Chapter 26 - Ryeamund's Garden I
The new planning, had created a couple years to get better ready for the great coming battle.
The more Ryeamund had learned about his "wench" Eira when he was a young man "out wenching" and she had found him instead of the other way around? The more impressed he had become. Eira had explained early on to Ryeamund, that between his strength and character and wisdom and "lord heritage"… mixed with her kingmaker status, well, if they had sons they would be lords, and if they were girls they would be kingmakers.
When Ryeamund had gotten over his initial "wenching" with his girlfriend Eira, he had approached her about making it permanent. Eira sat down with him, and explained that she wanted to as well. She preferred to have Ryeamund pass examination of her people. If Ryeamund refused? She would do without it, but she would prefer he did so. She assured Ryeamund that either way, the children would get the same result of her educating them the special ways she could, but why not get the full titles to go with it. Would he?
Ryeamund really did not relish the idea of passing examination. The problem there was, Ryeamund had promised himself something when young. Whatever "it" in life was? He had to try it. No matter how dangerous. How else had he first tried to be a blacksmith apprentice, at his father's request of what to do about the boys in the village.
A tall, fat, muscular, hairy giant of a drunken beast, had chased the little scrawny boy around with a hammer, for little more than doing as much as was expected of him. Ryeamund simply worked the bellows, one eye warily on this gigantic drunken ox walking around on two legs, always on highest alert to duck and jump from any hammer swing. That could come at any instant, out of nowhere, if the drunken ox-man was in a mood swing that day.
Ryeamund had survived that. Thrived on it eventually. When he found out there were tree men and ground men? Well, the tree men were the highest caliber example of the lot of them. He made himself try that. He could not shirk the responsibility of fighting with these strong men, because that was really in some way, the whole point of him being there in the first place.
Now, he had to not back down from an obstacle he had never once dreamed he would have to tackle. He was expected to learn how to read and write, and count, and do sums and differences. Knowing from the outset, that he could never do either one really well, on account of he was too old to begin training to expect any type of great success at either one.
It was a voluntary torture of some kind, that he had to take with a smile. He had to be willing to more or less get teased by little children that would whiz by him at simply every class in reading, writing, and arithmetic. Ryeamund's "curse" meant that he was physically incapable for whatever reason of getting actually "mad". His ears didn't get red. His face didn't flush. He didn't raise his voice. These were goddamned children, there was simply nothing to be done about it.
He could knock out big scary woodcutters, and mouthy blacksmiths. He could do something to them if he decided he had enough. What can any big strong man do when a six year old teases him, and might actually mean it? Nothing at all. Ryeamund could not even tease back at the six year old, because he was an adult and therefore knew better.
Ryeamund was curious what he could learn about reading and writing and arithmetic. It had taken a couple of winters, but Ryeamund did learn to read and write both old speak and new speak, in both North and South dialect and syntax. It just took him forever to slowly "decode" it and digest it. For him to read or write anything? It had to be extremely important.
Speaking? Was surprisingly easy. Ryeamund found out he was actually able to learn any of the languages as far as basic speaking, if only at a child-like level of ability. But, it was enough to make himself understood. It was sufficient to grasp enough of the conversation, if the person was helping out by being short and direct in the conversation.
The work required of him at all of this? Immense. The rewards? Small and few. One little reward though, came from speaking as a child in the other languages at the Garten. The petty kings, those down and around past the south-lands. They kept as "throne speak" an old language for only their nobility and their upper-most class. The only class of people they educated. The only class of people they allowed to become educated.
South of the south-lands, throne-speak was "Lattin". It was something left over from the Romans. They had come to the land of barbarians and been there a short time. They then fell apart themselves and withdrew, never to return. They had left little behind them of their passing.
Far to the south of the south-lands, then twice as far again to the west? They had left a great stone wall in that land they first coveted and took. They left behind roads paved with stone to preserve it. They left behind the idea of trade and commerce, beyond a simple village market or trading with the next few villages. Little was left of their dwellings, yet many had a curiosity that people found when they farmed where these Romans had once thought to set up a satellite kingdom there. Curious stone… things. Obviously inside their larger homes.
At first the barbarians took them to be large stone indoor fireplaces. A great stone pit. Yet, it wasn't in the center of their great-rooms. They were always off to the side rooms. The timber main construction was long gone, and only the stone remained. Of what best use, was the great stone fire-pit, off in some small side room? The barbarians puzzled at this.
One person eventually figured it out. A nearby spring hadn't come through on its own, after the place was in ruins. They had laid stone to guide the water to there. A large stone "gate" when down sent the water around and away, down another stone path created. When lifted? The stone "gate" let water flow down and into the indoor stone "pond".
Aha, the first barbarian to get this far at this great puzzle on his farm thought. A cistern. Handy to have drinking water indoors, particularly in winter, or perhaps for a dry season. Yet, what were the stone channels underneath the "cistern" for then? Solving the first puzzle, led only to another. These had been strange invaders, no doubts about it.
That first barbarian to get that far, had always been intrigued. He noticed ashes down in those stone channels, under the stone indoor pond. Any barbarian knows fire and its use. It warms things. A large iron box was where the ashes always were in these curiosities. With effort? You could move it, with a large iron bar. It resembled a great iron brazier. The leader of every village had a common great-house, and the villagers assembled there to roast a pig over coals on a spit. This iron box under the "cistern" thoroughly resembled the brazier that held the charcoal. You would lower the pig up and down to regulate temperature, but it was easier to push the hot coals in the low iron box in and out. This looked to be the same idea.
He had built a fire, and when it was down to hot coals? There was room to "bar" it forwards. In. Under the indoor stone pond. It heated the water in the pond. Aha! He showed others, these things were all over. They were great things to get into. In the heat of summer? Cold spring water was refreshing to dunk yourself in, and get the muck off your skin. Left to warm, the ice cold spring water was the same fun, in spring and fall. And in winter? Wonder of all wonders… a hot bath was great.
It was all that the Romans left behind. The ruins of these bath houses. The stone roads, that made trade easier. A large stone wall, to protect one area. And their "Lattin" they spoke and wrote with.
The little gift Ryeamund got for himself, amid all the great labors he was going through trying to become as little educated as a grown fighting man could? Was he now finally knew what Var had been bidden by Eira to yell out that night, when he first saw the Valkyrim providing the Bears with sport and entertainment. It was important whatever it was she said, and Eira had told her to scream it. Loud enough for the petty kings down south to hear it in their own language.
"Nemo me impune, lacessit!"
Ryeamund found this little gem to be profound. Roughly translated?
"No man may strike me with impunity."
For arithmetic, once again Ryeamund would never be a high reckoner. A high reckoner can count from one to any number they desire. They can add and get a correct answer of any two numbers of any size. They can subtract any number from any number. They can go through the laborious process of figuring out 12 measures of 173 each measure. They can figure out how many measures of 12 are inside 144. If any are left over, and how many.
Ryeamund's instructors were happy when he was able to count from one, up to any number. One after another, obeying the rules over and over, carefully and slowly. He would never be able to add big numbers, but he could count "14 more" starting from whatever number, to get the same result. He could subtract in the same fashion, but not nearly as well and even slower.
Once again, it had to be important. Ryeamund was not going to go through the long, slow, laborious process for no real reason.