“You have that ‘I’ve just come up with a plan that my older brothers will not approve of’ look.”
“Shut up.”
They watched Mary walk closer and then Nathan was tugging Zach sideways as the people shielding them moved right.
“I want to be close in case we need to intervene.”
“We’ve shuffled sideways, Zach, not fifteen feet away. I wonder if it’s Mary or Adam that is provoking this protective instinct in you.”
“I’m keeping an eye on her,” Zach muttered. “Because she’s sly and cunning and as you very well know, not who she seems.”
“She’s exactly who she seems, but there is also a great deal more to her than we first realized. She is still Mary however, Zach.”
“Bobby and Bessie said something similar this morning,” Zach said softly.
“Who?”
Zach shushed his brother.
“Excuse me, gentlemen, I wish to participate in the knife throwing,” Mary said, loud enough that her voice carried to them.
“You?” One of the men scoffed. “A lady.”
Zach tensed as the young men looked Mary up and down insolently.
“Just watch, and if she’s in any way insulted, we step in,” Nathan said.
“Are you perhaps too scared to compete against me?” Mary asked.
“And me?” Adam said. He had turned slightly, and Zach saw he had a small smile on his face. He had as yet not acknowledged that he knew Mary.
“A cripple and a lady,” a man said.
“Well, if you are worried—”
“Just do it, Bertram,” someone said.
Bertram the Beastly, as Zach immediately named him, stepped up beside Adam and elbowed him aside. The boy had strengthened his good leg and arms and did not fall or move.
“I’ve always found a person to be small and feebleminded when he attacks others to make himself appear, in his eyes, better. Of course, it is not true. He actually looks a cowardly fool,” Mary said in a voice loud enough that most people nearby could hear.
Zach groaned as Bertram’s jaw jutted out, but inside his chest there was a swelling of something he thought might be pride.
“My mind is not feeble. I’m just stating facts. A woman and a cripple will not best a man!”
“Why are you standing here hiding?” Abby said, startling both her brothers.
“Sssh, we’re watching,” Nathan whispered with his eyes on the scene playing out before them. If Bertram moved toward her an inch, Zach was going to be on him.
“Watching what?”
“Adam was being harassed and called gimpy by a group of men but stood his ground, and now Mary has joined him, although the men have yet to realize they are friends. A knife throwing competition is about to play out to put Bertram the Beastly in his place. We are not stepping in but standing by until we are needed,” Zach told his sister. “Now be quiet.”
“Excellent name, brother,” Nathan said.
“I thought so.”
Zach felt a small hand grip his shoulder and then Abby was leaning closer.
