Chapter Nine
18 April 1767
Plentiful, Richlan
Mystria
Out of respect for Prince Vlad, Nathaniel Woods had done his best to reserve judgment on Colonel Rathfield. The Norillian officer didn’t shy from hard work and took to paddling a canoe pretty easily. Even though he carried a smooth-bore musket, he proved a fairly good shot with it. Of course, that meant he was still the worst shot on the expedition, but he was worlds-away better than most Norillians straight off the boat.
There were things about him, however, that just stuck in Nathaniel’s craw. One was how he addressed all of them by their last names, save for Count von Metternin and Kamiskwa. Those two he treated with a certain amount of deference, but he still spoke down to them. And he treated Hodge Dunsby as his own personal servant. Hodge didn’t seem to mind very much, his having been a soldier in the Queen’s Army until not long ago, but it didn’t sit right with Nathaniel.
Still, if Hodge had no complaints, Nathaniel wasn’t going to step in for him. Hodge had been in Mystria long enough to know that he could speak his mind. Nathaniel and the others would back him in that. Nathaniel figured that until Hodge decided to change his family name to something more Mystrian perhaps that message hadn’t quite sunk fully in. Still, he was willing to bet Hodge would take a stand before the journey was up.
The expedition had worked its way west to Grand Falls, then started an overland trek toward the southwest. The journey took them across countless small lakes and small rivers, all part of the watershed of the Westridge Mountains. The mountains began roughly where the Bounty and Richlan Colony borders met at the western edge of their grants, and extended off to the southwest and northwest. They cut the coast off from the Misaawa River valley, which, if Tharyngian and Shedashee tales were correct, roughly split the continent in half.
Within the first two days they’d left most Colonial settlements behind. Rathfield had referred to it as “abandoning civilization.” Nathaniel and Kamiskwa had exchanged glances, since the Shedashee had nations and tribes all throughout the land. Nathaniel had found them much more civilized than most Mystrians, and figured he might make that point to Rathfield. Then he figured that Rathfield wasn’t ever going to understand, so he resolved to hold his tongue.
As they traveled toward the mountains and into Richlan, they came across scattered settlements in small valleys with good water and fields. The people generally had constructed a big log blockhouse in the center, with a town green that they jointly worked. Barns had been raised and flocks of sheep wandered over hillsides. The individual homes appeared small, but clustered in small groups.
Plentiful was such a town and fairly new. At the last town, Wisdom, they’d been encouraged to bypass Plentiful since the people there had split from Wisdom over doctrinal issues a decade earlier. While the people of Wisdom had been full of forgiveness for their former colleagues and family members, the word “wicked” got thrown around a lot more than made Nathaniel comfortable.
The expedition entered the small valley on foot, having abandoned canoes on the shores of the last lake. The Snake River, which eventually caught up with King’s River to the east and flowed to the sea at Kingstown, ran too shallow in the foothills to be navigable. The people of Plentiful found it a convenient source of fresh water and had built closely on both sides of it. They’d even raised a couple of footbridges, though most folks just happily splashed through it at low points.
Nathaniel and the others had walked a day and a half in, and brought with them a ten-point buck, which Rathfield had shot and insisted on carrying after basic field dressing—as opposed to butchering it and letting each man carry a piece. Nathaniel figured that was the man trying to show how strong he was. The Mystrian would have been more impressed if the load had been shared out, since that was the smarter way to travel.
A man in the valley rang the alarm bell in front of the blockhouse when they came out of the woods, but without the enthusiasm of someone reporting real danger. A large man wearing a white shirt, black woolen pants, and a tall, round-brimmed hat with a buckled hatband emerged from the blockhouse and headed toward them, cutting around the green. Nathaniel stayed on the road and raised his right hand, keeping it away from his rifle’s firestone, in a sign of peace.
The man bowed and spread open hands. “God bless you and welcome you to Plentiful, friends. I am the Shepherd, Arise Faith.”
Makepeace Bone stepped up. “I am your servant, Makepeace Bone. My companions and I would welcome comfort and counsel, as the Good Book dictates.”
Faith’s blossoming smile set Nathaniel’s stomach at ease. “Please, friends, know you are welcome. It is fortunate you arrived when you did, for the Sabbath begins at sunset, and we would have been forbidden even greeting you until Monday dawn.”
Nathaniel nodded. “We’re truly grateful for your welcoming, Shepherd Faith. I’m Nathaniel Woods. This here is Kamiskwa of the Altashee. Count von Metternin is from Kesse-Saxeburg only four years back. That’s Hodge Dunsby and the man with the deer is Colonel Rathfield. The Queen done sent him. And that there is Captain Owen Strake, hero of Anvil Lake.”
Faith nodded to each man in turn, but his face betrayed zero recognition. He covered himself well, but Nathaniel found him as easy to read as fresh tracks in stiff mud. While Faith knew there was a Queen, he didn’t know a place called Kesse-Saxeburg existed. Nathaniel caught a flicker that suggested he’d heard of Anvil Lake, but whatever he knew didn’t have Owen’s name attached to it.
Plentiful’s Shepherd pointed toward the blockhouse. “You will be quite welcome to stay in our Spiritual Hall, but you must understand that no profane or lascivious behavior will be tolerated. There is no hard liquor allowed. We will have services, and you are welcome to attend, and then we shall have our communal meal after that. You are welcome to share, though this early in the year the fare can be somewhat meager.”
Rathfield stepped up and dumped the buck at Faith’s feet. “Please, Goodman, accept this meat as a gift from Her Imperial Majesty, Queen Margaret. She wishes the best for all of her subjects.”
Faith looked down, and then back up. “Are you certain, Colonel? I would not have thought the Queen…”
Rathfield smiled. “My dear sir, by my reckoning, Plentiful is still within the bounds of Richlan, which marks you as loyal subjects of the Crown. If she cannot show her beneficence here, at the very edges of the empire God has granted her, to God’s most faithful servants, what kind of a ruler would she be?”
“I see. This is most unexpected but most welcome.” He clasped his hands together. “Please, friends, I will see to your accommodation and get people to prepare your gift. Follow me.”
Shepherd Faith led them to the blockhouse, which had been solidly built of logs. Longer than it was wide, it rose to two stories, with a loft that extended halfway in from the door. Bark had been skinned from the interior, making the room appear lighter and larger than it might have otherwise. The far end had a small pulpit carved from a single log. Trestle tables and benches filled the main floor, but people had already begun to break most of the tables down and arrange the benches for the coming service.
Faith took them up the steps to the loft, which clearly served as community storage during the winter. A few sacks of grain remained, along with a collection of items from spinning wheels to scythes that required repair or sharpening.
“Please, friends, make yourselves at home.”
Nathaniel smiled. “Already feel at home, but I reckon you can do me a favor.”
“Yes?”
“Point me to an ax and a pile of wood that needs splitting. I hain’t worked an ax good in a while, and I am sadly feeling the need of that exercise.”
“Of course. Around back is our shed. You can chop all you want until sundown.”
“Much obliged.”
Nathaniel waited for Shepherd Faith to descend from the loft before he turned to Colonel Rathfield. “Mighty nice of you just to up and give them your deer.”
“Calculated risk, really. Thank goodness they were not like that other place several days back—Restraint, was it?—which had its list of proscribed foods. I determined it was a good way to gain entry and a certain amount of trust.”
Owen, who crouched over a pack, glanced back at them. “But offering it in the Queen’s name could have caused a problem.”
“You think so, Strake, really?” Rathfield snorted. “Thing of it is this: either they are loyal subjects or they are subjects who have to be reminded that they are subjects. Let us face facts. While many of these settlements are based in religion, and the Virtuans came to Mystria to escape the wrath of the Church, these settlements are not fleeing the Queen’s power, but the perfidy of the settlements from which they have split. The Shepherd of Wisdom suggested the people of Plentiful were cannibalistic slave-drivers who believed in plural marriage and baptism in blood. I’d be concerned, but that’s what the people of Contentment said of the people of Wisdom, and everyone has said of the people of Restraint.”
Owen straightened up, his journal in hand. “I think you’re missing my point, Colonel. We’re a long way away from any Norillian troops. If we faced opposition…”
Rathfield laughed. “Surely you jest. Why Dunsby and I could pacify this settlement without blackening a firestone.”
“I ain’t so sure you’re right, Colonel.” Nathaniel pointed at the nearest window, which stood four times as tall as it was wide, and it was fairly narrow to begin with. “These windows ain’t just for letting light in. Get all your people in here with muskets and short of bringing up some cannon, you ain’t dislodging them.”
“And if they chose to defy the Crown, I would just order the building fired.” Rathfield raised his chin. “It would be a prelude to the hellfire reserved for those who defy God and oppose his anointed one.”
“I reckon that might be one way of handling it.” Nathaniel shucked his tunic and left the loft, making his way to the woodshed out back of the blockhouse. Logs had been dragged from wood yards and piled up. Residents had sawed many of them down into foot and a half lengths. Nathaniel hauled one of them onto a chopping block, split it with a hammer and wedge, then used an ax to cut it down further.
It wasn’t easy work, but wasn’t terribly complicated, either. He worked up a sweat quickly enough, and attracted the attention of a few young boys whom Shepherd Faith scattered to chores quickly enough. That behavior didn’t surprise him. Nathaniel likely had more scars on him than could be found in the whole of Plentiful. His long hair and the beadwork on his clothes marked him as an intimate of the Shedashee. Woods wasn’t a recognizable Virtuan name and though Nathaniel could be found in the Good Book, it wasn’t common among Virtuans either. Shepherd Faith likely didn’t see Nathaniel as being as bad as a horde of demons, but he reckoned the older man didn’t see him as being far off from that, either.
Shadows crept through the valley as the sun began to set. Nathaniel buried the ax in the chopping block and started to stack wood. Shepherd Faith summoned the boys back to help in that task, then tried to pull the ax from the block. Nathaniel helped him before the boys could begin to laugh at his struggles.
The red-faced man smiled. “It might seem a little thing, but we let our tools rest on the Sabbath, too. There it was working, but here, hung on the wall, it enjoys rest.”
“Pardon my ignorance.”
“No pardon needed.” Shepherd Faith smiled. “I know that you travel with Friend Makepeace, but clearly you are not of the faith.”
Nathaniel ran a long-fingered hand over unshaven jaw. “Well, my pa lived far from a church, and the missionaries what visited the Altashee didn’t take much notice of me. But Makepeace, he’s a fine example of a man. Saved my life a time or three.”
“I hope, Friend Nathaniel, he will save your soul as well.”
“Truth be told, Shepherd, my ears is pricked and my eyes is open.”
“Then I shall hope and pray the Lord’s Word lodges in your heart tonight.”
Nathaniel joined the others in the loft as Plentiful’s residents filed in. Everyone brought a pot, a crock, a jar, basket, or a cauldron and set them on the few tables that had been dragged to the walls. The scent of venison stew, baked beans, and oven-hot bread filled the hall. Nathaniel rubbed his belly to keep it quiet. While they’d not had trouble finding food on the journey, it was mostly fish here, berries there, being gathered as they went. This would be the most complete meal they’d enjoyed since leaving Temperance Bay.
Owen sat toward the back of the loft, making notes in his journal. The fact that he had a smaller book beside him and referenced it meant he was composing a message for the Prince. None of them could be certain how long it would take letters to make it back to Temperance, but every village sent someone down-river to trade skins and locally produced goods for sugar, salt, and anything which Mystria didn’t provide. That included firestones and brimstone for muskets, both of which could only be purchased through a government-licensed dealer.
In studying Rathfield, Nathaniel was able to pinpoint that which he found most unsettling about the man. When Owen had first come out to do the survey during which they’d discovered du Malphias’ fortress at Anvil Lake, he’d taken all sorts of notes and sent all manner of messages back to Prince Vlad. Rathfield, who said he was on a mission of similar import, seldom wrote anything down. Since Nathaniel had only begun to learn to read and write, he wasn’t about to fault a man for being illiterate. But he supposed an officer and a hero in the Queen’s Army would be able to read, and would have better sense than to believe his notes might not be valuable in the event he didn’t make it back from the journey.
He just ain’t taking this serious. Nathaniel frowned. If the man wasn’t devoted to his mission, either he was a fool, or the mission they’d been told he was on was just a story to cover what he was really doing.
Nathaniel had half a mind to ask Rathfield about that, but the hundred or so people that called Plentiful home had filed into the blockhouse and taken their places. They wore standard Virtuan garb, darkly colored, which covered the women from floor to wrists and throat, with a bonnet tossed on to hide their hair. Nothing decorative or unique about their clothes helped tell them apart. The men all wore hats and dark trousers, white shirts and long-tailed black coats pulled on over them. The hats remained on, with the brim lowered to modestly shade the eyes.
Arise Faith came to the front of the congregation and murmured a greeting, which the people returned. “We have among us some visitors who have chosen to share the bounty of their journey with us.” He looked up toward the loft, but no one turned around to look.
The Shepherd smiled. “I had intended on delivering a message on the virtues of chastity as all nature blossoms with fecundity around us, but after conversing with one of the visitors, I have decided to ask him to speak to you.”
Nathaniel’s stomach knotted for a moment. Ain’t no way…
Rathfield stood. “It would be my pleasure, Shepherd.” He pulled on a hat that clearly had been borrowed for the occasion, and stalked down the stairs to address the people of Plentiful.