Rae

Going home empty-handed was tough, but Fletch accepted my tale of woe with resignation and wandered off to forage for wild food. Meg was more curious. She let me be for a couple of days, then came to find me at the washed-out vegetable patch.

“To be honest,” she said. “I didn’t expect you to find either of them. Ted has been out of the game a long time, and the other bloke left under a cloud.”

“What kind of cloud?”

“Nothing that would put me off having him around.”

I scowled and dug my trowel into the waterlogged earth. “That’s not an answer.”

“It’s the only one you’re getting.” Meg reached behind her and touched wood. “Imagine if he changes his mind only to find the whole camp knows his business?”

If only she knew I hadn’t given him the chance to even refuse my request. That I’d lost my temper and bolted without formally delivering it. Perhaps she’d understand. Then again, perhaps she wouldn’t.

Meg drifted away to find Fletch, leaving me to finish my chores, then retreat to my tent to brood, a favourite pastime of mine when things didn’t go my way, though what I’d been expecting, or even hoping for, I wasn’t quite sure. I pictured the scene as if Cash had been pleased to see me, listened to what I had to say, then returned to camp with me to live out the rest of our days in this quagmire shithole. Had I wanted that? It was hard to tell when all I could see was Cash’s face when he’d realised his evening caller was me. “The fuck are you doing here?” Hardly a welcome.

Logic reasoned that I’d caught him off guard, hammered him with the past when all he’d known of me up until that point was some fuck-hot sex, but logic had never been my strong point when it came to my love life. Perhaps it was for the best that our second encounter had fallen apart. Cash wasn’t even here and he was already proving a fucking distraction.

The next morning, Fletch handed out the Go-Pros. We had two—both battered and bruised—but they were essential for hunts. Not that the police took any notice of our footage. One camera was usually strapped to Meg as she coordinated the more peaceful side of our operation. The other went to Sprig, my wingman, for no other reason than he had older bones than me, and huntsman tended to whack people without cameras first.

I did a double take when Fletch handed me a camera too. “We got a new one?”

“A couple actually.” He indicated one I hadn’t noticed already attached to his torso. “Got a big donation during the week. Gave us funds to get some body armour too. You want some?”

I shook my head for the same reasons I’d always let Sprig take the camera, but I did accept the Go-Pro. I was fast and agile, and it was often me who got to the front of the hunt first. If a fox was illegally pursued, hopefully I’d catch it on film.

“Are we ready?” Fletch asked.

A round of nods passed through our grim band, and we set off for the starting point of a hunt we’d failed to disrupt enough to be cancelled.

Me and Sprig got out of the car at the midway point and split up, each of us finding a concealed spot along the likely route of the hunt. I crouched in thick undergrowth by an abandoned badger sett. The sight of it reminded me of the culling we’d fought against all summer, and the explosion of words I’d thrown at Cash came flooding back. I’d run away from him with hopelessness weighting every step, but it had faded as I’d got closer to home, rejoined my people, and made ready for today. A flash of it reignited and kicked me in the guts. The badger cull had happened regardless of our action, just like the hunt today. Fuck it. I’m going home.

But I didn’t move, because camp was home, and defeatism had no place there. A hunting horn blew in the distance, and adrenaline chased away my doubts.

Let’s have it.

***

“Left, left, left!” Sprig hollered. “They’re coming up on you!”

I tossed a glance over my shoulder as I sprinted across the field, quad bikes hot on my heels. They’d been on my tail since I’d thrown myself in the path of the hounds, distracting them from the scent they’d caught early on in the hunt, and now the hunt “protectors” were out for my blood. The only reason they hadn’t battered me already was I could jump fences and they couldn’t.

A high hedge loomed. I dropped another handful of the soiled sawdust I was using to create a false trail, then hurled myself at it, thorns lancing my skin as I cleared the top and landed in the next field.

Crouched on the ground, I took a split second to scout and listen. The quad bikes behind weren’t getting any closer, and the hunt was to the east. Hounds bayed and horns blew, but as far as I could tell, they’d yet to pick another live scent.

A rush of achievement shot through me, but was cut off by the roar of a quad bike bearing down on me from the side. A new wave of protectors had found me.

Fuck.

My escape routes were blocked. I sprang to my feet and ran at the approaching bike, calculating my chances of clearing it before it ran me down, and of reaching the next fence before it spun around and caught me again.

The odds weren’t good, but I’d made more perilous jumps. Got the scars to prove it.

I kicked up my pace and leapt, leaving the ground just as the bike swept over where my feet had been. My shoes hit metal, and then flesh as I used the rider as a step, and then I was airborne again, flying over the back of him and landing hard enough to make my ankle groan.

But there was no time to absorb the impact. I rolled and kept running, screaming towards the boundary as shouts rang out behind me. Harder and harder, I ran, faster, and for a few blissful seconds, I dared hope that I’d won—the battle, at least, not the war. But my luck had run out. A quad bike charged me from the side, wiping me out, and as my body hit the cold, wet ground, the racket of the hunt intensified.

They’d caught a scent.