I show Casteddu around the building and where all the documents are. Lugh’s chair is a little bit too small for Casteddu, so, for now, we have to improvise with a crate, just another thing we will have to replace, I guess. Casteddu was true to his word and can both read and write, not only in the Aedh language we use here but also his native Tatarian and even a couple others I don’t recognize.

I feel a bit outclassed. If we count Earth languages then along with Aedh I also know Spanish, English, and Portuguese but those are all pretty useless over here and people would just think I’m talking gibberish.

Well, someone like this is good to bring me down to earth a bit too, I think I was subconsciously starting to look down on all the people here, a bad habit of mine. I did really well in school when I was a kid and would receive constant praise from everyone, so I’d end up feeling like I was the smartest person in the room a lot of times.

Looking back, I was a pretty insufferable teenager. Really can’t let myself fall back to that mentality.

Anyway. After showing everything to Casteddu and catching him up with the state of the realm it soon became night. We go back to the palace, where my maids and guards were helping all the people I had picked up get settled.

Evie runs to the entrance as soon as my first footsteps echo inside the manor. “Your majesty…” She says and then stops to look at the Arborean beside me before continuing. “We have procured beds for the serfs, although it is unusual to let them stay in the palace. As for the… Arboreans”

“What’s up? We have enough rooms, don’t we? Since the rest of my family died we hardly use 1/3rd of the manor.”

She looks down while gripping the sides of her maid dress tightly, she seems to want to say something but can’t.

God, that’s adorable.

Wait - no, no, no - Focus!

I imagine the maids are simply uncomfortable with the idea of Arboreans living here. There are probably some difficulties given their great size, our beds and chairs will definitely be too small for them, but we can improvise and get new stuff made in time. This shouldn’t be a huge problem.

“The Arboreans are freemen and also my direct employees. Given the housing situation here in Algatolla, it is not unusual to have servants live in the palace, is it? Kavanagh and Miles do, so did Lugh, for a time.”

“That is correct, your majesty, but…”

Ah, I can’t be a hardass with Eriu like I was with Lugh. She at least is already calling their species by the correct name, so she’s trying her best.

“It’s nothing much, don’t worry about it. Just trust me and in time your doubts will fade away. Arboreans are just normal people.”

She doesn’t say anything, but nods. We go over to the rooms where the Arboreans will be staying. The bed frames are too small for them, so we put crates side by side to put their mattresses on instead, and use crates once again for chairs.

Evie and the other maids are still so afraid of the Arboreans, but at least they weren’t completely scared stiff while helping them move stuff around at night, I hope everyone learns to get along better soon.

Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.

-x-

The next morning, I go along with Casteddu to meet with the serfs, they are all scared at the sight of my new minister, but don’t dare to say anything, instead just looking ahead silently.

I announce my decision to free them, and that instead of taking the larger part of the wheat harvest as tribute, I will pay them a flat rate of two silver scudi per month for their labor and the rights to the whole harvest, with them also keeping whatever vegetables and flax they grow in their own garden.

With this, they completely forget about the Asani standing next to me writing things down, some rejoice as this would be a much better deal than a serf could ever hope to get in life, others were skeptical, of course, as people usually are of deals too good to be true. It doesn’t matter though, as long as I keep my word and they get paid at the end of this month all their fears will be allayed.

I also tell them that beginning with the next sowing season I will fundamentally change the way we plant our crops, and told them roughly about my plans, I don’t think any of them understand why or how it would better things, but none seemed to oppose the change either, since the scudo they will earn will be enough to buy food regardless of how the harvest goes.

I instruct them to go ahead and divide the half of the field that is fallow in two and to also divide the other half after the harvest so that there will be four great fields.

Afterwards, I tell the hunters that they would no longer be assigned to the main field and to follow me. In the forest we gather many chestnuts and we carefully remove some alkanet plants, both fully grown and seedlings.

For the chestnuts, I demarcate a section of land further inland, and tell them to clear out the woods and plant the chestnuts there, I pick out a few of them to work in the chestnut orchard permanently after everything is set up.

For the alkanets, as I remember, they prefer sandy soils and warm temperatures, so I decide to plant the seedlings in a wasteland closer to the coast. Once again I instruct them to clear the land and select a few to maintain the area permanently, then I also took the adult alkanets and showed that they are to cut off the roots then leave them to dry in the sun, the result can be mixed in water and then applied to fabrics to give them a red tint, and is sure to be profitable.

I’m not sure how many alkanet seedlings will survive to adulthood, as I probably skipped some details of how they should be farmed, but if even half of them do that will be successful, we will sort it out in time. I tell the hunters to go look for more alkanets in the forest when they had downtime, the more dye we can have for the merchant ships, the better.

After taking care of all these tasks, it was already early night. Going back to the palace with Casteddu and Kavanagh, I stretch my arms in front of me, and look closely.

Eriu has really fair skin, almost pale, with dark freckles peppering her whole body. I think most people would love to have this kind of complexion, but I really hope more days like this make me tan a bit, I’m used to having olive skin, so it’s a bit unsettling.

“What are you doing?” Casteddu asked with curiosity, Kavanagh also looked on while waiting for an answer. “Uh, I wonder if I’m going to tan from being out in the sun all day, that’s all.”

“Do you want me to bring cover from the sun when we go out, your majesty?” Kavanagh asked, no no no no, that’s the exact opposite of what I want, I mean, I should be worried about skin cancer given how pale I am now, I guess, but given this time period I’m probably gonna die from dysentery or some other stupid shit long before that’s a concern.

I end up panicking trying to think of an excuse and blurt out an awkward no, surely leaving them confused. If I just said no normally it wouldn’t have been anything unusual, but I had to over-think things.

I wanna bury my face in a pillow after that. Ugh, it’s a lot easier to seem competent when there’s something at stake, fighting for people’s freedom and the like, I probably looked really cool talking with the Arboreans…

Wish I could just act without thinking too much like that all the time, day to day stuff is like, there is no intensity so I need to act casually but then I end up thinking about what it means to act casually then I try way too hard at it then I end up, I dunno.

I was always the loner kid in school, I don’t have that much experience talking to people like that. One thing that the old Eriu was definitely better than me at, looking through her memories she… sure had a silver-tongue, in more ways than one, but let’s leave it at that.