Chapter Seventeen #2
Alfie and his guard did. The children, including the “knights”, were frightened and even a little unsteady about the situation, but Alfie assured them they were doing important work.
The whole thing had disoriented and terrified them, but not enough to make them cower.
Perhaps it should have, but they were strong.
Thanks to Alfie.
As Alfie and his guard took their positions, Amabella found herself wandering over to the window, looking out to watch the Scots down below and the soldiers on the wall.
It was rather terrifying and when Aleanor wandered over to her, she deliberately turned her back on the window to partially block it from her daughter’s view.
Aleanor was nervous enough without seeing men with weapons down below, trying to breach the castle.
“Ama,” Aleanor said, hugging her mother tightly. “When will this be over with?”
Amabella wrapped her arms around her daughter. “Soon,” she said, though she wasn’t sure she believed it. “Sir Markus will make short work of these Scots. Have no fear.”
But Aleanor wasn’t easily quelled. She looked up at her mother, her pale face strained. “But what if he doesn’t?” she said. “What if they enter the keep? What then? They will try and kill us!”
Amabella shushed her daughter softly. “Not so loud,” she said. “Do not frighten your sister and brother with such talk.”
“But what if…?”
Amabella shook her gently. “If the Scots get into the keep, then we must pull Alfie and his guard away from the door,” she said. “You can hide under the bed or in the wardrobe. In fact, I want you to be responsible for Ambra. Take her with you and hide. Will you do that?”
Aleanor nodded warily, fearful of having such responsibility, but in the same breath, it made her feel… grown up. Her mother was trusting her with something important and that hadn’t really happened before.
“I will,” she said. “But what of you?”
Amabella sighed heavily. She turned her head slightly to catch a glimpse of the battle going on outside. She didn’t want to think of the possibility that the Scots would make it into the keep. That would mean Markus was…
Nay.
She couldn’t think such thoughts. She wouldn’t.
God didn’t bring Markus de Wolfe into her life only to cruelly snatch him away.
Markus was alive and he was going to stay alive.
God had overlooked her all her life and she refused to believe that He was about to play yet another wicked joke on her by taking away a man who had literally changed her life.
All would be well.
But even so… she prayed fiercely.
God, help us!
As far as battles went, it wasn’t a particularly brutal one. He’d been in worse.
But this one had consequences.
There were about one hundred Scots from what he could tell trying to scale the walls of Trastamara any way they could – ladders and ropes, mostly, although some were trying to scale the gatehouse without benefit of either of those things only to be kicked off or thrown off by Kieran.
While Kieran held the gatehouse and the nearby walls with about fifty soldiers, Markus took the rest of the walls and spread out about seventy soldiers on the two of them.
The Scots were few, but they were everywhere, like vermin, so the soldiers on the walls were there to cut the ropes or kick back the ladders.
And on it went into the afternoon.
The remaining soldiers from Trastamara were positioned in the bailey, both watching for any errant Scots who might actually make it over the wall and also lobbing arrows at the attackers. It was firing blind for the most part, but they’d managed to take a few Scots down.
Markus hadn’t worked up much of a sweat.
In fact, he’d rather enjoyed tossing Scots off the walls or kicking them in their faces when they got to the top of the ladders and close enough to his big feet.
He knew that, eventually, they’d get tired and skulk off, more than likely around dusk, so it was simply a matter of keeping them from doing any real damage and, so far, they hadn’t.
But that opinion faded when he saw Shand.
The man wasn’t difficult to miss. He was the only one in the group not wearing a long leine tunic, but rather a mail coat and padded tunic that Atlas hadn’t stripped from him.
He was lingering back in the tree line, trying to stay out of sight, but Markus had excellent eyesight.
He could see him clearly. The fact that Shand was here unnerved him because the man knew Trastamara better than anyone, Atlas included.
He knew her strengths and knew her weaknesses.
That began to concern Markus.
Therefore, he put several of the soldiers in the bailey on patrol in the bailey itself. He had them prowl every inch of the yard, the stables, and kitchen yard.
And that’s when they found something.
Markus came running as the soldiers in the kitchen yard sounded the alarm.
There were two big drainage swales that went from the kitchen yard, through the wall, and dumped out on the other side.
They discovered that Scots were digging under the iron grates, trying to use the swales as a way to breach the castle, so Markus put the men on gathering all of the hot water and stew bubbling over one of the big kitchen fires.
The hot water alone was perhaps fifty gallons and they took it up to the wall and positioned it right over the diggers.
Down it went.
Men screamed as they were scalded by the hot water.
The stew went down in chunks, clinging to skin and burning.
It was enough to chase the Scots away from the digging, but Markus knew they’d be back.
Shand was clearly exploiting that weakness in the wall, so Markus put the soldiers on stuffing as much debris as they could into the drainage swale, hoping to clog it up so the Scots couldn’t get through.
As Markus put some of the men to boiling more water, shouts could be heard from the top of the wall.
Markus raced up the stairs to the wall walk in time to see a small army approaching from the north. It didn’t take him long to figure out who it was because he could see the red tunics, even from a distance.
A smile spread across his lips.
The Trastamara army was returning.
Now, things were going to get interesting.