shoulder. I lowered it to the ground, spiky end down, obviously. The rusty nails looked nasty.
“Upgrade. Should scare off a few critters. Probably do myself an injury if I try to actually use it in a fight. Flossie, lend me that knife a minute.”
She didn’t hesitate for a second, just took out the dagger and handed it over. How was I ever going to turn this bunch into the cynical, jaded bastard they needed to be to survive?
I used the knife to cut off a piece of leather and gave it to Maurice.
“Use this to fix your shoe.”
He had a broken clasp on his left sandal. He quickly tied it together making the shoe ten times more secure.
“Thanks, man. Really.” He grinned at me. Amazing how the little things make you feel when you have sod all.
“Okay, I want to show you something.”
I picked up my sling and a small stone. I loaded the sling and spun it around my head. I had managed to make it work earlier, but with everyone watching my heart crawled into my throat and the sweat in my palms threatened to let the sling slip out of my grip. If I screwed this up I’d look a right fool.
Fortunately, when I whipped the sling to release the stone, it flew out in the right direction. It went up at a forty-five degree angle so only a good shot if we ever went giraffe hunting, but still good enough to demonstrate the weapon’s use.
The others burst into spontaneous applause.
“Marvellous. Absolutely marvellous,” said Dudley. I think they were his first words since introducing himself.
Their impressed expressions only embarrassed me more. “Er, yeah, anyway, obviously it’ll take practice to get good, but with something like this you can hit the target from far away. A lot safer than hand to hand fighting.”
Using Flossie’s knife, I cut up the other strips of leather and made some more slings. Together with some rags from the box of clothes in the shed, I was able to make one for everybody. They stood there, each admiring their new toy. They didn’t see them as tools of death, but they would.
“Right,” I said. “I reckon we’ve got quite a bit of daylight left. Let’s go hunting.”
19. A Hunting We Will Go
We left the shed and headed east. Everyone was very impressed I knew which direction east was, but I told them how I found out, quickly lowering their expectations.
I could have let them believe I had an innate ability to know where I was going, but then they might have started relying on me to tell them what to do. Some people like that sort of thing—being looked up to, asked their opinion, admired. Best way to make yourself look an idiot, in my experience.
We quickly came to the fields of wheat Kizwat had mentioned, ringed by a wooden fence. On the way into town, Grayson had made it clear fields were to be walked around, not through. Apparently, only in movies is it considered acceptable to run through a field trampling all the crops.
It meant it would take us longer to get to the other side, but we needed the time to get used to the slings.
The person who had most problems was Flossie. She would get it whizzing around her head and then be unable to get it to stop. She would try to fling the stone out, but after failing a couple of times and nearly ‘lamping’ herself (as she put it), she would start squealing and try to run away from the strap whirling overhead, even though it was attached to her hand.
Or she would release the whole thing, sending the sling flying off into the distance. And then we’d spend ten minutes looking for it in the undergrowth.
Everyone else soon got the hang of getting the pebbles to shoot out, if not the ability to control where they went. It didn’t matter where you stood, you were in the firing line. In fact the safest place seemed to be directly in front of whoever was shooting.
Still, the little stones did ricochet off the fence posts with enough force to
“Upgrade. Should scare off a few critters. Probably do myself an injury if I try to actually use it in a fight. Flossie, lend me that knife a minute.”
She didn’t hesitate for a second, just took out the dagger and handed it over. How was I ever going to turn this bunch into the cynical, jaded bastard they needed to be to survive?
I used the knife to cut off a piece of leather and gave it to Maurice.
“Use this to fix your shoe.”
He had a broken clasp on his left sandal. He quickly tied it together making the shoe ten times more secure.
“Thanks, man. Really.” He grinned at me. Amazing how the little things make you feel when you have sod all.
“Okay, I want to show you something.”
I picked up my sling and a small stone. I loaded the sling and spun it around my head. I had managed to make it work earlier, but with everyone watching my heart crawled into my throat and the sweat in my palms threatened to let the sling slip out of my grip. If I screwed this up I’d look a right fool.
Fortunately, when I whipped the sling to release the stone, it flew out in the right direction. It went up at a forty-five degree angle so only a good shot if we ever went giraffe hunting, but still good enough to demonstrate the weapon’s use.
The others burst into spontaneous applause.
“Marvellous. Absolutely marvellous,” said Dudley. I think they were his first words since introducing himself.
Their impressed expressions only embarrassed me more. “Er, yeah, anyway, obviously it’ll take practice to get good, but with something like this you can hit the target from far away. A lot safer than hand to hand fighting.”
Using Flossie’s knife, I cut up the other strips of leather and made some more slings. Together with some rags from the box of clothes in the shed, I was able to make one for everybody. They stood there, each admiring their new toy. They didn’t see them as tools of death, but they would.
“Right,” I said. “I reckon we’ve got quite a bit of daylight left. Let’s go hunting.”
19. A Hunting We Will Go
We left the shed and headed east. Everyone was very impressed I knew which direction east was, but I told them how I found out, quickly lowering their expectations.
I could have let them believe I had an innate ability to know where I was going, but then they might have started relying on me to tell them what to do. Some people like that sort of thing—being looked up to, asked their opinion, admired. Best way to make yourself look an idiot, in my experience.
We quickly came to the fields of wheat Kizwat had mentioned, ringed by a wooden fence. On the way into town, Grayson had made it clear fields were to be walked around, not through. Apparently, only in movies is it considered acceptable to run through a field trampling all the crops.
It meant it would take us longer to get to the other side, but we needed the time to get used to the slings.
The person who had most problems was Flossie. She would get it whizzing around her head and then be unable to get it to stop. She would try to fling the stone out, but after failing a couple of times and nearly ‘lamping’ herself (as she put it), she would start squealing and try to run away from the strap whirling overhead, even though it was attached to her hand.
Or she would release the whole thing, sending the sling flying off into the distance. And then we’d spend ten minutes looking for it in the undergrowth.
Everyone else soon got the hang of getting the pebbles to shoot out, if not the ability to control where they went. It didn’t matter where you stood, you were in the firing line. In fact the safest place seemed to be directly in front of whoever was shooting.
Still, the little stones did ricochet off the fence posts with enough force to
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