Marei - book one. Part one: The Call. chapter 4

A rooster’s crow woke me just as the sun came through the oiled paper of my bedroom window. I stretched under the warm blankets and smiled to myself – I was already thinking of the room as mine. Pulling the blankets up under my chin, I rolled to one side, and snuggled into the warmth. I was no longer tired, but I had decided that I would finish thinking about my options in bed and know how I wanted to proceed before I officially began my day.

It was mid Autumn. I had set out walking at midsummer and now the leaves were turning and the scent of frost was in the air in the mornings, though I had seen no ice crystals on the grass just yet. The moon was waning, with little more than a week to go until the new moon. As high up as I was now, I figured I’d see a frost two or three days earlier than the valley below. From that frost onward, I had no idea what to expect from the weather. I knew that at my home, it would only be a few weeks until snow flurries tickled the sky and then a few weeks after that until the white blanket of winter covered the ground for months.

I had taken over six weeks to make the trek from my parent’s house to here. I could only assume that it would take me that long to make the journey back to home. But six weeks would put me in serious danger of walking or trying to sleep outside in weather so cold it would become dangerous. This house was not mine to claim, but with no one here, and no other options, I decided that I would do my best to tend it until Grandmother came home, or until Spring came and I could safely walk back to my parent’s village, which ever came first.

Decision made, I hurried out of bed to make a more thorough inventory of the supplies of the house. I was not expecting what I saw in the common room when I brushed through the curtain and into room. A scream escaped me before I could stop it.

A large bearded man sat at the table, facing me, eating a bowl of the stew I had prepared two nights ago. His shoulders were broad and his clothes dark layers of fur and wool. His enormous feet were bare and I noticed peripherally a large pair of boots by the door. He stood when I screamed and towered above me. He still had the bowl of stew in his hands and as he walked towards me I backed away until my shoulder hit the door frame.

Panicked I looked around the room for something I could use as a weapon. The wood pile was behind him and so was the kitchen full of ceramic and pots. I was mentally canvassing the contents of the bedroom behind me when to my surprise he broke into a full faced grin.

“You’re not who I was expecting!” His voice was rich, low and loud, booming through the small room. I could easily imagine that if this was the volume he used inside, should he choose to actually yell he might be heard for miles. He threw back his head and laughed a big, hearty laugh that took the edge of my panic, though it did not stop me from feeling defensive.

He took a big gulp of stew from the bowl he was still carrying and sat back down at the table. “You make this stew?” he questioned with his mouth full, dripping bits of potato on his thick black beard. I nodded, still reluctant to talk to the large stranger. “Not bad. ‘Specially considering what you had to work with, or, more accurately, what you didn’t have.” He chuckled at his own joke and wiped his beard with his sleeve.

“Whyn’t you come and sit down? You must be hungry after sleeping like the dead as long as you did. I’ve been here since yesterday afternoon and found you curled up like a stray cat in the guest room and not a sound I’ve made since has waked you. I even lugged in some wood and water, stoked the fire and banged around a bit in the kitchen.” He gestured to the table where he sat and when I didn’t come over he studied me curiously.

“Come on now, I’m not going to bite you!” I still didn’t move so he shrugged and refilled his bowl. “Fine, have it your way, but I’m sure that out of the two of us, my way is better on the belly, regardless of how the stew tastes.” He chuckled again as he slurped the stew, belched, and rubbed his ample stomach.

“Well, now that breakfast is done, I’ve got to be seeing to the animals. Don’t suppose you’d like to come meet ‘em?” He raised his eyebrow in question, then shook his head as he looked at me. “Lord and Lady you’d think I was here to kill you instead of bring you the animals as I was told.”

“Animals?” I asked quietly, puzzled but starting to believe that this great beast of a man was not indeed here to kill me. “What animals?”

Puzzled he shook his great grizzly head. “You really have no idea who I am, do you?” I shook my head and he extended a huge paw-like hand towards me for a handshake.

“Woodsman,” he introduced himself as I tentatively placed my hand in his. My hand was easily a third of the size of his and fit neatly into his palm. His hand was warm and dry and he pumped my arm eagerly and enthusiastically.

“John Woodsman. I’ve been tending to The Lady’s animals since my father passed the torch to me at his death more than a quarter century ago. At times she has to leave unexpectedly and cannot take her animals with her where she goes. And who wants to travel with a grouchy old goat anyway, I’d like to know? Plus trying to herd chickens and get any distance covered has got to be nigh on impossible. And that’s without stopping to collect the eggs where they drop.” His expressive face bunched and wrinkled as he tried to contemplate a nomadic life involving a flock of chickens.

“Anyway, when she has to leave, all of a sudden, she comes down the hill to me and tells me ‘John, would you kindly fetch the animals? Bring them back home when you see the smoke from the chimney rise into the sky again, as usual.’ And then I go up and bring them down and every time I have to fetch them, I know that she’s made the right choice not traveling with them ornery chickens and that slow witted goat.” He grinned at me and ambled over to where his boots were resting at the door. As he tucked his big feet into them he continued, “So when I looked up two nights ago and saw the smoke in the sky as it is when she’s come home I rounded up the animals for her right away, and brought them home.

“Cept this time when I got here, she wasn’t waiting for me with news of the world, or an interesting new story. Instead I found someone curled up in bed in the guest room who had made herself at home and who slept sound through a day and a night, and who makes a passable stew.” He pushed open the heavy front door and gestured through it to the yard. “Since you’re here, you might as well meet the animals and tell me your story.”Since it was morning after a very long rest, the call of nature was quite loud so I too tucked my feet into the boots that Finn made me and, with a quick detour to the out house, followed John Woodsman to a shed behind the house.

He lifted the latch on the shed and already I could hear the angry protest of several chickens who just didn’t understand why we couldn’t leave well enough alone. Then protest turned to gossipy clucking and boasting as they clucked and chuckled about the eggs they had laid the night before. A small fur lined basket hung from a peg by the door and as if I had been doing this every morning, I took down the basket and collected five smooth, warm, brown eggs.

“Now that’s a better breakfast than two day old stew!” John threw back his head in what I was starting to realize was a characteristic gesture and laughed so loudly that the chickens squawked indignantly at being startled. “You’ll find they lay about a half a dozen eggs a day, and they’re all so set in their ways that they’ll be fine eating when they’re done laying.” I must have looked startled because he leaned close and tried to sound reassuring “Don’t worry, I’ll take care of the butchering for you, same as I do for The Lady. It wouldn’t be right, letting a young thing like you take care of it all by herself. No ma’am. I take my job seriously and right now, you are under my care and protection, same as would be for The Lady, were she here.”

Strangely comforted by this proclamation, I smiled up at the big man. “And the goat?”

“The goat you should let live. She’ll not be a good dinner, though she’s a great milker. Would you like to meet her too?” When I nodded he ushered me out of the chicken coop and carefully latched the door again.

He led me past the garden, which had been weeded further, to a large wooden pole that had been driven deep in the ground. Tethered to the pole on a twenty foot strap was a surly looking goat, munching contentedly on the knee high grass. She was obviously used for milking; her swollen udders swayed as she reached for grass that was just beyond the reach of her tether.

“She’s quite the stubborn creature, she is. When you go to milk her, wait until the sun has shown fully over the trees – if you go early, she’s liable to bite you. And her bite is not a love nibble, that’s for sure! But she’s a good milker, two quarts a day, and she’ll eat anything you have leftover for food at the end of the day, as well as the grass so long as it’s green. This winter when the snows come, you should have a supply of grain to keep her production levels constant so you don’t have to contend with a youngun’ in the Spring in order to get more milk next winter.”

“The Lady says we shouldn’t name the creatures we plan on eating, but I figure this old biddy’s too tough for us to ever think about eating her, so we’re safe calling her by the name I think she prefers: Troll-bait.”

I couldn’t stop the laugh that bubbled up within me. Surely he hadn’t just said he named a goat troll-bait? “So should we milk her now?” I asked when I had stopped laughing.

“She’s your goat!” John pounded me on the back with one meaty paw and chuckled. Troll-bait flicked her pointed ears at me and twitched her tail. I had done my fair share of morning milkings at my parent’s house, so this was not an unfamiliar process.

I walked into the garden and picked several vegetables either on the verge of going bad, or that had already started going bad and put them in a pile next to the garden, just out of the goat’s reach. In the kitchen I had seen a tall bowl that would work well for the pitcher, and a stool that I could sit on to get a better angle. I fetched these as John looked on, amused.

I picked up the pile of vegetables and brought them, the stool and the pitcher over next to the goat. I gave her the vegetables one at a time as I sat on the stool and milked her into the pitcher below. When both the goat and I were satisfied with the amount, I stopped and fed her the rest of the pile as a treat.

I carried in the pitcher and the basket of eggs. John brought in the stool. He stoked the fire back up to a flame and watched as I mixed up the eggs and cooked us both a hot breakfast.

“So you keep these animals for Grandmother when she’s away?”

“She’s your grandmother then? I wondered what brought you here. Though this is such a place where all manner of people pass through, and usually your grandmother sees them all.”

As we ate, I told John the story of my journey. “And now I think that I’ll have to stay here for the winter. I just don’t see how I could make it safely home with the winter approaching.”
John nodded as he drained a mug of spring water. “I would have to agree with you. And if she knew you were coming, I’d say it would be rude of you to leave before she returned. Besides, you’ll need to take care of the animals now that they’re back home.” He grinned at me.

“I do more during the winter for your grandmother, and I’d just as soon offer those same services to you, while you’re the steward of the House on the Hill. Your grandmother is far too busy with her work to be able to properly hunt for enough meat to pass the winter. We have an exchange – she gives me vegetables from her garden all summer, and I hunt for her table all winter. If you’ll be willing to part with some of your garden’s growth, I can continue to provide meat to this house for the winter months.”
I nodded gladly. The song of Thanks rose in my heart again as it seemed the Gods and Goddesses were continuing to look after my health and good fortune, even when my feet were not pacing the trails. “I’d be happy to make that trade with you John, and thank you for it too.”

"Well I’ll be off then, back to my own house. My wife is bound to be wondering what has kept me when I return after so long a time gone.” He handed me a jar of whitish powder from the herb shelves. “Should you need me, you can toss this powder into the fire – it makes the smoke turn colors against the sky – and I’ll know that I must come to the House as quickly as my feet can carry me.”

He picked me up and squeezed me into a fatherly bear hug, then set me down, patted my head and was gone down the hill, whistling a cheerful tune. I could hear the chickens clucking in the roost and the goat was still happily munching on the lengthy grass. I brought out the remains of the stew and dumped it within reach of the goat, then fetched the yoke and brought up three loads of water from the well.

Later, after I had made another vegetable stew and sipped some warm tea, I sat comfortably in the kitchen of a House where I had been declared steward and reflected on the day. I was home.