Free Sacrament by Clive Barker Page B

the cold but the warmth of
Steep's voice. 'A boy like you, out here alone, could come to some harm or other.'
    'He's lost,' Mrs. McGee chimed in.
    'On a night like this, we're all a little lost,' Mr. Steep said. 'There's no blame there.'
    'Maybe he should come home with us,' Rosa suggested. 'You could light one of your fires for him.'
    'Hush yourself,' Jacob snapped. 'I will not have talk of fires when this boy is so bitter cold. Where are your
wits?'
    'As you like,' the woman replied. 'It's no matter to me either way. But you should have seen him take the hare.
He was on it like a tiger, he was.'
    'I was lucky,' Will said, 'that's all.'
    Mr. Steep drew a deep breath, and to Will's great delight descended the slope a yard or two more. 'Can you get
up?' he asked Will.
    'Of course I can,' Will replied, and did so.
    Though Mr. Steep had halved the distance between them, the darkness had deepened a little further, and his
features were just as hard to fathom. 'I wonder, looking at you, if we weren't meant to meet on this hill,' he said
softly. 'I wonder if that's the luck of this night, for us all.' Will was still trying hard to get a better sense of what
Steep looked like; to put a face to the voice that moved him so deeply, but his eyes weren't equal to the
challenge. 'The hare, Mrs. McGee.'
    'What about it?'
    'We should set it free.'
    'After the chase it led me?' Rosa replied. 'You're out of your mind.'
    'We owe it that much, for leading us to Will.'
    'I'll thank it as I skin it, Jacob, and that's my final word on the thing. My God, you're impractical. Throwing
away good food. I'll not have it.' Before Steep could protest further she snatched up the sack, and was away
down the slope.
    Only now, watching her descend, did Will realize that the worst of the storm had blown over. The rainfall had
mellowed to a drizzle, the murk was melting away; he could even see lights glimmering in the valley. He was
relieved, certainly, but not as much as he thought he'd be. There was comfort in the prospect of returning home,
but that meant leaving the company of the dark man at his back, who even now lay a heavy, leather-gloved hand
upon his shoulder.
    'Can you see your house from here?' he asked Will.
    'No ... not yet.'
    'But it will come clear, by and by.'
    'Yes,' Will said, only now getting a sense of how the land lay. He had managed somehow to come halfway
around the valley during his blind trek, and was looking down on the village from a wholly unexpected angle.
There was a track not more than thirty yards down the ridge from where he stood; it would lead him, he
suspected, back to the route he'd followed to get to the Courthouse. A left at that intersection would bring him
back into Burnt Yarley, and then it was just a weary trudge home. 'You should go, my boy,' Jacob said.
'Doubtless a fellow as fine as you has loving guardians.' The gloved hand squeezed his shoulder. 'I envy you
that, having no parents that I can remember.'
    'I'm ... sorry,' Will said, hesitating because he was by no means sure a man as fine as Jacob Steep was ever in
need of sympathy. He received it, however, in good part.
    'Thank you, Will. It's important that a man be compassionate. It's a quality that our sex so often neglects, I
think.' Will heard the soft cadence of Steep's breathing, and tried to fall in rhythm with it. 'You should go,' Jacob
said. 'Your parents will be concerned for you.'
    'No they won't,' Will replied.
    'Surely-'
    'They won't. They don't care.'
    'I can't believe that.'
    'It's true.'
    'Then you must be a loving son in spite of them,' Steep said. 'Be grateful that you have their faces in your mind's
eye. And their voices to answer when you call. Better that than emptiness, believe me. Better than silence.'
    He lifted his hand from Will's shoulder, and instead touched the middle of his back, gently pushing him away.
'Go on,' he said softly. 'You'll be dead of cold if you don't go soon. Then how would we get to meet