“But you believe these nutters on the Internet,” I said. “Why don’t you question them?”
“If I could time-travel,” Will said, “I’d quite like to go back and see the dinosaurs. I mean, I’d take some really big guns with me…”
Suddenly my watch started a shrill beeping. Quickly I switched it off.
“What’s that?” Lizzie tilted her head.
“My alarm. The tide’s going out. Exactly two days till we can use the crossing.”
Lizzie wrapped our rubbish and put it in her rucksack. “What have we got that Carmen can eat when she wakes up?” She tugged out her washbag. “I’ve got my daily multi-vitamins – can she have a few of those?”
“Can you overdose on vitamins?” I looked at Grady, who shrugged.
“Ben and I have jerky,” Will said. “What else?”
“There’s Peperami, too.” I nodded at Will, who pulled out our cook pack and handed it over.
“And we’ve still got bacon from earlier.” Lizzie bit her lip. “But she can’t eat it raw and we can’t cook it in here. What did you bring, Grady?”
We looked at his huge rucksack.
“Have you got any beef stew left?” I asked. “That’d be good.”
Grady wiped his hand over his forehead. “I’ve got another couple of tins. Some ravioli, cocktail sausages. The rest is … well, mainly sweets,” he admitted. “You know what I’m like. I’ve got lots of gummy bears…” He tailed off.
Lizzie put her finger to her lips, and her eyes widened. “Listen!”
I gripped my axe. Voices drifted faintly from the other side of the hill.
“They’re trying to get into the checkpoint box,” she whispered.
“You mean there are still teams behind us?” Grady lifted his head.
I frowned at him and gestured at him to keep quiet.
“They’re fighting.” Lizzie clutched her stick.
“Did they get into the box?” Will slid towards the barrier of bags, listening.
The yelling was louder now. A higher male voice was screaming at other, deeper, voices.
“They want his tooth.” Will picked up his weapon, but moved no nearer to the daylight.
I put my hand to my face; my gum still ached.
The yelling intensified. We could hear grunts, calls of encouragement, shouts and cries. Lizzie shivered.
Suddenly, from behind us, a scream ripped through the cave. Carmen had woken up.
Grady scrambled to cover her mouth, but she writhed, arched her back and struggled to escape Grady’s grasp. With her one hand, she clutched at her bloody wrist. Tears dampened her cheeks and she made terrible sounds: half-scream, half-sob.
“Carmen, it’s us,” Lizzie whispered.
I joined my voice to Lizzie’s. “Car, whoever they were, they’ve gone. It’s Ben.”
Carmen calmed slightly, but still writhed and sobbed under Grady’s hand.
“Tell her to be quiet,” Will snapped. He remained by the entrance. “If they hear us…”
“Carmen, I know it hurts, but you’ve got to hush.” Lizzie was crying too now. “There’s another team on the hill – we don’t know what they’ll do if they find us.”
Carmen’s brown eyes met Lizzie’s blue ones. Her chest rose and fell in pain, panic and her efforts to be silent.
“Painkillers, Grady.” I grabbed a water bottle and Grady pushed the medical kit towards me with his free hand.
I fumbled the Tramadol out of the packet. “Take these, Car.”
Grady took his hand from her mouth as she twisted towards me, her teeth gritted. I pushed the pills past her lips and forced her mouth open. She gagged and I poured water into the corner of her mouth. “Swallow them, please.”
She gulped awkwardly and then gripped Lizzie’s collar with stiff fingers. “They thought … I was … you!”
“Say that again.” Will turned to stare at her.
“They wanted … to stop us … from…”
“Opening any more boxes,” Will finished with a nod. “Without Lizzie’s thumbprint we’d be screwed. Clever!”
“And … they wanted … my fingers … for geocaches.”
Then Carmen’s eyes rolled back in her head and she passed out again.
Chapter Twelve
Carmen was sitting up in Lizzie’s arms, shuddering violently. Lizzie stroked her head with one hand and steadied an open tin of stew with the other.
Grady held the spoon. “You have to eat,” he cajoled.
“I’ll be sick.” Carmen looked away from the food.
“What do you remember, Car?” Will leaned closer.
She trembled harder. “They called him Reece.”
“Reece Armstrong,” Will said. “Team eight.”
“He was big. He kept calling me … Elizabeth. I said I wasn’t, but he didn’t listen.”
“You don’t have to tell us if you’re not ready,” Lizzie whispered.
Carmen shook her head. “They said they’d seen another team with a girl … on a rope … a-a lead. Reece called her Spare Parts. He said they weren’t dumb enough to use someone from their own team like that. I-I’m his Spare Parts.” She choked into silence.
“Two teams ahead of us, then,” Grady said.
I glared at him.
Lizzie started to brush Carmen’s hair with her fingers, trying to untangle the bloody knots. “I don’t understand,” she said. “What do these idiots think is going to happen when we all get home? As if no one is going to speak to the police!”
Will raised his eyebrows.
“OK, Will, I get it,” Lizzie snapped. “You think ‘Spare Parts’ and others like her won’t get home to tell the tale.”
Will leaned on his knees. “Not necessarily – some of the teams might not be thinking further than the win. Maybe they’re even planning to buy their victim’s silence. But Reece is being clever. If you’re going to use someone like this, it’s best to use a stranger. That way, in a week’s time you have a traumatized victim who doesn’t actually know you – who could be confused about exactly who they saw while they were being attacked.”
Grady nodded. “You can argue you’re one of dozens of blokes on the island wearing camo gear, and you have your whole team to back you up.”
Will cocked his head. “Worst case, each team member can blame the other one.”
“Something like that was in the news recently,” I said. “Three suspects. They all blamed each other. There was no way to know who was the murderer so they all got off.”
Carmen gripped my hand. “It’s afternoon, right?” I nodded.
“They’ve had hours to find the next checkpoint.” She looked at Lizzie and then at me. “He’ll be back soon. If Will’s right, then you guys are witnesses he can’t afford.”
Her hand shook and I pressed it between mine. “Do you think you can walk?”
“Of course not!” Lizzie glowered, but Carmen’s eyes hardened. Grim determination dried her tears.
“If I have to,” she said.
Reluctantly, Lizzie helped me get Carmen to her feet. She sagged between us.
“Let’s at least decide where we’re going before we head out.” I looked at Will.
He opened the map. “We’ve a number of choices.”
“What are they?” Grady leaned over his shoulder.
“West – we can head towards the cliffs to look for another cave.”
“Not a bad idea,” Lizzie said. “Weren’t there meant to be loads of them? And we’d be hard to find.”
“But it could take ages to find one big enough and we’ll be out in the open the whole time we’re looking for who knows how long,” Will finished.
“Oh!” Lizzie dragged her fingers through her hair and Carmen shuddered.
“What’s our alternative?” I gripped my axe.
“Walking back to the jetty.” Will put his finger on the map. “If we hide out in that building where we found the first box, we should be all right. Other teams are l
ikely to be going forwards, not back. If we bump into anyone, it’ll be a team doing the same as us – giving up and hiding. Or one that hasn’t yet found that first checkpoint.”
“And they wouldn’t be a danger to us.” Lizzie brightened.
“Good thinking.” I bent to pick up my pack. “Let’s go.”
Will didn’t move.
“What’s the ‘but’?” Lizzie sighed.
Will shrugged. “It’s a long walk for Carmen.” He looked at Lizzie. “And we know there’s no medical help there. If there is help at the final checkpoint, this would take us further from it.”
I narrowed my eyes. “You still think we should go for the money, don’t you?” I said.
Grady flushed. “What if he does?” He pointed at Carmen. “She’s going to need the prize even more after this.”
Will held up the map. “There’s another option: just under halfway between here and the next checkpoint, there’s probably a cottage or barn.”
I shook my head. “What if Reece and his team are heading back from the next checkpoint now? We could walk into them.”
Will handed me the map. “We can avoid them. If you were going from here to the next checkpoint, which route would you take?”
I frowned. “Depends – do I want the quickest way or the easiest?”
“We were going to go around the river, past the small loch and across the fields,” Grady pointed out.
“So, if we go across the river and directly to the cottage, we should miss them – and it’s almost all downhill,” Will said.
“It’s a huge risk,” I said as I handed back the map.
Lizzie nodded. “Ben’s right, there are eight other teams – we could run into any of them. I vote we go back to the jetty.”
“This isn’t a vote.” Carmen spoke up, her voice low and rasping. “You think we should hide until the competition is over while they get a million pounds each for doing this to me?” Her voice rose.
Grady looked anxiously at the cave entrance. “Quiet!”
“No!” Carmen’s eyes chilled me. She roughly shoved blood-matted hair from her cheek. “We’re going to that building. We’ll rest until I have enough strength. Then we run the course, ignore the geocaches, and beat everyone to the last checkpoint. We won’t win the prize, but if we can find a way to hide the last box … or destroy it, then no one else will either.”
There was a long silence.
“You know,” Grady said thoughtfully, “if no one completes the geocache challenge, they might just give the money to the people who get to the end in the fastest time.”
“And it’ll get us to help quickly. Let me see the map.” Lizzie bowed her head over the paper. “If you’re sure about this, Carmen, we’ll go north-east first. It’ll mean we have a little more walking to do, but we’re less likely to run into anyone else.” She folded the map and handed it back to Will.
Carmen watched in silence as I clipped my rucksack over my chest, then I picked hers up and weighed it in my hands. “Is there anything you want from in here? Your vodka?” I touched her pocket where she still had her mushrooms stashed. “You could have a mushroom?”
Carmen looked sick; she shook her head.
I swung her rucksack on to my front and found my balance, then tested my knee.
“Will could take it,” Lizzie murmured. She was leaning on her stick. Or, with Will’s knife strung on to the end, should I have called it a spear?
I shook my head. “Not a chance. If we meet Reece, Will’s arms need to be free.”
Lizzie pushed her glasses up her nose. “You’re bigger than he is.”
“But I’m hurt.” I said nothing more.
It was my ninth birthday. My stegosaurus cake was in crumbly green pieces on the kitchen floor and Dad was sitting at the table, blood running from a cut above his eyebrow. Mum was disarming Will. He had the cake knife.
I tried to dab at Dad’s face with a tea towel, but he pushed me away. I could feel his anger.
“He went for Ben,” Dad said in a whispery voice. “I only just got in the way in time.”
“He didn’t,” Mum insisted, one arm around a redfaced Will. “He was only threatening. If you hadn’t got between them…” She tossed the knife into the sink.
I looked at Dad. “It’s my fault. Sorry.”
Dad stared at me, his face white. “Your fault, Ben?” He stood up. “It’s your birthday. You should be able to blow out your own candles.”
I tried not to look at the floor. Dabs of blue wax were sticking to the lino. There was a Will-sized footprint in the middle of the cake.
“This isn’t fair on Ben,” Dad said.
“I understand Will,” Mum said. “You know I do. I can deal with this. He’s been so much better.”
“Has he?” Dad looked at me.
“I guess.” I nodded. Will hadn’t hurt anyone in weeks. He was learning.
“I don’t know how much longer I can…” Dad tailed off.
There was a reason I never fought with my brother.
I bit my lip – was I making the right decision in taking Carmen’s bag? What if something happened to Will?
But we needed weapons and that’s what Will was.
“Everybody ready?” Lizzie looked around.
Grady stood by the entrance, shoulders hunched under his pack and misery on his face. “I don’t want to go out there,” he muttered. He clutched his pick to his chest.
“We can’t stay.” Will offered him a rare half-smile, his eyes glittering. “Look at it this way – we know they’re coming back here.”
Grady nodded.
“Carmen?” I glanced at her.
“I’m ready.” She faced the entrance.
Lizzie caught her shoulder. “One minute. Let’s listen first,” she whispered.
We stood silently. The air stirred, luring us outside. Birds sobbed hauntingly and I heard the distant bleating of sheep. The hill itself was quiet.
“Let’s go,” Lizzie said.
It was still bright, and we squinted as we emerged from the dark of the cave. Will and Grady led, with Lizzie and Carmen in the middle. Moving slowly, I brought up the rear.
We went without speaking, awkward steps broken only by occasional grunts and groans, and the clatter of Grady’s clanging rucksack.
“This isn’t going to work.” Lizzie leaned on her spear with a groan. “Grady’s too loud.”
We were still on the plateau. A ribbon of water glimmered below and to the right. To the left, another rise in the land, another peak, more cliffs.
We stopped, and Will started to unhook pans, a dangling coffee-maker, a camp stove and carabiners from Grady’s bag. “We’re leaving these.”
Grady nodded. “You’re right.”
He stood still while Will dumped his equipment beside the footpath.
“Can we hide it?” Lizzie’s knuckles whitened on her spear. “We don’t want anyone to know which way we went.”
“Hide it where?” Will tilted his head.
I tottered down the side of the rise to where a ditch was filled with stagnant water. “Here.”
Grady winced as Will pitched his equipment into the water.
“Have we gone far enough north-east?” I asked Will.
He looked at the map and nodded. “Probably.”
“So, we can start going down?” The incline was pitted with rocks, clumps of heather and thistle, rabbit holes and scree. There was no path, so our route wouldn’t be obvious to anyone looking for us.
In silence, Carmen stepped on to the slope and began to stumble downhill with her mutilated arm tucked under the other. Her tangled hair whipped in the cold wind. It was black and red now; the pink dye had vanished under blood and dirt.
As I half-walked, half-stumbled down the rise, I had to fight to keep from tilting into a jog. With Carmen’s huge rucksack hanging from my chest, it was almost impossible to look for safe footing, so I followed Will as best I could.
My shoulders ached
and my neck itched. We were too exposed – there was nothing but the vast sky above, the sweeping hillside and the moorland below. If someone came, we had nowhere to hide.
Somewhere out here, there were eight other teams. One had stolen our tooth from Lizzie’s bag. Another had… I looked at Carmen. Those two teams, at least, were ahead of us. We had been overtaken by one more group, maybe more, while we were in the cave. That left five. I reckoned everyone had found the second checkpoint by now.
“I wonder how many gave up?” I murmured.
“What?” Lizzie turned.
“How many teams do you think gave up, you know – when they found the tooth?”
“I don’t know.” Lizzie shifted her glasses out of the way and rubbed her eyes. “I mean, we kept going.”
“But I figure some would have stopped right there,” I said. “Wouldn’t they?”
Lizzie shrugged.
I halted. “Hey!”
“What?” Will turned.
“The teams who gave up – they’d go back to the jetty to wait, wouldn’t they?”
“Probably.” Will nodded.
“So, once Carmen has a rest, if we go that way, we’ll find allies – teams with no interest in hurting us and every reason to want to increase the size of their own group.”
Will and Grady stopped walking.
I pressed on. “That second checkpoint wasn’t simple. We had to work out the correct coordinates, the riddle, the locked-door game – then there was the tooth. There had to have been dropouts.”
“Ben’s right,” Lizzie said. “If we go to the jetty, we can join forces with another team.”
Carmen kept walking.
“You hear that, Car?
“We’re not … stopping.” She didn’t lift her eyes from the hill. “I’m not letting Reece’s team … win.”
“Car,” I pleaded. “You aren’t thinking—”
She whirled on me, eyes blazing. “We. Aren’t. Going. To. Give. Up.”
“I know how you feel, but—”
“Really? Because you lost … a tooth, Ben?” She raised her arm. “What kind of life am I facing without my hand? Tell me!”
Savage Island Page 11
