9
12.21p.m.
She isn’t back yet and worry, not to mention guilt, is eating at my stomach. I had hoped she would appear on my watch but last night passed fruitlessly and the day is hot and boring. Draven is finished spreading bolt holes through the barn and Gabby, after following Draven for most of yesterday, is twisting several thin twine lines into thick stretches of rope.
Relter returned last night with a very impressive crossbow with a black stock and smoked metal fittings to hide well in the darkness and word that Johnston was set up very well with only a bit of grumbling from the storekeeper who was less than happy to be confined to his supply room.
I am sitting again in the middle of the floor on a bench Relter was crafty enough to build with snide remarks about the King needing a throne, sharpening long wooden shafts into decent spears. I keep an eye on the barn doors, expecting Amm to stroll in, her features soft and pretty in her daytime persona.
Harry and Larry are also back, their heads together in the corner, a malicious ‘har har’ drifting to my ears every few minutes. These are truly their shining moments, when they’re in the element of explosions and fire.
Thousands of possibilities with the plans I’ve lain keep pushing themselves into my head and I banish them once more and they’re replaced by worry about Amm. It’s only when I’m inactive that I have problems being the ‘Boss.’ I feel I should be protecting the 20, who have put their faith in me.
A loud crack and a flurry of motion and Larry his on his back and what looks like a small animal is whipping around the barn floor sprouting flames and breathing fire as it goes. It whips closer and I roll off my seat into the closest stall, waiting for it to burn itself out and hear Larry and Harry hooting with laughter, Larry still lying in the hay.
Sizzling, the flaming animal stops and trembles like the top of a boiling kettle then shrieks deafeningly and shoots out of the barn faster than the eye can follow and explodes.
“Yar, Boss, some quick feet you’n got thar!” Harry bellows between laughs and Larry hoots off again.
“What the devil was that?” Draven’s head appears over the loft ledge, his hair unusually disheveled and his face flushed and I only now notice Gabby is no longer twining rope.
“Skive off, purdy face!” Harry laughs and Larry answers, “It’s an Exploding Squirrel, obviously!”
My stomach sinks, “Tell me you two didn’t just blow up a…”
“Har har! No, Boss, would’ve lef’ quite a bit more mess, yar? No, just some leaves patched over a firework and a couple of jointed wheels. Spanked you, though, didn’ she? Har har har!”
Harry breaks down in laughter once more and falls on his back and I can’t help grinning.
After many loud minutes Harry finally controls his humor and sits up, wiping his eyes, “Thinkin’ it’ll give them that try an’ get at us a pause. Give us somethin’ to laugh at anywho!”
Then Relter’s shaggy head poked through the door timidly, as if expecting another screaming rodent to come his way and quietly said, “What in the hell was that?”
This time I join in the twins’ laughter.
6.15p.m.
Draven has taken the north watch point tonight, Gabby east and the twins are taking the south, leaving Rel and I sitting at the barn. I’ve assigned myself to the roof watch point and from the scratching I hear from the hole we made in the roof on the first day, Relter is continuing my spear making.
Everything in the last week is cramming itself into my head and tomorrow Flanders hands himself in to the Judges. My gut wrenches thinking about it and the danger I’ve sent twelve of the 20 into without explanation.
And Amm, hopefully still safe in the woods around the barn but as yet refusing to return to the barn. I’m certain she wouldn’t have turned herself in, almost as certain as I am that one of the 20 in the city would have returned to report it by this time.
Only the last hour has been quiet, the hours before that filled with the popping and crackling and shrill shrieking of the twins’ exploding squirrels. The last of which caught fire to some hay and finally lit Harry up like a candle. Though all was contained and Harry was still in quite good humor, I forced them to make that their last experiment and sent them on to their watch.
Not a minute passes that I find myself thinking of reasons to go into the city and check on the 20 that are secreted in various positions. Of all the people who cannot enter the city, Amm and I are the high list, we would be spotted long before we accomplished anything of value.
So I sit still, the sun still hot but fading toward the west steadily.
The heat of the roof makes me drowsy and the constant swish and flick of Relter whittling spear points serves as a soft, repetitive lullaby…