It wasn’t even dawn yet when I woke up. For a short instance, I wondered why I was still wearing my clothes and how I had ended up in the hay. Then all came back to me and I wished I was still asleep.
All was silent except the rustling of the sheep. With my hand, I reached up, to feel my hair poofing up all ways. I realised I had not brushed or washed it since yesterday morning. I smelled sweaty. I smelled like sheep.

I got up, wondering what I should do next. Staying in the village seemed no longer an option. I thought I could hide out into the hills for a while, coming back later and pretending that Millie had gone back to this New York of hers. It was the best plan I had, until I remembered that I had left all my stuff in the room with her. Whatever I was going to do, I decided that I needed my personal belongings first. Grudgingly I understood that it was not Gran who had trapped me, but myself. I had to go back. 
Fist, I sneaked into my own orchard, picking as much apples as I could carry and devouring them for breakfast. It wasn’t great - most of the fruits were still small and green, and extremely sour. To this day, I’m still bitter over the fact that Gran did not even let me have porridge before I went, but at that moment I just accepted it as another setback in the downward spiral that my life had become.

As I had no other reasons to linger, however hard I was trying to find one, I eventually had no choice but to set food on the road again. I crossed the distance much faster without company or luggage, and arrived in Claywold just after sunset. It had become very chilly. In the lantern light that the buildings of the village emitted I observed the little puffs of vapour that were my breath.
The Common Barrel Bar seemed inviting, despite the peeled off paint. I stepped inside, feeling nervous, wondering whether Millie was still here.
She wasn’t in the taproom, but upon inquiring the pub owner told me that, yes, that room was still occupied. So I went upstairs, hesitating in front of the closed door. I couldn’t hear a thing - maybe she was sleeping already?

I knocked, the sound of it in the silence startling even myself. When no reply came, I pulled the door open, peering inside.
‘Millie?’
She sat on the bed, her legs pulled up high, chin resting on her knees. She seemed forlorn.
If there’s something I hate, it is people stating the obvious when I’m perfectly capable of noticing myself. Like: “look, it’s raining!” when I’m already soaked to the bone, or: “Be careful, it’s hot,” when I was just jumping up and down, nurturing my burned hand. ‘So, you’re still here,’ I said.
She merely nodded.
Awkward silence followed. In an attempt to keep my composure, I closed the door as slowly and carefully as possible. Then I scratched my nose, tugged a lock of hair behind my ear and sniffed, as if my nose was runny. 
‘Where d’you go?’ she asked eventually.
‘I…well, something came up, I kind of had to…’
‘I thought you had gone,’ she said.
‘Err- yeah. I’m sorry. I would’ve left you a note if I could write. I just -’ I was going to say “I just came to retrieve my stuff”, but looking upon her crestfallen face I found myself incapable of telling her the truth. ‘So, I’m back now.’
She looked at me with a sad face for a little bit longer. It reminded me of a doe, with those big, brimming eyes.
‘Don’t look at me like that!’ I said, forcing my voice to sound cheerful. ‘I really wasn’t going to leave you like this!’
‘It’s not that,’ she answered, rubbing her nose. ‘But I like you. I want us to be friends!’
‘Oh,’ I said, taken aback. ‘Um. Thanks.’
‘Anyway,’ she said, much more cheerful now. ‘I questioned some of the guests around here, you know, about the sword. Some of them told me they’d seen a man carry it off.’
Glad to change the subject, I asked: ‘Did they tell you what he looked like?’
‘No, none of them had actually seen him very clearly, it seems. But they did tell me in what direction he’d gone, so I followed his tracks and asked the villagers if they had seen him come their way.’
I had to admit it: I was mildly impressed with her. ‘And?’
‘As far as I could trace him, he went due north.’
‘Due north,’ I repeated, raising my eyebrows. ‘That’s Devilswood.’
‘Do you think we could follow him? Try to get the sword back?’
‘Hm.’ I was not very eager to venture into those regions, as they were known to be rough and male dominated. Then again, it was a long shot away from Merope and her cities. ‘Well, I suppose we could always try.’

We had our dinner in the taproom. I was so grateful for some solid, warm food that I ordered a second helping.
It was crowded, so we had to share our long, rectangular table with at least five others. I supposed they were tipsy, as they were making a lot of noise. Millie shied away when they started firing questions at her: where she lived, how old she was, whether she’d care for a date. Eventually, I banged with my fist on the table, telling them to leave her alone.
‘Oh, that’s one envious little thing,’ one of them laughed, red-faced and fat. ‘We can’t all be so pretty as your little friend here, though, miss.’

I took my jug and poured the water over his plate, which was still half full.

This silenced the table, eyes all turned to me.
‘That’s not very nice,’ one of the fat man’s mates eventually uttered.
‘Well, he wasn’t very nice to me, either,’ I returned. ‘I know I’m not exactly dashing, but I didn’t need to hear that from a man twice the size of a common barrel.’
Next to me, the fat man hiccoughed.
I held the water jug high, threatening, but he raised a hand in defeat. ‘I would like to finish me food, miss.’
‘Well, alright.’ I put the jug down. Opposite me, Millie was eying me with what I thought was admiration. I smiled a bit embarrassed.
‘Actually,’ one of the men said, still looking at me, ‘you’re a bit rebellious, aren’t you?’
‘Excuse me?’
‘No miss, no insults intended. I was jus’ wonderin’ whether you’d be familiar with them Rough Rebels. You seem like one ‘o them.’
‘Err,’ I responded, nonplussed. ‘I’m not part of anything. What the hell are the Rough Rebels?’
‘Comedians,’ one said.
‘Nah, they’re con men,’ another said.
‘Street performers!’
‘Circus freaks, me wife calls them.’
‘Yeah, either way…’ the first person said, leaning over on his elbows. ‘What’er they are, one thing’s for sure - they’re all actually tryin’ to break in ter Merope. Wants to see her hanged, they say.’
I made an unintentional gesture, slightly spastic come to think of it. It must’ve looked weird as well, though I was actually glad that the men mistook it for annoyance.
‘Well, like I said, no insults intended,’ the man said, before retreating to his food. I sat still for a minute, wishing he hadn’t said anything with Millie around. When I finally did look up to meet her eyes, she looked absolutely neutral.
I got up. ‘Come on. Let’s tug in for the night.’
We retreated to our room, where I finally got to wash myself, because someone had placed a washing bowl in our room. The water was lukewarm and wonderful and, to my embarrassment, pretty darn dirty when I had finished with it.
I waited until she, too, and climbed into bed and then blew out the candle.
Life can do unexpected stuff, I realised at this point. Here I was, sharing the room that I had intended to leave. And instead of my own bed, where I so longed for but would be gone forever now, I lay between these unfamiliar, cold sheets. Darn.
I heard Millie rustling next to me in the dark. ‘You’re not thinking anything stupid, are you?’ I asked.
‘About what?’
‘You know what about. Those rebels they mentioned below.’
She made a noncommittal sound, turned and became silent.
I sighed.

‘Let me ask you this one thing,’ I said to her, while we were on our way from Claywold to Devilswood. ‘Are you really not interested in these Rough Rebels, or whatever their name was?’
It was one of those delightful autumn days, where the sun stood low and treated the world to a magnificent golden shower. Red and yellow leafs seemed to be on fire. The air was crisp, not unpleasant.
Millie shrugged. ‘Right now, I just want to get my sword back.’
‘It isn’t exactly your sword,’ I pointed out. ‘It’s a monument of the people from Sword And Stone.’
‘They didn’t mind.’
‘Did you ever tell them that you were from…well, over there?’ I asked curiously.
‘I had to when I pulled the sword out.’
‘Why?’
‘I don’t think they would have taken me for one of you anyway,’ she said. ‘Not for long.’
‘Hmm,’ I said, ‘nah, probably not. So that’s why they sent you to Gran?’
‘Partly, I think. I mean, pulling a mouldy sword from a stone is one thing, even if they say that the Fairy Folk placed it there. But someone doing that while arriving from a different world...They must have thought it to be quite eccentric.’
  ‘Hmm,’ I said again. I had to admit - if it was, it would indeed be unusual. 

Devilswood wasn’t just around the corner. Of course, I had the map to orientate me with, even though I just had to look at the pictures and could not read the actual signs. But still, I warned Millie that we might do some intensive wandering before we got to the place of destination.
At night, we curled up in our blankets, praying that it would stay dry. Of course, we weren’t always that lucky. Some mornings, we’d get up, wet like a dog swimming in the river. Our woollen blankets almost too heavy to carry when drenched, we had no choice but to wait for them to dry.
There were other problems about camping with no actual tent. One night, when I had just slumbered off, Millie’s screech roughly got me back in the land of the waking. When I gasped what was wrong, she was already pulling all her blankets aside, telling me she was sure she had felt something crawling between her feet.

I fumbled for the lantern and the matches, lit the beeswax candle to - literally - try and shine some light on the case.
‘There’s nothing,’ I said eventually.
Millie was shivering in her pink dress. ‘Yes, there is. I’m sure I felt it!’
I held the lantern over the messy blankets once more. ‘Well, I can’t see - wait -’
The light spilled over the folds of Millie’s dress, close to her knees. ‘Stop moving,’ I told her.
‘Why, what is…?’ She looked down, and then gasped even louder than before.
A bug the size of my thumb and even broader clung to the pink fabric, close to the bare skin. Millie started flapping her hands panicky. The bug moved its paws.
‘Hold still!’ I commanded her again.
She obeyed, staring at it. ‘Get it off me,’ she pleaded with a thin voice.
‘Err…’ Touching the friggin’ bug was like the last thing I wanted to do. It looked grotesque in the eldritch lantern light, wholly capable of snatching my fingers with its antlers and crushing them. I feverishly looked for something to scrape it off with, finally getting hold of a branch. It worked; the bug fell on its back in the grass, turned over and scampered off into the dark. Or at least, I hoped it was actually moving away from us.
‘There,’ I said. ‘All gone.’
‘That was the most horrible thing I’ve ever seen!’
‘Yeah, it was pretty ugly.’
We were both positively trembling now. From the chill, I thought, not from fright.
‘I never thought you’d be scared of bugs, Daffodil.’
‘Like I said,’ I mumbled, ‘it was pretty ugly. ‘Now get back in the blankets before we freeze.’
I did like I had said, but she remained staring at them.
‘What if there’s more?’
‘Course there isn’t more.’
She rearranged the covers, finally lying back down. ‘I’m not comfortable.’
‘D-don’t be silly. What are the odds of another one crawling in like that?’ As I said this, I tugged my own blankets tightly around my body, willing myself to be as isolated from the ground as possible. ‘Now, go to sleep. The sooner you’re off, the sooner it will be morning.’
‘Will you leave the lantern on?’
‘Yeah,’ I said. ‘I’ll do that.’


I had always imagined Devilswood like a sombre, stony place. Before princess Merope’s ancestors had settled in Redwood, a feudal centre had been located here. A half-crumbled stronghold was a remnant of this.
Now, however, flags and banners hung out, somewhere up the street a music band played. I wondered if I had missed National Holiday.
‘There are so many people,’ whispered Millie, as we slowly made our way through the packed-up streets. ‘How are we ever going to find the one that stole our sword here?’
I had no idea and told her so. ‘Maybe we should just find a place to stay. First things first.’
I deliberately failed to mention that we were almost out of money. Another few nights in a comfy pub or tavern would leave us penniless.
I picked the shabbiest place I could find, ignoring Millie’s highly doubtful looks. I would discuss our financial status later. Maybe we should find a quick daytime job to upgrade our budget. Right now I just enjoyed the sensation of throwing the rucksack off, as it had pained my shoulders for the last couple of hours.
‘I bet I have blusters all over the place,’ groaned Millie, as she sank on the bed and took her boots off. ‘My feet are killing me.’
‘That’s the price for traveling,’ I sighed, inspecting my own bed. It looked a whole lot less clean than the beds in The Common Barrel Bar. It was probably crawled with little insects. I shut my eyes, trying not to think of the microscopic ecosystem right beneath my sheets.


Chapter Five
Getting our way

This is how we found out why the town was decorated and in such festive moods:
‘It is our annual festival,’ the bartender in our tavern told us.
‘What do you celebrate?’ Millie asked.
‘Ah, some kind of independence day. That’s all a farce, of course.’ He spat on the counter, which I found enormously revolting. ‘Still, nothing like a good party, we say. So we still go out an’ cheer.’
I wondered if princess Merope knew that Devilswood celebrated an independence day. I wondered if she cared.
‘If you want to know what our festival’s like, you gals should check out the tournament. It starts this afternoon.’
‘What tournament?’ I asked.
‘Some challenges. I don’t know what it’s gonna be like, it changes every year, see. But the first prize will be a fair amount of money. Always is.’
‘How much money?’ Millie asked, firing up.
The man grinned. ‘That got your attention, eh? Let’s say you won’t be sleepin’ down here if you had that bag of coins on you.’
‘Interesting.’ She turned to me. ‘You did say that we were short on our funds.’
‘I did, but I’m not so sure about this tournament thing.’
‘If you wanna join,’ the bartender said, ‘you better hurry and sign up before it’s full.’
‘Imagine, Daffodil! Not having to worry about beetles at night!’
‘Oh, alright,’ I sighed, giving in. ‘I suppose it can’t hurt to go and check it out at least.’

It wasn’t easy getting to the large square where the tournament was supposed to start. A crowd larger than I’d ever seen had gathered there.
‘I know one thing for sure,’ I told Millie as we fought our way through to the centre, ‘if these are all contestants we won’t stand a chance.’
In the middle of the square was a stage. It looked like it had been hastily build up with barrels and planks. Two uneven pillars supported it on the front corners, both enfolded with a string of garland, like ivy around a tree.
Next to me, Millie suddenly let out a gasp and nudged me hard in my side. ‘Daffodil, look!’
I looked. On the far end of the stage, another smaller pedestal had been raised. Stalled out on it were, as I assumed, the prizes. Highest was a bag, probably brimming with coins. On its left stood what was probably the third prize: a glass candy jar, full to the rim. And to the right of the money bag stood something that was slim and pointy, and the reason of Millie’s gasping.
Because it was her sword.