Bad-mad-mad, mad-bad-bad. His feet pounded the earth as Hans slogged up the Charcoal Burners Road. Far ahead the lantern bobbed in the dark like a glow worm in the cold pale fogs oozing up out of the Schwarzwald.
His ears rang with Mother’s dreadful scream. It had ended sharply, like a twig snapped off. That had been the very moment of her death. His eyes clouded up with tears.
How had it happened? Only yesterday everything had been the way it always was. And now the world had turned upside-down. His family was dead, weird things roamed the night, trees sprang up and tore houses down.
He lowered his head and slogged on. He was to blame for it all – he knew it.
If he could only wake up again and find everything back as it had been!
He stared far ahead at the bobbing lantern-light. That boy with yellow socks knew all about this. He was part of it. Hans squeezed his fingers into fists.
‘I’ll get him,’ he thought. ‘I’ll pay him back.’
But as fast as Hans could go, Yellow Socks ran faster. Soon Hans was panting, but the lantern-glow went on dwindling.
‘How far does he mean to go? Will he run all the way to Mutterbad?’
Even as this thought formed in his mind, Hans saw the lantern bob away off the Road among the fields to the right.
Hans slowed. He wondered if he should leave the Road where the strange boy had, or cut off into the fields here? Here, he thought, and stepped onto the field. The hay stubble was sharp here. It bit and scratched his feet. Hans loped up the slope, closer to the black wall the Schwarzwald made against the stars like a cliff rising up above the rolling carpet of fog.
The Night had grown colder. Dawn was maybe an hour or two away. Now began the Wolf’s Hour, the bittermost hour when Granny said the wicken-things loved to carry off children in their sleep.
Up ahead a glow loomed over the ridge line. The bobbing lantern made for it. Hans crept up the slope until he saw what cast the light.
Before him, high across the Dimmerthal’s western flank, the fields flattened like a shelf to meet the Schwarzwald. Open fires shone in the ground fog. About the fires things that looked like men crouched and tended to their carts. Hans had seen such men before. They were the coarse dirty soldiers he had seen marching below his window. There were maybe three score of them in small groups at the fires.
At the center of the fires stood a great tent. Some of the men went in and out of the tent. It was too far away in the fog to see just what they did.
Where had Yellow Socks gone? Hans had lost the lantern-glow among the campfire lights. He crept around the ring of fires, keeping low and out of sight. Still he couldn’t see the other boy.
‘Drat and curse it!’ he swore. Yellow Socks had gone.
Just then out of the corner of his eye Hans glimpsed a small lantern-light pass within the great tent. It was gone before he knew it.
Was it the one he wanted?
‘There’s no way to know but one,’ he said at last. ‘I’ve got to go inside the camp.’
He crept closer to the ring of fires. Most of them burned bright and high and close together, but some had burned low, and those left dark patches in between. Hans found the darkest patch and crept up to it. He tried to walk boldly as though he belonged there. But he held his breath when he passed between the fires.
A call came behind him. Was it meant for him? He didn’t look round. He walked on. The fires burned all about him now. A second call came, but it was followed by laughter. Hans let out his breath.
He was inside the Charcoal Burners’ camp.
Keeping his head low, he stole a glance about him. The cruel soldiers stood in small groups by their fires. They drank from flasks, wiped their chins on their coat-sleeves, snorted and laughed. Some lay on the ground in their coats, snoring and belching.
The great tent loomed before him. Through the opening soldiers came and went. Hans could catch a glimpse of torches, gold things, and sharp steel weapons. He walked around to the back of the tent. Nobody was about. Hans tucked himself inside a fold of the tent where ropes slung down to stakes hammered into the earth. He pressed his ear against the tent-wall and listened.
From inside he could hear voices. He couldn’t make out the words. Yellow Socks might not even be in there. He might be asleep on the ground somewhere in the camp, or standing with the soldiers at one of the fires. He might have passed the camp entirely and gone up into the black trees or back down to the Road again.
Hans yawned. He was suddenly bone-sleepy. His bare feet were like two sore ice-stumps and his legs ached with weariness. But if he fell asleep here he’d be done for. He had to do something.
He felt where the tent clung to the ground. The canvas was heavy but loose enough. Hans lay on the ground and wormed under the smothering canvas until he poked his head out inside the tent.
Before his nose lay a thick carpet, smelling of soot. Everything smelled of soot there. Carpets covered the ground everywhere he looked about the tent. Here and there iron stands burned charcoal, filling the tent with a drowsy, smoky warmth. A few paces from Hans, a great chair stood on boxes. Within the chair’s arms slouched a squat and ugly man. Because the chair faced away from Hans, he could see only the back of the ugly man’s head, half bald, blackened with soot and red with sores and warts.
‘I won’t have it,’ said the ugly man. He whined and threw his arms up over his head. ‘I simply won’t have you meddling in my affairs. This part’s mine, and that’s all there is to it. Go play with your toys in the White Lady’s hall, and leave the war to us that are true folk from within the Cinder Reek.’
Something stirred beyond the great chair. Peering through the ugly man’s legs, Hans saw a pair of polished shoes with silver buckles and ankles clad in bright yellow socks. One shoe rose and stamped the carpet.
‘Ah! So you won’t obey orders?’ said the strange boy’s voice.
