“Good morning!” was the next thing that Alban heard. It was spoken by Ryan, which was really a huge letdown for Alban.
“Oh! My aching head!” exclaimed Alban. “I need some food, too!”
“Do you refer to the food that you were cooking?” Ryan chuckled. “That food was served for breakfast two days ago . . . and also for lunch that day . . . and for supper . . . and breakfast the next day . . . yesterday! Boy, do you know how to cook! You made enough for a whole castle and its army. We had to serve it for the whole two days that you have been out, and you would think that the men would have complained at having to eat the same thing for each meal, but they were all saddened by the news that there was no more this morning for breakfast. Where did you learn to cook like that?”
Alban opened his mouth to answer, but nothing came out.
“You still don’t remember, do you?”
Alban just shook his head.
“I thought as much. But, I do believe you. I mean, you’ve been out cold for two days. Not even a peep or snort has come out of you! Though there were other noises, there were no delirious moans or anything. In fact, a few times. . . Joan, the girl that we had watching over you, she thought that you were dead a couple of times. She even called for the doctor to pronounce you dead on one occasion. To tell you the truth, I thought that she was right that time. We were getting ready to carry you out of the supply wagon, and leave you for the beasts of the desert. But the doctor said that he could feel a pulse. He saw that there were flowers called sorrow’s misery or something like that in the same wagon with you. He demanded that we move you at once. Apparently, those flowers can cause deep sleep when smelled for a while, and can put a body to sleep for good when they’re exposed for a prolon . . . a pro . . . well, a while.
“That’s why you are here in my personal wagon. I figured that it was the least that I could do after nearly getting you killed twice — once when I put you in the supply wagon, and another when I nearly left you for dead here in the desert.”
Alban looked around himself and was surprised to find that the cabin of the “wagon” was really quite spacious. There was a big bed where he was resting (which he had noticed to be quite comfortable, to tell the truth), an area that was used for dressing (complete with a small dresser), and even a table and chairs upon which the traveler could sit and dine. The woodwork was quite exquisite, boasting carvings that depicted scenes of hunters killing their prey, amid ornate floral swirl patterns and tree lines. The ceiling had a gorgeous painting of the creation of man with God above in the clouds, breathing life into Oggart (the first man) who also had a wound on the side that faced Aurora (his wife and helpmeet). Later, from the outside, Alban would notice that the wagon was really huge and that there was no optical illusion as to cause one to say, “It looks bigger on the inside.” The whole thing was extra wide and long. So much so, that there would be no way for it to pass through the narrow streets of many villages, especially if there should be a sharp turn in the road. It was drawn by a team made up of eight harvins (great big work horses that were probably twenty-four hands high at the shoulder, maybe more). Ryan liked to be able to move at a good, fast pace if needs be, and while a couple pair of the greater oxen would definitely do the job, they were slow and cumbersome.
“I said, ‘That’s why you are here in my personal wagon. I figured that it was the least that I could do after nearly getting you killed twice — once when I put you in the supply wagon, and another when I nearly left you for dead.’” Ryan stated in an ‘aren’t you going to respond to that?’ sort of way.
“Then I am deeply indebted to you. You could have left me to die in either case, but you did not. I am most grateful.” said Alban as he rubbed his eyes with his free hand.
“Don’t think that I am emotionally attached to you! I just knew that if Decebal should ever find out, he’d have me whipped good and bloody! Well, he might try, anyway. As it is, you might fetch a great price. How many slaves do you know of that can cook, organize men (even while in extreme pain and going in and out of consciousness) and are bilingual on top of all that? I know . . . that you don’t remember. Still, you’re a rare buy, and I think that I would now be in serious trouble should anything have happened to you, so we are both lucky in this . . .”
“Occasion?” Alban completed his sentence.
“Yes, this occasion.”
“It is said ‘on’ this occasion, but that does not really matter.” corrected Alban, and then walked his assertion back a bit.
“True. It doesn’t!” stated Ryan, miffed at the grammatical correction. “Besides, I was going to say ‘in this situation’. In which case, it would have been perfectly correct.”
“Anyway, with any and all personal detachment noted, I still thank you for your thoughtfulness. Such an attribute is a rare find, and must be treasured on every occasion that grants it. And if that isn’t enough, from all that I have seen, you do a great job at serving your master. That’s a good quality as well.”
“Do you always go around spewing compliments, or could it be that the bump on your head has jarred something loose?”
Alban drew another futile breath as if to answer, and then simply shrugged his shoulders; both laughed. Then Alban grabbed his head in somewhat mild . . . agony. He also winced a bit from a pain that he hadn’t noticed in his ribs. He looked down at his side and noticed a bandage.
“How long has that been there?” he asked.
“Do you mean the bandage or the wound?”
“Both, I guess.”
“Well, you had that stab wound when you came to us, but the bandage was dressed just a couple of hours ago.”
“You say that I came to you. How long have I been with you?”
“Oh . . . I guess five or six days. You had been with us for a couple of days before I got back to headquarters. You were moaning then, but nothing cohere . . . nothing that I could make out, except singing something about . . . a fair maiden that lived by the glen in Effulgia’s . . . something or other. Nordholst said that we should just put you out of your misery because you would never survive!”
“The more that I learn about Nordholst, the less I like about him.” marveled Alban.
“Now I know that you’re a smart young man!” Ryan quipped as he let out a loud roar of laughter. He noticed that Alban thought that it was funny, as he smiled big, but didn’t want to upset his wounds by laughing, so he added, “We’ll get along quite well after you are all healed up. You know, the funny thing is that I had wanted to know why in the world you had on the clothes that you were wearing. Half of me kept you alive just to find that out. There’s Nordholst trying to finish the job that someone started, and there was I trying to keep him from it. That was the other half . . . I wanted to know who it was that started that job, too. Now you can’t even tell me a thing! That’s irony for you, for you see, irony is . . .”
“When someone explains something in great detail that which one already knows?” offered Alban to Ryan’s displeasure. So, Alban tried recovery by distraction. “Why, if I came to you with these wounds days ago, is my side still bleeding?”
“Oh . . . you did get jostled a bit as you were being loaded from wagon to wagon. It must have been opened back up then. The doctor re-stitched it up. Nasty wound, anyway. Anyway, I must attend to my duties.”
As Ryan turned to leave the covered wagon, Alban blurted out, “I am sorry. I should not have been so curt with you. It was probably the aching of my head. Anyway, I do believe that we shall be better friends when I recover. Again, sir, I do apologize and ask for your forgiveness. I would stand with my hat in hand, but neither can I stand, nor do I know where my hat, should I even own one, might be.”
“You use the formalities in your manners?”
“Is that not how an apology is made?”
“You really are a mystery. At any rate, I accept your apology, and I raise you a meal. That will help keep you
r strength up, and perhaps (eventually) provide a solution to the great secret as to your identity and what you are all about.”
“I should be most grateful. I am having a hard time even holding . . . this conversation . . .” offered Alban as voice trailed off and eyes closed.
Ryan laughed for a moment — until he realized that Nordholst had been standing there for quite some time.
“How long have you been there?” asked Ryan.
“Long enough to hear what I needed to hear.” was the reply from Nordholst, who thought that he now had something to hold over Ryan’s head.
“Good!” answered Ryan. “It’s about time that you knew how others feel about your running about, grumbling all the time!”
“I knew that you hated me from the moment that I got here. Look, just because you have been with Decebal for so long, doesn’t mean that you can treat the rest of us crewmen like we are dirt!”
“Nordholst, I’ve been trying to find a way to put this all delicately enough that you should not be offended. It seems that this was really the only way to show you, however truly . . . unintentionally . . . that as a person, you are the worst . . . errrr . . . Well, you just . . .”
“Spit it out, you farvret blaster!” yelled Nordholst with a nasty, cold tone.
“You are just an egregious idiot!” Ryan blurted out without thinking. “Again, I didn’t want to tell you . . . like this, in front of the whole caravan, but now you’ve forced my hand. Anyway, there you have it. So . . .”
“You’ve done it now! Wait until everyone else hears how you’ve been yelling at me!”
“They all have! If you think that they cannot hear your loud, nasally whine throughout the whole company, you have another thing coming to you!”
“I suppose that you think that you’re man enough to give it to me!”
“Nordholst, I’m twice your size!” Ryan laughed with glee. “This is just as far as this all goes — and I mean that it ends here and now. There is no need for any further problems. You have found out some of your character flaws that, quite frankly, you probably already knew about.”
“What do you mean by character flaws? Now you’re saying that I have character flaws?”
“Yes. No. Look! Character flaws are imperfections in a person’s personality — things that show . . . things that make a person less desirable.”
“And so you just hang them character flaws around my neck to make me less desirable?”
“You’re doing a great job all by yourself because I haven’t hung anything on you. I just mentioned those qualities . . .”
“Or lack thereof!”
“Yes, thank you for pointing that out! Anyway, I mentioned a few of those undesirable things, and you overheard through your evident eavesdropping — another character flaw.”
“So now, just because I overhear you sullying my honored name (which you shouldn’t have been doing, to begin with), you have to hang these ‘character flaws’ around my neck so that no one will like me!”
“Oh, boy! Nordholst, nobody likes you. You know, I used to think that you were being cantankerous, but now I realize that you just don’t get it!”
“Can’t anchor us, huh? If anybody can anchor us it’s me. Do you think that you are smarter than me?”
“Smarter than I!” corrected Alban.
“What?” Nordholst gasped, stunned by the slave’s consciousness and grammatical correction.
“It is said ‘smarter than I’. ‘Do you think that you are smarter than I?’” Alban restated. Taking advantage of the pause at Nordholst’s surprise, he then turned to Ryan and asked, “How about that meal? If what you say is true, and I do not doubt it, I am literally starving to death. Could you please have something brought to eat?”
“Yes, certainly!” replied Ryan. Then he turned to Nordholst and said, “Would you please have someone bring him some food?”
As Nordholst nodded and turned to leave, he realized that he had been turned about, but decided that he would never win that argument now, what with his not having understood the correction of his grammar. He left, mumbling about character flaws and anchors, growing louder after he thought that he was out of earshot.
“Thank, you. I don’t think that I would ever have gotten out of that circular argument without that interruption. He’s more trouble than most of the slaves!” joked Ryan.
“I hate to speak of a man like this, but I find myself having a hard time not saying it. He’s like an animal tied to a treadmill. His only choice is to go forward without changing course, but at least he keeps the wheels turning!” Alban laughed.
“Yeah, but he’s got them going in the wrong direction!” jeered Ryan.
Both laughed long and hard, though Alban contained himself a bit more than Ryan, for obvious reasons.
That was it. That was the moment that Ryan knew that they would be friends in spite of the apparent social differences. It sort of scared him. He had never given cause for controversy before in all of his years at his current position, or any other, for that matter. He had paid his dues to rise in rank or position. He was never given any preference at all. In fact, Decebal really didn’t like him; he just knew that he needed Ryan. The owner had always tried to convince him that this was his company and that if he ever crossed him, he would never find work again. It was the old ‘do as I say, or I’ll throw you and your family out and let you starve to death’ routine. The problem with all of that is that it was Ryan that had made the best contacts. It was he that made friends easily and, for that very reason, he was sent to new villages or towns to sniff around and contract new accounts. It was he that won over the contract with the southern Darvanian mining colony, which now proved to be their biggest account. It accounted for the majority of their sales for a number of years, and eventually led to the opening of sales to the new emperor. Still, because it was a good job that did pay unreasonably huge sums of money, he didn’t want to jeopardize all that he had worked for just because he happened to like the cut of a slave’s jib.
The train of thought that was circling in Ryan’s mind as he laughed was soon interrupted by a young woman. She had brought something for Alban to eat.
“Ah. Nordholst must be getting faster! I just barely told him to get some food for our ailing . . . for this young man.”
“Nobody told me to bring the food. I just knew that he would be in need of some form of nourishment, being asleep so long!” she stated in a semi-annoyed tone. “If we women didn’t take care of you men, I don’t know how you’d get by.”
“Probably in peace!” returned Ryan.
“Well?”
“Well, what?” asked Ryan.
“I have brought this man his food from the kitchen wagon. Are you going to let me through to give it to him?” the young lady quipped.
“An ‘excuse me’ should be the first thing out of your mouth, lassie, in a situation like this, but since young Alban is starved, I’ll let it go this time. Anyway, I have a whole list of things that I am behind on. Alban, I’ll leave you with a warning not to trust this woman. She’ll rob you blind!” Ryan laughed, as his voice trailed off.
With that last remark, Alban had to wonder what he was in for.
Chapter Four - The Fires of Hope