The Lost Shepherd Page 3

crude shelter and in a few minutes he was happily snoring in his sleeping bag.

  John was watching him, an unreadable expression on his face. He turned to Charlie and said, “Brother?”

  “Yeah. My brother. What do you think about his offer?”

  John looked back at the priest.

  “We can go with him, if you like.”

  John didn’t answer.

  “Stupid old fool is going to get himself killed out here.”

  “He saved twenty-eight Reachers,” John murmured.

  “So he says. Maybe we should see him safe at least. We’ve got weapons now, it won’t be too hard to make up the lost time. He might even show us where he got his fresh food.”

  John nodded and stood up. He started to kick out the fire, covering it with soil.

  “I’ll take first watch,” Charlie said.

  John settled himself away from Darcy, pressing himself into a nook in one of the larger trees. If anyone came they would easily miss him. Charlie sat between them, thinking about the priest’s offer. He didn’t want to spend another winter in the wild. It was too hard and if he dared himself to dream he wanted better for John. There was a world out there, a world the two of them could do well in, accepting the priest’s offer gave them a chance at life instead of just existence and John needed that more than anything else. He watched the younger boy and smirked to himself; his brother.

  9

  When Darcy awoke the camp looked deserted. He felt a pang of disappointment and went to prepare another fire to cook breakfast. Before he could even start the fire the younger boy, John, approached him seemingly from nowhere. With a quick turn of the head he gestured to a figure sleeping in the nook of a tree.

  “No fires,” John said.

  “Oh,” Darcy replied. “I suppose it will have to be old fashioned protein bars for breakfast then.” He routed around in his pack until he found three bars. He tossed John two of them. “One for your brother. Most important meal of the day.”

  John sniffed the air and listened before crouching down to eat. There was something animalistic in the boy, as though he only looked like a boy and underneath he was something very, very different. He quickly finished his bar and put the wrapper in his pocket.

  “You’re not much of a talker are you?”

  John glared at the priest with piercing brown eyes.

  “Don’t worry, I do enough talking for both of us. It’s John isn’t it? Very strong name.”

  “You don’t have a weapon?” John asked.

  “No.”

  “Why?”

  “I trust God will protect me.”

  John frowned. “You were almost killed.”

  “But you came to protect me.”

  “We came for the guns,” John said sternly.

  Darcy smiled to himself. It didn’t matter that these boys didn’t believe. He knew why they had been sent and the feelings of doubt that had compelled him northwards were gone. His mission was still solid. His faith stronger than ever. Things would change, these boys were too different for Darcy to continue his operation in the same way, but that was the point. Things had to change. This world wasn’t a desolate wasteland, it was re-growing, regenerating and Darcy realised as he sat with the youngest brother, that these boys were the future. These boys were new hope.

  10

  September 2034

  Darcy watched as another summer storm ripped through the clouds. The purple sky above London twisted and convulsed violently. It was hot, so hot he’d removed his collar altogether and was contemplating standing in the garden and enjoying the heavy sheets of rain cascading on the city. With each flash of lightening he was reminded of the day he stumbled across Charlie and John.

  It wasn’t long after finding the boys that Darcy’s knees had finally given out and his long trips across the country had to be abandoned. But by then his mission had already changed and moving Reachers became easier. His church had grown, his supporters strengthened and he received regular donations from the boys to fund his cause. Now he could provide Reachers with clean papers, money to relocate and bribe authorities to turn a blind eye when needed. It was no longer a legitimate faithful venture, but it saved more and more Reacher lives, keeping them safer for longer. Darcy had long ago accepted that sin was a sacrifice he had to make for his cause and, although he still carried some burdens, he could concentrate on the greater good.

  Darcy’s reverie was interrupted by another scream from the room above. The sound made him flinch. He turned away from the window and his lamenting. The door to the little dining room opened and John stepped inside. The boy was now a man, probably the most unnerving man Darcy had ever met. He’d seen him grow, but to Darcy it was more like watching John just expand into his role on this world. He loved the boy as though he were a son, but he knew also that inside John was a darkness immune to all of Darcy’s guidance.

  “Still going?” Darcy said, gesturing to the ceiling apprehensively.

  John nodded and sat down at the old dining table. Darcy decided to join him.

  “You know it was a night like this that we first met. I remember those men attacking and you and your brother coming to the rescue.” Another scream interrupted them.

  “It wasn’t a rescue mission,” John corrected coolly. “We were after their guns. Then we were going to rob you.”

  “I know, I know,” Darcy said, waving his hand flippantly. In all this time he never could get the boys to believe. “I never told you this but I took that walk because I had lost my way.”

  “Should have brought a map.”

  Darcy rolled his eyes at John’s dry humour. “You know what I mean. I never told you this but there were two girls. Sisters. The elder sister, Isobel, she was like Charlie. She’d do anything for her little sister, anything to keep her safe. They had been through so much but they made it to me. The authorities had just stripped the last church I had and taken everything we had raised. I had nothing to help the girls and I knew I was being watched too.”

  Darcy paused. He would never be able to confess this to Charlie, but John had a clearer sense of duty and necessity. Another flash and another scream spurred him on.

  Darcy looked at his old, dark hands. “I was offered a lot of money for one of the girls by a man who... Well it doesn’t matter what he wanted. The money was enough to see the other sister safe. I let Isobel go, sold like she was nothing so her sister could survive. The guilt of it weighed heavily on my mind. I lost faith in myself.”

  “That’s why you went walking?” John said.

  Darcy nodded. “And, until I found you, I had all but given up on my mission. But you boys showed me that sometimes it isn’t enough to make all of the right decisions. Sometimes we have to betray ourselves for the good of the mission.”

  “Did she survive?” John said. This time the scream seemed to reverberate against the walls.

  Darcy winced. “She’s still in a convent now, doing well too or so I’m told.”

  “You can’t save them all,” John said.

  “No. Even though you want to.”

  “That’s what makes the decision the right one.”

  Darcy sighed.

  “Ensure they survive,” John told him.

  There was movement upstairs. Both men tensed, looking at the stained ceiling apprehensively.

  “Do you regret it?”

  “What?” Darcy said.

  “Finding us,” a rare hint of vulnerability touched John’s eyes. “Now you know that we changed things.”

  Darcy reached out and touched the other man’s arm. “Not once in all these years. You boys saved me.”

  “I thought you saved us?” John replied, his eyebrow raised ever so slightly.

  Before Darcy could answer there were footsteps coming down the stairs. Charlie rushed inside. His eyes were wide, there was blood on his shirt and in his hands was a tiny new born baby girl. She was wrapped in a blanket, gurgling and stretching her lungs. Charlie grinned proudly, his eye
s welling up.

  “She did it. She did it guys. Can you believe it? Look. This is Lilly. My daughter,” he said. “She’s a Reacher, Darcy. She’s one of us.”

  Charlie handed him the baby. Darcy smiled at the child, his own emotions starting to claim him. Ensure they survive, that had been his mission. When he met the boys that night his mission had been reignited, his faith and been restored, but as he held this beautiful little girl he understood the future and that it all rested in her hands. Her new born Reacher hands. There was hope. New hope.