George and Melitta dragged barrels and bales from the longhouse, stacking them up in the clearing outside. He couldn't help darting worried glances at the bandits each time they were in view, but the thunderous snoring was oddly reassuring.
Then Melitta came out of the door, carrying a burning brand.
"We could just leave," George suggested. "Let the king's men catch up with them and administer justice."
"I won't let them rape another woman," Melitta insisted.
His blood ran cold. "Did they…?" he began, staring at her.
She glared back. "No. And if we kill them before they wake, they won't." She hefted her makeshift torch.
"You can't burn the building. It's sod. The best it will do is smoulder," George told her. He felt oddly relieved by the admission. She would have worked it out on her own, he reasoned.
She kicked a nearby crate in frustration. "Then how are we supposed to kill them and claim the bounty on their heads?"
The bounty? George felt lightheaded. They didn't stand a chance against six men, each of them easily twice his size.
Melitta wasn't paying attention to him. Instead, she fished about inside the crate she'd kicked. "Perfect," she breathed. "We'll shoot them."
"What?"
Melitta straightened, holding a crossbow in each hand. "There's a dozen of these, and quarrels, too. Load them and stack them –" she surveyed the clearing "– beside those two trees. They give a good view of the door to the longhouse. When they emerge, we'll shoot them. No need to reload if all the bows are ready to go."
George's stomach roiled. Shooting a man from an ambush hardly seemed more honourable than killing one in his sleep. "We don't need the bounty," he lied weakly.
Melitta shoved the crossbows at him. "Load them, I said. You owe me a horse. I'm not walking home," she said. She grabbed another armload of weapons and began winding the first one up. When she'd finished, she dropped the rest at his feet. "I'll light up the roof." She advanced with her brand again, touching it to the longhouse. The sod began to smoulder in places, flaring into flame where dried grass had taken root.
"It won't be enough. The smoke is outside, not in," George told her. Though his heart rebelled against it, urging him to run, he continued loading the crossbows in accordance with her command.
Melitta frowned at the roof. "Then I'll have to go inside and light the place up. Starting with that smelly pallet." Before George could stop her or call a warning to be careful, Melitta marched back into the longhouse with murder in her eyes.
For a long moment, he waited, listening to the click of each crossbow before he set it in readiness beside its fellows. Seconds ticked by and his heart sank at the thought of having to go in after Melitta to save her. Would he be too late?
Shouldering the final crossbow, George took a step toward the door.
Melitta erupted from the longhouse, sprinting toward him. "Fire!" she cried, pointing behind her.
So she'd lit it, George thought, until he realised that wasn't what she meant at all. An angry giant of a man burst out of the door after her. George fired the crossbow. The bolt caught the man in the throat, and he collapsed on the ground with a gurgle before he lay still.
"One down, five to go," Melitta said, pointing a bow at the dark doorway. She had a smudge of soot on her cheek, but her eyes blazed with fire.
Once again, George fell in love.
"Get him!"
Melitta fired before George could even aim. Her bolt caught the man in the belly. She swore, picked up another bow, and fired again. This one penetrated his forehead, felling him like the tree George had pretended to help him carry here.
He didn't have time to reflect on it, though, for two men fought to get out of the doorway next, and they both had to choose their targets. His first shot missed both of them, to George's dismay, but the second one plunged into his quarry's thigh. Before George could fire again, Melitta's quarrel found his chest.
"Four!" she cried, reaching down for another weapon.
The fifth man charged out of the door, straight at her, bellowing, "Witch!"
Melitta dropped her bow in surprise.
Thank the heavens the man hadn't seen George, for George had scarcely a moment to bring his bow up to fire at the man before the giant reached Melitta. He wasn't fast enough to stop him, either – the man crashed into Melitta, throwing her to the ground. She managed to tug out her dagger and plunged it into his side before either of them realised he'd stopped moving. The fletching of George's bolt stuck out behind the man's ear.
Melitta rolled the man off her with difficulty. George moved to help, but she hissed, "Watch the door. There's still one left!"
The sixth man had already made it out the doorway, but instead of heading for them, he took off at a run. George didn't think. He paused only to snatch up a second bow before he was off after the man, trying to get a clear shot as the giant weaved through the trees.
As if by magic, a crossbow quarrel sprouted from the man's back, and he keeled over, face first. When George reached him, he wasn't sure if the man was alive or dead. He prodded the man's shoulder with his bow. "Get up," he said.
The man rolled, seizing George's bow in one hand and bringing a blade up with the other.
A bolt pierced the man's eye, and the knife dropped from his fingers as he fell back to the ground, lifeless.
George turned.
Melitta stood a dozen yards away, crossbow clutched to her side, with a look of grim satisfaction on her face. "He didn't deserve a quick death. None of his victims got one."
George looked askance at her, not trusting his voice. She'd killed a man. No, she'd killed four. He'd killed two. For all his talk of heroism and honour, he'd never killed a man before today.
"Not all the girls these men took were sold as slaves. This one liked to torture them, sticking knives into them so they bled to death while he raped them. He wanted to do the same to me." Melitta kicked the corpse.
George drew in a shaky breath. If she was right, these men deserved to die. Bandits, with bounties on their heads, he reminded himself. A bounty they could use to replace what they lost in Sanglier.
"See if you can find some sacks," George found himself saying.
Melitta frowned at him. "What for?"
George dropped to his knees and reached for the dead man's blade. "We'll need to put these heads in something so we can carry them to town to claim the bounty."
Now it was Melitta's turn to look sick. "Right. All right. I'll see what I can find."