Chapter 3 - Ryeamund III
The days of marching passed pleasant enough. Within a fair number of days, the biggest man was finally able to get in and out of the wagon with help. Help he now accepted, though at first not without his characteristic bitching about it. That too, slowly fell by the wayside. His two smaller friend's teasing grew within a matter of days into friendly words.
The big man started following his "Little sprig of Rye" in the mornings when Ryeamund would go unbidden to fetch wood for a morning fire. Ryeamund at first was going slow to allow the sore man to keep with him as he desired. The big man soon noticed, and waved him off.
"Nay, Little Rye. I will follow along well enough."
"I will whistle, ye will know where I be. It is, a woodcutter's custom."
"Ye whistle for nothing then. I can see yer track, I can follow easy."
The big man had no trouble following his new friend's tracks. Ryeamund noticed for the first time all of the heavy dew up here, and Heyermannen was right; the slightest track was unmistakable. The farther they made their way up the corridor, the bigger the dew drops got. Easy to follow at least until the underbrush, where tracks disappeared. The plants were slowly changing as well, little by little. The nights were getting a little crisper, the heat of the day more bearable.
Heyermannen still had difficulty bending over to pick up the small firewood.
"Little Rye. Ye run about, and gather, do that. I will carry the wood. I am the farmer's ox."
Heyermannen dipped his head slightly, and tapped his breast with his closed fist, as he said it. Ryeamund smiled and nodded.
"Ye are not my beast, to carry wood, big man."
"Many hands?"
"Aye, then…"
Ryeamund put a bundle of sticks he tied with cord on each of the mans shoulders. He got his own two bundles up, then they walked back out for the morning fire.
Rather than watch the bigger man struggle to keep up on the way back out the woods to camp, Ryeamund simply followed him out instead. If he walked in front, he had to keep looking over his shoulder so as to not greatly outdistance the recovering big man. The big man was apt to re-injure his ribs which were well on the way to mended. There was no stopping him, his pride wouldn't allow it.
It was easier to just follow the big man instead, let him set their pace.
The other two were about the morning ritual. One had fetched fresh water he had located, and replaced all their skins. The other had a small ring of stones and some tinder sparked up waiting, that he slowly fed bits of small twigs and dry brush into.
Other than what they all might find and gather up, the men would heat water in a small pot for their breakfast. A big handful of the dried and pressed greens they carried in a great sack in its place in Rye's little wagon hitched to the back of their bigger wagon. They liked having Rye's extra little wagon, as now all their stuff went in that, and all of their great wagon carried more bundles of the hard saplings they so highly prized.
A little bit of dried meat went into the boiling 'green's water'. Thus was breakfast each morning. At least the mushrooms they had collected and dried, and the wild onions found everywhere fleshed it out. A handful of fresh clover when they found it as well. Small seeds, berries and small useful roots were little prizes to add as well, especially when fresh; practical when dried and pressed into a sack as the greens were.
The idea was to first have a great green's sack to start out with, and second to be always making the next great green's sack to replace it. Edible leaves were often about if one knew where to look. Done skillfully, a man can at least in some fashion 'eat as he goes' and travel light, as far as his time will allow him to wander, hither and yon as his feet and eyes take him.
Ryeamund liked it. But of his three companions, the smaller two were rather indifferent to it. 'Something to eat', they said of it. Heyermannen though, would 'oink!' every breakfast as it was handed to him in a wooden bowl. 'Pah. Pig food.'
Ryeamund asked them what was wrong with it. He explained they had food damn it, and you just can't complain about having food. At least they had some.
Heyermannen was, uncharacteristically for him, the one to speak up. He was tired of exchanging glances with the other two each and every time the subject of "food" came up. They were embarrassed in their own way, that their friend was at first always trying to give them some of his coin.
"Ryeamund. We are your friends now. You, do not have to… pretend… you like pig food, every morning. And, why did you try to give us coin, for pig food? It is… free. We only eat it, because we travel. You are… too polite."
They were taken aback, when Ryeamund had a confused look on his face. They didn't at first believe him, when he said they were lucky to have food every day.
"Ryeamund. You are a farmer. Do you not eat every day?"
Ryeamund looked at them incredulously.
"No, why would I."
Now they were puzzled.
He explained the food was not his, he leased his land. Everything he made belonged to the land lord that owned his four acre slice of land. He was lucky to get some vegetables for himself and his father, and they ate mostly cereal grains. That the chickens and the dairy cow were a lifesaver. That was why he was also a woodcutter and a smith helper.
"What do you do with the pigs. Eat one."
Ryemund explained once again what a lease was, the land wasn't his. The house and the animals belonged to the land lord. He and his father were lucky to live indoors, and to have anything. Being a smith's helper made a few small coins, and woodcutting prevented them from having to buy timber for fences and such. He also explained that he loved being a woodcutter so much, because save for winter, he had learned from the other woodcutters over time. Berries, various plants, mushrooms, some edible barks. He could eat while he was working, for free. It was his favorite thing.
Ryeamund was ashamed to admit, that all the lease farmers had a little game they played. It seems, that baby pigs just happened to escape. Once in a while. Oops. The pigs would run with other older pigs run wild. And, when pigs that had "went wild" were coming in… well… you "had" to kill them.
They laughed, they understood. Then the men exchanged hard looks with one another. Ryeamund started apologizing, would they please not think him a thief for stealing off of his land lord, but what little meat and fat they could get came from this little "game" they all played. They had to explain to him. They were not mad at him, they were mad at his land lord. That the land lord was all but stealing off of him and his father. They were slaves, in all but name. They couldn't believe he was as happy as he was. To work three jobs, one of them basically just to get food.
They were amazed again, when one of them got a bag of salt out, and sprinkled it on the dried mushrooms. Ryeamund was excited. Real salt! They had to explain to Ryeamund, salt was all but free, it was… basically nothing.
They couldn't believe the farmers had no salt. No way to preserve things without salt. They could not believe that something as essential and everyday common as salt was an expensive, regulated, commodity. Sugar was practically unheard of as well, Ryeamund explained. Hence the clover, it was free and gave sweetness.
"Ye Father. He worked like this, all his life, did he not?"
"Aye…", Ryeamund softly admitted.
Ryeamund explained that other than sadness with the loss of his father, before his time… that this was why he did not want to seek a wife yet and bring children into his world.
They explained to Ryeamund, that when they were done traveling? He could easily have all the salt and sugar he could carry in great sacks if he so desired. But before that? He would feast. On whole hogs, slow roasting over a fire-pit, in the center of a "great-house" that was the tavern in their village.
Ryeamund was so excited, he wanted to set off now. They should not wait, they should move! By the oldest Father himself, he did not want to miss this great festival, and wait another season for it!
The men didn't laugh, as was their custom. They had to convince him that it was no "festival" of anything, that it was simply what the Satyr's Day was for. To drink, to feast, to enjoy bedding a woman. The day of the Sun was a day to rest, and followed it. The Moon's Day, all through Frey's Day, was for labors. But, when the sun went down on Frey's Day? The drinking and feasting and wenching was at hand, until first light of the Sun's Day.
They actually had trouble convincing Ryeamund, that they ate more meat than anything else. That Ryeamund would have no problems raising pigs, and that he could eat the pigs. All of them, if he wanted. Goats as well as small and hardy sheep were even easier. They explained they did not have the grazing lands like down south, on account of the mountainous terrain, but… potatoes and carrots and cabbage did marvelous. That "wild rice" was abundant in certain valleys nearby. They could store up great sacks of it after it was properly dried out, and it would keep all year.
Ryeamund had trouble with the very concept that everything he could build and gather and make? Was his. To eat, to keep, to sell, to trade.
"I… will get fat, and I will get lazy."
The men laughed. No, they hunted for days at a time, living on the trail. Just to get away from it all. To practice fighting. If a man were picked out to go and fight, to go on merchant runs? These were great honors.
Ryeamund loved hearing how the men sometimes traveled, for no reason other than to see things. Out of boredom. Ryeamund had great difficulty with the idea of being "bored". He had them tell him about the "fire lands" to the northwest of where they were going, over and over again each night. The earth opened up into great chasms, of fire and lava. Of faraway lands men traveled to in their boats. That it was easy to hunt and fish while on the seas.
Ryeamund was practically dizzy, trying to take it all in. They didn't seem to be fooling with him, the way you told fantastic fairy tales to children to entertain them. No, they seemed dead serious and rather matter of fact.
Unless it was all some grand deception, and it did not seem to be… Ryeamund's life was going to change more than he had ever dreamed for.