Looking down from her tree branch perch into the darkness below, Melitta repeated Sir George's words in her head. It wasn't a bad plan. It wasn't.
Then why did she feel like there were snakes writhing in her belly?
She shifted again, searching in vain for a comfortable spot on the hard tree branch. There was the trap, made of timber hastily nailed together this afternoon. It was barely visible in the moonlight now. The earthy smell of truffles and mushrooms filled the air, hopefully enough to entice the boar into the trap. If that bait wasn't enough, it sat at the foot of an oak tree, amid the remains of a century's worth of acorns.
Even Sir George had said the bait should be sufficient, but after several hours of sitting out here in the cold dark, Melitta wondered if perhaps they should have taken the advice of a man they met in the tavern. He had insisted that the only way to lure a pig was with the scent of fermented apples. Melitta had been on the verge of agreeing to include some apples in the bait, when the man had promptly offered to sell her a barrel of cider for a price higher than her mother would pay for a bale of silk. Yet now she was tempted to climb down from her tree, and venture to the tavern to see if she could acquire some of the overpriced cider. Anything to end her vigil.
Wait, was that movement?
Melitta squinted down the road. No, it was just the baker. He'd opened a window to set the rising bread dough on the windowsill. If he was baking already, then dawn would soon follow. The end of the night with no sign of their bloody boar, or sleep for her, either.
But wait…was that?
Yes!
A hulking shadow, low to the ground, passed in front of the bakery, ambling at a pace that showed the boar was in no hurry. Then it stopped and lifted its head so that its snout and tusks were clearly outlined against the light coming from the baker's window. Melitta's stomach lurched. Tusks like that could gut a man. She didn't even want to think of what it would do to her.
If he gored her, would the tusks go all the way through and come out her back?
She shut down that thought as quickly as it had come. Pigs couldn't climb trees, so she was safe up on her perch. She just had to wait for the animal to enter the trap, so that she could spring it, and the deed would be done.
She held her breath as the boar approached. Still in no hurry, it paused to sniff the ground before taking a few steps and lowering its snout to the soil once more. Slowly, slowly fate was closing in on the beast. It was a good plan, just like Sir George had said.
Moonlight shimmered on the dew-dropped leaves below her, before it abruptly winked out. The boar stood at the very entrance of their trap. Four steps would carry it all the way in, she decided, and then it would be trapped. No more terrorising the town for this pig.
Two steps. A long moment of snuffling, disturbing the moonlit leaves. Another step.
Melitta's lungs screamed for air, but she didn't dare inhale. Just one more, she begged the beast.
The beast trotted forward and buried its snout in a pile of mushrooms.
Melitta wanted to cheer, but she knew she couldn't. Not until the gate was closed. Now she tugged on the rope fastened to the gate below. It wasn't till she heard the latch click shut that she finally let herself breathe again. It was done. They'd captured the boar.
Sir George clambered down from his tree. Though he had said killing the boar was her task, in the end he had agreed to wield the spear that killed it.
So the knight took up a spear, hefting it in his hand as he approached the gate. The pig did not hear him at first, for it was too busy feasting on the bait. But he must've made some noise that alerted it, for the pig started, turned, and faced him.
Instead of throwing the spear directly into the pig's chest, as the beast presented him with the perfect target, George hesitated.
The pig did not. It charged at the gate. Which, to Melitta's horror, swung open. Somehow, it hadn't closed properly, and now the boar was no longer trapped, but it most certainly was enraged.
With a spear in his hand, George still stood in the perfect position to kill the beast. Melitta watched in awe, waiting.
George had other ideas. He took to his heels and fled, with the boar not far behind.
Sir George was a coward? Melitta couldn't believe it, yet the evidence was right there before her eyes.
George headed for the only sanctuary either of them could see – the lit bakery. He wrenched open the door, and flung himself inside, but he didn't get a chance to shut the door before the boar followed him in.
A great commotion arose from the bakery, culminating in the door slamming shut. Which might have been good except both George and the boar were still inside.
Melitta crept down from her tree. She wasn't sure what to do, but she couldn't just sit there and do nothing. She snatched up the spare spears, and carried them to the bakery. She was George's assistant, after all, and if he needed more weapons, it was her job to provide them. And she might learn something from watching the battle, she told herself. She crept toward the lit window, the volume of the clattering and crashing increasing with every step. Finally she was close enough to peer through the open shutters. She raised her head for scarcely a moment, before she had to duck to avoid being hit by the body flying out the window.
Sir George rolled, crouched, then clambered to his feet. He dusted himself off before he seized the spear from Melitta.
"That beast is going to die," he said through gritted teeth, advancing on the window.
But the boar, rampaging through the wrecked bakery, was hard to sight between the overturned tables and smashed furniture. Then it tore into a bag of flour and powder filled the air, making it even harder to see.
The beast shook its head, scattering flour everywhere, but it was unable to dislodge the bag from its tusks. It ran around madly, trampling everything in its path, until the bag finally flew off and landed in the fire. The empty flour sack began to smoke.
"There!" George hissed, loosing a spear. He caught the boar in the chest, but that didn't seem to slow the beast any. If anything, the pain only goaded it into greater action. It stampeded around the house, until it managed to dislodge the spear. Blood droplets dotted the floury floor as the pig's eyes seemed to grow red in the firelight. Lowering its tusks, the boar charged at George, only to be stopped by the wall beneath the window. George readied another spear but he only managed to jab at the pig before it darted away with an angry squeal. Melitta couldn't even tell if he'd wounded it this time.
What followed, Melitta could only call a battle of wills between Sir George and the beast. The beast would charge George, George would attempt to stab it with a spear, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. Then the beast would retreat, only to charge George again. Minutes passed, or maybe it was hours. Melitta could not be sure. Finally she was left holding the last spear. The others lay splintered inside the bakery, except for the one George still held his hand. The boar disappeared into the fog of smoke and flour, so that this time when it charged, it surprised Melitta. Yet something in her refused to just sit and watch this time. With George square in front of the window, she couldn't line up a perfect shot with the beast's chest, but she could at least do some damage, she decided.
Tightening her grip on the spear, she offered up a prayer to anyone who was listening: Let this battle end now.
George's spear struck it in the chest, and the boar lifted its head to let out a screech of pain.
Melitta took her chance, burying the point of her spear in the soft flesh at its throat. The boar backed up, tearing the spear from its flesh even as it ripped the weapon out of her hand. A gout of blood erupted into a crimson waterfall that turned the white flour into red mud. The beast tottered for a moment, as if drunk on the cider Melitta had denied it, before it collapsed for the final time.
"We did it," she said, surprised at how shaky her voice sounded. Heroes should have steadier voices, so she tried again. "We did it." There, that was better.
"I'd say that you have," a deep voice said behind her.
Melitta whirled. Somehow, while the battle had raged, the entire town had assembled behind them, and the dawn lit up their distinctly unfriendly faces.
"You destroyed the only bakery in town, and my house," the baker continued.
George drew himself up. "Your boar did that, not us," he said. "If we hadn't stopped him, he might've rampaged through your town. Who knows how much more damage he would have caused?"
A hard-eyed woman stepped forward. "That beast never attacked buildings, just people. And where will I get my bread tomorrow, now? All the dough was trampled in the dirt." She pointed at George's feet.
Only now did Melitta realise that George must have swept the bread dough off the windowsill when he dived out of the bakery.
"We'll pay for the bread out of our reward," George began.
The baker turned red. "Your reward won't even pay for half of the flour that beast destroyed. Seems to me you should be paying the town for the damage you caused. You're worse than any pig."
Melitta bit her lip, knowing before she did what she would read in the minds of the townsfolk. They had to get out of there, and fast.
"We should go," she murmured to George, tugging urgently at his arm.
He glanced at her, then said, "We'll just get our things and our horses and be on our way then." He made as if to march through the crowd to the inn.
The townspeople were having none of it. They closed ranks, barring his way, and it all went downhill from there.