Published: 15 Feb 2021

Once Dmitri was shorn and settled with the other boys, Spider began to work on the food which was nearly ready. With no extra plate for their new guest, Spider flipped over the lid of the pot and filled it to the brim for Dmitri. The new boy looked at the bonanza and smiled at his new friends. Had they known it was more food than Dmitri had seen in a month, they would have found more for him. It did not take long for the little gang of wanderers to become six. It also made Pierre very happy. His small tent was now feeling a lot more comfortable.

The next day, the now six boys, began to pack up after a hearty breakfast of rough bread buns made by Spider on hot stones along with the remains of last night’s stew. The pots and pans had been cleaned, and the boys looked around for something Dmitri could do.

It was finally decided to bundle the three small tents together with a rope and let him carry those until they could find a pack for him. There were no spare weapons so the next step was to find somewhere that had not been picked over in the hope of outfitting Dmitri.

It was two days before they came across a ruined village early in the morning. For the rest of the day they all searched high and low. No hiding place was left unsearched and finally, they had a pack for Dmitri along with a few extra things he could use. The only weapon they could find was an old pistol with a half full magazine.

Helmut was quick to strip the weapon and after cleaning the surface rust, he used a little of his last oil to make sure it worked without jamming. Dmitri was fortunate it was a 9mm as Helmut had an extra box of ammunition for him. It was going to be a few days before Dmitri could hit a large stump from ten metres but it was a start and they did not have much ammo to spare for more practice.

Dmitri seemed to really want to stay with his newfound friends. Everything they did he would watch intently and then sign for the person to show him again. It was not long before he was an integral part of the little gang.

It was two weeks after they had met Dmitri that Helmut once again was looking over his old outdated maps when, with a sudden babble of Russian, Dmitri pointed to the map and reached out for it.

“What is he saying?” Peter asked Helmut.

“He wants to know if he can look at the map and if I know about where we are.”

“Let him have it. Perhaps he knows something we don’t.”

Helmut nodded and then gave the map to Dmitri. The boy took it very carefully and laid it out so the fire light would let him read it. For some time Dmitri looked at the map, occasionally running his finger over some of the road markings and rivers.

After half an hour, Dmitri looked up at the boys and smiled. Gesturing for Helmut to come closer, he began to point to the spot where they thought they were. Once Helmut agreed, Dmitri began to trace his finger over the map for some distance until he came to what appeared to be a river with a high mountain near it.

Dmitri stabbed the map a few times with his finger while chattering to Helmut. When he stopped, Helmut looked at the others and there was the faintest of smiles forming on his lips.

“OK so tell us what he said for Christ’s sake.” Peter asked in frustration.

“Dmitri says we are close to his homeland, about five days walk and he knows of an old castle there that we could use for as long as we wanted. He said there is no one alive there now so we should be able to make it our home if we wanted one. So what do you say? Do we go in that direction or just keep wandering?”

“Well we still have about two months until winter. I say we at least go and look at it. What about the rest of you?” Peter said.

“Got me.” Said Spider

“Oui,” said Pierre.

“Si.” Replied Alberto.

“Well that’s a 100% vote so let’s get started.”

Helmut then changed to Russian for Dmitri’s benefit. He also asked the boy if he could lead them from where they were now. Dmitri shook his head and just pointed at the map again. After running his finger along the road marking he had pointed out earlier, he stopped and pointed a couple of times at one place about three days away. He told Helmut that he would know the way from that point, provided Helmut could get them there.

Helmut nodded and answered Dmitri before telling the others what had transpired. With the rest of the next day set aside for collecting food and setting up the camp, which Dmitri had now taken over doing, the gang rested for the night. The morning of the second day they would be starting a new adventure.

As the weak sun began to rise over the eastern horizon, Helmut sat with the old map on the ground in front of him. The rest of the boys were finalizing the breakdown of their camp as Helmut crouched above his map and began to make notes in his ragged notebook. None of the other boys knew what he had written in that ragged book but he would, on occasion take it out to consult or add a few things to it.

As they all shrugged into their packs, Helmut stood up looking around before taking out a very old brass compass and beginning to look for points of reference. Within two minutes he had finished. Shrugging his pack into place, he smiled at the others and indicated which way they should head.

As was normal when the boys were on the move, Pierre took the lead at about twenty yards in front of the others, then seemed to just disappear into the landscape. The boys were not surprised, but Dmitri began to get a worried look on his face.

Peter had turned to look behind them and caught the expression on their new friend. With a smile, Peter tried to indicate that Dmitri should not worry, as Pierre knew what he was doing. Although the gestures were confusing for Dmitri, he seemed to get the idea and relaxed a little, but only a little. He did not want to lose one of his new friends this early after their meeting.

The small group walked along in the direction Helmut had set for them until the sun was high in the sky indicating it was close to noon. While they had forsaken eating at midday they knew they had to keep well watered, so all stopped when they came up to Pierre as he sat in the shade of a fruit tree. They had left the forested area about mid morning and were now out in fields that must have been a farm at one time and so the fruit tree was no real surprise for them.

It was late summer and most of the fruit had fallen although somehow Spider had found late fall apples and tucked a good dozen into one of the pockets on his pack. He had plans for those before too much longer.

The afternoon was much the same as the morning hike and only the scenery changed. Now they were approaching what appeared to be a deep ravine with steep high sides and a small rivulet running down its centre. It was not hard for the boys to imagine what it would be like in the spring with the torrents of melt water coming off the high ranges far to the north of them.

Dinner that night was even better than any before as Spider had poached the apples until they were nice and soft and used the last of his cinnamon to add flavour. There was nothing left by the time dinner was done. It had been the first sweet dessert the boys had tasted since starting their wanderings.

The next two days were much of the same, although the country had changed and they were now walking through a huge pine forest that seemed to go on forever. That meant that they could move soundlessly as they followed the overgrown path. Once again Pierre was out in front somewhere in the treeline, but could not be seen.

Dmitri was now accustomed to his friend disappearing as soon as the march started. Apart from carrying the three small tents he felt there was more he should do to help his new friends. His nights spent with Pierre in the small tent were as wonderful as he hoped they would be and he knew that Pierre would protect him to his last breath. While Pierre had not said as much, due mainly to the language problem, Dmitri had a good grasp on the older boy’s feelings for him.

Early on the morning of the fourth day, they could see the end of the forest coming into view. Helmut came to a stop when he heard Dmitri call from further back in the single line they travelled in. Helmut called for a halt and signalled Dmitri to come forward and speak to him.

In his native Russian, Dmitri explained to Helmut that he now recognised where they were as he could see, in the distance, the top of a rounded mountain. He was sure it was the one he had been looking for.

When Helmut asked him, he told the older boy that it would take until late tomorrow to reach the far off mountain and then they would see, for the first time, the old castle that he had spoken of. While it was unknown to Dmitri, his mention of the citadel had given new hope to the small group, and all five of them had thought Dmitri was the best thing that had happened to them so far.

Had Dmitri known how they all felt about him, he may not have worried so much thinking he was not doing enough to help them all. Helmut called an early halt to their march at the very edge of the forest as it would be a good place to camp before making a last effort to get to the still unseen citadel. It was also a very good place for Pierre to set his snares as all of them had seen an abundance of rabbits and hares as they followed the overgrown path.

That night there were enough rabbits for each of the boys to have a full half a rabbit that had been spit roasted over the fire and stuffed with wild onions and Spider had roasted large pieces of fennel bulbs on a hot stone as a vegetable.

The next day was another long walk through the now overgrown farm lands. Many were small holdings, but most of the fences had now fallen into disrepair. Spider was the only one that seemed to have a perpetual smile on his face as he stopped at each holding to inspect old vegetable gardens. Though many were now useless, there were still those that produced vegetables that had seeded themselves and could be found among the long grass if you knew what to look for. Spider knew exactly what to look for.

When Spider had filled his own pack and could barely get it off the ground to put on his back, he felt a soft tap on his shoulder. Turning to look, he saw Dmitri standing there with his almost empty pack open, gesturing for Spider to put some of the vegetables in it so he could help carry as much as they could.

Spider smiled at Dmitri and began to put the last of the old potatoes in his pack along with a mid sized pumpkin. Spider felt that was more than enough for the thinner boy to carry and didn’t want to overload him. Dmitri was filling out but was still well underweight for his size.

By midmorning the next day the group was standing at the foot of the mountain and looking up. Just in visual rage at the top of the mountain, or what was actually more like a large hill, the boys could just make out what appeared to be some broken crenulations of an old stone castle.

Dmitri led the boys a little further along the base of the hill until he came to an overgrown walking track. Pointing upwards, he told Helmut it would only take about an hour to reach the top. They could then rest, or look around, to see if this was a place they would like to stay.

Helmut thanked Dmitri in Russian, before explaining it all to the others. Once that was done, he led them towards the path, and the climb, to the top to see what they had come all this way for. If nothing else came of their journey, there was the fact they had all eaten better from the wild animals and vegetables they had found along the way, than they had for a long time. It had been a worthwhile trip so far.

With a last glance up to the top of the hill, the boys shrugged their packs higher onto their shoulders and began the climb, along the overgrown path, towards the top where they hoped their new home was waiting for them.

For once, Pierre gave his forward position to someone else, that being Dmitri, as the lad was more familiar with the area and was, after all, the one who had brought them to this place. Was this where their future may lay, or would it all have been for nothing and all that awaited them was a pile of old ruins. Only time would tell and in the mean time they had a hill to climb.

The boys followed closely on Dmitri’s heels, and the slender boy led them higher up the barely visible path. Occasionally, they would see a small part of the huge stone walls above them as they wound their way back and forth up the overgrown path. Even to the most enthusiastic of them, the towering stone walls above them seemed foreboding.

As he glanced once or twice at the walls above them, Peter wondered what a soldier of the medieval period would have thought as he went upwards to attack such a strong point. For the first time in a long time, Peter’s interest in history started to become active, as he thought about the huge structure waiting for them above.

It was a little over an hour before they turned the last corner and saw the sheer enormity of the structure before them. While they had expected it to be a castle with a moat and great crenulated wall surrounding the main castle, it was in fact a great castle without the extras they were expecting.

While the walls were high and appeared to be very thick and old, Peter informed them it was in fact an old fashioned Citadel. The hill they had climbed would have been part of its defences and the lack of window slits below thirty feet would have explained the rest of its defences.

Higher up the wall the window slits could be plainly seen and would have been from them that the Citadel archers would have fired their arrows or in a later period it may have been musketeers.

As they all drew closer, they were able to see that, for its age, it was in a remarkable state of repair, except for the coating of new moss beginning to grow on the lower stone walls. Farther up the thick walls, the stone was aged but seemed to be in good repair and they could all just make out some of the red tiles on the high roof, none of which seemed to be missing.

Dmitri led the boys around the corner where they soon came to what could only be the gates of the Citadel. They looked formidable and not easily breached. This also meant the boys had no way to enter as the gates were tightly closed and the large heavy metal studs all over the doors made it look impregnable to any attempts they may make on it.

Unknown to the boys they had an ace in the hole, one that they never would have thought of. Helmut spoke to Dmitri once again in Russian. The Roma boy was trying to learn new languages but as yet, had not been with the boys long enough to become even partly fluent in any of them.

After Helmut had spoken, Dmitri became all smiles and almost broke into a giggle, which would have been the first time any of them would have heard him laugh. Dmitri broke into Russian as he explained something to Helmut still with the smile on his face.

A moment later and Dmitri was dropping his pack onto the pathway in front of the huge doors and with hands signals told the others to stay where they were and wait for him. Next he turned away and made for the next corner along the wall and disappeared around it.

The boys looked and took in the sights around them. From the top of the hill, they could see the land around them for miles. This gave them some idea of why anyone would want to build such a Citadel in this position. As it stood, it would be impossible for anyone to try to sneak up or to attack it, it was certainly a good place to make a home for them.

Below them and stretching for miles were what had once been rich farmlands and beyond the overgrown farmlands there were the thick forests that seems to stretch unbroken for miles and miles until they disappeared into the haze of distance

It was about ten minutes after Dmitri had walked away that they heard what could only be described as a cat screeching and a few solid sounding thumps from a heavy object. After a few more moments there came a slow creaking from the base of the large doors and, just off to the side the boys saw what appeared to be a smaller door begin to open slowly and under protest by the sound of the groans and squeaks that issued from it.

Another few moments, and the boys saw Dmitri’s head poking through the now open door and smiling in their direction. With a flick of his head he indicated they should all join him inside. The boys did not need another invitation, there seemed to be a universal acceptance that this strange, large Citadel may at last, be their new home. They now had the promise of a new future and there was a reason now for going on.

TBC

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