by B. K. Parent
“You’re right Nana. I do need to stop for awhile. Let me put it back together and then after our meal, I will try again. I can’t help but suspect that something important is hidden in this puzzle box.”
We ate our meal in silence. I helped Nana clear the table and offered to clean up, but she shooed me away and told me to get back to the puzzle box. Just as I sat down to start again, we heard a “hallo” being called from the front gate. I do not know why I quickly got up and without thinking put the puzzle box under the counter behind a stack of towels before I went to the door to see who had come into the yard, but I did. It was Thomas, come up from the village. I swung the door open and invited him in.
“Any news?” I asked anxiously.
“No, sorry lass, no one has seen or heard a thing that might tell us where your Da is. I just stopped by to make sure you’re both alright.”
“We thank you for your kindness,” Nana replied. “We are as fine as we can be with not knowing what happened to my son-in-law, or why those folks would tear the house apart. Would you care for some soup or a cuppa tea?”
“I’d really like to stay, but I’d best get back to the pub. The tide is early this day so the fishers will be comin’ in sooner than usual and be wantin’ somethin’ hot and fillin’ after a long day at sea. I hope the catch was a good one this day. Maybe they’ll bring news. Mistress Joransdatter or Arial, why don’t one of you come down to the pub towards dusk and see if’n the fishers have learned anythin’?”
“Sounds like a good idea, Thomas,” Nana said. “I think I’ll send Arial. Thank you for coming all the way out here to check in on us. I’ll walk you to the gate.”
After Thomas had left, I got the puzzle box out from behind the towels and started trying to figure out how to open it again. Nana came back into the kitchen but remained silent and went about her cleaning and putting items away. I idly turned the puzzle box over and over in my hands and tried to empty my mind of all the ways I had tried to open it before. I could hear Nana humming a tune as she worked. I could hear a soft snore coming from Carz as he slept by the hearth, and I could hear an occasional crackle of the fire. My stomach was full of warm soup, the kitchen was warm and quiet with only soft sounds, and my mind began to drift. Apparently my fingers had stayed alert, for I was snapped abruptly out of my reverie by a soft click. I looked down to find the end of the puzzle box open. Inside was another box, which came out easily. Much to my relief, it was not another puzzle box. It was just a rectangular box with a top lid that slid open.
“Nana, I have the puzzle box open.”
Nana dried her hands on her apron and came over to the table where I had been sitting. She stood behind me, hands on my shoulders, and indicated that I should open the second box. I slowly pulled the second box out, slid the lid open, and inside the box was a folded piece of paper placed on top of a tightly rolled up tube of paper. The folded piece of paper looked new, but the tube of paper was yellowed with age. I unfolded the newer piece of paper first. My eyes blurred a bit as I looked at the hastily scrawled handwriting. It was in Da’s hand and very brief.
Arial,
If I am not back in ten days time, take the homewagon to the road. Ask Nana to keep the home fires burning. Follow the rover’s route marked on the enclosed map. Do not go as who you are. Take your mother’s name and colors. Trust Thomas. He will help you change the appearance of the homewagon and get you out of town with no one the wiser. Sell your wares and Nana’s but take nothing of Mother’s or mine. If I am able, I will try to find you. If you get as far as Tverdal, find the smithy named Casper. Tell him you are a friend of Haakens. He will explain. If he is not there, find Mistress Fern at Wayfarers Market. If you can find neither, follow the fair circuit until you get to the capitol. Set up at the capitol fair. Hang the green banner off the back of the homewagon. Someone will find you. You will know they are a friend if they ask if you have any pilcher cream. Your Nana will explain. Give her the second map from the box. It will keep her safe. I will explain all when I see you. Oh, Arial, make sure you honor the Neebings.
Love you both,
Da
I looked at Nana, and I saw both surprise and worry on her face. “Do you know what this is all about, Nana?” I asked. “Do you think he’s alright? Does this mean he left on his own, and the strangers didn’t take him as we feared?”
Nana sat down heavily in the nearest chair and just shook her head. “I hope he’s alright. About the rest of the note, I can’t tell you much, child. I just can’t tell you much. I don’t know much about rover life. Your mother, my daughter, wasn’t raised as a rover. We come from a small village far north of here. She met your Da at the summer fair, and the rest was history as they say. You know she was such a fine weaver, and she and your Da traveled for years happily going from one town to another, from one end of Sommerhjem to the other. They tried to get back to see me each year, sometimes staying as long as a month, sometimes only a few days. You remember.”
I did remember. I loved the break from the road when we stayed with Nana. She would take me on long walks gathering herbs and medicinal plants, and she taught me their names and uses. In the last few years before Mother’s death, we did not spend but a day or two with Nana. I had not thought of that. I wondered why, but that thought left my head quickly, being crowded out with other questions.
“What does Da mean when he wrote that I should take Mother’s name and colors?”
“Your mother and I are of the northern clans. Clan colors are a little-used distinction nowadays in most of our land, but they’re still held to where we come from and with the rovers. When your mother first left home, she continued to wear her own clan colors. After you were born, she adopted your Da’s clan colors, as is the rover custom. The colors your Da refers to are your mother’s and my clan colors, the pattern and weave of the cloth, the tartan of our clan. You’ve a right to wear them. You have always worn your Da’s colors and gone by his name, as is the custom with the rovers. In the northern clans, we follow the mother’s side of the family. So if you do what your Da asks, you would switch from the red, green, and yellow of your Da’s tartan to the green, black, red, and light green of your mother’s clan. Your name would be Arial Anissasdatter by our clan’s custom.”
“Obviously from the note Da wrote, if he does not return, he wants me to go on the road in disguise. He doesn’t want me to go by my own name, but wouldn’t going under the name Anissasdatter be a dead giveaway?”
“I thought about that, but no, I don’t think so. As you know, your mother’s name was Anissa and your Da always called your mother Ani, as she was called in our village. Arial is a pretty common name for lasses of your age. You have grown so and changed so, since you and your family traveled, that all but the most astute would not recognize you. The homewagon will need some changing though. Let’s see what else is in the box.”
I laid Da’s note aside and carefully eased the roll of paper out of the box. At closer inspection, the roll was not one sheet but two sheets of paper. The outer layer was a sheet folded in fourths and was a very detailed map of Sommerhjem and a bit of the bordering countries to the south and the east, the west and the part of the north bordering the sea. The main roads were clearly marked, but what surprised me was what appeared to be the smaller roads and byways were also marked in great detail. In addition, there were notations all over the map in Da’s hand that indicated good camping places, and towns where we would stop annually. On the back were notations on markets, fairs, contacts in towns and villages, and other notes that did not make much sense to me. It reminded me that Da also kept journals which I should try to find. I found our village on the map and then traced my finger along a marked route to Tverdal. I noticed that the route did not take me to any really big towns but rather to large and small villages. If Da did not return in ten days, well nine days now, and I set off, I would arrive at the next town s
outh on market day, if the days held true to the markings on the map.
I set the map aside and unrolled the next paper that was folded in half. The bottom half of the sheet showed a sketch of our yard and the surrounding land, from the orchard on the east to the sea on the west. The top half of the sheet was covered with a set of interconnecting lines. They made no sense to me. I looked back to the bottom half of the page and that is when I noticed that there was a small x marked in the back left corner of the smithy. A similar x was marked on the area drawn to represent the pantry of the house. I looked at Nana. I am sure the confused look on her face mirrored the one on mine.
“What do you think this means, Nana?” I asked. “Why would Da say this would keep you safe? I mean, I know why he sent you to the still house when the strangers came. It is built so strong, and once the door is closed and the bar set in place, it would take a battering ram to get you out of there, but what can these drawings mean?”
Nana pulled the drawing closer to her and began to study it. She turned it upside down, she turned it over, she held it up to the light, and then she folded it in half once again. I was about to reach for it, thinking she was done looking, when she held it up to the light a second time. The image of the sketch of the lines was superimposed over the sketch of the house and grounds. The lines started where the small x marks were, and the one from the smithy ran to the house and connected to the one marked on the pantry. It also ran to the tack room in the stables. Nana flipped the sheet open and looked at the sketch of our yard and noted that we had missed a very small x in the stables. Nana refolded the paper and again held it up to the light. Another line ran from the pantry small x to the left side of the peninsula we lived on and ended at the sea.
“It looks like a map, Nana, but it makes no sense. The paths about the grounds do not match at all the paths drawn on this,” I said.
“I don’t think these are above ground paths,” Nana replied, “and that would begin to explain much. Perhaps even what might have happened to your Da, and how the puzzle box got on top of the well cover. Come, let’s check this out.”
Chapter Four
“Let’s try the smithy first,” I said to Nana, “since that’s where Da was heading when he told you to get to the still house.”
Nana agreed, and we both headed to the smithy. I opened the shutters up so we would have some light and began to look around. The smithy looked like it always did, except the fire was out and the bellows were still. Da had hardly been gone a day, but the place looked abandoned and forlorn to me. Maybe I was putting my feelings on the smithy rather than the other way around.
I remembered that the small x on the map for the smithy was in the back left corner. It seemed just the same to me. Nothing had been moved, nothing was different. The back wall of the smithy had a waist-high counter that ran the length of it. Under the counter were shelves that held a variety of tools, scrap metal, rags, buckets, half-finished projects, and organized clutter. The back left corner was no different than the rest of the back wall. The lower shelf on that section held a large wooden tub filled with rags and scraps of leather. The top shelf held boxes of small items Da made, like door latches, hinges, hooks and eyes, metal rings for horse tack, to mention a few. The top of the counter had various tools laid out. Why would there be a small x on the map marked here?
I walked over to the back left corner, and Nana followed closely behind. We both looked at the countertop, but it looked the same as always. I knelt down and took boxes off the first shelf. Once they had been removed, all that was left was a bare shelf covered with dust and the remnants of a spider’s web.
“Nana, would you help me move the wooden tub? It’s a bit awkward to move by myself.”
Nana knelt down, and we both reached for the rope handles to pull the tub and lift it off the shelf. It did not budge. We pulled harder, and it still did not move.
“That’s odd,” Nana said. “It doesn’t seem stuck on anything. You reach around your side, and I’ll reach around mine to see if anything is keeping the tub from moving.”
“Nothing on my side,” I told her.
“Nothing here either.”
We pulled, and pushed, tugged harder, and even tried to lift the tub to no avail. Since there was little clearance between the top of the tub and the bottom of the shelf above, we could not look inside. Nana then began to empty the tub of rags, scraps of leather, odd bits of old clothing, and I placed them on the first shelf. Once the tub was empty, I reached inside and felt around. At first, I felt nothing, just the smooth wood of the inside of the tub, nothing on the bottom of the tub or along the sides. I was just about to give up when I felt a small indentation halfway up the front inside of the tub. I felt metal. I stuck my finger in the opening and a ring flipped out. I tugged on it and smacked my hand on the bottom side of the shelf above when the ring slid smoothly upward.
“Ooh, that stings,” I said as I stuck my scraped knuckle in my mouth. I looked at the top of the wooden tub, and there sticking above the rim of the tub, was a metal piece.
“That looks like a latch, don’t you think?” said Nana.
She was right. It did look like one of the latches Da made for door locks. Without speaking, we both had the same idea at the same time. We grabbed the rope handles, pulled, and landed on our backsides when the tub and shelf swung out on well-oiled hinges. What a clever design. Where the shelf had been was an opening just large enough for a medium-sized body to fit through.
“I’ll go fetch a light,” stated Nana.
While she was gone, I felt around in the hole and discovered that there was a ladder attached to the front side of the opening. I would have to go feet first, hang over the edge with my feet dangling, and try to find a rung of the ladder without seeing what I was doing. I was not looking forward to dangling my body over a hole when I did not know what was down there or how far down it was, but I did not think I should ask Nana to do it. She is not as agile as I am, and her head was still hurting from her fall. No, it was going to be me. Nana finally returned with not only the lantern but a small pack.
“I thought you might need more than the lantern,” she said. “I put some candles, matches, and a few other useful items in the pack. I also brought your warm sweater. It will probably be cold down there.”
“Thanks, Nana. I’ve been thinking. If the map from Da is accurate, this entrance should lead to a way to get to the well in the root cellar. Would you open the trap door and listen for me?”
“Of course. If I don’t hear from you in a decent amount of time, I’m coming down after you. You be careful.”
“Always,” I said as I lay flat on the floor of the smithy and slid my legs into the opening. Then I was dangling at the waist, half out of the hole and half in the hole, thinking I would rather be mucking out the horse stalls than doing this. I groped around with my left foot until it found a rung on the ladder and tested it carefully. It held so I placed my right foot on the rung. Cautiously, I move my left foot down to the next rung and tested it. It felt solid. I slung the pack over my shoulder, and Nana tied a rope on the handle of the lantern, preparing to lower it down after me. I needed both hands to keep myself on the ladder.
I began to count the rungs, five, six, seven, and so on. At fifteen, I became concerned. I am not all that fond of heights nor enclosed places, so as the sweat began to run down my back and my palms became clammy, which was not helping me hold on to the rungs, I became worried that this hole I was in was going nowhere but down. Suddenly my right foot hit solid rock.
“Nana, can you hear me?” I called up the shaft.
“Loud and clear. Are you alright?”
“I’m on solid ground. Can you lower the lantern?”
Nana lowered the lantern, and as it lit up the shaft I had come down, I saw I was in a natural hole that had been enlarged in places. Fissures are pretty common near the se
a. Some think the wave action over time has helped form them. Once the lantern was in my hands, Nana dropped the rope, suggesting I might need it. I untied the lantern, coiled the rope, tucked it in my pack, and held the lantern up to get my bearings. A small opening led off in what seemed like it could be the direction of the cottage. I called up to Nana that I hoped I was heading towards the cottage and the root cellar well and would call up to her from there. She again cautioned care and left to meet me.
The tunnel I entered was low enough that I had to duck. I tried to imagine Da in it and thought he must have had to crawl through. I looked at the floor, and in the dust I could see a hand print here and there amid places where it looked like cloth had been dragged, confirming my suspicions. After what I estimated to be ten to fifteen feet, the tunnel became both taller and widened a bit. It was cool in the tunnel but reasonably dry. The rock was rough and this part of the tunnel appeared natural. The floor was uneven but fairly smooth. I think water must have run through here once.
Cobwebs were abundant. It is a good thing I am not squeamish about spiders for I would have been up that ladder so fast my shadow would have had to hurry to catch up. It seemed like I had been walking for a long time, but it was probably only minutes, when I came to a branch in the tunnel going off to the right. I got out the map and held it up to the lantern light. That tunnel to the right looked like it matched the line on the map that went to the stable. I continued ahead. The tunnel I was in took a curve to the left, and I noticed that the wall of the tunnel on my right was not natural but rather manmade of stones so closely fit together they had not needed to be mortared. Was this the well? Was there a door, an opening, a secret entrance? I looked at the wall, but I could see nothing obvious. Now what?
Finally, my brain kicked in, and I looked down and sure enough, there were footprints clearly showing in the thick dust on the floor. I followed them to the wall where it looked like someone, hopefully Da, had stood and shuffled his feet around in a small area. Nothing obvious appeared on the wall ahead of me, just a wall of well-fit-together stones. There must be some sort of latch. After all Da had managed to leave the puzzle box on the well cover after the strangers had come.
