It took another week of Woodrow’s merrymaking distractions and Knox’s unwilling illusions to complete their houses. Once we were finished, the village quarters looked like a miniature of Wilbur’s infirmary. Villagers and animals were grateful for their new homes. When I passed their new mini-barns, the pigs, sheep, and goats all licked my fingers.

The wolves and other wild animals, on the other hand, grew restless in their dens. At night, when the villagers slept, the edge of the forest glowed with menacing eyes accompanied by the sounds of impatient snarls and yelps. Beasts howled in frustration. Swithin could hunt them down, but he always respected the balance of nature, and so was unwilling to dispose of them. Abbott Blake and Knox could not care less about wild animals.

It was one of these nights where one couldn’t be certain if the wind was howling by itself or carried the howls of the wild that I saw Swithin squatting like a cat on the top wall of Trushire. Swithin the swift, we called him. Our scout and hunter. His speed made him look like he was flying from one end of the field to another. He held out a hand as I approached him, then held a finger to his lips.

We listened to the forest’s lament. Desperation echoed, and my mind filled with images of thin villagers grasping dried stalks, mothers and fathers abandoning their children to scavenge for food.

Swithin’s eyes were firmly set on the forest. “They are hungry. They want to feed their pups or they will die. They feel cheated.” He dangled one leg over the wall. “The people are well fed, but they are not. Soon, they will leave the forest they called home from their birth and their parents’ birth, and move on to another, where they will compete with other packs. Just like people.”

He brought out a bag, soaked and dripping with blood. “Don’t tell Ealhstan. I only slaughtered the oldest ones.”

This was not hunted from the forest. The blood seemed tame. “Which animals did you get?”

“A pig, a goat, and a sheep. The pig, I got from the neighbor who kept his gates always closed.” Mav, I thought. I nodded and he went off to the forest, to calm the ravenous hunger and maybe, who knows, travel with the wild tonight, guiding them to their new homes.

It wasn’t often that Brother Swithin was in a talkative mood. He was, like his senses, quick and simple, like the wild animals. He sometimes was primitive. He did not want to be caged inside the monasteries, preferring the fields and forests outside. He only came back at night to sup with us. But if he decided to stay, he slept in the crypts underground, where he shared a space with Wilbur.

___

Weeks after Trushire Monastery was finished, when the livestock had multiplied to replace the ones slaughtered and preserved for winter, when the newborn babes wailed against winter, Wilbur paced and tutted as he appraised his stock of medicines.

The crypts or dungeons were always underground of the nave, the main church where we invited the villagers every Saintsday evening to read and understand the story of the Saints, led by Knox at the pulpit. It was the one day when they visited the monastic grounds and admired our granges and gardens and Ealhstan’s craft.

Wilbur was a whirlwind of mutterings, pacing back and forth over his long wooden table. I noticed that he had fewer ingredients this time; there were some vibrant colors absent. “This won’t do. The good news is that I still have leftover preserved petals and bottles of basic medicine for the people. Unfortunately, it would just barely go over a fortnight with all the newborns–oh the newborns! I almost forgot to add the strains in their milk… thank our good senses that we harvested milk thistle before it got frosted over.”

He then grabbed a bottle from his satchel and filled it with powdered milk thistle. There was a small fire in the middle of his workstation, where he would melt some powdered stones and dissolve clumps into base liquids. He took a tiny cauldron and poured in a gallon of stored cow’s milk. To it, he added the powdered milk thistles and mixed them with a long spoon. He has been like this ever since Trushire monastery was finished.

The fortified milk done, he scooped its contents gently onto wooden bottles that he would hand to the mothers; it took longer than Shoreglass, but they put their trust in him. As he was spooning the boiling milk, I cleaned the tiny cauldron and the metal spoon in the nearby washbasin. The sound made him look.

“Ryne! I didn’t know you were here.”

“We were in the winter garden house Ealhstan built. The world vanished as you focused on that black dot on the flower.”

“Ah, yes.” Wilbur scratched his head and remembered his tasks before he got sidetracked.

Some summer and autumn flowers managed to survive in Ealhstan’s winter garden. It was closed off from the rest of the world with thick bricks and thin windows, with only a thin slant for air. The smell of earth was rich here, and it was so humid that I pulled back my cowl every time we entered.

When we gathered all his springtime and summertime flowers at dusk, Wilbur noticed a powdery substance in one of them, its name I had forgotten. At first, we thought it was simply dust or mold, but learned that it was a bruise that corrupted the flower, nullifying its healing properties. Strangely enough, it did not make them wilt, at least not yet. But when Wilbur tried to smudge it away with his thumbs, it was there still. A mole sitting on a face. He frowned and cut the flower for observation after he checked the remaining supplies.

Wilbur snapped his fingers, remembering where he left off. “We are out of rhodomentite… and…” He grabbed a chunk of ores from one of the crevices in the walls and chunks of the familiar dull gray-white ore from his pocket. “Please bring this densemond to Brother Ealhstan, won’t you, Ryne? Tell him to crush them into the finest powder and put them in this pouch. I would go myself, it’s just that I must find out this new disease in my plants.” He went back to another large flat stone smoothed by Ealhstan. This one he used for corrosive and explosive experiments. “Oh, and please send my thanks and appreciation for Ealhstan. If it wasn’t for him, I couldn’t continue my medicines.”

Quickly, he went underground and observed it under the microscope. Wilbur murmured, “How odd. How very odd.”

He would be preoccupied with that for who knows how long, so I left him to find Brother Ealhstan. Up the stairs I went, past the empty pulpit and the benches, and out onto the cold snow. I heard him first before I found him: just outside the brick walls that divided the monastery and the village settlement. His laughter boomed in the snowy evening.

It was now twilight, and the children climbed him like a great oak tree, small arms reaching for his arms and fingers. They all clung to him, they all loved him, innocent smiles and peals of laughter as they hung around the thick branches of his arms. They swung on them, pulling each other down. Ealhstan spun around slowly, making sure he would not step on anyone.

I leaned back on the wall, watching, careful not to disturb them. Soon, when the night swallowed the world again, when their mothers called them back home for supper and when fathers and sons went into the mess hall, Ealhstan shook them off, like how the trees themselves peeled off their leaves. When the last of the children was set down, he noticed me. “Ho, there!”

“Wilbur likes his new winter house for his flowers. Your skill seems to improve with each home,” I said.

He grinned. “I knew he would like that. I modified the blueprints he gave me. Made the windows wider and added moving tiles to the roof so that his plants could sing in the sun. Well. When the spring comes, anyway. How are they? I have not had a chance yet to visit.”

“The flowers thrive and are indeed singing.” Purple and pink petals molded into one another. Yellows and grays and royal purples dance with joy. Some plants snake into the crevices of the walls. Some are still sprouting from fertile soil. “Except for one that Wilbur was considering in his tools. I did not check what it was.”

He shrugged. “I am glad. His plants are finicky and weird. But delightful. It would be nice to repopulate the fields with such weird wonders. Does he know the results of his new crossbreeding yet?”

I nodded. That was one other thing he was working on. “Feverfluke flowers mixed with purple plumes produced a stronger fever-reducing effect. But needs rhodomentite to bind the effect together.”

He clapped his hands at that, smiling. He was so quick to celebrate one another’s accomplishments. Except for Knox. Everyone but Blake hated Knox. “Excellent! And it only took a monastery and a half for him to figure it out.”

“Speaking of….” I handed him the chunk of denzemond. “If you would be so kind, good sir.”

He opened his palm, thrice the size of my hand, and I placed it there. His fingers curled, the sound of denzemond as he crushed it sounded prettier than average stones, almost like a tinkling. Other sounds from sturdier stones sounded like falling trees. He motioned for me to open the pouch. He let it fall into its mouth, the once dull gray chunk now like white sands.

The tale has been illicitly lifted; should you spot it on Amazon, report the violation.

I tied the pouch around my waist. “Thank you.” I handed him the list of the ores that needed to be mined. The night was dark and it was a cloudy dark sky, hiding half of the stars in the sky. He pocketed it and looked around. “Wilbur’s not around?”

“Preoccupied with his plants. I think something’s affecting his plant children.” The infirmary was empty today. Crops have been good so far. Wilbur had already healed them of their hurts when we first came and with good food and good homes, the villagers have not any reason to visit him. I wanted to see him off and help him get his cart from the granges.

“Well, since you’re free today, won’t you accompany me?”

I wanted to, but Knox had given me a severe scolding after we finished the villager’s houses. So I shook my head, and consciously tied the knot of my hood close to my chest and doubled it. “Safe travels,” I muttered.

I looked at him and his smile was gone. He reached for me, his big hand blocking out the sky. “Come now. There won’t be anyone to see you.”

“I’ll only be getting in the way.”

Knox did not want me “disturbing” the rest of the brothers. I was allowed near Wilbur, but when he needed full concentration, I left him. There was one time when Knox and Abbott Blake gave him counsel or some secret mission in their tower. Their voices oddly did not echo down the spiral staircase when they spoke to him. I doubt even Swithin heard them.

When he emerged, Wilbur looked grave. He quickly rearranged his features when he saw me, and simply told me that from there on out he had serious work to do in the crypts, and gently told me that I was not allowed near him.

Ealhstan frowned. “You wouldn’t be getting in the way if I wanted to take you along. I will answer to Knox if he asks.” He crossed his arms, his face serious. Would he break him in half, even though Knox was above him in rank?

And then without another word from me, Brother Ealhstan told me to wait there and grabbed his cart. I heard its reinforced wheels scatter dirt. I thought about my brothers’ many tools. Wilbur had his satchel, and Ealhstan had his cart. I think that the other brothers had other important favored items, too. Sometimes, when Woodrow was performing, I saw a glint concealed behind his cloak. A mirror, perhaps.

Ealhstan stopped his cart next to me and nudged. “Hop on, little Ryne. While the night is still young.” I hesitated, but shrugging, climbed aboard.

When we left Shoreglass, we were crammed in this cart, my brothers and I, with all the remaining supplies that we packed. We left before my brothers' powers of deception waned and the villagers grew suspicious. Our power was not limitless, I learned. Knox and Woodrow had difficulties charming and tricking a huge number of villagers. So when they felt that their numbers grew more than we could handle, we moved on. I could not even remember the final day. I did not even remember farewells, nor Derek and his friends, not the other old women that pinched Wilbur's cheeks. All I remember was that we left Shoreglass monastery when the newborn babes there who greeted our arrivals turned the age of five. We would probably do the same here in Trushire.

Ealhstan draped his cloak over me. My brothers did not feel the harsh bitter cold of winter. Though the cloth wasn’t warm, for my brothers did not produce body heat, I snuggled in it nonetheless, using it as a blanket.

We passed the lit huts of the villagers, watching the candles through the windows being snuffed out one by one. The monastery itself had candles every night, simply to keep up with the illusion that we needed light.

“The stone huts still look so small compared to Trushire,” I pointed.

Elastane nodded. “If only I could build them castles, Ryne. If only. But Knox would not have it.”

I did not mean to say that what he did wasn't enough. I just meant that it looked cozy despite the difference in size. He rolled the cart until Trushire shrank in the distance and the forest expanded ahead. Snow had blanketed the tops of trees and the ground turned frigid. As we entered the thick trees, all was silent. No wolves were around, nor any strange beasts. We spotted a den when we were deep enough, but still, no glowing eyes. No snarls or howls or warning sounds. The only noise came from the trees and insects that flew around, dotting the area in dancing light. We passed a small marsh and slimy wet boulders until we found the mouth of a cave.

Small caves such as these housed common ores like copper and iron. But sometimes, common caves may have more valuable resources deep inside, inaccessible through thick rock walls or below perilous, slippery tunnels with no light and low air quality. Rarer caves and mountains have valuable resources on the upper floors but were owned by the kings and major lords of the realms.

We went inside, our eyes adjusting completely to the darkness. The warm breath from my lips turned to mist. There were no drops of water from the ceiling; maybe everything within its depths was frozen solid. There were no boulders around, the other villages must have mined this area as well and brought it back to their respective kingdoms. Ealhstan walked slowly along the wall and placed his hand there.

“How about we make it easier for our villagers to mine this area?” He punched the wall so hard that it cracked. Determined, he kept smashing down and clawing the stone, digging as if he were breaking and splintering thin wood.

“Careful,” I shouted. “Make sure the hole isn’t that big so the walls don’t collapse.”

“Right you are,” he replied, and his arms, stronger than any hammer or pickaxe, chipped away the new opening and clawed it like it was nothing but sand. Deeper he went, tunneling through the cave’s interior where it would take a team of miners weeks to excavate. When the sound was almost distant, just when I was about to call him back, he stopped. And then he slowly walked out into the main area with a rough crude shape of silver ore, as big as his palm. We smiled at each other, triumphant.

Ealhstan held out his hand and I grabbed it, holding onto him as he guided me down the path he made. It was spacious enough for my tiny self, but I almost slipped on the sharp stones littered about. Ealhstan’s other hand was on top of my head, protecting it from any falling debris.

The new area was a marvel, smaller than the main one, but packed with precious ores. If I had a torchlight, they would glint like a river at noonday, or stars peeking through clouds.

The ores were large; some were half the size of boulders, and some were clumped together. Others were tucked neatly out of place and some were even attached to the walls. The old pickaxe the villagers used could chip away the surface but not much deeper. The rich minerals hid in the center of an ore. Wilbur already had trace minerals, so maybe we should leave them to the villagers who would discover this new path. There were denzemond and rhodomentite and others whose names I forgot but features I remembered. I saw these ores balanced on Wilbur's scales.

“Wilbur will be overjoyed!” I said. “If we harvested half of these, it could last until our entire stay at Trushire. Could your cart carry all these?” As soon as I asked it, I knew that of course he would pulverise them into powder and put them in my many pouches.

“I think you should collect more for our stock,” Ealhstan said sadly. “We were lucky to have found rare ores, but who knows when we would stumble into this sight again. I am afraid that the villagers will have to stick with silver ores and a good months’ worth of copper and iron for now.”

I dropped the shining ore that he gave to me. I did not like to leave them with nothing. “Should we leave one rare ore, at least?’

“No, take them all, Ryne. They would fight over it and they wouldn’t know what to do with it, anyway. They'd just sell it to a merchant who would then sell it to a lord who would simply melt it into jewelry. Wilbur can do so much more with it.”

He was right. My sympathy will go nowhere. Ealhstan proceeded to harvest. He tore ores from the walls, unearthed them from the ground, and smashed rocks to collect the rich center. One by one he pulverized them with his bare hands, some easy and quick enough and some with grunting effort. All of them fell to dust into my pouches. When we had emptied the place, Ealhstan stepped away from me, breathing heavily from his work, and opened his great flask. He opened it quickly and took several swigs, facing the stone as he drank. There were no common ores here, yet I thought I caught a faint whiff of copper.

“Sometimes I feel like my strength is wasted,” he said. “That I am a hypocrite for not doing the best that I can. I try to make things easier for the villagers, but I know that I can do so much more.”

He sat down and leaned his back against the wall. I joined him. “We need to be careful, or else the kingdoms will rain down on us with their swords and spears. Strong as I am, I cannot take them all at once.”

I patted his arm. “You would build them such nice homes if you could. If we reach that bright point when people are more accepting, I know that you will build every single villager a nice home. Beggars in the street will soon be a distant nightmare.”

“I just hope it isn’t too late. And they won’t hate us for taking too long.” I squeezed his arm, soothing him. “Tell me, Ryne… if, say, we would build you a home, what would it look like?”

He stared intently at me. I tilted my head to the side. “I already have a home,” I said.

He shook his head. “Imagine a permanent dwelling, where one does not hurry with rituals and rites, of brothers looking down on you, and away from the suspicious eyes of villagers.” I’ve never thought about it. Being without Wilbur was unimaginable and I would very much like to still help him with his gardens and his bright potions. He saw me struggling and he said softly. “Dream big.”

“A place without Knox,” I chuckled. Then I described the image in my head like little Leila did. “A warm cottage with two floors… still connected to a monastery… near the mountains–or maybe an alpine monastery!” I stood up, the image overtaking me, my arms gesturing widely and touching the objects in that dream house.

A wide porch to receive guests. A farmland on the rolling hills, vast enough for livestock to roam freely. A vibrant garden at the back of the cottage. And many, many rooms that can house them all except for Knox.

He closed his eyes, listening. “Beautiful.”

We let the image linger. And then, quiet and serious, Ealhstan reached his hand out to touch my forehead. “Whatever Knox says, Ryne. Promise me that it won’t affect you. No matter how much he bullies you. Know that you are tougher than what he makes you to be. Do not believe his lies. Forget what he throws at you.” He stood up, nudging me back in the direction of the hole. “You are one of the few good people that lights the monasteries we inhabit.”

I did not disagree with him, because it would be disrespectful. Even though I only did a few good things, it did not match up to the miracles they had done. We returned to the monastery with a cart full of rare ores, some lesser stones, and timber for the villagers. Wilbur beamed at the sight of his new treasures, clapping Ealhstan at the back. We supped together; Wilbur smiling wide and Ealhstan returning to his good-natured self but just a tad bit solemn. His words sank slowly into my heart, etching themselves into my mind.

I willed myself not to forget his words, not to forget Wilbur’s words.