“Your money or your life!” It came out of nowhere, echoing through the forest and making the birds shudder in their leafy nests. “I tell you, sir, heed me for I will kill you if that is your choice. Make no mistake.” A dank and dark voice. A bad voice full of poverty, full of desperation.
The carriage driver calmly stopped his horse, tightening the reins and then loosening them again; this was not the first time he had encountered desolate ruffians, and he was unmoved by their plight. He knew what he had to do. “I don’t intend to,” he said with a grunt as he jumped from his seat, crunching into the dusty forest floor. “And I don’t doubt that you would kill me in a heartbeat. But not if I kill you first.”
There was a cry of alarm, a scraping scuffle, a shout of pain, and another of fury. There was a gunshot, a single, sharp, solitary pistol crack, and then a quiet nothing. There was no sound except for the clip-clop of hooves as the horse continued its journey, and the grumbling mumble of the carriage driver.
“Damned highwaymen,” he groaned at no one, at his horse, perhaps, at the trees and the birds within them. “Damned curs.”
The girl called Lark, small, dark, afraid, huddled closer under her blanket in the cab, sucking at her thumb in a way she hadn’t done for three years now, not since she was four years old. But she did it again now, nibbling at the skin around the nail, sliding her tongue around the new landscape, feeling the craters, filling them. When he had placed her inside, her father had told her not to leave the carriage, not to pull back the curtains, not to do anything other than make the journey and hand over the letter – the important, crucial letter – when she reached the other end.
Only then could she exit the carriage. Only then could she enjoy sunlight once more.
And if highwaymen attacked, which was possible, even probable, then she was not to make a sound. Unless she wanted them to find her, of course.
Lark did not want that. That was the last thing she could have borne. What she wanted to do was call out. She wanted to hear a reply. She wanted someone to acknowledge her. She was afraid though. What if the driver told her father that she had disobeyed him and had ventured a look outside? She could not risk it, not when her father’s temper was so quick to come and slow to leave. And so she lay on the straw covered floor, sucking her thumb and praying for the journey to be over.
The little girl clutched the letter she had been given as though it were precious metal. It was creased and damp from where she had held it so tightly, the ink bleeding from the words written on the front. And if she could read she would have known that it was addressed to the sheriff, and that that was where she was heading.
Lark could not read, and never would. She knew, however, that her father had been reluctant to send her on this journey and would have travelled himself had he been well enough. He had told her that when he had told her how important her mission was. But he was very ill. So ill that he could no longer walk, could barely breathe.
He was dying.
Lark knew that if she knew nothing else. She had seen much death in her short life; her mother, her brother, her uncle… And now her father was on the edge of the world, ready to drop into the afterlife, ready to leave her. She had tried to hold onto him, to drag him back, but she was too small, too young and weak.
Lark had the guilt-ridden feeling that her father held her responsible for his imminent death. Half looks and full blame meant that she was happy to carry out this task for her father. The look on his face, so desperate to cling on to a life that was too, too fragile. That would not last. But he wanted a little longer. Just a little longer.
A stumble. The horse, it stumbled. It tripped, the carriage tipped, and with it went the letter. For a moment Lark’s grip had weakened, for a moment she had closed her eyes and thought that maybe sleep would come, but instead there was the jolt of the carriage as the horse lost its footing and found it again. By then it was too late. The letter had slipped from between her fingers, too lightly held, and it was gone from the carriage, whipped away on a silent wind.
Now she would have to speak.
The lesser, as her father often said, of two evils. The letter could not be allowed to be lost.
“Sir?” Her voice was rusty and weak from lack of use. “Sir?” she tried again, stronger, intent behind the single word. “Sir!” Better. Much better.
“Sir, I need you to stop the carriage. I must have you stop, I must retrieve the missive my father entrusted to me.”
The carriage continued. The horse clip-clopping, the driver silent.
Lark shouted out this time, shouted and stamped her little foot. “I demand it, sir! Stop now as I must alight!” She paused. Remembered the threats made to her by so many people. If you do this then I’ll do that… “If you don’t stop then I shall jump and you will be sorry!”
But still the carriage ploughed ever onward.
And Lark was afraid to jump. It was such a long way down, and they were travelling at such a speed.
So she did not.
Instead she fretted and cried and wondered why the driver would not stop.
What Lark did not know – could not know – was that the driver could not stop. He was dead. He had died many hours ago, shot in the stomach by a dangerous highwayman who had really only been a boy, a child of fifteen, who was so afraid after what he had done that he chose to run, and not rob the driver, the carriage, the occupant. And the driver’s blood had drained away as he had ridden onwards, and he had died in his seat, slumped forward, reins in his hand, a trail of blood showing anyone who cared the way they had gone.
Lark waited. She waited until the driver heard her. She waited until they reached their destination. She waited to die without knowing it.
And the letter. Well, she was doomed either way. The letter would have made death swifter, that is all. The letter was a plea – yet another plea – from Lark’s crippled father to the sheriff, imploring him to cast a spell – yet another spell – that would prolong his life for a few more years.
It had been done before.
Sacrifices had been made.
Lark’s mother, her brother, her uncle…
Lark’s father had sent them all to their deaths to gain another year or two. Another month or so.
And although the little boy highwayman gave in to his despair, gave up on trying, and used his gun just once more that night, he had unknowingly slain a terrible beast.
What a pity it came at such a high price.
