“So what is the estimate for when you need the machines ready?” Kivamus asked. “Now that the plants have nearly grown up, I would like a better estimate of the harvesting time.”
Pinoto glanced at the fields for a few moments.
“A month for the plants and the grain to grow fully, then around five to six weeks before it ripens enough for harvesting. If the weather holds and the crops receive enough water, we can begin cutting the wheat in roughly two and a half months—at the start of the mid autumn month.”
Kivamus nodded, thinking about it. Two weeks to make the first lathe, a few more days to iron out any kinks in it, then another month to make two more of those machines. So they could have three working lathes in a month and a half—one for the blacksmith and two for the carpenters—assuming no new scorpions were built after the fourth one. They would have to stop making new lathes after that to focus on the farming machines.
That meant they would get less than a month to build enough mechanical reapers, and another couple of weeks at most to make the thresher and the winnower. That wasn't counting the multiple other projects Darora’s team had to work on, including more scorpions—which they still had to start making once the farming machines were built—and more crossbows, as well as the advanced version of it Kivamus was going to work on now, apart from the other regular requirements for the village.
It would be tight, but it was feasible.
“I think we should be able to do it, assuming all goes well,” he reassured the farmer.
Pinoto grinned. “I can't wait for the day I get to try out those machines.” He gestured at the fields ahead. “Let me show you our progress.”
Kivamus walked along the edge of the fields for a short while, letting Pinoto show him the driest patches, the strongest sections of wheat, and the places where the ground still needed more leveling before the next planting season. He did not pretend to understand every detail. Pinoto knew farming far better than he did, and Kivamus had learned enough by now to listen when the right person was speaking.
By the time they turned back, the sun had climbed higher, and the heat had really begun pressing down.
A few farmers were still working in the rows, but most had moved toward the well or the shade near a cart, taking a short rest before the worst part of the day. He would have to tell the carpenter apprentice to make a proper shade here for the farmers once he was done with the animal sheds. A large shed would be enough to provide enough shade, helping to shelter both nodors and farmers from the sun.
Kivamus looked back once before they left the fields.
As good as it felt to look at those fields, the wheat was not enough to feed Tiranat.
Not anymore.
But it was still proof that the village was no longer only trying to survive from one shipment of grain to the next.
They had food growing outside their own walls, coal leaving in their own wagons—the first of which had been handed over to the manor recently by the wainwright—steel coming from their own furnaces, and guards strong enough to kill the mighty beasts that came in the night.
Now he only had to make sure all of it kept growing faster than the dangers coming toward them.
They re-entered the village through the southeast gate.
The guards at the gate reported seeing nothing unusual, and Hudan only paused long enough to instruct the same to the next shift guards who had just arrived. Once that was done, the group continued north along the inside of the eastern wall instead of heading straight back to the manor house.
The four guards kept their loose box formation around Kivamus, while Hudan and Duvas walked beside him.
The heat was worse within the village than it had been near the fields. The air moved less here, and the sun had begun warming the packed earth of the road. Workers still moved through the village with tools, wheelbarrows and carts, but most had already wrapped cloth around their heads or shifted their work toward whatever shade they could find.
Ahead, beyond the eastern side of the manor wall, the new barracks compound was taking shape.
It was still mostly a construction site, but the outline was clear now. A smaller palisade surrounded the area, the same height as the manor’s own outer wall rather than the taller village defenses. Most of the posts had already been set, and workers were fixing crosspieces along the inner side to strengthen them. The last unfinished stretch stood near the southern corner, where three men were raising another post while a fourth checked its position with a cord.
Inside the new compound, two long rectangles had been marked into the ground for the barracks buildings. The foundation trenches had already been dug for both, but only the first had begun rising above the dirt. Workers were already setting vertical posts along one side over the foundation.
A large stack of planks had been piled beneath a rough cloth cover near the gate of the compound.
Kivamus stopped beside the road and watched for a moment.
“How long is it gonna take?” he asked.
Duvas had clearly expected the question.
“The palisade should be finished in another day,” the majordomo said. “The first double-story barracks will take around a week before the main frame is complete. Since the sawmills are keeping us well supplied with planks, we’ve already started stacking them here instead of waiting for the frame to be ready. Once the posts and beams are in place, fixing the wall planks should only take another few days.”
“And the second barracks?”
“The foundation is already prepared. Once the first building is covered enough to keep the work moving inside, some of the crew can shift to raising the second. I would estimate another two weeks for that one, perhaps a little more if we lose workers to urgent repairs elsewhere.”
Hudan looked across the construction site with open approval.
“I can’t wait to move the recruits here.”
Kivamus glanced at him. “Because it will make them easier to train?”
“Easier to watch over,” Hudan said. “Right now, they come from the longhouse blocks every morning. Some arrive late, some look half asleep, and some think training ends the moment they walk away from Nesser. If they live here, he can keep them in line from morning until night.”
Duvas gave him a mild look. “That sounds like a warning more than a benefit.”
“For them, yes,” Hudan said.
Kivamus smiled. “It should help with discipline. They’ll sleep, train, clean equipment, and eat under the same roof. Once they start thinking of themselves as guards instead of villagers who come for training during the day, Nesser’s work will become easier.”
Hudan grunted. “Easier might be too generous. But it’ll become possible.”
A shout came from the construction site.
One of the workers had set a post slightly out of line, and the foreman was making him pull it free before the mistake became part of the building. Kivamus watched the men correct it, then turned toward the manor’s eastern gate.
The group entered the manor grounds from the east and turned left toward the southeast corner.
Nesser was training the recruits there. Once the barracks compound was completed the empty area between the two barracks would become the new training ground, with dedicated training facilities in it. But for now the southeast part of the manor was the only place with enough empty space to train the guards.
Even from a distance, the man was difficult to miss. The burns across his face and neck made him look harsher than he was, and the recruits seemed to remember that every time he turned toward them. He stood near the front of the yard with a practice spear in one hand, watching two lines of recruits drill with shields and spears.
“Again,” Nesser called.
The recruits reset.
“Shields up. Feet apart. Don’t stand like you’re waiting to be pushed into a ditch!”
One of the younger men adjusted his stance too slowly.
Nesser pointed the practice spear at him.
“If an enemy has time to notice your feet are wrong, you’re already dead. Do it again.”
The man straightened at once.
Hudan looked pleased.
They did not interrupt the training. Nesser had seen them, but he only gave a brief nod before returning his attention to the recruits.
Kivamus watched the next exchange of shield and spear movements. The recruits were still rough, but they were less awkward than they had been only a few weeks ago. Their shields moved together more often now. Their spears no longer wandered as much, and fewer men stumbled when ordered to shift formation.
Nesser had done that.
Not kindly, perhaps, but effectively.
“They’re improving,” Kivamus said.
Hudan nodded. “They are. Still not ready for a real fight outside the walls, but they’re improving.”
“That’s a good start.”
“For now,” Hudan agreed. “Give us a month or two, and they'll be ready to be included in the teams sent outside the village. We’ll start by sending them with the hunting groups to give them some real fighting experience where they will be in the company of other veterans, and then we can send them for escort duty for the merchants or to protect the industrial area. In a few months, they will have a decent experience so they could be sent for any task. We have already planned to send two teams this time for spreading rumors in the north, but those guards will still be chosen personally by Feroy, and we can't send these recruits for that purpose anytime soon. He will lead one of the teams himself, while the other will be made up of the guards who accompanied him last time.”
Kivamus nodded, still watching the training. The two teams would be able to cover more around this time, which will help to spread the word in more villages and farms in the north. They were still only spreading rumors for now, but they would have to send separate teams with empty wagons to help bring the slaves back safely and discreetly. But this would do for now.
Tiranat was already getting above 50 new refugees every month now, including from the west and the north, and the village population was approaching 800 residents. It was becoming difficult to keep up with that influx of people, whether in terms of housing them or feeding them. Two construction teams were already active in the village now—Finn’s team building the first tenement block and the other team building the barracks—and the sawmills worked from sunrise to sunset. When Taniok returned after constructing the losuvil encampment, all the three teams would be working here in the village, and at least the first task of housing the refugees would become easier. The second task of feeding them depended on how well the Ulrigan trading route worked out.
The regular increase of village population meant by the time the wheat was harvested in mid autumn, the village population would likely pass a thousand people, including the expected increase of the number of refugees coming from the north. That would mean the village population would have tripled in the year since he arrived here, but he had no doubt it would only be helpful for the village even if it led to some problems in the short-term. The vision of Tiranat he had in his mind required lots and lots of workers, so the regular increase in population would make it much easier to find enough workers to farm, mine coal, construct new buildings, manufacture new products, and to protect the village by recruiting more guards when needed. He just had to make sure the immediate danger of another revenge raid by Torhan, or the arrival of mercenaries in a month didn't damage that future.
They continued west through the manor grounds, toward the former animal shed area in the northwest of the manor.
The soapmaking shed looked different from the workshops near the village center. It had been built to hide what was happening inside, not to display useful work. The sides were closed with planks and cloth screens so people passing nearby could not see the process, but the upper sections had been left open to let fumes escape. A small shaded area had been arranged for the workers, though the place still smelled strongly of ash, fat, and something sharp enough to make Kivamus avoid breathing too deeply.
Only three workers were inside, two men and a woman.
One man stirred a thick mixture in a large pot set over a controlled fire. Another measured liquid from a clay jar while keeping her face turned away from the fumes with a cloth tied over the lower half of his face. The woman was cutting hardened soap from an earlier batch into rough blocks on a wooden table in the shade.
Syrene stood beside the table, sleeves tied back, watching the blocks as they were cut.
She looked up when Kivamus entered.
“My lord.”
“Syrene. How is the work going?”
“Better than before,” she said. “The last batch hardened more evenly. This one should be stronger if they don’t overheat it.”
The worker at the pot immediately slowed his stirring.
Syrene noticed. “Not that slowly. Keep it moving, but don’t let it boil hard.”
The man adjusted again.
Kivamus looked at the blocks on the table. They were plain, uneven, and far from anything that would sell properly on Earth, but here, they were more than usable. For Tiranat, that mattered a lot.
“Will this be enough for the manor and guards?” Duvas asked.
“For a few weeks,” Syrene said. “But we can’t yet supply the whole village. Not until we expand the work or make more dilute, uh… poorer soap.”
“Poorer soap?” Hudan asked.
“It would still clean,” she said. “Just not as well. It might also smell worse. I don't recommend it.”
Hudan glanced toward the pot and scrunched his nose. “Worse than this?”
One of the workers laughed before quickly lowering his head.
Syrene smiled. “Yes. Worse than this.”
“Then expand it,” Hudan said.
Duvas frowned at him. “That’s not your decision.”
The captain shrugged. “No, but I do have a nose which I’d like to keep working.”
Kivamus chuckled and looked at the open top of the shed, then at the workers trying to keep the mixture steady in the heat.
“We can't do it immediately,” he said. “We already have too many construction projects waiting. But once the barracks is ready and Nesser moves the training to there, we’ll make a larger shed in the current training area in the southeast—with better ventilation. Supply of fat and ash for making lye wouldn't be a problem. I'll talk with a carpenter-apprentice about it once the barracks is nearing completion.”
Syrene nodded. “And cutting molds too. Cutting every block by hand wastes time and makes the sizes uneven. Once we expand the scale of making soap, we’ll need to assign another worker or two just to cut the soaps without a proper cutting mold.”
“Good idea. Make a note of what else you need. I’ll speak with Darora once the urgent weapons and lathe work are finished. He can coordinate with Cedoron to get a series of sharp but thin steel blades forged for the mold.”
“I will. I’ll also keep mixing new materials in each batch to try out which of them gives a marketable fragrance as well.”
She turned back toward the worker pouring a fresh batch of liquid soap into a mold.
“Not that thick. If the blocks are too large, they take longer to dry properly.”
Kivamus left her to it. Since she didn't have to process losuvil these days with the summer heat making it impossible to bring viable leaves here from the hills, and the encampment still under construction, she had taken over the training of the soapmaking workers, while also overseeing the process to make sure they were doing it right until they got enough experience to perform the task without supervision.
Once he had suggested that soaps could be made with good fragrances, she had gotten an idea to make a paste of various kinds of flowers and herbs, trying to see which one came out better—with Lucem and Clarisa helping in suggesting wild new ideas, ranging from any random weed to even powdered adzee fangs, which was rejected immediately, thankfully.
Soon, he had no doubt she would create multiple types of soap which he and others actually liked to use, compared to the current one they used where they often had to pinch their nose to not take in the smell. He was glad she was proactive in that, and soon soap would also become a commodity which the manor could sell for profit.