Abri's Story, Ch 1,2, & 3

I have revised the first three chapters of my story.  I need feed back.  Please make comments and answer the following about the main character, Abri.

1.  What do you think Abri wants more than anything?

2.  What do you think Abri fears the most?

3.  What are Abri's strengths and weaknesses?

There is no right or wrong here.  I just need to know what feelings you get as you meet her for the first time.  

Happy reading!

Abri's story

It All Started with a Rabbit, preamble

It has been nearly 7000 years since the nuclear holocaust that gave the world the prophesied era of

peace.  During the Millenium, as those years were called, there was continual peace because

humankind with its warlike ways had been blasted back into the stone age.  For a thousand years

there wasn’t much more than tribal disputes over hunting grounds.  Humans lived like wild beasts--at

home in nature, and as nature’s children, well fed and happy.

But at the end of the Millenium humankind began to learn technology again.  First came simple

machines like the bow and arrow, the lever, and then followed the wheel.  And the world knew war

again.  

Our narrative begins nearly 6000 years following the millenium as a new industrial age is dawning in

what had been in ancient times England.

It All Began with a Rabbit, Chapter 1

  It all began with a rabbit.  Well, more exactly, “it” all began with an apple and a young couple who

were more interested in knowledge than they were afraid of dying.  But our story begins with a little

bunny.  He had been taught by his mother that the forest would provide everything they would ever

need.  She also taught him that crossing the road to try the tempting cabbages in the farmer’s field

would mean risking death.  But when the wind blew across the fields of cabbage past his soft little

nose, he could not contain himself.  He watched. He waited.  Then he crossed the road.

   The farmer’s young daughter was becoming a woman.  She had been taught by her father how to

work.  “The farm will provide everything we need, Abri.  Stay as close to the land as you can.”  The

young woman had begun carrying her father’s musket with her to work in the fields.  “You may shoot

the small animals that come into the fields to feed,” he told his girl, “but you mustn’t ever hunt in the

forest.  The game there belongs to the Earl Lord Gillingham and we may not take it.”  

   So it happened one day that the young woman was leaving the fields at last light.  

She had finished the row she was hoeing, shouldered the musket, and started for home.  The last

light of a bright day is often golden, casting long shadows.  In this light, the young woman saw the

rabbit munching a cabbage leaf.  She stopped cold and swung the musket into firing position. 

   The rabbit saw the young woman and immediately froze as his mother had taught him.  Any motion

would catch the eye of a dog or fox.  The young woman had better vision than these, but the musket

had not been properly sighted, so the ball went a little to the right and down, striking the bunny in his

left haunch.  He screamed in pain and ran for the safety of the forest.  

   Mother had told him (when she realized that he would not resist the temptation of the cabbage),

“The Earl’s hunters will not come for you.  They are only interested in big game.  The farmer will not

cross into the forest for you.  Run to the forest.  The forest is your mother’s loving arms.”  And the

bunny ran, filled with pain and terror.

   The farmer’s daughter also ran.  She had seen a puff of fur in the golden last light, and she had

heard the scream.  As she ran, she saw the white tail disappear into the brush on the forest side of

the road.  

   Now, the girl didn’t forget what her father had told her about the forest and the Earl and the taking of

game, but her blood was racing with adrenaline and she was taken by the primal instinct of the hunter. 

She leapt the fence at the road side and came at the rabbit’s hiding spot from the forest side, hoping to

frighten him back into the road where he could be taken legally.  

   The bunny, bleeding and frightened, relied on the rabbit’s last defence.  He froze.  

   A quick search revealed the hiding spot, and the farmer’s daughter reached in and took him, screaming.

  Her knife ended the squall.  

   This’ll please the old man, she thought.

   A third party entered the scene at this point.  Gerald, Lord Gillingham’s nephew, and a riding companion

were coming up the road, returning home after a long day of recreation.  

   “Isn’t that peasant poaching your uncle’s game?” said the young woman.  Gerald might have otherwise

ignored the incident, being uninterested in rabbits or farmer’s daughters.  But a show of manliness was

required now.  A response must be given.  

   “Hey, you!  Peasant.”  

   Tables can turn, sometimes just that quickly, and Abri knew that she was not the hunter any longer. 

She froze.  “You belong to that good-for-nothing farmer, don’t you?” shouted Gerald.  

   Abri wanted to run.  A few years ago she would have screamed.  But she froze.  “Never look a lording

in the eye.”  Her father had taught her.  “They will take it as a challenge, and that means they will feel

bound to humble you.”  Abri looked at the ground, and hated herself for doing it.  

  “He was eating cabbage in the fields.  I shot him.  He ran for cover across the road here.  I think it no

harm that I took him.  I’m allowed to shoot the small game that enter the fields.”  All this was the truth. 

Large game had to be shooed back to the forest, but small game could be taken.  

  “Shut up!” shouted the nephew.  “We’ll see what Lord Gillingham has to say about it.”  And as he road

off at a gallop, “I’ll see you at the great house at noon tomorrow.”  

   

    Da’s going to kill me, the girl thought, and turned for home into the darkness of nightfall.   

Chapter 2, Scraping the Pelt

 Abri tied the rabbit to her belt and thought what a small meal he would make for all the trouble he’d

caused.  She started east for home, her long shadow stretching into the darkening horizon ahead, and

the sequence of events ran through her head as she tried to compose an explanation to give Lord

Gillingham on the morrow...and one for Da tonight. 

At a crossroad and in the dusky shadows, Abri saw a figure approaching.  

   “John, is that you?” she called out.

   “An’ who else would be haunting the road this time of day?”

   John Saunders was the son of a neighboring farmer, and ever since childhood, he and Abri would meet

and walk a stretch of the road home together.  What Abri had never realized was that John would wait

and watch for her, timing his approach to the crossroad to arrive when she did, though never precisely

when she did.  

   “That’s a measly meal of a bunny tied to your belt,” John ribbed.

   “It’s a wee bit larger than the one at your belt.”  Abri was referring to a lucky rabbit’s foot that John had

worn from boyhood.   They both had a laugh.

    “I have to be at Gillingham’s in the morning...about this rabbit.”

   “What?!  You didn’t poach that half-a-mouthful, did you?”

   Abri glowered.

   “You did!  Wow.”  Then John thought better and asked, “You and your dad are eating ok, are you?”

    The concern and charity in John’s voice at the last remark were more irksome than the derision in the

first.  Abri pretended to peer into the distance.

   “Yeah, we’re fine.  I shot him in the fields but only wounded him.  He ran across the road.  I probably

should have left him there, but I couldn’t.”

   “I saw Gerald ride past here with a girl just a bit ago.  It must’ve been he that spied you.”

   “I’m to answer at the mansion house tomorrow noon.”

   “Abi, there’s a clan meeting tonight in Daniels’s Hollow.  You should come.”

   “And are they allowing women to their meetings now?”  Abri laughed at the thought.

   “I’m serious, Abi.  You’re in more trouble than you think, and it has little to do with that bit of fur at your

belt. The clan should hear what happened with Gerald, and you’re going to need their help, though you

don’t know it yet.”

    The clan was formed of local men who met in secret, had codes and signs, and swore an oath to

protect the community.  To the law-abiding of the community they were Holy Knights, but to the stranger

or to the trouble maker they were a lynch mob in masks.  

   Abri looked at John and measured what he had said. The humor drained from her face. 

   “John, what’s up?  What’s going on?”

   “The Sheriff has been rounding up folk for a work detail.  Lord Gillingham wants laborers for the new

railroad.  Guilty or no, the judge will clap you on a public works gang. 

   As they parted ways, John said, “Meet me at Douglas’s Fork, Eleven O’th’Moon.”

   “If I can’t get out you’ll see a light at my window.”

    O’th’Clock was an expression used for daytime telling, and O’th’Moon was used at night.  On the New

Moon, it was O’th’Stars since neither clock nor moon could be seen.  But the celestial signs told any

country child what time it was.

Abri stopped near the well to fetch water to gut and clean the rabbit.  Maw, her calico cat, was already

there, looking up with expectant eyes.  

   “Ahk, you are a poor little bunny indeed, and I’m sorry to have taken your youth.  Did’n your mother

teach you anything of the danger in crossing the road?”  She lowered the bucket down the well and drew

it up again brimming with cool, clear water.  Abri rinsed the carcase and washed her hands; Maw made

off with the entrails.  The pelt had to be tacked to a board to begin the tanning process, and she would

have to scrape it soon.  But Abri could put this off until after dinner.

   Da came home from town later than usual that evening, so Abri had the rabbit stew on the table with a

crust of bread when he arrived slamming the door.  

   “What have you gone and done, you foolish girl?” Da roared.  

She began slowly while methodically scraping the pelt.

  “Sit down and have your supper.  What have you heard?”

   “Answer me, Abi.  What have you done?”

   “Sit down and have some dinner, Da. I’ll tell you.”

   The stew was warm and had a calming effect on Da.  

   “I was spied taking this rabbit from the Earl’s forest.”  

   “Why, Abi?  Why?  Are we so poor we have to go poaching now?”

   Abri’s reply came haltingly.  “He was eating the cabbage, Da.  The sight on the gun is off so I only

wounded him in his leg.  He ran for the forest.  Da, he had just crossed the road.  I took him cowering

under a bush right on the road’s edge.”

   Da’s expression was too stolid to read.

   “Da, it had just crossed the road after my wounding shot.  I think the Earl will blink the offense.  His

men don’t hunt the rabbits anyway.”  

   Nothing came from Da but the sounds of his eating and a glare as he looked up from his bowl.  

   “I’m to report at Lord Gillingham’s at noon tomorrow, Da.”

    “That much I already knew from the Blue Bull.”  The Blue Bull was the local tavern where Da often

spent his evenings gathering news over a pint.   

    “The Sheriff’s begun a new round up.  You‘ll be taken for a laborer on the railroad.”

   “How do you know?”  Abri asked with a show of incredulity.  

   “Tom Saunders’s boy was taken.  My mates at the pub be talking of little else.”  He paused to gulp his

stew.  “And this infernal railroad will mean ruination for every mule team and ox carter in the region.”  

    This was true.  The railroad that Gillingham was building would haul freight to Lochdown faster and

cheaper than the muleskinners and carters could.  Livelihoods would be lost.

    Abri gasped.  “John and I walked the road home just at sundown.  They’ll make him build the rail that’ll

put ‘is old man out o’ work?”

   There was a stretch of silence while Da mopped up the last of his stew with the bread.

   Abri asked, “What’d John do, Da?  What was his crime?”

   “Ain’t no one can tell.  Ol’ Saunders thinks it may be John was truant from church Sunday last. 

Whenever Gillingham needs laborers for a public works project, he tells Sheriff to arrest a few likely

suspects.  The Judge is swift to find a guilty verdict, and the penalty is always “public works.”  Whatever

the reason, it’s sure an’ John never did no real crime.”

     “Well then, it’s sure they’ll come for me whether or no I show tomorrow,” Abri said. “If I go, there’s no

guarantee they won’t find an excuse to come for you also.”  

  

    Abri continued scraping the bunny’s hide, deep in her own distressed thoughts, but comfortable in the

silence.  The lamp light flickered as a moth found it too attractive to resist. Abri’s mind was fixed on

Daniels’s Hollow.  She would go alone.

Chapter 3 Daniel’s Hollow

Abri slept in the loft which had three slanted walls, a ladder up, and a gabled window facing East.  This,

she carefully opened, climbed onto the roof, crossed to the West and jumped to catch a limb of the great

Oak that grew there.  All had to be performed in stealth so as not to awaken Da.  Abri knew that Da

would not be at the clan meeting.  He never went to such, fearing what Lord Gillingham would do if he

were caught. 

     Soon she was passing Douglas’s Fork.  No John Saunders.  She was troubled by Da’s gossip and

quickened her pace to an easy jog.

    Daniel’s Hollow wasn’t far.  It sat low between two ridges.  In early Spring it was often flooded, but now

it was a shaded glen.  The soft moon light sifted through a thousand, thousand leaves and bespeckled

the ground.  Abri slowed as she approached.

   There was no fire, and in the darkness she could see no one.  A voice was speaking in hushed tones.

   Suddenly all was silent.  Abri instinctively halted and listened.  The attack came swiftly.  One man

secured her legs; a second, her arms; and a third slipped a bag over her head and tied it around her

neck.  The men were practiced and precise.  There was no chance for escape.  Abri didn’t struggle.  The

time for that might come later.  The men handled her roughly, but not violently.  She smelled no alcohol

on them--a detail which calmed her.  The voice spoke, muffled and disguised.

   “Who be ye?”

   “Abri McCullouch.”

   “Why come ye here in stealth?”

    “John Saunders invited me to a meeting.”

     John’s invitation of Abri had been a youthful error in judgement for which he would be reprimanded or

punished had he not been taken by Lord Gillingham and the public works.

   “Ye lie.  John Saunders is not a free man.”

   “He was free this evening as we left our fields.  Gossip from the Blue Bull says he was taken after dark. 

I came in hopes that something can be done.”

   Silence.

   Abri’s eyes would have become accustomed to the dark by now, but the hood prevented sight.  Still

she tried to picture the scene in her mind..  It was obvious that the voice was not in charge here. 

Another must be giving silent signals, but how?  She could hear no writing, nor could it have been seen. 

Hand signs.  They must be using some kind of hand signs.  The “speaker” places his hand in the hand of

the “hearer” and forms letters and words.  Abri had seen the Blind communicate silently in this manner.

   “Leave here,” came the voice at last.  “Ye do no belong.”

   “But what of John Saunders?” Abri struggled to keep any tone of emotion from her voice.

   “Leave at once.”

   Abri was pulled away.

   The hooded men left her tied to a tree at Douglas’s Fork.  The bag was removed, but there was

nothing to see, only three dark figures departing in separate directions.  In the morning someone would

untie her.

When the sun broke the horizon Abri felt a rising fog in her brain.  Her limbs began to contract

involuntarily.  She knew the signs; a seizure was coming on.  “Good,” was her last thought as she lost

consciousness.  As the electrical storm raged in her head, her muscles contracted sometimes violently. 

Her tied wrists were torn and bled.  After eight minutes she fell limp.  Abri’s seizures were not frequent. 

They usually came when she was stressing over some course of action or other.  Like the ancient oracle,

when Abri awoke from her fits, her way forward would be clear.

   Darcie, the tailor's wife, discovered Abri at about 10 O’th’clock.  Her wrists were bruised and caked with

dried blood and she was exhausted.  The knot with which she was tied would not give.  The pain was

terrible and Abri gritted her teeth.

   “Do you have a knife?”

   “Yes, but I might cut you.”

   “Maybe, but it’ill hurt less.  Just cut it.”

   Darcie helped Abri to her feet and walked her home.  They didn’t speak.  Darcie knew better than to

ask who had tied her up or why, and Abri knew better than to discuss it.  As they approached the

McCulloch cottage Darcie asked, “May I help you bind up those wrists?”

   “That would be a blessing,” Abri replied.

   Abri wanted to ask Darcie if her husband had been at home last night, but strong taboos prevented her. 

No one pried into clan matters--ever.  Wives did not ask where their husbands had been if they came

home sober.  (Drunk was an entirely different matter.)  No one went or came from a clan meeting drunk. 

Initiations into the clan were stone cold secret, guarded by threats of mutilation and death, the tales of

which were whispered among children and believed by adults.  The business of the clan was mostly to

hold court, pass judgement, and plan the execution of punishments.  The condemned were only present

at such courts if he were a clan member.  If the community was ever threatened from without, the clan

would meet in warlike council and plan for protection. This rarely happened.

   The clan also kept up community traditions twice a year donning ceremonial costumes and masks in a

kind of play performed at the Vernal Equinox and at the Winter Solstice.  Seven elders of the clan would

dress up as the ancestral spirits and put the fear of God into the children.