A Duke in the Night(15)

“It’s me or them,” he snapped at the boy, and the child went still.

August jammed his heels into the gelding’s side and the horse bolted, only too happy to quit the trees, the gunfire, and the unseen threat on the other side of the copse. The boy, whoever he was, clung to August, one skinny hand poking from a threadbare sleeve clutching August’s arm, the other hanging on to his prize.

August aimed the horse in the direction of a long, thick hedgerow, the wind whipping past him and the ground blurring. He chanced a look behind him, but the trees were now hidden by the hills, and the horizon was empty. The gelding started to slow, and August let it, guiding it into the shadows of the hedgerow. The horse suddenly stumbled, and with a frown August pulled it to a stop altogether. The gelding’s gait was off.

August swung down, the boy slipping from the saddle almost as quickly. The child tried to dart away, but August caught his arm. He twisted, trying to conceal his front, where something bulky had been stuffed down his shirt. Something soft and yellow, a corner of which was trailing out at the edge of his waistband and looked very much like a length of silk.

August ignored that for the moment. “Who are you?” he asked, staring down into a thin, defiant face. Much, much too thin.

The boy shrugged in a manner August remembered all too well. He had been this child.

In dark, weak moments, he still was this child. And it haunted him.

“Never mind, then,” August said. “Tell me who was chasing you.”

The boy glanced back in the direction from which they had come, peering through the hedgerow. “Soldiers,” he said, as though that should be obvious.

“Why?”

The boy shrugged again and tightened his grip on the bag.

“What did you steal?” August asked.

The defiant look became harder.

“Something worth shooting you for?”

The boy scuffed a toe in the dirt and remained stubbornly silent.

August sighed and snatched the bag from the boy’s hands in a lightning-quick move.

“That’s mine,” the boy cried.

August ignored him and opened the bag. He peered in to find what looked like salted fish mixed with a few loose apples.

“That’s mine,” the child repeated.

August handed the bag back to him. “You got family?” he asked.

“Maybe.” It was sullen and suspicious.

“Here.” August reached into the pocket he’d had sewn into the inside of his coat, his fingers finding a handful of coins. He held them out, knowing it wasn’t much, but it was better than nothing.

The boy eyed him with incredulity.

“Take them,” August urged. “And the next time you need to…borrow something, I want you to come to the Silver Swan in town.” August had visions of the boy lying dead in a field, a bullet hole in him for the sake of a half dozen salted herring and a length of yellow silk cloth.

Incredulity turned to bafflement.

“The tavern and inn near the harbor?” August prompted. “There’s a sign hanging out front.”

The boy’s face cleared. “Thought that was a dyin’ stork on the sign,” he said. “Never knew it was a swan.”

August shook his head. “Ask for Charleaux. Tell him Holloway sent you. He’ll see to what you need.”

“Don’t need no charity.” The suspicion was back.

“Don’t need your family to starve to death either.”

Small fingers hesitated and then finally reached for the coins, stuffing them into the bag of food as though the boy was afraid August might change his mind. Slowly he started to back away.

“Remember what I said,” August told him.

“Thank you,” the boy mumbled, and then he spun and vanished through the thick hedgerow.

August stared at the space he had disappeared through, suddenly feeling a hundred years old. The more things changed, the more things stayed the same, no matter how much time had passed. Only back then, it had not been soldiers chasing him, but other boys just like himself, just as desperate to survive. Then there had been no one to come to his rescue. He’d had to do that all by himself.

August shot another look at the horizon. A half dozen horses and riders had appeared, the red of their coats easily visible in the long rays of the sun even from this distance. They were headed away from where he was concealed in the direction of the cliffs, presumably still hunting a small boy they would no longer find. A small boy with a handful of silk and a bag of dried fish that had been liberated, quite likely, from a larger cache of barrels and crates brought ashore and hidden somewhere.

August was familiar with the soldiers and blockade men who patrolled the chalky coast, hunting for those who slipped through with all manner of contraband. It wasn’t something new. But desperate people did desperate things, and while some looked to profit, most looked to merely survive. The war had been hard on these communities, the taxes to pay for it even harder.

August understood survival. He had done and continued to do what he needed to so that he would never have to go back. Back to a time when hunger and cold had been enemies, stalking him with a promise of death just as surely as the wraiths armed with knives and desperation had. Back to a time when he had lacked the power and ability to truly protect and take care of those he loved.

The appearance of that child had reminded him of that. And renewed his resolve to never rest. To never allow the safety net that he had so carefully woven to come apart.