Against a background of soft bleating sounds and occasional donkey noises, suddenly a very different call was heard, a loud and deep note of distress.
“Did I say something about sheep having babies?” Noni began. “I think one is about to, and might need help. Damn! I haven’t lit my lamp, and now I don’t have time. I have to go deliver a baby in the dark. Some of you can come along if you want. Whoever stays can finish the soup. Come on, Bo, let’s go find her!”
Buna was instantly at Noni’s side. Ilika, Boro, and Sata followed. They worked their way through the flock, all ripping and chewing grass. The distress call came again, then a bark from Bo, somewhere ahead. Soon they were outside the flock, feeling their way under a moonless night sky.
“We’re looking for an ewe laying down, probably the only one,” Noni said with fear in her voice. “Bo?”
He barked again, straight ahead, perhaps another hundred feet.
“Ilika?” Buna said with urgency in her voice.
“I’m thinking the same thing, Buna. Would light help, Noni?”
“I’d give anything for a little light right now. If she isn’t calling, she might be in big trouble. I hate this! Why didn’t I light my lamp?”
Suddenly there was light.
“What’s that?” Noni screamed.
“Just a little magic bracelet Ilika picked up,” Buna said in a calm voice.
“We use it all the time.”
While Noni was recovering, Ilika used a bright, focused beam to scan for the ewe and the dog. “Over there!”
They all dashed to the laboring animal, and Ilika changed the light to a soft glow.
Forgetting her fright, Noni set to work. The ewe was alive, but very weak.
Blood covered her hind legs and the nearby grass. The shepherdess quickly discovered one of the lamb’s back legs in the birth canal.
“Silly lamb. That doesn’t work very well.”
She slipped her hands along the lamb’s body until she found the other back leg, still inside its mother. Pushing in a little, she held the legs together, then pulled with all her might.
The lamb came sliding out into her lap, still partly covered by its birth sack, and red with blood. Noni burst into laughter and tears at the same time.
Buna was right beside her, trying to see and ready to help. “It’s not breathing . . .” she said anxiously.
“That’s okay,” Noni said, wiping the birth sack away with the tail of her tunic. “It has a little time. The ewe would be licking it right now, but I think she’s too weak. We have to trust the gods — there’s not much else we can do.”
“Where’s all the blood from?” Sata asked with a worried frown.
“The ewe. She got torn up trying to push out the lamb the wrong way.
How bad she’s torn will determine whether she lives or dies.”
“Maybe . . . me and the other guys could carry her back to the camp, near the fire?” Boro wondered out loud.
“Would you? She’s so far from camp, she’d be dinner for some wolf if we left her. But we have to let the afterbirth come first.”
Sitting beside Noni, Bo whimpered his concern.
“Everything’s okay here, boy. Keep an eye on the others.”
The dog whined once more, then trotted off to protect his sheep.
A moment later, the lamb began to sputter, and Noni angled its head downward in her lap and massaged its sides. “It has to breathe now, or die.”
The new little creature was trying very hard to breathe, but it was not an easy thing to do for the first time. The ewe began shuddering, and a moment later something large and dark red slid out onto the grass.
“That looks bad. Is she . . . d-d-dying?” Sata asked with a trembling voice.
“No, that’s normal. In fact, the more I look, the less blood I see. I know it looks like it’s everywhere, but it’s all thin, with no deep pools. I think her chances are good, especially if we can get her to camp.”
Boro hopped up. “I’ll go get helpers.”
“Thank you!” Noni called.
An hour later, the ewe lay on a blanket between the fire pit and the wagon, and the newborn was suckling on its mother. Ri and Tera helped to block the breeze.
Noni looked down at the pair. “Did I say eighty-seven?”
Buna laughed. “Eighty-eight now!”
“Tomorrow, I want to get a bath somewhere,” the shepherdess declared.
“Me too!” Boro called from the fire circle.
“Yeah!” Miko and Sata both agreed.
Noni mixed molasses and water and the new mother drank deeply. The bleeding had stopped and the lamb seemed healthy, so Noni ambled over to the fire.
“You and Buna haven’t eaten dinner,” Ilika said. “We saved you some.”
Noni swayed for a moment. “I was wondering why I felt faint. Maybe that explains it.”
The entire group laughed. Sata poured the remaining soup into wooden bowls as Rini handed them bread and cheese.
“Okay,” Noni said around a bite of bread. “I want to know all about this
. . . magic bracelet. I want to know where I can get one.”
“It comes with Ilika’s ship,” Miko said with a nod.
“He’s a captain,” Neti explained.
“And his country is far away from here,” Buna added.
“So it’s probably the only one in the kingdom,” Toli speculated.
“Damn!” Noni said with disappointment. “But thank you. That would have been a lot harder in the dark.”
For a minute they all sat in silence, gazing at the flames.
“Okay, with ten of you,” Noni began, “somebody must have a good story to tell.”
“How about . . . Mati and the Bottomless Pit,” Neti suggested.
Everyone chuckled — or shuddered — at the memory of crossing the gaping hole in the floor somewhere inside the city walls.
“Or
maybe
Boro and the Underwater Passage of Doom,” Mati said with a grin.
Spooky noises showed that many wanted to hear that one. Buna, however, remained silent.
“I know!” Kibi said. “Kodi and the Gold Piece.”
Everyone laughed nervously.
“Or
Kibi and the Fruit Basket,” Ilika suggested.
“The very best would be Ilika and the Evil High Priest,” Toli said.
“Yes!”
“Let’s hear that one!”
For the next hour, Noni listened to their stories, all of which made her laugh, or brought her close to tears. Then she took on a puzzled expression and looked at them askance. “Why do I get the feeling these aren’t just old wives’ tales you’ve changed by putting your own names in them?”
Kibi laughed deeply. “These are all the things that have happened to us in just the last few weeks!”
Noni smiled, then yawned uncontrollably.
“Noni,” Ilika began, “would it help if we hung around for a couple of days?
We have lots of lessons to do.”
“That would be great. I could get a bath, there’s enough grass for two or three days, and Bo and I can take them down to the stream each day while the mother and baby stay here. Hopefully I can get her up and eating in a day or two. What are your lessons about?”
The students looked at each other, then all said at once, “Everything!”
Deep Learning Notes
For a shepherdess, or anyone else who tends animals, life and death are always very close. The shepherdess is, among other things, a midwife, and an ewe’s only hope if something goes wrong with a birth.
What would have happened in this situation if Ilika and his students had not been there?
What do we call the device Noni wanted, and how hard is it to get in our culture?
Chapter 14: Rain, Rain . . .
“Can we learn some more astro . . . nomy tonight?” Toli asked.
Ilika looked up. “No. I think we will learn about the hydrological cycle that is probably about to dump rain on us.”
Everyone looked up. Even when they shielded their eyes from the firelight, not a single star could be seen.
“What’s a hydro . . .” Sata asked, struggling to remember the word.
“Hydrological cycle. Hydro is part of the word hydrogen, element number
. . .” He looked around.
“One,” Boro said without taking his eyes off the fire.
“Hydrogen means water-maker in your language. When two atoms of hydrogen join with one atom of oxygen . . .”
“Element . . . eight,” Mati said with only slight hesitation.
“. . . then two electron energy levels are completely filled by the ten electrons, creating a very stable compound called . . . water. Everyone’s heard of it?”
“Yes, Ilika,” Kibi said, grinning in the firelight.
“Where are you from?” Noni asked with wonder. “First a magic bracelet, now . . . I don’t know what to call it!”
“Basic chemistry,” Toli said.
Ilika chewed on a piece of dried fruit in silence for a minute, then described the cycle of water that begins with evaporation from the oceans, continues with falling rain or snow, and ends with rivers running back to the
sea. “It’s been going on for billions of years.”
Sata squinted. “Ten to the ninth power?”
“Several of those,” Ilika added.
“Would you draw the water molecule for us tomorrow?” Toli asked.
“Yes. And I need to go over the electron energy levels in much more detail.
But I just felt a drop. You don’t mind if we put our heads under your wagon tonight, Noni?”
“Just block it well! That old brake isn’t too good in a strong wind.”
They scrambled, and soon had all their saddlebags under the wagon. Noni took in her cooking things, and brought out a small tarp to put over the ewe and lamb. Miko and Boro put pieces of firewood around all four wagon wheels. Soon they had their bedrolls laid out with the open ends under the wagon. By that time, big drops of rain were landing everywhere around them.
“I’m going in,” Noni said from her doorway. “Stay dry!”
“We
will!”
“Good
night!”
They were soon snug in their bedrolls, the waxed fabric shedding the rain well. They could hear the wood creak above them as Noni moved around. Bo joined them as soon as he checked for strays.
The group stayed with Noni, Ri, Bo, and the eighty-eight sheep for two more days. A light rain fell each night, but the days in between were pleasant, and the sheep loved the wet grass.
Buna could be found with the shepherdess whenever she didn’t have lessons. After getting a bath and washing some clothes in a stream, Noni invited Buna into her wagon. Everyone else poked their heads in the door to observe the guided tour.
The bed and its straw mattress filled about half the space, with storage underneath and pegs for hanging clothes above. Opposite the head of the bed, a little iron stove straddled a small kindling box. A sturdy shelf held a copper washing basin, with a bucket on the floor for fetching water. Wooden boxes under the bed held clothes, food sacks, and crocks. Feathers, sprigs of greenery, seashells, and small bones dangled everywhere string could be tied, telling of the many places Noni had been with her wagon.
NEBADOR BookTwo: Journey 72
As soon as Toli got bored with the tour, he used his large boots to measure the outside of the wagon, announcing it to be three feet wide and seven feet long.
Back inside, Buna was fascinated by the little stove and its smoke hood, allowing Noni to cook and stay warm even in the worst weather. The two girls stayed and talked for more than an hour, until Buna reluctantly dragged herself away for the next lesson.
The ewe was on her feet the day after the birth, but didn’t go far from her hungry lamb. She had many volunteers to bring water and grass.
Ilika started teaching the multi-digit arithmetic for addition and subtraction, and several could remember doing it that way in their heads with simple problems. They devoured another chapter in The Adventures of Godi and Tima, and took turns reading the story, from the beginning, to Noni.
On the afternoon of the second day with Noni, Toli got his wish for more astronomy lessons. With the campfire as the sun, Ilika walked thirty strides across the grass before placing a tiny pebble on the ground for the innermost rocky planet, and several more equally far apart. His students came along behind, and stared with open mouths at the little pebble representing their own world. Then he hiked another three hundred strides down the road where he placed a fist-size rock for the nearest gas giant, then continued down the road with more gas giants in hand. Mati, on crutch, waited at the last rocky planet.
On the third day, the students gained a good understanding of electron energy levels, and could draw the chemical states of water.
Ilika noticed several of them looking thoughtfully into their cups that
evening, and carefully tasting before drinking.
The sheep started to wander farther and farther to find grass, and Noni needed to move her flock to a village to the north for shearing. Buna and Noni walked together in the twilight. Their laughter was heard back at the campfire, but their words could only be guessed.
Ilika and his students crawled under the wagon for the last time as the nightly rain began to fall.
Deep Learning Notes
The hydrological cycle, from oceans to clouds to rain to rivers to oceans, is driven by the heat from the sun. Without the sun at just the right distance, water would either be boiled away (if too close) or frozen (if too far). In either case, the hydrological cycle would not work, and little life could endure the resulting environment.
It is not possible to print, in a book, an accurate illustration of the solar system, to scale, like the one Ilika laid out for his students with rocks. If we made the sun a one-pixel dot, the Earth would be 105 pixels away, which would fit in an illustration, but it would only be 1/100 of a pixel across, so could not be shown. If we made the sun larger so the Earth could be shown, the distance between them would be too great for any piece of paper or display screen.
What we call water is not just molecules with one atom of oxygen and two of hydrogen. It is a constantly-changing soup of several closely-related molecules, several of which are ions (holding an electrical charge because of too many or too few electrons). These molecules constantly dance around each other (in liquid water) while exchanging electrons and hydrogen ions (free protons). The dance is much slower in ice.
The atom and the solar system have something in common: they are both
almost completely empty space. Philosophers and scientists from ancient times to the present have been aware of this parallel, and it is often expressed in the saying, “As above, so below.”
