cellar was shrouded in darkness, and Tauran couldn’t help the creeping shiver up his spine as he stared into the void. In times of emergency, the cellar doubled as a safety bunker. They could have hidden several titans in that darkness and nobody would know. Until they moved, of course. Even Tauran’s steps echoed in the big, empty space.
Turning his back on the darkness, he placed a hand against the nearest half cow. It wasn’t full grown. Sometimes, farmers would donate cattle that got injured beyond healing. But even a young cow cut in half weighed twice as much as Tauran. He took a deep breath, picked a coiled rope from the butcher’s table and used the crank to lower the cow. He only had to drag it maybe two hundred feet to the wagon he’d positioned near the eastern wall. How he would cross the open grounds without being seen... he’d deal with that when he got to it.
Oh, the things he would do for beautiful boys and their illegal dragons.
Looping the rope around the hind leg and tying a knot, he tossed the length of rope over his shoulder and leaned into it.
The half cow scraped against the floor, an insistent sting of pain and weakness shooting through Tauran’s left leg. He groaned between gritted teeth. “Fucking...”
At the bottom of the stairs, he paused to breathe. They were steep and curving left. It sure would have been nice to have the crank, now. Maybe it would be easier to pull from the top.
Tauran placed a foot on the bottom step and paused.
Voices.
A man’s and a woman’s.
Getting closer.
Releasing the rope, he took two steps at a time to reach the doors and pull them closed. His useless left leg buckled, stomach flipping as he lost his balance, and he cried out when his knees hit the edge of a stone step.
Stars of pain danced before his eyes as he gingerly pushed sideways and rubbed his aching knees. Dancing light fell over his face and he looked up to the sight of a slender form and a cloud of curly hair.
“Tauran?”
“Catria?”
“What are you doing?” She took the stairs down quickly and kneeled beside him. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” Tauran said, offering her a smile that probably looked more like a grimace. “Are you alone?”
“Yeah,” she said, slowly. “Emilian just left.”
“I, uh... I really need to get this cow out of here.” Tauran angled his thumb at the discarded length of rope on the stairs and the half cow at the bottom. “Would you lend me a hand?”
“Why in all the skies are you hauling half a cow out of the cellar?” she asked, giving him one of her suspicious glares.
Tauran pinched the bridge of his nose. “Would you... please just not ask? I’ll owe you one.”
Catria took a deep breath, then seemed to decide. “In all the skies,” she murmured, and headed past Tauran to the bottom of the stairs. “Come on, then. Why are you doing this all by yourself?”
“Uh.” Tauran rose, carefully testing the strength of his legs before joining her. He grabbed the length of the rope and wrapped it around his arm. “I kind of need no one to know about it.”
“So you’re stealing a cow,” Catria said, voice tense when she lifted at the other end. “And how did you plan on getting this out of here by yourself without anyone finding out?”
“I don’t know,” Tauran said. He pulled hard, dragging the cow up the steps. “I figured I’d think of something.”
Catria huffed out an amused sound from below. “You’re sounding more and more like the old Tauran.”
“And how’s that?” Tauran grunted, pulling the half cow onto the mosaic floor with one last tug.
“Like a rascal,” she said, arching an eyebrow.
“I’ve matured.” Tauran discarded the rope in favor of grabbing the base of the hind leg. “On three. One, two.”
Catria grimaced on the lift, blowing a stray lock of dark hair out of her face. “Please,” she croaked. “You’ve been a rascal since before I even told my father I was a girl and not a boy.”
Tauran looked over his shoulder, trying to ignore the ache in his knees and hip as he maneuvered them back toward the tower entrance. “I thought you said you were... four years old.”
“I was,” Catria said, making Tauran duck under another of her all-seeing glares. “Where are we taking this damn thing?”
“East back entrance.”
They put the cow down by the tower doors, Catria peeking outside before they dragged