By the time he had dug out enough to make his assessment, Dag saw Jack returning with a small army of helpers and the little canal barge. He grinned to see both Lavern and Shirley walking toward the back of the gaggle, big smiles, and pudgy babies on their hips.

Shirley’s face fell when she looked around and didn’t see Axle. Panic taking over her face caused Dag to run toward them, “He is fine!” he called out to alleviate her fears. Catching up to them, he only briefly kissed Lavern before turning to Shirley. “He is healthy and whole. I needed someone to stay at the fort this year, and he was the logical choice. It will only be a few more weeks until I send more supplies up on the boats. You can ride with if you like. Either for a quick visit while they are dropping off supplies, or if you like we can move you up there for as long as he is there.”

Lavern had confusion written all over her face, “Why leave people behind?” Shirley looked glad that she asked, but was still recovering from the earlier panic and hadn’t voiced the question.

Dag let out a long sigh. Then he gave them the cliff notes version of what had happened while they were away. Lavern and Shirley’s eyes were both wide in shock. “So all of these new people?” Lavern asked.

Dag nodded, “Widdows and orphans that we made in the battle. I can’t trust them not to seek some form of vengeance, but I couldn’t leave them to starve either. So, we’re breaking them up into groups small enough to be able to watch and control if they decide to be a problem.”

Shirley frowned, “But to leave Ajax all the way up there...” her words trailed off, but Dag could see the pain that not having him come back was causing her.

Dag shrugged, “I was planning it already. What we’ve built there is too big to leave unguarded. Also, it will be good to have shipments of wood to come down river every few weeks. I’m thinking about building a tower here as well.” He pointed to the rock he had been digging around. “It will make a good place to set up a way to load and unload supplies from the river. We’re not far from the marsh, and it will make sending foraging parties easy, with the excess able to be easily shipped down the canal to the village. It just makes sense. This might be a good place to put Jill in charge of, and leave several of the women here, at least in the early days. They will need all the hands they can get to gather stones for the tower.”

The ladies just nodded, but he could tell that neither of them were exactly happy about the decision, or the new comers. Dag gave himself a mental shake, they didn’t have to be happy about it, he wasn’t completely happy about it, but they seemed to be accepting it, so he let it all go and just focused in on getting everything moved to the castle that was going.

It was very late in the day when he used several of the extra travois poles to make a tee-pee for those staying at their new port to have some shelter through the night. Dag himself made it back to the castle exhausted, and took a long bath, ate his dinner, and then fell in to bed. He barely even got to play with John before both were sound asleep.

◆◆◆

Back Home

Dag found himself back on the battlefield. He hadn’t felt bad when the old man leading the charge had dropped, but killing the others, especially those who had turned to run wasn’t sitting easy in his mind. He hadn’t wanted to order them to continue firing, but he wanted to be sure that the result of attacking their clan was horrific enough that they wouldn’t be attacked again.

He watched the men turn to flee, and even as he tried to give the ceasefire order, he heard himself give the order instead, which sealed their fates, “Get them all!” The words rang in his ears, and then he heard them again, and again. He tried to stop himself, he shouted, “Stop!” It was too late, weeks too late he realized after coming awake in a cold sweat sitting up in bed.

He took deep breaths and tried to slow his racing heart, but it was of little help. He felt Lavern’s small hand reach out for him. She was still mostly asleep, but she reached out to comfort him, anyway. He let out a long sigh and got up. This was the third time he had awakened himself from this same dream in the week since he had been home.

In his rational and conscious state, he knew that he had made the right call. It was only the horror that attacking him brought down on those three tribes that kept the others from giving it a try, but that didn’t ease his subconscious which delighted in showing him in vivid images how far he had fallen from so many of the lofty ideals his wealthy and privileged western mindset had held so dear. The women were still part of work crews, slaves in all but name. They had done nothing to him, yet there they were. Paying for the actions of their husbands and fathers, or was it paying for his own fear of their righteous reprisals? Dag didn’t know, and wasn’t sure it mattered. He couldn’t imagine how he could do things differently without risking his own clan and family.

He walked out to stand on the castle wall outside of the room he shared with Lavern and tiny John sleeping in his fur lined basket. In the chill of the night air, he listened to the waves, and looked out at a star filled night sky. He wanted to scream at the sky. To demand answers for why he was trapped here in this backward world, where decisions like this needed to be made for simple survival. He didn’t. Why wake more people can make them worry? Or doubt his sanity? This was just what it was, and he would need to make the adjustment or not. Life was a series of tests taken pass fail, with the only assurance that eventually everyone failed, and once was all it took.

Reassured that no matter what the dreams may be, he had done the only ‘right’ thing at the time, and would likely have to do more things like that, Dag went back in and curled up next to Lavern. He listened to John’s little snores from the corner, and decided that whatever the cost had been to his former illusions about himself, the price had been worth it. Sleep was still a long time coming.

Larger World

Progress

Time passed and life settled back into what passed for normalcy. The bulk of the women became useful assets to the tribe. Two tried to run off. When they were caught and returned to Dag, he simply asked them, “You would rather try to go it alone without hunters to provide for you and protect you?”

The one spit at his feet, “Better than living with those who murdered my mate!”

Dag let out a long sigh, “Well, any who feel that way simply come forward now. Don’t be shy, if you don’t want to be here, I don’t want you here. Easy as that.”

Only the two caught trying to escape decided to leave at that time. So, he gave them three days’ worth of rations, and had the boats take them a week’s boat ride down the coast. There, the men in the boats put them ashore, and left them to their fates. Dag suspected that they wouldn’t last long, but better to have them out there where they could do little damage. Besides, it made him look better to those who stayed behind.

They weren’t anywhere near earning Dag’s trust yet, but those who hadn’t taken advantage of his offer to leave were less likely to cause trouble. At least, that was his reverent hope. He hadn’t wanted any of this, but actions had consequences, and attacking his people couldn’t be seen as a risk-free option for anyone.

Weeks more passed, and progress was made both in the village, and up at the river port. An additional longhouse was added to the village to ease the overcrowding that the additional women caused, and the tower at the river port was also finished. Troops were even rotated out of the fort at the Gathering spot. As a ‘remote’ outpost, Dag didn’t want to leave anyone out there for too long. Since both boats were currently being used to ferry food supplies up river, and wood and charcoal downriver, there was no hardship moving people at the same time. They had even created a small dock up river to ease the movement of cargo and passengers, and many discussions were had about what it would take to build one at the mouth of the canal.

At the castle itself, Dag had alternated between his water wheel project and diving. Diving had the advantage of adding food for the table, as well as allowing Dag to explore more of the local sea floor. The water wheel was their first real use of mechanical power. Dag was under no delusions that the first iteration of the water wheel he was working on would be enough to power grain mills or sawmills and the like, but it would be a proof of concept that worked with the crude tools he had available. He really wanted it to turn a couple of wood lathes and some pottery wheels.

Now that he had easier access to wood for building, and charcoal for the kilns, pottery wheels seemed to be the ideal industry for them. At least considering the massive amounts of new mud deposited after every annual flood. He knew that once he had real olive and grain harvest, that pots to store it in would be the only viable option.

◆◆◆

Domesticity

Lavern liked having him closer to home working on projects. Especially now that John was able to crawl anywhere he wanted to go, and standing on his own. Perhaps wobbling is more accurate than standing, but Dag was pretty sure that phase was only a short time from running wild. Either way, he was a handful, and she enjoyed time in the evenings when Dag would spend time playing with his son.

There were still hunts that needed to happen for the now massive amounts of meat that they needed to be gathered, but with the greater access to lumber, larger corals were built, and a few of the older women from the defeated clans were more or less permanently put on shepherdess duty. Shearing this year was a bit of a challenge, and Dag once again realized how badly he needed just the slightest bit of metal. Even so, most of the clan was now sporting a fine felt cloak to fend off the cooler evenings.

Dag only wished that they had access to cotton. Changing diapers in the here and now was so much more of an ordeal. Though, his introduction of coconut oil into the process had won over most of the women responsible for child rearing. Dag had to admit that he suggested it for the adults as well. If nothing else it smelled better than most of them did without it, even after baths became part of normal daily routine.

Ajax and Shirley had gotten used to their privacy, and were building another tower up on the ridge to connect with the two that were already up there. Dag was of a mind to keep building on to his original castle, rather than trying to build a new one. The newer towers were certainly larger and better built than the older towers. As time to do the job right was found, and everyone improved their building skills, things seemed to be improving on their own, without Dag needing to be directly involved.

◆◆◆

Visitors

Dag sat with a bow drill and a pile of fine sand, drilling through the new timbers for the next stage of the water wheel. A small power drill could have had these holes drilled in seconds, but he had been at it for over an hour, and was still only halfway through the piece. Drilling out and pegging each joint was torture. It probably wouldn’t have been so bad if he didn’t know that there was a much better way, if only he had the right tools. Unfortunately, he did know that, so the fight to remain patient and simply complete the tasks he began was harder than actually designing out the systems they would need.

It was while working on the project, with sweat dripping off his nose and falling on the wood before him, that he heard a great clamoring from outside the walls. With a few choice words that he knew he would need to remove from his vocabulary before Jack could start repeating them, Dag tossed down his tools, and snatched up a wicker shield from beside the gate as he went out to see what was on fire this time. Under his breath he said, “Damnit Jim, I’m an archeologist, not a fireman!” The old joke from a long-lost world brought a small smile to his face, and put him in a better frame of mind to tackle whatever life threw at him next.

His people were running back and forth, and tools were strewn everywhere. Fortunately, he found Oona trying to restore some order as he arrived. “What is it this time?” he asked.

Oona gave him a worried look, “Clans approach. Don’t know who.”

Dag nodded, “Get yourself and the children inside the walls, and take anyone close enough to get quickly with you. I’ll organize the welcome wagon.” She looked at him funny, not knowing what a wagon was, but deciding that she didn’t want to find out, so she set off to gather in noncombatants behind the castle walls.

Dag was frustrated that they didn’t have a bell, or an early warning system, but suddenly breathed easier as he heard Ajax sounding a conch shell horn. Dag looked about and found him high on one of the castle walls. Dag waved to him, and the young man waved back, still blowing the horn and directing things with hand signals. Long before he could see faces from the clan approaching, he had three spearmen with him, and the walls of the castle were lined with archers. Many had the light hunting bows preferred by the girls and young boys, but even such were perfectly capable of ruining the day of any attackers.

Dag turned to the spearmen, “If this turns into a fight, we go all defense and fall back on the castle gate. Let the archers do the attacking. Your job is just to protect each other while we get to the gate. Understood?”

Dag could tell by the grim look on their faces and the suddenly serious way that they held the spears that his orders were in fact understood, and that they would much prefer to rush off at any attacker than to run away and leave it to the archers. He repeated, “Understood?” and this time got affirmative replies from each of them.

Dag was tense. If this was a unified force, attempting to take vengeance for the battle at the gathering, he was going to be fighting a hard fight, and worse, even if he won, would be facing more unpleasant decisions...

It seemed to take the clans approaching an eternity to cross the distance. Standing in the sun with sweat rolling off of him wasn’t doing anything to ease Dag’s nerves either. He didn’t dare show any signs of his concerns though, or the men around him might lose courage and run, and then they would have an even bigger mess. It was one thing to feel the initial rush of anger, and think you want to run into the fight, and a wholly different thing if you saw those around you acting scared. Especially if you had time to stand around and think about it for a while.

Fortunately for Dag, he recognized the man leading the people toward him. It was Handden. While that didn’t mean that there wouldn’t be a fight, if he were there on his father’s orders, it did mean that the chances for a fight went way down. Even Handden’s father didn’t want a full-fledged war between them. At least Dag believed him to be a better leader than that.

Handden approached with a smile and a wave, and Dag’s knees felt weak with relief. Dag told the spearmen to hang back, as Handden was approaching well ahead of his people, Dag went out to meet him alone.

“Handden, it is good to see you, but I did not expect to see you until next year.” Dag said, returning Handden’s open smile.

Handden grinned, “My father believes we are out hunting, but I brought things to trade for meat, fish, and salt... if you have it to spare.”

Dag laughed, “Yes, I believe we have some we can spare. Please, come. Your hunters should go down to the village and enjoy the fountain. You can come to the castle, have a look around, and we can talk trade.”