, “when I marry you we can use your wealth and position to help the world. Areas like this. Have you noticed there are no bugs? No nightbirds, no frog sounds? Much of this area still suffers from the effects of the chemicals sprayed on the forest during the Vietnam War. Chemicals my family still produces. Such damage can be redressed with money and time.”
“I like that idea,” I smile at her.
“But first I must kill the Italian,” she shrugs, “and her roommates.”
I raise an eyebrow as she turns back to face the front of the canoe, her baby beginning to make whimpering sounds.
“I would have thought this perhaps isn’t the right challenge, given your leg, for such murderous ventures,” I smirk, aware she can’t see my expression.
“Not tonight,” she shrugs, “but soon.”
“And any particular reason why you feel those three competitors need to be eliminated?”
“The Nepalese is mentally ill,” she shrugs. “The Icelander is mentally deficient, and the Italian is mental.”
I laugh, the sound echoing across the water, but she doesn’t join in, and I realise she actually isn’t joking.
As her baby begins to become more fractious she soothes it by telling it to, “stop it. Stop it now!”
Rolling my eyes at her lack of maternal instinct, I look to the mountainside and see a flash of light. I think perhaps it was from a torch, although I can’t be sure, and I strain to block out the baby and listen for any sound that might indicate who, or what, was up there.
‘Friend or foe?’
Speeding up my rowing I ensure we reach the tunnel entrance well before anyone else and, helping Silke into the water, I hand her the basket containing her fretting baby.
“Good luck, Silke.”
“Thank you, I’ll see you when I win.”
I nod and she swims away, her life vest doing its job and her baby beginning to wail.
As she’s swept on the current into the cave mouth the last thing I hear is her repeating her order to the baby to ‘stop it.’ Behind me I hear loud voices on the water and look up to see Cherry standing in her boat and shouting at her guide; “row faster. Row faster, damn you!”
I imagine if she had a whip, she’d be using it.
Further back I can hear Thorun’s sweet voice carrying across the water as she sings ‘row, row, row your boat.’
As she comes into view I notice she’s cradling her baby in her arms.
I wait for her to arrive and prepare to accompany her through the first tunnel. I still haven’t told her the gold coin she has is the Life Token, but I won’t need to if I can protect her. And for this contest, that’s exactly what I plan to do.
For future contests, I have a different guard in mind.