the Leathermines

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Laun was up close to first light.  One of the men had risen at some point and left.  She remembered the movement but had fallen back into the nightmares.  She woke suddenly as a tip-tap on the window sounded out the rain that was on them for the day.

Laun was wrapped around Jaso and it took a while to disentangle from him without waking him.  Her mind was still partially remembering the need to run, to escape left from the dream.  The lists of things that she wanted to do, needed to do that day started to shade out the nightmare, cover it.  It still lent an urgency to her waking and leaving the chamber.

She pulled the robe on.  It was cold in the room, especially after the enclosed sleeping area.  She lit the candle on the table from the low lantern on the wall and sat, laying out the papers Gismar had drafted the day before.  She opened the journal and went directly to the pages Geralk had marked.

Laun looked at the journal and the papers for about half an hour, still no closer to finding if there was a connection or code.  Her mind just was not used to unraveling that type of mystery.

She left the papers on the table and slipped on a tunic.  She was out of the room and on her way to the privy when it finally sunk in.  Lady Hellon had been connected to the greyworld somehow.  It was obvious now.  Laun had seen the clapperless bells, broken keys, broken locks and grey ribbons before.  They had been tied around gifts or attached to little things that were sometimes given to her Mistress, usually from someone who was a courier for someone else.

Her Mistress was always so subtle.  Her hand gracious to all, and how she used her words always left Laun in awe when it was a tense situation.  Lady Hellon’s staff had still been in the castle that night of the raid.  They had laid out their Mistress for the vigil, brushing her hair and drawing the sheer fabric over her.  Laun closed her eyes and saw the faces of the women who had personally attended their Lady.  They were all buried in the household grounds near their Master and Mistress.

Laun was in the Great Hall, standing next to the fire that was being built up by one of the Protectors that had just come inside.  It was raining and he was soaked.  Laun went and found a tunic from the laundry, not clean, but dry.  The protector quickly changed and thanked Laun.

“I hope it was a quiet night.”

He nodded, a few droplets falling from his hair.  “It got really cold before the rain.  If I didn’t know better, I would say that there is snow behind that rain.”

Laun nodded, her head not hurting like it was before she and the four men had gone to bed.  “The sky was not good last night.”

The fire was catching the dry split log and there was a lot of light and heat in very little time.  It chased away the cold from the weather, and Laun’s own inner cold.  The morning was coming slowly with the light through the tall windows in the Great Hall being muted by the clouds.  There was so much that needed to be done every day to keep the household running.  Laun tried to stop the interlocking lists that seemed to constantly be pushing at her and concentrated on the right now.

Laun got up and touched the man’s shoulder.  “Get warm and get rest.”

Laun fell into one of her first actual responsibilities that she had been given years ago.  She had cleared out ash from the kitchen hearths, stacked the cold ones with wood ready to light and was heating one of the large pots full of water when Orgia came in.

Orgia had to look at the dirty woman in front of the cooking hearth closely to be able to see her Lady.  She was going to protest before she saw what work had been done.  Orgia was usually one of the first people up and in the kitchens.  The rain had made it hard for her to get out of her bed.  Not having Geralk with her to keep her warm had not helped.

“The rain is cold this morning.  It may be snowing soon.”  Laun pushed another stick under the grate in the cooking hearth.

Orgia nodded.  She started to pull out things for the first meal and said, “There is still one field that needs to be harvested.  I hope it dries out before we have to get that in.”

Laun handed Orgia a ladle from the clean basin.  “We have enough laid in for several months.  They may be lean after a while, but we will survive.”

Orgia was cutting apples and throwing them into a bucket of water.  “There are things we need from one of the merchants.  We...”

Laun saw the pain on Orgia’s aged face.  “I miss him too.  He will come back.  And with enough to keep up the household through the winter.”

Orgia nodded and continued to process the food for that morning.  More of the kitchen staff started to drift in, all knowing their jobs, all putting their hands to what needed to be done.  Laun and Orgia talked in brief sentences about the harvest, what needed to be done in the keep and just a few words about the people who had left on their mission.

Laun saw that she was secondary in the kitchen and excused herself.  Orgia had one last shot over her shoulder to the Lady, saying, “You had better get that soot off your face before I dump you into the tub.”

The chatelaine had a point.  Laun ducked not into the Great Hall, but through the back kitchen that had the soaps being milled.  She grabbed a cake of the new soap and went into the laundry.  She used one of the laundry tubs and washed herself, and the tunic she had been in.  The tunic was hung over one of the ropes hanging from the ceiling to dry.  A clean tunic and underskirt was pulled on and she headed back out to the Great hall.

There were many people gathered already.  The fires at either end were blazing, chasing the cold and grey out of the room.  Laun found a mug and poured herself some of the hot tea that was on the sideboard.  She started around the room, greeting people that morning.  

She was able to have a word to one of the people who played the music at night and mentioned that his Majesty was coming up to the celebration of his birthday, according to a note Laun had found in amongst the papers she had recently read.  A bright glint came to his eye and he said he had an idea.

Laun was able to talk to most of the people individually before she came to three of the four men she had been escorted by the day before.  Jaso looked well rested and accepted the touch to his shoulder without any of the hesitation as Laun had noted before.  The other two smiled and offered pieces of the smoked meat they had cut from the hunk on the sideboard.  Laun accepted and found that she was very hungry.  The tea was not enough for her growling stomach.  One of the men stood and followed her back to the sideboard.

They were not alone, but away from others when he said, “I heard what you did for Jaso last night.  He has been moping around for months being homesick.  I think this is the first morning in ages that he had not compared anything to his home in the South.”  He took her hand and kissed it.  “Lady, thank you for what you have done for us.”  He stepped back and went back to the tables.

He had been one of the ones who had started to chafe with Laun being the head of the household.  He had been at her back for a day, into the night, and had seen everything she had done.  Laun saw what Edgar had done by having them follow her.  Each person knew what they did.  No one, even she, knew what everyone did for the household.  But now, he and the others had more of an understanding, a knowledge, of what she did, and how she did it.  They may not know why, but they knew more.

More.  The little voice in the back of her head spoke up.  She needed to know more.  Where were her men?  Did she push them away and they decided to leave?  How was she going to not just lead but go through the day without them near her?  Yes, there was a physical need that had awakened in her, but the mental need to talk, to discuss, was growing more than the body’s wants.

She pushed it to the side and stood in the middle of the room.  Quiet spread as the people in the room noticed her.

“It’s raining.”  Several chortles started up.  Laun smiled, but her tone was serious.  “Because it is raining, there are several indoor projects that should be looked after.  If I could have the carpenters go through the keep and castle and see if there are any more leaks or holes that have popped up, that would be very helpful.  We also have a potential drainage problem to the East of the keep wall.  Jorde, see if you can break the dam that has built up and smooth the flow to the lower ponds.  Take as many volunteers as you can.  As you are going through the keep today, keep an eye out for rodents.  I found a particularly large rodent in one of the damaged trees yesterday.  If they head inside...”  She saw a few people shudder.

Laun turned and looked at everyone as she was talking.  A few people brought up other things, other projects, some needing to be done, some already underway.  It seemed that the morning ritual of communication was coming to an end, so Laun pushed herself to say something before they broke and went their separate ways.

“Some of you may have noticed that people are not here.  Do not be alarmed.  Do not worry.  They are out in the world trading for goods and information and should be back soon.  There was need to get out before this rain came to make travel faster.”  Laun saw the looks in some faces change, and she had thought right that the people had been missed.  “Please, be careful in the rain today.  And - thank you all for being here.”

The quiet broke and people started off to their various jobs for the day.  Laun had no real idea what she needed to do that day.  The days had started to blend in together, all the work to keep the household running and the planning that she was doing was underlying everything.  Even when she thought of the outside, what Falmir and his people might be doing, she held the household against it and how it may impact them.

Her stomach made it’s self known.  She hadn’t eaten much of anything and the emptiness was starting to get painful.  She helped the kitchen staff clear off the sideboard, grabbing some bread and new cheese as she did so.  A refill of hot tea was in her mug as she went back to her chamber to look at the papers again.

Laun felt like she was beating her head against a wall with the journal and tapestry papers.  But there was something there.  She set the papers down for the third time and covered her eyes with her hands.  She leaned back in the chair and tried to let her mind wander.  She heard the outer door open and then a small tap on the wooden wall.

“Yes?”  Laun had not spent much time in the room other than for sleeping and was not sure who would be trying to find her.

The tapestry hanging at the anti-chamber moved and Edgar was there.  Laun did not even know she was standing until she was in his arms.  He partly carried her into the room and she saw that Fount was also there.  She turned and found herself in such a close embrace she had problems breathing.  The three of them were in a three-way embrace for several minutes.  No talking.  Just standing there.

When it finally relaxed, the embrace fell to the end of the bedding.  Laun sat between the two men holding and being held.  Fount looked around and was the first to comment, “Made some changes?”

Laun nodded.  “Orgia.”  Edgar only had eyes for Laun and seemed to be trying to etch her into his mind with the intenseness of his stare.  A bad sort of shiver went down her back.

They were wet.  She finally realized that they were in wet clothing, cold and slightly dripping.  Laun pushed off of the bed and went to the pile of cloths on the anti-chamber chair.  One of the dancers was there as guard and Laun told her to go get hot tea and hot water for the men.

“Strip!”  The men did as told, the wet clothing being taken and dumped on the floor of the anti-chamber.  The large cloths were wrapped around the naked men and Laun draped her robe on Fount’s shoulders as he had been shaking even before the air had hit his skin.

More than hot tea and water was brought by the chatelaine.  She understood the call and had clean, dry clothing, some hot gruel and extra blankets brought into the chamber.  Before Orgia had time to ask any of the questions that raced through her mind, and across her face, Laun motioned everyone else out.

The two were warm, dry and eating.  They looked at the curtains around the bedding and at the papers spread on the table.  Laun waited until they were ready, and let them say the first things.  She sat between them and kept a hand on each of them, being calm.

Edgar finished his tea and looked at Laun.  He took up her hand and kissed it, lingering over her knuckle.  “My Lady...”

Laun did not say anything, but she did smile at him.  She waited.  She knew several things, some of which hateful, that she wanted to say.  She said none of them and waited for Edgar to continue.

“We rode as far as the River yesterday.”  Fount nodded an encouragement to Edgar over his tea mug.  “We came across several groups of people, most of them refugees from the Capitol City.  One group, though, was clearly wearing the Dark colors of Falmir.  They were lost.  We made them...more lost.”

Fount was warming his hands on the mug and said into the steam, “I wasn’t sure we were going to be able to go up against five of them. That Dance Master’s training really helped out.”

Laun was trying to wrap her brain around what they had just said.  “Did you kill them?”

Edgar nodded.  “We dumped them in the river, after we stripped them.  We have their horses and supplies.  They were coming here.”

Laun tilted her head and let them describe what had happened.  No mention was made of why the two of them had left, just what had happened once they were at the river road.

The refugees were trying to get to the mountains and over to Myrned.  Word from them was that most of the Northern lands were decimated from bandits and fighting, the West was getting crowded with refugees from the larger cities in the East and the nobles from Rosemond had usurped almost all of the sitting nobles in the Midlands.  When asked, the two men had identified themselves as from Helmic’s lands.  That worked until the Dark group.

They had just come from that castle.  They had just installed the new Rosemond noble and were going to go to Salam-Dir to scout it out.  They mentioned, before the fighting, that it was known that Salam-Dir was empty, that no one had survived the ‘cleansing’ or had made it back from the Festival.  The same false information that the merchant Gyrip had said.

“And then we fought, killed them and headed back.  It would have been difficult to explain to the next group why we had extra horses.”  Edgar seemed satisfied with the telling.

Laun was not.  She did not know how to ask what she wanted to know.  She wanted to say the things on her mind, but instead, said, “It is good that you are both back, and it looks like in one piece.”  Laun noticed Fount pulling a sleeve down to cover a small wound that really should have been tended to.  “My day yesterday was uneventful.  Other than the rat.”  Laun saw Edgar narrow his eyes.  “Thank you for leaving me the escort.  They were very useful.  And-” Laun hoped for a certain reaction, “they helped to keep me warm last night.”

Fount looked away briefly.  Edgar just kept looking at her.

A small scratching on the wood broke into their conversation.  “Yes?”  One of the younger servants came in carrying a scroll case.

“This was in the bundles that were on the horses.  Orgia thought you may want to see it.”

Laun accepted the scroll case.  “If you see Pillar or Lucaris, please send them here.  There are a few wounds that may need to be patched up.”  She felt Fount sigh next to her.

The scroll case was full of very interesting tidbits of information.  The writ of nobility and domain over Salam-Dir was the most important one.  Others had names, descriptions, alliances and such, but the one with Falmir’s name as King at the bottom was the top priority.

“Are you two up to talking with Dreng?”  They both nodded and were on their feet.  Pillar came silently in and stopped them from leaving.  It took a few minutes for him to check them out, a few salves spread over minor cuts and a few words to Pillar about the adventures before he led the way back out of the chamber.  The four of them went and found Dreng.  Several of the younger wardsmen and a few servants were at his feet as he told of one of the battles he had fought, and won, over forty years before.  The young boy with the burns on his back was one of the most enraptured of the young ones.

Laun said, in an even tone, “Sire, may we have a word with you?”

The look and tone stopped Dreng.  He excused himself from the younger people and started to walk with Laun and her men.  She handed him the parchment with the writ and waited until Dreng had stopped, both in mid stride and reading the page.

“There may or may not be repercussions from this, Sire.”  Laun let Edgar tell a short version of the adventure.  Dreng leaned against the wall in the corridor and thought.

He grabbed Edgar on the shoulder and shook him.  “I like your style, man.  Dumping them in the river will make it look like bandits took them out.  And this information is good.”  He turned to Fount and slapped the young man on the back.  “You are shaping up to be an excellent catch.”

Laun heard what he meant.  She was not pleased with the assumption that their Majesty seemed to have made.  But right then was not the time nor place to correct it.

“We have a few new horses and the supplies they brought.  Sire, if you would excuse us, I would like to go see what was brought in.”  Laun waited for his nod and went towards the stables.

 

Next, Chapter 35