Under the Oak Tree Novel - Chapter 195

The deluge that poured through the night finally ceased at dawn. Blinking his dry eyes, Riftan washed his face with the rainwater he had collected in a trough. The shack had creaked and groaned in the relentless, blustering wind, and even the roof had begun to leak. It had all made for a horrendous night.

The next morning, the sky was clear as if the storm had been but a dream. Riftan gazed up at it as he dried his face with his tattered sleeve. Despite his stepfather’s intermittent patch-ups of the shack since spring, the ramshackle structure was too old to be anything but a hellhole during the rainy season. It was likely that they would have to do additional repairs before Paxias (the season of repose, equivalent to winter) arrived.

As he wondered how much it would cost to purchase all the wood they would need, a gruff voice came from behind.

“Why’re you sitting on your backside, boy? The work ain’t going to do itself!”

With a grimace, Riftan turned toward the hammering ringing out from the wide-open door of the smithy. The blacksmith, a man with a tanned, craggy face, stared at him from the entrance. Riftan knew that if he dallied any longer, the man would not hesitate to rush over and deal him a good blow to the head.

Riftan hastily picked up the sack he had placed beside him. “I was just about to get up.”

The sack weighed almost as much as he did. He hoisted it onto his shoulder and walked toward the blacksmith, who shot him a disapproving look.

Just before following the blacksmith inside, Riftan glanced at the imposing castle that towered above the dense forest. He had been apprenticing at the Duke of Croyso’s smithy for months, yet he still felt a deep sense of dissatisfaction. Remaining at the stables shoveling horse manure might have been better. Although he had never had a moment’s rest there either, the amount of work at the smithy was incomparably greater.

His day began at dawn chopping a mountain of firewood, lighting the charcoal kiln, and hammering iron ore until his shoulders burned. When that was done, he had to relentlessly work the bellows until the furnace blazed.

The first couple of weeks had been difficult. His palms had blistered, and he had suffered several burns. There were times when he found himself overcome with rage at his stepfather for forcing him to take this post. Whenever he thought of the old man’s stoic face, however, his discontent would dissipate.

Riftan flung the sack onto the floor as he thought of his stepfather trying to fill his empty stomach with cold, watery stew. The man’s words as he had dragged him to this place rang in his ears.

Stay a peasant, and you’ll end up like me. Blacksmiths at least get some respect.

His stepfather had dug up a decaying, black leather pouch from a dirt patch behind the shack.

Inside was the entirety of the dowry he had received from marrying Riftan’s mother — fourteen derham. He had then proffered six of them to that pig of a blacksmith and had humbled himself before the swine in order to get Riftan this apprenticeship. Obscenities spilled from Riftan’s mouth as he dredged up the memory.

He should have used the money to build a new house… Why give a damn about the future of a bastard that was not even his own flesh and blood?

“Oi! Snap out of it, boy! Bring me more charcoal!”

The bellow jolted Riftan out of his thoughts. He heaped lumps of charcoal into a basket and rushed over to the furnace. Tossing the pieces in, he stoked the fire with the bellows with all the energy he could muster until a golden blaze shot upward.

There was no time to think about anything else after that. Riftan raced around the large smithy, obliging the orders of thirty men as they each bellowed commands or yelled for items to be fetched. Only six of those voices belonged to skilled blacksmiths. The remainder were apprentices just like Riftan, here to learn the trade, but it did not stop them from treating him as if he were beneath them.

Though Riftan knew they were dumping all the tedious tasks on him, there was simply no way for him to protest. The others were open about their disdain for the boy with foreign blood running in his veins. It did not help matters that the blacksmith who had taken him on condoned their behavior. Needless to say, even after all these months, he had not been taught to make so much as a horseshoe.

Riftan clenched his jaw. His blood boiled at the realization that his stepfather had essentially paid good silver to have his stepson treated like a slave. However, he knew he could not quit. There was no way the blacksmith would return the money. Riftan pushed down the pent-up anger that simmered inside him and worked on the bellows until his shoulders burned.

When at long last it was time to go home, he barely had enough energy left to curse. He scrubbed his soot-blackened face and hands in the stream, washed his filthy clothes, and pulled them on while they were still wet. Just as he was about to turn away, a glimmer beneath the water caught his eye.

He bent down and fished out a small pebble about half the size of his thumb. Its smooth, white surface sparkled in the sunlight, and he turned it over a few times before shoving it in his pocket. His exhaustion forgotten, he set off feeling invigorated.

The path he took through the thick forest circled around toward the back of the castle. Soon, a grand structure emerged through the oak trees — the annex of Croyso Castle. The firewood storehouse was next to it, and Riftan pretended he had come to collect supplies while his eyes busily searched the area.

He finally spotted her in the corner of the annex’s garden. The slight girl was crouched over, picking something off the ground. All the bitterness in Riftan’s heart seemed to evaporate like magic at the sight of her. With an armful of firewood, he began to move in her direction. There were other servants around too, each busy with their own tasks, so he did not think it would raise any suspicion.

The black hunting dog that usually shadowed the girl sat nearby. Its ears pricked up as Riftan approached. Being careful not to get too close, Riftan cautiously placed the pebble on the ground, then stalked away as though he had other matters to attend to.

He glanced over his shoulder a moment later and saw the girl pick up the pebble before placing it in a colorful pouch. Suppressing the smile that tugged at his lips, Riftan returned to the castle gate. The thought that he was an utter fool refused to leave his mind. Why the hell did this make him so happy? He practically flew out of the grounds and let out a bitter laugh.

It was unfathomable that his everyday routine now included a circling of the massive castle on his way home, all to catch a glimpse of the girl. Was he out of his mind?

They were worlds apart. As the daughter of the lord of the castle, one was not permitted to speak to her unless spoken to first. People would mock him for his brazenness if they were to learn that he felt an affinity to someone so much higher in station. Promptly feeling deflated, he angrily scuffed the ground.

She was not aware of his existence, let alone that he was the one who had been leaving the feathers and oddly-colored pebbles in the garden. She certainly did not know that he would wonder as he fell asleep about whether she had found them, and what kind of crown she would fashion if she had.

Reality set in as he gazed down at the dilapidated shack at the foot of the hill. She was not a girl who lived in the next village over. She was the daughter of the liege who ruled over this vast fief, while he was a commoner on the lowest rung.

Riftan began trudging down to the shack. All that awaited him was a mother who refused to acknowledge him, a stepfather who drowned his worries in booze, and an aching loneliness.

Riftan’s interest in the girl had begun shortly after he started working as a stable hand at the castle. The first time he had seen her was when he had been transporting a cart laden with fodder. She had been crouched in the annex’s garden.

Immediately recognizing her as the eldest Croyso daughter, he attempted to hurry past her when, for some unknown reason, his legs had refused to comply. The girl had seemed as small as a doll. Her short arms were wrapped around a black hunting dog almost as big as her, and her face was buried in its shaggy fur. Somehow, the sight of the little girl clinging to the huge hound rooted Riftan to the spot.

His heart twinged as he realized that she longed to be held. He felt her loneliness so acutely that he almost mistook it for his own. He, too, had leaned on the necks of foals to soothe that same longing.

Why was this girl, who had hundreds of servants at hand and foot, seeking companionship from a hunting dog?

Is she just as lonely?

As soon as he had that thought, he felt an audacious urge to comfort her.

It was a laughable proposition. How could he, a lowly stable hand who mucked out stalls, ever be of any help to a duke’s daughter?

The girl’s life was undoubtedly full of unimaginable opulence — a palace of glistening marble, a banquet hall dripping with gold chandeliers, the most decadent foods, and garments of such softness he could not imagine ever needing such a thing in his lifetime.

No doubt her soft-as-cloud bed was stuffed with feathers, and all the food and drink in the world was never denied to her. She would never know the pain of working until the skin of your palms peeled off. Shucking off his sense of empathy, Riftan hurried on to the stable.

From that day on, however, he could not stop seeking her out whenever he passed the annex. Nor could he help the flash of concern every time he noticed her slumped shoulders or sullen back. Whenever he chanced upon her smiling, he felt happier himself. And on days he did not see her at all, he worried that she might be unwell. Soon, she became an entity that helped him cope with his own pervasive loneliness.

Riftan scoffed as he emptied last night’s freshly made charcoal from the kiln into a sack. A part of him knew that he was simply using her as an escape from his harsh reality. It was possible that the girl was not lonely at all, and that he was simply projecting his own life troubles onto her. She might just as well be living a perfectly pleasant life.

The idea that she enjoyed his crude gifts could also be false hope on his part. She could acquire any real gem if she so desired. A few more years, and he doubted she would remember that she once used to collect something as insignificant as pebbles.