Practise Carrying The Twins
1614 Words
The birds were chirping melodiously in the morning as I lay awake and tossed around as I discovered that Heather had been nursing the twins early in the morning and for the past few times in the middle of the night.
"Dear, didn't you have enough sleep yet?" I called out and was hushed by Heather as she poked her head through the doorway. "You are going to wake up the twins, dear." and as soon as she finished her sentence, the twins began gurgling and giggling as they opened up their eyes wide and were looking for the source of my voice.
Being parents to newborns surely was a big headache as well as having to settle the twins at the same time. They wake up, sleep, feed, poop all at the same time and the twins would be awake when they heard my voice and would only sleep after I tell them to do so.
I rubbed my eyes and went over to the nursing room and found that the twins had finished nursing and all of them were in their cloth diaper and a baby binder. Two helpers were prepping the twins before they were dressed in their baby clothes, one as a boy and the other as a girl.
"Lookee here... What do we have right now? Two bundles of joys that had finished nursing and now getting ready to meet the citizens, eh? Hahaha. Want to join daddy for his morning meeting after breakfast?" I made some small clappity hands in front of me and the twins were kicking and jostling in their crib as if they were excited to join me too.
"Dear, do you want to practise holding the baby by yourself? Let me show you and you can follow through." Heather offered as she showed how she cradles the head first and support the bum before lifting the baby to the cradle of her arms.
"See, it is simple right. You go and lift Amy. You can do it dear. Support the head and the bum before liftoff."
I was afraid because they looked so delicate and after Angelica Mae or Amy we affectionately called, had been dressed in her white baby dress, I slowly did what Heather had done with Jay-R and lifted her up slowly.
This was the first time she was being held by me and she stiffened her body and when she was brought to the cradle in my arms, she started gurgling, kicking her feet and flailing her arms as I peeked my face close to her as she tried to grab my hair and nose.
I carried both for some minutes as I heard the new King of the Ring announces the start of breakfast downstairs, said grace beforehand before everyone starts digging in.
Ever since Heather had returned back to the domain with the twins, we barely had time to have our meals together with the citizens and had to tend to the twins first before we could attend to our matters.
"Ben, after the morning meeting, could we have you and Frank along with Priest Earl and Priest Walter over? We are going to chart the grounds to measure the half-mile across and a mile on each side."
"No worries, Your Majesty. With us around you wouldn't have to worry. As long as everything is in a straight line, we could easily mark out the area for you. Besides we would be using these Reed markers just in case we do not make a mistake during the plotting later."
"I trust you guys, so we proceed after breakfast I would be following you too, just to see how is the orchard and how the deforestation behind the domain goes. Do you think there's a need to deforest the remaining trees to make way for orchards all the way behind the half-mile distance?"
"As what your desires may be, we will try to accommodate as much as possible," Ben replied as he bowed slightly and went to find the other three, have breakfast and then head down to mark the lands and also to see the land depressed within the ground to make way for a new river to flow in. They would be great...!
"My dear twins, daddy would be going to the back of the domain to do some work okay? Daddy would be back once the work is done and then would go again to mark then sides for the new rover to flow, alright? Be good with mummy... Daddy is doing this for the good of all here. See you soon Jay-R and Amy... "
I kissed the twins as I made my way down to the courtyard and waited for the men to assemble after their meals while sitting on the two-seater bamboo throne.
Heather would be able to see the work done from the twin towers of the domain while I don't think it would be ideal to bring the twins up there, I guess.
Firstly I don't think they would understand what I would be doing but I'm sure they would when they start to learn how to walk soon.
"Let's go, Your Majesty. It's 500 strides from the riverbank there right to make the mark on the centre of the ½ mile behind us." Frank gestured to me when Ben arrived with a heapful of reed sticks with tiny white flags underneath their arms and Priest Earl and Priest Walter in tow.
"Let's go...! It's groundbreaking time for Gracehaven...! I called out with excitement and this also excites the other citizens around the courtyard as they arranged the benches and tables aside.
"We have to plant these markers for every 10 strides we walk. We have more than enough markers here and we could pluck them out once we had reached the 500th stride." Frank mentioned and I nodded as they started to count their strides from the riverbank and walked at the side of the domain in between the stable before planting a marker down.
When they had reached the 50th marker. We stopped for a while and checked the markets and ensuring that they are in a straight line and not crooked like a drunkard walking the line.
After they had made sure they had marked a straight line ensuring they had marked the 500th stride, they rested awhile and noticed the surroundings that they had bypassed the bamboo barricades set up much earlier before.
"Wow... Seems we got more trees to fell after this. So what's next, gentlemen?" I wiped my brows since I was perspiring even though it was just a walk and also counting my steps to ensure everyone had done so individually and gotten the right paces.
"How wide do you want the river to be, Your Majesty? Would 10 feet wide and 5 feet deep enough to make the initial base for the connecting river?" Priest Earl asked as he started to poke the ground with a reed stick to conjure up the earth soon.
"What about these trees? Are you going to cut them down, Ben?" I asked but suddenly the earth that Priest Earl was poking suddenly moved like a sinkhole and the tree disappeared inside the ground...!
"Eh? There's no need to fell then at all in this way?" I asked as Priest Earl informed me that the tree had returned to Mother Earth about 20 feet underground. "That's awesome... PRETTY AWESOME...!" I exclaimed and decided the new river bed would be the size mentioned by Earl.
"We have reached the ½ mile junction, so it's confirmed that the connecting would be a mile here and a mile back of me, right, Your Majesty?" Priest Earl inquired to confirm and I simply nodded my head as he aligned the stick he was holding onto the ground, perpendicular to the ½mile junction and slowly the ground began to move as the trees were 'swallowed' into the ground.
There was some rumbling as the trees were swallowed into the earth and buried 30 feet or deeper inside the land as Priest Earl stood rooted to the ground as he conjured up his abilities.
After 10 minutes, he repeated the other side and the same thing happened to the earth. Although there's a lot of work to do, Priest Earl performed the conjuring close to his limits and have to take intermittent work. 1 foot a minute was his best speed as he made a straight gouge on the ground first.
1 mile —5280 feet or 2110 strides. To make a straight gouge on the ground and to suck on those trees underground takes 1 minute. Considering that it's only a straight gouge not inclusive of the 10 feet width of the river. After 4 hours before lunch, Priest Earl had managed to clear only 240 feet out of 10,560 feet on either side of the planned river.
"Your Majesty, I'm out. Let's break for lunch and I rest a bit then continue once again. Ben and Frank can plant the markers on this length first and make the ½ mile junction where it will meet the river at the other end."
"No worries Priest Earl, all of you had done a good job. To be able to use the abilities and not using any methods to excavate the land is superb indeed. I never expected the trees could be returned to the mother earth in this way."
"Hahaha. Wait till the river completes, it would be lain with pebbles tones and would be teeming with life...!" Priest Earl remarked as they left the premise to head for lunch and continue thereafter.
- Writer
