by Vi Lily
Ooooohhhh…I get a devilish idea just then. I snap my fingers in front of Kate's face as I approach, since she's still staring at me like I'm a freak.
Which I am, but whatever.
"I need all the oil you have on hand taken up to Avisha's bed—uh, chambers. Right away!"
His room is the only one with the window right above the fortress's door. Which freaking figures, because it's seven stories up. Looks like we're going to be getting our cardio in for the day.
Fortunately, the fortress has a cistern. Unfortunately, to get to it, I have to go down the stairs that lead to the dungeon. It's going to suck lugging buckets of water up those stairs.
Carlie is still in the kitchen as I pass through toward the stairs leading to the cistern. "Come on, Bug," I tell her as I grab four buckets. One has eggs in it and another some sort of grain. I dump both on the center chopping block, ignoring the eggs that roll onto the wood floor.
My little sister isn't going to be much help lugging water, but I don't want her out of my sight. I will fight to protect her until those psychos drive a spear through my heart. Not that I'm going to let that happen.
I guess I shouldn't call them psychos. I mean, I don't even know why the mob is coming. Maybe they're just grabbing reinforcements, like stopping by our fortress to invite us to come along to attack the next fortress over. I wish.
Until we know for sure, I'm assuming the worst.
"Watch your step," I say over my shoulder as I grab a torch and we start heading down the slippery stone steps. I'm hoping they're slippery because of "normal fortress dampness," whatever that is, and not because of some weird substance coating the steps that I don't want to know about.
Our hiking boots have the waffled rubber soles that give you extra traction, but we're still slipping and sliding. I have no clue how the fortress people manage to maneuver these steps with the leather shoes they wear that have absolutely no sole whatsoever. They're like medieval geckos.
Finally, we get to the bottom and I put the torch into a holder before we head toward the back of the fortress where there's an opening to the outside. The cistern—which is really just a giant barrel—sits half in and half out of that opening, where it can collect rain water through several wooden rainspouts that run down the side of the fortress from the roof. Kind of ingenious, actually.
What's really cool is someone had the brains to put a spigot on the cistern. It's not the kind I'm used to that just turns on and off. This one has a wooden spout coming out of the barrel with a pin pounded into the spout through a hole that's been drilled halfway up the spout. To get the water, you have to whack the pin with a mallet that's hanging off the spout. It's kind of a trick to get just what you need and not waste a bunch when you're trying to pound the pin back in.
I knock the pin out and start filling the buckets. Carlie finds three more buckets on the side of the giant wooden tub and brings them to me. In no time at all, they're filled, and I plug the spout back up.
Now I have seven full buckets and no idea how to get them back up the stairs. And I need probably three times the amount I have now.
"Whuzz wrong?" Carlie asks me when she sees me with my hands on my hips, just staring at the buckets.
I smile at her, even though I'm not feeling very happy at the moment. I point at the buckets then up the stairs.
"I have to figure out a way to carry all these buckets back up the stairs and fast, cuz I'm gonna need to fill them a couple of times."
Carlie stares at me for a few minutes with those gorgeous, freaky eyes of hers and then she smiles and runs back to the side of the cistern. I start to yell at her, because I'm afraid she might get too close to the edge that drops down a sheer cliff, but my breath would have been wasted because she's back in a flash. With a pole.
She hands me the pole and I look at it with a raised eyebrow. It's about seven feet long and has notches in it about a foot apart. Obviously, it's for carrying several buckets at a time. Six, to be exact. I'll just have to leave the other bucket at the cistern.
Okay, so I'm not the best at math, but I can say that this pole with six buckets loaded with over a gallon of water each is going to weigh about…more than I can carry. I groan a little, and then hope that I still have some of that magic adrenaline in my system.
Or that I have some super freaky new strength talent.
We load the buckets onto the pole and then I squat to put it up on my shoulders. I then think stupid thoughts, like "it's just a stick I'm carrying, a broomstick. Doesn't weigh a thing. Light as a feather."
Apparently, the thoughts work, or something does, because I stand easily. Honestly, it's not even heavy. I'm really starting to think I'm, like, some sort of super chick. Which is awesome. Even better than being able to run like a gazelle.
I just need a cool super hero name.
But Houston, we have a problem. The stairway is narrow and I'm trying to carry a seven-foot pole up a four-foot wide space. I realize I'm going to have to turn sideways and that's not going to be easy, but whatever. It's got to be done.
"You go first, Bug," I tell Carlie. If she slips, I want to be able to stop her from rolling down the stairs.
Honestly, walking sideways up stairs isn't as hard as I thought it was going to be. I had figured my back was going to hurt or something, but only my legs are starting to feel a bit achy by the time we reach the top. But now we have to go up the seven flights of the tower to Avisha's room.
When we finally walk into the room, my legs are screaming, but I'm ignoring them. Kate and Gavina are already there and I see that they've managed to lug several buckets of lard up to the room. It's not oil, but it will melt.
"Great job, ladies," I tell them, "but we're going to need a lot more than that." I tell Gavina to put them on the hearth so they'll melt.
Kate frowns as she looks at the buckets the maid is lugging to the fire. "That's all we had in the larder."
Gavina offers to run to the butcher's for more lard and I tell her to hurry as I go to the window to look out. The mob is still a few hills away and I frown, because when I first saw them I thought they were much closer. But now I see that they're still a good couple of miles away.
At first I think that maybe I was wrong and they were moving away from us, but no, they're definitely heading our way. I can tell, because they're coming down a hill toward us.
So now I'm wondering if I have super sight too.
Killer new skills. Awesome.
Kate is eyeing the pole on my shoulder and I suddenly remember I'm still holding it. I squat down and let the buckets settle on the floor.
"Lass," she whispers as she looks from the buckets to me, "ye were just carryin' that thing like it was nothing. It takes two of us to do such a thing."
I shrug, a little embarrassed about the attention, honestly. "I guess I'm just worried about the enemy coming. It must have given me extra strength."
Kate nods at the explanation, but I can tell she's doubtful about it. I am too.
She reaches out then and pulls Carlie into her skirts. I hadn't even noticed that my sister left my side. She really loves Kate, that's for sure. Actually, she loves everyone here. Even "Avi" as she calls him. Which reminds me...
"You really don't know where Avisha is?" I ask her for the thousandth time since the gargoyle disappeared a few days ago. I guess I'm hoping he's hiding from me somewhere nearby. Not that I want him to hide from me, but, you know…it would sure be nice if he could swoop in right about now and save the day.
Kate gives me a look that says, “Oh my gawd, how many times do we have to go over this?” Instead, she says, "Nay, lass, I do not know where he is."
Well, dang, I guess it's up to us helpless damsels in distress to save the day. Alrighty then.
Chapter 9
W OULD HAVE been nice if Avisha were here," I mutter, then I pull the pole out from the bucket handles and ask Kate where I can find more containers because we need more water.
She tells me they don't have any mo
re buckets in the fortress. Seriously? But then she suggests we bring up a "bathing tub" that we can fill.
I can tell she wants to know what I'm up to, but she doesn't ask.
She runs off to find Aonghus to help her lug the tub up to the tower and Carlie and I head out to see if we can help Gavina. It's a good thing we do, because the butcher has a big tub of lard—yes, I said that—and we recruit him and a few others to come up to the fortress to help defend it.
So now we have the butcher, the baker, and the candlestick maker…no, seriously, the guy who makes the candles comes too. And a handful more workers that we practically have to beg to come along to help us.
I don't really get it—that these people who depend on the fortress for their homes and livelihoods aren't willing to fight against the enemy at the gates. Weird.
Must have something to do with the monster thing again.
We're all huffing and puffing by the time we get the heavy tub up those stairs and I have to say that I am pretty sure I carried most of the weight, since I somehow ended up on the downside of the stairs. The butcher's a big dude too, but he didn't seem to mind letting the skinny girl take the load. Jerk.
Good thing I'm Super Chick now. I think I'll ask Kate if she can sew me a cape.
"Put it by the fire," I tell the others while I grab the pole and now empty buckets. Thankfully, Kate and Aonghus were smart enough to put the tub by the window and emptied the buckets without being told. Yay for taking initiative.
I leave Carlie with Kate this time since I can see that the attackers are still a good twenty minutes away. I lose my footing as I'm trying to run down the slippery stairs and the buckets and I go sliding down all the way to the bottom. I think that was a lot faster, if more painful, way to get down and consider taking a board to ski down next time.
It takes longer to fill the buckets this time because the water is now down just out of my reach. The rainy season has let up a bit, which in Scotland means it's only rained every three days instead of every day, so the cistern isn't being refilled as fast.
And I feel kind of guilty because it's probably my fault that the water is so low, since Carlie and I have been bathing every day. But hey, there isn’t such a thing as medieval deodorant, and I’d rather not smell like…well, like the rest of them.
As soon as I get back up to the room and empty the buckets into the tub, I notice that the mob has made it to the fortress walls. No time to get more water. Hopefully, we have enough.
"Is the lard melted?" I call to Gavina, who's standing near the hearth.
"Not all of it," she replies, but then pulls a stick out of the fire to stir it. One that is flaming.
"No!" I yell, startling the girl so she drops the stick into one of the buckets. Which of course, causes it to flare up.
Kate grabs a water bucket to scoop out some water, but I stop her. I then grab a blanket off the bed and run over to smother the flames. And the ones on Gavina's skirt. She isn't even aware she's on fire. I roll my eyes at that. I swear, these people…
Okay, that disaster averted, I grab two of the lard buckets and head to the window.
"When the mob gets into the courtyard, we'll pour the oil out the window, as far away from the fortress wall as you can."
"Why do we no' just pour it now?" Aonghus asks. He still has that snarly look he always gives me.
"Because we don't want it soaking into the ground," I answer. I turn to Gavina then, who's surveying the damage to her skirts. She's lucky she wasn't injured—her skirt burned so badly, I can actually see her stockings.
"Gavina, can you go out into the hall and bring in the torches? Two of them." I then recruit the others to help me drag the lard tub over to the window.
"We're going to have to use the all the buckets to scoop the lard out the window," I tell them. "All of us are going to have to work at it to get it all out there."
Kate starts protesting about us getting her water buckets oily, but the look I give her must say enough, because she clamps her mouth shut. Which is weird, honestly. I mean, she's old enough to be my mother, if not grandmother, plus she's the housekeeper here. She really should be in charge, but she's letting me run the show.
"Now, just as soon as we get all the lard out there, we're going to light it on fire."
The butcher—and I realize I have no clue what his name is—frowns at me. "That's no' goin' to be much o' a flame, lass," he says as he scratches his bushy beard that hangs all the way down to his round belly.
I shudder when I think about how many hairs he drops on our meat.
"I know,” I tell him with a grin, “that's where the water comes in."
The confused looks I'm getting are almost comical. "Just wait," I tell them. "You'll see."
In just minutes, the mob of about fifty people has entered the courtyard. I call out the window to them because I want to make sure they're actually the enemy and not like, you know, the local Jehovah's Witnesses or something.
"What do you want?" I yell down.
A big burly man in the front—who I'm naming Maurice in my head—looks up with a scowl.
"We come fer the dragon," he yells back and leans over to spit, then wipes his hand over his nasty beard. "And his witch. I'm assumin' that be ye."
His witch? What the heck? I pull back in the window as that statement causes a prickle of fear to run up my spine. I'm not sure exactly when all the medieval witch hunting started, but I figure any time during the Middle Ages is not a good time to be different, in any way. And I'm also wondering how the heck they even know about me…assuming I'm the "witch" he means.
I know what they do to witches in the Middle Ages and burning at the stake is not high on my list of fun ways to die. I’m way too skinny to make a decent shish kabob.
But I'm also pissed that these medieval jerk wads think they can attack Avisha's fortress—and especially Avisha, for that matter. I lean my head back out.
"He's a gargoyle, you idiots!" I yell back, and then I motion to the others to start dumping the oily lard out of the window.
Once a dozen or so buckets have been dumped out, I grab the torches from Gavina and throw them out the window. The lard catches fire, but like the butcher said, it's not much of a flame. The mob actually laughs, and I can hear taunts.
"Thank ye fer the bonny fire to warm our bones!"
"Oh, look at the wee flame the lass started. 'Tis no’ enough to roast a rabbit."
"Ye better try ag'in ifin ye think that puny fire is goin' to stop us, lass!"
But then I grab a bucket of water and head to the window.
"Yer goin' to douse the flame now?" Kate asks in confusion and I'm fighting not to make a smart comment about how she's worked in kitchens all her life and should know that you don't put water on a grease fire. But I just grin at her and dump the water out the window without even looking down.
"This, ladies and gentlemen," I announce as the screeching starts, "is how you don’t put out a grease fire." I move to scoop up some more water while the others crowd around the window to look down.
I don't look because I don’t really want to know if someone has caught on fire. That's a horrible thing to have happen. And I honestly do not want to hurt anyone—I just want them to go away.
Apparently, the fire isn't enough to stop them as the sound of banging reaches our ears from below. I look out, and sure enough, they've brought some sort of tree along with them to beat down the front door. Some of the people are kicking dirt at the fire and I notice that it's not burning near the door, the one area we really need it to burn.
Go figure.
"More oil!" I yell to the others and we start dumping buckets out the window again and I try to make sure I hit the front stoop. Gavina runs to the hearth and grabs some lit sticks from the fire and throws them down and then Kate grabs a bucket of water and tosses it out.
I swear, the grins on the women's faces as they roast the mob below creeps me out.
"We need more water!" Kate yel
ls at me.
"On it!" I yell back as I grab my pole and scoop up some buckets. I'm nearly to the kitchen before I notice that Carlie has followed me.
"What are you doing?" I yell at her.
Immediately her eyes fill with tears and her thumb goes into her mouth. She never sucks her thumb unless she's really stressed out…and yeah, I can see why, since we're trying to barbecue humans who are trying to pulverize the fortress front door. She probably just wanted to stay close to my side, where she feels safe.
Now I feel like a major douche.
"I'm sorry," I smile at her. "I didn't mean to yell. I just wanted you to stay safe up in our room. C'mon, Bug," I tell her as I motion with my head toward the back stairs.
"You stay up here at the top of the stairs and be the lookout, okay?" I say, like it's a big job I've given her. I don't have time to watch her around the cistern, or on the stairs. She blinks her still watery eyes at me, but she nods, her thumb still in her mouth.
I intentionally slide down the stairs this time, wincing with each bumpy stair I go over. But it is definitely faster.
I have to tip the cistern over on its side to get the water out this time. I grimace, hoping that we'll get some rain soon to fill it back up. The skies outside are pretty black, so there's a good chance.
Good for filling the cistern, but bad for fortress defense—if it rains too much, it will put out the fire, even if it is a grease fire.
Once I have the buckets full, I tip the cistern back up and push it toward the opening so it can catch more rain. And that's when I see men crawling in through the hole.
Before I can even register what I'm seeing, I'm surrounded by ten very large, very angry men.
>†<
Avisha crouched on the ground for a few minutes, trying to catch his breath from his time travel. He'd never get used to the pain of being ripped apart, only to be put back together again. He consoled himself with the fact that it wasn't as bad as it was when he returned to a time where he already existed—the merging of the "two of him" was particularly excruciating. It was apparently nature's punishment for going against her laws.