Free Twelve by Jasper Kent

horse there was little chance that I could catch up and interfere with them. It was still difficult, however, to fathom why it was they wanted rid of me. Certainly from what I had seen they were immensely capable in close-quarter combat, but I was hardly so useless as to be a hindrance to them. There was something about them that they wanted to keep from us. Some secret way of fighting that was so effective that they had to keep it to themselves. And, as far as I could guess, Dmitry knew what it was.
    Even so, there was little to be gained by standing there worrying about it. I had a long journey back east ahead of me, alone and on foot.
     
    The first issue I had to deal with was that our next appointed meeting place (decided on the presumption that the French would still be advancing, which they were) was in Goryachkino, to the north of the main Smolensk to Moscow road – the very road along which Bonaparte and his army were now advancing and which I was currently south of. I had two options. Either I could head east as rapidly as possible and then cut across the road ahead of the French or I could go across the road west of Gzatsk, behind the French, hoping to evade their rearguard, and set off east from there.
    Taking a route that would lead me well behind French lines didn't seem the best option for rejoining my compatriots, so I went for the more direct route, heading east, to the south of the Moscow road. This proved to be the right choice. Bonaparte rested his army in Gzatsk for three days and so I was in fact overcautious, keeping well away from the road which was, as yet, not in French hands, and thus delaying my progress.
    The first day of my journey was uneventful. Sleeping rough was not too uncomfortable in the still-warm weather of late August. I arose early and carried on eastwards once again, making as good ground as could be expected over the rough, wooded terrain and covering about 25 versts each day.
    It was just after sunset on the second day, when I heard a sound way over to my right, that I first began to suspect I was being followed. A single incongruous noise in the forest is not enough to announce the presence of a pursuer – there are natural sounds all around – but I had already heard other noises from that direction. How long ago I had heard the first of them I could not recall, but the fact that they came consistently from the same direction relative to me, even though I was on the move, told me that whoever or whatever was out there was deliberately keeping pace with me. Though the sun had already set, it still cast enough light to see by. The moon had not yet risen, and even when it did, it would be a new moon. Throughout the night there would be total darkness. I made camp and used the remaining twilight to gather some wood for a fire, not for warmth, but to give some light – and with it, some hope – in case my pursuer decided to strike.
    I sat beside the fire, gazing into the flames and listening intently to the forest around me. The Russian woodlands are full of noise, although those of the night are very different from those of the day. The continuous background of birdsong, which becomes so familiar during the day that it is forgotten, had begun to quieten, with only owls remaining awake. Nocturnal animals began to move around, but they were mostly small creatures. The sound of a human skirting around my campsite, just beyond the light of the fire, watching, waiting, scheming, was unmistakable against these familiar background noises of the night.
    He (I presumed it was a he, although my hearing is not quite up to making such distinctions) settled down some way ahead of me, directly on the path that I would be taking the following morning, and did not move for around half an hour. Tactically, now was the time to act, but I needed no tactics to know it. Human instinct – human fear – told me that I did not want to be found curled up on the ground, exposed and asleep and at the