Now if you may, humble people of our town,
please applaude our magnicifent hero, the great knight Lord Rowan of Canterbury
III the Brave! The town square was
roaring. Never had they seen such a perfect man in all his mighty stature,
never had they experienced the presence of such a legendary knight. Women
fainted of his chivalry, every child in all of Europe dreamed of being him. And
now he stood here, with the crowd applauding and cheering his name in the town
square, commonly known in every town as "where it all happened". Here
you'd find merchants selling fine goods from all over the flat world we live
in, taverns with exquisite beer and not-quite-so-exquisite women and at special
occasions like today a heroic salute or the more often public punishment with
the pillory. Lord Rowan landed in the formen category, as he gazed proudly over
the crowd, standing with his basic knights equipment; shining armour, shield,
sword and lance. He was soon off to the next tournament, in which he expected
another smashing win and a following fantastic fiest. Rowan! Rowan! Rowan! the crowd cheered. Rowan! Rowan! Rowan!
Gradually the cheers changes, from ecstatic
young women and children to a far angrier and older deep voice. As a small rock
smashes against the back of my head, I properly comprehend the situation. I
have been daydreaming again during labor, and the angry shouts are being
slinged from my fathers exhausted mouth. ROWAN
in the name of the Lord if you will not stop this heretical dreaming of yours I
swear I will smack you till' your face is as blue as the heavens He created,
he shouts furiously and I swear he doesn't pause once in the sentence. To be
fair, this is a quite terrible day to be 'dreaming heretically'. It's the first
of two days each week in which we did a day's work at the demesne, the Lord's part of the manor. A quite nice man, the Lord, taking
little of our products and only demanding two days of labor a week. I hear some
Lords north of here require four days of labor a week, and some take half the
goods which the manor's peasants produce. However, our Lord is quite expensive with
the use of the manor's mill, oven and winepress, so we refuse to use those
facilities as much as we can stand it.
There are sixteen other families living on
the manor, and most of them are quite nice. Our houses are small and cold, and
our food is simple and just enough to survive. But it's not horrible. The
smaller children have plenty of space to play on, and it's quite enjoyable
listening to their laughter as we older ones work. We get our free time as
well, and with plenty of other boys on the manor it's not all bad once we get
off the fields. The Lord even has a beautiful daughter, Marigold, who lives in the manor house on
the demesne. With golden hair floating along her back, the bluest eyes a boy
has seen and a smile which melts your bones. I believe I am deeply in love. If
only I were more than a simple peasant's son. A knight in shining armour,
that's what I'd be. Saving my damsel in distress and living out our days in
happiness. But as the priest preaches; God has decided this is our place in life.
This is our fate. We are born peasants and we will die peasants.
Delightful
SvarSlett