The Siege Scare (3 page)

‘C
OME TO THE ARMOURY
,' said Smith. ‘We should work out exactly how many weapons we've got. If those brutes manage to breach the walls, we'll need a weapon for every man, woman and child in the castle.'

When they entered the dim room Tommy ran immediately to the sword chamber to see if her friends were all right. To her relief, the black and white cat was crouched in the corner beside the Old Wrecks.

‘Lil! Thank goodness you're safe!'

‘Only just,' replied Lil. ‘I was almost hit by an arrow.' The cat, who always seemed so calm, looked shaken.

‘What is it, Sword Girl? What's going on?' Jasper asked urgently.

‘It's the knights of Malice Castle,' Tommy said. ‘We're under siege!'

Back in the armoury, Smith was stoking the fire.

‘We're in a tight spot here, Sword Girl,' he said. ‘Sir Malcolm's men have the castle and the town surrounded. We'll hold them off for as long as we can, but even if Sir Hugh and his men returned now, I don't like their chances against a hundred enemies. We need Sir Benedict and the rest of the knights, but whether we'll be able to defend the castle until they return is anyone's guess.'

‘Can't we get a message to Sir Benedict?' Tommy asked. ‘Then he'd return straight away.'

The smith shook his head. ‘If only it were that simple. But Roses Castle is a full day's ride away. And we can't risk opening the gate to let a horse and rider out. The invaders would storm the castle.' He stared gloomily into the fire. ‘I'm afraid we're trapped here until help comes. If help comes …'

Tommy shivered. So the castle walls that protected them were also their prison. ‘But they won't be able to get in, will they?'

‘They'll be having a good go,' said Smith. ‘They'll try to crash through the gate with a battering ram long enough to reach across the moat, and they'll try to scale the walls with long ladders.' He poked at the fire. ‘We'll have to make sure the guards in the towers have poles so they can knock the attackers off their ladders.'

‘I wish I still had my lance from the tournament,' Tommy declared. ‘I'd knock them off.'

‘You're right, Sword Girl – lances would do the job nicely. But all our lances are with the squires who'll be jousting at Roses. Unless …' He looked up from the fire. ‘There might be some old weapons in the cellar.'

‘I thought the cellar was for storing food?' said Tommy.

‘Did you ever go down to the cellar when you worked in the kitchen, Sword Girl?' asked the smith.

‘No,' said Tommy. The door to the cellar was locked with a key, and the cook never let anyone go down there. ‘Mrs Moon always said that the cellar was her treasure vault and she wasn't letting anyone near her treasure.'

The smith nodded. ‘True enough. If we're to survive under siege, the castle's food stores will be more valuable to us than all Sir Walter's gold and Lady Beatrix's jewels. But the cellar is vast – there's more than food down there. The castle's old weapons will be there too. I want you to go down to the cellar and see what weapons we have, then report back to me.'

‘Yes, Smith,' said Tommy.

‘Oh, and Sword Girl? You might want to take a weapon with you – just in case.'

Tommy darted back into the sword chamber. ‘Jasper,' she said to the slender sword, ‘will you come with me to the cellar? Smith wants me to look for weapons down there.'

‘Of course,' said Jasper, and Tommy took hold of the narrow wooden grip and slid the sword from the rack.

‘You're going to the cellar?' quavered Nursie. ‘Oh, please be careful, my dears. What if my little darling really did find a tunnel in the cellar? The invaders might find it too!'

Tommy stared at the sabre. ‘Nursie, you're brilliant!' she exclaimed.

‘I – I am?' said Nursie.

‘Yes,' said Tommy. ‘Smith said we couldn't get a message to Sir Benedict because there was no way out of the castle. But maybe there is a way.'

‘Good thinking, Tommy,' said Lil.

‘Maybe you could come too, Lil, and help me look,' Tommy suggested. ‘You're much better at seeing in the dark than I am.'

‘An excellent plan,' said Bevan Brumm.

‘What's an excellent plan?' Nursie asked.

‘Why am I brilliant? I don't understand.' She sounded bewildered.

Tommy lifted her sword. ‘The tunnel,' she said. ‘Never mind about the invaders – I'm going to find it first!'

CHAPTER 4

T
HE PALE LIGHT
of dawn was creeping across the sky when Tommy stepped into the courtyard. The shower of flaming arrows had slowed, leaving charred patches of stone.

She picked her way across the courtyard towards the kitchen, skirting boulders and taking care to avoid the smouldering piles of ashes as the last of the arrows burned down.

‘Please!' a voice nearby said, and Tommy turned to see the small, round figure of the physician. He appeared to be pleading with the pigeon, who was perched on a low wall.

‘Certainly not,' the bird was saying in a cross voice. ‘Your constant demand for my droppings is an insult to my skill and training.'

‘But a guard in one of the watchtowers has suffered a nasty burn,' the physician argued. ‘I need to mix your droppings with some grated cucumber to make a cure.'

The pigeon groaned. ‘Very well. If you must.'

Tommy hurried on, knowing how the pigeon disliked people watching when he gave his droppings.

She entered the kitchen to find Mrs Moon standing by the enormous fireplace, stirring a large pot of soup.

The cook's face was creased with worry as she stared at the simmering soup. ‘He's a devil is Sir Malcolm the Mean,' she was muttering to herself. ‘If Sir Benedict doesn't return in time to save us, we might find ourselves in the dungeons of Malice Castle. Or worse …'

Tommy's heart thudded. She didn't want to know what could be worse than the dungeons!

‘Mrs Moon,' she said, ‘Smith asked me to go down to the cellar to look for old weapons.'

‘Thomasina!' The cook put a hand to her chest. ‘You startled me.' She shook her wooden spoon at Tommy. ‘This isn't a good time to go sneaking up on people, girl.'

‘Sorry, Mrs Moon,' Tommy murmured, though she hadn't meant to sneak up.

‘What's that you're wanting? The cellar? That's a fine idea. I don't know how long this siege might last. I'd better go down myself to check the stores.'

The cook led the way to a small wooden door in the scullery and pulled a big iron key from her pocket. She took a candlestick from a niche in the wall and gestured for Tommy to take one too.

‘It'll be mighty dark down there,' she warned.

Down, down, down they went, into the dark. The cold of the stone steps seeped through Tommy's clothes and shoes to chill her bones.

She clutched Jasper Swann in one hand and the candlestick in the other. ‘Are you there, Lil?' she whispered. There was no answer, but Tommy felt something warm brush against her leg and knew her friend was beside her.

Finally the stairs stopped, and Tommy lifted her candle. They were standing in a small, low-ceilinged room that had a doorway leading off to the left and another leading off to the right.

‘The food stores are kept in these rooms under the kitchen,' Mrs Moon told her, pointing to the doorway on the left. ‘But the cellar runs all the way under the great hall as well. That's where the weapons are likely to be.' She gestured to the right with her candle.

Tommy set off, entering a room that had barrels of ale and cider stacked against the walls. A door led to another room full of barrels and then another. As she walked through room after room her heart sank. She found dusty piles of tapestries that must have once hung on the walls of the great hall, a room full of bolts of cloth that had been long forgotten (except by the insects that had chewed holes in it), and another room full of tarnished armour. Her spirits rose slightly when she found a room of rusty shields and blunt swords. They weren't in very good condition but they would be better than nothing. There were no lances, though, and to her dismay there was no sign of a tunnel.

‘Perhaps Nursie was right the first time,' she said aloud. ‘Maybe there was no tunnel, and Sir Walter was just making it up.'

‘And yet it makes so much sense to have a tunnel,' Jasper pointed out. ‘There has to be some secret way out of the castle during a siege.'

‘I agree,' said Lil, her eyes glinting in the dark.

‘I suppose if it's secret, it has to be well hidden,' Tommy said. ‘Let's look again.'

They went back through the series of rooms, this time poking into every dark corner, but there was still no sign of a tunnel. They had almost reached the stairs to the kitchen when Tommy heard Lil's muffled voice.

‘I think I've found something.'

‘Where are you?' said Tommy, raising her candle so that light bounced off the barrels stacked against the walls.