Twelfth Krampus Night
been watching all sides of the castle—we’d have seen her,” Franco said.
    â€œThen she’s down there.”
    One cottar, dressed in a ragged tunic not warm enough for the cold, handed his torch to a fellow flunky, who dropped his pike to hold two torches. The first cottar stuck his long pike into the moat, poking around, jabbing for the hag.
    â€œWork your way right to circle the castle,” Franco called to them. “We’ll keep watch on the areas you’ve covered.”
    They wordlessly acquiesced and continued their dirty work.
    â€œIf your men saw the hag fall into the moat, then they certainly saw what sent her there,” Otto said.
    Franco, watching the cottars while addressing Otto, knew not to be flippant with the giant knight for fear that doing so would mean joining the hag at the moat’s bottom.
    â€œThis devil-man with the chain, yes—he turned tail and retreated for the forest. We’ve not seen him since.”
    â€œDo you believe me? Do your men believe what they saw?”
    â€œMy men witnessed something that was somehow bigger than you whip that witch into that mire. I can’t say what exactly they saw because I wasn’t present. I don’t doubt that you saw a man covered with furs.”
    â€œThen why the antlers, the horns?” Otto said.
    â€œI’ve got something!” one of the cottars yelled, sparing Franco from having to answer.
    â€œWhat is it?” the burgmann said.
    â€œA body, it must be!” answered Fritz, the cottar whose pike touched on something soft and lumpy. While his long weapon had a spear tip, it also featured a sharp hook curved toward the wielder. Fritz fidgeted the hook to snag clothing or a rib or a sturdy body part.
    The young cottar gulped when the mass jiggled the prodding pike tip. The three remaining cottars joined Fritz. Two held torches while the third man used his pike to help Fritz hook and haul.
    The hook caught hold of something.
    â€œGot it,” Fritz said. Maybe I looped the hook under the armpit? he thought. He tightened his grip and stepped backward, straining to lift the mass to surface.
    Fritz inhaled, his jaw trembling. Whatever he’d snagged squeezed the pike’s shaft and jerked it into the moat. The other men saw him lurch forward.
    â€œDon’t be such a bed wetter!” Fritz heard the jibe from above. “It’s an old woman! Lift her, damn it!”
    â€œMaybe it’s a snake,” Fritz said. The cottars noticed a quiver in his voice. “Yes, a snake has slithered around the pole, upset that I’m taking away its dinner.”
    The torchlight illuminating where the pole breached the murk showed only slight ripples as Fritz tried easing up his catch. Then the pole spasmed.
    â€œIt’s alive!”
    The archers—a few of the nervous ones, anyway—released arrows into the moat.
    â€œHold your fire!” Franco said, and then to the second pike-wielding cottar, “Help him!”
    The second man dropped his weapon and grabbed part of Fritz’s pike. Now the two men played tug–of–war with the unseen. But both felt the bending and crunching of wood, and then they fell backward, bringing with them a broken pike, the spear and hook snapped from the shaft.
    She exploded from the moat and corkscrewed to send filth in every direction, to repulse whoever it hit. She eyed the cottars at her apex and threw the pike’s blade into Fritz’s diaphragm. He collapsed, grotesquely gasping, while the other three cottars retreated across drawbridge for the castle’s protection. Perchta landed opposite the castle, next to Fritz’s writhing body. She glowered at the bewildered archers aiming at her. Brown sludge oozed its way down her face’s wrinkles, filling them like water down dry river arteries.
    â€œFire!”
    Arrows flitted toward her throat and stomach, but she was too quick and bolted toward the

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