Sieged

Chapter Three

A plinking sound wakes me out of my poor, almost non-existent slumber. I crane my head and glance over the foot of my bed. Water seeps through a crack in the roof, trickling down into my near overflowing piss pot. I try to sit up but pain shoots up my leg and I fall back, almost slamming into the headboard. 

Thank the gods it's still raining but it's not kind to my body. Ever since my injury it never has. My head hurts too. It pounds and kneads. It's as if I've been kicked squarely between the eyes by some raging warhorse. 

Gritting my teeth, I sling myself out of bed and thump to the window, catching myself with outstretched hands on the sill. The fresh morning air washes over me as soon as I open it. Rain pours onto the ghostly street below. It cascades and patters. It ebbs and flows with varying ferocity, and I can see no flame or smoke billowing in the air. 

Yes, such a gift from the heavens. I pray it continues forever. Rain means no attack from wooden dragons and if the reservoir is running low, this will surely make it swell. The parks in the city will thrive with all this water too, which will ease the theft's burden. 

It's early. Too early. I did not sleep long at all. A couple of hours at most. I still feel tired but I know I won't be able to close my eyes again. 

I turn around and check the crack in the roof. It's getting worse. Wider. Longer. And it festers just like my leg. With supplies I could fix it with ease – getting on the roof would be the hardest part – but there's just nothing available left in the city. I empty the full piss pot before placing it back under the dribble. 

After getting dressed into my sheriff's coat, I head downstairs to the kitchen, where I start rummaging through the cabinets. I'm looking for one thing. Elixir. But all I see are empty bottles. Too many to count. 

I need to get more. I yearn for it. I tremble for it. It tortures me like a brain in a rack. 

And as soon as my thoughts descend on the particular person that can give me what I want, he so happens to walk through the kitchen door without permission. As if what's mine is his. 

'You really hate knocking, don't you,' I say to my personal elixirman. 'Love sneaking into my home. Do you do this when I'm not here?' 

The man, five years my junior and wearing a vibrant blue cloak, trudges over to the kitchen table and sits down. Then combing his manicured mustache, he replies, 'Like all the times before, I just came by to see how you're getting along.' 

'Well my leg's still killing me,' I growl. 

'Is that it?' 

'Is that it!' I raise my voice. 

'There's nothing else?' he just asks without any reaction to my growing hostility. 

'There's never been anything else. It's always just been my fucking leg. How many times do I have to tell you that?' I then ape his question to myself, 'There's nothing else? There's nothing else?' before saying, 'It's as if you are day and night, echoing over and over and over.' 

My elixirman frowns. 

He always frowns. 

'Don't give me that face,' I say. 'Just give me more of your elixir.' 

'Unfortunately, sheriff,' my elixirman replies, 'there won't be anymore. I just can't get a hold of the ingredients, any ingredients, these days.' 

'You're jesting me,' I snap. 

'I wish I was.' 

'And what am I supposed to do?' 

'There's nothing you can do.'