The trick is not to mind about your wrist. Your legs feel fine. Covering lots of ground.
And anyway losing a hand isn’t that bad. You can replace it with something good … a hook … or a three-pronged claw like the guy in Enter the Dragon … or maybe something with blades that can be retracted, but, when you fight, out they come, ker-ching … or flames even … no way are you going to have a fake hand, that’s for sure … no way.
Your head’s dizzy. Buzzing too, though. Your body is trying to heal your wrist. You never know, you might get out of this with two hands. Still, the trick is not to mind. Either way, you’re out.
Got to stop. Douse it in the stream again, put some new peat in and get going.
Nearly at the loch.
Nearly.
Oh yes. Bloody cold.
You’re too slow. Wading is slow but it’s good to keep your arm in the water.
Just keep going.
Keep going.
It’s a bloody big loch. But that’s OK. The bigger the better. Means your hand will be in water longer.
Feeling sick … ughhh …
Shit, that hand looks a mess. But the acid has stopped coming out of the wristband. You’re going to get out. You’ve beaten her. You can find Mercury. You will get three gifts.
But you’ve got to keep going.
You’ll be at the end of the loch in a minute.
Doing well. Doing well.
Not far now.
Soon be able to see over into the valley, and –
ironing
‘You nearly lost your hand.’
It’s lying on the kitchen table still attached to your arm by bone, muscle and sinew that are visible in the open raw groove round your wrist. The skin that used to be there has formed lava-like rivulets, running down to your fingers as if it has melted and set again. Your whole hand is puffing up nicely and hurts like … well, like an acid burn. Your fingers twitch but your thumb is not working.
‘It might heal so that you can use your fingers again. Or it might not.’
She took the band off your wrist at the loch and sprayed the wound with a lotion that dulled the pain.
She was prepared. She’s always prepared.
And how did she get there so quick? Did she run? Fly on a bloody broomstick?
However she got to the loch you still had to walk back with her. That was a tough walk.
‘Why don’t you speak to me?’
She’s right in your face.
‘I’m here to teach you, Nathan. But you must stop trying to escape.’
She’s so ugly that you’ve got to turn away.
There’s an ironing board set up on the other side of the kitchen table.
She was ironing? Ironing her combat trousers?
‘Nathan. Look at me.’
You keep your eyes on the iron.
‘I want to help you, Nathan.’
You hawk up a huge gob, turn and spit. She’s quick, though, and snatches back so it lands on her shirt not on her face.
She doesn’t hit you. Which is new.
‘You need to eat. I’ll heat up some stew.’
That’s new too. Usually you have to cook and clean and sweep.
But you’ve never had to iron.
She goes to the pantry. There’s no fridge. No electricity. There’s a wood-burning range. Setting the fire up and cleaning it out are also your chores.
While she’s in the pantry you go to look at the iron. Your legs are weak, unsteady, but your head’s clear. Clear enough. A sip of water might help but you want to look at the iron. It’s just a piece of metal, iron-shaped, with a metal handle, old. It’s heavy and cold. It must be heated up on the range to do its job. Must take ages. She’s miles from anywhere and anything, and she irons her trousers and shirts!
When she comes back a few seconds later you’re round by the pantry door and you bring the iron down hard, pointed side against her head.
But she’s so bloody tall and so bloody fast. The iron catches the side of her scalp and sinks into her shoulder.
You’re on the floor clutching your ears, looking at her boots before you pass out.
the trick doesn’t work
She’s talking but you can’t make sense of it.
You’re back sitting at the kitchen table, sweating and shuddering a bit, and blood from your left ear is running down your neck. That ear won’t heal. You can’t hear at all on that side. And your nose is a mess. You must have landed on it when you fell. It’s broken, blocked up and bloodied, and it won’t heal either.
Your hand is resting on the table and it’s so swollen now that the fingers can’t move at all.
She’s sitting on the chair next to you and is spraying your wrist with the lotion again. It’s cooling. Numbing.
And it would be so good to be numb like that all over, numb to it all. But that won’t happen. What will happen is that she’ll lock you back up in the cage, chain you up, and it’ll go on and on and on …