The Fire and the Fog (9 page)

Time had worn on that morning though, and
concerns for her dress had lost the battle to the jostle and bounce
of the wagon, the noise of her siblings, and the dryness of her new
book. The wagon jumped with every dip and rise in the road, and the
crates of salted pork and sacks of flour jumped with it. Joahn and
Boll argued constantly, ignoring any ultimatums delivered from her
parents. And her new book, a historical text with an intricate,
blow by blow accounting of the political strife and turmoil between
Dheme and Dhome over the past century, was dry. So it was that noon
found Erris walking alongside Marmot, kicking lazily at passing
clumps of dirt with her heavy leather shoes, unconcerned about the
fine brown dust that was slowly settling onto the bottom of her
dress.

Not that the story of Dheme and Dhome wasn’t
interesting. Two democracies at the very eastern edge of the
continent sharing everything, from religion to currency to their
capital city, yet hating each other, was just strange. It was also
confusing. Erris didn’t understand why they had chosen names so
close to Dohm, the name of the continent, or why they had named the
two halves of the capital city they shared after each other. The
capital city was split by a river, and Dheme's half was named
Dhome, and Dhome's half was named Dheme. There was even an island
in between the two cities, and it housed both the countries
governments. At the same time. They even shared the same
legislature, each country getting half of the chamber. It was just
madness, and it sounded incredibly confusing. Confusing and
interesting. Erris decided she needed to concentrate on reading
it.

Her family had broken off into little groups
a while ago. Joahn was bothering Boll with little girls’ games in
the back of the wagon, Boll trying his best to ignore her and
failing, while Omah, Yolan and Serah sat, heads together on the
wagons front seat, whispering in hushed tones. Erris was sure she
heard occasional giggles coming from her older sisters, but
couldn’t concern herself to join them, even if there had been room
on the front of the wagon. Her father, Jayke and Johan were walking
ahead of the wagon, her father laughing loudly and frequently with
an arm draped over Jayke's shoulder.

This left Erris alone with Marmot, to walk
and think. Her father had given her the history text for her
birthday, and she knew she would enjoy it when she had more time to
spend prowling its hard-bound depths, hopefully surrounded by fewer
distractions, but the text had brought several questions to mind.
She still had a present to ask for from her mother, and from her
brothers and sisters. Normally, as in years past, she would have
asked for even more books, and she would have enjoyed whatever they
found for her, but she was starting to question.

She loved almost everything she read, whether
it was the religious sermons of Ragn's text or fairy tales or
educational texts or philosophical musings, it didn’t matter. But
most of her collection of books did not warrant repeated reading.
She would absorb a book in a half-day or so, and she would remember
it. This left her only the most interesting, or the most difficult,
books to reread.

As such, it was hard for Erris to say if it
was worthwhile to ask for more books. She loved reading, to be
sure, but surely she could do more with her presents.. Surely,
after everything she had read, she could write too. She had not
tried writing; not yet. Paper and ink were not a staple of farm
life. But if she used her remaining presents on writing
supplies…

Erris walked in contemplative silence as
Marmot and her family slowly made their way towards Oortain's
Copse, and the afternoon plodded slowly on.

***

Oortain’s Copse was a small village, seventy
or eighty buildings total, nestled in a small valley and surrounded
by a lush green forest. The forest was small as well, small enough
that it only barely enfolded the village, a tiny patch of green
surrounded by an ocean of golden wheat on every side, and as such,
both the forest and the village looked strangely out of place, like
they belonged in another part of the world.

At only an eight-hour walk away, Oortain’s
Copse was the closest village to the farm, but it stood in Rognia.
This meant that, at some point during the day’s walk, the family
and Marmot had crossed the border from Rege into Rognia. But a
border separating wheat from more wheat was both useless and
indistinguishable, and it was never until she reached Oortain’s
Copse that Erris felt she had entered another country. Entering
Rognia meant entering the dominion of a different Church. Both Rege
and Rognia believed in Ragn, as did virtually all of Dohm, but they
differed greatly on how that church should be run. Rege had a
Monarchy, a good old King and Queen who lived in Vhindyar, while
Rognia was a religious state. The Maeter was the master of the
army, the priesthood, and everything in between in Rognia. The
Regan priesthood took their cues largely from Rognia, but they were
not so absolute, or so fervent, in their devotion to Ragn.

There were other differences too. In Rege,
houses tended to be low, long, and wooden, often with an attic but
seldom with a second story. It was a style Erris was both used to
and preferred, while the houses in Rognia, at least those she had
seen, tended to be tall and narrow, with brightly
coloured
panels separated by thin strips of
wood.

Rognian clothing was much more chaste as
well. The women never bared any leg, and hardly any chest at all in
their long, beautifully
coloured
and
frilled dresses, and the men wore tight-fitted jackets that
buttoned almost all the way to their chin. The people themselves
though, at least those she had met, were just as nice as Regans. It
was hard for Erris to say more really. She learned everything from
books, and the one book that might have been able to tell her more
about Rognia, her brother Dom had burned. She was still sad about
that book. She always wondered what it had said about the people of
Rognia, and thereby Oortain’s Copse, for her brother to have burnt
it.

Then again, Oortain’s Copse was on the very
edge of the Rognian Empire, and had a fair amount of intermarriage
between Rege and Rognia. They were less religious, and more
accepting than the center of Rognia, where Erris had heard stories
of women being arrested and beaten by the church, for wearing
nothing worse than she wore now. Those stories were passed along by
word of mouth though, and Erris could never fully trust something
that wasn’t written down on paper or parchment.

Still, while she knew they were not
utilitarian at all, Erris always found herself wanting one of the
lovely Rognian dresses, with their lace and frills and petticoats,
and all the differently coloured layers. The way the layered skirts
spread out in a wide circle, rather than clinging closely to the
legs like Regan dresses made them so interesting. It would be
completely un-wearable around the farm, of course, but maybe when
her chest had filled out some more… Her mother and sisters had, so
surely hers would someday too. Erris barely noticed that the
streets were virtually deserted as she pondered what she would look
like in her new dress. All she managed to notice was that there
were none of the pretty Rognian dresses out in the street for her
to see, which made her momentarily sad. She liked inspecting them,
liked imagining what the frills and petticoats would feel like
swishing about her legs as she walked, wondering what would happen
if she jumped, or twirled on the spot, while wearing them.

‘Right’ her father said, pulling Marmot and
the wagon to a stop in front of the village’s large, three storey
tavern, the second largest building in the village behind the large
stone Rognian church, ‘I have to go unload all this.’ He said,
shrugging towards the goods they had brought, piled in the back of
the wagon and used as makeshift seats during the journey. ‘Boll,
Joahn, you stay with your mother, and do as she says’ he said to
the children, who nodded their ascent in silence. ‘The rest of you,
you’re on your own. We’ll meet back here in two hours for
dinner.’

Omah, Serah, Yolan and the children made
their way down from the wagon as Jayke walked up to Marmot. ‘I’ll
join you Pops.’ He said, taking Marmots reigns and rubbing the
horse’s nose friendlily.

Her mother and sisters would visit the
market, looking for some of the few vegetables they didn’t grow,
and for any of the spices they were running low on. Her father and
brother began to lead the horse and wagon off down the road, then
Johan would head straight for the tavern for ale; he did every time
they visited Oortain’s Copse. So Erris was left on her own, as she
liked it. Her birthday was the first excuse the family had made to
go into town in over a month and a half, which left each of them
with errands, some important, some not. As the rest of her family
separated, smiling and talking together as they split into groups,
Erris walked purposefully over the grey cobblestone streets, her
hardbound history text clutched in her arms. She knew exactly where
she would be spending her afternoon.

It was strange, going so long without news or
contact from the outside world, but Erris’ parents seemed to prefer
it that way, and Erris had never known any different. She was still
getting used to having Yolan, Jayke’s new bride, around the house.
Yolan came from a farm some four hours away from home, and Erris
had only seen her twice before she and Jayke were married. She had
never even spoken to Yolan before the wedding. She liked Yolan,
liked that she was part of the family now, but it was a sign of how
secluded her family really was.

It was part of the reason Erris had chosen to
come to Oortain’s Copse for her birthday. The sights and sounds of
a town were almost mystifying to her. There were dozens of houses;
hundreds of people in Oortain’s Copse! How did they all live
together? She knew that cities were larger, and had many times more
inhabitants, but those were just wrong. Oortain’s Copse she felt
she might someday be able to understand. Small enough to know every
persons name, but big enough that, if you didn’t want to be alone,
you didn’t have to be.

The other part of why Erris had chosen
Oortain’s Copse for her birthday, not counting being able to see
the soldiers (that came only from a small, unfamiliar but slowly
growing part of her mind
)
, was that
Oortain’s Copse was different from the other little villages that
dotted the Regan and Rognian countryside’s within a day’s walk of
the farm. It was Erris’ favourite of the villages for one reason:
It had a bookstore. Or maybe more of a library, it really
depended.

The bookstore encompassed the first and
second floors of a three-storey house that stood on one of the
villages smaller side streets. It was owned, curated, and managed
by a nice old man. He would sell you some books, lend you others if
he liked you, and not let you even touch even more. He took even
more care of his collection than Erris did. She sometimes wished
she might someday own a collection its equal.

She liked the old man, Erris thought as she
walked down the completely deserted streets, oblivious to the
boarded windows and doors on several of the tall narrow houses she
passed, and the general air of desertion that encompassed the town
as a whole. The bookkeeper was old and crooked, and walked with a
cane, and he smelled dry and musty, like everything else in his
house, but he knew so much about books. He had more in his house
than Erris thought she could ever read, and he knew everything
about all of them. He had read or seen every book Erris owned, and
she could remember several times, spending her entire time in
Oortain’s Copse simply discussing the books with him, what they
said, what they meant, what she thought of them.

In short, the little old man’s bookstore was
a paradise to Erris, and always her first stop when she came to
Oortain’s Copse. Often her only stop. Her father and brothers could
deal with trade, her sisters and mother could handle the shopping.
All she cared about were her books.

So it was with some surprise, and no small
amount of panic, that Erris came upon the shriveled old man outside
his house, waving his cane at two muscled youths who were busy
filling a large, canvas-topped wagon with boxes upon boxes of what
Erris could only assume were the old man’s vast collection of
books.

Erris stood, poleaxed and slack-jawed, in the
middle of the deserted street until the man finally looked up and
saw her standing there, motionless. Moving to the front seat of the
wagon, he grabbed a small burlap sack, then slowly walked over to
where Erris still stood, his cane tapping out a broken gait on the
cobblestone street.

‘Girl’ the old man started, setting the sack
down slowly in front of Erris, but he got no further.

‘What’s going on?’ Erris started, speaking
rapidly, her questions tumbling over each other, ‘Where are your
books going? Where are you going? Are you leaving? You can’t
leave!’ she stammered, taking a breath and leaning towards the
bookkeeper anxiously. Erris noticed that she was taller than him
now, though whether because he was shrinking or she growing she
didn’t know or care. He was shriveled and bent, but always before
he had been taller than Erris. He would always look down at her
with his gently wrinkled face, and he just seemed so dear. Now she
was taller than him, and she felt the revelation meant something
more than she was growing, something more important, but at the
time she couldn’t put a finger on it. She was much more concerned
for her books than for anything else.

‘Calm yourself, child’ the old man said,
reaching out and putting a wizened old hand on her shoulder, and
breathing in deeply. ‘Trouble is coming’ he said with a sigh,
looking her straight in the eye. His eyes were dark black, and
filled with tremendous knowledge and insight and, for the first
time, sorrow. ‘My friends and I are leaving before it hits. We will
go to the capital, where we can be safe.’ He said, motioning
backwards toward the wagon with his free hand. ‘We have friends in
the capital who will care for us.’ The old man had always called
his books his friends. Erris had always thought him endearingly
strange before, now she only felt confused.