From Londoner To Lord

Hudan shrugged. "We don't really have any other place where we can keep them, do we? Both the longhouses are already filled to their capacity with villagers even sleeping on the overcrowded floors there, while the damaged huts in the village won't do anything to prevent the cold if we put the newcomers in them. However, the jail was made from thick logs just like the longhouses and would easily keep them warm enough, although it would still be crowded for them inside."

"I also want to ask them more questions individually before we let them openly integrate with the other villagers," Feroy added, "just to make sure there are no holes in their story. I don't think there should be any problems, but it's better to be safe than sorry."

"I agree with that," Kivamus said. "So, how many of these refugees are there?"

"Nineteen people in total," the ex-mercenary replied, "who are coming from five different families. That includes two children, and three kids who are too young to work. Other than them, all the men and women have experience in farming."

Kivamus grinned. "That experience is going to be vital when we start farming in the spring! We do have Pinoto here who used to be a farmer in the past, but he can't do everything himself. Getting this many experienced farmers might very well be the reason which will make our farming project successful in this village full of coal miners."

"I did say that you would like the news," Feroy replied with a smirk.

However, Duvas was frowning. "I know it's probably a moot point right now, but are you sure you want to take them in? We hardly have enough grain to complete the sowing after feeding the people we already have in the village. Including these newcomers, Tiranat would have nearly four hundred people whom we will have to feed in the winter from our limited stock of food."

Kivamus smiled. "It's true I was only expecting immigrants to start coming by the end of winter, but we will manage somehow. We already needed some extra workers to start mining coal."

"I don't deny that," the majordomo replied, "but there is a good possibility that the Count will increase his taxes this time, which will make our situation even more difficult. We don't even have a way to house them properly, assuming Feroy clears all of them as safe to give refuge in Tiranat."

"There is hardly any chance that some bandits would have made up this elaborate story to enter our village when they had small children with them, but I'll make sure that they aren't a threat to us," the ex-mercenary replied." As for housing these refugees, the jail was already sitting empty these days, and while it was a little crowded inside for that many people, they were more than grateful to find a roof over their head and a promise of warm food waiting for them later tonight." He added, "It's still true that putting them in the jail means they are also inside the manor which can be a security risk, but with so many guards here all the time, this is probably the best place to keep them for now. We have already taken whatever farming tools they had brought with them as makeshift weapons."

Kivamus was glad to see that the ex-mercenary had already understood the importance of getting more workers here, even though the majordomo still seemed reluctant. He looked at Duvas. "Just think of it this way. While we will have to spend food on feeding them, the coal which we will be able to mine by the end of winter with these extra workers will more than pay for their upkeep. We might even get some surplus coal to sell this way, which will help us in paying the taxes. Anyway, what other choice do we have? They aren't bandits so we can't just send them and their children away from the village in this freezing weather, can we? They would die of hunger or cold before reaching any other human habitation, and that's assuming Nokozal or some other bandit group doesn't just make them their slaves after seeing them with little children which makes them defenceless."

"I guess you are right," Duvas muttered. He exhaled loudly. "In that case, I better meet with Madam Nerida and tell her that she'll have to cook more food tonight since we have more mouths to feed now."

"That's a good idea," Kivamus agreed. "Until we get some criminal who we need to put inside that jail, we can just let them stay there. That way they will be together with familiar faces, which will make them comfortable here, and we will get a better idea about them in the coming days before we think of shifting them to another place."

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Duvas gave a nod at that, and exited the hall after putting his fur coat around him.

Feroy stood up as well. "There is still some time before dinner, so I am going to talk with these farmers again." With that he followed the majordomo outside.

Hudan, who had been standing until now, finally found an armchair near the fire and sat down with a sigh. "I never knew when signing up to become your guard captain that my life would become this exciting. Although I still prefer it over the solitude of living in Madam Helga's inn in the past."

Kivamus smiled. "I'm glad you are here to lead our guards. I wouldn't know who to trust with Tiranat's defence without you and Feroy here."

"Still, I can't wait until the south-western gate is completed," Hudan replied. "If we already had that ready, there would have been a much lower danger of any bandit raid, whether they were ex-farmers or not."

Kivamus nodded. "Only a few more days now. After that, we have to start making the barn in the south for mushroom farming, and then we can finally put Taniok to start building the watchtowers."

Gorsazo, who had been quiet until now, finally spoke up with a proud smile. "I'm just glad to see so much progress being made here. We arrived in this village in a very difficult situation, but the village is already unrecognisable from how it used to be a few months ago."

Kivamus grinned. "It's only a start, Gorsazo. It's only a start."

*******

It was late afternoon of the next day and Kivamus was standing in the courtyard of the manor along with Duvas while looking at the frames of mould and deckle which Darora had brought. Thankfully it wasn't snowing today, so they were standing next to an empty table near the servants hall, on which the frames were kept. Some of them were small sized, while others were a little bigger, so that they could find out by experience which size was the best for making paper.

Cedoron had also brought a single sheet of handmade wire mesh to put on the mould. It was far from the quality one would expect from a mesh made on modern Earth by proper machine tools, but the blacksmith had still outdone himself in producing this mesh, with his experience making similar but smaller meshes for the safety lamp having certainly helped him in this.

"Alright," he looked at the young carpenter. "Now, take this mesh and nail it to the back of one of these frames. Make sure there is no gap between the mesh and the frame."

Darora nodded, and bringing out a hammer and a bunch of nails from a side pocket of the apron he was wearing, he took one of the frames from the table, and began to align the mesh over one side of it, before he started hammering the nails on the sides of the frame. The iron nails which the blacksmith and his apprentice had made in the past had turned out to be exceedingly useful here.

As the carpenter worked, Kivamus continued while looking at the blacksmith, "This mesh looks like it would be good enough to do that task it is meant for. I want half a dozen of these in total, half of them in the size of the smaller frame and the others in the larger size."

"It will take some time even if I put my apprentices on it since the mesh has to be woven by hand, but I can still bring all of them in a day or two," Cedoron replied. "Although I'll have to stop working on the safety lamps for this. Making more crossbow parts will also have to wait."

"Hmm..." Kivamus muttered. "That's true, but we already have four lamps now, and those will be good enough to give enough light for the workers to keep removing the standing water from the mineshafts. We can afford to wait a few days before you make more lamps. As for the crossbow, Darora already has all the parts for making the third one, so we can wait a few days before you provide him parts for the fourth one."

Once the blacksmith gave a nod in agreement, he asked, "What is the status of our stock of iron ingots? Although I'm glad that I had bought more than enough iron from Pydaso, expecting that we would need to use a lot of it in the winter, we are still using them at a good rate without buying more of it."

Cedoron thought about it for a moment. "Most of the iron ingots are stored here in the manor, so I'm not sure how many are left here, but at my shop I still have around a dozen of them. When bringing the ingots the last time from here, I had taken a look in the storeroom, and I think there should still be enough iron to last us another month at the current rate. That's only for the small things we are making like the wiremesh and the safety lamps. I don't think we can make the iron frame of the trip hammers' head without buying more ingots."

"I was expecting something like that," Kivamus grumbled. "That's okay, it will take a while until the dam is built and the water wheel is shifted there, so there is no hurry to make that anyway. Keep working on the safety lamps after you have provided all the meshes, and then I'll need you to make some fine iron parts for the seed drills, since the snow should start melting in a few weeks, and we will need to start sowing soon after that."

"Of course," the blacksmith nodded. "I'll be glad to try out something new once again."

Soon, Darora stood up, and putting his hammer down on the wooden table, he picked up the frame of the mould. "It's done, milord."