Spindle excerpt, 9 (and final)

And here’s the wrap up… what ended up being chapter three of the NaNoWriMo project.


The boy knew that he would soon be spread on toast unless he did something quite extraordinary, and he knew that in order to do something like that, he would need the spindle. So even as the giant stomped across the room, shaking anything and everything with each footfall, the boy kept working on the rawhide tie.
And just as the giant grabbed him, he got it loose and grabbed the spindle.
The broad, fat hand squeezed the boy until he thought his eyes would pop out of his head, then it shook him until he almost dropped his prize, but somehow he held on, and luckily Mudferthing decided not to squish him against his other hand like a mosquito right then and there. Instead, the giant brought him up close enough to examine. (Unfortunately, this was close enough for the boy to get a good look at the giant as well, and to be breathed and sniffled on, but in his current situation Mudferthing’s bad teeth and worse breath were the least of his problems.)
The giant squinted and peered, then snorted a mucus-filled snort. “You’re naught but a bratling! Not even a grown man or a knight! I’ll barely be able to get you spread over one piece of my toast, you little thief!”
The boy struggled, but managed to keep his right arm behind him. “That’s not true,” he shouted, “I am a knight! Look closer!”
The giant’s eyes widened at the pert attitude of the boy, and peered even closer, but all he saw was a simple boy’s clothing (because that was what the boy was wearing, of course). The giant snorted again. “If you’re a knight, I’m a dancing mouse. What’s your name?”
“Sir Bobby,” the boy said, and drove the spindle into Mudferthing’s eye as quick a flash of hope. For the barest second, the giant didn’t move, for the spindle was so sharp and the boy had moved it so fast that he didn’t realize what had happened.
So the boy pulled it back and drove it into the other eye.
Mudferthing screamed, bringing up both his hands to his bloody face and dropping the boy. This should have, would have, killed the brave lad, were it not for the giant’s poorly-made scarf, which Bobby managed to catch as he fell. He tumbled end over end along the ugly mess, catching hold of the badly-woven loops of yarn that stood out all along its length, until he reached the floor.
Then the boy ran. He ran out of the house. He ran down the broad, straight road. He ran through the Forest and finally, he ran up to his house, where he managed to hide the spindle and clean himself up before his father got home.
The giant Mudferthing did not follow him — never did come after him, actually, and most believe he never left his house again.
Because Mudferthing was blind, poked though the eyes by the boy with the silver spindle.

2 Replies to “Spindle excerpt, 9 (and final)”

  1. Made me cringe at the end but I knew that is what he was going to do. Way to go sir Bobby! Win one for the little guys.

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