After a while, he saw Tamm secretly wiping his eyes in the moonlight.
On the day he left, Tamm's luggage was simple: a packet of dried food, a family division order, and a pitchfork Nar had given him for cultivating land.
"Eat sparingly." His mother, with red eyes, put some more dried food into his bag. This time, his brother saw it and finally didn't yell as before, but said nothing, just stood silently by his side.
Tamm nodded, not daring to look into his mother's eyes.
Everyone in the military fortress came out to see them off, a lively scene. The crowd watched this large group of young people who were leaving home to venture out because of the Lord's new laws. They watched their figures along the narrow dirt road until they disappeared around the bend of the valley.
Walking towards the mysterious Brightmoon Mountains.
Ailaner looked at her two sleeping sons, wondering what she was thinking.
Her husband, sent by Lady Roslyn, had died fighting with Lord Arthur, killed in the River Valley battle, trampled into a pulp, his body not even brought back whole.
She was only in her twenties, one child seven years old, the other only three, who would only cling to her clothes and cry for food.
The people in the military fortress all urged her to remarry; the blacksmith next door was willing to marry her but didn't want her children.
Therefore, she refused.
Her youngest son had a nightmare and suddenly began to wail. She picked up the child and comforted him.
She also felt very scared; with no male in the household, countless pressures weighed down on her, and she didn't know what to do. Only by counting the ten silver stags over and over could the cold touch reassure her.
If she hadn't lived on Lord Arthur's land, where order was good and rule was perfect, if she were on another lord's land, a young woman like her would have been eaten until not even bones were left, or rather, at the moment her husband died, she and her children would have been sentenced to death.
She might have had some value as a young woman, but her husband's children would surely have been doomed.
Finally, Ailaner made a decision. She gently put down her comforted youngest son, found tools, dug a pit for the distributed pension, and buried it deeply.
The next day, with red eyes, she did enough mental preparation and found the steward:
"Lord, I want to work."
Ailaner held her children in front of her, speaking softly but clearly.
"I don't want to remarry."
"Can you find me a job?"
"I can do anything! As long as there's pay!"
The steward scrutinized this frail woman, this young widow, whose eyes held no tears, only a stubbornness: "What… can you do?"
Ailaner blushed, but still gritted her teeth and continued, "I… I have strength, and I'm not afraid of getting dirty."
"I can do anything! As long as there's pay!"
The steward thought for a moment, and then seemed to remember something, excitedly telling the woman to go back and wait for notification. A few days later, Ailaner became a "Water Purifier."
This was a new position Lord Arthur had established for the territory, responsible for cleaning the wells and irrigation canals of the military town. Lord Arthur placed great importance on environmental hygiene within his territory, and the steward was worried about not being able to recruit people for this job.
The work was exhausting; every day Ailaner returned home with a tired body, but her heart felt at ease.
She received her first pay, a few copper coins and some grain.
It wasn't much, but it was enough for her and her children to live on.
The support funds were distributed quarterly. Her name and her husband's name were registered on another small wooden board next to the public notice board in the market.
The first time Ailaner received this money, she couldn't hold back her tears, sitting on the ground and wailing loudly, scaring the steward who was distributing the pension, making him afraid to even breathe.
More and more people gathered, looking strangely at the steward, thinking he was threatening the poor woman. Someone angrily spoke up, wanting to report him to the Lion's Den.
To the steward's terrified gaze, she finally spoke to the trembling steward and the surrounding commoners:
"My Lord… My Lord… Lord Arthur… May the Seven Gods bless him…
1
"My children and I… will never forget his kindness."
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