Page 40 of Highlander’s Captive

“Do you want to eat well or continue roasting squirrels and eating hard oatcakes? How about some fresh bread, butter, and a hot stew? Winter is coming, I’ve heard.”

The other guard swallowed saliva. “Can only let ye in with the lord, mistress.”

Amy grunted in exasperation, turned away, and marched to the kitchen. “Lord this, lord that,” she mumbled under her breath. “We’ll see.”

Nevertheless, she was also tired of eating scraps. And she wanted to help out, so she was looking forward to establishing some sort of order in the household.

She already ran the local search and rescue station in Vermont, with eight people in her team. This couldn’t be much harder. And it would be much less dangerous—no lives depended on her actions. Unless she put a poisonous mushroom in a stew by accident… But she trusted herself enough to not make people sick from her cooking.

She entered the empty kitchen, still dirty from yesterday’s cooking.

She needed a team of cooks and a team of cleaners. Since Craig had let the professionals go, she had to recruit help from the men she had in the castle. The best method was probably to choose men based on experience. Likely, many of them knew some cooking, but she doubted anyone would want to clean.

She should make a rotation plan, so that everyone would share the burden. Otherwise, they’d need to be paid or rewarded in some other way.

The kitchen was a huge room, a separate timber building. There was a giant fireplace on one end with a big cauldron hanging from a chain. In the middle of the room, was a massive wooden table where vegetable peels and remnants of butchering remained from the night before.

Men, Amy thought.

There was, of course, no running water, so she’d need to send someone to the well in the courtyard regularly. But, thankfully, there was a slop drain for dirty water—just a hole in the wall leading to the castle gutter.

Bundles of herbs hung from the ceiling. When she’d first arrived, there had been fish hanging to dry around the fireplace and in the chimney, but now it was gone.

A stone oven stood on the opposite side of the room from the fireplace. Amy had seen some of the men use it to bake breads and pies. Unfortunately, she didn’t know how to bake. She remembered her mom baking in the farm kitchen. Amy used to help her, but it was such a long time ago, she no longer had any idea what to do. She wasn’t a big cook, either. She usually made mac and cheese from a box, put a frozen pizza in the oven, or heated up a microwave dinner. She needed to remind herself how to make real food.

Right. She went into the pantry at the back of the kitchen. It was chilly there, with the weather significantly cooler than when she’d first arrived, which, she supposed, helped the cabbages, leeks, onions, and dried peas to last longer. There weren’t any potatoes, tomatoes, or carrots. She saw plums, apples, and pears, but they were going bad already. She saw cheese and pots of butter, which was heavily salted, probably to preserve it. Sacks of flour stood by the walls—and remembering the scent of wheat from growing up on the farm, she knew this wasn’t it. Probably the sacks held either oats, barley, or rye.

Smoked meat and fish hung suspended from the ceiling. Eggs lay in a basket. She’d been feeding the chickens, which were in a pen right in the stables—probably to keep the birds warm.

Amy remembered caring for chickens and geese on the farm. They’d even had cows and horses. She’d loved the animals and even wanted to become a veterinarian. But once she’d gotten through one year of vet school, she’d known it wasn’t for her. She’d missed working with people.

There were also small pots with spices—cinnamon, ginger, and pepper—no doubt imported and very expensive. Salt was in a small sack on the shelf. A casket with vinegar stood in the corner. She could use it to clean the surfaces, and maybe even to clean wounds if it came to it. Yeast was there, too—no doubt for bread and ale.

That was it. Her small kingdom.

What could she do? Clearly, she couldn’t cook alone for the whole castle. Craig had mentioned there were a hundred people or so. Someone would need to bake bread, because she couldn’t. Her best, most effective cooking would no doubt be making stews and soups. She would just throw meat and vegetables into that giant cauldron, maybe even oats to thicken it. If that wouldn’t feed a hundred people for a day, she didn’t know what would.

She could roast the meat the men hunted, and make stew from the fish they caught. Someone would need to help with peeling, chopping, and cleaning vegetables, kneading dough for bread and pies, and general cleaning.

She needed to talk to Craig about assigning people.

Walking out of the kitchen, she hit a rock-solid human body, almost losing her balance. The tall man steadied her, grasping her by the upper arms.

“Whoa, lass,” Hamish said.

Amy quickly stepped away from him. “Good morning,” she said. “Looking for breakfast?”

“Aye, break the fast. My head is splitting from the feast yesterday. Something to ease the hunger would be fine.”

“Well, I’m just looking for Craig so that he can assign people to work in the kitchens. I need bakers and cooks and a butcher…”

“I can help ye,” he said. “I have watch duty on the southern tower after dinner, but I can help ye now.”

She’d learned by now that dinner meant lunch for them, eaten from midmorning to noon. And supper was actually like American dinner, eaten in the late afternoon or evening.

“Well, I really appreciate it, Hamish. Can you bake bread?”

“Aye. I grew up on a farm. I ken how to cook and bake.”