Rock Garden

originally posted September 6, 2006

After turning the soil, getting the tools of the peasant deep into the dirt, I worked a little more. In to the elbows, so to speak. From the scrolls and texts of Vintners and Peasants alike, I have learned that crops grow best if the soil facilitates the entrance of air and water. Soil 'compaction' prevents this. I was careful to plant the staked saplings in the nutrient rich soil, tilling it with tools and my own fingers so as to give the roots a chance to take hold and establish themselves on the slopes beneath the field of dina. That is when I found the greenish rocks. I thought, at first, they might be hardened excrement of some animal. A roving sleen, perhaps. A larl or a tabuk, maybe. After pitching them off to one side as I dug, I noticed some time later during the twilight ahn that they glinted a bit. Not in the manner of a woman's bana, mind you, but more than you would expect a twenty year old piece of doe dookie to glint. I realized they were one of those 'special rocks' that Naked Slave is always going on about. The largest was about the size of a fist, what might be considered a good 'braining' stone. I decided to let her add them to her satchel with the others she's collected on our journey. I will let her keep them with one caveat:
"Do not brain the other girls with the rock," I told her.