Banished Prince Charming

Chapter 26 - From A Settlement To A Village.

Within one week or so to be exact, 7 days after I had made an announcement after our breakfast since the arrival of Marcel the Merchant, work was underway to set up the Blacksmith store and the rest of the structures around GraceHaven and had been completed with the time frame.

Jack requested for a location to be allocated near to the clay oven as he said that the clay oven was the main focal point for him as a guiding point.

He explained that it was near a source of food which means sustenance for the citizens of GraceHaven and since it is within the courtyard, it would be easily distinguished in the future.

I agreed to his point of view and with his ideas on the construction of the store, he preferred it to be built with part bamboo for the sides and a clay wall at the back using reed as it's main support structure.

With the help of everyone, including the children where they hauled the majority of the mud from the riverbank, a Blacksmith store had been erected with a day and a half. A small back room was where ores and coal would be stored.

The space for the furnace, blower and anvil was inside and any works would be facing the storefront while a small bamboo and reed table was set up as a front to display the finished goods et cetera. It was like the shop back in Darlington and the kids helped to make a clay signboard too.

Since they had not the chance of learning the alphabets, I wrote on the soil and Harry copied it down while I taught the children the phonetics as well as to recognise the words.

Heather was there as well to guide so basically the children learnt to recognise the alphabets, learnt phonetics, to read and write. This was akin to killing a few birds with a stone.

As we hung signboard above the Blacksmith store, I called for a keg to be broken and everyone drank a cupful and decided to keep the rest after supper. (they did this because the work was not complete as there are more projects to be done)

After the Blacksmith store had been completed, the first customer was me, as I brought in my short sword in to be sharpened. From an ornamental and decorative piece of heirloom, it became a single-sided, pointed end short sword, that would prove to be a headache for any melee job assailant.

Next on would be the pigsty for the piglets. A single barn-like structure with half mud and half bamboo structure was built. It was an approximately 8' by 8' and Crystal informed me that this would serve as a holding area for the sow to give birth and milk the young.

The floor was liked with dry grass and looked pretty comfortable. Once the holding area was built, an enclosure made by bamboo was made since it was the sturdiest material to be used as constructing it. The enclosure was 30" by 30" and we made 4 enclosures of that kind so it looked 2x2 from above.

The goats were ushered into one of the enclosure and part of the settlers made a low roof barn with mud walls for its the sidewalls and back. The barn was about 5" high and hay was laid inside it for the goats to rest during cold and rainy days.

(Authors Note: Funny thing about goats and cows for me to share as part of the knowledge. Cows can withstand heat but not the cold while goats would be able to withstand cold but not the heat. I knew about these since I used to rear them back)

Building the low roof barn for the goats were much simpler since the goats would be under the shade most of the time but the fences have to be 6 feet high in case one started jumping out like a sheep!

The construction of the pigsty was next and it had a combined space of 30" by 5" which was actually end to end with the enclosure. A mud wall partition of every 5" was being constructed and a sturdy bamboo gate fence was being made to shut them in during the evenings.

A loop of rope was inserted into the mud around one end of the bamboo gate, acting as a hinge. Another piece of rope about a foot long was left embedded on one end to secure the gate. It was simple but it definitely served the purpose.

From the 7 hens and 1 rooster, Gwen managed to snare a total of 6 more where 4 were hens and 2 roosters, adding a total of 14 red jungle fowls. The rooster was left unrestrained while the hens were kept into the longhouse coop in the evenings.

Devon and Ellen were the ones being delegated to catch the hens and bring them to the longhouse every evening and the two children would check for any eggs in the mornings. They were also given the responsibility to feed and maintain the longhouse when they released the hens out from their longhouse.

A medium-sized open front stable was also built next to the shelter of the Levis, making use of the trees as the main support with mud walls on 3 sides. A slightly inclined extended roof was being constructed with a water and feed trough on its side.

Using only 2 pieces of thick bamboo poles, it was being attached to the front of the stables with a 'U' shaped angle bars that were fashioned by Jack with long spikes that were hammered into the trees as a mean of support.

When everything was up and ready, our tiny settlement had turned into a full-fledged growing GraceHaven village. The 30 rows of planting beds had begun to flourish, and Sir Hope has tasked to plough another 12 more rows for the apple, pear, plum and peach trees.

Ben fashioned a bamboo plough that looked like a 3 pronged rake while he stood on it to weigh it down. The weird contraption really worked and had successfully ploughed a piece of land for the cultivation of the above fruit trees.

Gwen then fashioned a small pyramid made from reed to indicate that underneath it was a seedling. The pyramid was made by using a few reed stalks and Gwen strongly believes that the forces beneath a pyramid would be stronger. This belief was being taught by her mother, then her grandmother and then by her great grandmother through several generations.

(Authors Note: lookup pyramid-cafe.in/Power.html to find out on the powers of a pyramid)

The urgent task to house the livestock had been done and it was time to use Sir Hope to venture out to do some hunting and foraging with the 4 ladies and the children in tow. Sir Blackie who would not miss the chance, also raced forward some distance in front of Sir Hope to act as a lookout.

They discovered that by selling woven mats and hunting bows reaped the most profit, they decided to gather some bundles of screwpine leaves as well as several sturdy bamboos meant to make the hunting bows.

Meanwhile, since they have Sir Hope and the wagon, the ladies would be able to venture further and thus be able to forage for more foods. Upon their journey, they had chanced upon yellowish coloured fruits with sturdy stalks underneath it growing to a height of 3 feet and each of the yellowish coloured fruit was as big as an a.d.u.l.ts head.

While some were small, with either small reddish or greenish fruits, indicating that these would be ripe in about 30 days or so, they decided to leave them be and chopped the stall of the fruit by its stalk. They had collected about 30 or more of these fruits and it was called pineapples...!

It could be eaten raw, used as a topping for pastries, or even as a cooked vegetable if it is medium raw. Some of these pineapples were about 2 and a half pounds in weight while some exceed 4 pounds. It was a source of vitamin C and has a lot of fibre in them. Gwen was the one who related to me upon her return.

Besides, pig feed could be made with wild wheat, fruits and vegetables as well with pieces of meat since pigs are omnivorous. The centre of the pineapple was hard but it could be mashed and cooked together and fed to the pigs.

Back at the village, after its status had been upgraded from a settlement, the 4 men sat down in a circle and were trying their best effort to make a multi-layered steamer basket after the outer green and yellowish skin of the bamboo was stripped down and was made to be weaved into stackable round baskets about 6 inches high with a circ.u.mference of at least 20 inches.

Even our fireplace had been upgraded by the usage of a clay rocket stove which was mobile. The old fireplace and the clay oven was still there and the usage of the fireplace was mainly to provide light. Since the village had extended on size, there had been more torches to illuminate the area especially the farmlands and livestock areas.

There were some miners who came over to our village and the exchange of goods were being made. Seeing the opportunity at hand I approached the group of jokers that consisted of 8 men. I invited them to sit around the fireplace as I stocked up wood and made some tea.

We engaged in some small talk and get to know one another and discovered they this was their main mode of income and they were using a stone pickaxe to mine for iron ores and coal which wasn't too shabby.

These people were freelancers and I learnt that it would take about 3 days on a horse-drawn carriage to deliver the coal and ores from their mines to our village.

I whispered to Jack and asked, "How much is the pay for a fixed salary for a labourer in Darlington?" while Jack answered earnestly, "2 gold per year. Which means they would earn 27 coppers per day."

I made a rough calculation on my head as I scratched the ground's surface to do a quick check. If 27c per day and a travel time of 5 days, with a mere 3 sacks of coals and 3 sack of ores, I don't think it would be able to produce much of a stockpile for Jack because a sack may weigh just slightly under 100 pounds.

Earlier I had learnt that the merchants would pay 15c for a sack of ores or coal which either the prices was downplayed by the merchants or being inflated by the miners.

For the former, 27c each day for 8 miners every 5 days would equal to 1080c or 10s 80c. For the latter, 15c for 6 sacks would only cost 90c. Of course, in terms of business negotiations, the lesser pay the better we would save.

But I have a soft side to me and in order for the village to grow, I need to have these men to spread the word of mouth that this village would welcome new settlers. But the miners would not be a part of the settlers because they were paid to do work while the rest aren't paid a single copper.

This would be unfair and would create unrest...!

So, in the end, I inquired the men. "Let me seal a contract with you. For every 5 days, you would deliver 4 sacks of coal and 4 sacks of ores. Each sack provided the sack would be of the same size and it would be filled to the brim. In return, you would be paid 20c for each sack, 2 kegs of ale and 10 loaves of bread and 20 dried fish"

"Since you were being paid just 15c with no other incentives, we are willing to put in an extra 5c and with these incentives for you. Would that be alright?" I paused for a while and let the 8 men discuss among themselves first since they were surprised I was intending to pay 20c for each sack instead of the usual 15c that the merchants had prepared to pay them.

On top of that, they were allowed to take away 2 kegs of ale, 10 pieces of bread and 20 pieces of fish. They were discussing excitedly and all of them agreed on the spot.

"However, there's a condition that would be met..."