With ever-shortening time until the Royal Visit, some things need hurrying along

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Disclaimer:

The original characters and plot of this story are the property of the author. No infringement of pre-existing copyright is intended.
This story is copyright © 2013 - 2020 Julia Phillips. All rights reserved.

It uses some of the associated characters and situations that arise from the world called ‘Anmar’ created by Penny Lane, whose stories
are also copyright © 2010 - 2020 Penny Lane. All rights reserved.

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“Maker!”

“I know! It is barely conceivable is it? She shall be here in about four weeks. And there is so much more to do! How on Anmar will we cope? And His Honour will not return for another two weeks or so.”

“We must trust Master Bezan to do what is required to drive this along. And Master Jepp and the rest of the Assembly, of course.”

“I know, 'Lina, I know. But, although it was hectic for us in these past few months, in that we were learning fast and setting up the routines and so on, we were really not pressed. Even from my bed, I can detect a buzzing about the place.”

“Oh Molly, dear, you have no idea! Would you believe that even today, the day of the Festival of Spring Dawning, there were no less than a hand of hands of workers swarming around the Community Hall, until Bezan halted everyone at the 4th Bell. He apologised to them all for making them work a half day on what should have been a free day. But there were other workers busy too, on other projects. As you know, the Festival, if it can really be called that, starts at the Noon Bell, which, by the definition of the day, must also be the 5th Bell. So there was still a lot of work going on all around the place, which stopped at the 4th.”

“Tell me all about it, them, I beg of you. The wretched Healers say I must stay here for another two days at the very least before I should put any of my weight on my feet. They must be healing though, judging by the wretched itching they are doing. It quite drives me to distraction sometimes. So distract me with your tales, I beg of you.”

I laughed: “You shall be distracted with and by much more than just those tales soon. The other girls should be here in a little while.”

I had arranged for the four of us to have a Bell together, before we other three all set off to the Salon for the most booked night we had ever had. The temporary replacement for Molly, an older woman, Konna was her name, would open up the kitchens and do the basics, to allow us a short while to be with our friend. I filled in the short time before the others arrived telling Molly about the doors on the Shuttle Shed, and how they were to be used in the new Community Hall.

The girls duly arrived; not together, so there were some drawn out greetings, which took up some two hands of moments, I suppose. At the time, I didn't really notice it. Once the descriptions of her injuries and her healing processes had been dealt with, I found myself telling them all about the hearings with Master Jepp, and the follow-up sessions that had taken place yesterday. They were all both shocked and amused at the ultimately pathetic attempts to try to gain their various advantages, and were all in agreement with me when I pointed out that they would be in deep trouble when the Captain returned.

I had started off by describing Master Jepp's request of the previous week. I deliberately described the first hearing as if it were absolutely serious and I brushed off the questions about why the Captain had left no confirmation for Master Jepp. I then described the second application, and they gasped when I revealed to them that it was for the same thing. They laughed when I told them about the third application for the same thing, and by then they fully realised what was actually going on.

I quickly ran over all the applications, as best as I could recall.

And then it was time for me to describe those follow-up sessions.

… … ...

“I thank you all for attending, and for bringing your wives and partners, as appropriate,” began Master Jepp, once everyone had settled down and I had picked up my reedlet, poised to scribe.

“I have considered all of the matters that each of you presented last week. At that session, or those sessions to be more exact, then each of you solemnly swore that your applications last week were the truth, and that His Honour, Captain Bleskin, must have forgotten to inform me in the confusion of events just before his departure.”

He paused briefly, and then continued in a far more menacing tone than I had heard him ever use before: “Do any of you wish to change anything that you said last week?”

There was a pause.

A pregnant one.

A very pregnant one.

Just one man stood up, but only after being dug in the ribs by a woman I assumed to be his wife. Master Jepp looked at him sternly and the man started to get worried. His wife held her hand to the small of his back to lend support, and also to help drive him forward. She nodded encouragingly when he turned almost pleadingly to her.

He stood there a brief while but said nothing.

After consulting his notes, Master Jepp said: “Well Goodman Betruk? What have you to say?”

Stammeringly, Betruk, after a few more agonised glances at his wife, said: “If it pleases Your Honour, I must confess that I have not actually discussed this with His Honour the Steward, although I reported to you that I had. I broached the subject with Master Bezan once and he said that he was sure His Honour would agree. But last week I was so nervous that I fear I may have misled you.”

“I see. And yet you still, let me see … ah … here it is! You still made your mark on Mistress Julina here's written report of your claim? A mark declaring that its contents were an accurate report of what you said?”

His head hung as he murmured: “Aye, Your Honour. That I did. And I am ashamed that I did.”

“Why?”

“Well, the thing was, that we all discussed it in the waiting room last week and we all felt that if we all demanded an early decision from yourself, then we could increase the pressure on you and you would likely grant us all our wishes. So we decided upon needing a reply by what is now the morrow.”

He received many glares from the others for that statement I can tell you.

“I see. So all of you colluded to some extent, huh?”

A sheepish, barely audible reply came: “Aye, Your Honour.”

“Very well. Mistress Julina, have you recorded these statements?”

“I have, Your Honour.”

“I thank you. Please also make full note of my following statements and open questions. Statements and questions that I now make to all here present. All of you! Not just Betruk here.

“Did you really imagine that I would not check this all out? Do you not understand why we have an Assembly? I shall not, indeed cannot by dint of my oath of office, decide this matter alone. These applications have been discussed in our Assembly meetings. And I say now, that several of the applications afforded much merriment in that meeting. And have you all forgotten that we have a semaphore system, the use of which has allowed me to converse with our Steward?”

Master Jepp then turned back to Goodman Betruk: “I thank you, finally, for your honesty. 'Tis a shame that you chose not to be completely honest from the outset. Your application is therefore NOT thrown out, and you may prepare a fuller, and more accurate application, to present to the Assembly after His Honour returns. In the meantime, I shall guarantee that your application shall remain exclusive, for no-one else has approached the Assembly with this idea, and furthermore I shall ensure that no-one else may submit a similar application before the Assembly have heard your detailed proposals.”

“Why thank you Your Honour. You shall not regret this decision I assure you!”

“But be warned, Goodman, I cannot protect you from the wrath of His Honour, when he discovers you have used his name in vain! And you have lied to try to gain some advantage. There will surely be some accounting for these offences. I myself am deeply disappointed that you decided to try to lie to me. Now begone, both you and your wife. There is nothing more I can do for you.”

The couple departed, and were just approaching the door when the Goodman received a terrific blow on his back; his wife could keep silent no longer, and began hissing in his ear, promising all sorts of dire results as soon as she got him home. I suppressed a smile, and was shocked to see a grin swiftly cross Master Jepp's face, before it returned once more to a severe expression.

“Does anyone else wish to say anything?” he said, glaring at the seated people.

There was a silence.

“I assure you that anyone discovered to have lied shall be punished, so I offer you all one final chance to speak up now.”

Again a silence, broken eventually by a pained grunt.

Our eyes were dragged to one man as he stood up, clutching his left-side ribs whilst glaring at his woman, who also stood up alongside him. It was she who said: “Your Honour, I regret that this great lump was led astray, and he didn't think properly. We shall accept a punishment for wasting your and the Assembly's time, and HIS application is hereby withdrawn as if it never occurred.”

“Thank you Mistress Laina. You may go, both of you, but with the knowledge that some punishment shall needs be applied. Goodman Loogner shall be brought to account upon the Steward's return. I will tell you this, in his application, your husband claimed that the Steward had granted him exclusivity. Indeed EVERY applicant claimed that for their particular idea. However, Goodman Loogner's application is identical to another application made, so I know at least one of them was lying. And both, remember, have claimed that the Steward promised exclusivity! By showing some sense now, you have reduced the punishment you shall receive!”

Everyone watched Loogner and Laina make their way to the door and let themselves out. There was a certain amount more of rib-digging and hissing amongst the others sitting there, and finally three other couples rose, and asked to be excused, withdrawing their applications. They departed with Master Jepp's reminder about future punishment ringing in their ears.

This left six applicants sitting there, with their partners.

Master Jepp sighed loudly.

I knew why he did it, but thought that mayhap he had made it a little too theatrical, as I had learned from Berdon and Bettayla they termed things like that.

“Very well. Then let me make a further statement. Mistress Julina, you are ready to scribe?”

I nodded.

“Anyone still sitting here now is making a statement without speaking. You are saying, clearly and unequivocally (a word I had later to get him to spell out for me) that everything you have told me in the last meeting, that was recorded and that you have agreed to the report thereof, is true and accurate and to be actioned. You have been offered a chance to retract or amend your previous statements and you have chosen not to. Is that correct?”

They all nodded, some looking a lot more worried than others.

“Very well. I shall be....”

He broke off as another couple stood up.

“If it pleases you, Your Honour. We feel that perhaps we too might have made a mistake, and we would like to withdraw the statement that His Honour knows anything about this. We beg the opportunity to do as Goodman Betruk has done.”

“Very well Goodman Bogdan. I shall arrange matters accordingly. Your application was met with a certain amount of approval at the Assembly meeting. But your punishment shall be greater than Betruk's for you went past the deadline I gave you all here. Be prepared!”

With a gulp, Bogdan and his wife departed, with a certain heavy tread.

Another couple then stood, and this last sequence was repeated.

Which left four applicants.

I inwardly gasped, for I recognised something that connected them all. I worked very hard not to smile.

Master Jepp put on his severest face and glared at them, saying nothing.

One looked uncomfortable, one looked supremely confident and the other two showed no emotions at all.

The silence stretched and still Master Jepp said nothing, just glared at them.

I think I might have screamed to break the tension that was in the air had it gone on much longer.

At long, long last, Master Jepp sighed again, theatrically again. Then he started sorting out the papers in front of him, pushing several reports to one side and ending up with four in front of him. He opened the reports one by one, scanned them swiftly and closed them, looking up at a different one of the applicants each time he did so.

Another sigh.

“Very well.” His voice sounded so loud after the tension-filled silence. “I shall shuffle these reports and select one as the first to talk about.”

He did just that and placed them in a pile. He opened the top one.

“This one concerns, let me see ...” He ran his finger down the page as if he was reading what was written there, but I knew him well enough by then to recognise that this was purely for effect. “Ah yes! A plot of land, roughly triangular in shape, touching the Campsite in the North, and bounded on the East by the Dam Road, on the West by East Street and on the South by the North Cross Lane. Would the applicant for this please stand up.”

I was hard pressed not to laugh as all four stood.

They looked at each other in shock.

Then the shouting started.

My! What words were employed! I fair blushed, I can tell you.

Nevertheless, I had to turn away, because I just wanted to laugh. Master Jepp told me off for that afterwards, as it nearly made HIM laugh too.

“Quiet! QUIET! Quiet!”

No reaction.

“QUIET! All of you! Now! QQQ UUU III EEE TTT !!!” This last was shouted as loudly as I had ever heard a human shout, and there was a steel in the voice too, sufficient steel to start to achieve the required objective. (That steel raised Master Jepp even higher in my estimation, I can tell you!)

Master Jepp had had also to hammer his gavel (another new word he taught me afterwards) for several heartbeats before they all finally quieted and paid him attention once more.

“As we can all plainly see, at least three of you have lied. The penalties shall be severe. You have all had ample opportunities to retract your claims, and you have all willingly foregone those opportunities.”

He picked up another sheet, one I recognised easily as a semaphore sheet. “Let me read this to you all … 'No land allocations ever approved and no promises made – stop – anyone so claiming to be placed in jail until my return – stop – Bleskin'.”

He paused to let the significance of that seep into their various minds. They all paled when they finally understood the trouble they were in, even the confident one.

“Gentlemen, and I use that word a trifle sarcastically now your calumnies have come to light, for you are all impugning the characters of the others here. You shall report to Master Fedren at the First Bell tomorrow, giving you the rest of today to set your affairs in order. You are all to be held in jail until His Honour returns. Your women shall be responsible for feeding you, and providing clean attire during your stay at His Honour's pleasure. Make sure that your supervisors, if you have any, are informed of your inability to work until well into the next month. Do you all understand your instructions? … Well do you?”

The four reluctantly nodded. Their women were all looking at their men as if sizing them up to decide where exactly they would first plunge their knife.

“I will remind you that we are at the end of a long valley. Should you decide to try to escape your fate, then there is only one way out of this valley. You shall be caught, and you shall have 'attempted escape' added to your list of charges for when you are brought to trial. You had better hope that His Honour gets back safely, for you are to be locked up until he returns! Now go and get out of my sight.”

… … …

Again, the girls were torn between shock and amusement when I related all these goings-on. They all wanted details of names and so on, but I was already worried I might have given away secrets so I swore them all to silence about it until such time as I released them from that promise.

We stayed with poor Molly a little longer before dashing to Em's and getting set up for our busy evening. I frowned a little at what Konna had done, but we had no spare time that day, none at all. Konna's changes made things slightly more complicated than we were used to, but we just had to get on with it, work around the hindrances. Konna was going to have to be on dining room duty that day, and I had persuaded Kords to come along and help me in the kitchen.

We were told that the Festival that afternoon up at the Parade Ground went well, and that the tradition of family groups, each providing their own food for a lunch, but ready to be shared with neighbours, passed off well.

But we were just too busy to be able to see anything of it. We were very hard pressed that day as I have already said, and we just barely managed. There was little time even to tell Konna some of her mistakes, let alone give her some more training. There was an awkward moment at the end of the day when she had to be persuaded to share her coin collection left to her by the diners. She did so with most bad grace. I made a mental note to put her on a kitchen duty and see how she liked it, getting no coin at all if we all did as she wanted to.

We still didn't know then that Molly would actually never return. Whilst inconvenienced and staying abed, B and B visited her often, and from then on, we lost her to her writing and her amazing ability to choose, select and make words come alive. She struggled at first, but soon her abilities were rewarded with some significant coin.

Talking of which, we had a visitor to the Town on the 29th of that month, five days after the Festival. Again I was called to an Assembly meeting, this time to help describe the banking system I, and others, had joined down in Tranidor. Our visitor came with documents of introduction from Master Moshan, confirmed by semaphore, with a proposal to set up what they called a 'branch' of the bank here in Town.

Master Schild was a very pleasant but serious man, slow to smile.

But we managed to make him do so!

And Maker was it was worth it? His smile was very attractive to the females present that day. Producing as much inner fluttering as does Master Pocular's voice.

… … …

It is impossible for me to relate the events of all that happened in those weeks in a sensible order of time, so I shall remind you that several of the following events all occurred at the same time as each other. I have merely chosen to concentrate on one single project at a time.

So I should really start with the most important.

But which was the most important?

I may have had a few ideas here and there, and may have been asked to help out occasionally, but I was NOT a member of any of the directing bodies that decided what was to be done first. Thus I had no influence upon deciding the priorities.

On the face of it, the accommodation for the Baroness, well Princess as we would all have to start rethinking her title, should be a priority, but if you actually stopped to think more deeply about it, then she managed before when she came to Town, so why couldn't she do so again? Maybe the Royal party could take over the Steward's House, for example, the Steward and Master Mesulkin could move into, say, Em's for the duration.

So maybe the provision of the complicated suite of rooms up in the Community Hall wasn't quite so urgent after all.

Now I need to point out that the decided priorities were not specifically told to us ordinary folk.

Let me be clear upon that, and take this heartbeat to repeat that the following projects may well have been numbered by me, but they weren't necessarily done in that sequence, they were done mostly all simultaneously.

… … … 1 … … ...

The one request that Her Ladyship had made was for the provision of that Community Hall. So some priority should really be given to the open, in other words the non-private, rooms up there.

Or so they explained matters to us afterwards.

Thusly, let me mention first the Community Hall.

The new mini-cistern had been first completed, and stationed above it was a properly equipped kitchen, two bathing rooms and no less than five toilet rooms for each gender. This was sensible as all these rooms required easy access to water. The kitchens, you shall recall, were being used by Mousa nowadays, to provide for the ever-increasing demand for ready food at nearly all hours.

Next to the kitchen/cistern block were an assortment of storage rooms and huts, and also some stabling. Obviously, the kitchens required some deliveries so there was a large area of roofing, overhanging an open area for the wagons to be unloaded where they could be unaffected by all but the most inclement of weathers. The same area was designed to allow visitors to arrive and gain access to the complex from under cover, in the event of heavy rains. This worked since the kitchen block was connected to the Hall by a closed-in passageway, affording shelter to those using that way of entrance. The big square to the north of the kitchen/cistern block was the normal parking area for those who arrived by beast or wagon – and maybe by carriage in the future!

South of the kitchen/cistern block, through the closed-in passageway, was the Community Hall itself. This was a curious shape, narrow where the passageway came in, but swelling outwards in pleasing curves until the curves stopped and normal straight walls continued. The Hall was probably half as wide again as the kitchen block, and what was unique was that nearly all the walls were made of clear windows. I say nearly all, because of course there were the window frames, and the strengthening poles that were necessary to hold up the ceiling and the first floor above.

Running at about a stride and a half inside the outer windows were a series of Uncle's trusses, the lattice work of them as open as possible to allow light in. These trusses were standing on their ends and larger trusses went across the room connecting pairs, upon the tops of which the grounding material for the floor above was constructed. What was really clever though was that the ceiling of the ground floor room was hung from that upper layer. So that by the time the construction was finished, the cross supporting trusses were hidden from view.

It was in fact Mousa who showed me round the building now that it was watertight. She arranged a private visit for me and the girls.

Of course, I asked about various features as we went around.

“Over there ...” we were in the main room at the time, “... in each corner of the main room, the partitions that are to be used to create smaller rooms are stored.”

We looked up then at the apparent ceiling and the tracks running through in severe straight lines. These tracks appeared as dark lines.

“They are the tracks from which the partitions are suspended. It is all very cleverly designed, I must say. And it is fun to watch these wooden 'walls' being wheeled into place. Let's have a little play, so you can see how it all works.”

There was much giggling as we did just that, and we discovered how careful or not we have to be when moving those partitions around. But they worked fantastically well, and we soon lost our wonder at such a marvellous new-fangled idea.

“The whole main room is actually wider than Main Street, and about twice as long as wide, roughly speaking and allowing for the curved walls.”

It was a wondrous room, so light and airy. I could actually see in my mind the lessons that we could give in here. And the dances we could have. And the village meetings. I looked round, just as the other girls were doing.

Along the uphill side, the east side, were strange stacks.

“Those stacks? They are the rows and rows of seats that shall enable the audience to see the stage, which is itself a raised flooring, built on wheels, and which is split into no less than a dozen equal portions. These stage parts, as you see, can also be neatly stacked along that east side.” She pointed at a separate set of stacked items.

Looking round the totally open room, we were impressed by the size. We could also see that there were other entrances into the building with doors at the centres of the south and west walls.

Finally, a stair rose up to the next floor, close to where the kitchen block passageway came into the room. By the time the Princess was due, this first upper floor was equipped with six rooms. There had to be at least one, of course, to prevent the rain from pouring down the stairs!

“Come on girls. Come upstairs and see the rooms up there. They are not quite so window-filled as down here, but still more so than all the other buildings in Town! Be prepared to be amazed."

We all followed her up there, where we discovered she was right. We WERE all amazed.

The views, from this first floor up, to the south and west (well, and the north-west too) were spectacular. Since then, it was discovered that everyone loved to go there just to see those stunning views.

So much so that the workers eventually had to define opening times for the 'gawpers' as they referred to those who came just to look.

We as residents of our town were all proud of the result, and we all looked forward eagerly to the Princess' reaction.

… … … 2 … … ...

You will recall that, sadly, a new water source had been discovered.

Sadly, because men died whilst achieving that.

However, it enabled the Town to expand, provided always that some method could be found to extract the water and to join it into our existing system.

So a priority had been assigned to that.

It was a major achievement to discover the water, to know that it was there for us. The first tests of it showed that it was good water for general use – drinking, cooking, bathing and sluicing down the less savoury water channels.

It would be a further major achievement to extract the water, mind you!

And yet another to integrate it into our existing system.

However, Bezan came to breakfast one morning, on one of my rest days, to gain some of Papa's expertise. This led me to be witness to some of the discussions and also to be invited along on a demonstration walk. The men weren't pleased that a female insisted upon joining them, but a sharp reminder or two about what I had so far achieved and suggested made them back off quite quickly.

I delayed them scarce five moments as I went and changed into my least-cherished work dress. They were talking earnestly when I returned.

“... a route to the existing large cistern. It seem silly to build so much more when the existing system functions, surely?”

“Yes, Kordulen, you are right in a way … ah, welcome back 'Lina, I was just explaining some generalities to your father. At the moment, the water system of this town is JUST sufficient for its needs, but it was designed for a small village really, a community which basically dipped into a stream occasionally for its water requirements. The Chivans cleverly designed a system by which the wastes would be permanently washed downvalley; they effectively just diverted a few waters. Their genius was to have such an open system that it could cope both with the droughts we occasionally experience and also with the excesses we get in the rains.

“Now the Town has started growing so rapidly, then the water requirements have changed. We have been discussing in the Assembly various methods of water conservation, indeed we have some excellent ideas that look most promising. However, we have discovered, at a costly price, more water – a supply that seems, after first investigations, to be more than adequate for our needs all on its own. So we can cope extremely well now we have two sources.

“But this second supply needs to be extracted somehow, and the years-old Chivan system needs a thorough overhaul and refurbishment. 'Twould be better to do this now, before the Town gets so large that its very size makes it awkward. We feel that, once the second supply is opened fully, then ALL the dam supply can be routed into the cistern at the Community Hall, and we can either demolish, or, better, completely modernise the aqueduct from that branch all the way to the existing cistern at the top of town. That way we will have a double feed lest there be any emergency and one or 't other fails.

“We intend to route the greater part of the new supply into the existing cistern, perchance have a new cistern or two (or three!) prepared to let us cope with any further expansion. Almost certainly we shall require one at the head of the valley, the Bray valley that is, not the Blackstone Vale, to feed the burgeoning artisan zone across the Bray from the Town, inside the Loop Road. That will take time of course, but once the supply is joined in with the existing Cistern, then that will make any refurbishment of the Chivan system that much more awkward. So we need to start that as soon as possible.

“Master Kordulen here will become in much demand as the roads are dug up to access the ancient systems and so on, so we decided to involve him now. Perchance he shall have some ideas or reasons why we should do things a certain way.

“We need to be able to access freely that second water supply before we can continue with anything else to do with water. If we cannot do that, then we are still limited. So THAT is our absolute priority. So let us go now to inspect the 'Yarling' shaft, and I can describe the difficulties and the facts.”

Thus it was that Papa and I soon gazed with awe at the underground lake, peering through the shuddering shadows as our puny miners' lanterns failed to illuminate the vastness of the exposed underground cavern. We had been surprised to find ourselves gently fighting against a head wind as we made our way down the slope of the access tunnel. We reached the end of the tunnel, a sort of wider place that Bezan called the 'Access Chamber'. He directed our attention to the gaping hole to our right. This was the hole blasted by the explosion we had heard about.

We were peering with all our might into the distances over what we were told was the water, when Bezan grinned at me as he produced a special miners' version of a beam lantern, and he swept that around revealing to us things we found wondrous. In its narrow beam we saw strange reflections from otherwise dark rocks, and fascinating shadow forms and the like. We saw too, that there was a work area some five or so strides lower than us. I wondered what it was, but had not too long to wait to find out!

But we were not here just to sightsee. The beam lantern was replaced in its niche, to be available to anyone who came to that spot. Bezan explained that what was important did not need the power of the beam lantern.

You will have gathered by now that there had been some developments down there, of course, in the intervening time since its discovery, so it was no longer so wild and rugged as it had been. A set of stairs had been quite crudely hacked into the side, which led down to a natural outcropping - the strange work area of which we had previously had a glimpse or two.

Even from above, we could see several ropes tied to this outcropping that lead out over, and soon into, the water. Following the directions of most of these ropes, we could see a hand or so of clusters of lights out on the water at differing distances. My eyes could just make out the shapes of men near each cluster.

Before I could ask, Bezan explained: “We have some crude rafts we have constructed and on each there is a pair of men measuring the depth of the water. It appears that it is more than a cast deep in most places. One brave pair paddled all the way across to the other side and we know that the lake itself is wider than the dam lake at ITS widest. One of those, nay TWO of those, ropes have been stretched across to the far side to make it simpler for future occasions; they will be able to just hand-pull themselves across using them. We have positioned them such that they reach roughly one third of the way round the perimeter, whether you go to the left first or to the right. Hence the two ropes.

“The lake is not actually circular, there are some side caverns that are part of the complex, but we have yet to finish mapping it all accurately.

“Somewhere over on that far side,” he gestured vaguely across the water, “there is a cave down which flows a quite strong stream of air, so only the Maker knows what will happen now we interfering men have created a further access for air to circulate in here. Mayhap there was already some circulation of the air, but that is something we shall never know now. You will have noticed the quite strong wind flowing up the access tunnel as we made our way down it.

“Come now, let us descend to the 'dock' outcropping. A guide rope has been attached to the rock face so keep a good grip on that. Here is the upper end of it.” He guided our hands to it, sending Papa down first, and bringing up the rear himself.

We made our careful way down to the 'dock', with a few gasps from my throat as the unevenness of the steps revealed themselves. Once we reached the so-called dock, our increased light revealed the makings of another two rafts, and a curious area at the far end with strange benches and tools and equally strangely shaped pieces of wood.

“I see you regarding the workspace at the end, 'Lina. We have sent to Tranidor for a boat builder, and he arrived just a few days ago. This is the start of his endeavours. Soon we will have safer things than rafts to help make a diagram of this lake here. The boats will be far more nimble than the crude rafts.”

We looked around at various things that Bezan pointed out, perhaps the most significant of which was a clear watermark line some three strides above where we were standing, and therefore two or so below the Access Chamber, which was, of course, above us now. I was about to ask a question or two about the watermark line when there came a shout from above us.

“Hold!” ordered Bezan before tugging us away from our end of the outcropping, towards the boat building area. Once we were a stride or two away from the other end, he called: “Clear! Continue!”

There was a creak or two, a rumble and then a fearful splash. I felt a drop or two of water splash on my legs and toes.

“We are digging rapidly another tunnel back to the outside, from the point where the breakthrough was made. A tunnel that this time slopes down towards the outside rather than slope down FROM that outside. Young Yarling decided that his original shaft should slope the way it does, to minimise the risk of a catastrophic flooding should his shaft break into a body of water. The upslope should have been a defence against all but the worst scenarios. This new shaft of course does not need to follow the original one, for we know in which direction the hillside lies, the Loop Road if you prefer. We are digging directly towards it.

“This will be the tunnel down which the water shall eventually flow, meaning that we shall have to raise the water a minimum distance before allowing Nature to take its course. We have started this tunnel at the same level as the Yarling shaft reached, so it is in the Access Chamber, as that is two and a half strides above the high-water mark I showed you earlier. That mark, we believe, is the upper limit of the lake surface in the rains. We shall have to wait and see of course where the water level reaches during the various seasons.

“At first we shall probably use beast power to pump the water up to its new channelling, but the hope is for a steam engine to be able to run in here without fear of setting off another explosion. That said, we confess that the very easiest way of all would be to have what the Chivans called a 'siphon', some spell it 'syphon', but it means the same. A semaphore signal from Yarling reminded me of that possibility. Apparently, Her Ladyship reminded HIM of it.

“And before you ask, I shall demonstrate one to you when we leave this dark and dank place. Easiest would be to go to Brydas' forge, I deem, for that demonstration.”

There was little for us to do down there in the darkness, so we climbed back up the crude stairway to the end of the now twin tunnels. We had not noticed the second one when we arrived, our focus being upon our guide, and the wonders he was pointing out to us. Bezan sent us on ahead of him, up the slope of the long tunnel, the original tunnel, while he quickly disappeared down the new one to ask the workers something. We were nearly at the end of ours when he caught us up once more, a little out of breath.

Once he had regained his composure, he told us: “They say that they are just about at the breakthrough point, according to their figures. Maybe later today, but most likely tomorrow. Certainly by the day after that.”

“And the significance?” asked Papa.

“Then decision time shall be upon us. If we route the water down to the existing cistern, then we shall have much more to cope with doing those alterations that shall require a new temporary bridge at the bottom of town. The trusses are ready for that, and we have the sturdy wooden blocks standing by, we just need to build the bridge supports and the temporary road surfaces. I deem I need them to get started on that as soon as they may. 'Twould be best if they did so this afternoon. But first I must make some markers.”

Whilst had had been talking, we had descended once more to the Loop Road surface, or at least the surface of the widened strip that was between the Loop Road and the hillside. We were nearly at the beginning of the Miners' Village, so we turned our feet once more towards the head of the Bray Valley and soon passed under the entrance to the 'Yarling' shaft. Bezan started counting our strides, so we kept quiet, fearing to disturb him.

When he reached his desired count, he stopped and asked me to stand exactly where his foot was. Once I was positioned, he trotted up the road a cast or more and picked up a bow that was lying there, and what looked like quite a heavy carry bag. He came back to us and extracted a hammer and a stake from the bag which he handed to Papa. He rummaged some more, took out a wicked looking tool much like an axe, before shouldering his pack. He then scrambled up the hillside above me, using the 'axe' in some places to gain a solid handhold in the steep grassy bank.

Papa backed away from me and stood on the very edge of the Loop Road itself, judging the angles with his experienced eye. He called to Bezan to go left and/or right as was appropriate, until he was sure that he was at a vertical angle up the hillside from where I was stood.

Bezan reached a certain height (I suspect it was more that he was out of breath rather than at the actual height he wanted), took from his carry bag a roll of twine, a further sharpened wooden stake and another hammer, and then drove the stake into the ground. He fastened the twine to it and dropped the rest downhill, where Papa gathered it, stepped back a few paces and pulled the twine free of any bushes and grasses and the like. Then Papa hammered in his stake at the bottom before tying the twine tautly to it.

Meanwhile Bezan strung the bow and took an arrow out of the carry bag. He attached a thinner twine to the arrow, loudly called a warning, received an acknowledgement and shot the arrow towards the entrance to the Yarling shaft. It landed a mere five or so strides from that entrance.

He called again, and someone emerged, scrambled over the hillside, also with the use of a similar 'axe' tool thingy. This new man then retrieved the arrow and took it back to the mouth, where his stance was more certain.

Bezan attached a thicker twine to the thinner one that he had now cut, and the thicker one was pulled steadily to the mouth of the tunnel by the other man, who then still kept pulling more and more, so he had a pile of it at his feet. He signalled to Bezan when he judged enough spare twine had been hauled in. Bezan cut his end and tied that to the stake he had originally driven into the ground.

I looked on in amazement as, with a whoop, he grabbed all his equipment, half jumped into the air, and slid down the slope on his backside, yelling and chortling as he went.

I was amazed, but not so amazed that I didn't grin widely.

I realised what he had then done. For planning purposes, he had estimated the exit of the new tunnel and stretched marker twines along so that they could estimate where the new water channel might have to go. Bezan dusted off most of the mud and stones from his rear, and we all three walked back towards town, talking as we went.

Well I have to confess I mostly listened.

“... along there. So you see the difficulty. To avoid problems at the Town Quarry mouth, the water shall have to pass either over the quarry itself, or be taken along at ground level. If we do the latter, then we shall restrict the ease of access to the Quarry, particularly for wheeled visitors. If we do take the former option, then we shall have much work to do up on the hillside, where it is far more awkward.”

“This is true, indeed. I deem 'twill be better to restrict the access to the Quarry. Maybe a suitable ramp, or, rather, a pair of ramps could be made to carry the access way over the new channel. A slight awkwardness for the citizens, perchance, but far more easily achieved than the complications of hillside construction.”

“Aye, you are correct! We should do that.”

“Excuse me?”

“Yes, 'Lina?”

“If you have this siphon-thingy that I don't understand, but anyway, if it can suck up water somehow, why can't you have one there, and suck the water in an arch over the path into the Quarry?”

Bezan looked at me yet again with a shake of the head.

“Oh 'Lina, I should never have forgotten your abilities. And to think I didn't want you to accompany us! Of course, that is the simplest answer. We simply bury the new channels so that the access path can remain level, and then we use an inverted siphon. I'm sure that is the neatest solution. It would work so easily, as sure as Brydas is your Uncle. Thank you once more, sweet lady.”

I didn't know what I had done. I had no idea what an 'inverted siphon' was. But I found myself glowing with pride again! Something was tickling at my brain though, something about siphons. The word was not as strange to me as it should have been.

We walked briskly down to Uncle's forge works, works that nowadays were getting smaller as parts were transferred over to the artisan area beyond the stream. This made me look over at the Saddler's and it seemed to me that he too was working in a reduced area. I started to look around some more, but my attention was called back to the matter in hand, now Bezan had set up his demonstration.

I soon found out what both a siphon and an inverted siphon was. A simple demonstration with a specially bent pipe and a bucket of water explained it to me far more readily than a thousand words would have done. I was glad to see that several of the apprentices and journeymen gathered in Uncle's forge yard were as equally astounded as I had been. I saw immediately how that principle could be applied to bring the water up those five or six strides from the underground lake.

Then I remembered. Bezan had mentioned a siphon to me before, when we were discussing getting hot water from my hot tank invention and into the bathrooms and privies. At long last, I fully understood now what he had told me then.

Another sudden thought flashed through my head. Bezan had told us that a siphon would work always as long as there was no air in the system, and that a simple siphon would work up to heights of ten strides. What would happen if the lake surface dropped sufficiently that the height became more than ten strides?

“Then we shall have to use pumps, but a siphon is a thing that really needs neither beast nor human to control.”

“Could you not create a sort of half-way cistern inside there? So that a siphon could fill the half-way cistern, and then another would do the final, now shorter, lift into that new tunnel? That would surely cope for all extremes?”

Papa and Bezan looked at each other before they both bowed to me and began clapping. I was SO embarrassed.

---

This project continued, as I have said, but these were the early days of it.

The following day, they did indeed make the breakthrough from the new tunnel out into the fresh air - the centre of the gaping hole they made was eight strides further upvalley and two strides higher than Bezan had marked. Not bad for informal measuring. The twines were all adjusted accordingly.

I shall tell you more about this project later, but another project was mentioned, so I shall take that up now.

… … … 3 … … …

A new bridge at the lower end of the Town? What was that all about?

Well, this is what I was told, this time by Papa, who was heavily involved ...

“Milady suggested that we have a far more efficient waste water treatment system. The Assembly has taken her comments and suggestions as to how to achieve this and has designed something to be far better than our current system.

“Up to now, no-one bothered mentioning it, but the level area near the Town bridge was so rarely used for anything other than pyres (and executions as had happened when Milady was last here) simply because of the unpleasant smells that linger there. The reasons for the smells are easy to understand but difficult to see. The town's waste pipes emerge from the ground under that bridge, and the Blackstone River (still really a stream at this point) washes it all away. It was fine before the huge population increase, but now it is far more noticeable and the Assembly have been getting some complaints, particularly when the wind changes direction.

“An area for this has been designated, according to Milady's principles, far larger than actually required, to cater for future expansion.”

Papa told me that the area had been chosen in the middle of the valley, south of the river after the Blackstone had joined the Bray, and half-way between the Main Road and the Loop Road. So the waste piping had to be diverted, with extension pipes and so on.

The new route would require the waste to be carried over the Blackstone at first, so the Town Bridge would be used for that and the waste no longer dumped into the waters just there. Then the pipes would follow the road (ease of digging there) for a little while, until just before the first Markstone, before swinging towards the middle of the Valley and crossing a minor stream. The fields there would then be made into the new facility. For the development period, that minor stream would be used as the river under the bridge had been. They just hoped the water strength was sufficient.

“As those waste pipes need extending under the Town Bridge, then it should be done before the flow is heavier, as it will be as soon as the Yarling source of water is connected into the system. Which means that the Town Bridge must needs be dismantled, and soon. Which means a temporary bridge shall have to be constructed and traffic kept off the Old Bridge.”

And this was what Bezan was wanting to initiate the afternoon of our visit to the underground lake.

I confess that I was amazed to find that, within a week, the temporary bridge was in use and the old one was being torn apart. The plan was for this work to be done within a further week, and that the temporary bridge would be gone long before Her Ladyship arrived. As it was, this phase of the project took two hands of days, amongst several complaints from those assigned to handle the joining of the new waste pipes to the old (I shudder to think of it, those workers were real heroes).

So there were still scars for her Ladyship, no, her Highness, to see as she would enter the Town.

… … …

Before I mention other projects, or indeed any continuation of ones I have already mentioned, it was at about this time that we had a near-disaster in the Salon, one that came as close as a stitch to destroying all that we had built up.

My hand wearies a little at this point, so I shall tell you those tidings sometime soon.

---