Bessie was happy to see Elayne smiling again.
Elayne returned to the forge and had dinner with her father and Mrs. Logan. They were pleased with the many candles Bessie had promised in exchange for her work and heartened by Elayne’s more positive demeanor.
“Bessie asked me to come back next week to help prepare a batch of larger candles and soap. She wishes to complete the work before the summer fair. I never kent how many candles the castle uses. Despite working the entire day, she needs to make more. Fortunately for us, it will save us coin for other things, and we won’t need to barter to get candles.”
After dinner, Elayne and Mrs. Logan sewed.
“I obtained potatoes at the market, and tomorrow, when ye have time, I thought ye could help me plant them in the garden.”
“Aye, let me ken when ye are ready, and I will gladly help ye. One morning next week, I will go hunting with the bow Cailean left for me. I will search for more pheasants, and that will give us more feathers to use for stuffing.”
“If ye shoot a few, I’ll ask yer father to pick a chicken for the table and we will use those feathers too.”
At the end of the night, Elayne bid her good night as Mrs. Logan left to walk home with her father.
Hours later, when her father returned home, Elayne still lay awake thinking about Cailean. She couldn’t wait to discover how his visit to the first clan had concluded. Travel to clans across the Highlands was inherently dangerous. Clan wars erupted with little provocation. Cailean faced fighting bandits and the temptations of many ladies. Ladies who could capture Cailean’s attention and his heart. Although she had given her heart to him, he had never been hers. They were only friends. When he found a wife, that would change. Then she would have nae one.
*
Elayne labored long hours every day, and as the weather grew warmer, it felt more oppressive inside the forge. The following week, she took a horse from the stables, with the bow and arrows Cailean had given her, and Thomas, a fair- haired groom, accompanied her with his own bow. He had a fun personality that Elayne enjoyed. Tethering the horses by the stream, they crept silently in the forest, hunting game. Thomas shot a rabbit first. Afterward, concentrating on all the lessons she had learned from Cailean, Elayne shot a brace of pheasants, and Thomasshot pheasants too. They knelt by the river and washed their faces and drank the cool water, refreshing themselves before returning to the keep.
Thomas said, “Thank ye for letting me go hunting with ye. It is more fun than mucking out horse stalls the entire day. I’d be happy to go again with ye.”
“Ye are welcome. I ken what ye mean about going hunting. I find I need a break from working in the forge. To be out in nature is a welcome change. I’m happy we found game to shoot. What will ye do with yers?”
“I’ll give ye my game. I have nae place to cook it. If yer mother makes rabbit stew, mayhap I could have some one night?” he asked hopefully with a lilt to his voice and earnest eyes.
“I will ask Mrs. Logan who cooks for us. She is nae relation to me. “
“Ye said Mrs. Logan sews. It gets cold at night in the winter. If I shot more rabbits, could she make me a blanket? I cannot afford to purchase one and I cannae ask my mother.”
“I will ask her.”
“A warm one will be most welcome. I need to ken how many more rabbits she needs to fashion a blanket.”
His simple request gave Elayne pause. Although she lamented the tediousness of her job, she ken she was more fortunate than many others in the clan. Her heart ached to improve their lives, even if in the simple ways of a new blanket, a shawl, or a tin lantern illuminating the darkness.
William and Elayne invited Thomas to dine with them the next day and shared the rabbit stew and roasted pheasant he had shot. An active growing boy, he devoured the food, scooping upspoonful after spoonful. Mrs. Logan appreciated his enjoyment of the dishes and served him a second bowl before William had half of his dinner consumed. Thomas wolfed down several pieces of bread and butter with his stew and pheasant. Even William’s eyes widened as he saw how hungry Thomas was and how large an appetite he had.
Thomas’s father had a small farm outside the hills that surrounded the village. The oldest of eight children, Thomas had worked on the farm along with his siblings aside from the youngest, helping their father plant crops and care for the livestock.
Before leaving, Thomas smiled brightly. “Thank ye for the meal. I can’t remember when I have had such a delicious dinner. Yer cooking reminds me of my mother’s, and her rabbit stew was always my favorite.” Elayne left Thomas talking to her parents after dinner while she worked on the forge making iron spikes to hold up candles, which she hoped to sell at the fair.
Two days later, Elayne returned to the castle to help Bessie make soap. A big production, lassies and lads tended the fire and stirred the pots. In one small batch of soap, Elayne added ground heather flowers she had pulverized inside a cloth on the anvil. In another batch, she used ground pine needles. Bessie appreciated the fragrance of each and she ken the ladies of the castle would be delighted to try the scented soaps.
Bessie and Elayne poured the hot soap into molds in the stillroom, where it would cure for the next month. Elayne ate lunch with the castle staff at Bessie’s insistence and enjoyed talking with lasses of her age. Bessie planned for Elayne to return the following week to make larger candles. The timing was perfect since her father had finished the model they used to create the larger tin lanterns.
In the forge, Elayne worked on horseshoes to sell at the summer fair. Her father as blacksmith for the laird and having made horseshoes for the laird’s horses, his warriors’ horses, and others, it was a testament to the quality of his work.
In addition to what she continually made for the fair, Elayne cunningly bartered with a carpenter at the castle for leftover small pieces of wood she could use to fashion sturdy wooden crates to carry items for the sale. William and Mrs. Logan were delighted with the crates, as it would make their job easier. One night, when Thomas came to dinner, Elayne instructed him on how to build the crates with the wood she’d obtained. Thomas followed her directions exactly.
The two later returned to see the carpenter and bartered with eggs she had collected from the hens for more scrap pieces and also blocks of wood. She asked the carpenter to demonstrate how he sanded and polished wood. Additionally, Elayne got a piece of rough limestone from him and asked Thomas to carry it.
Back home, she hammered the iron spikes she’d made into the wood blocks to hold candle tapers, but she wanted the wood polished into a satiny soft hue so that the wood gleamed. With a polished finish on the wood, she could fetch a higher price at the summer fair from those visitors with fatter purses.
Elayne’s father and Duncan had made a new bargain. Thomas would apprentice as a blacksmith. Thrilled to learn the blacksmith trade, Thomas enjoyed dinner occasionally with Elayne and her family. Each evening after closing the forge, Elayne sat with Thomas and taught him how to read and write.
“As a blacksmith, ye need a keen eye for measurements and mathematics. Ye need to be good with yer hands to create weapons and tools. We rely on carpenters to create handles for the tools, so ye need to cultivate respect and good relationshipswith many other artisans. Ye need to understand weights and measures, since we may charge more for a heavier tool. The time to create a tool is also taken into consideration in pricing items. Ye will be expected to help Papa and Mrs. Logan at the fair. It will help to learn to give the correct change.”
