Errol Stone's Arc

Chapter 3 of 2

Errol reached his boat. The hound's bark ripped across the water. He grabbed the pole, then stopped. Even if he crossed, the trackers would follow. The stag was gone across the river, the cable trailing from its neck. His fortune swam free while men closed in behind him. He turned back to Erasmus, and the plan died in his throat. He could not do this alone. "Help me," Errol said. Erasmus stood in the mud, breathing hard. "You dragged that beast by the neck. Now you beg." "I'm not doing this to be cruel." The words came fast. "There's a woman. Thalia. Her father sells her by winter unless I pay a debt I can't pay. The stag was the only way." He wiped blood from his palms. "You know the marsh. You could find a buyer. A sanctuary. Someone who wants it alive. I don't have to kill it. I just need the money." Erasmus went still. The hound bayed. The old man watched the far bank where the white shape had vanished into the reeds. "You'd do anything for her," Erasmus said. It was not a question. "Yes." Something moved behind the old man's eyes. He looked older then, not angry, just tired. "I had a woman once," he said. "Loved her past sense. She died bringing a child into the world. Twenty-seven years back." He stared at Errol's bleeding hands. "I gave the boy away. Couldn't look at him without seeing her go." The trackers were near now. Poles thumped mud. But Erasmus did not move. "Where were you raised, boy?" the old man asked. Errol frowned. "A farm east of the fen. Never knew my parents. Why?" Erasmus did not answer. He stepped closer and looked hard at Errol's face, at the set of his jaw, the shape of him. His filthy hand rose halfway, then stopped. The first tracker broke through the reeds. The hound lunged on its rope, teeth bared, straining for Errol's scent. The man behind it raised a hand. "Hold," Erasmus said. His voice cracked like a whip. The tracker froze. The hound whined and sat. Errol stared. The trackers answered to the old man. All of it, the horn, the hunt, had been his. "This one stays with me," Erasmus told them. "Go find the stag. It went north bank. Follow the cable, not the man." The tracker hesitated, then hauled the hound around. They pushed back into the reeds after the white shape. Erasmus turned back to Errol. His hand shook now. "Twenty-seven years," he said quietly. "Tell me the month you were born." Errol's mouth went dry. He said it. The old man closed his eyes. When he opened them, they were wet. "Then we'll find your buyer," Erasmus said. "Alive. Both of us. There's a woman in this marsh who rescues creatures like that stag. We go to her."