The Robber Knight's Secret

19. The Walls of Jericho

Ayla gestured to the wooden monster rising above the enemy camp in the distance. "Once it is up, that thing will be able shoot through our walls, Dilli. Who says it won't also also shoot over our walls? What if one of the boulders they will hurl at us flies right over the outer and inner wall and into one of the buildings where the women and children are quartered? Can you imagine what a rock which can punch through castle walls will do to thin wooden walls and the people behind them?"

Dilli's face paled.

"Exactly." Ayla nodded, starting towards the tower stairs. "The soldiers have to stay on the walls, in case the bombardment is just a distraction from another kind of attack. But we have to find the safest place in the castle for the women and children to hide until the danger is past. Come."

"But, Milady..." Dilli was looking back and forth between her mistress and enemy camp in the distance. "Surely they won't really start firing at us? Surely, um... he will be in time?"

There was no need to ask which he Dilli was talking about. They both knew very well.

Ayla felt the surge of violent images return, stronger than ever. Reuben hurt, Reuben in chains... She pushed them down with all her strength. He had to fight his fight—and she had to fight hers.

She was ripped from her thoughts by a sudden swishing sound, a sound like the wings of the angel of death. She looked up just in time to see a motion out of the corner of her eyes, like a giant mantis striking out at its prey. The motion was gone from the night as quickly as a flash, but it was followed by a groan that seemed to come from the very bowels of hell. It rose and fell in a rhythmic chant that made Ayla's skin crawl with fear.

Turning, she searched the landscape for any attacker, anything close that could have uttered this unearthly cry. Nothing.

"What was that?" Dilli rushed towards her mistress. "Milady, what—" Quickly, Ayla held up a hand, stopping her friend in mid-step. "Be quiet! I think it's..."

The noise of the deadly angel's wings returned. Rising, growing above the hellish groan, it drowned out Ayla's voice and made fear surge within her. Not for Reuben, this time, but for everyone within the castle. Dilli fell to her knees, clasping her hands in prayer, and Ayla had half a mind to join her.

Please no! They can't already be—

An Explosion ripped the night apart and the castle wall shuddered. For a moment, Ayla thought the trumpets of God were about to sound and bring down the walls in retribution for her sins. She clutched at the parapet, trying to keep her knees from buckling. The spray of dirt from below hit her right in the face.

"Milady!" Jumping up from her kneeling position, Dilli rushed toward her, terror on her sweet face. "What happened? Your face, your beautiful dress...!"

"Never mind the dress," Ayla told her, spitting out bits of clover. She reached up and plucked an earthworm from her head that had somehow found its way into her hair. "Look."

Putting the earthworm down carefully on one of the crenels—the poor creature had suffered more than enough—she pointed down to a dark something on the ground far below them. Together, they leaned out between the crenels.

"I-is this what I think it is, Milady?"

"I'm afraid so." Ayla answered, grimly.

Down there on the ground, only a few feet away from the castle walls, a dark crater had opened in the earth like a fresh wound. At its center sat a ball of dark stone, as big as an ox's head, partly buried in the dirt.

Slowly, they raised their eyes towards where, in the distance, the arm of the trebuchet was swinging in the wind, sending its hellish groan up towards the heavens.