The Lost War, Karl Gallagher [recommended reading txt] 📗

made her fish start thrashing again. It broke her grip, falling into the weeds. The critter squeaked an imperative and ducked back into its hole.

Two similar heads popped up with squeaks of their own.

Goldenrod let out a stream of curses. She picked the fish up by its tail.

“Looks like they’ve eaten about a third of the patch,” said Redinkle.

“Right. Time to hunt some rats.” Goldenrod gripped her fish firmly as she marched toward the bluff.

At the tent she picked up her hoe and a militia spear. Mistress Tightseam joined the pest control expedition with another spear.

Goldenrod was not in the mood for conversation on the walk back to her garden plot. Tightseam didn’t try to start one.

The critters were too nimble for Goldenrod to spear them. After working off some frustration with stabbing attempts she switched to the hoe. Caving in the burrows under the garden forced the critters to go above ground to another hole. Tightseam held her spear ready to impale them when Goldenrod flushed them out.

Once two had been speared (and finished off with the hoe) the third critter fled into the weeds of the flood plain.

Goldenrod hoed through the dead portion of the vegetable patch without flushing any more. When she paused to wipe the sweat from her face Tightseam said, “The good news is you have it ready for replanting.”

“Yeah.” Goldenrod’s breathing broke up the words. “Have to go—find some wild ones. To chop up for eyes.”

Tightseam held out her hand for the hoe. Goldenrod handed it over. The older woman moved into the remainder of the patch. The hoe blade gently pulled vines aside before chopping at the base of the tall weeds.

“Did you bring your spinning wheel?” asked Tightseam.

“No.”

“What about your inkle loom?”

“Where would I have put it?” Goldenrod let some exasperation leak into her voice.

“Calligraphy set?”

“I brought an embroidery project. A favor with my device for Newman to wear at the archery tourney,” snapped Goldenrod. “And I haven’t worked on it because we’re trying to survive. What’s your point?”

Mistress Tightseam chopped under another weed, pulling it out with most of its roots. “My point is you keep starting things and dropping them when something else captures your attention. That’s fine for a crafter in the Kingdom. Try everything, find your love.

“But we’re trying to survive here. You can’t drop something unless someone else is going to pick it up. Showing people how to find food in the wild, that’s great. Dozens of women are out looking for vineroot. The weir’s too big to keep to yourself.

“Now this—” Tightseam waved at the garden patch. “This is yours. You claimed it. Nobody else is going to mess with it. So you need to follow through.”

Goldenrod kicked at one of the dead vines. “I am following up.”

“No. You need to check on it every couple of days. Chase off that critter before he comes back with friends. Take out weeds before they get this tall.” Tightseam hoed down one standing above her knee.

“Hmph.”

“You’re a dilettante. That’s fine back home. The Kingdom attracts dilettantes. Some pass through, some stay until they’ve sampled everything. Some settle down. We can’t afford that here.”

She stepped closer to the younger woman. “We especially can’t afford someone as talented as you wasting her efforts.”

Goldenrod flushed. “Most of it is luck. I didn’t know how many fish were out there for the weir to catch.”

“Fine. We can’t afford your luck being wasted.”

***

Lady Burnout looked up from her notebook as a patient came in. He limped into the chirurgeon’s tent, supported by a cane on one side and his wife on the other.

“How’s the foot, Lord Barrel?” she asked.

“No better,” he grunted.

“All right, up on the table and I’ll take a look.”

“Do I have to?”

Burnout gave him a stern look—but he’d had a hard time climbing up on the previous visit. “Fine.”

Elderberry turned the big chair around for him then set a footstool before it. Burnout dragged up another footstool to sit on.

Barrel sat and put out his right foot. His wife slipped the shoe off of it.

“Thanks, Dandelion,” said Burnout. She unwound the brown-crusted bandages.

The puncture wound on the sole of the foot still dripped pus. The red swelling reached around to the top of the foot. Yes, not any better.

“Well, that antibiotic pill didn’t help any,” she said.

“Time for a full course?” asked Barrel.

“I don’t have enough left for a full course. And if it’s ignoring a single dose ten might still not be effective.”

“Plus you’d want to save them for someone more useful than me.”

Burnout nodded.

Dandelion bristled then subsided as her husband put a hand on her arm. “Don’t be mad, sugar. It’s her job to make those decisions. What can you do for me?”

“I think it’s time to amputate.”

Barrel laughed. “My GP always told me I’d wind up losing a foot if I didn’t keep up with my meds. Guess she’s finally right.”

Burnout was grim. “You might not survive the amputation. And it might not get all of the infection.”

“How long have I got without it?”

“Three days. Maybe five.”

Dandelion gasped and clutched her husband’s hand.

“Then let’s cut.”

***

“You want us to do what?” demanded Master Chisel.

“I can cut the flesh,” explained Lady Burnout. “But going through the bone will take strength. It has to be done fast.”

The carpenter looked over his apprentices. “We don’t do fast. We want it done right. Hmmm. Plane, think you can do this?”

The burly apprentice flinched, then straightened. “Aye.”

“Go sharpen the saw then.”

Lady Burnout took charge of the rest of them. The apprentices carried the examining table and most of the other furniture out. A plastic tarp covered the rugs. A chunk of log used as a