Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 203 of 619

The dryad was gone an hour when Tucker's cart came up the road. Ajax opened the gate himself. The cart rode low on its axles. Salt sacks were stacked against the front board. Behind them sat rolled hides, a keg of oil, a crate of nails, and two bundles of dried fish. Tucker sat with the reins loose in one hand, gold chains bright at his throat. "All of it," Tucker said. He climbed down and stretched his back. "Salt cost more than last month. I paid it. Ninety days of feed if we're careful. More if the dryad keeps her word on roots." "She will," Ajax said. "First cart in three days." Tucker looked at the fresh leaf mark cut into the hall post and did not ask. He never asked when he could read a room instead. Bran came from the kitchen wall with mortar on his forearms. Ajax caught his eye and waved him over. Bran stopped a step away and waited, hands loose at his sides the way Ajax had taught him. "Your house," Ajax said. "First thaw. Sooner if the weather breaks." Bran did not answer at once. His new confidence was evident. "Two rooms," Ajax said. "Hearth. Loft for your sister. Inside the walls, against the west face by the herb strip. You helped build my walls. We’ll help build yours." "She'll be near the garden," Bran said. "She will." Bran nodded once, thanked him, and went back to the wall. He carried the mortar bucket like it weighed nothing. Tucker watched him go. "You're binding him past the walls now." "He's already bound," Ajax said. "I'm paying him what he's worth." Rowan came in from the tree line with a longbow across his back and a doe over his shoulders. He set the carcass on the flat stone by the well without a word. Blood ran into the crack and stopped at the moss. "One shot," Rowan said. "Clean through the lung. There's a buck two ridges over. I'll take him tomorrow if the wind holds." "Salt him down tonight," Ajax said. "Tucker brought enough." Rowan drew a short knife and started at the belly. He worked fast and did not look up. "The grove past the creek smells wrong," he said. "Same rot I told you about. It's spreading." Ajax stopped. "How close?" "Half a day north. Not at our line yet." "Finish the doe. Then show Chalam on the map." Rowan nodded and kept cutting. Ajax stood between the cart and the carcass. Salt for winter. Meat on the stone. A house promised to a man who would build it himself. His shelf had food and a mason and a bowman who could feed them. And something rotting a half day north, moving slowly toward his wall.