PELAIR. The Gems of the Golden Serpent.

8. The Alor Castle

At the second floor of the tower, they noticed that a door opened to give way to an extended covered corridor, which seemed to lead to a three-story building, whose windows overlooked the central courtyard of the castle. They peeked through a small skylight and saw what had probably been a beautiful garden, which occupied the entire back of the tower. A roof supported by four colonnades made of stone guarded an old well from which two separate water channels, now completely dry, departed.

"What now?" asked Gertrudis, having long abandoned the initiative to lead her young companion. It was useless to contradict him because the young man was stubborn once some thought had settled in his mind.

"We have to go up and find out who attends that fire," Brannan said. "We've had enough of chases to let someone else do it again."

Cautiously, they went up the three floors. As they climbed, the walls of the tower began to disappear, likely victims of the siege that the castle had undergone long ago. Finally, they reached a sort of anteroom that gave access as well, to three different rooms by the number of doors that were there. Through one of them, they could hear what appeared to be an argument.

"Let's find out what is in those two rooms," gestured Brannan, pointing toward the doors from where no noise came.

Carefully turning the door's knob, Brannan cautiously introduced his head, noticing the room was very dark. There were no windows or skylights, so while still blinded by daylight, he could not clearly distinguish its contents. He beckoned Gertrudis to do the same with the other room.

The woman opened the other door cautiously, to confront with the back of a big man, entertained in mulling over a spit in which a little sucker was skewered and diligently roasted over a campfire.

"So this is where the smoke comes from," Gertrudis thought. She raised her head to see the column of smoke escaping through a large hole in the ceiling of the stay.

Suddenly, the big man turned around, to come face to face with a woman who watched him. In his confusion, he could not draw his dagger fast enough to stand up to such apparition. In no time, he had the sharp end of a sword at his throat. A miscalculation by Gertrudis made her brag that when threatened, the man would lose his weapon and surrender. On the contrary, the man emitted a scream, heard throughout the entire demolished complex. Alerted by the shout, a troop of men armed with swords, daggers, and axes, hurried out of the last room, coming to the passage without giving Brannan and Toto time to react. In a moment, they were surrounded and outnumbered.

The trio had had the misfortune of prying into the tower when a group of what appeared to be a band of outlaws readied to leave the castle.

The men wore rawhide trousers and coats of raw linen, covered by breastplates made of small leather straps sewn together. Most had long hair pulled back and tied with a braid.

Gertrudis meanwhile, circled the plump man that just before roasted his piglet and thrusting her sword to his back, forced him to leave the room to go where her friends were.

"Stay away from my companions or this potbellied will die!" tried Gertrudis to bluff that party of warriors to free Brannan and Toto, although she was almost sure that her bravado would not deceive them. However, she did not lose anything by trying.

"Pierce him thoroughly if it pleases you!" replied haughtily with an accent, who seemed to be the leader of that band. "We have cooks to spare," drawled the man with a guttural accent.

Gertrudis had no choice but to lower her sword and was quickly surrounded by some of those outlaws.

Immediately, the men proceeded to disarm their captives, booting the sword from the woman's hands. They struck Toto with the handle of a sword on his skull when he refused to hand over the pole he carried.