Chapter Four #3
“We must get to the window overhead,” he said, pointing up the tower to a window that was about twelve feet over their heads.
It was long and thin, about two feet across, with a lip on the bottom of the sill that stuck out a few inches.
“The lady and Pryce will scale the wall with ropes and make their way inside. Once in the tower, they will make their way to the wall next to the tower and lower those ropes for us to climb. Are there any questions?”
Asmara and Pryce were the closest to Blayth. They were already looking up at the great stone tower. “If the weather was not so wet, scaling the wall would be a simple thing,” Pryce said. “But the stone is wet, Blayth. I fear we shall lose our footing.”
Blayth had already thought of that. He, too, found himself looking up at the tower, realizing their plan to scale it was in great jeopardy, especially since the rain was picking up.
He even reached out to touch the stone; it was slick.
It would be very difficult to scale. His mind began to work quickly for an alternative plan, knowing he had to think fast if they were going to salvage the situation.
And then, he saw it – there was a vine about eight feet up, a bushy thing that was growing all over the eastern side of the tower. He thought that if maybe they could get to it, then they could use it to climb to the window, because it was growing over the window itself.
It was worth a try.
“There is something else we can do,” he said. “I am tall enough so that if the lady stands on my shoulders, she can pull herself up to the cluster of vines and use it to climb to the window.”
The entire group looked up again, seeing the massive growth of vines over their heads.
Wet, perhaps even weak vines. It wasn’t much of a back-up plan, but it was all they had.
Just as they were about to put the plan into action, they could hear someone else moving up the slope and they turned to see a figure struggling through the slippery grass.
Every one of them was armed, so daggers were unsheathed.
Aeddan was part of their group, and he pulled his knife from its sheath.
They could all see the figure moving in their direction, but Aeddan didn’t wait for the body to come to them – he slid down the slope and grabbed the small figure by the neck.
Everyone could hear a decidedly female gasp, quickly stifled by Aeddan as he slapped a hand over the mouth.
Somehow, he managed to drag the figure up the slope, shoving it to the ground in front of Blayth.
When the muddy head came up, it was Asmara who reacted most strongly.
“Fairynne!” she gasped, trying to keep her voice quiet. Furious, she reached out and grabbed her sister by the arm, practically pulling it out of its socket. “What are you doing here?”
Fairynne was defiant and repentant at the same time. “You may need me,” she said. “I came to help!”
“Does Dadau know you are here?”
“Not… exactly.”
“What do you mean by that?”
“He told me not to come, but I did not listen. I knew I could help you, Asmara. You must let me!”
Asmara was so enraged at her foolish sister that she started hitting the girl around the head and shoulders, slapping at her, only to be separated by Blayth and Aeddan. While Aeddan pulled Fairynne away, Blayth managed to get hold of Asmara’s slapping hands.
“Enough,” he growled. “You are going to cause every Saesneg soldier in the castle to hear us. Who is this woman to you?”
Asmara was so embarrassed that she could hardly look at the man. “My sister,” she said. “My reckless sister. She followed the army when we left our home and my father could not spare a man to return her. She has been with us ever since, like a disease we cannot be rid of.”
She’d said that to insult her sister, who was glaring at her, wounded. Blayth eyed the offended woman in the darkness. She was small, and very slender, and from what he could see, not a ravishing beauty like her sister. He shook his head with both disbelief and regret.
“Another ferch Cader female,” he muttered. “Can she at least fight like you?”
“Nay.”
“I can!”
The sisters answered at the same time. Blayth eyed the pair before shaking his head again, realizing they now had an unwanted woman as part of their group of skilled warriors.
Before he could comment further, however, Asmara pushed Fairynne aside, so hard that the woman rolled backwards and crashed into the men behind her.
“Come on,” she said to Blayth, hoping to divert the attention away from her disobedient sister. “Stand up and I will climb on you. We must hurry. The sun will be rising soon.”
Blayth thought it seemed as if she were giving him orders, but she was right in one respect – they had to make haste.
They couldn’t continue to stand around and argue about a silly young woman who had followed them.
Therefore, he forgot all about the younger ferch Cader sister as he stood up, trying to anchor his big feet into the mud of the slope as he leaned forward against the tower.
As he knew, it was slippery – all of it.
The stone, the grass, everything. He was having a difficult time anchoring his feet because of the heavy grass, and he could feel someone butting up against his lower legs, trying to give him some support.
Throwing his substantial weight forward even further, he pressed himself against the stone of the tower.
“Go,” he hissed to Asmara. “Climb.”
She did. Aeddan had put himself against the back of Blayth’s legs, trying to bolster the man, so Asmara took the hemp rope that was handed to her and climbed on his back, using him as a stepping stone to climb onto Blayth’s back.
As she literally scaled his broad back and onto his shoulders, he lifted a hand and pulled her up.
With her knees on his shoulders, Asmara clung to the wet, stone tower for support as she made her way to her feet.
Beneath her, Blayth and Aeddan were grunting with effort, trying to keep from slipping in the very wet footing.
Asmara knew this, and she didn’t want to particularly fall if they lost their footing, so she quickly grabbed on to the vine, which was stronger than it looked.
She could feel substantial branches beneath the foliage and was able to grab hold and pull herself up.
Blayth felt her weight lift from him and he looked up in time to see her scaling the wet vines.
She managed to climb with ease, quickly making headway up the tangle of vines to the slender lancet window.
As he watched with some trepidation, she peered inside the window for several long moments before moving away.
Blayth watched with concern as she suddenly backtracked on her climbing, enough so that she was nearly to the bottom of the vine again.
Either she was refusing to go through the window, or there was something she wanted him to know.
Her actions were concerning.
“What is it?” he hissed at her.
Asmara was trying not to raise her voice, fearful she would be heard. “The window narrows on the interior,” she whispered loudly. “I believe I can squeeze through, but your man cannot.”
She was describing an arrow slit – windows that were wider on the exterior and then narrowed on the interior to protect the man firing the arrow at attackers.
Sometimes they could become quite narrowed, like a funnel, and Blayth didn’t like the thought of Asmara going in alone.
He wouldn’t have liked the thought of anyone going alone for what needed to be done, but he was particularly concerned for the Dragon Princess.
She was trying to do a man’s job and it simply wasn’t right that she should go alone.
Turning his head, he could see his men crouched behind him, and he saw Pryce in particular. He motioned the man forward, grabbing his arm when he came close.
“Get up there with her,” he said. “You will go through that window if I have to get up there and pound you through it.”
Pryce nodded. He was slender, but he had big bones.
Big knees, big joints, and the like. He wasn’t tiny by any means.
But he was skinnier than any of the other men, including his brother, so there was little choice.
And he knew for a fact that Blayth would climb up and pound on him if he became stuck, which was an embarrassing thought.
Blayth started to boost him up so he could grab hold of the vine, but Asmara waved him off.
“He is too large,” she hissed. Then, the men heard her sigh heavily. “Give me my sister. She can make it through.”
So the little rebel was to be part of this, after all.
Blayth frowned as he turned to look at the small woman, several feet away and crouched in a muddy ball.
Although he didn’t argue with Asmara, the thought of sending two women into a castle full of English was starting to give him hives.
He was leery enough with only Asmara breeching the castle, but sending her younger sister in with her was less than ideal.
Still, there was little choice if the window was narrowed on the inside, and he had to trust Asmara in the matter.
She knew what she was looking at; he didn’t.
The Dragon Princess surely knew what she was doing, didn’t she?
Men had spoken of her prowess in battle and of her skill, so even though Blayth hadn’t fought with the woman, and hadn’t yet developed a trust for her, he had no choice if this endeavor was going to have a chance of succeeding.
He had to trust the woman.
Therefore, he motioned silently to Fairynne.
She’d heard her sister’s request, but she hadn’t moved, fearful of being pushed down again, until Blayth beckoned.
Then, one of the Welshmen grabbed her by the arm and pulled her up, passing her over to Blayth, as someone else put a coil of hemp rope around her neck.
As Fairynne adjusted the rope so she could climb with it, Blayth heaved her up in the direction of her sister’s outstretched hand.
“Listen to your sister in all things,” he rumbled in her ear as he passed her up. “For if you do not, I shall find you when this is over and blister your arse.”
Fairynne’s eyes widened with fear as Blayth lifted her up as high as he could.
She ended up with her feet on his shoulders, much as Asmara had done, but her sister was there to pull her up onto the vine.
Fairynne held on tightly, now climbing the vines and following her sister to the slender window of the tower.
Their entire success now rested on the shoulders of two small women.
“What do we do if they are captured?” Aeddan was standing next to Blayth, his dark eyes watching the sisters climb. “Cader will never forgive Morys if that happens.”
Blayth was watching them also. Truthfully, he didn’t know what to say about the situation.
It had all happened so quickly and they’d had to improvise with the changing of the circumstances, but as he watched Asmara insert her head and then the rest of her body into the window above, he was beginning to wonder if this wasn’t a very bad idea.
But they’d come too far to turn back now.
“Cader raised his daughters to fight like men,” he said simply. “He only has himself to blame.”
Aeddan didn’t reply because he knew Blayth didn’t mean it as coldly as it sounded. He knew for a fact that Blayth had more feeling than most and, at times, would rather negotiate out of a situation than fight it. But he was also a man who was unafraid to do what was necessary in the end.
There were just over a thousand men waiting for a handful of men to open the portcullis of Llandarog Castle so, in this case, sending two women to make the initial entry was necessary and Aeddan knew the man well enough to know that he was harboring a wicked sense of guilt because of it.
Sending women in to do a man’s work.
Now, all they could do was pray.