The Fiery Cross - Diana Gabaldon [667]
The gasp and thud of a running man came from his left, and he heard a breathless shout.
“Tulach Ard! Tulach Ard!”
The boar heard Jamie’s cry and swung snorting round to meet this new enemy, mouth agape and eyes gone red with rage.
Jamie had his dirk in his hand; Roger saw the gleam of metal as Jamie dropped low and swung it wide, slashing at the boar, then danced aside as it charged. A knife. Fight that thing with a knife?
You are out of your fucking mind, Roger thought quite clearly.
“No, I’m not,” Jamie said, panting, and Roger realized that he must have spoken aloud. Jamie crouched, balanced on the balls of his feet, and reached his free hand toward Roger, his eyes still fastened on the pig, which had paused, kneading the ground with its hooves and clashing its teeth, swinging its head back and forth between the two men, estimating its chances.
“Bioran!” Jamie said, beckoning urgently. “Stick, spear—gie it to me!”
Spear . . . the splintered fence-pole. His numbed leg still wouldn’t work, but he could move. He threw himself to the side, grabbed the ragged shaft of wood, and fell back on his haunches, bracing it before him like a boar-spear, sharp end pointed toward the foe.
“Tulach Ard!” he bellowed. “Come here, you fat fucker!”
Distracted for an instant, the boar swung toward him. Jamie lunged at it, stabbing down, aiming between the shoulder blades. There was a piercing squeal and the boar wheeled, blood flying from a deep gash in its shoulder. Jamie threw himself sideways, tripped on something, fell, and skidded hard across the mud and grass, the knife spinning from his outflung hand.
Lunging forward, Roger jabbed his makeshift spear as hard as he could just below the boar’s tail. The animal uttered a piercing squeal and appeared to rise straight into the air. The spear jerked through his hands, rough bark ripping skin off his palms. He grabbed it hard and managed to keep hold of it as the boar crashed onto its side in a blur of writhing fury, gnashing, roaring, and spraying blood and black mud in all directions.
Jamie was up, mud-streaked and bellowing. He’d got hold of another fence-pole, with which he took a mighty swing at the rising pig, the wood meeting its head with a crack like a well-hit baseball just as the animal achieved its feet. The boar, mildly stunned, gave a grunt and sat down.
A shrill cry from behind made Roger whirl on his haunches. Jemmy, his grandfather’s dirk held over his head with both hands and wobbling precariously, was staggering toward the boar, his face beet-red with ferocious intent.
“Jem!” he shouted. “Get back!”
The boar grunted loudly behind him, and Jamie shouted something. Roger had no attention to spare; he lunged toward his son, but caught a flicker of movement from the wood beyond Jemmy that made him glance up. A streak of gray, low to the ground and moving so fast that he had no more than an impression of its nature.
That was enough.
“Wolves!” he shouted to Jamie, and with a feeling that wolves on top of pigs was patently unfair, reached Jemmy, grabbed the knife, and threw himself on top of the boy.
He pressed himself to the ground, feeling Jemmy squirm frantically under him, and waited, feeling strangely calm. Would it be tusk or tooth? he wondered.
“It’s all right, Jem. Be still. It’s all right, Daddy’s got you.” His forehead was pressed against the earth, Jem’s head tucked in the hollow of his shoulder. He had one arm sheltering the little boy, the knife gripped in his other hand. He hunched his shoulders, feeling the back of his neck bare and vulnerable, but couldn’t move to protect it.
He could hear the wolf now, howling and yipping to its companions. The boar was making an ungodly noise, a sort of long, continuous scream, and Jamie, too short of breath to go on shouting, seemed