“Little bitch, where did you learn to be such a sneak? Not from me, that’s for sure.”
“Father, please, put the bottle down. Do you need drinking money? There’s some in the house—”
I cried out and shrank back as he flung the bottle of cider at me, smashing it all over the ground by Nellie’s hooves her small calf working to suckle under her oblivious to the danger around.
Nellie shifted from one foot to the other, and I fumed.
“What do you think you’re doing?” I demanded, stepping forward and pointing a finger at him. “Why don’t you just go? Sometimes I wish you’d just drink yourself to death and free me from having to clean up after you!”
Tears streamed from my eyes as I crouched on the ground, picking up pieces of broken glass. Nellie mooed in distress, and I just hoped she didn’t decide to kick me in the face while I crouched behind her.
“You’d be happy about that, wouldn’t you, you little cunt? Happy if I died.”
From behind me, I heard sudden footsteps, and for one instant I thought maybe it was Randal, that somehow my words had summoned him like some sort of witch’s spell. But as I turned, I was taken aback to find four men in dark clothes, their tunics unadorned with any crest or symbol, light armor covering their chests and legs. They looked from me to my father, then exchanged glances.
“Who…who are you?” I stammered, trying to keep a brave face, the argument with my father forgotten.
One of them drew a dagger, staring straight at me as he flipped it end-over-end, catching the hilt in his palm again and again. “So, you’re the milkmaid,” he said, grabbing his groin and giving it a pump as he guffawed like a sailor in a bawdy house. “This is going to be fun.”
I backed away, remembering the shards of glass on my father’s workbench. If I could grab one, I’d at least have something to defend myself with. But if I made a lunge, I had a feeling I wouldn’t get very far before I felt a knife at my throat.
My father staggered around in a confused circle, looking at the men in astonishment.
“What the fuck are you doing here? Who the fuck are you?”
The men glanced side to side at one another, all grinning.
“Save it, you worthless piece of shit,” the one with the knife said to my father. “Take your bottle, go back to your house and have one last drink on us. We’ll be with you soon enough. First, we have some business to take care of with your daughter.”
The second intruder, the one on the left, began to undo his belt.
I was paralyzed, for one terrible instant, by the purest fear I had ever known. I glanced around at the broken glass, and decided it was now or never. If I was killed trying to get a weapon, at least it would be quick. I took a deep breath, and was about to lunge for the nearest long shard, but my father’s poor judgment was faster, and he rushed past me, trying to grab the intruder’s dagger—blade first.
“Fuck!” He screamed, jerking his hand back and holding it, blood dripping from his fingers. “Now just look what you’ve done! Get out of here! Get off my property!” He grabbed a spade from a nearby shelf and tried to use it as a weapon, nearly falling over in the process, which got him nothing but a roar of laughter.
The third man, who was by far the biggest and most imposing, picked up a pitchfork from where it lay leaning by the wall. The other two nodded their approval and stepped aside. And then in one astonishing, horrible movement, he plunged the pitchfork straight into my father’s belly. With a sound like a knife cutting into an apple, the four prongs ran him straight through and emerged, dripping with blood, from his back.
I scrambled backwards, all thought of grabbing a weapon forgotten as I stared in horror at my father. He lay face-up on the floor, his eyes red and bloodshot, looking confused and far-away. He placed his hand to his bloody stomach and stared at his red palm in amazement. “What? What happened?” he murmured, like the sequence of events didn’t make sense.
“Father, just…” Despite the words we’d just flung at each other, I didn’t want to see him die. Not here, anyway, not like this. He wasn’t much of a father, or much of a man, but he didn’t deserve that. “How could you?” I said, looking up at the four men. “How could you do this?”
The one that seemed in charge grinned at me. “We have our orders. And now, we’ve got some orders for you, pretty little thing.” He looked straight at my sex, while he spun his blade again and again.