The Hunted Read online

  He waved to her to come with him and went over to a tall tree growing high above the other trees and bushes that surrounded the farm. He showed her some wooden boards that had been nailed to the trunk, making a sort of ladder, and she saw that there was a platform up in the branches, like a tree house. He started to climb and she went up after him, trying not to slip on the steps that were wet and slippery from the rain. It was drier at the top as there was a canvas sheet tied to the branches above the platform to make a roof.

  Ella noticed that there were other platforms in the trees, half hidden among the branches and leaves, with ropes joining them. Scarface sat on the edge of the platform and Ella joined him, dangling her legs over the edge, trying not to look straight down. The platform was much higher than it had looked from the ground and you could see for miles. The area they were in was mostly fields and woods, but not far away were other buildings, and here and there she could see the grey streak of a road.

  She felt safe up there in the treetops and began to sing. ‘Ella and Face-Ache sitting in a tree, K-I-S-S-I-N-G.’ She stopped and turned to Scarface, who was staring at her with his one good eye.

  ‘No offence,’ she went on, ‘but that’s you … Face-Ache … Because you’ve got that face on you. I bet it hurts. And, I don’t mean to be rude, but … you’re very ugly. And we’re not kissing. That’s just the words of the song. And I’m sorry if you don’t like the song, but really you’re just an ugly old sicko, so why should I bother what you think? I expect you can’t understand anything I’m saying. You’re just like the other grown-ups. Dumb. Dumb old Dumbo Face-Ache.’

  Scarface turned away.

  Ella could see the mother’s body in the middle of the field and realized that what she had thought were white sticks were actually bones. Scarface must have dragged lots of dead bodies there and left them to rot away. She had to admit he did seem to be a good hunter. She could see the crows landing around the body, pecking at it.

  And then, in the woods on the far side of the field, she saw something else moving. Moments later it came charging out into the field, then another, then more and more. She could see now that they were dogs. Of all shapes and sizes. There must have been at least thirty of them, too many for Ella to count. They raced to the boneyard, snapping and yelping at each other, and sending the crows swirling up into the sky in a noisy, messy spiral.

  The dogs fell on the mother’s body, and Ella and Scarface sat up there in the tree, side by side, their feet dangling over the edge, watching the dogs, and the great black crows darting down to pick up scraps. And Ella couldn’t tell if this was a good thing or a bad thing.

  The next thing she saw was definitely a bad thing.

  6

  There was a grown-up standing in the next field. A live one. It looked like a mother, but it was hard to tell from this far away. It was very still, like a scarecrow, its arms straight out. Ella nudged Scarface and pointed. He squinted at it, then slipped the pack off his back and dug around inside it until he found a pair of binoculars. Ella had stopped being surprised at the way he didn’t behave like other grown-ups. She’d accepted him for what he was. Weird. He put the binoculars to his eyes and adjusted the focus, gently turning the wheel with his knobbly, bent fingers. He made a deep humming sound in his throat, almost like an animal growling. Like a dog.

  The dogs had seen the scarecrow as well now and were acting all confused, whimpering, their ears going flat, hair up on their backs, crouching low to the ground and dropping their tummies. They started to move away from the mother they’d been eating, going in a pack towards the live grown-up. As they got closer, they seemed even more scared, holding back, running in yippy circles. Every now and then one would get braver than his friends, dart forward, daring himself to go up closer. He’d sniff the scarecrow, nip at its legs, then run back with his tail between his legs. Then another would try. Like little kids daring each other. In the end they all got near enough and started to circle the scarecrow, yelping, howling, running in and snapping at it, but never getting right up close. Eventually they ran off together in a pack, barking their heads off, back into the woods.

  Scarface started down the ladder, Ella followed, and soon they were pushing through the long grass towards the scarecrow. When they got there, it was like they were copying the dogs. Neither she nor Scarface wanted to go any nearer. Scarface was holding both of his knives in his hands, the blades pointing down towards the ground.

  Ella looked and saw that it was a father with long, stringy hair and man boobs. The skin had rotted away from the bottom half of his face, showing the bones and the teeth of his lower jaw. There were so many boils and swellings on the top half of his face they’d blocked his eyes up. He must be blind. Maybe that was why he was standing like that.

  He didn’t look very dangerous to Ella, just ugly and horrible and old. Smelly. But what did she know?

  ‘Go on then, Face-Ache,’ she said. ‘What are you waiting for?’

  At last Scarface moved in closer. Went right up to the father and sniffed him, circling him just as the dogs had done. Finally he looked at Ella and mimed covering his eyes. Ella got the message and turned round. Behind her she heard a slicing sound, slish …

  When she turned back, the father was gone, fallen over and hidden in the long grass, and Scarface was kneeling down doing something to him.

  Afterwards Scarface showed Ella a sort of trail where the grass had been flattened by something walking along, probably the scarecrow. They followed it until they came to an area where the grass was trampled all over the place, with paths coming off it in every direction it seemed.

  Scarface picked one trail and set off, moving fast along the edge of the woods. Ella couldn’t always see what Scarface was following and he sometimes stopped and went back and took a different path. He was sniffing like a dog, always listening hard, peering around with his one good eye.

  They kept going like that for what felt like ages and soon Ella was tired and bored and fed up. She started grumbling at Scarface, but he just ignored her. He was a dog with a scent and nothing was going to stop him.

  Ella stared at the Nike bag on Scarface’s back. Something was dripping from it. She looked closer and saw little grey things wriggling, like tiny slugs or worms. She was going to say something, that Scarface had maggots in his bag, but didn’t. It was his problem. If he wasn’t going to speak to her she really didn’t need to speak to him. Grumpy old grown-up.

  After a time – maybe an hour Ella thought, but she couldn’t be sure, her aching legs thought they’d walked a hundred miles – they came to a big broken-down wire fence. A tree had fallen on it and squashed it half to the ground. Scarface inspected the wire where it was torn and snaggly. He found a scrap of clothing stuck on it. He sniffed it, nodded to himself and climbed over the flattened bit of fence, holding on to the tree trunk for balance. Ella followed, picking her way and trying not to fall over. There were more trees on the other side, and then a wooden fence that was broken in a couple of places. When they went through it, Ella found that they were in some sort of park with paths winding among jungly trees and bushes. There were benches and bins, odd-shaped things she didn’t quite understand, funny-looking statues, giant toadstools …

  Then she stopped suddenly and tugged at Scarface’s jacket, pointing up. There was a man in a tree. She instantly saw that it wasn’t a real man, it was a plastic model, and she felt embarrassed. Thought Scarface would laugh at her, tease her, silly little girl, but then she remembered that he never laughed. Grumpy old man. Ugly, grumpy old man. Face-Ache.

  The man in the tree looked old-fashioned, from the time of knights, and he was carrying a horn. And then Ella saw a tree with the words the Enchanted Forest written on it. The more she looked around, the madder this place was. There was a castle just showing above the bushes. Up ahead a walkway through the trees with a sign saying The Rat Trap, and a shield with a wolf’s head on it. Memories were coming back to her. She’d been here before, she w
as sure of it, but she was confused; she hadn’t been expecting any of this and everything was all overgrown and broken.

  Scarface set off towards the castle, and when they got there Ella saw that it seemed to be made of giant plastic bricks.

  She finally realized where they were.

  ‘This is Legoland!’

  7

  ‘Why have you brought me to Legoland, Face-Ache?’ Ella squealed. ‘Are we having a treat?’ And she laughed at her joke. Scarface didn’t laugh. He just tilted his head to one side and stared at her through his good eye.

  Ella had come here with her family, with Mum and Dad and Sam. A long time ago it seemed, but she remembered some of the rides, how scared she’d been, how she couldn’t go on them because she was too small and had cried, even though she was secretly glad, because she was really too frightened.

  Frightened? Of a silly Lego ride?

  That was a different world.

  The past was Legoland. The future was Zombieland.

  ‘There’s the shop!’ she shouted, and before Scarface could stop her she ran off towards a sign saying Turret Shop. The doors to the shop were open and inside everything was as it’d been left, the shelves piled high with Lego toys. Dust and dirt and dead leaves and rubbish had blown in through the doors, birds had been in there and made a mess, but Ella didn’t mind. She ran down the aisles, looking at the brightly coloured boxes. She picked out a castle set, with a king and a queen and a princess and some knights, and held it out to Scarface.

  Scarface sniffed, and then took the box from Ella and squashed it into the top of his backpack, with the end sticking out. She thought he might be cross with her, having to carry toys like this. Her mum and dad had never let her buy anything in any of the shops when they’d come here. ‘It’s a rip-off, darling. Too expensive.’ Well, now everything was free.

  ‘Can I get something else?’ she asked. Scarface looked at her. He might be really angry now. But he didn’t lose his temper; instead he went over to a rack and picked up a full-size Lego knight’s shield, with the same wolf’s head on it as she’d seen outside.

  He sort of smiled. At least that’s what Ella thought he was trying to do as his face twisted and wrinkled. She held the shield in one hand and her club in the other. The shield was just made of rubber, wouldn’t really protect her, and the club … Well, she was never going to use it, was she? But it made her feel good, like a real warrior. She grimaced and roared at Scarface.

  He made a weird gurgling sound.

  Maybe he could laugh after all.

  She was about to give another roar when Scarface put his finger to his lips and went very still. In a blink she was out of Legoland and back into Zombieland. Forget theme-park rides: this was what it was like to be frightened. When you didn’t know what was going on. When you didn’t know where the enemy was. When you knew that there were things out there. Monsters. Real monsters, who wanted to kill you. Who would eat you if they could. Cannibals. Flesh-eating sickos.

  Scarface made a movement with his hands that Ella understood – Go carefully, keep quiet, stay behind me – and walked out of the shop.

  Not that she needed to be told to be careful.

  Scarface crept on, hunched over, his spear held out in front of him. She stayed in his shadow, making herself small.

  They made their way through the theme park, Scarface listening, listening, listening, although Ella could hear nothing. None of the paths here were straight; they wound through the trees and past the attractions, so that it was very hard to know what might be up ahead.

  At last they rounded a corner and there ahead of them was Miniland, a sort of shrunk-down version of the world with all the famous places made out of Lego bricks, with buildings and roads and mountains and cars and people and rivers and boats … and sickos.

  Three grown-ups were walking through it, looking lost. She heard Scarface sigh. Was this what they’d been tracking all this time? These three? Was it really worth coming all this way?

  But, to be fair, she was glad there weren’t more of them.

  They were going the other way and hadn’t seen Scarface and Ella. Scarface crept closer. Ready for the kill. Ella had seen dogs behave like this. All stiff and concentrating. There was going to be blood. Ella could see the colourful box of the Lego set sticking out of Scarface’s bag. It was always the same. Good things then bad things, good things then bad things.

  Scarface got closer and closer, and still they hadn’t seen him.

  The grown-ups were crossing London now; they’d passed the weird skyscraper called the Gherkin and were going past the Tower of London towards St Paul’s Cathedral. They looked like giants, or monsters from an alien invasion film, trampling the city. One of them, a big father wearing a long, dirty coat, brushed against Nelson’s Column as they crossed Trafalgar Square. When they got to Buckingham Palace, Scarface suddenly ran in and attacked, stabbing one in the back.

  Ella looked away.

  She didn’t want to see any more blood, any more killing, even though it had to be done. Every last grown-up had to die.

  She heard the sounds of the fight – grunting, hissing, thudding – and when she looked back one of the grown-ups was lying half in the River Thames, turning it red, and another was lying across the Houses of Parliament. The third, a mother, had made it to the pathway and was lying there, her arms and legs sort of wriggling. Scarface was squatting over her, cutting her with one of his knives. He spotted Ella watching him and scowled at her so that she looked away again.

  If only it would be that easy to kill all the grown-ups in London. If only the three giants were all they ever had to deal with and Scarface was Jack the Giant Killer.

  But Ella knew this wasn’t the end. Not by a long way. This was just Legoland.

  8

  The next few days were the same. Wake with the sun. Feed the chickens and clean out their run. Check the traps. Follow trails. Track down grown-ups.

  Kill them.

  The grown-ups mostly went about in ones and twos. Sometimes there were more, sometimes there was only one of them, and every time Scarface was able to sneak up on them and kill them without being seen, without getting hurt. Most of them were asleep, hiding inside buildings, and Ella would wait outside while Scarface went in and did what he had to do. She would sit there, nervous, hoping there were no others nearby. She would try not to listen to the sounds of Scarface clearing out the nest, the sound of fighting, things crashing and breaking. Then Scarface would come out all covered in blood.

  But sometimes the grown-ups were wandering lost and confused in the daylight. And every morning there were more out in the fields, standing like the first scarecrow. Arms stretched out. Once Ella saw a crow sitting on the head of a father, pecking into his earhole, and he didn’t move at all.

  Occasionally they found more scarecrows on their travels, and always Scarface would cut them down. They were the easiest ones.

  Ella got to know the area around the farm very well on her travels. There was a big park nearby with trees laid out in long, straight lines. And lots of lakes – there seemed to be lakes everywhere. Sometimes in the distance she saw what looked like a city, with a real castle watching over it, but Scarface never went near it. He seemed to want to avoid towns and houses, unless he had to go in to find hiding grown-ups.

  Ella thought they weren’t really in the countryside at all, not the faraway countryside. There were roads everywhere, criss-crossing the fields and woods, with grass and weeds beginning to poke through the tarmac.

  She spent the whole time feeling tired, but she was growing stronger every day, and was able to walk further without her legs feeling like they were going to crumble. At least Scarface had good food. The best she’d eaten since she’d moved out of Waitrose all those weeks ago. There were eggs every day, sometimes a chicken. Sometimes animals Scarface had trapped. Rabbits and ducks and pigeons. Sometimes fish. Scarface had nets and traps all over the place in the lakes and rivers. He also had store
s in another barn. There were big sacks of flour, and dried beans, a pile of potatoes, and onions hanging up.

  When they were out, he picked lots of wild leaves and what looked like weeds. They tasted bitter, but Ella chewed them and swallowed them down because she knew they were good for her. Scarface even made a sort of flat, hard bread.

  Ella was beginning to wonder if this was how her life was going to be from now on. Just him and her, not ever seeing another child again. Never having a proper conversation again. It wasn’t too bad. She felt safe with old Face-Ache. He knew how to look after himself and how to look after her. But she did feel lonely and bored a lot of the time. She cheered herself up by reading some of the books on his shelves. She never saw him read; instead he would sit by himself for hours and hours, just staring at nothing.

  And then one day they saw some other children.

  Ella and Scarface were returning from a hunt and it had been a big waste of time. They hadn’t seen any grown-ups, not even a scarecrow, and in the end Scarface had given up. They were a long way from the farm and it was starting to grow dark, so they’d turned and headed for home. Ella was looking forward to getting back: they always had something warm to eat, usually soup of some sort. Scarface was always cooking up chicken bones and stuff. Ella was picturing the two of them sitting by the fire as the smoke went up through the hole in the roof, getting nice and warm and cosy. Like how her mum had used to make her a mug of hot chocolate when she came home from school in the winter.

  These thoughts had kept her going, and they were nearly at the edge of the woods when Scarface froze, as suddenly as if someone had paused a DVD. One moment he was walking along and the next he was still as a statue, in a sort of half-walking position. He stayed there like that, one hand on Ella’s chest to stop her moving. Then, without any warning, he quickly pulled her to the ground. They lay there, peering out from behind some dead, scratchy brown bracken.