The five of us rode to the marshlands as soon as the first light of the next day shone bright. We decided that the Headless Horseman would be powerful at the dark of night, so we had as long as the sun had allowed us to find the head before we would be vulnerable to the rider’s wrath. The marshlands were particularly eerie when traveling there in person, not only because of its uncountable number of Rashokis deaths, but by how foggy it was. The fog seemed to follow the Horseman’s presence, like it was under his control. It was horrifying enough to see him shoot balls of fire from thin air, but to let him manipulate the fog, it was just too much. He could emerge from the fog at any second and lob off one of our heads.
I was also worried about the mysterious ranger who had knocked out Abraham Van Brunt the night before. It was like he was a ghost. And I was busy enough dealing with one living ghost to have to worry about another. I felt the same chill around him that I felt when I was being haunted by the Horseman. Why did he feel the need to haunt me? I secretly knew why. He wanted Orin’s trinket. It could reveal the location of just about anything, from what I had seen previously. If he got his hands on it, he would be able to be free of his curse.
The idea of surrendering the trinket to him came up in my mind. The problem would be resolved peacefully, at least I had hoped. There was no way of telling whether or not the Horseman would keep his end of the bargain. It wasn’t like I could see the expression on his face, because he didn’t have one. And it wasn’t like we could just meet up anywhere. He would come to us when he wanted to, because he could. Maybe I wouldn’t have to worry about being ambushed by the Horseman, now that I was on horseback. Still, he was the commander of a Thunderhooves regiment, his skill could only have increased tenfold over the past century of his haunting.
I was very nervous and afraid, to say the least, but it was safe to say I had a former opponent on my side - Abraham Van Brunt. His burliness and strength could now be used against our common enemy, instead of against Lloyd and I, and Mr. Crane. He was also clever. I hadn’t notice it at first, but he was smart enough to get others to work with him, rather than just relying on his own ability. I began to think whether or not I was being used for one of his goals down the line. I stopped those thoughts when I realized just how dangerous the Headless Horseman was.
We kept on searching, even splitting up to cover more ground in our allotted time. Lloyd and I would ride together, while Abraham Van Brunt accompanied Mr. Crane and Katrina Van Tassel. It wasn’t my first plan, but either one of them would have slowed Lloyd and I down. The two of us covered ground fairly quickly with our eagle-sharp eyes. We found some hoof prints, some of them not belonging to either of our horses. But we didn’t pay too much attention to the mud and dirt. Instead, we focused on the naked trees, the ones that looked like hands reaching out the earth. I imagined one of them would grab me while the Horseman made short work of me.
But they all looked the same. And the ones that were hollow didn’t have any spare heads in them. Our search went on while the sun retreated. Darkness was our new enemy. It harbored all creatures of that nature. The Headless Horseman was one of them. The way dark mist would trail off of his horse made it clear that he was an accumulation of the dark magic that had developed in Sleepy Hollow. He and the Rashoki shamans were to blame for this. Unfortunately, the people who had laid down this curse were long dead now, unless they had somehow discovered some means to staying alive forever. But I was getting ahead of myself.
“We’re getting nowhere with this,” I said. Lloyd steered his horse to stop. “Plus, we’re running out of time. We’ll be too far way from town to get back by the time it gets dark.”
“Are you saying we should give up for today?” Lloyd asked. “Because its not like we have as many days as we need to get this head found.”
Lloyd was right. People were counting on us. On top of that, we, I, had been given Valen’s permission to get this done. I wasn’t a simple matter. When a ranger allowed you to do something, it was expected that you got it done sooner rather than later. I decided I would keep on going.
