Looking at lady piggy, Will couldn’t remember a time when he wanted to hurt someone so badly. He wanted to cause Messenia pain and nothing would be too bad for lady piggy. Lady piggy really wasn’t smart, insulting the person holding the reins of her horse.

’I could probably make her fall off the horse with a single jerk of my arm’ thought Will. Lady piggy and her fat arse could be down on the ground with Lavender’s hooves trampling her on the road. Maybe one of lavender’s hooves would land on her head, but then again piggy’s head was so messed up that having a horse trample on it might be an improvement.

Will was seriously considering these possibilities when Lavender brought her nose closer to Will’s head as if asking him whether he was alright. This was one of the reasons why Will preferred the company of animals to those of the majority of humans. People may say phrases like dumb as an animal, but in his experience they were kind and loyal, far more than most humans.

Will let out a sigh that he’d been holding. No, he couldn’t do it. As much as he wanted to make piggy squeal, he couldn’t do it if it ended up hurting Lavender in the process. He couldn’t let down Master Rowan and Mary who might be affected by his rash decisions.

Resigning himself, Will turned away from Messenia and looked ahead on to the road. He ran his hands along Lavender’s nose to let her know that he was alright. Will slowly started walking towards the meadows praying that the lord and his men didn’t make it back before Master Rowan was back from his home. Messenia was still upset the cripple had dared to dismiss her dream that she would marry the handsome prince Henry. She was too angry to speak for now, which was just fine with Will. In fact Will could’ve happily gone the whole trip without hearing a single word out of lady piggy’s mouth.

Will knew that Messenia’s silence was just a momentary reprieve and she’ll be back to throwing insults his way very soon. But this time he was determined to not give her the satisfaction of hurting him.

They proceeded along the dirt road in silence for a while and by now, they were more than halfway to the hill, beyond which lay the meadows. Lady piggy had recovered from her momentary silence and she was throwing snide comments and insults at Will every which way she could think of, which wasn’t a lot. A lot of piggy’s insults were recycled and it seemed like she was fast running out of ammunition and interest as Will showed no signs of being affected or responding to her comments.

Will was trying to tune piggy out and didn’t make any responses unless he was asked a direct question. Instead, he tried to focus more on the surroundings. That’s when he noticed some subtle changes in the air.Wind was starting to slowly pick up from the north. The sun should’ve been brighter as they were nearing mid day, but the sky was no longer perfectly clear. Beyond the hill he could see unmistakable signs of storm clouds ready to roll in.

He stopped the horse and turned to face messenia “My lady, we should immediately head back”.

“And why would I do that cripple boy?”

“There’s a storm rolling in from the north my lady”said Will pointing to the northern skies.

Stolen story; please report.

“That looks pretty far away to me. I doubt it’ll even drizzle, much less turn into a storm.”replied Messenia in a dismissive tone.

“Yes, my lady, but the wind is picking up from the north and we usually don’t have rains this time of year, but whenever it does rain, it ends up being a heavy storm.”

“ So, now you’re not just the stable boy, but an expert on weather as well. You’re nothing more than an ignorant cripple. If there was a storm coming, I’ll be able to detect it far earlier than you. Now keep walking you idiot and we might just be able to make it there before nightfall with the snail’s pace of your crippled leg.”

“Yes, my lady”. Will continued walking towards the meadows when in fact they should’ve been going in the other direction because he was sure that the storm was coming. Will had spent too much time watching the skies to not know the sure signs coming his way, but reasoning with lady piggy was an arduous task not to be undertaken lightly by anyone. A few months back, lady Daisy, who was the same age as lady piggy had come to visit the Faustad manor. Lady daisy had worn a royal blue gown with an embroidered surcoat and piggy immediately fell in love with it. Piggy ordered the tailor to fashion a dress just like lady Daisy’s and he had delivered the dress within a week.

Lady piggy walked around town expecting the same kind of compliments that her friend Daisy received. The truth was that piggy had nowhere near Daisy’s figure or beauty and she looked just as she always did(ugly and stupid) despite the dress. In Fact the tight belt that she wore that day just accentuated her pudginess. Will had a good time that day laughing at piggy strutting around town as if she was the most exquisite beauty in the world. Narcissistic and self absorbed as she was, even piggy couldn’t ignore some of the comments people made about her behind her back. Instead of self reflection, piggy had decided to blame the tailor for fudging her dress which made her look too big in the wrong places.

The poor tailor, in a momentary lapse of judgement, had actually tried to reason with piggy about why the dress looked better on Lady Daisy than on piggy. The result was that the tailor lost 3 month’s pay from the manor and only narrowly avoided being flogged by lady Mildred’s men. After that incident, no one was actually stupid enough to tell lady piggy anything other than exactly what she wanted to hear, let alone try and reason with her.

Will resigned himself to being wet and cold today besides being sore from all the walking.

The light breeze coming from the north steadily grew into a fierce howl as the wind was crossing the hill and very soon they could hear the distant rumbling of thunder. The wind was blowing fast enough that piggy was having trouble keeping her cloak wrapped around her.Piggy was finally looking a little worried and not her usual confident self.

“I think it’s time we head back, there might be bad weather ahead” said Messenia in an uncertain voice.

‘Oh really, whatever gave you that idea?. Was it the howling winds, the thunderclaps or the fact that I fucking said this would happen when we actually had the fucking time to turn around’ Will thought furiously.

He settled for replying “Yes, my lady we’ll head back.”

Will knew that the storm was close and that there was no way they would make it back to the stables before the storm would hit them hard. Will had an idea, Old farmer creedy’s place was not too far away and they could take refuge there and wait out the storm. They were only a couple minutes away from creedy’s land when it started drizzling.

“My lady, we could go take shelter at old Creedy’s farm and wait out the storm”

“No, we’re going straight back to the stables” Messenia said. Will noticed that her voice was slightly quivering as she said this. Lady piggy was clearly scared. The sound of thunderclaps were getting closer and closer. Any rational decision making capacity she might have possessed had gone out the window. Like a scared pigeon, she was desperate to fly back to her coop. They were about halfway back to the stables when the storm hit in earnest. If lady piggy actually knew how to ride a horse, she would have left him in an instant and galloped away. As things stood, she was stuck with him. Will struggled as he tried to walk as fast as we could through the dirt road that had now become thick mud. The only bright side of this trip was that lady piggy was getting as wet as he was and the storm was howling too loudly for him to make out whatever insults piggy was throwing his way.