Chapter 9: Months of the Demons (Part II)

Carter came back after the three men had gone, and Roland had expected this.

“You’re considering staying,” Carter said. Not a question.

“What would you recommend,” Roland said, “if I were?”

The Knight Commander’s face did the thing it did when he was balancing what he thought against what he was permitted to say. The balance never took long to resolve. “I would recommend strongly against it, Your Highness. The hunter’s account alone—a single mixed-variety beast defeated him, and he’s arguably the most capable fighter in this town. We have the town guard, which is not cavalry, and we have the castle guard. Against a migration of demon beasts? The only defensible position in this region is Longsong Stronghold.”

“Which has walls.”

“Yes.”

“What if we had walls?” Roland said.

Carter stopped.

“Between the north slope of the mountain and the Chishui River,” Roland said. “At the nearest point. Six hundred yards. That’s the distance. I checked the old surveys.”

“Your Highness.” Carter said this carefully, the way he said things when he wasn’t sure whether the prince was serious and didn’t want to treat a jest as a proposal. “You understand what building a wall requires.”

“Tell me.”

The knight’s expression shifted. He had apparently decided this was serious, and was now recalculating.

“Foundation work first,” Carter said. “The earth has to be compressed—layers, every two feet reinforced, or the weight will cause settling and the wall will crack and fall. Even a fieldwork earthen rampart, the simplest possible structure, takes time and labor in proportion to its length. A stone wall—” He shook his head. “Stone walls require cut stone. Cutting stone requires masons. Hundreds of masons, working the stone at the quarry before transport, and then setting it block by block at the site. Mortar between the blocks. The wall rising in sections, each section cured before building continues.” He looked at Roland steadily. “You have perhaps two and a half months until the first snow. In two and a half months, a work crew of the size this territory can assemble could not build a stone wall six hundred yards long tall enough to stop a boar-variant. Walls of that scale take years. They have always taken years.”

“Everything has always been done the way it’s always been done,” Roland said.

“Some things, yes, because they are the correct way to do them.”

“Or because no one has tried a different way.” Roland stood and walked to the window. The garden was visible from here; he could see the cottage, the fence, the pond. Anna was not outside—she’d gone in after the afternoon session. “If I told you we could build a wall with materials we already have, using a binding agent that sets harder than fired brick and doesn’t require individually cut stone—would you think it possible then?”

Carter looked at him without warmth. “I would think you were describing something that does not exist, Your Highness.”

“Everything you’ve seen since I arrived in this territory has conformed perfectly to your previous understanding of what exists,” Roland said mildly.

A pause. Carter’s jaw moved. He was thinking about the dungeon.

“If there is no wall ready when the snow comes,” Roland said, “we evacuate. I’m not throwing anyone’s life away on a plan that doesn’t work. But if it works—if I can give you a wall and enough defenders trained to use it—what are our chances?”

“A wall between the mountain and the river,” Carter said slowly. “High enough to stop a boar-variant. Manned by disciplined fighters who can hold their position.” He calculated. “Against the ordinary beasts—reasonable. Against the mixed-variety—” He stopped.

“Against the mixed-variety, we deal with them separately. Two or three per season.”

“That’s not small number, when a single one nearly killed the best hunter in this territory.”

“No. But it’s not unlimited.” Roland turned from the window. “We have Anna.”

The silence that followed was a different quality.

“I will not abandon my post,” Carter said finally—not quite at Roland, not quite at the window, somewhere between them. Then he knelt. “Your Highness. I will protect you.”

In the garden that evening, the ale was cold and tasted like autumn grain left too long. Roland sat with it in the fading light and let the quiet settle around him, and thought about limestone.

The North Mine had been running for decades—longer, maybe. Decades of extracted ore meant decades of waste rock dumped at the mine’s perimeter. Grey and coarse-grained, calcium carbonate heavy: limestone, or close enough that the difference was academic for their purposes. You calcined limestone in a kiln, drove off the carbon dioxide, were left with quicklime. You added water, got slaked lime. You mixed slaked lime with volcanic ash or fine aggregate, and under the right conditions it set—not like dried clay, which crumbled, but like something that had become stone.

Concrete. Not Portland cement, not reinforced; this was Roman concrete, the kind that hardened underwater if you let it. The Empire had built ports with it. They had built them to last.

He had perhaps two months. The calcination alone would require a kiln and fuel and labor organized in shifts. The mixing and application would require workers who had never done anything like this before, following instructions they had no framework for, under a prince they had no particular reason to trust.

The wall would not be concrete. He had spent the past hour working through the quantities and had concluded that the amount of raw limestone available—and more importantly, the time available to process it—was insufficient for a concrete structure at the scale he needed. But cement as a binding agent between fieldstones—irregular, uncut stones of the kind that were already piled at the mine entrance in enormous quantities—that was achievable. Barely. Not comfortably.

He was working through the specific problem of how to organize the processing chain when Anna said, from behind him, “Look.”

He turned.

She was standing a few feet from the cottage door, her hand raised to the level of her shoulder. In her palm—balanced there, entirely still—was a small flame.

Not rising from her feet. Not climbing her arm. Not consuming the sleeve. A flame balanced on her open hand, the tip of it swaying upward and downward in a slow rhythm, as if breathing.

She tilted her hand slightly and the flame moved—slowly, deliberate, like a child learning to walk—toward her index finger. It reached the fingertip and sat there.

It was a small thing. He knew it was a small thing in the context of what she had done in the dungeon. He knew it was a small thing in the context of what it might eventually become.

It was not a small thing.

Her eyes were on the flame, reflecting it—not performing anything, not watching him watch her, just looking at what she’d made. On the tip of her nose there was a small bead of sweat from the effort.

“You did it,” Roland said.

She looked up at him. Something in her face that was not quite a smile, but was close to the conditions that made smiles possible.

“Now try it on the iron ingot,” he said.

She looked at him, then at the ingot.

She was going to be extraordinary.

Chapter 9 Months of the Demons (Part 2)

“Not many, Your Highness,” the hunter replied. “During every Months of the Demons there will only appear two to three mixed species demons, otherwise Longsong Stronghold would be in huge trouble.”

“Well, you seem to be very observant,” Roland ordered the man to stand up and asked, “what’s your name? You don’t look like a man from my Kingdom of Graycastle.”

“Half of my lineage hails from the Mojin Clan, the townspeople call me Iron Axe.”

Mojin Clan, the people from the Shamin Kingdom, located southwest of the barren lands, it was said that they were the descendants of giants. Roland searched within his brain for any memories related to the Mojin Clan and realized that Iron Axe did not use the name his clan called him by, rather using the name given by the people of Border Town, and apparently he did not want to have a relationship with the Shamin Kingdom. As for why, since it was obvious that he was from the southwestern border of the desolate lands, he estimated, that there were a series of sad stories involved.

But for the moment those stories weren’t important; everyone was welcome in Border Town, regardless of his or her background.

Roland clapped his hands, “That’s not why I asked you to be here, Carter, bestow each of them with ten silver royals, then they can leave.”

“Thank you very much for the reward, Your Highness,” said the three in unison.

Afterwards the people were taken away by Carter. When he had finished his task, Carter returned once again and asked, “Your Highness, why did you ask them these questions? Do you want to stay here?”

Roland didn’t express any opinion and instead asked, “What do you think?”

“This matter is out of question, Your Highness!” Said the knight loudly, “According to the statement from the hunter, even a wild demon bear would be difficult to cope with. Outside of fifty yards a shot with a crossbow would have no effect; we would have to wait until it closed to forty yards, or even until thirty yards before making our shot, only our elite soldiers can accomplish this. Plus the demons are too numerous, and we can’t rely on strong walls, only standing side by side with the local guards to stop them. I’m afraid that the casualties would outstrip the accomplishments, our defeat would be assured.”

“You already saw what a witch is able to do, so why do you can’t think positively?” Roland sighed.

“This… The witches are evil, but Anna… Miss Anna does not look so, as your Knight Commander, I have to seek truths by looking for facts.”

“If I would give you a city wall, would you think it will be possible?”

“What?” For a moment Carter suspected that he had heard wrong.

“If I give you a wall, between the north slope of the mountain and the Chishui River,” Roland stressed every word he said, “Although they would not be like the enormous walls from Graycastle, but to stop animals, they should still be able to.”

“Sir, do you know what you are saying?” The knight didn’t know whether to be angry or to laugh, “Even your nonsense should have a limit, if you don’t stop, you will have to excuse my lack of manners.”

“We still have three months, don’t we? I looked at the past records, the first snow usually falls here at the end of the second month from now.”

“Even if we had three years it would not be enough! Building a wall would require many workers, for setting the foundation they have to compress the earth and every one or two feet would have to be reinforced; otherwise it would have a high risk to collapse. This would be the simplest of the earthen

walls,” Carter shook his head again and again,”brick and stone walls are even more difficult to build and it would need hundreds of masons who would first have to cut the stones or bake the clay into bricks. Afterwards they would need to build it block by block. Your highness, all walls were built this way, without exception. A city being built in the time of a day and a night, that is only the stuff of legends.”

Roland indicated he had heard enough, “I see. You don’t need to be so upset, if there is no reliable wall in place, I will evacuate with you to Longsong stronghold. I’m not going to give away my life in this place.”

The knight knelt down, “I will protect you!”

Afterwards in the beautiful castle gardens, Roland nipped at his bitter ale. Looking at Anna who was intently eating cream cakes, his mood recovered a lot.

He had decided to stop the demonic beasts at the Border town – joining the elite soldier with the town guards, he would also intensive the farming by expanding the area the guards patrolled. If he wanted to build the wall, connecting the north slope of the mountain and the Chishui River within three months, he must use an appropriate technology from the modern times.

It was not the case that Roland had suddenly thought of this, previously he had checked the edges of the Border town (although he didn’t go personally), in his memory remained a clear picture — the northern slope of the mountain and the Chishui River were only separated by 600 yards at their closest point, it was a natural bottleneck. And due to the all year round mining in the North Mine, it was surrounded by rock gravel mined from the cave.

These gravel cast offs were ash gray, containing plenty of calcium carbonates, which could be used as limestone after grinding. With the limestone he had his solution, it would be equal to cement.

Yes, this would change the history of mankind, to be able to build with a water hardening material, with raw materials which were easily to obtain, which were simple to prepare, it truly numbered among one of the most efficient tools for tilling the fields.

Roland estimated the needed time, even if he would implement new technology, even with cement he wasn’t sure if it was possible, the amount of cement they actually needed was too big, he wasn’t sure if they could calcine so much cement powder within three months. And concrete toughness would be inferior, in the end they would need to reinforce it with steel, thus the probability to succeed in building a concrete city wall was not that great.

They had to maximize the usage of the existing materials and save cement, so building a fieldstone wall would be the most appropriate choice.

The so-called fieldstone, was a stone which had not undergone any grinding, it was just a natural byproduct of mining. This stone, because of the irregular shape of the edges and corners, there was no way to directly using it to build, instead it first need to be processed by the stonemason into usable bricks. But building a fieldstone wall while using cement as binder was possible, regardless of how oddly shaped the stone was it could be used, the gap between the stones was filled by the cement, saving cement and using leftover materials.

With this the big direction was set, but the actual implementation, he was afraid he would have to do it by himself, thought Roland. Regardless of whether it was the calcined cement or fieldstone wall, both were new things. Except for himself, no one had seen these things, and also no one knew how to make them. He was afraid he would be very busy for the next three months.

“You, look here.”

The sound of Anna’s clear voice came from behind him.

As Roland turned, he saw a small cluster of flames in her palm quietly burning, there was clearly no wind, but the flame tip was rising up and down, as if it would nod to her. She shook her finger, and the fire was like a toddler, moving slowly towards the tip of the finger. In the end, it stood at the top of the index finger, simmering down.

“You did it.”

It was an incredible scene, Roland felt admiration from the bottom of his heart. This was not illusion magic, nor a chemical trick, but it really was a supernatural power. But this was not the most attractive thing to Roland – many time more dazzling than the flame, was Anna’s look.

While she was intently staring at her fingertips, the lake water limpid eyes were reflecting the vibrant flame, as if an elf sealed within a sapphire. The traces left from the prison torture had already faded, though she rarely smiled, but her face was no longer lifeless. On the young lady’s tip of her nose was a speck of sweat, the rosy color on her white checks emitted vitality, even looked at also can let a person feel cheerful mood.

“What happened to you?”

“Ah… Nothing,” Roland noticed he looked at her for too long, he removed his gaze and coughed.” well, then, try using it to melt the iron.”

In the past few days, except for eating and sleeping, she always repeated her practice, in front of the hardworking enthusiast Roland could only endlessly blush in shame — even in the face of the college entrance examination he did not work so hard.

“Apparently she will not need long, until she completely grasps this power,” Roland thought. Following that, his ideas of new projects can be set on the agenda.

TN: For information about concrete and why it is logical that he was able to invent it.