The Great War And The Forging of The Peacetroth
The Aethalfolk grew Wise in the Ways of Industrie and prospered. The Woole of their Sheepe was fine and coveted by the Peoples beyond the Sea. Fleeces sold for such Coin as was too dear to refuse, though their Children might shiver and go naked. Thus the Aethelfok sought new Pastures for their Flocks.
Knowing already of the fearsome Baelgaste who dwelt in the Narrow Land between the Bay and the Mountains, the Aethelfolk did cross the Mouth of the Bay into the Northern Lands unwitting of the Wolffe Kings there abiding.
The Wolff Kings little heeded the Aethalfolk for more than two Dozens of Yeares and tolerated Port Cities to be built. But as the Aethalfolk labored to dam the Eormen Bourne, the Wolfe Kings grew angry and made War on them. The Wolfe Kings lay in Siege a-round the Far Port and the East Port and stopped the Shippes of the Aethelfolk coming to land.
The Aethelfolk grew fearfull of Defeat, and so in Budding Month they did march Armies through the Narrow Land to the Border of the Wolfmarch. There they clashed with the Armies of the Wolf Kings and War raged down through the Narrows for eight Moonths, til the Baelgast would be driven from their Homes, even up into the Mountains of the Raven Peoples.
The Baelgast and the Raven Peoples kept Peace on Terms that neither should cross the Line where Oak yielded to Pine. The Baelgast were Proud and would not but keep their Oath to the Ravens, and so brought War on the Wolff Kings and the Aethalfolk both.
Albord Baelric, High King of the Baelgast, marched with every Man, Woman, and Childe of the Wyrm Northward, even into the Wolfmarch, and burnt every House Town and Fielde put behind them so that None would find Respite nor Quarter as Winter fell upon them.
The Wolffe Kings were dismayed at the Furie of the Balegast. They made Peace and allied with the Baelgast. The Wolfe Kings were long allied with the Ravens, and so the Three Peoples united and made war on the Aethelfolk until they fell back to the South Lands.
All Peoples pledged Troth to the High King of the Baelgast at a great Feaste at Midwinter and across the Lands there was Peace.
(excerpt from An History of the Peacetroth and the Peoples of the Trothlands, as recorded by Aethelred of Caxton, and amended so as to include Events of Recent History by Alfred Caxtonson, Esq.)
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The next days passed in a sort of idleness. To be sure, my hours were full enough; nearly every minute had a prior claim on it, from my first bite of toast in the morning til late at night, when I began yawning pointedly. I played quite a few lawn games and quite a few more parlor games. I sang, I danced, I went on walks, and I spent hours trying to form an opinion on ruffles... But by day's end, I could not honestly claim to have really done anything.
I did arrange to have my penned-in sheep moved to pasture, and I informed Darlene and Henry Thatcher, both, that I would speak with them as soon and as often as I was able to, but my knitting was so woefully slow, I might as well have not even bothered with it. The guide for young brides, still wrapped in brown paper, waited for my attention beneath a pile of letters, which also waited for my attention -- they were invitations, mostly, and I never had time to answer them properly, so the pile grew every day like a bury of rabbits.
I didn't even manage to pick a favorite suitor. There were five eligible men in the lot, and I did try my best to forge an understanding with at least one of them, but by the end of a week, the only thing I understood was that Hollis Acton was far better matched with Temperance Grimmond than with me.
The Ansleys and the Blackwells usually found their way to Ewert by midday, very often not finding their way home again until my grandfather rose from his seat by the fire and bid all a firm good night. Then they summoned their servants and donned their hats and cloaks, laughing about how quaint country life was.
My younger guests complained more and more about Ewert's husbandman hours as the days passed, til one evening, Elfie Ansley decided to persuade the rest of us into some mischief.
"Why don't you all come back to town with us?" he suggested. "We can finish our game at the cottage."
Temperance frowned, rather poutily. "And walk back in the middle of the night?"
"Stay overnight, then... You can have the maid's room."
I frowned. "But then where will the maid sleep?"
Elfie shrugged, but Hollis interrupted whatever he was about to say with, "Miss Grimmond can't stay in servant's quarters."
"Besides," Temperance said, fluttering her lashes in a way that was somehow both demure and coquettish, "Mother will never let me go visiting overnight."
"Well, alright, I'll stay here, then," Elfie said.
"There's no point." Hollis shook his head. "By quarter after eleven, this house is shut up like a jail. The doors are locked, the candles snuffed out..."
Earnest grinned, adding, "If you turn a page too loudly, old man Shepley sends out his hounds."
Elfie strived on, undaunted. "Well then, sneak out and meet me. There's got to be an empty barn or something... Eh, Miss Shepley?"
"Well, there's the wool shed," I told him, thinking that would be the end of it. Alas, Elfie did not understand me.
His eyes eager and his brows high, he asked, "Is there a table or anything in it?"
"There are quite a lot of raw fleeces..."
"No table, then?" He frowned, thoughtfully. "Do you think we could rig one up?"
I tried hard to not scowl at him -- this was a wool merchant's son!
"Perhaps," I said, "if you can stand the smell long enough."
Earnest snorted.
"Well, how about Oakhurst and I go back to town with you," Hollis suggested. He glanced at Earnest. "Your mother would let you go, surely...?"
Immediately, Temperance protested. "That's no fair to me, at all!"
Hollis said not another word. He re-arranged his cards instead, with his shoulders drooped rather sheepishly.
It was my turn, then. I looked at the Rook Earnest had just put down, and considered my hand. I had two Knaves, a King, and a Queen I could play, but I folded my cards and said, "Well, that's the end of me."
This was met with some display of disappointment, but it was a brief one -- before I'd even risen from my seat, Temperance was greedily scooping up Earnest's Rook.
I took my knitting to the fire and sat beside Miss Goodwin. Mr. Wentworth was reading some very dull political paper to her -- an opinion on the best use of the old Wolfmarch.
On the other side of me, my grandfather was engaged with Captain Acton and Wesley Blackwell in most sober conversation on a similar subject.
There had apparently been some attempts to dam the Smallbourne, a small river, I supposed, somewhere west of the Stanbourne. A company of lumbermen wanted to build a saw mill there so that they could simply float their wares down to the port cities, rather than pay to have raw logs trimmed up at one of the Southland mills.
It seemed the company had been very profitable for half a dozen years or so, and they'd convinced investors to fund their new undertaking easily enough -- the Blackwells were chief among them.
A very reputable surveyor marked out the likeliest spot; a team of engineers and architects were hired, and great gears had been cast specially to their designs in the foundries of Northpoint. There was a bit of a delay breaking ground owing to a late winter storm, but otherwise, all seemed to be coming together quite satisfactorily.
And then the company suddenly stopped sending reports back to the investors.
Wesley Blackwell explained, in very grave tones, how he and his brother hired a team and went themselves to investigate. There, they found no traces of a dam. What they supposed to be the beginnings of a mill were burnt down to the very foundation -- only charred stones and the great gears remained. And there wasn't a soul to be found.
I listened to this, rapt and aghast. My grandfather did, also. The clock in the hall ticked and ticked and chimed eleven, but he showed no signs of stirring from his seat.
"We ventured further up the river," Wesley said, his manner bleak and quiet, "and there we found them all, or what was left of them, anyway. The engineers, the carpenters, the whole lumber company... Fifty-three men. They were staked up like scarecrows, all the way to the border of the Ravenswald. And their heads..." He trailed off and cast an uneasy glance around the room. "It was only when we found the bodies that we noticed the heads above us, up in the branches. They'd strung them like beads."
A cold pall settled over me. I worked my stitches quickly, trying to fill my mind with the rhythm of the pattern -- knit knit knit purl purl purl -- but Wesley's words kept echoing in my thoughts.
"That's the third attack...?" my grandfather asked.
"Fourth," Captain Acton said. "The Lord Regent has tried to be quiet about it, but we've also lost a settlement. Just farmers, their wives and children..."
My grandfather met his eye. "All dead?"
"Yes." Captain Acton nodded, licking his lips. "Always."
The three men were silent a while, grim and pensive. At length, my grandfather huffed and asked, "Well, and what's Richards doing about it?"
"We're sending men," Captain Acton said.
My grandfather listened, nodding and frowning, while Captain Acton talked about the logistical difficulties of moving troops through the old Wolfmarch -- the Wolves' roads were no good anymore, abandoned and disused as they were, and the causeway over the Great Fen never was wide enough for the modern army.
At length, he concluded, "So, there's the woollens duty, and the new toll on the post roads."
My grandfather sighed. "Well, it won't be popular, on my word. We Northerners have gotten along with the Ravens for two hundred years..."
Captain Acton shook his head. "You never got along with the Ravens," he said. "You were shielded by the Wolves."
"And the Wyrms put an end to that, didn't they?" my grandfather said, his nostrils flaring. "We lost our sons in the war, we lost our tenants and fieldhands in the Purge... And did we get so much as a Spear from Richards...?"
"The Lord Regent was instrumental in restraining the Baelgast. Without the Wolfkin Articles, your losses would have been far greater."
My grandfather scoffed, utterly unswayed. "We rebuilt," he said. "On our own. And we never once provoked the Ravens in a dozen years since. Now you tell me a bunch of know-nothing fools go and rile them up like a nest of hornets, and Richards wants us to pay for it...?"
Wesley smiled his tight, unhappy smile. "The dam was well within the old Wolfmarch."
"It was a dam." My grandfather looked to Captain Acton again. "It won't be popular," he said. "Tell Richards that."
Captain Acton sighed then. "If that's the way the Northerns will see it, then go to court and tell him yourself."
My grandfather grunted a cheerless laugh, his brows twitching upward. "Well, you're right there, Bob."
He yawned then, and soon he rose from his chair, saying, "A good talk, gentlemen... Good night to you."
The servants were called, cloaks and hats fetched. I was not obliged to stay up and see everyone off; the clock chimed half past eleven, and my grandfather nodded toward me, commanding, "Go on up to bed, girl."
I obeyed all too gladly, though I did find my room rather darker and colder and lonelier than I usually did. After Mrs. Burke dressed me and greased me for bed, I opened my window and called, "Puss puss puss..." into the night.
Soon enough, I heard mews and the scrabble of claws on the pomegranate trellis, and then the little black kitten leapt out of the shadows, alighting on my windowsill almost gracefully. I scooped her up and carried her back to my bed, rubbing my face in her fur while she purred. There, we made a very happy nest together and slept.
Evidently, some further scheming went on after I'd left the card table. Deep into the night, when the fire in my room had burned down to nothing, I was awakened by a great clatter and commotion. My grandfather's hounds barked and bayed. The little cat leapt away, fur on end, and skittered out the window.
I climbed out of my bed, my heart pounding, and I dragged on my dressing gown. I crept through the sitting room and peeked out into the hallway, expecting to see flames or burglars or Ravens... But there was only my grandfather and his valet, candlesticks in their hands and hounds at their feet.
"I saw two go that way," my grandfather said, pointing down the hallway. "Find Edith."
"I'm here, grandfather."
He turned and stalked toward my rooms, holding the candle up high, his eyes raking over me.
I wrapped the dressing gown tighter around my neck. "What's going on?" I asked. "I heard the dogs."
He snorted. "Inconsiderate nonsense, that's all." He caressed my shoulder, saying, "Go on back to bed, now. There's a good girl."