Title: Charlotte's Tumbling Time Travel: Acceptance
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters from Outlander, I am only borrowing them for the story.
Notes: The story about the boy who fooled the giant is a Swedish folk tale with an unknown author, as far as I could tell. Nevertheless it is not my story and it does not belong to me but since I cannot find the precise author I cannot give credit to him/her in the proper way here. Its original title, however, is: Pojken som åt ikapp med jätten. So, please note that I am only borrowing the story for my own story, I am not claiming to have created it.
CHAPTER 4
The room went completely silent. Everything was as still as a calm summer evening when the chorus of crickets is the only sound heard. Everyone was staring at Lottie and at first that was a little frightening, but she took a breath and got right to business. She wasn't going to let herself become insecure now. And besides, it was too late for that anyway.
"Gentlemen! You talk of cheating?!" she boldly exclaimed across the room. "You don't know anything about cheating until you've heard the story of the boy who cheated the giant!"
She cast a quick glance Jamie's way but he stood just as frozen in place as the others, a slightly stunned expression covering his broad and handsome features. Their eyes met and he looked like he was about to collect himself and say something to her but she quickly looked away again.
The brawlers had gotten completely thrown off track by Lottie's interruption and they all stared confoundedly at her with big round eyes. It was as if the awkwardness in the room was making it impossible for them to get down to fighting and the big man with the gap between his teeth rolled his eyes and put one hand impatiently on his hip.
"What are ye goin on about, lass?" he asked with a slightly raspy voice.
"The boy and the giant. You actually haven't heard the story?" she said, making her eyes go wide with pretend shock.
He shook his head. She then looked at Angus and Rupert who had taken a step back from the round table and were now looking up at her with confusion. They both shook their heads too.
"Oh, my. What about you?" she asked the man with the red beard. And he had not heard it either.
"No, I dinna ken any story about some giant!" the man with the gap now blurted out a bit irritated. "I ain't even sure I want to."
Lottie put up both hands in front of her like she wanted to stop his decline from reaching her ears.
"I will not hear it, sir. Now listen to me as I deliver this, I assure you, truly wonderful story to you as a gift, gentlemen. I assure you it will stay with you forever, like raspberry jam stuck in your hair."
And with those words she began delivering what more resembled a performance at a theatre, than a simple story. Her checkered skirt billowed about her legs as she moved around on the table, using big gestures to convey the story to her, at first, skeptic audience. She moved to and fro, feeling her heavy, red dutch braid dance against her neck and shoulder blades with her movements.
She told them about the shepherd boy who herded his sheep close to the giant's cave, and how the giant discovered him and threatened to crush the boy in his hand, like he could a stone. She also told them, using a suddenly lowered voice to create suspense, of how the boy rolled a piece of cheese in ashes to make it gray and squeezed it in his hand to chock the giant and make him believe he too could crush a stone. And how the giant suggested they compete by seeing who could carry a fallen fir tree the farthest. They carried it together up a hill and the boy insisted on carrying at the root of the fir tree. But when the giant wasn't looking the boy jumped up and hid among the branches, and that way caught a free ride until the giant finally admitted he couldn't carry any farther, whilst the boy cockily told him that he had not even broken a sweat yet.
Lottie paused. People had actually taken their seats again and were listening intently to her telling the story. Jamie and Claire remained standing, Jamie with his arms crossed over his chest and a small grin playing on his lips, and Claire with her shawl wrapped around her shoulders and an expression of serenity on her face. The fire could be heard crackling in the corner of the room and someone was whispering something at the back of the audience.
"Well," Angus's voice came as an explosion in the silence. "What happened? Who won the competition?"
"The giant of course, ye daft man," Rupert thundered. "He was the biggest one and he probably came up with something the boy couldna do."
"Big isna always best," Angus snorted with his tongue sticking out of his mouth as he waved his small dagger playfully at his friend's face. "Just look at ye and me."
Rupert and Ned laughed and even Murtagh, who had come in from taking care of the horses just after she started the story, joined in the laughter.
Lottie smiled, pleased she had their attention and that the atmosphere in the room had changed so drastically. She had done it. She had managed to distract the belligerent men long enough to get their minds off fighting each other. Rupert and Angus were in good spirits now and even the man with the gap and the man with the red beard had both plumped their butts down on their chairs again and seemed totally spellbound by her story.
"Whoa, easy now, gentlemen," Lottie said to quiet down Angus and Rupert. "Here's how it ends."
She then told her captive audience how the giant suggested to the boy that whoever ate the most porridge would win. And how the clever, clever shepherd boy then tied a bag inside his shirt that the porridge landed in when he ate, and when the giant finally gave up and asked him how ever he could eat such big amounts of porridge, the boy told him he always cut his stomach open to let the porridge out after a while. Using a knife he cut the bag and the porridge came pouring out.
Lottie grabbed a knife by her foot on the table and dramatically pretended to cut her own stomach with it.
"And the giant who thought that sounded like a good idea took his knife and cut open his stomach...and died. The shepherd boy entered the giant's cave, took all his possessions and left."
With an agonizing wheeze she slowly pretended to sink into a heap on top of the table, with her hands clutched tightly to her stomach.
The room was quiet and she cracked one eye open to steal a quick glance around the room. People were staring at her, some with mesmerized expressions, others wearing more thoughtful looks. Then someone started applauding. She looked up surprised and saw that it was Dougal. He stood by the table he had been seated at during dinner, clapping his hands loud and clear, with an expressions of appreciation and content on his face. Lottie then quickly got to her feet and took a deep bow, as every person in the room followed Dougal's lead and applauded her performance. Someone even sent a piercing whistle her way. She felt herself blush slightly and tried to make the pink glow on her cheeks go away by brushing at them with her fingers. When the applause started to die down she was happy to hear Rupert even offer to buy the man with the gap a whisky, and he gladly accepted. In turn he asked for another game of dice and as the men started to look ready to resume their game Lottie realized it was time for her to get down off their gambling table. She didn't have time to though, before Jamie was in front of her. Even with her standing on the table he was still tall enough for his forehead to be at the same level as her chin. As she faced him she felt her stomach flutter a little. She had disobeyed him, after all. She relaxed, though, when he offered her a small attempt at a sinister glare but failed, and just gave her a short grin instead. She had disobeyed him, but he didn't fail to see what she had accomplished while doing it. He lifted her down off the table.
"I think ye have done enough here for one afternoon. Let's go."
To be continued
Author's notes: Thank you for all your previous reviews and feedback on this story. I really love writing it and it helps to hear from people who read it (even if it's just a word or two, it still helps me a lot with continuing to write) so please let me know your thoughts. I'm planning to put some more work into and time on my stories about Lottie over this summer and I'm hoping to finish this one pretty soon.
