“I swear, it wasn’t me!” A boy small in stature and thin of build stood by a giant hearth. Its fire raged and licked at the remains of several large conies caught early that morning. His hands, knotted in the ragged tunic he wore over course short breeches, trembled.   

      “You filthy dirtling,” one of the serving biddies hissed. “How dare you lie to me. You didn’t find my lost broach, you stole it.”

      Stumbling back from the girl’s stabbing finger the boy felt a reassuring hand on his shoulder before a voice, thick and heavy, spoke from behind him, “Ease your tone, Mylie. If the boy says he didn’t take your bauble, I believe him.”

      “You’re always taking his side, Matron,” Mylie whined. “Whenever something goes missing, he’s the first to find it. I say that’s an unquestionable measure of guilt.”

      Several of the kitchen staff raised their voices in support of Mylie’s accusations, all accusing the boy of nicking bits and baubs and then returning them. The Matron’s hand tightened on the boy’s shoulder, “Evan? What say you, son. You didn’t take anything, did you?”

       Hanging his head, Evan swallowed, his throat dry, “I did not take it.”

      “He needs to be punished, Matron.” Mylie stepped closer to the boy; her fingers quivered as she reached out to grab him. Jerking away from the Matron and ducking beneath Mylie’s fingers, the boy raced through the garden door, ignoring the Matron as she called after him. “Evan! Evan, get back here!”

      He dashed down the servant’s path. Soft puffs of dirt kicked up behind him as his bare feet pounded the earth. A brood of hens scattered in a storm of feathers as he careened into a small courtyard where the animals of the keep milled around in wooden pens. He raced on, ignoring the inquisitive bleats of sheep and the excited greeting of one of the hounds who chased him for a time, before being called back by a yard hand’s high-pitched whistles and gruff command.

      He ran even further down the path. Past raised plots of soil burdened with an array of vegetation. The overwhelming sweet smell of rosemary and sage assaulted his senses as he brushed by their wattle fence enclosures.

      He ran as fast as he could, not knowing where he was going, nor caring where he ended up. Eventually, he stumbled through a stone archway which intersected the garden path. Curtains of ivy obscured the opening of the arch, and a large stone wall split the kitchen garden in half straight across.

      Staggering to a stop just beyond the entrance, he bent double, gasping for breath. The air was much cooler here, and the sun had yet to reach above the large perimeter wall, casting much of the yard beyond in long shadows. With hesitant steps, he walked forward. The path continued in a gentle curve. Much of the yard was barren with the exception of two rows of thorn bushes lining the pathway on either side.

      A few of the bushes displayed barbs as big as a man’s thumb while others displayed smaller, less intimidating, prickles. Each bush was spaced an equal distance from the last, and not all were the same size. As he walked, the bushes seemed to grow smaller until he came to the smallest and the last. The soil surrounding this bush was black and loose as if it had recently been planted. The thorn bush itself boasted only two woody stems with a light dusting of prickly fuzz.

      As if he were a puppet on strings, he knelt in the loose soil and pushed his fingers into the dirt at the base of the plant. As his fingers dug deeper, the sun crested the massive wall, illuminating the empty yard and the formidable structure of the keep at the boy’s back.

      The urge to dig, to push his fingers deeper into the ground consumed him, commanding him to delve further. Sweat trickled down his back and off the end of his nose. Barely aware of the stiff complaint of his knees or the twin pangs of fatigue in his shoulders, he continued to dig.

       Finally, the urge to grab handfuls of soil lessened when his fingers brushed against an object both cool and firm to the touch. Jerking his hand back as if bitten, the boy cautiously peered down at the object lying in the ground.

      Sitting back on his heels he took a few minutes to allow his aching muscles to relax as he studied his find, because that’s what it was, he realized, but it wasn’t a lost keepsake or a doodad like the things he found for people at the Manor house before. No, this was an odd thing even for him who was used to finding strange and unusual objects, like Hawker Burgh’s clay eye. This wasn’t a painted eye, but a bottle.

      The smoky blue glass stood about four inches high, with a long neck and fat belly. The odd thing about it was not the shape of the bottle or its color, but that it was wrapped in knotted red string with a cork drenched in black wax to seal it shut.

      Even hefted his find in his hands and shrugged. He didn’t give much thought as to why this strange glass bottle was buried deep in a hole under a thorn bush. He never gave much thought to any of his findings. If it belonged to someone, he gave it back; if it didn’t, he kept it. This, however, was different. He was guided by feeling. He felt, rather than thought, and his gut was telling him he should keep the bottle and not tell anyone he found it or how he had found it. It seemed like the right thing to do. 

      Looking first to the right, then to the left, he tucked the bottle in his shirt, unmindful of a large shadow detaching itself from near one of the outbuildings in the Keep’s yard. The figure stood watching, as the boy quickly walked back through the arch to where the kitchen gardens bustled with life.