36

Ordeal

“Remember. It is day. We have an hour or so before there is any danger to us. No matter what you see, remember there is no danger.”

Peter nodded.

It was a bitter afternoon. It had begun to snow heavily as they rode around the outskirts of the village, and more than this, the snow was being driven by a nasty wind from the east, straight off the mountains. It had come from nowhere, quite suddenly, and now the storm was at its most furious. On any other day, Peter might have cursed it all, but today was different. He and Sofia were glad of the appalling weather because it meant no one else was about. They seemed to have the village to themselves, which was just as well, given what they were about to do. Tomas and Caspar had both been locked up for doing the same.

They had cut buckthorn from a large bush, and Peter had broken the lock on the sexton’s shed with one swing of his axe.

Now they stood at the edge of the graveyard.

The snow hurled itself out of the sky, tearing around their heads, making it hard to see more than a few feet, never mind to the far side, where the wooden church hunkered into the slight hillside, as if trying to escape the storm.

“Ready?” Sofia called.

Peter smiled.

“Go on.”

He made a stirrup with his hands to help Sofia into the saddle. She smiled and, allowing him this indulgence, settled herself. She guided Sultan to the gateway, and Peter followed, axe in one hand, spade in the other.

With the back of his wrist he brushed at the snow clogging his eyebrows, and then opened the gate for Sultan and Sofia.

“Where?” he asked.

By way of answer Sofia steered Sultan over to the path that ran down the middle of the graveyard, to the first grave in the first row. That made sense. To start at the beginning.

Peter and Sofia exchanged one last look, and Sultan walked forward.

It was slow progress. At first Sultan seemed unsure of what he was supposed to do, but then he understood. He stepped over the first grave, passing the wooden cross, and to the other side.

Nothing.

He had moved as calmly as if he had been walking in a summer’s hay meadow.

Peter looked at Sofia, but she didn’t look back, urging Sultan to the next grave.

Nothing.

Again Sultan moved happily across the ground.

The third grave approached.

Nothing.

Sofia urged him on.

“Sofia,” Peter called. “It’s not—”

He didn’t finish what he was saying.

Sultan reared so suddenly and violently that he threw Sofia before she could do anything about it.

Peter ran to her side as Sultan shied into the snow, becoming a gray ghost in the gloom.

“We’ve found one,” Sofia said.

“Are you—?”

“I’m all right,” Sofia said. “Hurry. We have to try.” She got to her feet. “Come on!”

It was so hard. What they were doing was so hard, and the ferocity of the snowstorm only made it harder.

Peter picked the spade up, his hands numb already, and began to dig. His first efforts cleared the snow, and then he hit the ground. The winter had frozen the soil solid but he didn’t give up, driving the spade down with his boot. He prized up a huge sod and flung it to one side, and with that achieved, his work became much easier.

In a short time he had dug a hole halfway along the grave, going deeper with each blow.

Suddenly the spade tip struck something, something other than soil.

“Wood!” he called to Sofia. “I’ve found it.”

She nodded.

“Now what?” he asked.

She grabbed the axe and seemed to be about to swing it, when Peter stopped her.

“That’s my job,” he said, taking the axe from her, “and anyway, I’ve got an idea. Go and fetch Sultan back.”

Sofia stalked away into the swirling snow, to Sultan, who had been too scared to come any closer and too scared to leave altogether. She coaxed him back toward the graveside, in time to see Peter swing the axe at the surface of the coffin. He had made two blows already and shattered the lid. He left the axe sticking out of the wood, and came over to Sultan. From the horse’s saddle he took a rope and tied it first to the axe, and then to Sultan’s saddle.

Immediately Sofia understood his intentions and they both began to walk Sultan away from the grave. He was only too happy to oblige, and pulled.

There was an earsplitting crack and half the lid of the coffin flew up into the air to land on the snow beside them.

Now that they had done it, they realized that the worst bit was still to come.

They stood motionless, not even daring to look at each other, but staring at the lip of the hole they had made. Peter couldn’t move. Then Sultan whinnied and seemed to goad Sofia into life. She sprang forward, giving herself as little time to think about what she was doing as possible.

Shamed, Peter rushed to her side and saw what she had already seen.

“It’s empty!” he cried. “Sultan was wrong.”

Sofia was silent, as she peered deeper into the coffin.

“Sultan was wrong,” Peter repeated, “this isn’t going to work.”

“No,” she said. “Sultan wasn’t wrong. Look!”

She pulled Peter down beside her.

As they leant into the hole, they were for a moment oblivious to everything else around them. They no longer noticed the snow, and they didn’t hear Sultan snorting. They didn’t see the snow shifting strangely on top of the graves that lay behind them.

“Look,” Sofia said again.

Peter didn’t need telling. He remembered what Sofia had told him about the things you could bury with a hostage to stop them from walking. Charcoal. That was the one. Charcoal.

Peter stared at the inside of the coffin they had uncovered. Every inch of wood was covered in writing, in charcoal. It was scrawled, as if written in a fury, or a great hurry, but nevertheless it was legible. And with every word that Peter read his heart grew colder and his hair became a little whiter.

“What does it say?” Sofia asked. “I can’t read. What does it say?”

Peter shook his head. He wished Tomas had never taught him to read, because then he wouldn’t have had to read what was written on the inside of the coffin. Words of such anger, and malevolence, and hatred. Toward the living. Descriptions. Statements of intent. Jealous rantings. All the disgusting horror to be perpetrated on those still above ground.

“If I tell you,” Peter said, “you’ll wish I never had.”

Sofia looked away from the writing, and then they both heard something slither behind them.

They turned, and Sofia screamed. Sultan bolted, and this time nothing was going to keep him in the graveyard. It was all Peter could do to keep from screaming. They watched with a deep and mortal fear as snow slid from the top of graves on every side.

Sofia whirled around.

“Peter!”

He followed her movement and saw the same thing happening behind them. What they saw next was even more terrible. All around them, squares of snow lifted bizarrely into the air. The graves were opening. Snow slipped from the squares to reveal coffin lids being pushed upright, being pushed aside.

Then came a hand, grasping for something to hold on to. Desperately Peter and Sofia looked around. Sultan was long gone, and every glance showed them something worse than the last.

They came out.

In front, behind, to the left and right, they came out, and it was clear they knew Peter and Sofia were there.

“This can’t be happening!” Peter cried. “It’s daylight!”

“I know,” Sofia shouted.

“Run!”

They ran, heading for the side of the church, aiming for a gap between the hostages. But there were dozens of them now, all running for them, all with a simple, deadly intent.

“Quickly!” Peter shouted, and pulled Sofia onward.

But she stumbled in the snow, and fell awkwardly against a gravestone. Peter reached to help her, but got only halfway when one last grave opened before him. The lid flew off as if blown apart by gunpowder. Snow fountained into the air, then settled, and Peter gasped.

Not one, but two figures rose from the grave hole. The first was Stefan, and with him was a girl. Agnes.