“Healed,” she said. “I thank you for my life.”
“And I hope the Fathers took my little lecture to heart?” Mike asked. “You’re not considered…”
“Unmarriageable?” she asked, giggling. “No, they accepted your command. In fact, I am to be promised to Jitka Ferani. We will be wed next fall, if the jadan can be worked out.”
“Is that a dowry or a purchase?” Mike asked, having to use the English word for “dowry.”
“When a woman is wed, she must bring certain money and things with her,” Irina said, shrugging. “It is our custom.”
“Dowry,” Mike said, nodding.
“It is much money,” Irina continued, unhappily. “It is very hard on the Family.”
“Things will get better,” Mike pointed out. “More planting and I’m thinking about other ways the Keldara can make money. And, besides, this is spring. Aren’t you supposed to be happy?”
“You’re right, Kildar,” the girl said. “Drink your beer and eat your bread and meat, that you may have the strength to fell the trees of the spring. We’ll leave this here; we go to gather flowers.”
“Let’s see,” Mike said, smiling. “Girls gathering flowers, boys gathering wood. My, there might even be chance meetings.”
“There may,” the girl said, giggling again. “A few.”
“What about all this careful separation?” Mike asked.
“It’s spring,” Irina replied, shrugging. “On the nights of the spring festival, things are… different.”
“And here I am chopping down a tree,” Mike said, shrugging ruefully.
“It makes you one of the Nine,” Irina said, smiling in the moonlight. “You will be able to challenge for the Ondah, the King of Spring. The Ondah chooses the Queen.”
“I’m not even going to try,” Mike pointed out. “After this is over, I’m just going to crash.”
“You will find the day is long, but fun,” Irina promised. “No one will sleep tonight, except the young children and the old people. And tomorrow there will be feasting and games and dancing. And tomorrow night is the Lighting, and no one will sleep at all.”
“Sounds like Hell Week,” Mike said, grinning. “I’d better eat and drink my beer so I can finish cutting down this tree.”
Some of the girls hung around after Irina left, ostensibly looking for flowers in the woods and mostly hanging out with the boys, who began bringing in less and less wood. Mike didn’t care, though. He was busy cutting down the tree, thankful for the gloves Irina had brought. He had calluses, but not the right kind either in depth or position to help him with the axe.
As it turned out, he finished all three trees well before dawn. That only left getting them to the hill. That was where the others had their place. Five of them could lift one of the logs over their head, and Mike joined the second group, despite the weariness of his arms, lifting the log onto his shoulder and carrying it up to the hill.
They were one of the first groups in but as it turned out there was a particular spot that the logs had to be laid. Chocks were placed on the hill and then Father Kulcyanov, who was looking mighty worn, carefully had the poplar logs laid perpendicular to the slope at a particular point on the side of the nearly round hill.
When Mike returned to the hill, following the last poplar log and with the other four dragging the crowns, Father Kulcyanov stepped over to him and nodded.
“Kildar, you would do me a great honor if you could cut down one more tree before dawn,” the elder said. “Givi can show you the proper tree. It must be a fir tree, of the width of a thigh and at least as tall as two normal men. Again, it must be cut before dawn and should be in the village by dawn.”
“That’s not much time,” Mike said, estimating by the moon and then checking his watch.
“The young men assure me that you can do it,” Father Kulcyanov said. “I would send Oleg, but he has had trouble with the oak. He has not yet cut his last tree.”
“Okay, okay,” Mike said, feeling hard done by. “I’m on it. Any idea where to find a fir nearby?”
“Givi will lead you,” the elder said, gesturing to one of the Kulcyanov boys.
“Lead on, Givi,” Mike said. “Come on, boys, one more tree to cut down. You want it in the village?”
“Yes, Kildar,” Father Kulcyanov said. “In front of my house.”
“Let’s go,” Mike said, trotting off. They didn’t have a lot of time, if the tree was going to be there before dawn.
Givi led them to the hill behind the compound and up a steep path to near its summit. Mike could hear cutters in the woods as they passed and the sound of laughter from the girls who were “looking for flowers.” At one point he also clearly heard the sort of gasp you only got when two people were entwined. So much for all of the girls being virgins.
As they neared the summit, they came to a grove of firs. Mike could see that there was some sort of crosstree set at the top of the ridge, but the guide led him off to one side and it dropped out of sight. Givi led them through the grove to a tree that looked identical to the others. But he definitely felt that was the one to cut.
The fir tree had branches that reached nearly to the ground, making it hard to get the axe in.
“Is it okay to cut away the branches?” Mike asked.
“Yes,” Givi said. “It’s really the only way.”
Mike crawled under the boughs and hacked away a couple of branches, giving himself enough room to get at the trunk on one side at least. One of the lads had a sharpening stone with him and Mike quickly honed the blade — it had obviously needed it — and then started cutting the tree.
The spot where he was cutting had had branches on it so there were tough knots to negotiate. And the fir was much harder than the poplar. But he felt the urgency of time so he laid in as hard as he could, really hammering it so that chips flew. In about fifteen minutes he’d cut halfway through and crawled under the other side to give himself some room to cut there.
In less than an hour he had the tree felled and took a few minutes cutting away some of the larger branches so that the Keldara could get the tree up on their shoulders. When it was all ready, they started down the path as fast as they could, safely, racing the approaching dawn with those not carrying the tree gathering up the fallen branches and following. It was already pre-dawn, Before Morning Nautical Twilight as they’d say in the military, with the air a ghostly blue. The moon was down and the sun not yet up and the visibility sucked. There was also a slight ground fog, giving the woods an eerie feeling. It combined to really slow them down.
Mike wasn’t sure if Keldara dawn counted as the sun over the horizon or the traditional “telling a white thread from a black thread.” But whichever counted, they were in the village in time. When they got to the spot outside the Kulcyanov house, all eight of the other axemen and their parties were gathered around a hole dug in the hard courtyard.
The men carrying the tree laid it gently on the ground and the other axemen fell on it with a will, cutting away the branches until there was only a bit of green at the top. Then the whole group gathered together to set it in the hole and pull it vertical with ropes and pushing. When it was vertical, the earth that had been dug out of the hole was shoveled back in and tamped down hard so that the tree stood firmly upright.
Several of the cuttings from the tree fellings had been gathered in the same area and as soon as the tree was erected, the axemen started chopping them up. They cut the boughs from the woody portions so that there was soon a huge heap of greenery one side of the courtyard.
As this was going on, the younger children and old people of the village started to come out, bringing breakfast for the whole troop. Mostly it was cakes with some sort of a wash on them and eggs, with buttermilk instead of the usual beer. Mike was so thirsty from the previous night that he ended up drinking about a gallon of the milk. He also started to wonder when he could leave to go get some sleep.