There are notes on word usage at the end

28th of Towin Day 1

When George was fully awake and aware of his surroundings, he had no explanation for what his senses were telling him. The last explicable event he remembered was going to the abattoir to see if he could scrounge something to feed his dogs with. He vaguely remembered having a strange dream where he was cold, there was a big bonfire, and a small man in a fur coat and what appeared to be a rusty Davy Crockett hat but with two tails gave him a cup of something strange to drink. Then he’d been walking, but his recollection of the dream had not included details of where he had walked nor aught else concerning the walk.

Now he was awakening in what appeared to be a cross between a hospital and a prison. Not that he remembered his only experience of the former, excusable since he had been young at the time, newborn in fact, or indeed had any experience of the latter which, as he had admitted to himself a number of times, was due more to good luck than good judgement. George was nearly thirteen, a skinny, underfed, inner-city street-boy who had lived on his wits and with violence all his life. He had never known his father, and his mother had moved on one day leaving him behind. To avoid the authorities putting him into care, he moved into a shed on an allotment plot.[US community gardens] He’d lived by running errands for petty criminals who were higher up the pecking order than he, but who, much more to the point, paid in advance in cash.

His passion was leaving the city and taking his string of dogs out for rabbits and hares, usually with Denny his poaching partner. He also went lamping,(1) ferreting and salmon poaching with other boys he knew, he was far too bright to to call them friends. His ambition was to acquire a gun, not a handgun like all the other boys of his age wished, he wished a shotgun to extend the range of his only interest in life. As he put it, “Handguns just get you into trouble, but a shotgun puts food in your belly.” A century ago, apprenticed to a gamekeeper, he would have been regarded as an asset to any estate, a model member of society in any country parish, and he would have had no need to steal to stay alive.

He realised someone must have undresst(2) him and given him a wash. Like all the children he had been bathed, before being put to bed in some light but warm trousers and a shirt of the same cloth. From the bed, which had sheets and blankets on, items with which, like the night clothes, he wasn’t familiar, he noticed the uncovered portions of the walls were all stone. He looked at the wall with the narrow window in and noticed it must have been twenty feet thick and was curved. There were twenty or so beds in the large chamber, all occupied. He had been staring berount the chamber for five or so minutes, when a small, chubby, smiling woman in her early forties came in, “Goodday, Dear. I’m Mistress healer Iris. You seem to be the first to recover. Would you like some braekfast(3) and a mug of leaf?”

George suddenly realised how long it was since he had eaten. “Yes please,” he replied, hoping he wasn’t going to be asked to pay for it. He followed this with, “Where am I, and what time is it?”

“I’ll just be a minute, Dear, and then I’ll answer your questions.” Iris went away and returned shortly with a tray. “I didn’t know whether you would prefer honey or lingberry(4) on your porridge, so I bringen(5) both.” She slid the tray on to the bed, and he saw a wrinkled apple, what looked like a dried yellow-green plum, a large bowl of what he presumed was porridge, with a spoon beside it and two small bowls, one with red stuff and a spoon in it, the other with golden stuff also with a spoon in it, and there was also a mug of something hot. He’d heard of porridge and honey too, but he’d never eaten either. The lingberry Iris mentioned he presumed was the red stuff, but he had never heard of it before, and the stuff in the mug, which smelt vaguely similar to tea, was he gathered leaf, which he had never heard of either.

“You are in the Keep infirmary on Castle, and it’s ten in the forenoon. None of which means aught at all to you, does it? So I suggest you eat and then I’ll try to provide some answers.” Iris was pleasant, and he didn’t appear to be in trouble, but those walls were awfully thick. When he had finished eating the, to him, exotic meal, which he had enjoyed, especially the plum, she returned, “There will be someone from the Master at arms office coming to have spaech(6) with you after lunch, but we didn’t expect any to awaken just yet. I suggest you listen to start with and ask questions at the end, because I’m not good at explaining, but I’ll do my best.” George nodded.

“You are not on the same world you came from, and our world, Castle, is much calter(7) than yours. You arrivt(8) here in the middle of the night in the open, and it was calt(9) enough to kill you. We had to have you under cover and warm as quickly as possible, or you would have dien.(10) You were given a gentle calming herb in your leaf to help you over the shock. The herbs and the caltth(11) are what maekt you sleep. To help you recover we undresst and batht(12) you before putting you to bed in clean night clothes. As I sayt,(13) our world is Castle. I believe there are a lot more persons whence you come, there are nigh to thirty-five thousand of us here, and we call ourselfs(14) the Folk. This has happent(15) before, but we don’t know how or why you came to Castle, and we don’t know how to return you. We shall have you settelt(16) into a new family and a craft too if you will as soon as possible. Does that help a bit?”

George thought a bit and realised the bonfire hadn’t been a dream. “This is only a small place then, how far is it to the nearest city with a lot of people?”

Iris didn’t understand what a city was, but she did understand his mistake. “No, Dear, there are only thirty-five thousand of the Folk on Castle and most of us live here at the Keep.”

Only thirty-five thousand people on a whole world! George hadn’t thought it through, but one thing was crystal clear to his intelligent, albeit informally educated, mind, there had to be plenty of opportunities for him to pursue his passion, and he doubted any would even care. No trigger happy keepers, wrathful farmers or irate water bailiffs to be avoided here. Maybe he could have a shotgun. He tried again, “What do I have to do, and where do I go when I leave here?”

This was taking Iris out of her deepth,(17) “I am a healer and can’t explain those things to you because I don’t know the answers. You will have to await the Master at arms staffs’ arrival. If you will to dress the launderers have returnt(18) your clothes, they are on the chair over there. Would you like more to eat or more leaf?”

George stammered his gratitude with, “No thank you. I’m full.” Iris thought that doubtful, her boys would have eaten at least four times as much, but George had just eaten more than he had in the last forty-eight hours, and more than at any single meal in his memory. George wondered regarding Iris’ accent, she uest a few odd words but mostly she sounded like a lot like he did and not like the posh folk he’d come across. Posh to George had nothing to do with class and everything to do with money. George thought of his five dogs and came to the realisation they were now Denny’s dogs. Denny lived with his dad, and he had two dogs. They kept all seven of them at the allotment shed where George had lived since his mother had moved on. Denny had helped him to repair it and make it waterproof, and the men who cultivated the allotments often gave him food for himself or the dogs in return for keeping the vandals out and the rats down. George could have moved in with Denny and his dad, but he preferred to have his own place. It was also a very good place to live in order to avoid having to go to school.

George dresst,(19) his clothes had been washed and dried he noticed, and he waited patiently as occupant after occupant of the other beds came to. They were all boys of near his age. Iris and two other women who sounded like Iris gave them braekfast, but he noted none of the boys had been given the explanations he’d received. Some of the boys were dresst in clothing which was very different from his own, and he wondered where they came from. The boys congregated together, and he telt them what little he knew. The boys in the strange clothes telt the others they had been taken in the middle of the night, and had been given the clothes they were now wearing by the locals. The boys were shewn by Iris to a large chamber where they met some more boys and a similar number of girls. She explained there was a while to go before lunch would arrive, but if they wished fruit juice it was on the table, and if they preferred hot leaf all they had to do was tell her.

The children shared what little they knew, and one of the girls said, “I’m Belinda. They don’t have tellies.(20) I asked Iris where we could watch one, and where I could charge my mobile. She didn’t know what I meant!”

A boy who had introduced himself as Waverley said, “I reckon mobiles won’t work here, because I don’t think they have electricity. Look, there’re no lights on the ceiling and no switches or electric sockets on the walls any where. Everywhere is heated with wood fires and that black stuff which I think is called coal.” The children looked and suspected he was right. They tried hard to imagine what that would mean, but few knew of any alternatives to electrical power, none had ever heard of its precursor gas lighting, which the Folk didn’t have either, and though all knew of candles few had ever come across oil lamps. The heating by wood they could see, and feel, worked, but most wondered what would happen when it became dark. Belinda tried to explain to some of them what a mobile phone was but some of the children just didn’t understand.

“I wonder what they do if there’s no telly(21) or electric(22)?” Belinda asked.

George answered her, “I lived in an allotment shed after my mum left. There was no electric there, and when it got dark I went to bed, and I got up when it was light enough to see. There was always loads to do. To keep warm I had a wood fire, and it takes a lot of time getting enough wood dry enough to stay warm.” George’s response had stunned some of the children, and there was little more conversation before lunch.

This is the point at which Marcy (chapters 1-6) comes in my manuscript. Since that has already been posted I’ll next post the portion of the manuscript that follows Marcy 1-6 which is the continuation of Marcy’s tale. It can be read without reading Marcy 1-6 first but it makes more sense having done so. The title of this chapter refers to George / Gage because there are two Georges. The other is an old man and remains George. George the boy one choses Gage as a new name in a short while. The reference is for my benefit.

1 Lamping, hunting after dark with a bright light which will often immobilise prey especially coneys.
2 Undresst, undressed.
3 Braekfast, breakfast.
4 Lingberry, lingon related to cranberry:Vaccinium vitis-idaea.
5 Bringen, brought.
6 Spaech, speech.
7.Calter, colder.
8.Arrivt, arrived.
9.Calt, cold an adjective.
10 Dien, died.
11 Caltth, cold a noun.
12 Batht, bathed.
13 Sayt, said.
14 Ourselfs, ourselves.
15 Happent, happened.
16 Settelt, settled.
17 Deepth, depth.
18 Returnt, returned.
19 Dresst, dressed.
20 Tellies, slang for televisions.
21 Telly, slang for television.
22 Electric, uest thus as a noun electric is slang for electricity.