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The cold, swirling river whisked Pipkin downstream, faster even than the Enborne he'd floated across with Fiver. Almost instantly the tunnel and the willow tree and Primrose disappeared behind rushes and lashing rain. Pipkin flailed, his only thought to keep his head above water. He'd never swum before!
"Primrose!" he cried out again, but couldn't hear her answer over the rushing water in his ears. Green-blue-black and fast and cold. He whirled past a rock, sticking up and creating a burble of white, and suddenly a surge of the current buffeted him sideways, sending him into a tailspin and then the river dragged him under.
Icy terror gripped him in its claws. He couldn't breathe! He nearly screamed that last dying scream of a rabbit, in all the fear and confusion of the dark rushing water, but at the last second he found his wits and clamped his mouth tight shut. He'd die for certain if he screamed. He started trying to paddle again, but he didn't know what direction was what and if he was going up or down or sideways or anywhere and it was so fast—
Thunk! His body slammed into something big and hard, and whatever breath remained in him was banished in a whoosh of bubbles. But it was something solid. After a dizzying heartbeat or two, Pipkin scrabbled at the hard surface—stone!—and found up. Using the stone as an anchor point, he pushed his head above water and gasped for breath. Sweet air! He'd never take it for granted again.
Catching his breath, he was able to see that he was pressed up against the stone column in the middle of the broken bridge. Dark water swept past on either side of him. The strong current pinned him against the middle column, and he had to scrabble against the bricks to stay afloat. His head was above water, for now, but he couldn't stay like this for long. Already he was so tired.
"Primrose!" he called out. "Hazel! Anyone!"
Vervain's ears pricked up at the voice. "Quiet!" he ordered his bucks. "Listen!" He was sure the voice had said Hazel. One of the outsiders?
"Help me!" cried a high, frightened voice.
"It came from the river, sir," said one of the patrol.
"Then don't just stand there, get a move on!"
In an instant they were on the bank of the flooded, raging river, searching the water for the source of the voice. If Vervain brought Woundwort one of the outsiders as a prisoner, he'd have a chance at the glory and favor of the hour—especially because he had the distinct sense that Campion was not up to his own assignment. Campion might have undermined him earlier, but with this opportunity…
"There!" he cried out, spying a small shape pressed up against the bridge. "We can't lose another chance like this. Get him!"
The bucks hesitated, and a couple of them started forward in a distinctively reluctant shuffle. The rest looked nervously between the river and Vervain.
"Sir, the water's too fast to swim," said Moss.
"What sort of Owsla can't swim a river?" Vervain demanded crossly. "Get out there."
"Please!" shouted the voice. "Hazel! Bigwig!"
"See, he's an outsider!" Vervain pressed. If it had been a hlessi he wouldn't bother—a drowned hlessi was no trouble. "Get out there now! I gave you an order!"
"We'll drown!" Moss insisted.
"Then drown!" Vervain snarled, snapping his teeth in Moss's face. "I swear I'll see every one of you court-martialled if you let a chance like this slip away! The General won't be lenient if he knows you let a valuable hostage like this die before we could use him. So unless you want to lose your tongue for talking back and spend the remainder of a very short life on quarter rations, I suggest you do as you're told!"
Without further complaint, the patrol slipped down to the river, moving a good way upstream of the bridge. Moss and Haw leapt as far out into the water as they could, paddling the rest of the way to the center of the river so that they could intercept the outsider at the center pillar of the bridge. Vervain led the rest of the patrol to the bank on the other side of the bridge, waiting to finish the capture.
Moss and Haw were strong swimmers, and they made it to the bridge without incident. Moss grabbed the outsider—who looked very small close up, which Vervain supposed made it easier than expected—and pulled him out into open water towards the rest of the patrol on the riverbank. Burly Haw acted as a buffer, swimming just downstream of them and pushing them up against the current so that they weren't swept along quite so quickly.
But the going was difficult getting back to shore. They rushed downstream faster than they were swimming across. Vervain swore—he couldn't lose this chance! The patrol raced after them, but the swimmers' strength was clearly flagging. Nearly there—nearly—
The other two soldiers in the patrol, Burnet and Marjoram, waded out into the shallows as Moss and Haw dragged the outsider closer. Marjoram grabbed the outsider and pulled him ashore, while Burnet helped Moss and Haw in. The swimmers were shaking with exertion and cold, but Vervain paid them no mind. He turned to examine the new prisoner.
The outsider was very small, no more than a kit maybe four months old. Vervain smiled viciously. Oh, wouldn't that hit Hazel right in the heart.
Pipkin's struggles became weaker and weaker as he tired. It was just—cold and—he was so tired. His movements slowed. He felt himself slipping.
I'm sorry, everyone, he thought. More than anything, he felt sad that his friends would miss him.
He barely registered it when teeth grabbed the scruff of his neck and dragged him away from the stone column, absently noting the movement of water everywhere again. Then mud was under his paws. He coughed out water and air flowed clean and fresh into his burning lungs.
Mud! His eyes flew open and he scrambled to his feet, whirling to take in his new surroundings.
His fear immediately returned, flooding his veins with ice. Vervain and a patrol of Efrafans surrounded him, blocking off any escape. The horrible roiling river was at his back. Part of him wanted to sob in relief at finding himself back on land, but he wouldn't in front of these Efrafans who were trying to kill his friends. He sniffed hard and took deep breaths. His fur was soaked down to the skin with cold. He shivered violently.
Vervain leered down at him. "You're coming back to Efrafa."
"I'm not going with you anywhere!" Pipkin said fiercely.
Without warning, Vervain cuffed him across the face, knocking him down into the mud. Pipkin lay there stunned for a moment, more shocked than hurt even as pain bloomed in the side of his head.
"I don't remember giving you the choice," Vervain hissed.
"Come on now, sir, he's just a kit," Moss protested.
Vervain glared venomously at him. "I didn't ask for your opinion, soldier. Now get moving. I have a very important report to make back to the General."