One more chapter tomorrow, I hope, then I will break for a few days to let everyone catch up: Dawn.

Stone

Stone 21 – Coming Home

The trip north was slower than the one south, thanks to the two wagons carrying the millstones. Larger as well: there were many emigrants from Sarn heading north, and they were quite willing to travel at a slow pace, in return for protection against the bandits.

The first night on the road, Stone noticed that the Duke’s Chef was with them, and he had more or less taken over the making of the dinner, along with two others from the castle who worked with him. They prepared the meal, and then the Chef and another came to Stone and family, each bearing two plates.

The chef handed Stone and Rayla their plates, which had thin sliced beef, and several vegetables, along with two mounds of fluffy white stuff. But before they could eat, they heard a squeal of delight from Emily. Looking at her plate they found the same food, but arranged differently. There was only one heap of the white stuff, but two peas created eyes, and carrots made up whiskers and long ears.

“It is a bunny,” Emily squealed. “Look how pretty it is.”

Jason had a similar meal, but he merely smiled and then took a bite of the white stuff. “Oh wow, wow, wow,” he exclaimed. “It is delicious.”

At that the parents tried some. It was potatoes, but like no other potato they had ever eaten. It was creamy, with some kinds of spices in it. Rayla tried the vegetables, and they tasted almost like candy, fried in butter. All in all it was the best meal they had ever eaten. The tender beef nearly fell apart on their forks.

The Chef’s man had gone back to serve the rest of the train, who were also murmuring over the taste of the meal.

“That is wonderful food,” Stone told the Chef. “You are quite the cook.”

“It was a bit of a sample,” he replied. “I wondered if you need a good chef at your palace?”

Stone had to laugh. “I wouldn’t call our house a palace,” he said. “It is only four rooms, and not large ones at that. Only one is large enough for guests. I don’t think you could serve more than ten in there. I don’t do the lavish dinner thing that the old Duke did.”

The chef’s face fell. “I was hoping to get work with you in Greenstone.”

“Have you thought of a café?” Rayla asked.

“What is a café?”

“Well, there are two sorts. One is downtown, and merchants and artisans come in once or twice a day for a cup of choc. You get 100 people twice a day paying fourpence for choc, plus some lunches and dinners, and you have a nice business. The other sort can be anywhere. It is a destination café, and you would only serve dinners. It would be super fancy but the food you serve would attract those people in town who want a special night out. Charge several silvers for a meal, and even if you only get eight people a night you would make good money.”

“The latter seems interesting. May I ask you more questions about it?”

“Certainly,” Stone said. “May I ask if you have any funds?”

“Oh yes,” the man said. “I have over 50 gold hidden in one of my wagons.”

Stone held up the silver plate the meal had been served on. “And it seems you have some of the fixtures from the castle.”

“Yes. I was not paid for the past two months, so I felt it was fair to take the plate and goblets, as well as much of my kitchen pots and pans. I have three wagons full, although there has been a bit of spare space for walkers in the train to ride for a while.”

“How did you manage to accumulate 50 gold?” Stone asked, wondering if the Chef had been stealing from the treasury like so many others.

“I got a bonus of 25 gold for moving down from the Duke of Kona’s palace to Sarn,” he said. “And I was paid, until recently, a gold a month, which all went to my savings. That was 22 gold.”

“Kona? The place we had a war with?” Stone asked, ignoring the fact that 22 plus 25 did not equal 50. But if the chef had been dipping into the castle treasury, it was not as much as the other officials.

“Yes. I’m afraid that the war was because Sarn would not send me back north. Kona sent troops primarily to capture me. I’m sure they would have looted the town too, but they mainly wanted me.”

Stone just shook his head. Thousands died, and for what? Two Dukes squabbling over a cook. He pulled his mind back into the conversation. “I think you will have enough money. You could build a house, with a large dining room for your patrons. The kitchen would be as large as you need it. You will probably need storage if you have three wagons of goods. If you want you could build a residential area for yourself. And a stable for the horses and wagons of your customers.”

“That sounds doable,” the Chef said. “Would there be any business?”

“Well Stone and I would come in at least once a week,” Rayla said. “And people in town tend to mimic us, so I expect you will soon fill the place, depending how large you make it.”

Other people visited the family that night, usually to see if they should go to Greenstone or if they should attempt to find work in Greenford or Greenwood on the ways up north. One was a cartographer, and Stone urged him to go all the way.

“Can you draw me a map of the lands?” Stone asked the man. “Not a fancy one to hang on a wall, but a field chart that just shows the roads or paths between all the towns that Sarn once controlled. I need to visit all of these on a future trip, and a map would be useful. I know the Green Valley, but not the other towns.”

“I could draw a map of the south part of the duchy,” the man said. “I don’t know anywhere past Greenwood. But I can do the rest. And if I go to Greenstone, I will be able to learn that area, and map the entire duchy.”

“What is a fair price for that work?” Stone asked. “A gold?”

“Oh, no sir,” he said. “Ten silver would be ample. I will be able to sketch it while on the wagons, and do the fine work at our camps. I can have it done by the end of the trip.”

Arthur occasionally reported bandits in the area, so Stone and Doug went out on patrol regularly, and occasionally Rayla joined them. Arthur would spot small gangs of bandits and the patrols often surprised the men. To Pate’s dismay there was little killing: usually the promise of a meal would make the men surrender. The result is that the road north was much safer to travel in the future, and the people of the Green Valley were happy to have a leader who actually cared for them.

Jason begged to go out on the patrols, but Rayla firmly forbade it. She did take the boy on some of her hunting expeditions, which she considered less dangerous. Although one trip during the trip between Greenford and Greenwood proved the exception. Arthur spotted a boar, an animal Rayla had not yet shot. She discovered that it took five arrows directly into the head to bring down the animal. While Rayla and the two soldiers accompanying them were cleaning the downed animal, there was the sound of another animal tearing into the bush. The men grabbed swords, but Rayla’s bow would be useless against the animal while she was on foot.

The soldiers had given Jason a steel-headed pike when he begged for a weapon on the hunt. Rayla had started to teach him archery, but his thin arms were not strong enough to send an arrow far. But as the second boar approached, incensed at the death of its mate. Jason jumped from his horse and brought the point down and it caught into the thick hide of the animal above the neck. It caught, and pulled him off his horse, but his weight was enough that it pinned the animal to the ground, and the soldiers swords were used to finish the wounded animal off.

Rayla and Jason embraced, each certain that the other had just faced certain death. But when then foursome entered camp with all that pork and bacon behind their saddles, there was general rejoicing.

“Boars usually travel in pairs,” Stone remarked as he held his son, the hunter, on his lap.

“That would have been good to know six hours ago,” Rayla said dryly. She explained that the other boar was in the deep bush and Arthur had not seen it until it burst into the open. Both Stone and Rayla were uncertain if the pike attack was smart, or just very, very lucky, but everyone agreed that Jason was brave to attempt it. The young boy just glowed in the attention, and beamed when Stone said he was proven enough to carry a knife on his belt. Rayla didn’t agree, and there were arguments for the next week, usually after the boy had nicked himself with the blade. But he was allowed to keep wearing the knife, and in his dreams he fought wild animals and bandits alike with the small five-inch blade.

Emily was not jealous of her brother and all the attention he got. She enjoyed the bacon as much as anyone else on the train, which was so large that the meat was gone in two days, when they reached Greenwood. It was taking three days for each leg of the trip. The little girl made friends easily, and in both Greenford and Greenwood she had reunited with little ones she had played with on the trip down. As well, she had made friends with children emigrating north with their parents, and it became common for her to have one or the other of the girls ride with her in the caravan, where they would play for hours in the back with the dolls O’Breyne had carved for her during the rest periods.

Of course Rayla had to ask permission of the mothers of the girls to allow them to ride in the caravan, and more often then not the woman would agree to join Rayla, allowing the women to chat away on the otherwise boring trip.

Stone noticed that they were now in an area with the grasses flattened and significant amounts of cow droppings. It was clear that this is where the cattle herds had passed by, and sure enough, later that day they could be seen slowly grazing as they travelled. The dairy herd was still being milked twice a day, do they wouldn’t go dry, and most of the milk was converted into butter or cheese, in a travelling dairy that was set up twice a day. The chef was ecstatic to get hold of butter, in particular, and Rayla managed to get milk for the children: hers and the others in the train.

Stone slowed the train down even more, to keep pace with the herds. They were close enough to Greenstone that the delay would not be major. They came across an abandoned farm a little later, with spacious fields surrounding it. The farmer with the beef herd decided it would be a perfect location for his farm. The dairy farmer was unsure. “I really should locate closer to town,” he said. “The milk will be fresher when it is delivered.”

“I think there is an abandoned dairy farm a mile south of town, but I suspect that it is already been taken up by a resident,” Stone said.

They reached that farm several hours later, and the farmer inspected the barns. “It is perfect,” the farmer said. “Very clean. We could set up operations here.”

“But this is my home,” the resident said. “And I spent a lot of work cleaning up those stalls. Most of them had piles of bones to be removed.”

“Oh my,” the farmer said. “The slavers must have captured the old owners at milking time. The cows would have to go through a painful day or two as their milk dried up, and then later they must have starved to death in their stalls. We will have to disinfect the entire area. Where can I get vinegar: a lot of vinegar?”

“In town,” Stone said. “And what happened to all those bones.”

“I got lucky there,” the resident said. “There was a man starting a soap operation, and he and his men carted them away for soap-making.”

“Soap?” Rayla said. “We have soap now? I need to get some. These two little ones need a proper bath before the river gets too cold, and you do too, Mister. You have been getting pretty ripe lately.”

“We’ll get soap when we get to town, Rayla,” Stone said. “First we have to settle this matter.” He turned to the resident. “If you want, you can keep this house, and we will build a new one for the farmer. Or if you prefer, you can have a new house built for you, at the town’s cost. What type of work do you do?”

“I have made a bit of coin as a carpenter’s helper, and for a day I worked in the new saw mill, but the noise was too much for me. I have bad ears, and noise bothers them. The carpenter was not too happy when I told him to hammer quietly.”

The farmer looked up. “I may have the perfect job for you. I will need someone who knows the town to deliver milk each morning. The job will go from 4 a.m. to 8 a.m., and then I can find some quiet work for you in the dairy. Buttermaking is pretty quiet.”

“Then I will move to a new house, perhaps here on the property,” the resident said. “You can take the larger house, since you have a family.”

That settled, Stone and Rayla left the farmer and his new driver, and they headed into town. Like Greenwood and Greenford, the town showed many changes since they left. Most of the new buildings were built of sawn planks, a sign that the sawmill was in operation. Main Street had more buildings, and fewer tents. The tent that had been a schoolroom was moved back a block, and men were busily making two more classrooms in its place.

“School tomorrow,” Rayla told the children, with Jason groaning and Emily elated at being able to connect with her friends.

“Evening captain,” an approaching man said. After a moment Stone recognized him. It was the printer who he had convinced to move north. Apparently he was starting a weekly newspaper for the town, and had come out to get a story on their trip.

In the end, he got three stories. A small one was the wedding of Rayla and Stone: Stone felt that it would be good for the people of the town to know they were legal now. Rayla had to describe her dress: the reporter knew that the women readers would need to know. A second story covered some of the basics of the trip, and noting some of the people who had come north with them, including the cattlemen and the chef. But the little printer got most excited when it was mentioned that Jason had killed the boar, and he dug deeply for all the information he could about that experience. Finally he decided he had enough and nearly ran back to his printshop.