“But it eats flesh too—those poor animals!” Jenny gasped.

“Yes, child, it has been created to require flesh also. It is a brutal creature, designed as a battle entity to devour the soldiers of an opposing army.”

Without speaking, I set off after the vartek, and Grimalkin and Jenny followed behind me. Soon I halted and pointed down at the grass. “It’s directly below us—about fifty feet down, I think.”

“How can you know that?” Jenny asked, staring at me in astonishment.

“You’ve got your gifts, and I have mine,” I replied. “It doesn’t always work, but I can often locate a person or an object from a distance. Fortunately it’s working well in this case. I know exactly where the vartek is.”

Grimalkin already knew of my gift and made no comment. She appeared to be deep in thought.

“It is too far down for us to reach by digging,” she observed at last. “And even if we could do so, it would be too dangerous.”

I concentrated again. I was sure that the vartek was not moving.

“The creature’s at rest,” I said, “but it may not actually sleep. It may also be aware of our position. We could be ambushed.”

“So that leaves us with just one option,” Grimalkin decided. “We must slay it as it comes to the surface.”

I nodded. “It’ll either emerge here, or travel for some distance underground . . . in which case it will be much slower. We should be able to keep up or get ahead of it.”

We settled down right there. There was no point in taking turns to sleep, because I was the only one who could detect movement by the vartek. So Grimalkin and Jenny dozed off while I kept watch.

About an hour before dawn, it began to move again. Quickly I roused the others, and we followed its underground progress. It was still heading in the same direction.

I looked up at the fading stars and took my bearings. I felt sick with dread.

This was the approximate route that I took when traveling from Chipenden to Jack’s farm. If the beast continued in the same direction, my family lay ahead.

“Jack’s farm is in its path,” I told Grimalkin. “If it misses the farm, it will still pass through Topley. More than sixty people live there, and tomorrow is Friday, market day. People converge from all the nearby hamlets and outlying farms. There’ll be hundreds of people in the streets and on the village green.”

Had this vartek knowledge of what we had done to the haizda mage? I wondered. Was it heading for Jack’s farm out of revenge? If so, why hadn’t it made a beeline straight for me? It seemed preposterous, but whatever the truth, the danger was real.

Grimalkin remained silent. She was staring into the distance.

The vartek might pass right underneath the farm and the village, but if it sensed what was above it, the farm animals might draw it to the surface. And how could it not sense all those people at the market?