The Toymaster's Castle

Chapter Fifty - Rambo

A bored, anxious Daniel, I quickly discovered, was not a pleasant creature to be around.

For a few days, he entertained himself by improving the defences for the 'Toymaster's Castle'. He had some builder type people shipped over from the mainland. They put spikes and broken glass on the top of the wall that surrounded our compound to discourage climbing and fitted a new, heavy duty gate. They also cut four small 'firing ports' in the low wall that ran around the bottom of the glass room at the top of the Lighthouse. That meant that, as long as you lay on the floor, you'd be able to shoot out at people without them shooting back at you.

But, in the end, I realised that I was going to have to find him something to do before he started taking his frustration out on me and my bottom bits. I mean... I know that, in some sort of crazy, mixed-up way, my body liked it when he did his 'assume your position' thing with me but still, I didn't exactly want to encourage him.

"Do you think we ought to learn to shoot those rifles?" I suggested. With the ambushes and the raids on Angus's watch posts, we now had plenty of the things. All our trained auxiliaries had one and there was still one left over.

"We?" he responded. "Call me old-fashioned but I have no intentions of taking a girl into the middle of a battle."

"If your plans with Angus work, then the battle is going to come out here to the island to find us. And if it does... and if he wins... I really don't want to survive. I can't imagine the last few days before he kills us would be particularly pleasant... and, if I'm going to die, I might as well do it with a gun in my hand."

He thought about this then gave a nod. "OK then... but just the basics," he said. "And neither of us is going to be firing more than about a dozen rounds. We simply don't have all that much ammunition and we need to keep what we do have for Angus."

"Fair enough," I said.

So we went up to the glass room, where George was on lookout duty, to ask him to teach us how to shoot.

"I'd be happy to," he replied, "but you'd do much better to ask Rambo instead. He's much better at that sort of thing than me... in fact, he's much better at that sort of thing than most people."

So Daniel and I strolled up to the other end of the island. The weather was cold, damp and generally pretty miserable but, in spite of the tension of the upcoming war and everything, I really enjoyed that walk. We hadn't had all that much time to ourselves since our wedding and we appreciated just having each other's company for a bit.

There was a blustery wind coming in from the west and so, without really thinking, we went up the east side of the island, following the track to the jetty and then along the beach. That meant that the walking was easy and so Daniel could wrap an arm around me and keep me snuggly and warm.

"There's no point in just teaching you how to shoot," Rambo told us when he heard what we wanted. "You've got to learn how to handle yourselves in combat or you'll get your arses shot off in the first ten seconds."

"And you can do that for us?" I asked.

"I could do... if we had enough time."

"How long is it going to take?"

"Well, even for the most simple squaddies... the guys who aren't going anywhere near combat... basic takes six weeks."

"We haven't got anything like that much time, Daniel said. Can you teach us enough to stay alive in five days?"

"We can give it a go... but it'll be pretty tough... particularly on you, Ma'am."

"Ma'am can be pretty tough when she sets her mind to it," Daniel told him with a tiny grin in my direction.