Free Vengeance Child by Simon Clark Page B

grass in front of him. His father always cast a huge shadow. Now it engulfed the child as the man got closer.
    â€˜Archer. Don’t run away from me.’
    A hand clamped down on his shoulder. It stopped him from moving. He found himself being turned round to look into the face from the grave.
    â€˜Archer . . .’
    The boy’s knees gave way. Everything had gone faint.
    â€˜Archer, what’s wrong?’
    He looked up into the man’s face.
    â€˜Victor?’
    Then the world went away.

Ten
    Victor had been surprised by his effect on Archer. The child’s entire body had seized up tight. Then he’d slowly walked away through the trees. Victor would have needed all the sensitivity of a concrete block to miss the fact that something had gone badly wrong with him. He’d gone after the boy, calling his name. When he touched one of Archer’s narrow shoulders the boy had dropped down in a faint. As Victor picked up the boy, marvelling at how light he was, he noticed the dead stare of the eyes. Immediately, he returned to his sister’s farm at a run. At that moment he believed the boy would die in his arms. Yet the jog of being carried revived him.
    â€˜Put me down,’ Archer insisted.
    â€˜Don’t worry. I’ll get you indoors, then we can get someone to look at you.’
    â€˜Put me down.’ The voice rose. ‘Let me walk.’
    Victor gently set him down. ‘What happened back there?’
    â€˜Nothing.’
    â€˜You might be coming down with a bug.’
    â€˜I’m not. I’m fine.’
    Before Victor could say anything else the boy raced across the field to join the other children at the barn, where they still tucked into snacks. What now? Report Archer’s fainting spell to Laura? Had the shock of seeing Victor in the woods caused some kind of blip that made him keel over? Of course, he knew what he had to do. He decided to find Laura.
    Laura was busy in the farmhouse kitchen with a teenage girl who complained loudly that she had a headache. When Victor signalled he needed to speak to her she mouthed, just give me a minute. Then she broke a couple of tablets out of a blister pack. The girl kicked up a fuss. ‘Is this all? My head’s splitting. It’s my period!’
    Victor returned to the yard. There Archer held a juice box in his hand as if it had just dropped down from another planet. He stared at the carton, eyes glassy.
    He doesn’t know what to do with it, Victor told himself, the kid must have had one hell of a shock. From twenty paces away, Victor checked the boy over the best he could. His clothes weren’t dishevelled, no sign of physical injury. Maybe he’d got himself lost in the woods and given himself a scare. Victor knew he’d be overstepping the mark if he interrogated the boy so he decided to stay put until Laura emerged.
    There were around twenty children standing outside the barn. Most were dropping their empty cartons into a box that had been provided for refuse. Often school parties would squirt what remained of the juice on to other kids, however the children from Badsworth Lodge were not only well behaved but there was a sense of stillness about them. They could be so uncannily quiet at times. Maybe it was just because Badsworth Lodge was a specialist centre for troubled youngsters. These kids today were unusually subdued. It didn’t take long to recognize the source of their unease. Jay stood near the barn. Although the kids didn’t make a fuss about it they quietly gravitated to the other end of the yard to keep their distance. Jay, meanwhile, did nothing but watch them with those large eyes of his.
    â€˜Victor? Did you need me?’
    He turned to see Laura. The breeze toyed with her hair. ‘Can we speak?’
    â€˜Weren’t we due to meet up at eight? It’s just we’ve got to get the children back to the lodging houses by three.’ She shrugged. ‘I