Chapter 2
Worm
We walked in silence for a while. I studied my companions. One of them was the boy who had smiled at me the day Jordus had come. He was much like me only maybe two years older and a little shorter. Noticing me studying him he spoke.
"Welcome Pit, my name is Con and this worm is Jot.”
Jot smiled and the expression on his face suggested he was struggling with wanting to talk but all he managed was "welcome worm". The two young Keepers were as all Keepers are - robbed in blue and their heads shaved. In the past, new worms had had their heads shaved in a ceremony that had been the finale of a great party thrown by the family to celebrate the very special time in a boy’s life when he would don the blue robes and go into study. The tradition had fallen away after it had become the habit of marauders to target the unattended farms of families gone to celebrate. The shaving was now an un-ceremonial part of entry into the Keep. I ventured a question.
“How long have you been a Keeper Con?”
“This is my third year. I became a receiver before the last rains.”
“My family is large and they have less need of me than if there were fewer of us” he added when he saw the look on my face which was plain enough to read.
We walked for about an hour before we came to the village hold. A hold is where village Keepers lived. Village Keepers provide services to the local villagers. They know the verses of growing and harvesting of all the crops that would grow in the area. They also know the verses of calendar – the days when the sun is at its highest or lowest, the time of the rains for our area. This knowledge they used to ensure that the village knew when the times to do things did not pass without appropriate action. Mostly all the people in the village knew by heart when each of these things would occur but from time to time the Keepers would introduce new stanzas in the versings and share the new knowledge with the village. The rest of their tasks were those that served our social needs – marriages, funerals. Birthings were left to the Midwives who were the keepers of all medical lore.
The hold was a small compound with a washing block, an eating hall, a sleeping hut for each Keeper, a large garden and a small ornately decorated hall where the Keepers would spend much of their time in meditation. Keepers spent each morning walking through the village, each going a different route, with their begging bowls ready to receive the offerings of the villagers. This way, every family was visited every day by a Keeper and in this way the bond between the people and the Keepers was maintained. A village Keeper could tell you the goings on of the whole village but that was not their way. A Keeper’s life was not to sew discord but to help maintain the harmony of the village and to provide the core versings that kept village life in sync with the nature of the world.
Keepers only ate before midday so each Keeper’s path through the village would be timed to see them return to the hold with some time left to prepare the only meal of the day. Whatever had been offered by the villagers was augmented from the hold garden which would be tended in the early morning and evening of each day by the Keepers. The rest of the time was spent in the versing hall where the Keeper’s would mediate for hours on their versings.
Once a year, the Keepers would hold public versing. This would start on the birthday of one of the great ancestors – Bhut. Bhut Day it was sometimes called but most villagers called it Hold Day. On Hold Day the Keepers did not eat at all. They each would sit in meditation posture and starting with the rising sun would verse in harmony. They would verse all of the public verses until all of them had been versed. This took two days and nights and though many villagers would be there for the day verses, only the most dedicated followers would sit through the night versings with the Keepers. I had sat through the night versings with my father since I was seven. Very tedious it was. During the versings Keepers would take turns to break – to go to the toilet or to drink. They were permitted to drink and if they were weak they could take small sustenance in juices but they did not eat until the versings were complete. The dawn of third day marked the beginning of the Celebration of the Verses which was the high point
We entered the hold before noon and about the same time the village Keepers were returning from their rounds. Denret, the Head Keeper greeted us.
“Welcome Con and Jot and welcome Pit. It is good to see you entering the hold as a new worm. Well done. I wish you great versing. Come Keepers, let us eat. Pit you shall go first with Grom who will deal to your head and robes.”
I felt a bit strange and quite uncomfortable as I followed the bobbling old Keeper who came forward when his name was called with “this way boy, come on, don’t hang about.”
He led me to the washing block and made me sit on a stone bench that was worn smooth by countless Keepers sitting to have their heads shaved or re-shaved. He was very deft – he washed and lathered my hair and then he gathered his tools. He used the shears quickly and then while he stropped the razor he started to talk.
“I’ve seen you often lad, though we have never talked. I knew your grandfather he was a great friend to me and a great Keeper.”
I was taken aback. I had seen Grom many times in the past when I had come to Hold Days but my father had never discussed him as I’d imagine he might of someone who knew his father. But then, we had never really discussed my grandfather very much. I knew that he had been a senior Keeper and had left the village after raising my father to return to the Keep where he spent the rest of his life but there was little more that I knew.
“You knew my grandfather at the Keep?”
“Yes Pit.” He said as he started to shave my head. “It was he who sent me to be a Keeper at this hold many years ago. He was a really good man and an exceptional verser. Your father has told us that you are also a natural verser. I have heard that you have already memorized the village versings and that you make up verses for your sisters and family almost every day.”
“Oh. I’ve never considered this to be such a big thing. My father knows all the versings and there’s not much else to do when working in the fields alone but play with words.”
“Ah Pit. Little do you know of people then. Very few men can master the versings. Some of us have the mind for it and not the heart and many have the heart yet not the mind. Those who have both are few and far between and those who have the gift to make new verses at will are very rare. We have waited a long time for you to come. There will be much opportunity for you at the Keep if you can keep up with what they throw at you.”
He laughed and with a flourished flick of the last of my lathered hair he said “there, we are done. Go quickly now into that washroom and shower and put on the new robe I have set there for you. We will all eat as soon as you are done.”
I showered quickly and put on the blue robe. I was a worm. I was smiling to myself as I gathered my clothes. A worm. A lowly creature at the bottom of the Keep. As I came out of the washroom Grom was there with a string bag.
“Here lad, these are for your clothes. Hang them there. You must wash them after eating and this evening I will pack them so that I can send them home to your mother.”
He led me then to the eating hall. A dozen Keepers were there and the food was ready but they had not started eating. They were waiting for us. Denret was seated on a raised platform at the end of the line of likewise seated Keepers. He stood up and the others followed him to the tables. Grom said “you’re last lad” and joined the queue. Con and Jot joined the end of the queue both looking to me to follow. The food was simple. Much the same as anyone in the village would eat though there was no meat and no fish other than set aside there were those offerings of meat or fish that were made by the villagers. These would be used to feed the dogs and cats that lived with the Keepers in the hold. Killing was not permitted within a Hold nor were Keeper’s permitted to kill so it was not uncommon for those villagers with unwanted animals they did not have the heart to kill to quietly dump them at the gate of the hold knowing that they would be cared for.
I took a large plate and filled it. This would be my last meal until morning. I’d never gone a whole day without eating. You couldn’t work a farm and not eat. I considered taking a second plate with me but somehow Con guessed my thoughts and shook his head with a smile.
“You can come back for more as you need. Take your time, eat slowly and chew everything well. Do not drink anything. Approach it as a task you must be very mindful of.”
I thanked him and found a place to sit on the floor.
“No lad. You must sit here on the platform.” That was Grom, bobbing up and down and gesturing for me to sit at the end of the platform the Keepers had been sitting on when we came in. I stepped up and sat. And ate. While I ate I watched. They were very focused on their eating. Not rushed. Not like hungry men. They all ate in silence and they ate very carefully. The task was clear – you must stuff yourself but you had to do it as you might carefully pack a crate – ensuring that every little space was filled.
I noticed that the Denret was an exception. He spoke as if to nobody in particular “Ah Keepers know this. That when your teeth are getting loose and your mind starts to wander you will not be able to eat as you eat now. So make the most of it.”
After we ate we cleaned up and I was tasked with the washing by Grom. Con and Jot joined me and while we were working he outlined the next few days of our journey to the Keep.
“Pit, it will be hard for you but we have to start on our way immediately after midday. We have a long way to walk before we get to the next Hold and we must arrive before noon or we will arrive too late to eat. You would not like that and nor would we. Maybe we will be lucky and someone will be taking a cart in the same direction but we can’t count on it and usually we can walk faster than a cart.”
Our departure from the Hold and from the only village I have ever known in my life was a non-event. There was only Grom to see us off as the other Keepers had gone to their versings. Grom held out a string bag with some bamboo bongs stopped with bungs.
“Here’s some water for your journey lads. Mark. The bong with the cross is a little more than water for our new worm – just in case the grumblings of his stomach are too loud for you others to sleep.”
With that we were off. We walked not too vigorously at first letting our stomachs adjust to the outrage of not having a chance to rest after so much food. After a time we fell into a strong gait and covered many miles with few words other than the occasional comment on the farmlands we were walking through. I was staring off into the haze at something I could not make out.
“What is that there to the west of the road ahead?”
“That worm is the Keep. Or rather it is the Mountain upon which the Keep is built and it is very old for it sits on ground that has not been disturbed since so long before humans walked the earth that not even were there insects or worms. Like You.” He threw back a smile and pressed on. I thought on his words for a while.
“How could it be that the world was devoid of insects? Did something happen to them?”
“No Pit, but there were times when there were no living creatures in all the world and only after eons did life emerge and only long long after that did insects come into being and even longer after did people come. Pit, you will learn all this at the Keep but the thing you will struggle with most is time and the age of things. The readers can tell you more and the writers even more than they. Maybe, if you are a good enough student, you can even put your questions to a poet.
“A poet? What’s a poet?”
“Poets are the Keepers who make all the versings. All the versings you have ever heard have all come from poets. We all aspire to become poets if we can though it is not so easy to rise so high. One needs a lot of talent and years of work.”
It was getting close to sunset when we could see that we were approaching another village. It was obviously the local market day so there were people on the road with us – some heading in the same direction and some returning from the markets carrying bags of goods. A few carts also passed us going the other way with children and livestock and market goods all packed into their trays.
As we were passed, each person would nod or bring their hands together in reverence. The children would wave. It was strange to be walking clad in blue with nothing but our begging bowls and a few oddments in our string bags. It was even stranger to be treated so differently to how we would have been treated had we not been so attired. Strangers were usually questioned and pressed for news. The former because people were always wary of marauders and the later because news was something usually limited to the immediate village and its surroundings.
“There is no hold in this village. We shall have to either walk through the night to the next village or we can sleep here a bit and then rise early and head off again.” This was Jot, speaking for the first time in many hours.
Con replied. “If we sleep we will have to rise too early to ask food from the villagers. It is better that we walk as far as we can and then find sleep later. It will shorten our journey.”
And so it was that we walked for many hours more. There was some moon and the road was easy enough to follow but we were very tired by the time we stopped and found a suitable place to lay down. I fell asleep clutching my robes.
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