Man Eater

Hacking, choking, Claudia twisted her foot and found a toehold between the posts. Not much, just enough to give her purchase so she could jerk free of the sack. She heard a thud as he vaulted the fence, and too late she was back in a headlock. Claudia heard him (her?) grunt with the effort. Man or woman, it needed precious little brute force, a crime like this, based on the mechanics of haulage. Her ankle wrenched under the strain and she tasted blood where she bit through her lip with the pain. At her back, the sack was twisted round and round, tighter and tighter for leverage. Dear Juno, if there is any mercy in your breast, give him heart failure. Right here on the spot.

Utterly helpless, she was wrenched from the palisade. Tears rolled down her cheeks. Don’t let me die, she prayed. Don’t let me die in a grainsack. Not a grainsack. Not gagged and trussed and Wait a minute. Claudia gulped at the hope that dangled in front of her. He could have suffocated or strangled her at any point and he hadn’t. Why not?

Because her death must appear accidental, that’s why not. Dark night. Storm. Terrified beasts who might rampage any second. Poor Claudia. Took fright and ran. Didn’t know where she was going. Until it was too late.

Very soon, then, he would have to remove the evidence. But how? Pulling off the sack would free her to fight back, unless… of course! She’d have to be unconscious.

Bugger that for a game of knucklebones.

As the attacker fought to heave his struggling bundle over the peak of the earthworks, she let out a short moan and fell limp. Heaven knows there were enough rocks about, any one could have knocked her cold. But would he fall for it?

Minutes passed and nothing happened. Was this a test? Would a boot ram into her ribs any second and expose her trickery? Or was he taking advantage of the lull to get his wind back?

The tension was as terrifying as the struggle. Then he grabbed the top of the sack and yanked, and she prayed that in tipping a dead weight out in the dark, he wouldn’t be concentrating on where her hand went.

It closed over a rock.

Seizing hold of her ankles, he began to lug her over the brow. Above the storm and the growls and the trumpeting, she could hear him wheezing with the effort.

Sinister splashes came from the water below and she felt her heart lurch. Timing was crucial…

When he leaned forward to push his unconscious victim down the bank, Claudia lashed out. There was a sickening squelch as stone drove into flesh, and his mouth formed a wide O as the cry was drowned by a clap of thunder. Stunned only momentarily, his face twisted in fury and he swung towards her. With reflexes dulled by the fight, she just had time to brace herself as strong hands closed round her throat. The night, low and heavy, obscured her attacker’s face. Who are you? Why are you doing this? Thumbs pressed into her neck, deeper and deeper…then suddenly one hand released her and they both stumbled.

Blinded by the blood in his eyes, her assailant had lost his balance. As he looked round for a foothold, the rock she still clutched in her fist caught him on the nose, and this time she made no mistake in the force she should use. His nose exploded under the impact, his hands flew up to protect himself and, in that split second, he realized he had lost. A second cry rent the air as he stumbled backwards, his feet scrabbling furiously on the bank, his hands clawing gouges in the mud as the momentum carried him down the bank towards the snapping jaws of hell.

Then, in a flash of silver lightning, Claudia saw for the first time the face of the person who was trying to kill her.

XIV

‘Janus!’

For a split second the shock was so great that she couldn’t breathe, let alone move, and when she did recover, it came as a bigger shock still to find her instinct was to pull, rather than push.

Using one of the larger rocks as leverage, Claudia flung herself flat and stretched out her arm. ‘Take it!’ she yelled. ‘Take my hand!’

The face below was white with terror, panic barely a short gasp away.

You could see the dilemma. The loose earth had slipped far enough, and like a burr on a blanket, her attacker was stuck on the side of the embankment. To move would court disaster.

The words ‘Fetch help’ were mouthed to her, but it was too late. The rains had already begun.

‘No time,’ she yelled back, as the look of bewilderment on her assailant’s face deepened. ‘Take my hand!’

They started with just a few large drops, yet within seconds a cataract was falling from the sky, beating the parched earth like a drum, the overflow gushing down gulleys.

‘Quick!’

There was no time to dither. Any second now and the packed earthworks would turn to slippery mud. In the waters below, stippled with raindrops, larger shapes twisted and dived.

Claudia strained forward, her hair plastered flat to her face. ‘It’s your only chance!’