The Mysterious castle

Pub fight

Rafael's view

I was not only desperate, I was outraged.
The jerk was now out drinking while his wife needed him.
I don't think I've ever felt such hatred for anyone in my life.
I broke down the wooden door of the cottage and ran out. I ran past the houses on my way straight to the pub, which was filled with laughter and violin music.
I knew the route from our house to the pub and back again by heart, my mother and I used to take it almost every night, dragging the stepfather to our house.
Not that I agree with that.
If it were up to me, I might let him live in the pub if I didn't have to see him anymore.
I ran inside and looked around for his red face.
Strangely enough, I found him sooner than I would have expected.
He was sitting at a long wooden table with the other men of the village, and with a broad smile he was paying the innkeeper by giving her a few pence in her neckline.
It made me sick.
I walked straight in his direction.
I expected him to notice me right away and stop smiling, but apparently he was so intrigued by the woman's figure that he only noticed me after I roughly placed my hand on his shoulder.
The knuckles of my fingers turned white at the squeeze of his muscles.
I felt like digging my nails into his skin until his blood ran.
He turned his head sharply toward me and shot me an irritated look. "What the hell are you doing here?" He barked hoarsely. "I'm not going home yet, as you can see I have something important to do."
"Important."
I wondered with my jaw clenched.
I'm the one with something important."Mother is dead." I said a little louder, whereupon the fact hit me harder and harder with each passing moment.
He paused a little. "What are you talking about?"
"I'm telling the truth. She died. And you weren't there." My anger was growing. "Because you're sitting here! Instead of being her support at the last moment! Drinking, and groping all the women in the village!" I screamed, and in that moment we let each other in.
I don't even know who started first. Maybe I did, when I smashed his chin with my fist.
My stepfather was no toothpick, anyone would say he was a man of the mountain. He ate a lot and carried heavy things during the day.
I was well built too, but a lot of the guys in the village outnumbered me. So I guess it wasn't too surprising when my attack came back with even more force.
He punched me in the stomach and I tripped his leg.
All the people in the pub made room for us and watched to see who would win the fight.
My stepfather picked himself up off the plank floor, his eyes bloodshot. He even had a bruise over his eye.
I must have given him a black eye in the fit. I didn't even realize it.
"You fucking bastard!" He yelled at me and punched me in the nose.
There was a nasty crunch and I screamed in pain.
I covered the wound with my hands and when I looked back at my hands, there was fresh blood on them.
My own this time.
He tried to punch me again, but I kneed him in the groin and elbowed him in the back.
"Fuck, shit!" He cursed and dropped to his knees. He was a sturdy peasant, though, and nothing was going to get him down.
In a flash, he had me by the throat, and he threw me against the wall.
My back was on fire.
I hissed in pain and collapsed on the floor.
For a moment my eyes were darkened, but when I managed to focus my vision a little, I saw his stocky figure approaching the table and taking the sharp knife from there.
Get the hell up! I shouted at myself in my mind.
My whole body ached, but I forced myself to. I quickly looked around to see if the knife was still there, but it was too late.
Fortunately, what I expected didn't happen.
Someone pulled my stepfather away from me and someone else took the knife from him. "Let me go!" I said.
"Oh, come on, James," one of the men tried to calm him down, "you wouldn't kill your son."
"He's not my son!" The stepfather continued to protest. "He's just that bitch's bastard!" Those words sparked another wave of anger in me. Of course, I couldn't lunge at him and hit him because someone was holding me too. "Don't talk about my mother like that!" I yelled at him. "She loved you, even when you were hitting her and calling her names. You spent money in the pub and cheated on her. The cottage was hers, she could throw you out whenever she wanted!" The words finally came out of me.
My stepfather looked like he was going to burst out of his skin at any moment. "Shut up! You don't know shit about this! And the cottage is mine now, so you're out of there immediately and you're not coming back, understand?"
"No," I said.
I knew it.
That's what he and my mother had agreed.
That the cottage would be his one day after she died, but she always begged him to leave me there, and he promised her fervently.
I knew he'd never keep his word.
He only ever did what suited him.
And I got in his way.
He had no reason to let me live there. That's one of the reasons I decided to give him a good send-off. "It was clear to me a long time ago. As soon as my mother died, you'd kick me out. I'm not asking for your cottage, let it fall on you!" I kept yelling at him and I slipped away from the man who was holding me.Everyone seemed to expect me to do something more to my stepfather, but I just walked over to the open door of the tavern, and stopped on its threshold. I turned back to the bully, and in a calm quiet voice said, , "Goodbye."I had no idea where I was going, where I was going to sleep, or perhaps even live for a while, but one thing was clear.I can't come back here. I had no money for an inn, and of the few friends I had, no one would let me stay at their house.
Most of them had the same as I did at home. Either they had a step-parent, or there were so many of them at home that they could hardly fit in one house.
Even though it seemed rather silly, I followed my mother's last words and headed into the woods.
Maybe she said that for some reason, or just in a fit of fever.
Either way, it seemed like the only place I could go.
For there was a path through the woods that led to a neighboring village, and that was where I was headed. To start a new life, a new beginning.

Hello, my dears! ❤️A week has passed like nothing and the next chapter is here! I hope you like the story so far.
I'm looking forward to see which of you I can write a dedication for the next chapter for the first comment.
I love you all so much and I'll see you next week!❤️
Your K.😘❤️