The Clearing

by Lina J. Potter

  I wonder where she learned these things?

  Hans continued his inspection of the wall. He kicked one of the peasants and yelled at another who had nodded off. When he went back to check the castle, he saw that everyone was occupied: servant girls were ripping cloth for bandages and boiling them in large cauldrons of hot water. The Eveer and the countess were running an installation the likes of which he had never seen. It stank to high heaven. The countess tried to explain what it was, but Hans’ eyes widened when she used words like “anti-inflammatory.”

  There will be time later to ask her about these strange things and to file away her answers.

  Watching the servants prepare bandages, Hans remembered something else he had learned while at Earton. Several of the servants had told him that the countess was forced to sell her dresses and jewelry in order to buy livestock for the estate. No one had ever seen any gifts or other goods arrive from the earl.

  I suppose the law does not oblige him to send her anything, but she is his wife and she was carrying his child. Why wouldn’t he want to care for her?

  Lily had given Hans all the letters she had found in the castle. Reading them had reinforced his conclusion that the earl never gave a thought to his wife.

  He turned and went back out to the wall.

  “Leir Hans?” The countess had come up behind him silently. He thought that was odd for a woman of her proportions. That was another strange thing he had noticed about Lilian Earton: sometimes she moved like a warrior, and sometimes she stumbled clumsily. When he turned to her, he saw that she was moving slowly, like a person who is exhausted.

  He bowed. “My lady, why haven’t you retired?”

  Lily was so worked up that she suspected even an elephant’s dose of Temazepam wouldn’t knock her out. But she didn’t want to explain that to the king’s envoy. “I am concerned.”

  “Don’t be. Everything will be fine.”

  She gave him a grateful smile. “Thank you, Leir Hans. You have no idea how long it’s been since I heard those words.”

  Hans felt his face go warm. “Have no fear, my lady. We will keep the pirates away from the castle.”

  “Of course, but men will be killed and wounded.”

  “Their job is to defend you. I believe any of them would be glad to lay down his life for you.”

  The countess’ eyes were sorrowful. “I have seen so much death, Leir Hans, starting with the death of my child. How many more will die?”

  “It is a man’s job to fight, and a woman’s job to wait for him and treat his wounds.”

  “I am waiting for my husband,” Lilian sighed. The piety in her voice was thick enough to spread on a piece of bread. “And I am concerned about Miranda. Aldonai forbid that anything happen to her.”

  Hans couldn’t help but think that she was right. It was not his place to be here on the wall defending Earton from attack. The earl should be here. Instead, he was off cavorting with Prince Richard while his wife was robbed blind by the manager and then attacked by pirates.

  Lily seemed to read his thoughts. “Is everything in order on the wall?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then I will go in. I must continue my preparations for the wounded.”

  “My lady, how do you know so much about the art of healing?”

  The countess shrugged. “I don’t. Tahir is the healer, and Jaimie knows a few things. I am simply there to learn and to give orders.”

  “Do you trust them, my lady?”

  “Who else can I trust, Leir Hans? I do not see a line of men waiting to serve as my medicus. I did have a medicus, but he knew nothing. He let my blood after I lost the baby. I could have died.”

  “But my lady,”

  Lily gave him a sharp look. “Leir Hans, I find it strange that I have to explain this to you. But if you insist, I will try. When a woman loses a child, she also loses a lot of blood. Letting more blood is deadly. Any one of us will die if we lose just a quarter of our blood. Now tell me, what kind of an idiot would do that?”

  Hans pondered her question. It did seem strange to let the blood of a woman who was already bleeding. What was the medicus thinking? He would file a report when he got back to the capitol.

  The countess sobbed quietly. Hans had been distracted, so he had not seen her pinch her arm so hard that it brought tears to her eyes. He looked at her with alarm.

  “Forgive me, but it is hard for me to think of these things. I am sorry…” She turned and left, looking small and helpless. The envoy felt like a beast.

  Why did I press her? Now she’s upset. Her life is already difficult enough, with the castle and estate on her shoulders and a stepdaughter to raise.

  Hans looked up at the stars. He would have to get through the next day somehow. Either the Virmans would defeat the slave traders or the slave traders would defeat the Virmans. If the former happened, Hans’ work would only just be beginning. If the latter happened, he expected to die there on the wall alongside Earton’s defenders. That would be disappointing, of course, but he had never expected to die in his bed of old age.

  Lily sighed. She had taken a walk, gotten some fresh air, and pulled the wool over the envoy’s eyes. She thought she had done well, even without preparation. Now she had work to do. She pushed Tahir and Jaimie until sunup, making them practice laying stitches on a pillow.

  It’s better to be tired now than dead later.

  People in her new world were not completely unaware of how to stitch wounds, but they had never seen proper surgical technique before. Lily knew that Tahir would have endless questions for her, but it would have to wait until later.

  The first wounded were delivered at noon. It was hell.

  Work, work, work… Lily felt like she was back on trauma rotation. She was terrified, but she had to keep sewing men together and cleaning and bandaging their wounds. When she checked Erik’s leg, she saw that Jaimie had already cleaned and bandaged it properly. The Virman tried to smile at her, but it came out as a grimace. Any other time, she would have sat with him and made sure he was feeling better, but she had to rush on to the next wounded man.

  The slave traders had been taken completely unawares. As a result, they were unable to mount much of a defense, and the defenders’ wounds were fairly uncomplicated. The most unpleasant part of the day came when Lily had to stitch up Helke’s nephew’s side. She couldn’t take the time to feel bad for him, so she poured him a glass of homebrew and started sewing. Once the wound was closed, she checked him for broken ribs and bandaged his torso tightly.

  I’ve seen worse. I remember observing an operation on a man with a knife wound that nicked his stomach. The surgeon had to remove his spleen. By comparison, this is nothing.

  Tahir was busy, as well, assisting Lily and stitching up his own patients whenever she didn’t need him. The wounded just kept coming.

  Lily did what she had been trained to do: she packed away her emotions and used her hands to fix the damage that she found on the bodies presented to her. As the only properly trained surgeon in the whole entire world, she had no choice. Her methods were simple. She had each patient sit or lie down and drink a glass or two of homebrew as an anesthetic. Then she took off Jaimie’s bandages, checked the wound, cleaned it, and stitched it up. Once that was done, she applied a layer of honey and a fresh bandage and turned to the next man.

  At best, this will keep only half of them from getting serious infections. Her hands kept working while her mind strategized. Bread mold. I could try applying plain old bread mold to their wounds. It won’t save them all, but it might help.

  The next man she turned to had been stitched up sloppily. She could tell Jaimie was just trying to stop the bleeding. Taking a deep breath, she carefully unpicked the large stitches and re-did the work professionally.

  Soon, Lily lost all sense of time and her surroundings. She only saw each man, each wound, treating them the very best she could. Her back hurt. Her head ached. Her arms were sore. She had given the only large
table to the less-experienced Tahir, so her own patients were on blankets on the floor. Giving up on propriety, she hitched her dress up and got down on her knees to save her back. Several maids put their hearts into the effort, pouring homebrew for the men and holding them down when necessary. Watching Lily, they began pulling out long hairs from their braids, washing them in homebrew and handing them over for use in stitching. Even the children did their best to help the wounded men, some of whom were their own fathers.

  By evening, the countess was tripping over her own feet in exhaustion. She couldn’t believe it when she looked up and saw no more men waiting to be stitched up. No one had brought any of the slave traders into her field hospital, and she wouldn’t have worked on them anyway. Earton had too many defenders in need of help. She finished working on the man in front of her, sat down on the floor, and wiped the sweat from her face with a relatively clean section of her dress.

  “Son of a…” (No one knows exactly what the countess said when she finished the last surgery of the day.)

  Utterly depleted, Tahir and Jaimie fell down on the floor next to her. Lily looked over at Jaimie. He was white as chalk and his eyes were huge.

  “Both of you, go to bed.”

  Tahir nodded. He stood up slowly and held out his hand. “My lady.”

  Several servants were still bustling around in what had become the operating room, but Lily no longer cared who saw her exhaustion. She took Tahir’s hand and let him help her to her feet. She was dizzy, so she held onto him for a moment.

  “We’ll live.”

  “We will, my lady. Can I take you to your room?”

  Lily shook her head like an old war horse. “No.” She looked around and focused her eyes on one of the maids. “Mary, bring me some cold water so I can wash. And find out where Leir Hans is. I need to speak with him.”

  Mary nodded and disappeared. Lily put her face in her hands. Her forehead was hot, but her fingers were icy cold.

  What does that mean? I should check my blood pressure…

  She immediately dismissed the idea. She was in charge, and there was still much to be done that evening.

  His Majesty Edward the Eighth, by the grace of Aldonai king of Ativerna, read Hans Tremain’s decoded letter. All of the king’s carrier pigeon letters were copied out by his personal secretary, a discreet and highly intelligent man who transformed the miniscule shorthand used for letters sent by bird into a large, handsome script that was easier on his majesty’s eyes.

  “Your Majesty!” Tremain had written.

  “On your instructions, I have arrived at Earton and find that I am obliged to stay here for the present. The manager was stealing and selling the earl’s peasants to slave traders. The castle is in terrible shape. The guards were sent away. Winter may bring starvation. I am still investigating the attempt on L. Earton’s life. M. Earton is alive and well and adores her stepmother. L. Earton is doing everything she can to improve the situation, but she needs help. I remain your devoted servant, Leir Hans Tremain.”

  His majesty rubbed his eyes. He was still no closer to understanding what was going on in Earton. Tremain was one of his best envoys. There was obviously much more to the situation than what Jess had led him to believe. It had been such an easy story: his wife lived on the estate year-round because she was ugly and selfish and didn’t know how to behave in polite society.

  Edward looked down at the gold pen in his hand and at the inkwell on his desk. August’s gifts were a delight to use. The pens never needed sharpening, and they wrote beautifully. The king had already told his secretary that he wanted all of his residences to switch to the new pen and inkwell sets. After trying them out, his secretary wholeheartedly agreed. He hated to see a nice, expensive piece of parchment ruined by spilled ink.

  The king sighed again folded his hands.

  Jess was always a good, smart boy. How could he let his family down like this? Something about this story just isn’t right.

  August Broklend looked sternly at his agent. “Taris, I fear I must send you on another trip.”

  “Will I be going far?”

  “I want you to go see Lily again.”

  “But sir!”

  “Don’t ‘but sir’ me! You had only the most flattering things to say about her.”

  “It’s not that. Lilian Earton is a wonderful woman, an excellent host, and the best of company. But how can you ask me to go back down there during the stormy season? I barely made it out alive last time.”

  August snorted. “Be that as it may, I can’t leave my daughter defenseless.”

  “But she has an army of Virmans!”

  “Even so, I want you to take some carrier pigeons and ride down there. If you are well motivated you will arrive in one piece. Once you are there, I want you to help her with the estate. You say she fired the manager?”

  “She didn’t even give him time to put his things in a sack. He was tossed out the gate the same evening.”

  “She takes after me,” said August, hooking his thumbs under his belt. Taris did not bother voicing his own opinion, since everyone knows that children get their finest traits from their fathers and their worst traits from those fathers’ mothers-in-law. “Now listen,” August continued. “I will give you a letter and some money for her. You are to stay there and help her manage Earton. Tell her I will make sure she is invited to court.”

  “When do I leave?”

  “In ten days.”

  Taris sighed. August patted him on the shoulder. “Don’t worry, my boy. Once you get to Altver, it’s not that long of a trip to Earton.” Taris felt the heavy hand on his shoulder. He wouldn’t be able to get out of this assignment.

  Hans Tremain brought the countess good news. “My lady, our attackers are slave traders. I have already questioned several of them. I learned something important: they have been here before.”

  “That’s why we caught them so easily.”

  “Yes, my lady. They didn’t expect resistance.”

  Lily nodded. She had already deduced as much. All the wounds she had seen were flesh wounds; only two of the men had injuries that went deeper. The slave traders hadn’t had time to mount a defense. She couldn’t find it in herself to feel sorry for them.

  “Your men knocked off most of them, but we still have some important witnesses, my lady. Were you aware that the boatswain on one of the slave ships has family in Riverton?”

  “I suspected they had help on shore, but I wasn’t sure. Probably one of the elders.”

  “Indeed. You should have had them all tortured,” Hans stated matter-of-factly. “It probably isn’t too late to try now. According to the accomplice, my lady…”

  “Was it Erk Grismo?”

  “Yes. Now listen. He says that there is a deposit of amber on your coast.”

  “That’s good to know.”

  “It’s very good. They worked it very carefully over many years. You know how expensive amber is, don’t you? They sold it in very small quantities to avoid arousing suspicion. Just enough to provide a comfortable life for the family.”

  “What changed?”

  “You arrived, my lady. And your husband brought in a manager who found out their little secret. They had to take him in as a partner. With every month that went by, Etor became more and more demanding. I suppose he paid for that in the end.”

  “He did. I had him expelled from the estate. I acted hastily.”

  “Very hastily. You had no way of knowing, my lady, that Etor had a chest full of amber. I’ve been told that you were able to get some money out of him. Is that true?”

  Lily sighed. “I had no idea they were stealing on such a large scale. What I got back from him was enough to hire the Virmans and to purchase supplies.”

  “And yet it wasn’t enough, was it? I don’t know of a single woman who would sell her dresses if she didn’t need money. Do not be overly modest, my lady.”

  Lily lowered her eyes. She was the picture of humility and modesty. Insi
de, she was grinning.

  I get ten points!

  She had been delighted to unload all those pink silk rags, but if the envoy saw her every move as a noble sacrifice, then she had already won. Hans saw her as a decent, upright woman suffering terrible privations all on her own.

  “Tell me what you learned about Etor, Leir Hans.”

  “It was simple. He got in on the amber work and started putting pressure on the Grismo family…”

  “Family?”

  “Erk and his two brothers.”

  “I see.”

  “Eventually they decided that it was time to close up shop. They wanted to get as much amber out of the deposit as they could, fill in the deposit with rock and leave Earton altogether. Remember, they had a sea-faring relative.”

  “I see. And the slave traders…”

  “At first, they came here to pick up slaves. The brothers kept the amber to themselves. It wasn’t difficult.”

  Lily was dying to ask how much amber was going for these days, but she decided against it. “Did they fill in the deposit?”

  “Not yet, my lady. They wanted to remove more amber, first.”

  Lily pulled her wrap tighter around her shoulders. “That is good news. I will want to make the most of it. Can you give me any advice, Leir Hans?”

  “I will be happy to advise you, my lady. In fact, I will stay here a while longer. This has been an unusual case.”

  “I certainly appreciate your help and your company, Leir Hans.”

  Tremain smiled. In all the conversations he had had with Lilian Earton, he had never caught even the slightest hint of snobbery. She was a countess and he was a lowly chevalier, but she treated him like a man who was older and wiser than herself. Hans had been involved with more noblemen and ladies than he could even remember, and all of them were unfailingly polite to the king’s envoy, but their eyes always said “you lout.” Lilian Earton thought nothing of the kind. He could tell. Conversing with her was pleasant, and Tremain was enjoying himself in Earton, despite the adventures of the last night and day. He would certainly not leave a woman in trouble. He would help her get her affairs in order and go directly to the king.