Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 360 of 619

The trees stood trenched and bearing, the beer working by the hearth. But Ajax still had no man who had ever made wine. He sat with Aldric, Grayson, and Tucker at the hall table to settle it. "We have fruit and no hands to turn it," Ajax said. "What do we need? A grower? Buildings?" Aldric tapped the brewing book. "Both. A man who knows the fruit. And a place to work it. Vats, presses, a cool cellar for the wine to rest. The trees give nothing without them." "The next valley has a grower," Ajax said. "A woman who works the fruit crop, so the market men say. I sent word for a name." Tucker leaned back. "I found her," he said. "Rode out yesterday. Bought her a drink at the crossroads inn." He turned a gold chain in his fingers. "She presses cider for half the valley. Knows wine too. Learned it from her father." "Will she come?" Ajax asked. "She'll come for coin and her own room," Tucker said. "But she won't swear to a wall she can't see. She wants the work, not a fight." Grayson set both hands flat on the table. "A stranger through the gate," he said. "Every season it's one more. Where does it end." "It ends when the house stands," Ajax said. "Marco reads her first. If she's clean, she works." Grayson held his eyes a long moment. He did not soften. "Then she works under the silver chain," he said. "Not the Code. Not the mark. She sees the cellar and nothing more. And when she leaves, Marco wipes it." "Agreed," Ajax said. Grayson gave one short nod and said no more. Aldric drew the cellar plan on the back of the brewing page. "Dig into the hill behind the workhouse," he said. "Stone walls, cool and dark. Two vats for the fruit, a press between them, racks for the jars. Chalam cuts the stone. Bran lays it." He set down the charcoal. "Three days, if I have the grower here to say where the vats go." "You'll have her," Tucker said. "I'll fetch her at dawn. Cart's already loaded with her presses." Bran and Chalam cut the cellar in two days. The stone walls held the cold. The vats stood ready, the press bolted between them. On the third morning Tucker's cart came through the canal. The grower climbed down, a broad woman with stained hands and a hard look. Marco met her at the workhouse door, listened, and gave Ajax a single nod. Ajax showed her the cellar and the trees. She pinched a plum, split it, tasted it. "Ten more days on the fruit," she said. "Then twenty in the vat. You'll have wine before the second ship." Ajax had his grower and his cellar. He had the hands to turn the fruit at last. But the plums still hung green, and the first ship's sail was already two days out on the water.