The Ritual

have seen his face. ‘Chieftain,’ he said, and winked at Luke, conspiratorially, like a grown-up coming to the rescue of a boy being picked on in a playground. It just made
Luke’s face flush hotter, but his anger immediately switched to himself and against his own poisonous thoughts. Hutch followed the wink with a warm smile. ‘I don’t think we have
much choice, buddy. We have to get dry. We’ll never do it in a tent. We’ve been pissed on all day.’
    ‘Knock knock, we’re coming in,’ Phil called out and joined Hutch before the front door with more purpose than he’d shown all day while floundering and wheezing in the
undergrowth. Suddenly, Luke couldn’t stop himself glaring, all over again, at Phil’s rounded shoulders and pointy head in the blue hood. He actually hated the sight of him right now, so
he made a decision: once he was back in London, he’d even avoid their one drink a year.
    ‘You can stay outside with the wolf that gave that moose a good seeing-to,’ Dom said with a half-smile on his face.
    Luke refused to meet Dom’s eye, but found his voice; a tight, aggressive, sarcastic thing that slightly shocked him when he heard it come out of his own mouth. But he didn’t care
what he said, just wanted the others to know how he was feeling. ‘Or we could feed you and your useless knee to him, and while he’s busy stoving you in, we’ll head to
Skaite.’
    Dom paused as he walked after Hutch and Phil. Disappointment and surprise softened his features for a moment before anger tightened them. ‘Spoken with all the petulance of arrested
development. Stay outside you silly arse and you can freeze to death. Who’s going to miss you but some tart. This is for bloody real, if you hadn’t noticed. I’d like to get home
in one piece. People depend on me back there.’
    Hutch snapped away from the door again, realizing the irritation behind him had turned to provocation. ‘Time gentlemen, please. If you don’t cool it, I’ll fetch me a long piece
of green cedar and stripe your arses.’
    Phil burst into his dirty laugh that sounded unpleasant near the house, but didn’t bother to turn around. He banged and pushed at the door.
    Too angry to move or breathe, Luke stared ahead, meeting no one’s eye. As if the exchange had meant nothing to him, Dom followed Hutch back to the house. He even laughed.
‘You’d enjoy that. Beating the buttocks of a fine young man in the woods.’
    ‘I would. And I wouldn’t check my swing either. You’d get it backhand.’
    ‘There’s no lock. But it’s stuck,’ Phil said.
    Hutch removed his pack. ‘Not for long. Step aside.’
    Luke took the cigarette packet from the side pocket of his wet combat trousers. His hands were shaking. This was not the time to be analysing the situation, but he couldn’t help it. Could
not stop himself thinking about the four of them. Because the trip had been such a disappointment. Not because of the weather; he’d have come out here even if he had known it would rain every
day. He had been so excited about hanging out with them all again and looked forward to it for the six months following Hutch’s wedding, when the idea was first mooted. But the trip had been
so wretched because he recognized so little of the others now. Which made him wonder if he had ever really known them at all. Fifteen years was a long time, but part of him had still clung to the
notion that they were his best friends.
    But he was truly on his own out here. They had nothing in common any more.

SIX
    Once the door was open, Dom, Phil and Hutch rooted through their packs for torches. Nothing could be seen through the space Hutch had created by directing the stamping sole of
his boot around the iron door handle.
    With each bang of Hutch’s foot on the shuddering wood, Luke had winced. The idea of it opening made him nervous. Reluctance to join the others at the door was worsened by his sulking after
the confrontation with Dom, which now made him feel foolish, again. But he was also ashamed by this vandalism. He remained in the paddock in the rain while the others crowded around the door egging
each other on.
    Like the other three, he was dead on his feet. And wet and hungry and thoroughly miserable. He just wanted it all to end – the tortuous walking, the rain, the dark unpleasant forest
– but they should not be reduced to this: breaking into private property. A place that just wasn’t right. And had they really thought