Dream d2768-s: Yarrowgarth, One Day

I had a dream where...

I had a dream where the commons in Junipercombe was full of the day's business. Men with barrows were moving split timber from a stack near the west gate to a second stack being built closer to the common hall. I stood near the hall wall with the drawn sheet folded twice and counted the marks against the light.

Sixty-five places on the sheet. Nine of them carry a small circle in the corner, the sign I use when a light is showing. Lano sat beside my boot and watched the barrow men with her ears up.

The clerk of the common works was directing the stacking, calling measurements from a board. I wrote nothing she said. I was counting the places past the edge of the sheet.

Two hundred and seventy-six in all, held in the tally book I carry separate from the sheet. Of those, a hundred and seventy-one have no entry on any page I have drawn. Fifty-eight of the undrawn were worked in the last thirty days. Not one mark set for them.

I opened the tally book to the page for the undrawn country beyond Osierthwaite. Twenty-seven of the fifty-eight showed some kind of light on this round. I wrote the number at the top of the column.

One of the barrow men set his barrow down and pressed his hands to his back. A second man was mortising a cross-timber by feel, not looking at the joint. Lano's nose went up. She trotted three steps toward the stack, then came back and sat again.

Seven marks on the drawn sheet point at ground no reader can reach. I checked each of them twice. I left them as they are.

Yarrowgarth I added to the tally this morning. One day standing. Place-name, date, the classification field left blank. The tally carries the name and nothing more.

Rurik came out from under the hall steps and found the warm patch of sun at the base of the wall. He stretched the full length of him on the flags and closed his amber eyes. The morticer finished his joint and moved to the next timber. The barrow men went on.

I refolded the sheet and put it away.

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