Free The Grey King by Susan Cooper Page A

and that freakish white hound of the freak boy Davies! I will show you! Six sheep in my field, there are six of them, with their throats ripped out, dammo, their heads half off—all for black joy, and that is what those bloody dogs had of it and that is what I shall shoot them for! Bring me them here! Bring them! And I will prove it to you!”
    The boys stood frozen, gazing at him in horror; he was not for that moment a human being, but a frenzied creature possessed by rage, turned into an animal. All that could be seen in him was the urge to hurt, and it was, as it always will be, the most dreadful sight in the world.
    Looking at Prichard with the eye of a human and the vision of an Old One, Will was filled with an overpowering compassion: an awareness of what must inevitably overtake Caradog Prichard if he were not checked, now, for always, in this passion before it was too late. Stop, he longed to call to him: stop, before the Grey King sees you and puts out his hand in friendship, and you, unwitting, take it and are destroyed. . . .
    Before he thought what he was doing he stepped forward, and the movement brought the red-haired man swinging towards him. The finger wheeled viciously round, jabbing at him through the air.
    â€œYou there too, Sais bach, you are part of it, you and your uncle’s farm. They are Clwyd dogs, these murdering brutes, it is on all your heads, and I will have my due from all of you, from all of you—”
    Spittle foamed at the corners of his mouth. There was no speaking to him. Will fell back, and with the fury of Prichard’s shouting even the firefighters paused in amazement. There was no sound but the thump of the fire engine’s pumping and the crackle of the approaching flames, and no movement for an instant anywhere. Then David Evans pushed forward, a small brisk form with a fire broom in his hand and smudges of soot on his face and shirt, and he took Prichard fearlessly by the shoulder and shook him, hard.
    â€œThe fire will be on us in minutes, Caradog Prichard—do you want your farm to burn? All of us here working our hands raw to keep the flames from your roof, and your wife inside there doing the same, and you stand here shouting your silly head off and think of nothing but a few dead sheep! A lot more dead sheep you will have, man, and a dead farm too, if you do not pull yourself together now. Now!”
    Prichard gazed blankly at him, the small bright eyes squinting suspiciously in the pudgy face, and then he seemed gradually to wake up, and to realise where he was and what was happening. Dazed, he stared at the flames leaping closer beyond the hedge. The pump of the fire engine rose to a higher pitch, as the workers swung their hoses round to meet the advancing fire; sparks flew in all directions as the beaters thwacked frantically at the bracken. Caradog Prichard gave one short squeal of terror, turned, and rushed back towards his farmhouse.
    Without a word Will and Bran rejoined the line of beaters, edging diagonally up the hillside in an effort to keep the fire from sweeping over and beyond the Craig. The sky was growing darker as the clouds thickened and the evening drew on, but there was no hint of rain. Again the wind gusted, dropped to nothing, rose in a sudden new gust; there was no telling what it would do next. More and more strongly Will could feel the enmity of the Grey King thrusting at himfrom the high peaks at the head of the valley; it made a wall as fierce as the wall of flames roaring towards them from the other direction, though the only one who could feel the force of both, the only one caught between the two, was the Old One, Will Stanton, bound by birth to follow this quest wherever it might lead. . . . He was swept up suddenly in a wild exhilaration, bringing energy from nowhere to harden his drooping arms and legs. Yelling with sudden glee, grinning madly at Bran, he whacked at the flames licking the bracken at his