Chapter 2 Tales of the Miller's

"Dodge!" a man hailed me from a rooftop across the square.

"Bernard!" I replied to the rancher/grocer, who stood at his third-story porch, beneath the roof's peak of his grocery store.

"Bob!" he replied. "My name is Bob!"

"Okay!" I agreed with a laugh. "We have a rancher by that same name!"

Our watchtower, which is roughly in the middle of town, stands a full story taller than the next highest structure. The grocer's building was second in height so I pretended that a higher attitude came with my higher altitude. I stood watch for Hrothgar, who was at rest with a dose of Juice's design.

"Lars said that more are coming!" Bob announced the reason for calling loudly across the square. "Lars is staying here, second floor, and I will make six bunks for more comers."

"That little balcony makes it seem as if you can fly," I stated, seeming to change the subject. "If we double our occupancy, we must double the cane farm to produce enough paper and sugar. While you're at it, did you crunch the numbers of what we need for two hundred newcomers?"

"Two?" Bob's expression scowled with thought. "Miller's build? He may feed two or five towns, and we just happen to be here already. Why is it our duty? Did the Spirit put this upon us?"

"Towns," I said quietly, "take only six to ten people to build, and just two of us to do maintenance. Nothing rots, our food is gratifying and sanctifying, and we heal with astonishing speed, not to mention other miraculous facts."

"You're talking to yourself—again!" Bob groaned loudly.

"Can you see Miller's Lake?" I demanded. "It has two feeder streams, now, that spring right out of solid stone!"

Bob did not need to look. The brunt of my statement hit home. If the rate of water flow doubled, then the output rate of the flour mills might double. Any juggling of numbers was pointless. The Spirit could and would conscript each person and region to do Our Lord's will, at any moment.

"Want to meet?" Bob called out the next order of business.

"I want to meet Miller!" I decided. "He's been staying at the inn, but he's never there when I'm about. I will have to go out and invite him to join us."

"Join? Join the town?" Bob was nodding in reply to his own question.

"May as well, since his work upstages ours," I agreed.

Neither of us said more. We had no plans. We had been surviving, feeling a bit guilty about not doing more but also feeling guilty about having abundance without just cause.

"I'll take watch," Bob stated.

I waited, watching all around Bogusville. There were no new plans for expanding the village, but still we decided to make way towards the east. There were waterway links to several small lakes. Looking at matters as they stood, I decided that we deserved to learn how the miller's works would be part of the town's future.

The waterfront was an unused expanse that was eighty meters wide. We had set out to clear it, to cultivate that land, and to prepare docks to invite trade and expansion. Now that the miller's group had industrialized the mount's flank, I needed to determine how their future and ours worked together. Engineering to use water for power was clever, but what if their ingenuity extended beyond just one facility? What if they needed more water, such as the waterfront, lakes, and ways?

To the south was an isolated lake and small ponds. Southeast was a promontory which hid a small elevated lake. Southwest was forested and then south was a majestic mount which we called Westmount. I considered clearing away all of the forest from within one hundred meters around the village. There was no real justification for such a scheme. It was a marginally practical use of time that would accumulate wood.

"Stockpiling," I sighed. "We can gather much but with so little use, and now? Now, after the village was just translated to a different region?"

The questions hung in the air, awaiting the Spirit to answer. The Spirit had truly plucked up Bogusville from the midst of a jarred region, and transplanted it entirely to this present locale. The former home region was undergoing the annual purge of unrepentant people, jarring the foundations of the region. The instability of regional weather and odd behavior of animals was a judgment of calamity.

Just a few days ago, I hurried back to that region to rescue my dogs. Over the years I had tamed four wolves, then bred three guard dogs from those. I lost two of the canines in fights against bangers. On the long march back to Bogusville, I made a kennel at a hermitage called Derringer. The constant battles with mobs of monsters had wearied my soul. It was too hard upon me to continue striving to save my canine friends and also get back to my town. Now, I had finally fulfilled the promise to bring them home.

The sounds of Bob climbing the four stories of stairs up to the watchtower peak were barely noticeable. He was inherently unhurried and quiet. His ranching work with animals bespoke a calm spirit which did not leap to anger nor hesitate when making the kill. The levels of the watchtower build varied in height, from three to four meters each, thus the three-story grocer's house with its steeply pitched roof was nearly as tall as the five-story watchtower.

"Do you know..." Bob said from a floor below, as he paused to look out of some windows. "Do you know what I do not miss, about where we used to be?"

"The ice," I stated. "The ice that came upon the lands across the river."

"The bone-crunching, tooth-grinding, relentless ice!" Bob agreed, resuming his climb up the stairs. "At least we are in a moderate climate, now, instead of being perched upon the very lip of Our Lord's cold demeanor towards the..."

"That could be us, someday," I warned the grocer/rancher. "We've seen the attitude for the hot fiends, in the nether realm, when Juice needed warts and such."

"Wouldn't that be cheery?" Bob persisted. "If Our Lord froze over hell, the same as he did for that forsaken bunch, that we left behind?"

"They are being reminded, not forsaken," I countered. "The loss of water to ice is more severe in some ways than when he decrees a year of drought and winds."

"Having water but being unable to wet anything," Bob agreed. "That's irony, to let them keep the water but not to use it except by candlelight."

"Even candlelight water will freeze over, especially in a basin," I said. "You know, they must kneel to the frozen river, by torchlight, until their leaders and councils repent before Our Lord, or else they go thirsty."

"For how long, I wonder?" Bob prodded. "How long can a man thirst, until he finally repents from weariness of being thirsty?"

"Perhaps for those people, a few centuries," was my guess. "If they repent, and be blessed with family, then it gets worse."

"Blessing is worse?" Bob's face returned to a familiar thoughtful focus.

"Children and women do not suffer hardship well," I explained. "It is the edge of a razor upon which we fell. On the one side, we seek to please Our Lord and Savior, thus risking being entrusted with a family's welfare, guiding them, and so forth. We chose to suffer independence, this blessing without shackles to family and region. There is no stick with which to smite an unruly brat or a selfish wife except that we will be stricken down as failures. We chose independence, Bob, regardless of not recalling that which we forsook."

"Aye," Bob sighed with acceptance. "Lars says to tell you that there will be many workers for roads and ways, coming soon."

"Do you know what the smell of baking ovens tells my spirit?" I asked.

"It tells me that cakes and pies be nearer than yesterday," Bob smiled.

"It tells me that women and children are coming near," I warned. "This realm has no shortage of meats and stews. We produce enough already to feed one hundred warriors each day, and you said that more output is feasible."

"Meats and stews, we do," Bob agreed only halfway. "The redstone affair that I have been working up for the cattle and pigs? It can output thirty of each, daily, but that is not thirty whole critters."

"Not whole?" I was taken by surprise.

"We get maybe two steaks per animal, with blessed swords," Bob stated. "Two steaks! Each critter is from half of our size to four times that big! Two steaks? Who are we kidding?"

"And the rest?" I wondered. "Where does the rest of each animal go? Did we not discuss this, just yesterday?"

"It goes to the same place that our invisible coworkers labor?" Bob posed his reply as a question.

I would not say what Bob wanted me to say. My silence prodded the animal caretaker to continue speaking.

"Dodge, the angels may not be the only invisible beings working out affairs with Our Lord and Savior," Bob persisted. "Something, somehow, is making ninety-five percent of each slaughtered critter vanish from this world. That doesn't happen with bread, or mushroom stew, or cake. It only happens when a living breathing thing is killed."

"We talked about this," I said again.

"We talked about this," Bob said.

"What did we decide?" I wondered.

"We decided that soulless critters have this life, no afterlife, for starters," Bob admitted, "and that us being made healthy by their flesh is the best end for our companionship."

"You know that this is true," I spoke earnestly. "The proof of this sincerity is that my friends, the canines and horses, would give their lives to defend me. I also fight for their welfare. If a pelt or a tooth survives their death, should I not use it to defend us all the more? I believe in this, but I cannot communicate with them so well as you can do."

The brutality of kindness given to a doomed being no longer bothered me. Their lives either enjoyed kindness or were given no mercy of being loved. Bob loved all animals, openly and honestly, but he would not risk harm to a person for the sake of an animal. We differed in our emotions and spirits, yet we labored as one for the same cause.

"To get only one or two steaks from sacrificing a kind animal seems unjust, to me," I said carefully. "What you say is that something else is gaining almost all of the sustenance and the blessing of our sacrifice."

"It would be unjust whether or not a critter openly hated us, also," Bob pointed out. "Being a genuine animal with only trust towards us and happiness to be cared for is not the issue. The issue always has been that these animals and this world are not what our minds expect to exist. We remain the product of the world that we were born into, although we cannot remember it."

"Thus, we can be wrong about what is fair to expect," I reasoned.

"It is fair!" Bob responded quickly. "I have no doubt about that, but we rightly suspect that more is going on than we can see."

With that statement hanging in the air, I departed the watchtower. We left the conversation unfinished. It was just one more unfinished thing in a completely uncultured world.

A short walk to the north gate cleared away my mental cobwebs. I crossed our arched short bridge, following the stepped route down six meters into a westerly turn. This road went along fifty meters to turn at the lowest end of the four flour mills. Smells and atmosphere of business of activities within the mills thickened the air.

This was a seventh day. In every seven-day cycle, the seventh was reserved for worship, to put aside worldly concerns and focus upon serving Our Lord. These many evidences of work and productivity went contrary to my expectation about being welcomed.

Halting at the unframed opening for a door, I looked into the building. There were not any people within, going about works. The floors were smooth, even shiny from sweeping or artistry. The walls facing me were bare. Inset shelving above clean workbenches and basins held cutlery, spices, and the like. A large bank of ovens filled the north wall, on my right, inset behind brick facing. To my left was a behemoth millstone, rising fully three meters, and above that the wood gearing which enabled a waterwheel to power the grinding beast.

Waiting silently, beholding work approaching the finishing stages, I expected to meet somebody attending to it all. There was neither door nor defender for preventing damages from monsters or accidents with animals. I ventured to take two steps into the building, watching for beasts and monsters. Torches and furnaces lit the structure within, diminishing the risk of surprise.

Looking across the twelve meters of floor, my eyes rested upon a stairway rising from its midst. I strode in without changing direction, to gaze up the stair. It continued, in stepped fashion, up through all four milling structures. At each mill, the stair reset to meet its next riser across the floor, then up to the next, and so forth. The three-meter high entries led through each middle wall, both at the stair and above each millstone, so that I could not see much beyond the next building in line, from any stairway vantage point.

"Hello!?" I called out, preferring not to wander through works without a host knowing of my presence.

"Welcome!" a voice called down, from far up the stairway. "Come in! Come up!"

"Miller?" I called upward as I climbed the stairs. To right and left the flaming heat of furnaces and the resting behemoths of the millstones took hold of my attention.

"Yes! Yes! I am the miller!" the man shouted happily. "My name is Ben! Ben, the miller! You are the innkeeper?"

"Yes, that's me," I said as I climbed the sets of stairs.

"We meet, at last!" Ben shouted, turning and waving an arm to several men who sat around the uppermost chamber of the mills. "These are my crew, and family! These conscripts of the Spirit stand ready to do Our Lord's work, with fervor!"

"That is the mayor, of the town," one man mentioned to Ben. "He's innkeeper, monster hunter, wolf tamer, and many things. Lars told us about him. He is Mayor Dodge."

"Oh?" Ben stopped motioning and stood still, clearly thoughtful. "This is that man, of whom Lars spoke? This one, whom Lars objected to going back into the land under judgment?"

"Hello, friends," I said easily. "Thank you, for welcoming me. I truly do not know what relationship the village has with your works, but I came to invite you to join our village."

"Us?" Ben turned alertly to stare into my eyes. "Each of us? You invite us to join your village, yet you do not know our names, reputations, or what works the Spirit has conscripted us to do? Are you insane?"

"Perhaps I do not know of sanity," I admitted. "It is you who are called to build mills, and presumably to operate them. I decided to find out if the village should join you in whatever this work shall achieve."

Ben grew less agitated, stilling in body and in feature. It appeared that he was in a sort of trance, awaiting being awakened by whoever controlled the trance from the unseen realm.

"Warehouse!" Ben exclaimed, returning to his excitable demeanor. "You are to build a warehouse! Yes! Many, many—a great many—warehouses! There will be ships, and armies afoot, and by rail, all coming through and emptying them, one after another!"

"When?" Dodge asked. "I have heard nothing of armies, of ships and so many people coming—wait—coming here? Is this the many people whom Lars spoke of, this morning?"

"No, not Lars," Ben said. "Lars is a builder, a bricklayer, and stonemason. It is his unction to do what he is called to do, just as it is mine and theirs—these men here—to build and set up milling operations."

"Then you are not the miller who will stay here, to run these things?" I was mystified. "That is fine, but you are still invited to join our village, for the time that it is needful or convenient for each person. You need not join, if that is your preference, to remain unfettered by such things."

"There, then; that is it!" Ben rejoiced at my closing statement. "We are to be unfettered!"

Nodding silently, agreeing with whatever decision the individuals found to be in keeping with their calling, I said no more about the matter. Still, I stood there looking around casually without moving to leave. I was just turning to see where and how things moved and what should occur.

"You, Mayor Dodge, are interested in becoming a millwright, and miller, and perhaps a baker?" Ben inquired.

"I am interested if that is a duty that I should fulfill," I spoke candidly.

Ben shook his head just a little bit, not breaking eye contact.

"No?" I was surprised at the ease of dismissal.

"Not a calling, for you, but perhaps duty," Ben explained. "Most of us are called according to the will of god, by the Spirit, but some of us are less spiritually focused. Such men respond to readiness, to fulfilling needs, and to the duties of a situation."

That list fairly described me. I looked around at these men. Each of them had a weapon at hand, at ease but never relaxed from wariness. Readiness was a fit term for them.

"The tools of any trade lend themselves to many uses," Ben continued, acutely aware of my assessment. "Being ready to build also is readiness to action, and to more than that. The body is familiar to taking action, to being mobile even while not in motion. The mind is freed from directing it to do unfamiliar things and need only confirm a thought. The body fulfills the mind's certainty. The spirit moves them both."

The inference could be that our inactivity—my town's inactivity—had made us less ready to do anything. Inactivity fueled indecision. The urge to plan shrank away from commitment. On the contrary, I felt and acted upon the desire to do something. I was here, now, following the decision that this needful action must be taken.

In silence, I admitted that this action was tardy in being done. I ought to have been involved from the first hours, becoming familiar if not directly committed to aiding this work.

"The readiness to act comes not from merely doing things," I replied. "The town has many things to which we attend hourly, but the repetition conforms us to an imaginary bubble of safety and comparative inactivity."

Ben gave a noncommittal look of indifference. It spoke loudly how unconvinced he remained.

"The trip—the adventure—to regain my dogs, was upon the heels of the village being moved here," I explained. "When we were returned to the town, it was obvious that no living thing had survived the transfer. I investigated, to see if those animals are tied to that region. If they are native products of that region's body, they could still walk out but not be spirited away."

The sincerity of my outlook registered as worthwhile. Ben nodded but then he shrugged it away.

"I need not defend this, to you," I continued. "I explain that I do not take life lightly, especially those trusting in my constancy. When I suggest that you become townspeople, here, it is with that same spirit."

"That you would be constant, loyal, and go to lengths in order to rescue us when the Spirit does not?" Ben countered. "No man rescues us, for we are the ones who are conscripted to do great things!"

Without warning, Ben turned and strode away behind the milling stone. He went out of a doorway and up a stairway. The miller walked away until he stood upon the lake fashioned for this task. I followed along, but not too closely.

"This is twice the lake that it was, upon our arrival!" Ben motioned at the deep waters, his voice carrying across them with clarity. "These stones and cobble and bricks are of our handiwork, as conscripted to do! Look around, at the road carved from the stone mountain, the steps for carts, the softer stone as is kind to hooves of horse and mule drawing the carts."

He spun around, aware of my having come along, but he was not looking at me. Ben motioned to the topmost mill, its roof and outermost wall, wordlessly pointing out what was obvious but unremarked.

"We have not ranched draw animals," I offered.

"You have not seen any here!" Ben emphasized. "Have you?"

"None," I agreed.

"Yet these buildings, constructed of sandstone and acacia and jungle wood, are of no concern to you?" Ben demanded. "How did we come to get great chests filled with these materials, yet nothing from your town?"

Silence was my reply. The rhetorical question demanded no answer.

"Not one pin nor stone of this work came from your village!" Ben pointed away, towards Bogusville. "For all my patience, and reasoning with men of action, not one of us felt moved to ask after your town's resistance to being neighborly!"

The obvious silence from the gathering company of specialists and of helpers informed me to remain quiet. I bit my tongue, refraining for giving way to an irritated reply...for the moment.

"The signs posted within your village proclaim that any who do not work shall starve, but we have seen not one whit of work beyond your walls, for several days now," Ben described. "Many full days, with six of you seeing this team of men working virtual wonders of achievement within sight and hearing of your bedroom. What are we to think of Bogusville, that we should relay to others on our travels to build and adventure? Ah, the Bogeys, we will say, do not come out of yon walled camp to adventure nor to offer aid! They huddle within, to scheme to defraud the victims of the wilderness from safe food and safer companions."

Without a word of interest in what I might reply, the miller strode away. He went below, back into the warmth of his buildings.

"Why are more coming?" I asked and followed along, going down into the topmost mill. "We who cower within our meager walls and shrink from friendly skulkers who vanish at dawn and reappear at dusk, we desire to know."

My tone had changed. I was now coming back in reply to the miller's accusatory words of dismissal.

"None of these forest-wise workers of yours deigned to mention what their business was about!" I said with a wave of my arm to include the group. "We had to inquire of a kin whose work you admire. What of the towns and little villages you have built, the gathered skills and craftsmen who cast their lot in with yours to see through the next thousand years? What wandering souls like yourself did them any favors? Dare you to abide with social ties, to condemn the world around rather than to risk any of them coming to harm?"

I paused, looking around, pointedly unamused at these meager works. With a withering glance at the ovens, I moved to the next stair lower, then back to the top.

"Granted, your genie brought sand and clay and a bit of tree," I shrugged it away as nothing great. "Your skilled artisans crush and refine seeds to make a clay patty of food with which to bake. Your engineers design and fit paddles to wheels the like of which children at play can do, by age ten. You handle sword and bow and hammer with ease, but I see no animals here to your aid."

I gestured expansively, silently, face open to inquire a reply from anyone listening. No reply came. I was not finished speaking.

"What then shall my hamlet say is their tale of the miller?" I turned the table upon Ben, the miller. "They skulk in at dusk, stealthily as a thief, and are gone with day's break, as if embarrassed that they carry no tent nor food or materials of trade. Great wonder fills the townsfolk with the mystery of the banging monsters which halt none of this work! It seems as if a sideshow of freaks has come to entertain each other in hiding. We six, the surviving inhabitants of yon village, wonder at how not to interfere, for we are uninvited, unasked, and unsought. We are but simple townsfolk, producing meats and grains and fruits in plenty. Plenty, did I say? Plenty, sufficient to feed this little group and ten more of its like without us breaking a sweat!"

With yet another dramatic pause, I turned and walked away, going down the stairs. I strode into range of greater numbers of ovens. I spoke loudly, one more time, but did not pause in leaving.

"All while we laze away the days and kill monsters coming near," my voice fell deafened in the heat waves, not echoing but dying. "Should you need more than a place to hide and sleep, my people can ready a stout home for your likes within any given day. For we gather, craft, and hoard."

My leave-taking halted. I turned around and then I leaped up the stairway, two steps at a time, as quickly as any nimble creature. In my hand was a glowing magical sword, all of diamond, dribbling particles of dangerous magics.

The group of ready warriors building the mills stood ready, each with a weapon of fair ability. They were surprised by this turn of events, not by me coming up the stairway.

"Your piddling chests of materials are no match for the wizardry of our village thaumaturge," I announced. "The entirety of this site, all of its materials, all of the tools used here, and your weapons, clothing, armor, foods and petty trinkets would fit in just one of his chests!"

There were two glimmers of surprise, I saw. My words cut these men down to normal worldly description in the eyes of a warrior. They were unused to having their feet held to the fire of my inquiry.

"The only item of value here is you!" I shouted, sheathing my sword, and with that action it vanished from view. "It is your worthiness, your dedication and determination which give any value to this piece of a bygone world! That is what I came here to descry, to see if ye are worthy additions to my little hamlet of unobtrusive survivors."

"What if we say nay, to being townsfolk?" Ben inquired saucily. "We have here a gathering of equals and betters, larger than your hamlet has. We may be of a mind to mind our own business, but to remain at your wall, for this is where the will of Our Lord made clear by the Spirit for us to do."

"Then welcome to the neighborhood—neighbor," I bowed slightly.

"What plans, if any, do you have for neighbors, such as trade, business, life and the like?" Ben asked.

"The latest plan is for us to plumb the harbor depths, make ways and means for trade and expansion," I answered with quiet words. "There is one other matter, though, in which you may be interested."

Ben waited, arching an eyebrow in question.

"This area, from yon north lane to the river east and beyond, to the nearest islet on isthmus, was named in a town expansion plan."

"Here?" Ben demanded with sharpening tone. "Your town made plans to expand at this site?"

"Why, yes, we did," I spoke with stately patience. "The name of the expansion is Miller's Grant. It was drawn up on the first day of your construction work—before Lars said anything to us about this place."

"How far did this granted land extend, to west and east?" Ben wondered with the slightest of chagrin at being surprised.

"From beyond Miller Lake to that isthmus, beyond the nearest waterway to the east," I described. "It was clear that your works would need access far beyond this locale, therefore we named two roads after your works: Ascension and Descent, for this mill's receiving area. Those connect to the waterfront and thence to North Mill Lane, and back along Mill Creek, under our north bridge."

The layout seemed thoughtful, as I described it, but Ben seemed not to approve of agreement. Eyes of several of the men sought his, and with a look away to the east the question became clear.

"What of connecting a road to the regional main route, over to the east?" Ben asked me. "Why all these paltry little avenues yet you avoid linking to the main way, between north and south?"

"The same regional route that I traveled, to rescue my dogs, and two horses, and fought monsters going and returning?" I replied icily. "There is no favor from that route that profits this village sufficient to justify the risk."

"Hah, ye do defend your own, townsman," Ben stated with calm appraisal. "The kennel, at Derringer, seems quite stable, and your animals yet live."

Lars must have identified the kennel, for the miller's party. This informed me of which direction the troupe of workers had traveled.

"We visited that judgment area, to witness the Spirit's handiwork," Ben stated as a fact. "When I say visited, I mean that we each were gathered together, there, from various points, the same as your nephew. Lars was hit hardest by a memory of this world having gone into nonexistence, for his father died there, in battle with monsters. Died, and did not return, nor find resurrection to some other trade, as has been done with us."

With care not to scowl nor give evidence of my feelings, I said nothing. It was news that the vanishing of Bogusville would hurt anyone's feelings.

"You have not asked why we return to the theme of Rome's architecture and the purpose of this place," Ben prodded.

"Lars is smitten with Rome, which is good enough reason," I said. "It came up, in discussion, that the gross output of this facility could feed hundreds or more, and that our village needs to be up to supplying its share."

"That may be the case," Ben agreed. "Your village has its purpose; we have our own. It is comforting to know that your group thought ahead to provide us with ways and means to supply harbor and overland freight. As for the purposes of this build, I do not know if it shall be used, ever, nor if it would supply for many hundreds or just for one."

"One?!" I exclaimed.

"Surely, Mayor Dodge, you have seen the haunts of nether and other realms, beyond this world?" Ben inquired. "There are greater things in this Earth than can be imagined by the likes of us. Greatness, however, does not infer that they know how to make flour, or to cook well."

A growing urge to hide my face in my hands took hold. I did so, and rubbed my palms over my face. In so doing, I tried to consider taking hold of the outlook of the miller.

"Let us reason in reverse, for a moment, Mister Miller," I suggested.

"Reverse of what?" Ben wondered.

"What if we are the instigating factor, not the support factor?" I asked. "What if it is your works and our own that generates change to this region? What if we seek to achieve that goal without waiting for others to find us useful?"

"Advertise our presence?" the thought came to the miller of its own accord.

"Publicize, send samples away to that regional route, set up markets for the exchange with other regions, and more," I expanded the idea.

"Make profit?" now Ben was intrigued. "What need have we, each or together, of anything others may have?"

"Need? No, not that!" I laughed. "Am I alone waiting on the lead of the Spirit to determine what to do? Have I not seen the need, in your presence and works, with my eyes? Even if you are spirited away to another calling does not change the functionality of these devices of your creation."

"You fairly cursed exchange with that regional route, just moments ago," Ben pointed out.

"I cursed making road to that route," I disagreed. "I see no reason to let that regional route be unused. There are other ways to transport goods than by building a road to that place."

The shrewdness of my suggestion clearly gained close consideration from the unusually silent audience. I waited for a reason to continue.

"Anyone can build a road, from that route to here," Ben mentioned. "If trade with this village becomes popular, they will make such a road."

"If the output of your people and mine is already set out for trade at the route, why then would anybody build a road away from there, to here?" I asked.

"Again, Mayor, what do we seek in trade?" Ben persisted.

"Do you not see the judgment region, in need of food?" I retorted. "Is it uninhabited? Are there no people pleading with Our Lord for food which they cannot supply on their own? What will we learn from a grateful people, to enhance the knowledge that is handed to our descendants and kinds?"

I turned away, leaving that meeting with the miller's band. We had laid grounds for proceeding in a new direction. Bogusville had become a place of value in the esteem of the millers. That happened because Lars was part of the miller's party, and the Spirit had shown them the consequence of being removed from among a land under judgment. The sword of the Spirit that severed them from the land under judgment had not cut off their history. The rescued became morally bound to feed the hungry because their conscripted mission was set out to produce enough bread to feed an army.

"Mayor!" the miller called to halt my exit.

Slowing at the stairway's end, I turned to listen.

"Your ranches can supply so much!" Ben stated the issue of interest. "Why do you not supply the food for that region, yet we come to make bread and cakes, to feed the hungry? This is not logical!"

"Logic?!" my voice carried when it had not done so, earlier. "The vast majority of food stock vanishes when the external shell is taken! One part in twenty is for consumption, but nineteen parts disappear. Vegetarian food suffers no such loss!"

We could not see one another, but we heard what was needful.

"Then how!" Ben demanded, coming down the stairway, into view. "How is it that you can feed ten groups of this size, without much effort? That was your claim, stated to my party."

"Do you mean how can we feed so many engineers, builders, millers, wrights, and assistants—but not feed the judgment region?" I reworded the question to expose its real purpose.

"Yes, that is what I mean, also," the miller agreed.

"Because we are taken away, after proving that we could supply such quantity of livestock," I explained. "Not steaks, but living animals, whole herds of them, to cover the frozen land. That is what was removed from their midst, Miller. We are just people, but our capacity to feed that land was removed. Here, we can feed your kinds—conscripted servants of Our Lord and King, but there?"

The miller stood his ground. Perhaps he saw me as a carefuller adventurer than had been described.

"The Spirit allowed you take animals from there, to here," Ben pointed out. "The cost was high, but not only for you. We were shown the devastating effect of Lars having lost his father and his home."

I waited. There was more to what the miller was saying than I discerned.

"If you had not gone to their rescue, the dogs and horse would have remained, when Lars beheld emptiness," Ben reasoned. "He would have seen them, and had no choice other than to leave them. You have entrusted nobody with ability to rescue your beloved animals."

"You are the third man to remind me about that fact," I said with some resignation. "Apparently, I should do something about it. Still, I thank Our Lord that they were gone before you arrived."

Ben came closer, looking at me, trying sincerely to make out my meaning.

"Tell me this, if you can..." I continued. "When you left that place, did you march here, battling through mobs of monsters? Or did you walk undisturbed, without a fight, and so your men are armed but scarcely attacked or suffering grievous harm?"

"Conscripts do not suffer the same as others," Ben admitted. "How we travel is by the Spirit."

"Then your question about my duties has been answered," I surmised. "You are to build this behemoth milling site, then be on your way until the Spirit releases you to a fitting calling. Lars may remain, ascending from mason to millwright, but my townsfolk are to do the remainder. They will be the bakers and chefs, dray drivers and dockside trade managers."

"Perhaps," Ben admitted. "Perhaps also some of my party will find their calling to become townsfolk, as you invited us to do."

"That seems the more likely scenario, in my opinion," I agreed. "We shall be very busy, in town. I cannot foresee much, but I also cannot imagine that this great work shall remain free from fussy skirts and toys laying underfoot. We may be the first spirited here—yours and mine—but this is only just the start of greater things."

"Truly," the miller said thoughtfully. "My men have discussed that very thing. It is a presumption, we decided, that whatever we now do is assumed to be of use during this year. Did you forget that this is but one of many such places which we are assigned to build?"

"I remember, but I also recall that Lars training included not being the first class of trainees, nor the last," I replied. "Bear with me, one moment, while I restate what will be the path of this age.

"There will be thousands of builders, and not a few like these here, for the whole world will one day rebel against Our Lord and King," I began. "Those armies which turn against him shall come from farm and field, a great multitude, and they shall require food by the hundreds of shiploads. It is written.

"Between now and that time, just five years into Our King's reign, we are barely the forerunners of millions who will become our inheritors," my tale for the miller continued, "Many of our descendants will rebel against Our Lord. We will perish while they promise to remain faithful, but we already know what has been written about that time.

"My question remains," I reminded the miller, "what can we learn from the grateful people suffering judgment under their leaders, which we pass on to our generations?"

The miller looked at me with a strange expression. I do not know what his thoughts were, but something changed about his demeanor.

We parted ways, neither saying more about the complex matter of guesswork in the offing. Bogusville survived by tenacity, using guesswork to prepare for what was foreseeable and predictable. Millwrights apparently needed none of that, for their work was conscripted, their duties ordained, their progress led by the Holy Spirit. Again, I must deal with the realities of being largely mortal while placed in proximity to largely immortal persons. They cannot see nor think with hearts as desperate for fulfillment as mortals must suffer each day.

It had been unmerciful for me to jab at the miller's descendants, but he needed to awaken from the self-aggrandizing stupor of conscription. Conscripts held that their calling was holy and righteous service of god and man, but their folly was faith so pure that they held it a sin to plan ahead. The world abounded in wealth and foods beyond containment, but yet the conscripts gloriously claimed that their works would feed whole armies. Those whole armies would not exist until the end of this age; a fact which was written before the foundation of the world, but which these conscripts seemed not to have read.

Lacking a Town Tome, the written Word did not travel in the backpacks of conscripts. Lars was without excuse for falling under the spell of conscription, for Cortez had read the Word and trained his son. Lars declared that it was his calling to masonry, and artful design, but that his conscription was merely training to fulfill his duty.

I admitted that Lars seemed to be cut from the same cloth as Manger, and not as the conscripts, but I did not know them well. Perhaps there were different levels of conscription and dedication which the Spirit discerned appropriate for one and not for another.

Returning to town, I relieved Bob from oversight. There remained many duties and changes for me to outline, investigate, clarify, and map out. Such things needed attention to detail before calling a meeting.

"Balmy!" I hailed the mage, who had just stepped onto his secondary porch, out above the lower story of his home.

"Hail, Mayor!" the thaumaturge replied, turning away and climbing an isolated stair to a locked spire.

Balmy's spire, at the southeastern corner of his home, rose halfway up from the second story. The detached containment facility held nothing other than a cot, as far as I could see from the watchtower vantage. The spire seemed for all the world like a prisoner's chamber, but without a prisoner.

I noted that Balmy locked the door as he entered the spire from the outside stair. This was no secret, nor that he spent hours alone in that chamber of solitude. Nobody yet surmised the true purposes of being locked away from the world, but yet remaining within the sanctuary of town. Apparently the mage had issues to resolve which required such a place. It stood partly above the house and away from the dungeon which held his portal to the nether.

I had ventured within Balmy's maze, and it wasn't pretty. The nether chamber had three trapdoor access covers, besides the upper room one-way door. Why the mage had a cot beside the nether portal was another mystery, since things from the other side could come through the portal at any moment. The walls reeked of dungeon dankness, as if transplanted from some dangerous part of the worldly domain. Great powers had somehow cracked the stone bricks during their tenure, for whatever reason.

Taken together, as a whole, the thaumaturge had earned respect, or at least a certain wariness. Balmy once shouted that he was not a sorcerer, nor a mage, nor even the apprentice of such people. His esteem of his knowledge and ways was so low that none of us dared to ask what greater beings he had found in his adventures.

Manger's adventure resurrected Balmy's eagerness to discover mysteries. I saw that the desire had never departed but had been muted by our boring lives. It was similar to Juice's anxious examination of Manger's artifacts. Even our apothecary was excited by the news of dangerous changes coming upon this region, if not upon the whole world.

Derringer had asked me about the terrible evils which had brought about the fall of several towns and places. He appeared to be exceptionally well armored and capable beyond normal needs. I knew nothing of those places, and neither did the miller's crew make mention of such dangers. Conscripts truly seemed to care nothing about other people, yet here I was uncaring about fallen villages and towns within a few day's journey.

Without further delay, I commissioned Balmy to armor and breed the horses and to breed dray animals. Bob could well hatch colts but not donkeys, nor breed up the mules for fast service. Bob would be best kept busy expanding farmland and stock. Juice was too caught up in making dreadful potions for me to disturb, but his adventuring time was nearing at an obvious pace. Manger had proven his mettle, yet I wondered whether tasking the mason with a great project was just the ticket to strengthen his spirit to greater heights.

Hrothgar, the watchman, needed no urging to battle. Neither did he waste away days without forging greater weapons and tools for Balmy to enchant. Still, the truth was that Hrothgar wanted to journey through the dark forest, dispatching any and all minions of The Foe. His spirit was willing, but although his stature was greater than any of our kind he was not nearly so strong nor energetic that he could withstand witches. The potions of those evil minions slew or weakened greater men than Hrothgar, and he was not fit to survive a long fight with those evil enchanters.

Another project that needed to be addressed was the creation of a foundry for recovery of article essences. The recovery efforts of Balmy were too paltry and we would require a greater mass of castoff goods. To salvage gold from gold, iron from iron, and enchantment from enchanted would be a boon to our capabilities. Whether the source material fell from friend or from foe, the output could be turned to advance our kinds.

I functioned as the village smithy, also, and thus the duty to transform or repair basic castoff goods was mine alone. Neither was I weak, but my comparably greater age demanded attention. Children borne into this age would never suffer the infirmity which the advent of Our Lord relented from my body and mind. Still, it was a fact that my spritely behavior was not equal to that of Derringer, who was half my age and yet easily twice my capability. I knew without discussion that my kind would pass away. Younger and mightier adventurers would stride across the regions, rising as great oak trees above elders withering away in their shadows.

Still, duty called me to be more, do more, and to prepare the better. The way ahead lay hidden in the perennial fog at vision's edge. All the world was constrained to do and to contend with what was within their domains. My vision of the end of times showed no such barrier of expanses. Man and monster and demon would see across the world without hindrance...gathering together thereupon for the great march against that holy city, of Our Lord and King.

Even as I knew that my knowledge would die in my grave, unbelieved by many of my descendants, duty called me to prepare their way. They would disbelieve even the hint that they would turn against Our Lord. Thus, they might labor faithfully for nine centuries and bear many faithful generations before that dark and fateful time. To them, and to the people of this day, I owed allegiance and action upon foresight.

Nearer to day's dusk, I left the watch to find our mason. He was busily taking all that he had once known and reconfiguring his storage and tools. New realities demanded changed behavior to take command of matters. I seated my dogs outside of our mason's door, for his shop was too small for several canines inside with us.

"In what manner did you descry the location of town, from down in the caverns and ways of the deep?" I inquired.

"Eh?" Manger was shaken from his reverie and works. "What did you say?"

"How did you know whence to ascend, into these buildings?" I repeated. "From darkness and echoes, without landmark nor marker, you arose to within stone's throw of your workbench. How did that occur?"

"It wasn't easy!" Manger scowled. "Of all the questions, you have shown almost no interest in what lay far below, but want to know how I came up to air!"

"So, I do," I agreed.

"It's by witchery!" Manger spat. "There are more blocks, Mayor Dodge, of kinds I do not know! They are seen, and appear glowing and even gold! Great gold blocks, solid and without dirt or stone! And diamond, too! Solid and pure, made of any nine the best of my collection—but they are not real!"

"So?" I shrugged. "What has that to do with finding this town?"

"Smithy!" Manger snapped. "Have you no value for purest ores?!"

"I value an answer to my question," was my response.

"Before I lost the last of my kindling, I struck it at the dirt, thinking to plant it in the dark, as if by miracle it might sprout as a tree," Manger replied. "I was not without light of any kind, but had found a lode of redstone, to kick."

"Kicking redstone helps your feet?" I wondered.

"It lights one's way, but not brightly, nor for long, as it fades," Manger said. "The fact is that there is much redstone in the lowest places, and I traveled away from lava by touching upon it. A great many things were slain, before the last world's end, Mayor. Many, many things which never saw the light of day!"

"Move on with your answer," I interrupted the mason.

"When no more redstone was near, I used a torch," Manger continued. "From that point, I ran back and forward, touching the ore and then reaching to the end of the torchlight to find more."

"And?" I prodded.

"And that stick, which I stuck into ancient dry dirt, caused the cursed blocks of purest kinds to show up!" Manger growled. "They showed, but only for a while, much like the redstone ore glowed and then faded. Always, they came in a line or in a corner, like so."

I watched the mason arrange three blocks in a corner fashion. He then placed two more blocks, equidistant, along either axis.

"This is the diamond block," Manger pointed to the corner block. "These others are gold at the corner, and sometimes gold far away, but sometimes they look like that strange glowing crystal which Balmy brought from the nether land."

"Those lit your way?"

"No, they showed, and they seemed bright, but they lit nothing else!" Manger stated with exasperation. "I did this, several times, and then I stepped off the distance. Finally, I guessed that this stayed in place because it was a corner of some kind. At first, I thought that the Spirit showed me its intent for me to build at this corner, and along those sides."

"What changed your mind?" I asked.

"The next corner made me see," Manger admitted. "Off in a tunnel, around and twisting it went, and then there were parts of the tunnel floor fallen away. That was a danger, of falling, but as I walked I also dug up ores. Digging out ores at one such place, I looked down and saw the place where I had been, a few hours earlier. The glow from lava, far down that way, showed that it was true. I had traveled in a circle, returning above whence I began."

"That must have been frustrating, I suppose," I remarked.

"It was, but then it was also a relief!" Manger said with a smile. "Finally, I had traveled for a while and knew where I was, relative to that corner! Little did I know that the corner was not down below me."

"It moved, to be where you were?"

"No, it stayed there, but it was not just there, Dodge," Manger was excited. "It was also all of the way up!"

"So that corner was down below, and you arrived back at it, above it, and found another part of the corner?"

"No, it does not exist!" Manger cackled a mirthless laugh. "None of those blocks exist, but they are real! They show when I use stick or spade within a boundary of those signs! Being above the lower place, when I struck stone again, those blocks showed in the higher tunnel, directly above the other place. In my mind, I finally saw that they went clear to the surface! That was their purpose—to show the outline of the town's expanse!"

If this were true then such things would show constraints or boundaries of our works. It might also show the same boundaries of other works.

Manger and I set out to the town's south, the nearest gateway. Each of us took a stick among our usual sets of tools and weapons. We paused beyond the wall, at the top of the slope to the bench upon which Bogusville stood. I loosed the dogs to roam and to watch our for us.

"Do the honors," I said.

Manger touched the soil, whereupon gold blocks, ten meters apart, appeared beyond the south road. They stretched east and west to the corners of similar distance from the slope's foot. There, as described, I beheld blocks of pure diamond blue. I touched my stick to the wall.

"Behold!" Manger cried out a warning, pointing his stick at the ground in front of our feet.

Leaping sideways, sword coming to hand, I spun into a crouch at the ready. In front of Manger's feet, upon the very soil, I beheld writing in Spirit script.

"Why did you not warn of this witchery!?" I demanded.

"It was unseen, in the deep!" Manger gasped. "Surely, it was there, but I did not see it in the darkness...yet I ought. It glows green, like weakening potion which Juice concocts. It is not the magenta of Balmy's enchantments."

"You see Balmy's enchantments, in Spirit script?" I was astonished. "You did not see such things before, either of Balmy or of Juice."

"Before?" Manger blinked.

"Before your return from the balmy deep!" I snorted. "What other witchery clings to you, adventurer?"

Manger looked again at the writing, but now it faded from view. We looked at the unreal boundary blocks, and they too faded away.

"Perhaps this is due to us both touching stick upon this land," Manger said.

I stood away, nodding for our mason to touch a stick to ground again. The same result came about.

"Very well, then it is not a danger, but a sign," I surmised.

"Are we constrained to build within these boundaries?" he wondered aloud.

We went to the marker blocks, and then touched stick to ground beyond that line. Turning about, we looked up to the watchtower, seeing Hrothgar watching us from on high. Our efforts had gained more attention, for each member of our town either stood upon the walls or approached our location. The very air about us seemed to thicken, presaging rain and shadows.

"Darkness falls!" Balmy sang out, from atop the gateway. "Hurry!"

I would say that we hurried, but more accurately we floundered. Great gushing rain bolted down from the darkness which thickened into a mouth-gaping cloudburst. Manger and I helped each other up the slope, and thankfully grasped poles extended to help us up.

The townsfolk wanted to bolt indoors, out of the deluge. The uncanny quickness of rain and descending darkness warned us to take careful steps.

"To the armory!" I shouted, not discussing anything in the roaring downpour.

"One moment!" our mason warned, pulling from his backpack three half-slabs of stone. "Now!"

Pushing Manger to the lead, we slogged over to the armory. At the door, before opening it inward, the mason laid the half-slabs across the way. They fit into a U shape, and blocked water from running into the armory.

Entering the small bunker which was the foundation of the watchtower, we all shook off our sodden clothing. Armor had saved me much of the swamping, for my helm, chestplate, and leggings had shed much water. My boots however had not saved my footings from being drenched, for the boots were not sealed.

The dogs wandered in the flooding rain, on guard for skeletons, which they attacked without delay. I heard them shaking off water and giving occasional barks of reassurance to each other.

The men took off clothing as I fired up the armory's stove. Clothing would be dried prior to going outside. The armory served also as a hardware and tool storage. Thus its chests held needful things for repairs, construction, and for battle.

Refuge in the armory was the purpose of our practiced response. Five years of survival and calamity had taught us to make way to the armory whenever the man on watch called out a warning.

"What is this!?" Bob demanded loudly, over the roar of the downpour. "What omen did you two trigger upon our heads?"

"Dress for battle!" I yelled back. "This is a presage of what awaits the workers which Lars said are on the way here!"

Unusual silence and somewhat sullen looks greeted my statement. Four men stood in their undergarments, donning dry apparel and untried armor. They had been caught unprepared, without heavy armor and with few weapons. I stood in a tight space, fully armored, armed, and prepared for what came, thus it may seem that I expected calamity to fall.

This was my habit, at whatever task, journey, or duty I fulfilled. It had once been the norm for each townsfolk, but time had enabled overconfidence.

"What about Hrothgar?" Balmy asked loudly.

"His arrows are useless, in this!" I replied. "He cannot see the walls, nor gates, and all torches not under cover are extinguished! Hrothgar must defend his lookout from whatever comes. We cannot see to move about and there is no internal access up to the tower."

"I say, we shall have to build siege rooms, like this, at the four corners, and at each gate!" Manger suggested. "We cannot always be near here if these rapid downpours come without warning!"

"Your hounds are weakening!" Bob called a warning. "The cold in the water are sapping their strength!"

Now, for once, everyone stared at the rancher. We knew that he knew what our animals experienced. More than that, though, factors about the environment had never effected animals so rapidly before this moment.

"What of the livestock!" Juice inquired. "Are things changed?!"

"And the villagers!" Balmy interjected.

"Nay, the hounds alone stand in the rain!" Bob gave a small smile. "Did you not know that efforts and battles and cold sapped their strength? It always has been thus!"

"Manger, can you open a window, opposite the door, so that I may feed dogs, or at least let them in for warmth?" I asked.

"Me? You can that, as well as anyone!" Manger laughed.

I moved through the tight confines of the armory, standing ready at the only door. If making a window opposite the door drew monsters to that opening, the dogs would not attack until something attacked us. That was their major weakness, for only if we attacked or were attacked would they leap into the fray. Except for skeletons, of course.

Three of the men glanced at me, then at Manger. The looks spoke well that my request made sense without explanation.

"What is your plan?" Juice inquired. "To the villies?"

"I should see to those!" Balmy interrupted. "My study time, in the spire, taught me something new! I want to try it, and now is a good time!"

"Now? Now is good?" I asked, perplexed. "Now is the worst of times to risk your neck for this!"

"Bah!" Balmy waved a vial of Juice's potions. "I can see perfectly well! Hrothgar also carries these, for vision at night!"

I nodded reluctantly. Most of us carried a few potions, just in case. This was just in case.

"We need to shrink the gateway opening to two meters!" Balmy stated. "There is a good reason, but trust me on this!"

"It is two meters, inside here!" I pointed out. "Whatever you do, this is that height!"

"You must go!" Bob shouted. "Feed your dogs!"

Not waiting for further discussion, conceding that Balmy should do as he wants, I nodded to the door. Without further delay, I took a swig from Balmy's jug, and dropped it upon the startled mage's feet.

The night vision potion rapidly swelled my pupils and yet it changed objects into bright reds and unusual colors. Everyone in the tight confines of the armory got a whiff of it, but Balmy was blanketed in fumes from the broken vial.

I flung open the door and thrust high with my sword. A dog stood in my way, and thus my sword stabbed above it, on purpose, and I lunged outward.

The dogs were on high alert, knowing that I was moving out on the attack by stabbing at things. Still, until I connected with something, they would not spring to the attack. Or unless something attacked me.

Clearing the way across the street for Balmy, I advanced to the repaired fence around the villagers. The dogs spread out, in all directions, watching without seeing much in the pouring rain.

"Can you climb over?!" I hollered, watching Balmy, and I saw that he changed direction away from the fence.

I glance upward, into the downpour, just to see if I could make out Hrothgar. In the pouring rain I could not even see the third floor of the tower, much less the top of it. The watchman would have to survive this without our aid, for the moment.

Taking advantage of the momentary lull, I grabbed meat from my pack and got to each of the dogs. I fed them, watching their drooping tails picking up. Food helped a beings spirit to lift, and I was glad for Bob's warning.

"Stand away!" Balmy called out, but I scarcely heard his words. He sloshed in calf-deep water that pushed against the door of the decorations hut.

From what I could make out, Balmy was stacking up blocks of some sort. He attached other blocks to either side of the upper block, forming a T shape. Just as he was about to add a higher block, his dilemma increased. It was too tall for him to accomplish. He needed a step up.

"The planter!" I called, pointing to a planter at each corner of the hut. "Use the planter!"

Thwack!

An arrow ricocheted off from my helmet. I spun around, stepped sideways, and looked for the attacker! The night vision potion was wearing off!

A yell from above got my attention for just a moment. I kept moving, waiting for another arrow to come and betray the archer's position. All that I knew was that the archer was not in the direction of Balmy, where I had been looking when the arrow hit me.

Keeping my back towards Balmy, I sidled around the tower. My dogs likewise were on alert, searching for the enemy. That told me that the archer was not very near, and probably above the water.

Ping! Clang!

Two more arrows hit, and one of them stuck out of my right shoulder plate. The other ricocheted away, but now there were two archers attacking. A dog ran past me, heading towards the north gate. That was the direction of my right shoulder.

Moving ahead, putting the tower between me and the north gate, and whistled to get the dogs' attention. They would not come to me, but would orbit my new position, searching for the other archer.

The ground shook! Something beastly trod the town's streets! I heard the thud stomp even though the water was calf-deep.

"It works!" Balmy crowed happily.

I risked a glance towards him, but I could no longer see. Only darkness and hard roaring rain filled my awareness.

Thok!

An arrow slammed into my chestplate, knocking me backward! It thrust home, sticking into my chest through the armor!

My hands searched my backpack for a familiar vial, but found only some items in place where I always secured them. The ties were loosened, swelling in water, and the oilskin covering was no longer keeping items dry.

Floundering now, on my back in the rising flood, I rolled away. Getting to my hands and knees, I heard a bark, and then another. My dogs were returning, apparently successful at killing the archers or driving them away. I heard one of them whining, as injured.

The pouring rain vanished, tapering away to a drizzle!

"Balmy!" I yelled. "Can you see?"

"No!" he responded. "It's okay! We have two golems on patrol!"

The news of golems inside of the town's walls did not reassure me. Thudding great footsteps came near, then stopped.

"Balmy!" Hrothgar's deep voice rang out. "What is that thing?!"

"It's a golem!" Balmy replied cheerily as he lit a torch. "Those will protect the villagers, from all attackers! No zombie can come near to them!"

In the flickering torchlight, I pulled out the arrow whose tip was cutting into my chest. Still upon my knees, now awash in water up to my pockets, I looked over my dogs. The injured one held away from me, over at the corner of the armory, as if apologizing for being hurt. It was too dark for me to make out the injury, at any distance, but I did not see an arrow. Perhaps the arrow had gone through without mortal injury.

"You need aid, as does your hound," Balmy stated, coming closer through the running waters. "We are not done with this night, but just beginning."

"They must be above us!" I growled hotly. "They cannot spawn in waters! They are on the rooftops, and in second story arches!"

We both turned as I rose to my feet. Flaming arrows were shooting out of the tower's third story. Hrothgar had found his range, and the rains did not snuff out his arrows.

"Another thing!" Balmy chortled as he led the way over to the armory. "We each must secure lighting in our quarters and quadrants that will not go out!"

"Yea, and doorways above the flood!" I agreed, going past the armory to kneel at my injured pooch. With a bowed head in thanks to Our Lord and King, I gave aid to the wounded animal.

"You have too few of those, for the town's good," Balmy mentioned, standing at the armory doorway, looking around with his torch held high.

"Not I, but you!" was my quick reply. "Each of you are unguarded, whether or not I give you permissions to aid and feed my dogs. They exist in bonds to me, but none of you have guardians."

"Would you have two dozen hounds patrolling the streets?" Balmy laughed. "We need only have a villager encased at each corner, and the golems will patrol to keep them safe."

"Like it kept me safe, just now?" shaking my head said no. "They are dogs for the villagers, but only when attacked or when a zombie comes near. That one did nothing to guard me, nor to find the archers that attacked me."

Balmy's silence admitted the truth.

"For each monster there is an anti-dote, as Cortez learned," I said. "Cats deter bangers. Dogs attack skeletons. Now, golems defend primarily against zombies, but we do not venture forth with cats and golems on leashes. Dogs alone bond to your lives, attacking whatever you attack or that which attacks you. The lone exception is that they never attack bangers, for which I lost two of the brutes in running battles."

Not one of the men argued against the logic. It was increasingly a deadly world in which we lived.

"I have too few townsfolk to risk losing you!" I emphasized, opening the door to the armory. "Any one of you is too much to lose. We already lack a carpenter, and decorator, a dedicated cook, a farmer, and others. We talked about this, after Cortez was killed. I have offered housing to the miller's party."

"That's about time," Juice and Bob said, together.

"Were it feasible, I would move this town to Derringer!" I continued, ignoring the interruption. "That would be so that he might teach us to be as formidable as he has become. Greater evils are loosed to draw men down to unbelief against Our Lord."

The statement brought a moment's pause. The men looked to me, to explain what I had just said.

"The end of this age is not the only rebellion," I said. "We saw that it happened, where Bogusville was translated away. That is minor rebellion, perhaps, but we lost focus on the written Word. It said that many nations would suffer drought and other judgments because of leaders refusing to worship in Our Lord in truth, and refusing tithes, and honors, and to enforce his decrees.

"My offer, to the miller's group, included supplying them food and more," I kept on speaking. "That is in order that they may labor to feed the suffering peoples of those downcast leaders. We should not feed the judgment people because we already were withdrawn. We are prepared to flood the locales with livestock, but we were withdrawn. The millers are conscripted, which is not the same as the Spirit withdrawing them from action, but perhaps it is. I do not know."

"It surely seems withdrawn," Juice stated. "Conscripts are withdrawn in order to do dedicated works for Our Lord and King. They cannot be turned aside, lest we incur judgment for doing so."

The apothecary's warning hung in the wet air.

"Do you think that is cause for what is now happening?" I asked.

I shed my chestplate in order to bare the arrow's wound. Pulling aside my under tunic, I saw the flesh healing but my health was not restored. Standing still, I let Juice apply salve and give me potion to drink.

"Another thing!" Balmy repeated, somewhat belatedly. "We need diamonds! Lots of diamonds!"

"Because?" Manger stared directly at the thaumaturge.

"Armor! This paltry iron armor would not have defended our mayor!" Balmy put a hand to his own armor, which he had gained from the armory chests. "That arrow is a perfect example. It pierced his diamond chestplate! Others did not, but what if he had worn this iron armor, instead of his enchanted armor? Right now, we would be appointing a new mayor."

There, another truth was laid bare. The battlefield realities escalated, even while we talked about such things.

My armor, which was all encased in enchanted diamond, had served me well on the trip to regain my dogs. I had suffered minor injuries. Several times I had come close to being mobbed by monsters, but the dogs had rallied to me. The fact was that my armor survived three days and nights of battles. The certainty, now, was that the weapons of the foe were escalating.

"How much of this escalation is because of dogs?" I asked. "You want to know, as do I, but what would we have done without them, tonight?"

"I am more concerned with the seasonal weather, right now, than about your dogs attracting trouble," Balmy stated.

"You say weather, as if this will repeat," I responded.

"This is seasonal, meaning that we are not in a stable region," Balmy explained his reasoning. "All regions are fixed climates, always following patterns by day and week, but this seems different. Except for judgment, the weather pattern should be cyclical, unchanging. For nine days, we had daily and nightly rains, except for twice. Now, we have a downpour unlike anything outside of a jungle climate."

"Are we incurring judgment?" Bob asked. "That is the first question, Mayor Dodge, is whether this region or this town is under judgment?"

"Agreed," I said, to both men. "Let us pray."

The attitude of prayer always began with being penitent. Without repentance there would be no actual prayer, but a pretense. Having lived for years on the edge of a judgment zone, we six had reason to stay penitent lest the judgment spread into our lives. Prayer was almost as constant as being thankful for every mercy and blessing and correction.

Tonight's prayer brought five of us together, and promptly we left the armory and went up to Hrothgar. Restarting our communion, with all six of us, and the dogs on watch all around, we became penitent and sought guidance from Our Lord and King.

The downpours renewed, unrelenting, for at least an hour, and then faded again. We stayed constant, in prayer.

For the remainder of the night, until after the sun should have risen, we stayed in prayerful waiting. The monsoons renewed, faded, and renewed again. By mid-morning, waters surrounded Bogusville unto the horizons. Forests and hills stood out of the water. The flat watery expanse warmed in the noon sunlight.

"Well, would you look at that?" Manger said, and he pointed down to the north gate. "Remember that sinkhole that swallowed me, one week ago? It's acting like a great drain hole, in a sink!"

"That is happening, more or less everywhere," Juice intoned. "There could be hundreds of such open caves, particularly in the low hills, where waters have never flooded."

"Open—now," Manger responded. "The dirt covering the mouths of caves will be washed away, swallowed into their gullets."

"Wow!" Bob gasped, pointing over towards the north of Westmount. "What has become of the lake, for the milling works?"

"Good heavens," Manger said quietly. "The northern wall must have given way, and it washed down around north of that rise, taking all the dirt and trees in its path."

I watched silently as our group walked around the high watchtower and looked over the flood damages. Westmount had shed its waters in all directions, but we had no vantage point to see the brunt of damages to its west. The Mill Creek was no longer fed by the reservoir, but only by receding waters draining from the lands nearby.

"Our bridge, over Mill Creek, stands still," Hrothgar mentioned. "That is a bit of wonder, for all the water in the town walls exited through the two gateways, north and south. We have no drainage system, for it wasn't needed until now, but I suspect that the southward embankment is much damaged."

"So is the west," Balmy stated, looking past his house. "That mountainside had to have washed clean away, between Westmount and our town's farm. See all that barren stone? It was covered with soil and a few trees, yesterday."

"Look, at the lowest milling house!" Bob said worriedly. "There is a stream of mud, coming from that lowest doorway, covering the road apron."

I went down to the fourth floor, and then lower, until I could reasonably make out almost every nook and cranny of our town. Predictably, there were mobs springing into existence, lacking anywhere else to be.

"Hrothgar, your watch is over!" I called up the stairwell.

"Nay! I could not count heads, this day!" Hrothgar roared with laughter. "Ye had me distracted, with praying and repenting! I know not where the working men have gone!"

"Let's go," I said. "I shall find out if my guests, at the inn, slept well."

"Go?" Balmy called down. "Go where? Our shops are secure, but unused, and we need affix torches and lights, but the water has swept our town cleaner than before. It is too swamped for us to go beyond the walls!"

"Suit yourself, then," I said.

Ignoring the others, I walked down to the street and set about clearing monsters from our town. My dogs were more than eager to take several bites out of the intruding monsters. I focused on entirely killing any bangers, but the other mobs I either hit in passing or shot with an arrow, and the dogs finished the job.

When I went around the inn, it seemed that mobs had disappeared. Under the archway, no mobs lurked, but then I discovered that the east door was open. The monsters gained access into the lower two rooms on the east. Going inside, I discovered more than a few monsters. The torches were gone, leaving two large dark rooms and a dark hallway for monsters to spawn. Try as I might, the mob of monsters pushed me back out the entry door.

"Troubles, Mayor?" Lars asked, coming out of the main door.

"You have the day off?" I responded, kicking another monster back and killing it with my sword.

Most of my dogs were busy inside, killing the monsters that had attacked me. In a minute, there should be room to fight my back into the rooms.

"That is strange," Lars commented, searching about with a sword in hand. "The engineers and helpers took off to fix a breach at the reservoir. Then another of the monsoons came. The last monsoon cloudburst."

My question went unanswered. I reopened the door, stabbing in high, and a small zombie villager came running out under my thrust.

Lars tagged the little attacker with a nice downward slash. He did it again, as soon as the creature came upright after being knocked down. It died.

I placed torches onto the entry hall walls, lighting the way. The doors to both lower rooms stood open, and I heard several zombies milling about at the east end. They were trying to get at the villagers, one building over.

"Banger!" Lars called out, pulling me back as a banger came out from the right hand doorway.

"Together now!" I surged forward.

Lars and my swords slashed the creeper against the wall, pinning and killing it on the spot. I put torches into the room on the right, from whence it had come out.

"Closing in!" Lars called from the hallway. "I'll take the left!"

I heard the outside door close, as Lars had signaled. While I happily slashed at two zombies in this room, Lars apparently found more in the other room. Dogs came to me, for they were not bonded to Lars, nor would the help him.

"C'mere!" I whispered to my pets, and fed them overly much.

Within moments I had two puppies to feed and nourish. With that, I devoted two of the adults to Lars, and off they went.

"Hah!" Lars shouted with mixed irritation and surprise.

I laughed at the sounds of Lars' dogs taking over the slaying. My own quartet of canines, now two elders and two pups, circle about, wanting to find monsters.

"Lars!" I called out, sensing the completion of his work. "Have you noticed any belongings of the miller's party, in these rooms?"

"Nay!" he replied, after a moment. "We carry our purse and goods in packs, lest we not come back."

"Exactly so," I said easily, picking up dropped items from slain monsters as I crossed the hallway. "Therefore these monsters did not slay them during the last few moments before our arrival."

"Slay them?" Lars turned away from the fading corpses of the monsters. He got a spade and some articles of leather gear dropped by the losers.

"Do you suppose that they just left the doors open, both outside and at these rooms, when they departed?" I probed.

"No, of course not," Lars admitted, now becoming intrigued. "Neither did they call upon me to aid in repairs."

"Perhaps they could not call upon anyone, Mister Bricklayer."

Lars stood shaking his head, denying the possibility.

"Here," I passed over an iron ingot, to Lars. "The first drop of a mob, since the Spirit assigned you to this town. Now, save that rotten flesh, for your pack of dogs, as it is time for you to breed those two."

"Why?" Lars asked. "Why do you think that the miller's engineers are killed? Or that I have been tasked to Bogusville?"

"These rains," I answered, adding torches to room and hallway. "You said that your preparation was for building many such milling sites. Ben, the Miller, said the same thing. You said ten days time remained, but he spoke of finishing and leaving. I would guess that they have departed, one way or another."

Lars hurried to catch up, but feeding his new pup's health to fullness kept him busy by the inn. The dogs often would not stay still, demanding to be loose on the hunt.

"Let us say that you are both correct," I continued, walking around the archway and relighting torches. "Let us reason that the Spirit called the miller's party to do repairs, up at the reservoir. But for what? There are no supplies of grain with which to feed the milling machines, to make flour for bread and cakes. Even the nutritionist never set foot beyond those mills, to asses our gardens and fields for ingredients. Everything that is used to build those things came supplied by the Spirit, in those chests. True?"

"True," Lars admitted, watching his dogs search for foes.

"Then, for what purpose place the chests and milling work here, without using anything of this region, other than a manmade reservoir?" I prodded. "Miller was fine with teaching me to be the baker, the chef, the laborer, and whatever else came to mind...but he singled out you to become the millwright."

"Me!?" Lars was astonished.

"It was my idea to name you as millwright, but he did not deny it," I said. "Nor did any man in his company! You were held separate, and they held off from accepting my offer of citizenship, in Bogusville. You returned home; they denied belonging here."

"I am to be millwright?" Lars was still unable to believe the sudden change.

"There is another way for you to asses what happens," I explained. "These are just rainstorms, Lars."

"Hardly!" Lars laughed. "That was a flood, fit to sail great ships!"

"Aye, perhaps, but sail from where?" was the question.

"What? You're serious?" the new millwright asked.

"That rain is serious, but not fit for this locale," I observed. "It is normal for a different region entirely."

"Jungles!" Lars shouted in surprise. "The jungles have such monsoons!"

"Yea, that is so, therefore if these rains tested the fabric on workmanship, at that reservoir, what did it prove?" my smile spoke my opinion.

"That they are not ready to build flour mills in jungles, I guess," Lars admitted with some undefinable regret.

"Or mills for any other purpose, in monsoon regions," I nodded. "There was in that miller a geyser of pride, when we spoke. I'm of the mind that humility is better to chew upon than having to swallow it after crowing."

"Do you think that repairing the damages will shrink his pride?" Lars asked so quietly that his nervousness was plain.

"You are not betraying anyone by speaking honestly," I promised. "To your question, I will say this: If you repair and operate that milling industry, then five of us may be called to provide ways, means, grains, mules and packs."

"That is an awfully big labor to take upon the town, Uncle Dodge."

I nodded, but it was not as large of a commitment as the Spirit was already calling the townsfolk to perform . There was much more to be done, to achieve, and to sacrifice.

The way ahead was hidden in fog. Circumstances could be clues. Faith was the coin of trade, no matter the direction of progress.

Praying constantly, silent but for my own mind and the Spirit to hear, I went off to survey the extent of terrain changed by the flood.