“That’s me cousin,” Ernest supplied with a smile, “came over to help us out he did.”
“What’s his name?” Falon asked cautiously, wondering if she was going to have to prove her non-sissified manhood to yet another angry Doyle boy looking to bust her chops for sitting inside reading while they were stuck in the barn. Krisy just didn’t understand what she’s doing by forcing me to stay cooped up inside my room, she thought irritably.
“Parents named him Dug, but everyone knows him as Green Feet, on account of the way he used to always come home with grass stains on his feet,” Ernest said with a conspiratorial grin.
“Huh?” she boggled, eyeing the cousin doubtfully.
The work of sawing and hammering on and around the wagons slowed to a halt, and both Duncan and Cousin Dug exchanged a glance before strolling over to the barn entrance.
“So is this be the dreaded, Boar Knife,” Cousin Dug asked with a good-natured roll of his eyes before abruptly sticking his hand out.
Falon nodded and took his hand. Once again she was surprised at how the boys started out squeezing her hand until it hurt. Glaring, she tried to squeeze back but she wasn’t strong enough, and Dug ground her finger bones together before releasing her hand with a self-satisfied smirk.
“So I hear ye can fight,” Dug said, looking entirely too smug for her taste.
“What was that for?” she demanded irritated to the point of anger at these antics. She looked at his hand pointedly, still upset over how hard he had gripped hers.
“What are ye, some kind of a sissy?” Dug asked in disbelief, looking over at Duncan for some reason.
“A sissy,” she yelped in alarm, eyebrows climbing for the rafters.
“Me sisters hit harder than he did” Duncan bragged, and from the sideways glance he shot her way she could tell he was deliberately trying to provoke a response, “but ye have to watch out for those fancy wrestling moves of his. Almost broke me arm, he did.”
“A girl is it?” Falon demanded, her face clouding as she realized she was probably going to have to fight to defend her honor from charges of fighting like exactly what she was: a girl. She wearily raised her fists.
Ernest stepped between them, shooting a warning look at his older brother and cousin. “Be times Green Leaf can act like he’s the cock-of-the-walk, and Duncan likes to shoot his mouth as ye already know, but there’s no need to take to brawling again,” Ernest said sternly.
“I was just pressing the Squire’s son a mite, to see how he reacted,” Dug said, placing a hand over his chest innocently, “I didn’t mean nothing by it, Ernest.”
“I’m getting’ back to work,” Duncan muttered, sounding disappointed there wasn’t going to be any action.
“Yeah right,” Falon said ignoring Duncan and continuing to stare down Dug.
“Ye don’t take me at my word,” Dug demanded, surging forward into Ernest’s already raised arm.
“You plan on calling me a sissy again anytime soon?” she hissed, knowing she couldn’t let the insult slide. Even if they didn’t think anything else of it, letting them call her a sissy might lead others to start thinking down the wrong path—or rather, the wrong path for Falon Rankin, Brother at Large.
“Knock it off you two,” snapped Ernest.
“The Boar Knife’s a little touchy when it comes to his pride, isn’t he?” Dug said, shrugging off Ernest’s arm and turning back to work on the wagon as if he hadn’t just about started a fight.
Ernest scowled after him a moment. “Maybe if you’d been the one to slay that boar and got called a woman afterward, you’d feel a bit touchy too.”
“Sorry,” Dug said, glancing over his shoulder to meet her eyes with a mostly unrepentant look before bending down to reclaim a hammer.
“You’re not forgiven,” she muttered under her breath.
Ernest looked over at her long enough to make her feel guilty, but she still wasn’t willing to forgive the other boy.
Shaking his head and shrugging, Ernest gave her a disappointed look before turning back to his own project in the side of the barn.
“What are you doing?” Falon asked, more to say something and break the growing silence than out of any real desire to learn of their efforts. Although as she glanced over what he was doing and took in a pair of small metal weights with pieces of string tied between them, her forehead wrinkled in confusion.
“I’m using these to make sure the wood’s been cut straight,” Ernest grudged, pointing at the weights and string and then to the rough cut board underneath, “if it’s not straight, it goes back to clod brains over there to get fixed up right,” he finished, shooting a glare over at the other two before bestowing another sour look in her direction.
“Why does that matter?” Falon asked in surprise before adding, “That it’s straight, I mean.”
Ernest gave her such an ‘are you stupid’ look that Falon knew she had just stuck her foot all the way in her mouth.
“Who knows how far these wagons will need to go,” he explained, speaking slowly as if to a simpleton and Falon felt her face flush with anger, “if the new boards don’t fit together right with the old ones, it could put more pressure on one part of the wagon than the other.”
“Okay,” she said shortly.
Seeing her still not fully comprehending look, Ernest sighed. “A fully loaded wagon on a rough road, carrying a heavy load, could break a wheel if the load isn’t evenly distributed. Might could even just shake apart if we don’t put it back together properly,” Ernest explained.
“Whatever,” she sniffed, turning away as if this information were unimportant to her, but this time when she looked at the work they were performing it was with a new eye. Although she wasn’t prepared to let the boys know, she was actually quite grateful they were taking the time to fix the wagons up right.
“Fancy boy may not care about these wagons making it to the field and back,” Dug scowled at her, and by field she assumed he meant the field of battle and not some stretch of cow pat-filled grassland, “but for those of us who plan on going along, they’ll be our lifeblood.”
Falon lifted a single eyebrow at this information and managed to keep a cool expression on her face despite the provocation.
“This ‘fancy pants’ can bust your chops anytime you like, Green Leaf,” she snapped once she was entirely certain she was in control of her reaction.
“Oh yeah?” Dug demanded, standing up with the hammer still clenched in his fists.
“Ye know there’s no way yer father’s going to let ye leave,” Ernest said into the tension filled silence.
Dug scowled at her and then reluctantly looked over at Ernest.
“He might, Ern,” Dug ‘Green Leaf’ said, “it’s an uphill climb, but there’s still a chance.”
“Yer closest brother is what, eight years old?” Ernest rolled his eyes. “Not a chance this side of Lamont Castle...” he glanced over at her and mouthed ‘sorry’, “I mean, Keep.”
“He won’t want to pay the extra taxes,” Dug growled, “that alone…”
“Besides the, uh,” Ernest shot his eyes her way before focusing back to his cousin, “current count of families in East Wick,” he said, no doubt referring to something the older villager men had mentioned about there only being ten families in that village. “I heard me Pa talking with yers about trading a steer and some pasturage and sending me in yer place instead. Seein’ as how Duncan and I have a pair of younger brothers age thirteen and ‘leven, while ye’ve only got the one brother, and him bein’ quite young.”
Falon stared at Ernest in surprise. It was rare for a family to send two sons off to war, and in this case they wouldn’t even get the tax benefit from it. Their fathers must be close, although since these boys were cousins it stood to reason that their fathers might have been brothers.
“Lady’s tits, Ernest that’s bloody unfair,” Dug yelled, throwing his hammer into the side of the wagon nearest him hard enough to cause a crack in the w
ood.
“Hold yer thunder, Green Leaf,” Duncan warned, clearly trying his best to calm the situation.
“Screw you too, Duncan,” snapped Dug, while Duncan’s face darkened in response, “both ye and yer wretched brother get to go off to fight while I’ll be stuck at—”
He got no further, because Duncan’s face suddenly turned so red that Falon was surprised it didn’t explode, and he unleashed a primal roar of male outrage. “What did ye call me brother!?” Duncan shouted, throwing his saw to the ground and charging his cousin. Just like that, the two boys began exchanging punches.
Taken aback by the sudden turn of events, Ernest’s jaw dropped while Falon was still turning to see what he thought of this seemingly male urge to start a scramble at the first opportunity.
Then, giving a yell of his own, Ernest’s mouth snapped shut and he ran over to jump into the middle of the fray—only this time instead of being the peacemaker, his own fists were flying.
Staring at the now three-way fight with shock and disapproval, Falon decided then and there that she didn’t care what the expectation of her might be; there was no way she was stupid enough to get in the middle of this fight.
Almost before she knew it, the fight was over. Ernest was sitting on the ground holding his own face, and Duncan, after placing his cousin Dug’s neck in a headlock, threw him against the side of the barn so hard that Green Leaf split his lip and sat there shaking his head in resignation.
Looking overly pleased with himself, Duncan wordlessly went back over to his saw and started cutting wood again.
Then, inexplicably to Falon, the other two shook off the fight and went back to working and joking as if nothing had happened. That was the moment Falon knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that all boys were crazy.
Epilogue 1: Meat for The Machine
“Not like that, Falon,” Christie scolded for what must have been the fifth time in as many minutes. “You need to properly salt the entire layer of meat before stacking more on top of it! Just because I soaked it in brine for three days doesn’t excuse finishing the job improperly.”
Falon’s eyes were still stinging from the smoke all around them, but the fires had already died since every piece had been smoked properly. It was a big job, and Falon was still upset that Christie had not let her help with the task but her older sister had been insistent. Still, Falon had been equally insistent after a few days of nonstop reading, and her older sister had relented in allowing Falon to help with packing the last of the meat. “I thought it was already cooked,” Falon grunted as she sprinkled more salt on the top layer of boar meat in the barrel.
Christie rolled her eyes. “It still needs the salt to keep it from spoiling, should it get wet,” she explained tersely.
“What about the sausage?” Falon asked as she carefully laid the next layer of brine-soaked, smoked boar meat.
“We had all the ingredients for turning the innards into an old-style sausage, thank the Lady,” Christie replied as she worked opposite Falon. “Its flavor leaves much to be desired, but we are fortunate to have it at all. In truth, I am uncertain how we would have raised enough provisions to satisfy our obligation, were it not for this boar.”
“How much meat was there?” Falon asked.
Christie shrugged as she scooped up the last tray of smoked meat. “Two half-barrels, which I estimate at thirteen or fourteen stone in all — nearly half the animal’s live weight, if the blacksmith’s initial estimate was correct.”
The sound of the Doyle boys working on the wagons ceased momentarily, causing Falon to poke her head around the corner of the small, stone smokehouse and listen for the cause of their break.
“Mornin’ Vance,” she heard Duncan call out before the sound of the boys’ work resumed.
“Morning, Duncan. Morning, Doyle-son,” Vance greeted the two boys as he made his way around the barn to where Falon and Christie were finishing their task in the old smokehouse. Christie gestured for Falon to go meet the blacksmith, so she made her way a few steps from the smokehouse. When Vance came into view, Falon could see that he had a large, wrapped bundle under his arm. “It’s not the finest work,” he patted the bundle as he made eye contact with Falon, “but it’ll make a fine wall piece, of that I can assure you — I suggest it go over your bed, next to all your other trophies,” he said with a wink.
Falon was confused when the blacksmith thrust the bundle toward her, but then she saw dark, boar hair inside the bundle, and she realized that Vance had finished with the hide. He actually thinks I should hang this on the wall over my bed, she thought with a shiver of revulsion. “Thank you, Vance,” she replied, accepting the heavy bundle with both hands.
Vance nodded curtly. “Biggest thing I ever bagged at your age was a three point buck down by the creek,” he said with a hint of admiration. “I was never prouder than the day I brought that animal home and I stuck those antlers on my wall, but I can’t imagine how big my head would have gotten with this hanging from my wall.”
Falon tried to think of something appropriately manly to say, but she was still struggling with the idea of sleeping with this smelly old hide anywhere nearby.
“Those Doyle boys are doing a right fine job on those wagons,” Vance said into the awkward silence as he turned to see the boys and their work. “I think I’ll take a look at their work just to make sure, but you should be confident they’ll be ready for the march in time.” With that, he made his way to the wagons, leaving Falon holding the heavy boar’s hide.
“What did Vance want?” asked Christie as she came out of the smokehouse.
Falon felt the weight of everything which had happened — and everything which was about to happen — come crashing down on her in that moment, and all she could do was stare down at the boar’s hide in her arms as she felt her lip begin to quiver.
“Krisy,” Falon whispered, “am I really going off to war?” She had cognitively known it was going to happen, and she had spent every day since killing the boar in preparation for it. But for some reason the blacksmith’s words had triggered something within her, and she was unsure that she could keep it from overwhelming her.
Christie wrapped her arms around Falon’s shoulders and squeezed tightly. “Falon…” she began in a low voice.
Falon wanted to collapse into her sister’s arms and hear her big sister say that it was all a bad dream, or that they could find some clever way out of it. But she knew that those were childish thoughts and the quicker she banished them from her mind, the better chance she had to help her family in the only way she knew how.
Falon reached up and wiped her moist eyes. “It’s ok, Krisy,” she said in as steady of a voice as she could manage as she patted her sister’s hand comfortingly, “I’ll be ok. Let’s close up these barrels and get the pork inside the barn.”
Christie gave her a searching look, but Falon gently removed herself from her sister’s embrace and turned back to the smokehouse.
Falon knew that marching off to war was supposed to be a man’s endeavor, but she also knew that it was the only way she could protect her siblings from being torn from their home and cast to the wind. She knew that she had no place in battle, but she was going because she had to — Christie, Kaitlin, Sinead, Blair, and little Rogan needed someone to protect them. Having that responsibility fall on her shoulders was unexpected, but there was no one else who could answer the call.
She only hoped that when the time came she could meet her fate with her head held high, and make her family proud.
Epilogue 2: Binding Moonlight
The clearing was lit by the power of the moon as it made its slow, stately way high above, across the starry sky. Waiting in the clearing was a single figure, one who made no attempt to hide herself. She had been asked to come here in the Old Way, the way known to her and the line of mothers and teachers before her — one did not refuse the Moonlight Call lightly.
“Thank you for coming, Brood-Sister,” she heard a woman’s voice from
the far edge of the clearing.
The Healing Wench of the West Wick turned to see a woman emerge into the starlight, and her suspicions were confirmed: it was Muirgheal, the Witch. She bowed her head slightly, “I am just a simple Healing Wench,” she demurred before straightening, “Why have you asked me here, Muirgheal?”
“Do I need a reason to speak with another who walks the Moonlight Path and lives so close?” the Witch replied with amusement. “Perhaps I was just feeling lonely.”
The Healing Wench snorted, “It has been a long time since last we met like this but not that long. As I recall the last time we walked together by moonlight we were girls—”
“There’s no need to go over old history,” Muirgheal said quickly, a sudden frown growing upon her face.”
“As I recall,” the Wench said, “you punched me in the face for holding hands with him by the bridge, and then we rolled around in the ground screaming and pulling hair for a while, West Wick girl.”
“You had no right chasing after Paddy,” Muirgheal started her face taking on a slightly reddish cast and then all of a sudden the breath whooshed out of her and she broke down laughing, “I was a jealous harridan, wasn’t I?”
“Ah that’s right, Pádraig Carthaigh,” the Wench said with a grin she moved to hide behind her hand as she wisely refused to comment on that last part, “whatever happened to that one?”
“You know, it all seemed so important at the time,” Muirgheal mused and then grimaced, “I caught him sleeping with another girl, Mindy from Kempsrest way. Her father was a carter,” she said ironically, “last I heard he’d moved to Kempsrest and left her for yet another.”
“Wandering eyes,” the Healing Wench said knowingly, “the bane of every woman. It’s a good thing you warned me off.”
The Boar Knife (Rise of the Witch Guard) Page 13
