Quintspinner - A Pirate's Quest

Chapter One

CHAPTER ONE

William would never forget the last day of his life as he knew it.

He was being attacked for the first time that morning.

The rough grip clutching him dug into his shoulder and shook him hard. His heart bolted into a sudden pounding frenzy.

“William! Wake now!” The voice was shrill and pierced his sleep. His eyes shot open and focused on the face hovering above him.

His mother. Even in the dim pre-dawn light, he could see a deep furrow of worry lacing her eyebrows together. Her lips were pressed into a narrow frown and he couldn’t quite read the emotion fueling her painful grasp on him.

Worry or anger? It didn’t matter. Whatever it was, it wasn’t going to be good.

“C’mon lad! Up wi’ you. Your father and brother didna’ return from the pub last evening – still drunk as mice in the dregs of a brandy barrel, I ‘spect – but that’s no relief to Millie, will it be, wi’ her bag near ready to burst, nor to those of us needing kindling to a’ kept the flame tucked overnight. Sometimes I curse the day John Robert discovered his dammed drink!”

His confusion at being woken well before sun up was quickly replaced with alarm. Not home? Neither one? William wearily struggled to sit up on his straw-filled mat. A tangled lock of sandy colored hair swung down into his face and he tucked it behind his ear.He recognized his mother’s angry use of his father’s proper names.

“Bring us wood and dung as fast as you can lad, and I’ll set to save what embers I can. Your sister will start the milkin’. Quickly! Off with you now!”

He could hear the strain in her voice. His Da’ not home? Nor Johnny? His mother’s worry was well placed then. His father would never have left the evening milking undone. At the very least his older brother, John, would have been sent back to help do the chores. And no wood for the overnight or morning fire!

He quickly slid both feet into the worn leather boots lying on the floor beside him.The worn leather had molded to his feet like a second layer of calloused skin. Throwing his woolen tunic on overtop of his night shirt and trousers, he quickly lashed it around his waist, and called out.

“Lucas! C’mon boy, let’s have a look.” From a woven floor pad, the grizzled hound lifted his head in response to his name, but the relative warmth of the house called more strongly to his arthritic joints, and he merely yawned and laid his head back down upon his front paws. “Fine then, you old fart! Stay here while I go looking.” Lucas simply closed his eyes and exhaled a contented sigh. William didn’t blame him. The dog was nearly as old as William was now and the past winter’s ache had settled and stayed in his bones. Being allowed to stay inside was a special treat. Giving his dog a fond scratch between the animal’s ears, William pulled the tunic’s hood up over his own head, and stepped through the hut’s doorway, out in the chill of the damp air.

An urgent lowing greeted him as he strode the few steps it took to reach the livestock shed’s doorway. Running footsteps from behind told him that Abbey, was already on her way to milk the cow. For a heartbeat, William felt a pang of guilt for his little sister.The cow’s bag would be swollen hard, and the animal would be more miserable and uncooperative than usual. Millie was calmer with a female’s handling of her teats at the best of times, it seemed to him.

Probably comes from having the same kind of equipment themselves, the lady folk, and knowing just how to handle ’em without harm.

William trotted silently further down the rutted path, its surface having been torn into parallel troughs by years of foot traffic and cart wheels. Anything useful as kindling had long since been picked clean near the buildings. His keen eyes gradually adjusted to the dim pre-dawn light. He preferred to find branches and twigs to burn, rather than to have to return with an armful of dung from the cowshed. Although the manure burned slowly and gave off decent warmth, its smoke was thick and noxious.

He was closer to the village than to his home by the time he came across anything worth picking up. Skirting around the edges of the underbrush that lined both sides of the path, he gathered a small armful of dried twigs. They would burn up in no time, he knew. He continued to scour the bushes deeper into the underbrush in hopes of discovering a few decently sized branches.

Just a bit more  and I’ll have enough to make the porridge fire, anyway.

He realized that it was the wrong time of year to be finding much dead wood. Everything was leafed out and no limbs on the trees or bushes were dry enough to have been shaken down by wind passing through the thickets and forest.

Scrambling out of the underbrush he clutched the twigs and a few skinny branches to his chest. Reaching the road once more, he stumbled in one of the ruts and pitched forward onto his knees, dropping his kindling. An intense bolt of pain shot through hisleg as his kneecap cracked against an exposed cobble rock. William ground his teeth together in quiet agony.

Goddamn these ruts! Where in the hell were Johnny and Da’ anyway?

Still on his hands and knees, he lifted his head and glanced down the road. Something off to the side glowed eerily white, lying in an area of dark trampled grasses. He squinted in the semi-light and cursed the rut again for being the cause of his knee pain.

Damned stupid stumble –

William strained his eyes on the strange discoloration ahead, his knee pain immediately forgotten.

What the hell is that?