The wagon moved down the road in silence.
The old man spoke again, his anger drained.“And here I was thinking you’d gone soft on the Blood.”
“They’ll be isolated,” Jerrold said.“The farm isnotdefensible.The place is a wreck, the thatch rotten, the rook leaking and the fields overrun with moonseed and twitch grass.Nothing left in the tool shed but bits and scraps.”
“Barn’s good.”Old Petro said.
“Barn’s good, but empty.Your goats and hogs went feral a long time ago.”
“They’re not feral,” Old Petro insisted.“Shake some grain in a bucket and they’d come running.”
“The cisterns seem sound, but the clay pipes are leaking.”Jerrold said.“Wells are filled with rocks.And, if I am not mistaken, there’s a mass grave under one of those fields.”Jerrold shook his head.“The place needs hard, long days of work, and there’s no safety in the bargain.”
The wagon creaked as they rode on a pace in silence.
Old Petro was the first to break.“Think they know that?”
“Roth might,” Jerrold said.“Our Lord High Baron is an idealist who seems to think that reasonable people can resolve their issues without resorting to swords and battle.”
“The Blood of Xy, living on my lands.”Old Petro suddenly sounded his age, worn and tired and not quite knowing what to think.“Easier to hate them when they ain’t looking at ya all doe-eyed, babes feeding at the breast.”He admitted grudgingly.
Jerrold knew the feeling.
His mother turned her head to look at the old man.“She asked you to come live with them, didn’t she?”
“Aye,” Petro sighed.“Pulled me aside, asked me quiet like.Said she could use my wisdom and advice.Said a Hearth isn’t complete without the young and spry and the old and wise.”
Jerrold opened his mouth, but Bercie gave him a sharp look.He rolled his eyes at her and refrained from the obvious, wise-ass comment.“It’s for the best, that they be somewhere we can keep an eye on them.”He didn’t say “offer them as lambs to appease a lion,” though that was part of his thoughts.The knot twisted tighter in his chest.
“I could put the wheels back on your cart,” Jerrold offered.“Those damn goats of yours are getting too damn fat, lolling in the fields.You could go out once in a while, keep a watch on things.”
Old Petro’s response was slow.“I don’t know,” he said.“Too many memories.Gotta think about that.”There was a long pause.“You’d put the wheel blades on too?”
“No,” Jerrold said firmly.
Bercie spoke up.“Might want to start breeding your goats again.”
That caught Jerrold by surprise.He looked at his mother, who was still facing forward, looking calm and serene.
“You’re thinking there will be trouble.”Old Petro said.
“There’s always trouble,” she replied.“Hope for the best.Plan for the worst.”
Damn knot in his chest got even more tangled.Jerrold didn’t want to think on it, didn’t want to think about Orval looking overwhelmed and Amari starting to show, happily making plans, and that Rosalind wrinkling her nose at the dirt and Roth worried about defenses and giving Jerrold sharp looks, and the boy, roughly Cirda’s age.
And the babes, innocent, sleeping in their parents’ arms.
“Gee up,” he called to the horses, suddenly eager to get back to town and deal with the simple problems waiting for him there.
They’d been offeredthe farmstead.Which was when the arguments…discussions…began.
Orval stood, Lara in his arms, jostling the table and rattling the supper dishes.“Lara needs changing,” he said.
“And that’s another thing,” Amari shifted to let Orval past.“Far easier to do laundry with those cisterns working.”
“If they can be repaired,” Rosalind retorted.“And with enough servants—”
Orval left, climbing the stairs to their bedroom on the third floor, the loud voices following him.
