The Edinburgh Dead by Brian Ruckley

Author:Brian Ruckley
Language: eng
Format: mobi, epub
Tags: Mystery, Fantasy, FIC009000
ISBN: 9780316079969
Publisher: Orbit
Published: 2011-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Beneath the powerful mid-morning sun, Davey Muir’s hand clawed weakly at the soft earth. His fingers dug in, gouging out little ruts, piling up the grass between them. He had left a scrabbled trail of mud through the field, where he had hauled himself from the ditch, dragged his broken body another few dozen yards.

Blegg stood looking down at him. The lower half of Davey’s left leg was rotated a good quarter-circle further than it should have been, the knee joint ruptured. A stick protruded a few inches from the ruined socket of his right eye. He made no sound. Just reached, and took a feeble handful of soil and grass, pulled it towards him. Reached, and held, and pulled.

“Go back to the farm,” Blegg said without looking round to the man standing disconsolately behind him. “Get a fire started.”

The man did not move at once. He stared in dumb horror at the crippled form on the ground.

“Wallace, did you get deaf as well as drunk and stupid last night?” Blegg snapped.

“No. No.”

“Then go back to the farm and get a fire started. Same place as we did the one got shot at Duddingston. I’ll bring this.”

Wallace turned and began to trudge away, sluggish. Blood still crusted his hair where his head had been cracked against the farmhouse wall. As he walked, he favoured his left side, protective of the aching bruises put there by a couple of good punches.

“When we’re done, you’ll need to start loading the wagon up,” Blegg called after him. “Everything. This place isn’t safe any more. Not after this. Ruthven’s equipment’ll be needing another home.”

Blegg bent down over Davey and pulled the stick from his eye. Fragments of skin and eyeball adhered to it. Blegg threw it casually away. He regarded the sluggishly moving figure for a moment or two, then turned to shout at Wallace’s receding back.

“Have you a knife?”

Wallace paused and looked back.

“Not on me.”

“Get one from the kitchen, then. I may have a use for a part of this thing yet.”

Blegg picked Davey up, slung him without difficulty over his shoulder and began to walk after Wallace.

“Quire,” he murmured, with a strange mixture of loathing and relish.

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