Chapter 8

We left for home early to make sure we caught up with Mirikar and Torkelar. They should also be leaving for home this morning. We left the tents and our supplies since we’d be returning to the east valley to complete my exploration of the mountain east of us. Banttu rode with us, the mica secured to the pack mule he led. We’d know by later this morning if it was safely secured on the mule.

I was surprised to find that the men who had been working on the road were now upgrading the path up to the main valley. They explained what they intended to do. Just beyond the chalk quarry, where the path was still too steep for sheep, they would create a branch to the left and make a wide path along the ridge leading to the west valley since it was less steeply inclined.

There, they would make a switchback to the right, along the ridge until they reached the rim of the main valley. I suggested that they also improve the path from the main valley to the west valley so sheep or goats could reach it, or maybe even horses.

When we caught up to Mirikar and Torkelar, they were excited to tell me about everything I had sent home with them. Mother Sofala was very excited about the bekar clover, especially the seeds. The remma root and seeds would help extend her supply. Everyone was excited about the bee tree. It was huge and provided more honey than we usually got from four of Uncle Zebahar’s wooden skeps. The wild bees had stayed in the hive Uncle Zebahar put them in, so we had another hive of bees. There were so many bees that Uncle Zebahar was sure the hive would swarm soon, especially since he took away so much of their stored honey.

Even with the expanded string of twenty-five chalk-laden mules my cousins now led, we were home just after mid-morning. Mother Sofala teased me when I had no herbs for her this trip. Father was extremely excited about the mica.

“That one piece of mica should sell for five or six gold coins,” he said enthusiastically. He was equally elated at the way we transported it home since it arrived intact.

“Good, now you can add to the herb garden so that Nykeea and I have enough for our new clan members and the expanded flocks,” Mother Sofala told Father.

“I will have someone start on it this week, although I would like to try selling this piece to one of the ships,” Father replied. “I’ve never seen pieces so big,” he commented to me.

“I had to chisel those out of a layer of mica in the mountains. I could cut even bigger pieces, but they would be too big to transport,” I replied.

“It will also require lots of glue and rabbit pelts, although I hear the pelts are easy to acquire in all three valleys,” Banttu added.

“We’ve already made fur-lined gloves, coats, and blankets for everyone who might work in the mountains during the cold season. Most of the other rabbit pelts were used to make fur-lined gloves for the women of the clan,” Mother Nykeea commented.

Then Kazani and Saraki told about finding the antler thorn bushes and berries. We all knew that the stoppered ceramic urn they had transferred the poison to was already half empty and we had intended to ask the next caravan to find someone to bring more. Both Mother Sofala and Mother Nykeea wanted to help the girls so they could also learn how to make the poison. The four of them quickly disappeared into Mother Sofala’s workshop. Mother Nykeea uses the workshop too, but we still refer to it as Mother Sofala’s workshop.

I know that they are both proud of the workshop. Mother Sofala’s own mother was the town’s herbalist before she died. She only had a small table in a corner of their bedroom and a small set of shelves on the wall above the table. She hung dried herbs from the beams and rafters of their home.

Mother Sofala’s workshop is huge. Two six-foot-long workbenches line the walls on the left and right sides of the room. The walls above the four workbenches have large cabinets and lots of shelving. Floor-to-ceiling shelves and cabinets cover the wall opposite the door. The cabinets are filled with stoppered glass vials and stoppered ceramic urns of varying sizes. Mortars, pestles, and cage cups line the shelves, along with bunches of dried herbs. More dried herbs hang from racks lining the wall adjacent to and behind where the door opens. The adjacent wall to the left of the door has a fireplace, a large supply of firewood, and a sconce to hold a torch if necessary.

Dozens of bundles of herbs hang from hooks attached to the high ceiling above their heads. Each workbench has two tall stools to use while working at the bench and there are two chairs for each of the two smaller tables in the room. A long hickory pole with a hook on the end helps to get the bundled herbs down or to hang new bunches of herbs to dry. They even have a sturdy table in the center of the room that someone could lie on while Mother Sofala tends their wound or ailment.

When Iltapar heard that I was home, he hurried over and hugged me. “You won’t believe it,” he exclaimed. “When the ship got here, I bought all the iron, copper, and coal that he had. I haggled with the captain and got a slightly better price than he originally asked for. Father bought the forty-two slaves they had to offer, including two that the rest of them said were argumentative. The captain offered them to us for two gold coins each so he didn’t have to sail to Port Zamfara.

“A ship from Nordland arrived three days later and I bought the copper, iron, and coal he had, too. When the caravan arrived the next day, they bought nearly all the iron, copper, and coal that we would sell. He couldn’t believe that we had so much and that we charged less than Port Zamfara. Father also sold the two contentious men to them for four gold coins each. I can’t believe that I earned ninety pounds of gold for the clan!” Iltapar exclaimed excitedly.

I knew how he felt; it was an intoxicating feeling. I was also happy to see him excited about how much he earned for the clan and not how much he earned for himself.

“We received payment from the King,” Father said. “He thinks that four of the same size urns will be enough for the entire kingdom. We got more than I expected for the poppy tears. King Kugiar sent seven thousand gold coins, two thousand for each full urn. Now we know what to charge when we sell it to ship captains.”

“I want to grow the antler thorn berries, too; maybe at the very top of each hill of poppies,” I said animatedly. “That way they’ll be under guard so nobody steals them. Kazani and Saraki say that the only man in their country who has them grows them in the large courtyard of his villa. The small ram’s horn of the potion they brought cost five gold coins. We could sell them for half as much to caravans, or make a smaller urn like they use now and sell it for one gold coin,” I suggested.

“It’s a good thing we bought so many slaves and planted so much more this year,” Father laughed. “We’ve tripled the number of people living here since you brought the camel caravan home. I hope that the two men you sent back to Nordland were able to get word to their king and were able to stop the attacks. If so, there should only be two more shipments of slaves from there,” he said somberly.

I now wondered how the two men were doing, having barely thought about them since they left. I hoped they were able to find the wives of the soldiers who were our slaves. I shuddered when I thought about how it would feel to be separated from my wives like that, and for them to not know what happened to me.

When the women joined us for lunch, they were excited. They estimated that they made enough of the poison to fill thirty small urns like Kazani and Saraki now used. I suggested selling each small urn for one gold coin. That would allow the caravan master to sell them for two and still sell them for less than the other man who sold them.

After lunch, Mereesia and Senna nearly dragged me over to see Khoujo. He grinned when he saw me and motioned for me to follow him into the new wooden building that was now his workshop. It was big enough that there were ten large workbenches inside. Each bench had a tall stool like Mother Sofala’s workshop had. Wooden bins lined one wall, holding the raw materials that he needed. Four men and five women were busy making more of his crossbows.

He then took me to a new building right next door and introduced me to Bjord, an experienced arrowsmith who was making the bolts for the crossbows. The bolts used small, steel, diamond-shaped tips for an arrowhead that would help them penetrate even deeper into whatever they hit.

Bjord was working at his own bench, and twenty women were working at benches in the crowded building making both bolts and regular arrows. Khoujo explained that Father liked his new crossbows so much that he planned to build him a new, larger workshop from stone after the housing and walls were finished. In the meantime, his current workshop worked just fine for him and this one worked for Bjord.

Khoujo showed me the original hickory crossbow that he made. He designed it so you set the tip of the crossbow against the ground and leaned against the rear of the crossbow to draw the bow. It only took a few heartbeats to draw the bow and load the bolt. I liked it.

Then he showed me the crossbow Father liked best. It looked rather awkward, but Tuirae and Kaijia loved it. A lever drew the bow, locked it in place, ready to be released, and dropped a bolt into place from a rack above the bow. The rack held ten bolts and the bow could be drawn and the crossbow loaded even faster than the first one I tried.

Father had him making a thousand crossbows to start. What we didn’t need for the clan or town, he planned to sell to the King. The bow on these was made from hickory. He was also making composite bows, but they would take several more weeks to complete. On those, he carved the bow’s belly, the part of the bow that usually faced an archer and where he would hold the bow, and glued a piece of bone or animal horn there.

The spine of the bow, the part facing the enemy, had crushed sinew glued along the entire length. When the glue holding the bone and sinew dried, he wrapped the bow in fiber from the stems of thistle plants and glued birch bark around the whole thing to help waterproof it. The entire process took three months to complete, although he could work on several of them each day. Right now, he was working on five so he could show Father the completed crossbows and he could compare the two. They should be ready in a few weeks. In the meantime, they were busily turning out the crossbow with a simple hickory bow and the magazine that held ten bolts.

Except for Zuela, all my wives and concubines rode with me today. When we met Mirikar and Torkelar, they had ten men with them. Four of the men were driving new wagons with supplies for the workers in the valley. They had wood, nails, burnt lime, glue, and food. Several of the men were riding horses and trailing a string of mules. Four of the men would use the mules to bring mica back.

Four more men would build the special frames like Banttu made to carry our first slab of mica back. Each evening they would set forty snares for rabbits in the east valley and would bring their catch to the women that I left in camp that day. The women would scrape and stretch the pelts to dry so we could use them for cushioning the frames.

At the chalk quarry, the building supplies and food were loaded onto the mules to carry up to the main cave. Supplies for us and for the men who would quarry mica would make up the second load for the mules and would go to the cave in the east valley. Father agreed that we should build folds in front of the caves in both the east and main valleys.

He thought we should use the west valley to pasture the steers we fattened to eat. Banttu and his men would cut down trees and split them to make fence posts and rails to divide the valley into pastures so we could rotate the cattle between them. While a steer ate more than a goat or a sheep, we had far fewer of them.

We stopped briefly to see Lukas and Vidar. I wanted to let them know that we needed as many rabbit pelts as we could get and explained why. We grabbed the supplies that we left there last time, loaded them onto our mules, and made our way to the east valley. The ladies wanted to stay in the cave there, so we unloaded everything into the cave, including our two pavilion tents.

Once everything was unloaded, I went with the four men who would quarry the mica to show them where it was. They had three pavilion tents, ones that had the arrow slits patched. One tent was to hold their supplies. While two of the men set up their camp as close to the mountain as they could, I took the other two to show them the mica. Once there, I showed them how I used the hammer and chisel to break through several layers of the mica, and then how I loosened several layers at once.

I explained how Banttu and I lifted the slab out and set it on one piece of the frame, set the other piece of the frame on top of the mica, tied the layered frames and mica together, and then loaded it onto a mule. They went to work eagerly as I headed back to the valley.

I spent nearly two more weeks exploring the upper half of the mountain, discovering what was there and seeing numerous plants that I’d never seen before. After the girls spotted the antler thorn bushes, rather than risk missing an herb that I hadn’t seen before, I started collecting branches that showed the leaves. If possible, I chose a part that also showed the flowers and/or fruit and seeds of the plant. When we returned to the main valley to resupply each week, I’d leave a bag with any new plants. By the time I finished exploring the mountain, none of the new plants I gathered had piqued anyone’s interest.

It seemed that each week, I discovered one or two wild beehives and sent word back with Mirikar and Torkelar when we went to the main valley to replenish our supplies and to send my plant samples to Mother Sofala. I showed the girls where each new hive was so they could direct Uncle Zebahar when he arrived. That way, I could keep exploring.

On our way home after being gone for well over a month, we stopped in the main valley where we were greeted excitedly by everyone. I was amazed that the wall protecting the new road from the caravan trail up to the valley was complete, even though it was nearly complete last time we came back for supplies. Two thirty-foot high guard towers provided protection, as did a catwalk along the inside of the wall that let archers shoot down on an enemy through arrow loops while still being protected by the wall. Mirikar and Torkelar were gone so either they were returning home today or would be coming back today or tomorrow. We’d probably pass them along the way.

The new road up to the valley was nearing completion, too. Soon, the sheep would be able to graze here. That was exciting because it meant the closer and easier to reach pastures could be reserved for the expanding herds of dairy goats, the very young kids, and the dairy cows.

Vidar’s wife led me into the cave where the first two bitches whimpered excitedly when they saw me. They didn’t get up to greet me since each one was lying in a large, rabbit-fur-lined, woven willow branch basket with a litter of pups attached to her teats. Both bitches panted happily when I scratched their ears. I could see that each had a bowl of clean water nearby, as well as pieces of dried meat.

I counted eighteen pups between the two new mothers. Ten of them looked like tiny versions of Missimo while the rest looked like a mixture of the other males. This now doubled the number of dogs we had for herding, and none too soon if the sheep would be up here soon.

The puppies were hardly a surprise. Two weeks ago, both bitches were waddling. Last week, both were lying in the shade near the cave watching the workers building the wall for the sheepfold. Unless I was wrong, even the newest bitch seemed to be fuller than just from eating well. I almost felt like a proud father myself and realized that I would be a proud father in a few months. That thought made me nervous, and I hoped that I could be as good a father to my children as my father was to us. I was sure that my wives would be good mothers.

I smiled as I remembered watching the two bitches teach the wolf pups not to harry the goats and realized sadly that I was going to miss watching them teach their own pups.

With a final round of goodbyes, we headed for home, now able to go beneath the just-completed arch over the gate in the rock wall surrounding the sheep enclosure. The workers had been removing the wooden supports that supported the rounded stone arch over the gate when we arrived a little while ago. They had let the mortar dry for four days before removing the wooden supports. The wall on either side of the arch was eight feet high. The square bases of two guard towers being built beside the gate were already nine feet high.

Aside from the unfinished opening in the rock wall where we entered this morning, the rest of the wall was at least six feet high. That opening had been left to use as a gate until the arch over the main gate was complete. I was almost jealous of how quickly the men had completed so much of the wall, but many more men were working on it than when I was alone here. It did feel good to see the wall nearly complete.

Banttu told me that half the men were already starting work on the wall for the fold in the east valley. The other half would stay and finish this wall before joining them. Since all three bitches were temporarily shunning him, Missimo came with us when we left for home.

We met and passed Mirikar and Torkelar halfway home. Even with the wagons, they led twenty mules laden with chalk. They explained that four more wagons were nearly complete. Anzikar had our slaves building even more lime kilns and his business was growing rapidly. Ships arriving in the port were starting to ask for the lime, and even the caravans were buying it to take back with them. Evidently, Libania imported their burnt lime from the north and paid double what Anzikar charged.

Anzikar had asked Father’s opinion about raising his price and Father told him that we were purposely charging less for coal, iron, and copper than what the caravans used to pay in Port Zamfara. Hearing that, Anzikar decided to continue charging the same price. He’d already raised prices slightly for lime that he sold to ships and caravans compared to what he continued charging people in town.

Another benefit to selling the lime was that women in town made money now by weaving and selling baskets to hold the burnt lime. They even planted reeds in the marshy area at the river mouth. They built portable wooden guard towers where they could watch for crocodiles while they worked. With the new crossbows that Khoujo was making, several women were able to stand guard so the men could continue working at their normal jobs.

As we neared home at midday, we could see camels grazing in one of the designated pastures meaning that another caravan was here.

“Estebo,” Kazani suddenly squealed animatedly, quickly urging her horse to race the rest of the way to the house. Saraki was right behind her. Both girls were locked in a happy hug with what I assumed was their brother when the rest of us finally got there.

“Harazar, this is our brother, Estebo,” Kazani introduced us without letting go of her brother.

“Welcome Estebo,” I greeted him, reaching to shake his hand.

Instead, he reached over and hugged me. “Thank you for saving my sisters and for making them so happy, as well as for dealing with the men who killed our father,” he said emotionally.

“Everyone in town says that your family has been the wealthiest and most respected family in town for years, and that your clan is one of the most respected in the country. They say that your recent adventures have left you one of the wealthiest men they know of and that you gave the money to your clan to use. Now I learn that you’re exploring the mountains looking for more things to help your clan.

“I learned just before coming here that the great-great grandfather of the caravan leader who died in the bandit attack, as well as two other caravan leaders that same year, accepted money from the Baron of Port Zamfara to spread rumors of evil spirits in the mountains east of here so that none of the caravans would come this way.

“He told his wife about it before he left on his last trip. Rather than admit that every generation of his family since then knew of the deception, he planned to show that it was safe to travel here. When it was reported that he was killed by bandits from Port Zamfara, his wife told us what he said,” Estebo explained.

Father suggested that we go inside and eat lunch. Several slaves arrived and took our horses. I handed Mother Sofala the most recent bag of unknown plants. “Blue diffle,” one of the slaves exclaimed when he saw one of the plants. “It makes a very good blue dye for cloth, but only grew in the southernmost part of our country. Unfortunately, there was little enough arable land there, but it grew well on slopes that were too steep to plant with crops,” he explained.

“Is there a market for it?” Father asked.

“Absolutely,” the slave assured us. “Once the dye is extracted in water, allow the water to evaporate and make thin discs of the powder. You could easily sell a thousand discs a year just in Nordland. I’m sure other countries would buy it too. If you have any bloodroot, you could do the same for red dye, or wigga weed for yellow dye. I can have Pia, one of our women help you see if you have any of those plants here,” he offered.

“Have her find me after lunch. I have a large collection of dried herbs and have another collection of unknown plants Harazar doesn’t recognize that he sends me each week,” Mother Sofala replied. That surprised me. I figured that she would compost any that she didn’t want.

The man left with the last of our horses. I realized that I’d have to start learning the names of the slaves. I knew the names of every clan member, but only knew twenty or thirty of the slaves.

Inside, Kazani and Saraki were talking with their brother. “I have to apologize for my wife’s actions,” he told them. “She was worried that your behavior would reflect poorly on me and on the family,” he told his sisters. “I explained to her that there are two types of wealthy people. The first are usually newly wealthy and worry about everything they do and how others will view them.

“Those like our family are wealthy enough that we don’t give camel dung about what others think of us. That’s one reason Father gave the guards permission to train you with weapons when you asked them to. You two have been like that all your lives, always wanting to learn how to do everything.

“Still, it appears that your marriage makes both of you happy. Your husband is both wealthy and well respected. He obviously allows you to continue in your ways since both of you carry a sword and a bow. I heard that you even helped in the attack against the bandits and the Baron of Port Zamfara,” he said emotionally as we entered the kitchen.

“I see that you got Father’s sword that we saved for you,” Saraki said, looking at the sword her brother wore.

“Yes, your sister-wife Zuela gave it to me for you. She didn’t know if you’d be back before I left,” he replied.

The conversation continued throughout lunch. The caravan that Estebo came with bought all of our copper, iron, and coal, and filled the rest of the camels with burnt lime. Estebo even bought the urns of the potion the ladies prepared from the antler thorn berries. Since he was now family, Iltapar had given Estebo first choice of what he wanted to buy. Normally, the caravan master got first choice, and each succeeding merchant went in order of the number of camels he had.