Chapter ten

Hexen was right; Eothen was working hard. She was working from the moment she woke up, which was usually well before dawn, to the moment her head hit the pillow, which was well after midnight. She was exhausted. She didn't know how she was expected to keep up this pace, and she was fairly sure she wasn't actually capable of doing so. She had fought military campaigns that were less exhausting than this; at least on a military campaign, they couldn't keep fighting after dark.

:My troops did.: said Taia. :That was one of our best strategies – send in a small raiding group to create havoc in the enemy camp, take out as many as you can, get out before they woke up enough to be organized; and attack a different part of the camp every night, so they can't be really prepared. It was quite effective.:

:Don't tell the Valdemarans that, they'll start doing it.: Eothen said.

:We used it when I was commanding them, too, not just the Fire Eagles. Don't tell me they've forgotten everything I've taught them!: Taia joked.

Eothen was busy hearing a case where a noble was accusing a farmer of allowing his sheep to graze on the noble's land. The sad part was, the noble technically owned the sheep, and took his payment for their 'use' in wool; whatever he didn't take was what the farmer had to live on. The noble also owned the land the farmer had built his home on, and the farmer had to pay rent out of that same income. The farmer admitted that yes, the sheep had wandered onto unauthorized land, but that was because the fence had broken. It hadn't been fixed because the farmer's son had been ill, and unable to repair it; the farmer could not shepherd the sheep and fix the fence at the same time, and the sheep had wandered out of his sight while he was fixing the fence.

What angered Eothen was the fact that according to the letter of the law, she had to rule in favor of the noble. But it wasn't fair. It wasn't at all fair. The farmer had no leg to stand on, and yet the noble was demanding – and she would have to award – an exorbitant fine for the unauthorized use of his land, which had done no actual damage and had caused no harm to anyone whatsoever. He was just abusing his power. And Eothen didn't see any choice but to help him, not if she was going to follow the law. She needed some advice.

"I would like to call a recess," she said. "We will reconvene in one candlemark, after we have had some time to eat."

She banged her gavel; Alek looked at her, confused, but didn't say anything. They went back to the room they shared at the inn to talk. They ordered food to be delivered to them, so they would not be disturbed.

"What's the problem?" asked Alek. "Looks like a pretty cut and dried case. Sad, but the law is clear."

"I know," said Eothen. "But I don't like it. This noble is just torturing the farmer, bleeding him dry of everything he has, just to abuse his own power. I don't like it, and I don't want to help him."

"What's your option?" asked Alek.

"That's why I called for a recess, so I could ask you if I had any," said Eothen. "Do I?"

"Why don't you want to follow the law?" asked Alek. "I mean, it's horrible that the farmer's son was sick, but was there really no one else who could have watched the sheep while he fixed the fence? His wife? Doesn't he have other children?"

"His wife was busy taking care of the sick son, minding the toddler daughter, cleaning the house, cooking dinner, minding the rest of the farm – no. There wasn't anyone else," said Eothen. She was getting really annoyed with Alek; wasn't he supposed to be on the side of fairness and justice, just like her?

"Well, then why didn't the farmer just leave the sheep penned until the fence was fixed?" asked Alek.

Sheka. Eothen didn't have an answer for that one. But she was going to give it a try anyway.

"The broken fence was all the way on the other end of the field from the sheep pen," she said. "It would have likely taken the farmer half the day to get up there, fix the fence, then come back and let the sheep out." Lame, and she knew it.

"So he was lazy," said Alek.

"Hardly!" exclaimed Eothen. "I'm only guessing that it would have taken just half a day – it very well may have taken the entire day. The sheep can't be left in the pen for that long!"

"Quite right," said Alek, looking satisfied. "The farmer was stuck without option. It would have taken the entire day to fix that fence, not half of one; I was raised on a farm, and fence fixing can be tedious. There was no one to help him; the neighbors around here are kept too busy minding their own plots to be of help to each other. Is there any way you can see to fix that?"

"Why were you arguing with me, then?" asked Eothen, still annoyed.

"To make sure you were seeing all the arguments that the noble will put to you, and make sure you had a response for them," said Alek. "Now, do you have a solution?"

"No," said Eothen. "The law says it doesn't matter the circumstance, the farmer is responsible. It's not fair."

"You're right," said Alek. "It's not fair. But we are Heralds; we don't have to stick with the letter of the law. We can ad lib, a little bit, as long as we don't get crazy. Now, do you have any ideas that will satisfy the noble, not unduly punish the farmer and maybe prevent this from recurring?"

"Maybe the farmer should sell one of the lambs of the season, and the chit should go to the noble as payment for the violation," said Eothen. "That's money the farmer doesn't have yet, so he hasn't budgeted for it. And we could work out a plan so that all the farmers in the region rotate shepherding all the sheep together; they can brand them or something, so it's clear whose is whose, and that will free up the farmers to get other work done when it's not their turn."

"Excellent!" said Alek. "Now you're thinking like a Herald, and not just a judge. Good work."

They returned from their recess, and Eothen took up her place on the bench to make her ruling. She was a little nervous; she had watched Alek adjudicate a few trials, but this was the first time she would be doing it herself.

"Welcome back," she began. She was working on being able to say something other than 'oh' when she was nervous. "The law is clear; the noble owns the land, the sheep are not to be grazing on the portion in question, and the sheep were, in fact, allowed to graze on it. That is clear."

She looked around; the noble started to look positively giddy, while the farmer – and a goodly portion of the town, also farmers – started to look angry. But she wasn't done.

"However," she continued. "It was through no fault of his own that the fence was not repaired; there was no reasonable manner in which the farmer could have fixed the fence and tended the sheep so as to prevent them from escaping through the broken fence onto this land."

The people started to look confused, and there was a murmur through the crowd; she ignored it and went on.

"I could just order the farmer to pay the noble a fine; that is the letter of the law, and many judges might do just that," she said. "But I am not a judge, I am a Herald, and that is not a fair judgment. The farmer does not have the ability to be in two places at once, and the fact that his son was ill is hardly his fault. This is a system that is not sustainable; therefore, a strict punishment will not suit."

More murmurs of confusion, and the nobles started to look angry. Eothen started to get more nervous, but there was no stopping now.

"The farmer will pay a fine; in the form of the sale price of one of his lambs to be born this season," she said. "But more than that. No farmer should lose his income because his son is ill. No citizen of Valdemar should become destitute because of illness; it is uncivilized. So, the farmers are to begin branding their sheep. Then they are to abide by a schedule – each farmer shepherds all the sheep of the village one day each sennight. That way, each farmer can spend the remaining days of the sennight working on fence maintenance, planting, harvesting – whatever. This should never happen again."

There was uproar. Eothen was shocked; she hadn't expected everyone to be happy with her ruling, but she hadn't expected them to be this angry, either. She was confused, and rapped the gavel, but no one was paying her one bit of attention. Everyone was yelling, nobles, farmers alike; she had no idea what they were saying, or why they were so angry. She looked over at Alek, who looked just as confused as she was; he shrugged his shoulders and shook his head, he had no idea why the people were reacting this way. But then they started to rush the bench, and she ran for the exit just in time to see Aladrian and Kasara galloping to where they stood.

:Chosen!: said Aladrian. :Get on! As quickly as you can!:

Alek was able to jump on Kasara's back with her barely slowing down; were it not for Eothen's gimp leg, she would have done the same, but as it was Aladrian had to skid to a halt in front of her while she clambered to his back. He pivoted neatly in place and galloped back the direction they had come, only a few hoofbeats behind Kasara, and not a moment too soon – the angry mob, nobles and farmers alike, were hot on their heels, chasing them. They ran outside of the village, and into the woods beyond it; they had planned on staying in the inn again that night, but clearly with that level of anger by the villagers, however inexplicable, that was not going to be an option.

"What in the nine hells…..?" Eothen began. "I expected some grumbling from the nobles, but a mob?"

"I'm as surprised as you are," said Alek. "But my Gift is Thoughtsensing; I was able to get a bit of surface thoughts from some of them, and while I am surprised by what I found, I might be able to shed some light on things."

"Well, go ahead, because I'm clueless," said Eothen. "And angry."

"I don't blame you," said Alek. "I'm not happy either. The nobles, as you predicted, were angry because their level of power is challenged; they enjoy keeping the farmers on their land as little more than slaves. Keeps them too busy working and trying to survive to realize that there are actually more of them than there are of the nobles, and if they worked together, they could overthrow the system."

"Oh," said Eothen. "And I just created a rule that says they HAVE to work together."

"Exactly," said Alek. "That threatens their power. I expected some level of discontent from that; I'm sorry, I should have mentioned it when we were discussing options. I did not expect it to be anywhere near this level, and that's part of why I didn't think to mention it; I expected some grumbling, but not violence."

"I don't think anyone could have predicted that," said Eothen.

"The farmers, well, they are a complete surprise," said Alek. "From what I could get, some of them feel that they are being punished by having their days proscribed for them when they are not the ones who let the fence go unmended. They don't see that it was a problem that could have just as easily happened to them; they only see that it happened to that other guy, and they want to believe that he deserved it somehow, like if they just work hard enough they'll never find themselves in that boat."

"That…..sort of makes sense," said Eothen. "Wrongheaded, shortsighted, but I can see how they get there."

"That's the prevailing reason people were angry," said Alek. "Others just went along with the crowd, and a few just – didn't like being told what to do whether or not it makes sense."

"Well, I can identify with that latter," Eothen joked. "I certainly don't enjoy being bossed around, and I don't tolerate it well even if my instructions are completely reasonable."

:You get that from me.: said Taia.

:Hmph.: responded Eothen.

"How do we fix it?" asked Alek.

"I'm not sure," answered Eothen. "I think maybe one of us should take the farmers and the other the nobles and try to calm them down."

"I think that's our best bet, but we need to let it cool off overnight and re-enter the village together tomorrow," Alek said. "If they haven't calmed down and decide to fight, we need to be ready to fight, and we're better off together for that."

"Ok," said Eothen. "I think you should take the farmers; you grew up on a farm, you'll be able to speak their language. As much as I don't understand nobles and don't relate to them terrifically well, I'll take that group. Aladrian will help me."

:Of course, Chosen.: said Aladrian.

"Good plan," agreed Alek. "Now, any chance you can hunt us something to eat while I build a fire?"

"Absolutely, I thought you'd never ask," said Eothen. "I'm starving."

Eothen and Aladrian went off into the woods with her bow. They were gone for longer than Eothen had hoped it would take; the woods were not deep, and they had to stay clear of the edges so that the villagers would not see them. When they finally managed to take down a warthog for dinner, she thought she might pass out from hunger; they headed back for camp as quickly as they could. Alek was happy for the hog, he loved pork; Eothen was wishing she'd settled for rabbit, or even squirrel, since it would cook faster.

"Here," said Alek. "I have a little bit of bread from lunch today, I'll split it with you."

"Thank you," said Eothen. "I'm famished."

"I could tell, you were drooling," said Alek.

"Shut up," said Eothen. "I was not." Alek laughed.

"Only a little," said Alek. "I wish we'd had time to grab our bags from the inn. I had hoped to have enough time to write Malak tonight; I imagine you would have had time to write Hexen, as well."

"Malak?" Eothen asked. "Who's Malak?"

"My husband," Alek said. "He's a bard, frighteningly enough. But – he's a good soul. I miss him."

"Wait, you're – " exclaimed Eothen.

"Shaych?" said Alek. "Yep. I imagine that's why Hexen was ok with you coming on a field circuit with me, no danger of me seducing you."

"Wait, Hexen got to decide who I went on field circuit with?!" Eothen said sharply. This did not make her happy.

"Well, he wouldn't have been allowed to dictate, but he did go to the Dean and make a request that your mentor be either female or shaych like me," said Alek. "I thought you knew."

"Hellfires, no," said Eothen. "I would never have tolerated that. No one, not my mother, my father, my troupe leader – and certainly not Hexen – decides who I do and do not spend time with, and I refuse to be in a relationship with someone who has no faith in my ability to not be seduced like I'm some sort of trollop in the first place!"

"It did strike me as odd that you would have tolerated that kind of paternalism," said Alek, laughing. "You are not exactly a simpering little girl."

"No," said Eothen. "I am not."

And as soon as she had her belongings back, she was going to tell Hexen just exactly how she felt about his assumptions. She was not happy in the least.

But first, she'd have to survive this village.