Tristan was right about the back way being quieter; they met no-one at all on the little path that ran down behind a row of terraced houses to the beck. Tegan looked up and down the stream for a moment, then led the others along the bank away from the town until she recognised the copse where she had met the Sheppa.
"Is this the place?" asked the Doctor, scanning the trees anxiously;
"Yes, I'm sure of it. He was right there, crouched behind that log." Tegan started forward to cross the beck, but the Doctor stopped her with a warning hand on her arm.
"Be very careful, Tegan. We don't know how badly injured he is. Now, both of you follow me, but slowly." He led the way across the stream and into the little trees. There was no sign of any dogs, alien or otherwise, but the Doctor's eye was caught by a few shards of metal wedged into the ground at the far side of the trees, where the lush, green fields of the floodplain began. He hurried across, pulled a shining shard from the ground, then tossed it away with a look of hard, cold anger on his face, one that Tegan had only seen very rarely, but which always scared her far more than anything else that she had experienced in her travels with him.
"So that's what the poor thing was doing here…" he muttered, his voice suddenly cracking with cold fury; "slavers."
"Slavers?" if Tegan was unnerved by seeing the look on her companion's face, it was nothing to Tristan's unease at seeing the same expression on what looked for all the world like his own.
"Intergalactic kidnappers, abducting whomever they can grab from anywhere and everywhere they happen to be, then selling them off on the few planets where slavery is still considered acceptable. I imagine the Sheppa became injured or ill and more than they could handle, so they just jettisoned him like a piece of rubbish onto the nearest planet. These are the remains of the capsule he came in. Probably thought they were being more humane than just kicking him out through an airlock. Humane!"
"But he wasn't injured when he was talking to me. He was fine."
"Yes, that's what worries me, Tegan. How long has he been here, recovering, and what's happened now?"
They were interrupted by a call from Tristan, who had re-entered the wood and was bending over a dark smear near the base of a tree-trunk.
"Doctor! Come and look at this!" The Doctor smeared a little of the stain onto his finger tips and sniffed them.
"It's definitely blood," he said, "And not from earth. It's also very fresh, so he can't have got that far…"
"'Ow do, Mr Farnon!" The cry came from an elderly man with a dog at his heels standing just beyond the wood, and Tristan leapt up, hoping he was the one that had been spotted. The Doctor and Tegan both instinctively flattened themselves against trees, while Tristan went to return the greeting.
"Mr Dugdale! Lovely day!"
"Now, then, Mr Farnon. Ye'd not be looking fer a dog, would ye?"
"Yes, I would, as a matter of fact. Did you see where it went?"
"Aye; over towards Ling 'ill farm. But it'll be long gone, now."
"Thankyou so much, Mr Dugdale. And did you see what happened to it?"
"Aye. I shot it. It were after me sheep. I were going to finish off t'job, stop it from suffering, but then that little lass appeared. I'd not shoot it in front of 'er, so I waited 'till she were gone, but it took fright at summat and disappeared the moment she left. By gaw, it could run, even on three legs. Reckon it won't last long, though. No need o'vitneries."
"Thankyou, Mr Dugdale," replied Tristan coldly. "I'd still like to make sure that the poor creature doesn't suffer any more than it already has done." He waited until the older man had gone on his way, then turned to see the others coming towards him, Tegan raging.
"Shot it? He had the nerve to stand there calmly and tell you that he'd shot the poor thing? Can't we do something about it? Tell someone?"
"I'm afraid he's within his rights" muttered Tristan grimly. "If he truly believed the dog was after his livestock, he had a right to shoot it. Those sheep are his livelihood, after all, and to lose them would be to see his family go hungry. Not much choice if you see it from his angle."
"Where's Ling Hill?" interrupted the Doctor urgently.
"It's a deserted farmstead roughly in that direction." Tristan pointed uphill, in roughly the direction of the TARDIS. "Not too far off."
"We'd better get going, then." The two men set off quickly and Tegan moved to follow them, but as she did so, a rough hand came from behind to cover her mouth, another grabbed her arm and a harsh voice hissed in her ear;
"Don't move, and don't make a sound if you know what's good for you."