When I started this story, I warned there would be minimal TG in it. In this chapter you get it: Dawn.

Stone

12. The Secret

Stone and Rayla spoke to the old man as soon as he had finished his story. They started by telling him the town would pay him two silver a week to tell the stories, and gave him several coins to cover the prior weeks. It was a small investment for keeping the people happy. He was grateful: at his age there was little chance of earning a living conventionally. He had been sleeping in a rough lean-to he had built, and only eating at the communal suppers.

They grilled him on his knowledge of the three towers of power. He was certain of some parts of the story: that the land was far to the south and across deserts and the ocean. He was uncertain of other parts though. He said that the creatures the mages created could not reproduce, and most didn’t even have sexual organs. They lived for 100 years without aging, and then were recycled into new creatures of the same type. The one exception was the dollies. They were designed for sexual pleasure, so had the proper parts, but they could not reproduce. They also did not have a navel.

That answered one question Stone and Rayla had: they had noticed the lack of a navel on her otherwise perfect body weeks before. It also explained why she never had menstrual periods like most women her age. Finally, when he had told him all he knew, and he slipped away towards his little hut.

Rayla and Stone walked back to their small tent. As they approached the shelter, Stone noticed that they were holding hands. It felt nice. Soon they were cuddled into the bedrolls. They slept together, but did nothing more.

“Do you think we will have to go to the towers?” Rayla asked as she nuzzled into his muscular back.

“I think we must, if we want to find out why we are here. But not until the town is secure, perhaps in a year,” Stone replied. “I suspect the wizards had something to do with our arrival here. It seems that they have the power that could have brought us. I would like to know if there is some sort of mission that we need to follow. I have been thinking about the four of us. I came from Saskatchewan in 2018. When did you come from Cleveland?”

“It was 1954 back then,” the girl said softly. “And Arthur said he came from Birmingham England, although he was in the trenches in France in 1916 when he came over.”

“And Doug was from San Diego, in 1965,” Stone said. “Four of us came over: three men and one woman.” At that Rayla tensed up. She finally decided to come clean about her past. She was falling in love with this man, and wanted to have no secrets from him.

Stone felt her tense up. “Is that not right?” he said. “You were a woman back on earth, weren’t you?”

He waited for her to say ‘of course’ but was met with silence.

“You were a man back there?” he finally said in realization.

“Yes,” she said with a sigh. “Although not much of a man. I was a 32-year-old black man named Ray. I was born with a cleft palate, and my parents didn’t have money to have the operation to cure it. As a result I grew up shunned by those my own age due to my hideous face. I was teased and bullied, and when I was 10 a group of about eight boys attacked me, breaking ribs and other bones. Again, no hospital for me, and for the next eight months my mother nursed me. But I never really recovered. My spine was bent, and I could only walk with a bend to the side, and a hump in my back made me look like Quasimodo. I never went back to school, and no one cared. Teachers didn’t like having to look at my deformed face in school, and back then one less black boy in school was not a concern to anyone.”

“I retreated into the life of my home. There was a lady next door who raised flowers, but was going blind, and I became her eyes. She couldn’t see my ugly face, so I started raising roses, which my mother took to the florist down the street. He only paid us half what they were worth, but it was enough to help Mom with the bills, especially after my alcoholic father died. But more importantly, it helped my self-esteem: I was earning money to keep alive and the flowers didn’t judge me. Between the flowers and the money Mom earned doing washing for white folk, we were doing well: for blacks.”

Stone just gasped at the girl’s tale of woe. She continued.

“So coming here was a mixed blessing. I am attractive, so much so that people stared at me as much as they had when I had the messed up face. But it was better here. And once you let me wear a normal dress the stares were less of an ogle. But I was female, and quickly found myself being used as such. Then I met you, and you refused to rape me. Since then I am growing more into a woman, and less remains of that ugly little twisted black man.”

Stone felt her arms curl around his body, and touch his penis. It immediately started to harden, and she continued to massage it, and his testicles. “I was afraid of that at first,” she said as the man started panting with desire. “But it is a wonderful thing that I can do this to you.”

For several minutes she continued, and eventually Stone exploded, shooting his juices far out into the campsite. “Oh my, did I do that?” she whispered coquettishly.

“My God, that was wonderful,” Stone said.

“I can do that as often as you like,” Rayla said. “I’m still leery of you putting that thing inside of me. You’ll probably tear me apart. But if that feels good, we can do it again.”

“Not tonight,” Stone gasped. “Maybe in the morning.” Then he fell asleep.

The next morning Rayla repeated her feat, much to Stone’s surprise and pleasure. For a girl who had been so shy before, she really seemed to enjoy giving Stone pleasure. After they had cleaned up, they went for breakfast, paying a silver each to join the children. Stone also told the women working the meal that he was making them town employees, and would pay them two silvers a week to do the job.

Carlson walked by, not eating, and Stone waved him over. He had not planned on breakfast, but almost magically a full plate appeared in front of him, and he ate as Stone explained the groups that were approaching the town. “We will deal with the small group first,” he said. “But tomorrow I want all the soldiers ready to ride out to the west. Speak to Sgt. Pothman and work out a plan. I don’t think we will need the militia, so put out the word that this will be an optional exercise that they can join if they need, or skip if they have more important work here in town.”

It was nearly noon when a young boy ran up to Stone. “Men on the ridge to the south. Many on horses, and a fancy looking wagon,” the boy said.

Stone was on Doug at the time, so he merely had to look to the south. As Arthur had warned there were eight soldiers. It was too far away to recognize any faces, but he knew that there were three who had fought with him against Kona. A man with stirrups has a different posture than one without.

He turned to call the sergeant, and saw him riding forward with seven soldiers.

“Eight for eight, Captain, or should we send more?” Pothman said.

“No eight is fine. I think I know three of those men, and I suspect that you know them all. I don’t know who is in the fancy buggy though.

“That is a carriage of the Duke of Sarn,” Pothman explained. “I think we can assume that our visitor is from Sarn, and those with him are merely his guard.”

The men of Greenstone had ridden up to within comfortable speaking distance of the newcomers. Up close it was clear that the man in the carriage was terrified. It was a member of his guard who spoke.

“This is the Vicomte Vickers, a representative of the Duke of Sarn. We come on a peaceful mission.” With that Stone sheathed Pate, to her dismay. “Don’t worry, tomorrow or the next day we will feed your blood lust,” Stone said softly. He heard the men behind him also sheathe their swords, and a few seconds later the newcomers also put away their weapons. The tense atmosphere eased considerably, and now the man in the carriage spoke.

“The Duke of Sarn sends his best wishes and would like to make a formal treaty with your duchy,” the man said in a frail voice. “We discovered that tax collectors sent to Greenford and Greenwood have either not returned, or came back empty-handed. When we passed through those towns, they told us that they were under the protection of a community called Newtown. Is that the community I see before me?”

“It is, although the people have chosen the name of Greenstone for it. We also claim all the lands previously known as The Barrens, which are now called the Greenswath,” Stone said. “We will gladly form a treaty with Sarn, on one condition. The Duke must ban slavery from all his lands: Sarn and the other towns he controls. If he accepts those terms, we will have peace. If not our army will go to Sarn and free the slaves and depose the Duke during the winter season.”

“That is a major demand,” the shocked envoy said. “The economy of Sarn depends on the slaves. Is there any other way?”

“That is a fallacy. We banned slavery in Greenwood and Greenford and both towns have prospered since. And you can see that Greenstone is developing at a rapid pace, with no slaves. We might negotiate on land: we currently claim all of the Greenswath, and both sides of the Green River, down to 12 miles past Greenford. The two villages are not negotiable.”

“The loss of those two towns is grievously felt by the Duke,” Vickers said. “His tax base is not as large as he would like it to be. We should like to negotiate terms of the peace.”

“The terms are set,” Stone said. “No slavery for all of Sarn, and no farms between Sarn and Greenland shall return to the Duchy without the consent of the owners.”

“Consent of the owners?” the Vicompte said in surprise. “Why on earth would their wishes matter? We are their masters. What we say, happens.”

“The world is changing, sire,” Stone said. “The rights of the people are starting to be noticed, including slaves.”

“That is beyond my ken,” the other man said. “I can make agreement with you on boundaries, but the Duke will have to decide if he wishes to give up his slaves. I will send a horseman back to Sarn immediately to get an answer.”

“That round trip will take more than a week,” Stone said. “I offer you the hospitality of the town until he returns. I assume part of your visit here was to spy on our progress.”

“Spy? Oh my no,” the vicomte said. “True, the Duke will want a report on what is happening in his former territories, but I would not call it spying.”

“Our troops are heading west tomorrow on exercises,” Stone said. “We would welcome your men joining them. And you will be able to get a first hand look at how the Greenlands fight war. You are welcome to attend as well.”

“No, I thank you for your offer, but I would prefer to stay in the town. My backside is more than a little sore from the ride up here, and I would recover for the ride back. Is there a good hotel in your little town? My men can join you though: they seem eager.”

“Not even a bad hotel yet, but we will find you a room somewhere.” Stone said. “And I fought with three of your men in the battles against Kona, and my sergeant here knows the other men. They will be welcome to come, and I think I can promise you that they will all return intact.”

The Vicomte was lodged in one of the early log cabins that had been built, and granted a bed and breakfast at the ridiculous rate of one silver a night. It made the woman who owned the building think of going into the hoteling business.

Stone stopped to check that preparations for tomorrow’s march were well underway, but Sgt Porthman had everything in order. So the big man headed to the healer’s tent. “What do you need to do there?” Rayla asked as she accompanied him.

“Your story last night … what you went through as a child,” Stone avoided called her a boy. Just saying it seemed wrong: she was so female now. “I want our community to follow the Canadian model for health care. Good health care is a human right, not a commodity. We need to see what is being done now, and set things right.

There had been several women among the former slaves who had assisted healers, and one who had been a healer for a rich family, that had come to hard times and had to sell specialist slaves like the healer. She was the one who took charge of the healing tents, which currently housed several people: a miner injured by a rock fall, and a woodsman cut by an axe bouncing awkwardly off a tree. There were continual emergency calls, with people coming in with minor ailments that didn’t require bed care.

“Who is in charge here,” Stone said from the entrance to the tent.

“That would be me, Captain. You may call me sister Dayna,” the healer said.

“Sister, I have decided to turn my attention to health care,” Stone said. “I want to know how people are paying for their treatments.”

“Payment?” the sister said. “We ask no payments. Our nurses get the evening meals, so we have no real need for monetary payments. The odd thing comes to us in barter, and our tents have been given freely. The men also plan to build us a wooden building on this site later, before winter.”

“Good,” Stone said. “I want to make it clear that the healing community will be a free service to all. How many assistants do you have?”

“Five, although there is a shortage. You see, we need to provide care at all hours.”

“Well then, your nurses, as I think of them, will be paid four silvers a week,” Stone said. “And as the main healer your own pay will be seven silvers a week. No doubt when word gets out that the job is paid, others will look for positions. Would 10 in total be enough?”

“Twelve would be better,” the woman said.

“You may hire those you feel will be competent,” he said. “Up to 12. I am going to have to get someone to be paymaster for all the positions we are creating. I’ll let you know how to collect your money. There will be five weeks of retroactive pay … that means pay for the past weeks … as well.”

“Bless you Captain,” the healer said. “And if we need supplies?”

“Anything needed can be purchased and you will be reimbursed.”

The healer had a big smile on her face as Rayla and Stone walked out of the tent.