The Bramble-Choked Field

"Yes, you could help. If you could drive the nail while I hold the tiles, that would be very nice indeed. Hammering is more strenuous. Would you prefer not to do that?"

"I can do it, if you are not afraid of me missing and hitting your hand."

"Just give the nail a light tap to guide it, and then two or three harder taps to drive it."

And with that advice, Sabok and Astra started to lay down the next row of tiles. Sabok observed that the position of the tile was important. A straight row was actually not desirable, in his mind. Even if they were able to perfect a straight line, the tiles would slip a little as the roof became weathered, and would look old before too long. Sabok preferred to set the tiles in a line that gently undulated, and where a little slippage of any one tile would not be noticed.

Astra (as Galilea) asked, "Do you tile many rooves, then?"

"Only when someone needs it, and I need some coin. I wander around, and prefer to sing, play a lute, and tell stories. But sometimes my hosts need my back and hands as well as my voice."

"With all the care that you are taking in the placing these tiles, I would have thought that you were in that trade."

"Well, thank you. I look at tiling a roof and singing a song as flowing from the same spring. Both should be done with a ear and an ear toward beauty."

"That is a good way to look at things. So how long have you been wandering?"

Sabok replied, "Let me think. I left the Foggy Coast in the thirty- first year of King Manasseh's reign - I was thirteen. His reign lasted forty years. That would make it, what, nine years? It is now the eighth of King Cyril's. So eight and nine would make it seventeen years."

"You are figuring time by the Hespaniard kings. Here we use the founding of Themyscira as our starting point. 1228 years ago."

"Ah. So you were born in the year 1218 or so?"

Astra giggled and smiled, "That would make me ten years old! I think that numbers are not your strong point."

"Well, I have trouble with numbers over ninety or so. I would say that you are probably twenty or thereabouts."

"You are a little high. Twenty-five."

"I beg your pardon, my lady. I meant no offense."

"Oh, absolutely none taken. I wish my family thought of me as twenty - they would not be trying to press suitors on me."

"Ah, yes. I had not thought of that, Gal. I always thought of that as being more of a Hespaniard custom."

"It is alive and well in the north of the Ryngaerd as well," replied Astra. The noble families in Aqualaria did try to marry their daughters off early, although for somewhat different reasons than elsewhere. But she did not want to expose herself as an Aqualarian of noble rank.

Sabok, happily for Astra, told the story of a maiden of the Tenge. Marriages in the backcountry of Hespan were often arranged, and a maiden had to settle for whomever her parents deemed suitable. The maiden talked her father into establishing a test to determine who would be a worthy suitor. There was a patch of land that was choked with brambles. The farm would need a man who could do tough work, and so the test was that the man who would marry the maiden would have to clear a six foot row of the patch with nothing but an iron shovel. In order to add weight, the vow was written into the King's Own Register of Oaths and Promises, which could not be repealed.

The plan worked too well. It seemed that nobody could even make it halfway down a row. It appeared that the woman would become an old maid.

One day a peddler came to visit. He impressed the both the woman and her mother with his courtesy and kindness. By the fire that night, the peddler asked where the woman's husband was. The father said, "Sadly, she will never marry. I vowed that only the man that could cut a row of that bramble-choked field out yonder could have her. And it has been entered into the King's Own Register."

The peddler replied, "I think that I could do it. I will clear it just for the challenge, and then let your daughter make the decision."

The man shook his head. "You will only injure yourself. Many tougher men then you have failed and gotten badly injured as well. I like you, and would ask that you not do a foolish thing."

The peddler assured the man that he wished to try, and would not place himself at undue risk.

The next day, the men of the village all came around to see the peddler try to clear out the brambles. He took the shovel, and struck a rock. It was bad luck for the peddler. He made no progress down the row. There was just the sound of a scraping shovel against the rock. The men just laughed as the peddler was making a fool of himself. The saw the peddler sweat as the heat of the day caused the air around him to shimmer. Then a wisp of smoke could be seen, and then a tongue of flame. The field was catching fire!

The men of the village panicked. The fire now raged, and they could not smother it. They had to go to the river. But where were the buckets? They had all disappeared!

The barns and houses of the village were in danger. All the men went back to their houses to summon aid. But there was nobody there.

Finally, the father found his daughter and the peddler waving at him from the edge of the field. They had a number of buckets full of water, and were dousing the flames at the field's edge. As he approached, he saw pairs of women, also with buckets full of water, working to douse the fire. For the peddler and the maiden had worked out the plan, and had brought all the women of the village in on the conspiracy.

By sundown, the fire was out. The field was free of brambles, and none of the barns or houses in the village were even singed. At the house of the farmer, the peddler could barely stand, but said, "Your daughter has no objections to the match. Sir, will you grant me permission to marry her?"

The farmer said, "Sir, if you have all the women in the village supporting your suit, who am I to stand in their way? You have my blessing."

At that point, the row of tiles was finished, and Sabok and Astra were ready to move onto the next row.

1. A voice came up from below. "Mistress Galilea, has our Sabok gotten you to lay tile for him? He is such a silver-tongued devil."
2. It was not quite time for lunch. Astra asked, "Where did you hear of this tale? And where can I get some water - this is hot work."

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