‘… then the A … and a K to finish off with. And the date, of course: 1825.’ Kyselak stepped back to admire his handiwork. Not too far, though. The grassy ledge was fairly narrow and the drop steep enough. The stencil had definitely been a good idea. The letters were well formed and reasonably straight. It looked … professional. Up here on a lonely rock-face in the middle of the Steinernes Meer it was unlikely that anyone would see it, perhaps the odd illiterate shepherd looking for a lost beast, but he knew it was there, his own name standing out proudly in the boulder-strewn desert. The sun was bright, the rock warm and the bed of moss and grass inviting. He lay back, carefully putting his knapsack where it wouldn't go rolling down the slope, and making sure his rifle was in a safe place — he didn't want another accident.
After a lump of chewy black bread, a hunk of cheese and a mouthful of the refreshingly tart white wine from the last village — how sour it had seemed at first in the inn! — he let himself drift into a daydream. It had been a good day yesterday. Those two dairymaids! One blonde and one brunette, and he still didn't know which one!
If it hadn't been so cold in the hut he would surely have been fast asleep when she came down. Stretched out on the rough wooden bench, his knapsack under his head, fully clothed with only a threadbare horse-blanket for cover, he could still feel every bruise from his fall. First he had almost been smoked like a prime ham by the fumes from the open fire then, when it went out, the freezing cold started to eat into his bones. The shepherd boy on the bench across the room snored, and the animals in the pen outside scuffed and scraped against the side of the hut with a constant jangle of cow-bells. No wonder he'd still been awake!
And he could have been dead, never mind asleep.
© Ascog Press
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