Chapter 29 — The Warm Wall

Chapter 29: Chapter 29 — The Warm Wall

Chapter 29 — The Warm Wall

Christopher noticed the wall because his back was against it.

Godfrey had knocked the wooden sword from his hand. Christopher stepped away, slipped on loose gravel and struck the south-facing wall of the old kitchen yard.

The stone was warm through his shirt.

He stayed there for a moment.

"Are you injured?" Godfrey asked.

"No. The stick only caught my sleeve."

"Then pick up the sword and stop watching the ground."

Christopher pressed his palm against the wall. The morning air remained cold, but sunlight had already reached the dark stone, and there was almost no wind in the narrow yard.

"This part of the yard is warmer than the training ground."

Godfrey looked around. "It faces south."

"I know. The southern wall holds the morning sun."

"Then why do you look surprised every time you step beside it?"

Christopher retrieved the practice sword. "I have an idea."

Godfrey struck him before he had settled his feet.

"You can inspect it after training. Pick up the sword."

By breakfast, the idea had become larger than the yard.

Christopher used charcoal to draw a long sloping roof against the south wall, adding rows of planting beds beneath it, a door at one end and windows across the front.

Owen Wren and Cedric Palmer studied the drawing. Wilfred Ross took the charcoal and drew a line through half the structure.

"What’s wrong with it?" Christopher asked.

"Everything above this line," Wilfred said.

They had gathered in the gatehouse because it held the largest usable table. Bennet stood at one end with his supply board. Mabel had come after Christopher mentioned growing herbs.

Christopher turned the drawing around. "The stone wall holds heat. Sunlight passes through the covering and warms the space. It protects plants from the wind."

"What do you plan to use for the clear covering?" Owen asked.

"Glass, if we can buy enough of it later."

Bennet checked his board. "No glass."

"We found five small panes," Owen said. "Three in the old chapel windows. Two in a storehouse frame."

"Five panes are enough for a small test bed."

"It is enough for five small windows."

Christopher studied the long roof he had drawn.

"Oiled cloth," Wilfred said. "Some northern gardens use it over early beds."

Bennet shook his head. "Oil is not free."

"Neither is glass," Owen replied.

Cedric took the charcoal and drew a much smaller box against the wall, low enough for a man to reach across without entering.

"One bed," he said. "Test it before building a house for turnips."

"Not only turnips," Mabel said. "I have herb seed."

Everyone looked at her.

"A little," she added. "Feverfew, yarrow and two others. Some may not grow here."

"Then we test those," Christopher said.

Mabel placed one hand over the pouch at her belt. "A small part. I am not burying all my seed because you found a warm wall."

The final plan fit on one corner of Christopher’s original drawing.

Owen would build a low lean-to frame against the stone. The five cloudy panes would cover part of the sloping top, oiled linen would cover the rest, and two wooden shutters could close over it at night and during hard wind. The structure was closer to a large covered planting bed than the greenhouse Christopher remembered.

Cedric believed the bed might grow enough greens for several meals, and if it survived the colder nights, they could build more.

Owen selected wood salvaged from a condemned roof. The beams were old but dry, and the frame did not need pieces large enough for the gate. Wat Cooper and two carpenters cut the joints while Nicholas Tanner cleaned the cloudy glass.

The panes were thicker than the windows Christopher remembered, bubbles and faint green streaks distorting everything seen through them. One had a cracked corner.

"Do not break those panes," Bennet said. "We can’t replace them here."

Nicholas continued wiping the first pane. "I had not planned to."

"I am making certain he understands their value."

"Stand farther away and make certain."

Bennet did.

The oiled linen caused more trouble. Martha refused to surrender good kitchen cloth, and Walter would not allow wagon covers to be cut. Joan found two worn sheets that had already been patched beyond ordinary use, and Bennet measured out enough lamp oil to treat them.

The cloth became darker and slightly transparent when the oil soaked through. It let in less light than glass, but more than Christopher expected.

Bram carried the completed wooden frame into the kitchen yard with two men guiding each end. Godfrey had warned him three times not to lift until Owen gave the order.

"Do I lift the frame now?" Bram asked.

"Not yet. Wait until the lower brace is tied."

The men turned the frame.

"Is the brace ready now?"

"Lift slowly and keep the frame level."

Bram raised his end too quickly. The opposite side struck the ground, and Wat shouted.

"Set it down gently," Owen said. "Do not twist the corners."

Bram lowered it at once.

The second attempt went better. They placed the frame against the wall and fixed it with wooden pegs driven between old joints rather than cutting deeply into the stone, and Owen added braces at both ends.

Christopher kept the idea to himself. He had learned.

Cedric prepared the soil, rejecting earth from the wet field and mixing drier soil with old manure from the animal pens. Wilfred broke the larger clods by hand, and Mabel divided the bed into narrow sections using string.

She planted only part of her herb seed. Cedric added a small amount of turnip seed and several onion bulbs Martha had kept after the journey, and an uncovered bed of the same size was prepared beside the wall for comparison.

By evening, the five panes sat in their wooden slots, the treated linen stretched across the remaining frame, and Owen closed the shutters over both.

Christopher crouched beside it.

"It does not look large enough to matter."

"It only needs to keep the first seedlings alive," Cedric said. "If it does that, we can build another."

The following morning, the air beneath the covering was noticeably warmer. Moisture covered the inside of the cloudy glass.

Christopher took that as success.

On the third day, Mabel found white growth across one corner of the soil.

"Mold is the first danger," she said.

Christopher looked through the open shutter. Drops ran from the cloth and fell onto the bed, and the soil smelled heavy and sour.

"Would that come from watering the bed too heavily?" he asked.

"Too much wet air," Wilfred said.

"It is meant to keep the warm air inside."

"The covering kept all the damp air trapped inside."

The sun had strengthened after breakfast. When Owen lifted the linen panel, trapped heat rolled out against Christopher’s face, warmer than the kitchen yard and far more damp.

One section of herb seed had washed toward the lower edge where water dripped from the frame.

Mabel turned to Christopher. "You cooked mud."

"Nothing has sprouted yet, so we cannot know whether the heat helped."

"Then you may have cooked the seed instead of helping it grow."

They opened both ends and left the shutters raised. Owen cut two small vents beneath the upper edge and fitted them with sliding wooden covers, while Wilfred dug a shallow channel along the lower side to carry dripping water away from the bed.

Christopher wanted to reopen everything the following morning. Cedric made him wait until the surface dried.

"If we close it at night and open it during the day, it should work," Christopher said.

"If someone remembers," Cedric replied.

They assigned the task to the kitchen garden crew because those workers passed the yard every morning. One person could lift the cover during the morning round.

For the next three mornings, Christopher checked the bed after training. On the first, Joan had already opened the vents. On the second, the lower channel had filled with loose soil and Wilfred cleared it with a broken spoon before breakfast. On the third, one of the linen ties snapped in the wind, and Wat replaced it with cord and added a second tie beside it.

The problems stayed small enough to be handled without pulling Christopher from training. The kitchen crew saw the problem and repaired what they could, calling Owen only when the wooden frame shifted against the wall.

The weather continued to improve. Cold wind still crossed the northern walls, but the midday sun lasted longer. Wilfred said spring had been kinder than the year before the war. Cedric answered that one mild week did not mean anything.

Christopher left the weather argument to them and went to look at the barley. The shoots remained green.

On the sixth day, the first shoots appeared beneath the glass.

Mabel found them while checking the damp corner. Three thin green points had broken through one herb section, and the turnips followed near the oiled cloth two days later.

The uncovered comparison bed also sprouted, its shoots fewer and shorter, though Cedric warned that the difference might disappear as the weather warmed.

Mabel marked the herb rows with pieces of split wood so nobody mistook them for weeds. Martha warned every child who entered the yard that pulling even one shoot would cost them a morning beside the washing tubs. Meg repeated the warning to Elsie with enough seriousness that the younger girl walked around the bed rather than beside it.

"Then the warm bed works," Christopher said.

"Something grew. That’s not yet proof the whole design works."

"It means the bed can keep at least one seed alive."

"It means we have not killed everything."

Owen checked the frame. One side of the oiled linen had already loosened where the wind pulled against its ties, and he added another strip of wood and told Christopher the cloth would need replacing before the next cold season.

The five glass panes remained intact.

Bennet calculated the oil, nails, labor and cloth used for the small bed. Christopher stopped him before he compared the cost with the amount of turnips it might produce.

"It is a test," Christopher said.

"Tests still cost money, my lord. Especially tests made with glass."

"Did we have anything more important for five cracked panes?"

Bennet considered that. "No."

"Then write the glass beneath experimental costs."

"That’s not how household accounts work, no matter what name you give the expense."

The little structure remained against the warm wall with three rows of new shoots beneath its patched covering. Cedric assigned the kitchen-garden crew to lift the cover each morning, check the soil and close the shutters before dark.

Christopher left space beside it for another bed. He would wait until the first survived a full change of weather before asking Owen to build it.

Owen Wren refused to enter the quarry until everyone stopped moving.

"Stay where I can see you," he said. "No one climbs the cut face. No one goes near the water unless Robert tells them. If a stone moves beneath your foot, step back."

Eight workers stood beside the wagon. Nicholas Tanner and Martin Pike guarded the horses while two other Knight Apprentices watched the road and tree line. Walter remained near Christopher with one hand resting on his sword.

Robert Miller looked down at the brown water filling the quarry.

"You should also tell them not to fall in," he said.

Owen eyed him. "I thought that part was clear."

"People still surprise you by ignoring clear orders."

The flooded cutting appeared larger from the upper ramp. Stone had been removed in wide steps, leaving dark walls on three sides. Rainwater covered the deepest floor, reeds grew near the shallows, and a fallen tree lay partly submerged against the eastern face.

Christopher could see squared blocks beneath the water.

"How deep is the water near the cut face?" he asked.

Robert tied a stone to a cord and lowered it from the surviving edge. The line disappeared through the brown surface.

"Here, my lord? Deeper than you are tall."

"Could we drain enough water to reach the lower stone?"

Robert considered the lower ground beyond the quarry. "Into what?"

Christopher opened the map on the wagon bed. The eastern road ran below the quarry before crossing the stream, and land beyond it sloped toward the abandoned farms.

"A channel along this side," he said. "It could carry the water toward the stream."

Robert pressed one dirty finger to the map. "It could carry the quarry wall toward the stream."

Owen crouched beside them. "The ground here has already moved."

He pointed to a long crack near the upper edge. Grass hid part of it, but the line continued toward the old ramp.

"Cut below that," Owen said, "and we may loosen the whole bank."

Christopher folded the map. "So we do not drain it."

"Not with eight men and two shovels," Robert said.

The blocks above the water were another matter.

The old quarrymen had left nine squared stones beside the upper ramp. Three lay completely free, while the others had sunk into soil or been trapped beneath smaller rubble. Moss covered them, but the stone beneath remained sound.

Owen inspected each one with a hammer. He marked five for recovery and rejected two with cracks running through their centers. The last pair stood too close to the damaged face.

"Those are good blocks," Christopher said.

"They’re beneath loose stone."

"Can we clear the loose stone without bringing down the bank?"

"Yes, but the work must begin from above."

Christopher waited.

Owen struck the nearest rejected block again. "We’re not going to."

The first free stone required six men, two wooden rollers and a rope around the wagon axle. They moved it less than twenty paces before stopping to reset everything.

Christopher watched the workers strain against the rope. "A Knight could pull that faster."

Walter did not look away from the tree line. "A Knight could also watch for the riders who used that road."

"I know why you came to inspect the quarry."

"You sounded like you had forgotten."

Godfrey had refused to send the Black Iron prisoner outside the walls. The man’s wounds had mostly healed, and he could move stone better than several ordinary laborers, but he could also break a worker’s neck and disappear into the forest before a guard raised the alarm.

The escaped prisoner remained chained separately at Dragonwatch. His attempt had ended any discussion about bringing collarless prisoners into open country.

The workers rolled the first block onto the wagon.

The axle groaned.

Wat Cooper had reinforced the wagon before they left, but he had also forbidden them from carrying more than two stones at once. Owen agreed. Christopher had stopped arguing with two craftsmen giving the same warning.

While the team secured the first block, Robert walked the edge of the water. He found a narrow flow entering through broken stone near the northern face.

"A spring feeds the flooded cut from beneath," he said.

"So even if we removed the rainwater, it fills again," Christopher said.

"Slowly, but yes. The water rises again after we remove it."

"Could that flow power a mill wheel?"

Robert stared at the trickle.

"A very small wheel," Christopher added.

"For a very small mill that does very little work."

Walter laughed from the road.

Christopher marked the spring on the map and said nothing else.

They hauled the first load back to Dragonwatch before midday. Nicholas and Martin walked beside the wagon on the steepest parts. The oxen moved slowly, and every rut threatened to shift the stones despite the ropes holding them.

Inside the outer gate, Godfrey waited with Bram and the Black Iron prisoner.

The prisoner’s hands were bound in front with enough chain between them to let him grip a rope, another chain joining his ankles. Two armed apprentices stood close, while a third watched from the gatehouse steps with a crossbow.

Godfrey pointed to the first block. "Drag it to the western breach."

The prisoner looked at the distance, then at the guards. "Alone?"

"Bram will take the other rope."

Bram already held it.

The prisoner pulled. Knight Essence tightened through his arms and shoulders, and the block moved off the wagon ramp onto two rollers. Bram followed too quickly and pulled his end sideways.

"Keep the rope straight and do not wrap it around your hand," Godfrey said.

Bram corrected himself.

They moved the block across the courtyard while workers shifted the rear roller to the front. The prisoner did not attempt anything, keeping his eyes on the stone and the crossbow above him.

"He could do more at the quarry," Christopher said quietly.

"He could escape more at the quarry," Godfrey answered.

"Walter would be there."

"Then Walter spends the day watching one prisoner instead of the road."

Christopher watched Bram and the prisoner reach the breach. "Inside only."

"Bram trains inside the walls only. He isn’t ready for quarry work."

They returned to the quarry with the empty wagon.

The second marked block came free without trouble. The third was half buried beside the upper ramp. Workers cleared its sides with spades and pry bars while Owen checked the ground around them.

"No one stands below it," he said.

The block shifted after the second pry.

So did the ground beneath it.

A hollow sound came from under the ramp. Soil dropped into a space nobody had seen, and one side of the stone sank. A worker standing behind the pry bar lost his balance, his right leg sliding into the opening before the block settled against the earth.

He screamed.

Everyone stopped except Walter.

He crossed the distance in three steps and caught the upper edge of the stone. Bronze Knight strength slowed it, but did not lift it clear.

"Ropes," Owen shouted. "From above. Nobody enters the hole."

The workers moved. Two threw a rope around the exposed end while Nicholas brought the wagon team closer. Walter held the stone until the rope tightened.

"Pull together and keep the rope above the marked stones."

The oxen strained. The stone rose just enough for Owen and another man to drag the injured worker backward by his coat.

His lower leg bent where it should not.

Christopher knelt beside him.

"Do not touch that block until I brace the stone above it," Owen said.

The man gripped Christopher’s sleeve and cursed through his teeth. His boot remained on, and no bone had broken the skin.

Martin brought the small medical bundle. They bound the leg between two straight pieces of wood without trying to force it back into place. Mabel would have to set it at Dragonwatch.

The opening beneath the ramp was an old drainage passage. Its stone cover had cracked and disappeared under years of soil, and digging around the block removed the last support holding it.

Owen drove two stakes into the ground well above the collapse.

"No one crosses these marks without Owen’s permission."

"What about the other marked stone?" Christopher asked.

"That stone stays where it is until the upper bank is secured."

"It is on the other side of the cut, away from the collapse."

"So are two cracked drains we cannot see."

Christopher took in the empty space remaining on the wagon. "We came for two blocks."

"We’re leaving with one block and one injured man."

They laid the worker on straw in the wagon and tied the recovered stone near the front so it could not roll toward him. The return to Dragonwatch took twice as long as the first trip.

Mabel met them inside the gate. She cut away the man’s trouser leg, examined the swelling and made four people hold him while she straightened the break. His scream carried across the courtyard.

Christopher remained until the splints were tied.

"Will the injured worker be able to walk again?" he asked.

"If the bone stays straight and the wound does not swell badly," Mabel said. "Not soon."

"How long before you know whether the leg will heal?"

"Several weeks before he should put weight on it. Longer before heavy work."

The injured man’s family gathered beside the wagon when it returned.

At the western breach, Owen’s crew had already set the first block into the lower course. The Black Iron prisoner and Bram waited beside the second wagon under guard.

"Move it tomorrow," Owen said. "The mortar bed is not ready."

Christopher turned toward the eastern road.

"Do we return to the quarry tomorrow?"

"For the three loose blocks," Owen said. "Not the ramp. Not the water. We take one at a time."

"And what happens after those three blocks are removed?"

"After that, the quarry waits until we have men, tools and a reason worth another broken leg."

Christopher agreed.

The next morning, the Black Iron prisoner and Bram moved the second block into place. Owen kept them on separate ropes and shouted whenever Bram pulled too quickly. Guards remained close to the prisoner until the chains were locked again.

The injured worker watched from a bedroll beneath the gatehouse awning. His face had gone pale from pain, but Mabel said the leg remained straight.

Two dark blocks now strengthened the western breach.

The flooded quarry still held hundreds more.