Страница:
to help those who couldn't.
When men's names were called, they stood to hear the share to be taken
from their wages the next week. Because he was new, Richard's name was
called last. He stood, staring off across the dimly lit room at the people
in moth-eaten coats sitting behind the long table made of two old doors.
Ishaq sat at one end, going along with the others in everything. Several of
the women still had their heads together. When they finished, they whispered
to the chairman and he nodded.
"Richard Cypher, being as you are new, you still have some catching up
to do
on your duty to your workers' group. Your next weeks wages are assessed
as due in aid.."
Richard stood dumbly for a moment. "How am I to eat to pay my rent?"
People in the room turned to frown at him. The chairman slapped his
hand on the table, calling for silence.
"You should thank the Creator to be blessed with good health so as you
can work, young man. Right now, there are those who are not as fortunate in
life as you, those with greater need than you. Suffering and need comes
before selfish personal enrichment."
Richard sighed. What did it really matter? After all, he was lucky in
life.
"Yes, sir. I see what you mean. I'm happy to volunteer my share toward
those with needs."
He wished Nicci hadn't given away all their money.
"Well," he said to Nicci as they shuffled out into the night, "I guess
we can ask the landlord for the rent money back. We can stay on where we
were staying before, until I can work some more and save up some money."
"They don't give rent money back," she said. "The landlord will
understand our need and let our debt build until we can start paying on it.
Next meeting, you just have to go up before the review board and explain
your hardship. If you present it properly, they will give you a hardship
charity to pay your rent."
Richard was exhausted. He felt like he were having some kind of silly
dream.
"Charity? It's my wages-for the work I do."
"That's a selfish way of looking at it, Richard. The job is at the
grace of the workers' group, the company, and the Order."
He was too tired to argue. Besides, he didn't expect any justice in
anything done in the name of the Order. He just wanted to go to their new
room and get some sleep.
--]----
When they opened the door, one of the three youths was pawing through
Nicci's pack. Holding some of her underthings in one hand, he aimed a smirk
back over his shoulder at them.
"Well, well," he said as he stood. He still wore no shirt. "Looks like
the two drowned rats have found a hole to live in." His leering gaze slid to
Nicci. He wasn't looking at her face.
Nicci snatched the pack away first, then her things from his other
hand. She stuffed her personal clothes back in the pack while he watched,
grinning the whole time. Richard feared she might abandon the link to Kahlan
in order to use her power, but she only glared at the youth.
The room reeked of mold. The low ceiling made Richard feel
uncomfortably hemmed in. The ceiling had once been whitewashed, but was now
dark with soot from candles and lamps, making the room feel cavelike. A
candle sitting on a rusted bracket by the door provided the only light. A
wardrobe stood crookedly in the corner in front of dirty walls spotted with
flyblows. The wardrobe was missing a door. Two wooden chairs at a table
under one small window on the far wall were the only place to sit, other
than the warped and gouged pine floor. The small squares of window glass
were opaque under a variety of different-colored layers of paint.
Through a small triangle in the corner where the glass was broken out,
Richard could see the gray wall of the next building.
"How did you get in here?" Nicci snapped.
"Master key." He waved it like a king's pass. "See, my father's the
landlord. I was just checking your things for subversive writings."
"You can read?" Nicci sniped. "I would have to see that to believe it."
The defiant grin never left his face. "We'd not like to find we have
subversives living under our roof. Could endanger everyone else. My father
has a duty to report any suspicious activity."
Richard stepped aside to let the young man by as he headed for the
door, but then caught his arm as the youth picked up the candle.
"That's our candle," Richard said.
"Yeah? What makes you think so?"
Richard tightened his grip on the bare, lean, muscular arm. Looking him
in the eye, he gestured with his other hand.
"Our initials are scratched in the bottom, there."
Before he thought, the young man instinctively turned the candle to
have a look. The hot wax spilled over his hand. He dropped the candle with a
yelp.
"Oh my, I am sorry," Richard said. He stooped and picked up the candle.
"You're all right, I hope. You didn't get any of that burning wax in your
eyes, did you? Hot wax in your eyes hurts something fierce."
"Yeah?" He swiped his straight dark hair back from his eyes. "How would
you know that?"
"Back where I came from, I saw it happen to some poor fellow."
Richard leaned partway out into the hall, into the light of another
candle on a shelf. With his thumbnail, he made a show of carving an R and a
C in the bottom of the candle. "See, here? My initials."
The youth didn't bother to look. "Uh-huh."
He swaggered out the door. Richard went with him and lit the candle
from the flame of the one in the hall. Before walking away, the young man
turned back with a haughty look.
"How did that fellow manage to be stupid enough to get hot wax in his
eyes? Was he a big dumb ox like you?"
"No," Richard said offhandedly. "No, not at all. He was a cocky young
man who foolishly put his hands on another man's wife. He got the hot wax
dripped in his eyes by the husband."
"Yeah? Well why didn't the dumb jackass just shut his eyes?"
Richard gave the lad a deadly smile for the first time.
"Because his eyelids had been cut off, first, so he couldn't close
them. You see, where I come from, anyone touching a woman against her wishes
isn't treated indulgently."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. The young man's eyelids weren't the only thing that got cut
off."
The young man swiped his black hair back again. "You threatening me,
ox?"
"No. There would be nothing I could do to you that would harm you more
than what you're already doing to harm yourself."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You are never going to amount to anything. You will always be the
worthless muck people scrape from their shoes. You only get one life and you
are wasting
yours. That's a terrible shame. I doubt you will ever know what it is
to be truly happy, to achieve anything of worth, to have genuine pride in
yourself. You bring it all on yourself, and I could do no worse to you."
"I can't help what life deals me."
"Yes, you can. You create your own life."
"Yeah? How do you figure?"
Richard gestured around himself. "Look at the pigsty you live in. Your
father is the landlord. Why don't you show some pride and fix up the place?"
"He's the landlord, not the owner. The man who owned it was a greedy
bastard, charging more rent than many could afford. The Order took the place
over. For his crimes against the people they tortured the owner to death. My
father was given the job of landlord. We just run the place to help out
fools like you who don't have a place; we've no money to go around fixing up
the building."
"Money?" Richard pointed. "It takes money to pick up that garbage left
there in the hall?"
"I didn't put it there."
"And these walls-it doesn't take money to wash the walls. Look at the
ceiling in this room. It hasn't been washed in a decade, at least."
"Hey, I'm no scrub woman."
"And the front stoop? Someone is going to break their neck on it. Could
be you, or your father. Why don't you do something worthwhile for a change
and fix it?"
"I told you, we've no money to fix things."
"It doesn't take money. You just need to take it apart, clean the
joints, and put in some new wedges. You can cut them from any little scrap
of wood lying around."
The young man wiped his palms on his pants. "If you're so smart, then
why don't you fix the stairs?"
"Good idea. I will."
"Yeah?" His sneer returned. "I don't believe you."
"Tomorrow, after I get home from work, I will fix the stairs. If you
show up, I'll teach you how it's done."
"I might show up just to see some dupe going to the work of fixing
something that isn't even his, and for nothing besides."
"It isn't for nothing. It's because I use the front steps, too, and for
the pleasure in the place where I live. I care if my wife falls and breaks
her leg. But if you want to come and learn how to fix the steps, you will
wear a shirt out of respect for the women in your building."
"And if I show up and watch you, and I don't wear a stupid shirt like
some old geezer?"
"Then I wouldn't have enough respect for you to bother teaching you how
to fix the stairs. You will learn nothing, then."
"What if I don't want to learn something?"
"Then you will have taught me something, about you, instead."
He rolled his dark eyes. "Why should I care about learning to fix some
dumb stairs?"
"You shouldn't necessarily care about fixing some stairs, but if you
care about yourself, you should care about learning-even learning simple
things. You come to have pride in yourself only by accomplishing things,
even from fixing some old stairs."
"Yeah? I got pride in myself."
"You intimidate people and then mistake that for respect. Others can't
grant you self-respect, even others who care about you. You have to earn
self-respect yourself. All you know right now is how to stand around and
look stupid."
He folded his arms. "Who you calling-"
Richard jabbed a finger against the young man's smooth chest, forcing
him back a pace. "You only get one life. Is that all you want out of it
standing around calling names, scaring people with your gang? Is that all
you want your one life to mean to you?
"Anyone who wants more out of life, who wants their life to mean
something, would care about learning things. Tomorrow I'm going to fix those
stairs. Tomorrow we'll see what sort you are."
The youth folded his arms again in a defiant stance. "Yeah? Well, maybe
I'd rather spend time with my friends."
Richard shrugged. "That's why your lot in life isn't fate. I don't have
any say in much of my life, but I make whatever choices I can make in my own
rational best interest. It's my choice to fix those stairs and make the
place I live a little betterinstead of whining and waiting and hoping for
someone else to do something for me. I have pride that I know how to do that
for myself.
"Fixing stairs isn't going to make you a man, but it's going to make
you a little more confident in yourself. If you want, bring your friends,
and I'll teach you all how to use those knives of yours for something more
than just waving in people's faces."
"We might come to laugh at you working, Ox."
"Fine. But if you and your pals want to learn anything of worth, then
you'd better start out by showing me you mean to learn by showing respect
and showing up with shirts. That's the first choice you have. If you make it
wrong, then your choices as you go along are only going to become more
limited. And my name is Richard."
"Like I said, you might be good for a laugh." He made a face.
"Richard."
"Laugh all you want. I know my own worth and don't need to prove it to
someone who doesn't know theirs. If you want to learn, you know what you
must do. If you ever wave a knife at me again, thoughor, worse, my wife-then
you will be making the last of your many mistakes in life."
He chose to ignore the threat with more bravado. "What am I ever going
to be? Some dupe, like you, working your tail off for that greedy Ishaq and
his transport company?"
"What's your name?"
"Kamil."
"Well, Kamil, I work in exchange for wages so I can support myself and
my wife. I have have something of value-myself. Someone values my worth
enough to pay me for my time and ability. Right now, choosing to work at
loading wagons is one of the few choices I have to make in my life. I chose
to fix the steps because it improves my life." Richard narrowed his eyes.
"And what does Ishaq have to do with it, anyway?"
"Ishaq? He's the one who owns the transport company."
"Ishaq is just the load master."
"Ishaq used to live here, back before the Order took over the building.
My father knew him. Matter of fact, you'll be sleeping in his parlor. Back
then, it was his transport company. He chose the path of enlightenment over
greed, though, when it
was offered him. He let the citizen workers' group help him to learn to
be a better citizen of the Order, learn his place under the Creator. Now he
knows he's no better than any of the rest of us-even me."
Richard glanced at Nicci, who was standing in the middle of their room,
watching the conversation. He'd forgotten all about her. He didn't feel like
talking anymore.
"I'll see you tomorrow evening, whether you come to laugh or to learn.
It's your life, Kamil, and your choice."
The sun was just coming up. Dusty shafts of light angled into the
warehouse through the high windows. When he saw Ishaq coming down the aisle
to give him the list of iron to be loaded for various wagons, Richard hopped
down off the rack where he'd been waiting.
Richard hadn't seen the load master for a week. "Ishaq. Are you all
right? Where have you been?"
The burly load master hurried up the aisle. "Hello to you, too."
"I'm sorry-hello. I was worried. Where have you been?"
He made a face. "Meetings. Always meetings. Wait in this office, wait
in that office. No work, just meetings for this and for that. I had to go
see people to try to arrange for loads people need. Sometimes I think no one
really wants any goods to move in this city. It would be easier for them if
everyone got paid, but had to do no work-then they would not have to sign
their name on a piece of paper and worry if maybe someday they will be
called to account for having done it."
"Ishaq, is it true that this transport company used to be yours?"
The man paused to catch his breath. "Who tells you these things?"
"What about it? Did the transport company used to be yours?"
Ishaq shrugged. "Still is, I guess."
"What happened?"
"What happened? Nothing happened, except maybe I got smart and figured
out it was more work than I needed."
"What did they threaten you with?"
Ishaq peered at Richard for a time. "Where are you from? You don't seem
like any farmboy I ever met."
Richard smiled. "You didn't answer my question, Ishaq."
The man gestured irritably. "What for you want to know about past
history? Past is past. A man has to look at the way things are and do the
best he can from what life presents him. A choice was put to me, and I made
it. Things are they way they are. Wishing don't put food before my
children."
Richard's inquisitive frown suddenly felt cruel on his face. He let it
go. "I understand, Ishaq. I really do. I'm sorry."
The man shrugged again. "Now I work here just like everyone else. Much
easier. I must follow the same rules, or I could lose my job, just like
everyone else. Everyone is equal, now."
"Praise be to the Order." Ishaq smiled at Richard's gibe. Richard held
out his hand. "Let's have the list."
The load master handed over the paper. It only had the names of two
places on it, with some directions for grade, length, and amounts.
"What's this?" Richard asked.
"We need a loader to go with a wagon to pick up some iron and see it
delivered."
"So, I'm working on the wagons, now? Why? I thought you needed me in
the warehouse."
Ishaq took off his red hat and scratched his head of dark, thinning
hair. "We had some . . . complaints."
"About me? What did I do? You know I've worked hard."
"Too hard." Ishaq readjusted his hat on his head. "Men in the warehouse
say you are petty and spiteful. Their words, not mine. They say you make
them feel bad by flaunting how young and strong you are. They say you are
laughing behind their backs."
Many of the men were younger than Richard, and strong enough.
"Ishaq, I never-"
"I know, I know. But they feel that you do. Don't make trouble for
yourself, now. Their feelings are what matter, not what is."
Richard let out a frustrated sigh. "But I was told by the workers'
group that I have the ability to work whereas others don't, and that I was
supposed to contribute my full effort in order to help relieve the strain on
those less able-those who don't have my ability. They said that I would lose
the job if I didn't do my full effort."
"It's a fine line to walk."
"And I stepped over the line."
"They want you dismissed."
Richard sighed. "So, I'm through, here?"
Ishaq waggled his hand. "Yes, and no. You are dismissed from the
warehouse for having a bad attitude. I convinced the committee to give you
another chance and let you be moved to the wagons. The wagons aren't as much
work, because you can only load it, and then when you get to where it's
going, you unload it. Can't get in much trouble, that way."
Richard nodded. "Thanks, Ishaq."
Ishaq's gaze sought refuge among the racks of iron and the bins of
charcoal and long rows of ore that needed delivery. He scratched his temple.
"The pay is less."
Richard brushed the iron and ore dust from his hands and rear of his
pants. "What's the difference? They just take it from me anyway and give it
out. I'm not really losing any pay, other people are losing my pay."
Ishaq chuckled and clapped Richard on the shoulder. "You are the only
one around here I can count on, Richard. You are different than the others-I
feel I can talk to you and it won't drift to other ears."
"I wouldn't do that to you."
"I know. That's why I tell you what I don't tell the others. I am
expected to be equal, and to work like anyone else, but I am also expected
to provide jobs. They took my business, but they still expect me to run it
for them. Crazy world."
"You don't know the half of it, Ishaq. So what about this wagon-loading
job? What is it you need done?"
"The blacksmith out at the site is dealing me a fit."
"Why?"
"He has orders for tools, but he has no iron. Lots of people are
waiting on things." He swept a hand out at the rack of iron. "Most of this
is what was ordered
last autumn. Last autumn! It's nearly spring and it's only now come in.
It's all been promised to those who ordered it before."
"So, why did it take so long for it to get here?"
Ishaq slapped his forehead. "Maybe you are an ignorant farmboy, after
all. Where you been? Under rocks? You can't just get things because you want
them. You got to wait your turn. Your order must pass before the review
board."
"Why?"
"Why, why, why. Is that all you know?"
Ishaq sighed and said something under his breath about the Creator
testing his patience. He slapped the back of his fingers to the palm of his
other hand as he explained it to Richard.
"Because you've got to think of others, that's why. You got to take
other people's needs into consideration. You have to consider the good of
everyone. If I get all the runs picking up and delivering the iron, then
what chance have others who want to do the same? If I have all the business,
that's unfair. It would put people out of work. What's available has to be
divided up. The board of supervision must make sure everything is equal to
all. Some people can't handle the orders so fast as I can, or they have
trouble, or they can't get workers, or their workers have troubles, so I got
to wait until they can catch up."
"It's your business, why can't-"
"Why, why, why. Here, take this order. I don't need to have that
blacksmith come all the way down here again and yell at me. He's in trouble
with his orders and he needs the iron."
"Why is he in trouble? I thought everyone had to wait their turn."
Ishaq lifted an eyebrow and lowered his voice. "His customer is the
Retreat."
"The Retreat? What's that?"
"The Retreat." Ishaq spread his arms, indicating something big. "That's
the name of the place being built for the emperor."
Richard hadn't known the name. The emperor's new palace was the reason
for all the workers coming to Altur'Rang. He supposed it was the reason
Nicci had insisted they come to the city, too. She had some interest in
having him be part of the grand project. He assumed it was her grotesque
sense of irony.
"The new palace is going to be huge," Ishaq said, waving his arms
again. "A lot of work for a lot of people. It will be work for years
building the Retreat."
"So, when the goods are for the Order, then you had better deliver, I
take it."
Ishaq smiled and dipped a deep nod. "Now, you are starting to
understand, Mr. Richard why, why, why. The blacksmith is working directly
from the orders of the builders of the palace, who report to the highest
people. The builders need tools and things made. They don't want to hear
excuses from a lowly blacksmith. The blacksmith doesn't want to hear excuses
from me, but I have to go by what the review board says-he doesn't, he goes
by what the palace says. I'm in the middle."
Ishaq paused when one of the other loaders came down the aisle with a
piece of paper. Ishaq read the paper the man gave him, while the man gave a
sidelong look at Richard. Ishaq sighed and gave brief directions to the man.
After he was gone, Ishaq turned back to Richard.
"I can only transport what the review board allows me to move. That
paper, just now-it was instructions from the board for me to hold a shipment
of timbers to the mines because the load was going to go to a company that
needs the work. You see? I can't put other people out of business by being
unfair and delivering more than
they do, or else I have trouble, and I get replaced by someone who will
not be so unfair to his competitors. Ah, it's not like the old days, when I
was young and foolish."
Richard folded his arms. "You mean to say that if you do a good job,
you get in trouble-just like I did."
"Good job. Who's to say what is a good job. Everybody's got to work
together for the good of everybody. That is a good job-if you help your
fellow man."
Richard watched a couple of men off in the distance loading a wagon
with charcoal. "You don't really believe that mouthful of mush, do you,
Ishaq?"
Ishaq sighed in a long suffering manner. "Richard, please, load the
wagon when you get to the foundry and then go with the wagon out to the
Retreat and unload it at the blacksmith's shop. Please. Don't get sick on
me, or get a bad back, or have infirm children in the middle of the run? I
don't need to see the blacksmith again, or I will have to go swimming with
an iron bar around my neck."
Richard grunted a laugh. "My back is feeling fine."
"Good. I'll get a driver over here to drive the wagon." Ishaq waggled a
cautionary finger. "And don't ask the driver to help load or unload. We
don't need that kind of grievance brought up at the next meeting. I had to
beg Jori not to lodge a complaint after I asked him to help me unload the
wagon that day in the rain, when the wheels broke-the day you helped me get
the load to the warehouse. Remember?"
"I remember."
"Please, don't give Jori any trouble. Don't touch the reins-that's his
job. Be a good fellow, then? Get the iron loaded and unloaded so that
blacksmith doesn't come to see me again?"
"Sure, Ishaq. I won't make any trouble for you. You can trust me."
"There's a good fellow." Ishaq started away, but turned back. "Was not
so much trouble on a farm-am I right?"
"No, it wasn't. I wish I was back there, now."
Before he got far, Ishaq turned back once more. "You be sure to bow and
scrape if you see any of those priests. You hear?"
"Priests? What priests? How will I know them?"
"Brown robes and creased caps-oh, you'll know them. You can't miss
them. If you see any, you be on your best manners. If a priest suspects you
of having an improper attitude toward the Creator or such, he can have you
tortured. The priests are Brother Narev's disciples."
"Brother Narev?"
"The high priest of the Fellowship of Order-" Ishaq waved his arms
impatiently. "I have to get Jori to come with the wagon. Please, Richard, do
as I ask. That blacksmith will feed me to his forge if I don't have that
iron out there today. Please, Richard, get that load out there. Please?"
Richard gave Ishaq a smile in order to put his mind at ease.
"You have my word, Ishaq. The blacksmith will have the iron."
Ishaq heaved a sigh and hurried off to find his driver.
It was late in the muggy afternoon by the time they made it to the site
of the Retreat. Sitting in the wagon beside Jori as they cleared the top of
the final hill, Richard was awestruck by the sight. It was beyond huge. He
couldn't imagine how many square miles had been cleared. Gangs of thousands
of men, looking like ants spread out below, worked in lines with shovels and
baskets reshaping the contour of the land.
Jori was disinterested in the construction, and only spat over the
side, offering the occasional "I suppose" to some of Richard's questions.
The foundation was still being laid in deep trenches, enabling Richard,
looking down from the road, to see on the ground the outline of the future
structure. It was hard to fathom how enormous the building was going to be.
Seeing the specks moving slowly beside it, it was hard to keep in mind that
they were men.
For sheer size, the structure would rival anything Richard had ever
seen. There were miles of grounds and gardens going in. Fountains and other
towering structures along entrance roads were beginning to be erected.
Sweeping stretches of mazes were being constructed with hedges. Hillsides
were dotted with trees that had been planted according to a grand plan.
The Retreat faced a lake in what was to be that majestic park. The
short side of the main building was to run a quarter mile along the river.
Stone pilings marched partway out into the river, with a series of
connecting arches just starting to be constructed. Apparently, part of the
palace was to extend out over the water, with docks for the emperor's
pleasure craft.
Across the river lay more of the city. On the palace side of the river,
too, the city spread all around, though at a great distance from the
Retreat. Richard couldn't imagine how many buildings and people had been
displaced for the construction. This was to be no distant and remote
emperor's palace, but rather it was set right in the center of Altur'Rang.
Roads were being paved with millions of cobbles, giving the multitudes of
citizens of the Order access to come and see the wand structure. There were
already crowds of people standing behind rope barricades, watching the
construction.
Despite the poverty of the Old World, it would appear that this grand
palace was to be a crown jewel of unsurpassed splendor.
Stone of various kinds lay in great piles. In the distance, Richard
could see men working at cutting it into the required shapes. The heavy
afternoon air rang with the faraway knells of hundreds of hammers and
chisels. There were stockpiles of granite and marble in a variety of colors,
and massive quantities of limestone blocks. Special quarry wagons waited in
serpentine columns to deliver yet more. The long blocks of stone, called
lifts, were slung under heavy beams that bridged the front
and rear axles. Huts and great open shelters had been built for the
stone workers so they could work no matter the weather. Timber was stickered
in row upon row of huge stacks covered with purpose-built roofs. The
overflow was covered in canvas. Small mountains of materials for mortar were
scattered around the foundation, looking like anthills, the illusion aided
by all the dark specks of men moving about.
Away from the site itself, on a road that snaked its way along the side
of a hill, among a small city of new work buildings overlooking the site,
lay the blacksmith's shop. It was quite large, compared with such places
Richard had seen before. Of course, Richard had never seen anything on this
scale being built. He had seen grand places that already existed. To see one
just beginning was a revelation. The sheer scale of everything was
disorienting.
Jori expertly backed his team, putting the rear of the wagon right at
double doors standing open into blackness.
"There you be," Jori said. It was a long speech for the lanky driver.
He pulled out a loaf of bread and a waterskin filled with ale and climbed
down from the wagon to find a place farther down the hill, where he could
sit and watch the building while Richard worked at unloading the iron.
The blacksmith's shop was dark and stifling hot, even in the outer,
cluttered, stockroom. Like all blacksmith's shops, the walls in the workroom
were covered in soot. Windows were kept to a minimum, mostly located
overhead and covered with shutters, so as to keep it dark in order to more
easily judge the nature of the glowing metal.
Despite being recently built for the work at the palace, the
blacksmith's shop already looked a hundred years old. Nearly every spot held
some tool or other in a dizzying array and variety. There were rows of
tools, piles of them. The rafters were hung with tongs and fire pots and
crucibles and squares and dividers and contraptions like huge insects which
looked to be used for clamping pieces together. Low benches seemingly
cobbled together in haste were hung all round with long-handled dies of
every sort. Some benches held smaller grindstones. Slots around some tables
held hundreds of files and rasps. Some of the low tables were covered in a
jumble of hammers in such variety as Richard had never imagined, their
handles all sticking out, making the tabletops look like huge pincushions.
The floor was choked with clutter: boxes overflowing with parts, bars,
rivets; wedges; lengths of iron stock; clippings; pry bars; pole hooks;
dented pots; wooden jigs; tin snips; lengths of chain; pulleys; and a
variety of special anvil attachments. Everything was covered with soot or
dust or metal filings.
Broad short barrels full of liquids sat around the anvils where men
hammered on glowing iron held in tongs, flattening, stretching, cutting,
squaring, clipping. Glowing metal hissed and smoked in protest as it was
quenched in the liquid. Other men used the horns of their anvils to bend
metal that looked like bits of sunset held captive in tongs. They held up
those fascinating bits and matched them to patterns, hammered on the metal
some more, and checked it again.
Richard could hardly think in all the noise.
In the darkness, a man worked a big bellows, putting all his weight on
the downstroke. The blast of air made the fire roar. Charcoal overflowed
from baskets sitting wherever there had been room to put them. Cubbyholes
held pipe and odd scraps of metal. Metal hoops leaned against benches and
planks. Some of the hoops were for barrels, bigger ones were for wagon
wheels. Tongs and hammers lay here and there on the floor where men had
dropped them in the haste of battle with the hot iron.
The whole place was as agreeable a clutter as he had ever seen.
A man in a leather apron stood not far away at a door to another
workroom. He held out a chalkboard covered with a maze of lines as he
studied a large contraption of metal bars on the floor in the room beyond.
Richard waited, not wanting to interrupt the man's concentration. The
sharply defined muscles of his sooty arms glistened with sweat. The man
tapped the chalk against his lip as he puzzled, then swiped a line clean on
the board and drew it again, moving its connecting points.
Richard frowned at the drawing. It looked familiar, somehow, even
though it was no recognizable object.
"Would you be the master blacksmith?" Richard asked when the man paused
and looked over his shoulder.
The man's brow seemed enduringly fixed in an intimidating scowl. His
hair was cropped close to his skull-a good practice around so much fire and
white-hot metaladding to his menacing demeanor. He was of average height and
sinewy, but it was his countenance that made him look big enough for any
trouble that might come along. By the way the other men moved, and glanced
at this man, they feared him.
Taken by inexplicable compulsion, Richard pointed at the line the man
had just drawn. "That's wrong. What you just did is wrong. You have the top
end right, but the bottom should go here, not where you put it."
He didn't so much as blink. "Do you even know what this is?"
"Well, not exactly, but I-"
"Then how can you presume to tell me where to put this support?"
The man looked like he wanted to stuff Richard in the forge and melt
him down.
"Offhand, I don't know, exactly. Something just tells me that-"
"You had better be the man with the iron."
"I am," Richard said, glad to change the subject and wishing he had
kept his mouth shut in the first place. He had only been trying to help.
"Where would-"
"Where have you been all day? I was told it would be here first thing
this morning. What did you do? Sleep till noon?"
"Ah, no, sir. We went right to the foundry first thing. Ishaq sent me
right there at dawn. But the man at the foundry was having problems
because-"
"I'm not interested. You said you had the iron. It's already late
enough. Get it unloaded."
Richard looked around. Every spot seemed occupied.
"Where would you like it?"
The master blacksmith glared around at the crammed room as if he
expected some of the piles to get up and move for him. They didn't.
"If you'd have been here when you were supposed to be here, you could
have put it out there, just inside the door in the outer supply room. Now
they brought that big rock sled that needs welding, so you will have to put
the iron in the back. Next time, get out of bed earlier."
Richard was trying to be polite, but he was losing his patience with
being castigated because the blacksmith was having a troubled day.
"Ishaq made it quite clear that you were to get iron today, and he sent
me to see to it. I have your iron. I don't see anyone else able to deliver
on such short notice."
The hand with the chalkboard lowered. The full attention of the man's
glower focused on Richard for the first time. Men who had heard Richard's
words scurried off to attend to important work farther away.
"How much iron did you bring?"
"Fifty bars, eight feet."
The man let out an angry breath. "I ordered a hundred. I don't know why
they sent an idiot with a wagon when-"
"Do you want to hear the way it is, or do you want to yell at someone?
If you just want to spout off to no point and no useful end, then go right
ahead as I'm not much injured by ranting, but when you finally want to hear
the truth of the way things are, just let me know and I'll give it."
The blacksmith peered silently for a moment, a bull bewildered by a
bumblebee. "What's your name?"
"Richard Cypher."
"So, what's the truth of the way things are, Richard Cypher?"
"The foundry wanted to fill the order. They have bar stock stacked to
the rafters. They can't get it delivered. They wanted to let me have the
whole order, but a transport inspector stationed there wouldn't let us have
the whole hundred bars because the other transport companies are supposed to
get their equal loads, but their wagons are broken down."
"So Ishaq's wagons aren't allowed to take more than their fair share,
and fifty was their allotment."
"That's right," Richard said. "At least until the other companies can
move some more goods."
The blacksmith nodded. "The foundry is dying to sell me all the iron I
can use, but I can't get it here. I'm not allowed to transport it-to put
transport workers, like you, out of work."
"Were it up to me," Richard said. "I'd go back for another load today,
but they told me they couldn't give me any more until next week at the
earliest. I'd suggest you get every transport company you can find to
deliver you a wagonload. That way, you'll have a better chance to get what
you need."
The blacksmith smiled for the first time. It was amusement at the
foolishness of Richard's idea. "Don't you suppose I already thought of that?
I've got orders in with them all. Ishaq is the only one with equipment at
the moment. The rest are all having wagon problems, horse problems, or
worker problems."
"At least I have fifty bars for you."
"That will only keep me going the rest of the day and for the morning."
The blacksmith turned. "This way. I'll show you where you can stack it."
He led Richard through the congested workshop, among the confusion of
work and material. They went through a door and down a short connecting
hall. The noise fell away behind. They entered a quiet building in back,
attached, but set off on its own. The blacksmith unhooked a line attached at
a cleat and let down a trapdoor covering a window in the roof.
Light cascaded down into the center of the large room, where stood a
huge block of marble. Richard stood staring at the stunning stone heart of a
mountain.
It seemed completely out of place in a blacksmith's workshop. There
were tall doors at the far end, where the monolith had been brought in on
skids. The rest of the room had space left open all around the towering
stone. Chisels of every sort and various-size mallets stuck up from slots
along the pitch black walls.
"You can put the bars here, on the side. Be careful when you bring them
in."
Richard blinked. He had almost forgotten the man was there with him.
Still he stared at the lustrous quality of the stone before him. "I'll be
careful," he said without looking at the blacksmith. "I won't bang it into
the stone."
As the man started to leave, Richard asked, "I told you my name. What's
yours?"
"Cascella."
"Is there more to it?"
"Yes. Mister. See that you use it all."
Richard smiled as he followed the man out. "Yes, sir, Mr. Cascella. Ah,
mind if I ask what this is?"
The blacksmith slowed to a stop and turned back. He gazed at the marble
standing in the light as if it were a woman he loved.
"This is none of your business, that's what it is."
Richard nodded. "I only asked because it's a beautiful piece of stone.
I've never seen marble before it was a statue or made into something."
Mr. Cascella watched Richard watching the stone. "There's marble all
over this site. Thousands of tons of it. This is just one small piece. Now,
get my shorted order of iron unloaded."
By the time Richard was done, he was soaked in sweat, and filthy, not
only from the iron bars, but from the soot of the blacksmith's shop. He
asked if he could use some of the water in a rain barrel that the men were
using to wash in as they were getting ready to leave for the day. They told
him to go ahead.
When he finished, Richard found Mr. Cascella back at the chalkboard,
alone in the suddenly silent shop, making corrections to the drawing and
writing numbers down the side.
"Mr. Cascella, I'm finished. I kept the bars well off to the side, away
from the marble."
"Thank you," he mumbled.
"Mind if I ask what you will have to pay for that fifty bars of iron?"
The glare was back. "What's it to you?"
"From what I heard at the foundry, the man there had been hoping to
fill the whole order so he could get three point five gold marks, so, since
you got half your order, I believe you will be paying one point seven five
gold marks for the fifty bars of iron. Am I correct?"
The glare darkened. "Like I said, what's it to you?"
Richard put his hands in his back pockets. "Well, I was wondering if
you would be willing to buy another fifty bars for one point five gold
marks."
"So, you're a thief, too."
"No, Mr. Cascella, I'm not a thief."
"Then how are you going to sell me iron for a quarter mark less than
the foundry is selling it for? You smelting a little iron ore in your room
at night, Mr. Richard Cypher?"
"Do you want to hear what I have to say, or not?"
His mouth twisted in annoyance. "'balk."
"The foundry man was furious because he wasn't allowed to transport
your whole order. He has more iron than he can sell because he isn't allowed
to transport it, and the transport companies are all jammed up so they
aren't showing up. He said he would be willing to sell it to me for less."
Why?"
"He needs the money. He showed me his cold blast furnaces. He owes
wages and needs charcoal and ore and quicksilver, among other things, but
hasn't enough money to buy it all. The only thing he has plenty of is
smelted metal. His business is strangling because he can't move his product.
I asked what price he would be
willing to sell me iron for, if he didn't have to transport it-if I
picked it up myself. He told me that if I came after dark, he would sell me
fifty bars for one point two five gold marks. If you're willing to buy it
from me for one point five, I'll have you another fifty bars by morning,
when you said you need it."
The man gaped as if Richard was a bar of iron that had just come to
life before his eyes and started talking.
"You know I'm willing to pay one and three-quarters, why would you
offer to sell it to me for one and a half?"
"Because," Richard explained, "I want to sell it for less than you'd
have to pay through a transport company so that you'll buy it from me,
instead, and, because I need you to loan me the one and a quarter gold
marks, first, so I can buy the bars in the first place and bring them to
you. The foundry will only sell them to me if I pay when I come to take
them."
"What's to keep you from disappearing with my one and a quarter gold
marks?"
"My word."
The man barked a laugh. "Your word? I don't know you."
"I told you, my name is Richard Cypher. Ishaq is scared to death of
you, and he trusted me to get you the iron so you won't come wring his
neck."
Mr. Cascella smiled again. "I'd not wring Ishaq's neck. I like the
fellow. He's stuck in a tight spot. -But don't you tell him I said that. I'd
like to keep him on his toes."
Richard shrugged. "If you don't want me to, I won't tell him you know
how to smile. I know, though, that you're in a tighter spot than Ishaq. You
have to deliver goods for the Order, but you're at the mercy of their
methods."
He smiled again. "So, Richard Cypher, what time will you be here with
your wagon?"
"I don't have a wagon. But, if you agree, I'll have your fifty iron
bars right there"-Richard pointed at a spot out the double doors beside
where Jori had parked the wagon-"in a pile, by dawn."
Mr. Cascella frowned. "If you don't have a wagon, how you going to get
the bars here? Walk?"
"That's right."
"Are you out of your mind?"
"I don't have a wagon, and I want to earn the money. It's not all that
far. I figure I can carry five at a time. That only makes ten trips. I can
do that by dawn. I'm used to walking."
"Tell me the rest of it-why you want to do this. The truth, now."
"My wife isn't getting enough to eat. The workers' group assesses most
of my wages, since I'm able to produce, and gives it to those who don't
work. Because I can work, I've become a slave to those who can't, or who
don't wish to. Their methods encourage people to find an excuse to let
others take care of them. I intensely dislike being a slave. I figure I can
entice you to go along with the deal by offering you a better price. We each
gain a benefit. Value for value."
"If I were to go along, what do you plan to do with all that money-go
live off it for a while? Drink it away?"
"I need the money to buy a wagon and a team of horses."
The frown knotted tighter. "What do you need with a wagon?"
"I need the wagon to deliver you all the iron you're going to buy from
When men's names were called, they stood to hear the share to be taken
from their wages the next week. Because he was new, Richard's name was
called last. He stood, staring off across the dimly lit room at the people
in moth-eaten coats sitting behind the long table made of two old doors.
Ishaq sat at one end, going along with the others in everything. Several of
the women still had their heads together. When they finished, they whispered
to the chairman and he nodded.
"Richard Cypher, being as you are new, you still have some catching up
to do
on your duty to your workers' group. Your next weeks wages are assessed
as due in aid.."
Richard stood dumbly for a moment. "How am I to eat to pay my rent?"
People in the room turned to frown at him. The chairman slapped his
hand on the table, calling for silence.
"You should thank the Creator to be blessed with good health so as you
can work, young man. Right now, there are those who are not as fortunate in
life as you, those with greater need than you. Suffering and need comes
before selfish personal enrichment."
Richard sighed. What did it really matter? After all, he was lucky in
life.
"Yes, sir. I see what you mean. I'm happy to volunteer my share toward
those with needs."
He wished Nicci hadn't given away all their money.
"Well," he said to Nicci as they shuffled out into the night, "I guess
we can ask the landlord for the rent money back. We can stay on where we
were staying before, until I can work some more and save up some money."
"They don't give rent money back," she said. "The landlord will
understand our need and let our debt build until we can start paying on it.
Next meeting, you just have to go up before the review board and explain
your hardship. If you present it properly, they will give you a hardship
charity to pay your rent."
Richard was exhausted. He felt like he were having some kind of silly
dream.
"Charity? It's my wages-for the work I do."
"That's a selfish way of looking at it, Richard. The job is at the
grace of the workers' group, the company, and the Order."
He was too tired to argue. Besides, he didn't expect any justice in
anything done in the name of the Order. He just wanted to go to their new
room and get some sleep.
--]----
When they opened the door, one of the three youths was pawing through
Nicci's pack. Holding some of her underthings in one hand, he aimed a smirk
back over his shoulder at them.
"Well, well," he said as he stood. He still wore no shirt. "Looks like
the two drowned rats have found a hole to live in." His leering gaze slid to
Nicci. He wasn't looking at her face.
Nicci snatched the pack away first, then her things from his other
hand. She stuffed her personal clothes back in the pack while he watched,
grinning the whole time. Richard feared she might abandon the link to Kahlan
in order to use her power, but she only glared at the youth.
The room reeked of mold. The low ceiling made Richard feel
uncomfortably hemmed in. The ceiling had once been whitewashed, but was now
dark with soot from candles and lamps, making the room feel cavelike. A
candle sitting on a rusted bracket by the door provided the only light. A
wardrobe stood crookedly in the corner in front of dirty walls spotted with
flyblows. The wardrobe was missing a door. Two wooden chairs at a table
under one small window on the far wall were the only place to sit, other
than the warped and gouged pine floor. The small squares of window glass
were opaque under a variety of different-colored layers of paint.
Through a small triangle in the corner where the glass was broken out,
Richard could see the gray wall of the next building.
"How did you get in here?" Nicci snapped.
"Master key." He waved it like a king's pass. "See, my father's the
landlord. I was just checking your things for subversive writings."
"You can read?" Nicci sniped. "I would have to see that to believe it."
The defiant grin never left his face. "We'd not like to find we have
subversives living under our roof. Could endanger everyone else. My father
has a duty to report any suspicious activity."
Richard stepped aside to let the young man by as he headed for the
door, but then caught his arm as the youth picked up the candle.
"That's our candle," Richard said.
"Yeah? What makes you think so?"
Richard tightened his grip on the bare, lean, muscular arm. Looking him
in the eye, he gestured with his other hand.
"Our initials are scratched in the bottom, there."
Before he thought, the young man instinctively turned the candle to
have a look. The hot wax spilled over his hand. He dropped the candle with a
yelp.
"Oh my, I am sorry," Richard said. He stooped and picked up the candle.
"You're all right, I hope. You didn't get any of that burning wax in your
eyes, did you? Hot wax in your eyes hurts something fierce."
"Yeah?" He swiped his straight dark hair back from his eyes. "How would
you know that?"
"Back where I came from, I saw it happen to some poor fellow."
Richard leaned partway out into the hall, into the light of another
candle on a shelf. With his thumbnail, he made a show of carving an R and a
C in the bottom of the candle. "See, here? My initials."
The youth didn't bother to look. "Uh-huh."
He swaggered out the door. Richard went with him and lit the candle
from the flame of the one in the hall. Before walking away, the young man
turned back with a haughty look.
"How did that fellow manage to be stupid enough to get hot wax in his
eyes? Was he a big dumb ox like you?"
"No," Richard said offhandedly. "No, not at all. He was a cocky young
man who foolishly put his hands on another man's wife. He got the hot wax
dripped in his eyes by the husband."
"Yeah? Well why didn't the dumb jackass just shut his eyes?"
Richard gave the lad a deadly smile for the first time.
"Because his eyelids had been cut off, first, so he couldn't close
them. You see, where I come from, anyone touching a woman against her wishes
isn't treated indulgently."
"Yeah?"
"Yeah. The young man's eyelids weren't the only thing that got cut
off."
The young man swiped his black hair back again. "You threatening me,
ox?"
"No. There would be nothing I could do to you that would harm you more
than what you're already doing to harm yourself."
"What's that supposed to mean?"
"You are never going to amount to anything. You will always be the
worthless muck people scrape from their shoes. You only get one life and you
are wasting
yours. That's a terrible shame. I doubt you will ever know what it is
to be truly happy, to achieve anything of worth, to have genuine pride in
yourself. You bring it all on yourself, and I could do no worse to you."
"I can't help what life deals me."
"Yes, you can. You create your own life."
"Yeah? How do you figure?"
Richard gestured around himself. "Look at the pigsty you live in. Your
father is the landlord. Why don't you show some pride and fix up the place?"
"He's the landlord, not the owner. The man who owned it was a greedy
bastard, charging more rent than many could afford. The Order took the place
over. For his crimes against the people they tortured the owner to death. My
father was given the job of landlord. We just run the place to help out
fools like you who don't have a place; we've no money to go around fixing up
the building."
"Money?" Richard pointed. "It takes money to pick up that garbage left
there in the hall?"
"I didn't put it there."
"And these walls-it doesn't take money to wash the walls. Look at the
ceiling in this room. It hasn't been washed in a decade, at least."
"Hey, I'm no scrub woman."
"And the front stoop? Someone is going to break their neck on it. Could
be you, or your father. Why don't you do something worthwhile for a change
and fix it?"
"I told you, we've no money to fix things."
"It doesn't take money. You just need to take it apart, clean the
joints, and put in some new wedges. You can cut them from any little scrap
of wood lying around."
The young man wiped his palms on his pants. "If you're so smart, then
why don't you fix the stairs?"
"Good idea. I will."
"Yeah?" His sneer returned. "I don't believe you."
"Tomorrow, after I get home from work, I will fix the stairs. If you
show up, I'll teach you how it's done."
"I might show up just to see some dupe going to the work of fixing
something that isn't even his, and for nothing besides."
"It isn't for nothing. It's because I use the front steps, too, and for
the pleasure in the place where I live. I care if my wife falls and breaks
her leg. But if you want to come and learn how to fix the steps, you will
wear a shirt out of respect for the women in your building."
"And if I show up and watch you, and I don't wear a stupid shirt like
some old geezer?"
"Then I wouldn't have enough respect for you to bother teaching you how
to fix the stairs. You will learn nothing, then."
"What if I don't want to learn something?"
"Then you will have taught me something, about you, instead."
He rolled his dark eyes. "Why should I care about learning to fix some
dumb stairs?"
"You shouldn't necessarily care about fixing some stairs, but if you
care about yourself, you should care about learning-even learning simple
things. You come to have pride in yourself only by accomplishing things,
even from fixing some old stairs."
"Yeah? I got pride in myself."
"You intimidate people and then mistake that for respect. Others can't
grant you self-respect, even others who care about you. You have to earn
self-respect yourself. All you know right now is how to stand around and
look stupid."
He folded his arms. "Who you calling-"
Richard jabbed a finger against the young man's smooth chest, forcing
him back a pace. "You only get one life. Is that all you want out of it
standing around calling names, scaring people with your gang? Is that all
you want your one life to mean to you?
"Anyone who wants more out of life, who wants their life to mean
something, would care about learning things. Tomorrow I'm going to fix those
stairs. Tomorrow we'll see what sort you are."
The youth folded his arms again in a defiant stance. "Yeah? Well, maybe
I'd rather spend time with my friends."
Richard shrugged. "That's why your lot in life isn't fate. I don't have
any say in much of my life, but I make whatever choices I can make in my own
rational best interest. It's my choice to fix those stairs and make the
place I live a little betterinstead of whining and waiting and hoping for
someone else to do something for me. I have pride that I know how to do that
for myself.
"Fixing stairs isn't going to make you a man, but it's going to make
you a little more confident in yourself. If you want, bring your friends,
and I'll teach you all how to use those knives of yours for something more
than just waving in people's faces."
"We might come to laugh at you working, Ox."
"Fine. But if you and your pals want to learn anything of worth, then
you'd better start out by showing me you mean to learn by showing respect
and showing up with shirts. That's the first choice you have. If you make it
wrong, then your choices as you go along are only going to become more
limited. And my name is Richard."
"Like I said, you might be good for a laugh." He made a face.
"Richard."
"Laugh all you want. I know my own worth and don't need to prove it to
someone who doesn't know theirs. If you want to learn, you know what you
must do. If you ever wave a knife at me again, thoughor, worse, my wife-then
you will be making the last of your many mistakes in life."
He chose to ignore the threat with more bravado. "What am I ever going
to be? Some dupe, like you, working your tail off for that greedy Ishaq and
his transport company?"
"What's your name?"
"Kamil."
"Well, Kamil, I work in exchange for wages so I can support myself and
my wife. I have have something of value-myself. Someone values my worth
enough to pay me for my time and ability. Right now, choosing to work at
loading wagons is one of the few choices I have to make in my life. I chose
to fix the steps because it improves my life." Richard narrowed his eyes.
"And what does Ishaq have to do with it, anyway?"
"Ishaq? He's the one who owns the transport company."
"Ishaq is just the load master."
"Ishaq used to live here, back before the Order took over the building.
My father knew him. Matter of fact, you'll be sleeping in his parlor. Back
then, it was his transport company. He chose the path of enlightenment over
greed, though, when it
was offered him. He let the citizen workers' group help him to learn to
be a better citizen of the Order, learn his place under the Creator. Now he
knows he's no better than any of the rest of us-even me."
Richard glanced at Nicci, who was standing in the middle of their room,
watching the conversation. He'd forgotten all about her. He didn't feel like
talking anymore.
"I'll see you tomorrow evening, whether you come to laugh or to learn.
It's your life, Kamil, and your choice."
The sun was just coming up. Dusty shafts of light angled into the
warehouse through the high windows. When he saw Ishaq coming down the aisle
to give him the list of iron to be loaded for various wagons, Richard hopped
down off the rack where he'd been waiting.
Richard hadn't seen the load master for a week. "Ishaq. Are you all
right? Where have you been?"
The burly load master hurried up the aisle. "Hello to you, too."
"I'm sorry-hello. I was worried. Where have you been?"
He made a face. "Meetings. Always meetings. Wait in this office, wait
in that office. No work, just meetings for this and for that. I had to go
see people to try to arrange for loads people need. Sometimes I think no one
really wants any goods to move in this city. It would be easier for them if
everyone got paid, but had to do no work-then they would not have to sign
their name on a piece of paper and worry if maybe someday they will be
called to account for having done it."
"Ishaq, is it true that this transport company used to be yours?"
The man paused to catch his breath. "Who tells you these things?"
"What about it? Did the transport company used to be yours?"
Ishaq shrugged. "Still is, I guess."
"What happened?"
"What happened? Nothing happened, except maybe I got smart and figured
out it was more work than I needed."
"What did they threaten you with?"
Ishaq peered at Richard for a time. "Where are you from? You don't seem
like any farmboy I ever met."
Richard smiled. "You didn't answer my question, Ishaq."
The man gestured irritably. "What for you want to know about past
history? Past is past. A man has to look at the way things are and do the
best he can from what life presents him. A choice was put to me, and I made
it. Things are they way they are. Wishing don't put food before my
children."
Richard's inquisitive frown suddenly felt cruel on his face. He let it
go. "I understand, Ishaq. I really do. I'm sorry."
The man shrugged again. "Now I work here just like everyone else. Much
easier. I must follow the same rules, or I could lose my job, just like
everyone else. Everyone is equal, now."
"Praise be to the Order." Ishaq smiled at Richard's gibe. Richard held
out his hand. "Let's have the list."
The load master handed over the paper. It only had the names of two
places on it, with some directions for grade, length, and amounts.
"What's this?" Richard asked.
"We need a loader to go with a wagon to pick up some iron and see it
delivered."
"So, I'm working on the wagons, now? Why? I thought you needed me in
the warehouse."
Ishaq took off his red hat and scratched his head of dark, thinning
hair. "We had some . . . complaints."
"About me? What did I do? You know I've worked hard."
"Too hard." Ishaq readjusted his hat on his head. "Men in the warehouse
say you are petty and spiteful. Their words, not mine. They say you make
them feel bad by flaunting how young and strong you are. They say you are
laughing behind their backs."
Many of the men were younger than Richard, and strong enough.
"Ishaq, I never-"
"I know, I know. But they feel that you do. Don't make trouble for
yourself, now. Their feelings are what matter, not what is."
Richard let out a frustrated sigh. "But I was told by the workers'
group that I have the ability to work whereas others don't, and that I was
supposed to contribute my full effort in order to help relieve the strain on
those less able-those who don't have my ability. They said that I would lose
the job if I didn't do my full effort."
"It's a fine line to walk."
"And I stepped over the line."
"They want you dismissed."
Richard sighed. "So, I'm through, here?"
Ishaq waggled his hand. "Yes, and no. You are dismissed from the
warehouse for having a bad attitude. I convinced the committee to give you
another chance and let you be moved to the wagons. The wagons aren't as much
work, because you can only load it, and then when you get to where it's
going, you unload it. Can't get in much trouble, that way."
Richard nodded. "Thanks, Ishaq."
Ishaq's gaze sought refuge among the racks of iron and the bins of
charcoal and long rows of ore that needed delivery. He scratched his temple.
"The pay is less."
Richard brushed the iron and ore dust from his hands and rear of his
pants. "What's the difference? They just take it from me anyway and give it
out. I'm not really losing any pay, other people are losing my pay."
Ishaq chuckled and clapped Richard on the shoulder. "You are the only
one around here I can count on, Richard. You are different than the others-I
feel I can talk to you and it won't drift to other ears."
"I wouldn't do that to you."
"I know. That's why I tell you what I don't tell the others. I am
expected to be equal, and to work like anyone else, but I am also expected
to provide jobs. They took my business, but they still expect me to run it
for them. Crazy world."
"You don't know the half of it, Ishaq. So what about this wagon-loading
job? What is it you need done?"
"The blacksmith out at the site is dealing me a fit."
"Why?"
"He has orders for tools, but he has no iron. Lots of people are
waiting on things." He swept a hand out at the rack of iron. "Most of this
is what was ordered
last autumn. Last autumn! It's nearly spring and it's only now come in.
It's all been promised to those who ordered it before."
"So, why did it take so long for it to get here?"
Ishaq slapped his forehead. "Maybe you are an ignorant farmboy, after
all. Where you been? Under rocks? You can't just get things because you want
them. You got to wait your turn. Your order must pass before the review
board."
"Why?"
"Why, why, why. Is that all you know?"
Ishaq sighed and said something under his breath about the Creator
testing his patience. He slapped the back of his fingers to the palm of his
other hand as he explained it to Richard.
"Because you've got to think of others, that's why. You got to take
other people's needs into consideration. You have to consider the good of
everyone. If I get all the runs picking up and delivering the iron, then
what chance have others who want to do the same? If I have all the business,
that's unfair. It would put people out of work. What's available has to be
divided up. The board of supervision must make sure everything is equal to
all. Some people can't handle the orders so fast as I can, or they have
trouble, or they can't get workers, or their workers have troubles, so I got
to wait until they can catch up."
"It's your business, why can't-"
"Why, why, why. Here, take this order. I don't need to have that
blacksmith come all the way down here again and yell at me. He's in trouble
with his orders and he needs the iron."
"Why is he in trouble? I thought everyone had to wait their turn."
Ishaq lifted an eyebrow and lowered his voice. "His customer is the
Retreat."
"The Retreat? What's that?"
"The Retreat." Ishaq spread his arms, indicating something big. "That's
the name of the place being built for the emperor."
Richard hadn't known the name. The emperor's new palace was the reason
for all the workers coming to Altur'Rang. He supposed it was the reason
Nicci had insisted they come to the city, too. She had some interest in
having him be part of the grand project. He assumed it was her grotesque
sense of irony.
"The new palace is going to be huge," Ishaq said, waving his arms
again. "A lot of work for a lot of people. It will be work for years
building the Retreat."
"So, when the goods are for the Order, then you had better deliver, I
take it."
Ishaq smiled and dipped a deep nod. "Now, you are starting to
understand, Mr. Richard why, why, why. The blacksmith is working directly
from the orders of the builders of the palace, who report to the highest
people. The builders need tools and things made. They don't want to hear
excuses from a lowly blacksmith. The blacksmith doesn't want to hear excuses
from me, but I have to go by what the review board says-he doesn't, he goes
by what the palace says. I'm in the middle."
Ishaq paused when one of the other loaders came down the aisle with a
piece of paper. Ishaq read the paper the man gave him, while the man gave a
sidelong look at Richard. Ishaq sighed and gave brief directions to the man.
After he was gone, Ishaq turned back to Richard.
"I can only transport what the review board allows me to move. That
paper, just now-it was instructions from the board for me to hold a shipment
of timbers to the mines because the load was going to go to a company that
needs the work. You see? I can't put other people out of business by being
unfair and delivering more than
they do, or else I have trouble, and I get replaced by someone who will
not be so unfair to his competitors. Ah, it's not like the old days, when I
was young and foolish."
Richard folded his arms. "You mean to say that if you do a good job,
you get in trouble-just like I did."
"Good job. Who's to say what is a good job. Everybody's got to work
together for the good of everybody. That is a good job-if you help your
fellow man."
Richard watched a couple of men off in the distance loading a wagon
with charcoal. "You don't really believe that mouthful of mush, do you,
Ishaq?"
Ishaq sighed in a long suffering manner. "Richard, please, load the
wagon when you get to the foundry and then go with the wagon out to the
Retreat and unload it at the blacksmith's shop. Please. Don't get sick on
me, or get a bad back, or have infirm children in the middle of the run? I
don't need to see the blacksmith again, or I will have to go swimming with
an iron bar around my neck."
Richard grunted a laugh. "My back is feeling fine."
"Good. I'll get a driver over here to drive the wagon." Ishaq waggled a
cautionary finger. "And don't ask the driver to help load or unload. We
don't need that kind of grievance brought up at the next meeting. I had to
beg Jori not to lodge a complaint after I asked him to help me unload the
wagon that day in the rain, when the wheels broke-the day you helped me get
the load to the warehouse. Remember?"
"I remember."
"Please, don't give Jori any trouble. Don't touch the reins-that's his
job. Be a good fellow, then? Get the iron loaded and unloaded so that
blacksmith doesn't come to see me again?"
"Sure, Ishaq. I won't make any trouble for you. You can trust me."
"There's a good fellow." Ishaq started away, but turned back. "Was not
so much trouble on a farm-am I right?"
"No, it wasn't. I wish I was back there, now."
Before he got far, Ishaq turned back once more. "You be sure to bow and
scrape if you see any of those priests. You hear?"
"Priests? What priests? How will I know them?"
"Brown robes and creased caps-oh, you'll know them. You can't miss
them. If you see any, you be on your best manners. If a priest suspects you
of having an improper attitude toward the Creator or such, he can have you
tortured. The priests are Brother Narev's disciples."
"Brother Narev?"
"The high priest of the Fellowship of Order-" Ishaq waved his arms
impatiently. "I have to get Jori to come with the wagon. Please, Richard, do
as I ask. That blacksmith will feed me to his forge if I don't have that
iron out there today. Please, Richard, get that load out there. Please?"
Richard gave Ishaq a smile in order to put his mind at ease.
"You have my word, Ishaq. The blacksmith will have the iron."
Ishaq heaved a sigh and hurried off to find his driver.
It was late in the muggy afternoon by the time they made it to the site
of the Retreat. Sitting in the wagon beside Jori as they cleared the top of
the final hill, Richard was awestruck by the sight. It was beyond huge. He
couldn't imagine how many square miles had been cleared. Gangs of thousands
of men, looking like ants spread out below, worked in lines with shovels and
baskets reshaping the contour of the land.
Jori was disinterested in the construction, and only spat over the
side, offering the occasional "I suppose" to some of Richard's questions.
The foundation was still being laid in deep trenches, enabling Richard,
looking down from the road, to see on the ground the outline of the future
structure. It was hard to fathom how enormous the building was going to be.
Seeing the specks moving slowly beside it, it was hard to keep in mind that
they were men.
For sheer size, the structure would rival anything Richard had ever
seen. There were miles of grounds and gardens going in. Fountains and other
towering structures along entrance roads were beginning to be erected.
Sweeping stretches of mazes were being constructed with hedges. Hillsides
were dotted with trees that had been planted according to a grand plan.
The Retreat faced a lake in what was to be that majestic park. The
short side of the main building was to run a quarter mile along the river.
Stone pilings marched partway out into the river, with a series of
connecting arches just starting to be constructed. Apparently, part of the
palace was to extend out over the water, with docks for the emperor's
pleasure craft.
Across the river lay more of the city. On the palace side of the river,
too, the city spread all around, though at a great distance from the
Retreat. Richard couldn't imagine how many buildings and people had been
displaced for the construction. This was to be no distant and remote
emperor's palace, but rather it was set right in the center of Altur'Rang.
Roads were being paved with millions of cobbles, giving the multitudes of
citizens of the Order access to come and see the wand structure. There were
already crowds of people standing behind rope barricades, watching the
construction.
Despite the poverty of the Old World, it would appear that this grand
palace was to be a crown jewel of unsurpassed splendor.
Stone of various kinds lay in great piles. In the distance, Richard
could see men working at cutting it into the required shapes. The heavy
afternoon air rang with the faraway knells of hundreds of hammers and
chisels. There were stockpiles of granite and marble in a variety of colors,
and massive quantities of limestone blocks. Special quarry wagons waited in
serpentine columns to deliver yet more. The long blocks of stone, called
lifts, were slung under heavy beams that bridged the front
and rear axles. Huts and great open shelters had been built for the
stone workers so they could work no matter the weather. Timber was stickered
in row upon row of huge stacks covered with purpose-built roofs. The
overflow was covered in canvas. Small mountains of materials for mortar were
scattered around the foundation, looking like anthills, the illusion aided
by all the dark specks of men moving about.
Away from the site itself, on a road that snaked its way along the side
of a hill, among a small city of new work buildings overlooking the site,
lay the blacksmith's shop. It was quite large, compared with such places
Richard had seen before. Of course, Richard had never seen anything on this
scale being built. He had seen grand places that already existed. To see one
just beginning was a revelation. The sheer scale of everything was
disorienting.
Jori expertly backed his team, putting the rear of the wagon right at
double doors standing open into blackness.
"There you be," Jori said. It was a long speech for the lanky driver.
He pulled out a loaf of bread and a waterskin filled with ale and climbed
down from the wagon to find a place farther down the hill, where he could
sit and watch the building while Richard worked at unloading the iron.
The blacksmith's shop was dark and stifling hot, even in the outer,
cluttered, stockroom. Like all blacksmith's shops, the walls in the workroom
were covered in soot. Windows were kept to a minimum, mostly located
overhead and covered with shutters, so as to keep it dark in order to more
easily judge the nature of the glowing metal.
Despite being recently built for the work at the palace, the
blacksmith's shop already looked a hundred years old. Nearly every spot held
some tool or other in a dizzying array and variety. There were rows of
tools, piles of them. The rafters were hung with tongs and fire pots and
crucibles and squares and dividers and contraptions like huge insects which
looked to be used for clamping pieces together. Low benches seemingly
cobbled together in haste were hung all round with long-handled dies of
every sort. Some benches held smaller grindstones. Slots around some tables
held hundreds of files and rasps. Some of the low tables were covered in a
jumble of hammers in such variety as Richard had never imagined, their
handles all sticking out, making the tabletops look like huge pincushions.
The floor was choked with clutter: boxes overflowing with parts, bars,
rivets; wedges; lengths of iron stock; clippings; pry bars; pole hooks;
dented pots; wooden jigs; tin snips; lengths of chain; pulleys; and a
variety of special anvil attachments. Everything was covered with soot or
dust or metal filings.
Broad short barrels full of liquids sat around the anvils where men
hammered on glowing iron held in tongs, flattening, stretching, cutting,
squaring, clipping. Glowing metal hissed and smoked in protest as it was
quenched in the liquid. Other men used the horns of their anvils to bend
metal that looked like bits of sunset held captive in tongs. They held up
those fascinating bits and matched them to patterns, hammered on the metal
some more, and checked it again.
Richard could hardly think in all the noise.
In the darkness, a man worked a big bellows, putting all his weight on
the downstroke. The blast of air made the fire roar. Charcoal overflowed
from baskets sitting wherever there had been room to put them. Cubbyholes
held pipe and odd scraps of metal. Metal hoops leaned against benches and
planks. Some of the hoops were for barrels, bigger ones were for wagon
wheels. Tongs and hammers lay here and there on the floor where men had
dropped them in the haste of battle with the hot iron.
The whole place was as agreeable a clutter as he had ever seen.
A man in a leather apron stood not far away at a door to another
workroom. He held out a chalkboard covered with a maze of lines as he
studied a large contraption of metal bars on the floor in the room beyond.
Richard waited, not wanting to interrupt the man's concentration. The
sharply defined muscles of his sooty arms glistened with sweat. The man
tapped the chalk against his lip as he puzzled, then swiped a line clean on
the board and drew it again, moving its connecting points.
Richard frowned at the drawing. It looked familiar, somehow, even
though it was no recognizable object.
"Would you be the master blacksmith?" Richard asked when the man paused
and looked over his shoulder.
The man's brow seemed enduringly fixed in an intimidating scowl. His
hair was cropped close to his skull-a good practice around so much fire and
white-hot metaladding to his menacing demeanor. He was of average height and
sinewy, but it was his countenance that made him look big enough for any
trouble that might come along. By the way the other men moved, and glanced
at this man, they feared him.
Taken by inexplicable compulsion, Richard pointed at the line the man
had just drawn. "That's wrong. What you just did is wrong. You have the top
end right, but the bottom should go here, not where you put it."
He didn't so much as blink. "Do you even know what this is?"
"Well, not exactly, but I-"
"Then how can you presume to tell me where to put this support?"
The man looked like he wanted to stuff Richard in the forge and melt
him down.
"Offhand, I don't know, exactly. Something just tells me that-"
"You had better be the man with the iron."
"I am," Richard said, glad to change the subject and wishing he had
kept his mouth shut in the first place. He had only been trying to help.
"Where would-"
"Where have you been all day? I was told it would be here first thing
this morning. What did you do? Sleep till noon?"
"Ah, no, sir. We went right to the foundry first thing. Ishaq sent me
right there at dawn. But the man at the foundry was having problems
because-"
"I'm not interested. You said you had the iron. It's already late
enough. Get it unloaded."
Richard looked around. Every spot seemed occupied.
"Where would you like it?"
The master blacksmith glared around at the crammed room as if he
expected some of the piles to get up and move for him. They didn't.
"If you'd have been here when you were supposed to be here, you could
have put it out there, just inside the door in the outer supply room. Now
they brought that big rock sled that needs welding, so you will have to put
the iron in the back. Next time, get out of bed earlier."
Richard was trying to be polite, but he was losing his patience with
being castigated because the blacksmith was having a troubled day.
"Ishaq made it quite clear that you were to get iron today, and he sent
me to see to it. I have your iron. I don't see anyone else able to deliver
on such short notice."
The hand with the chalkboard lowered. The full attention of the man's
glower focused on Richard for the first time. Men who had heard Richard's
words scurried off to attend to important work farther away.
"How much iron did you bring?"
"Fifty bars, eight feet."
The man let out an angry breath. "I ordered a hundred. I don't know why
they sent an idiot with a wagon when-"
"Do you want to hear the way it is, or do you want to yell at someone?
If you just want to spout off to no point and no useful end, then go right
ahead as I'm not much injured by ranting, but when you finally want to hear
the truth of the way things are, just let me know and I'll give it."
The blacksmith peered silently for a moment, a bull bewildered by a
bumblebee. "What's your name?"
"Richard Cypher."
"So, what's the truth of the way things are, Richard Cypher?"
"The foundry wanted to fill the order. They have bar stock stacked to
the rafters. They can't get it delivered. They wanted to let me have the
whole order, but a transport inspector stationed there wouldn't let us have
the whole hundred bars because the other transport companies are supposed to
get their equal loads, but their wagons are broken down."
"So Ishaq's wagons aren't allowed to take more than their fair share,
and fifty was their allotment."
"That's right," Richard said. "At least until the other companies can
move some more goods."
The blacksmith nodded. "The foundry is dying to sell me all the iron I
can use, but I can't get it here. I'm not allowed to transport it-to put
transport workers, like you, out of work."
"Were it up to me," Richard said. "I'd go back for another load today,
but they told me they couldn't give me any more until next week at the
earliest. I'd suggest you get every transport company you can find to
deliver you a wagonload. That way, you'll have a better chance to get what
you need."
The blacksmith smiled for the first time. It was amusement at the
foolishness of Richard's idea. "Don't you suppose I already thought of that?
I've got orders in with them all. Ishaq is the only one with equipment at
the moment. The rest are all having wagon problems, horse problems, or
worker problems."
"At least I have fifty bars for you."
"That will only keep me going the rest of the day and for the morning."
The blacksmith turned. "This way. I'll show you where you can stack it."
He led Richard through the congested workshop, among the confusion of
work and material. They went through a door and down a short connecting
hall. The noise fell away behind. They entered a quiet building in back,
attached, but set off on its own. The blacksmith unhooked a line attached at
a cleat and let down a trapdoor covering a window in the roof.
Light cascaded down into the center of the large room, where stood a
huge block of marble. Richard stood staring at the stunning stone heart of a
mountain.
It seemed completely out of place in a blacksmith's workshop. There
were tall doors at the far end, where the monolith had been brought in on
skids. The rest of the room had space left open all around the towering
stone. Chisels of every sort and various-size mallets stuck up from slots
along the pitch black walls.
"You can put the bars here, on the side. Be careful when you bring them
in."
Richard blinked. He had almost forgotten the man was there with him.
Still he stared at the lustrous quality of the stone before him. "I'll be
careful," he said without looking at the blacksmith. "I won't bang it into
the stone."
As the man started to leave, Richard asked, "I told you my name. What's
yours?"
"Cascella."
"Is there more to it?"
"Yes. Mister. See that you use it all."
Richard smiled as he followed the man out. "Yes, sir, Mr. Cascella. Ah,
mind if I ask what this is?"
The blacksmith slowed to a stop and turned back. He gazed at the marble
standing in the light as if it were a woman he loved.
"This is none of your business, that's what it is."
Richard nodded. "I only asked because it's a beautiful piece of stone.
I've never seen marble before it was a statue or made into something."
Mr. Cascella watched Richard watching the stone. "There's marble all
over this site. Thousands of tons of it. This is just one small piece. Now,
get my shorted order of iron unloaded."
By the time Richard was done, he was soaked in sweat, and filthy, not
only from the iron bars, but from the soot of the blacksmith's shop. He
asked if he could use some of the water in a rain barrel that the men were
using to wash in as they were getting ready to leave for the day. They told
him to go ahead.
When he finished, Richard found Mr. Cascella back at the chalkboard,
alone in the suddenly silent shop, making corrections to the drawing and
writing numbers down the side.
"Mr. Cascella, I'm finished. I kept the bars well off to the side, away
from the marble."
"Thank you," he mumbled.
"Mind if I ask what you will have to pay for that fifty bars of iron?"
The glare was back. "What's it to you?"
"From what I heard at the foundry, the man there had been hoping to
fill the whole order so he could get three point five gold marks, so, since
you got half your order, I believe you will be paying one point seven five
gold marks for the fifty bars of iron. Am I correct?"
The glare darkened. "Like I said, what's it to you?"
Richard put his hands in his back pockets. "Well, I was wondering if
you would be willing to buy another fifty bars for one point five gold
marks."
"So, you're a thief, too."
"No, Mr. Cascella, I'm not a thief."
"Then how are you going to sell me iron for a quarter mark less than
the foundry is selling it for? You smelting a little iron ore in your room
at night, Mr. Richard Cypher?"
"Do you want to hear what I have to say, or not?"
His mouth twisted in annoyance. "'balk."
"The foundry man was furious because he wasn't allowed to transport
your whole order. He has more iron than he can sell because he isn't allowed
to transport it, and the transport companies are all jammed up so they
aren't showing up. He said he would be willing to sell it to me for less."
Why?"
"He needs the money. He showed me his cold blast furnaces. He owes
wages and needs charcoal and ore and quicksilver, among other things, but
hasn't enough money to buy it all. The only thing he has plenty of is
smelted metal. His business is strangling because he can't move his product.
I asked what price he would be
willing to sell me iron for, if he didn't have to transport it-if I
picked it up myself. He told me that if I came after dark, he would sell me
fifty bars for one point two five gold marks. If you're willing to buy it
from me for one point five, I'll have you another fifty bars by morning,
when you said you need it."
The man gaped as if Richard was a bar of iron that had just come to
life before his eyes and started talking.
"You know I'm willing to pay one and three-quarters, why would you
offer to sell it to me for one and a half?"
"Because," Richard explained, "I want to sell it for less than you'd
have to pay through a transport company so that you'll buy it from me,
instead, and, because I need you to loan me the one and a quarter gold
marks, first, so I can buy the bars in the first place and bring them to
you. The foundry will only sell them to me if I pay when I come to take
them."
"What's to keep you from disappearing with my one and a quarter gold
marks?"
"My word."
The man barked a laugh. "Your word? I don't know you."
"I told you, my name is Richard Cypher. Ishaq is scared to death of
you, and he trusted me to get you the iron so you won't come wring his
neck."
Mr. Cascella smiled again. "I'd not wring Ishaq's neck. I like the
fellow. He's stuck in a tight spot. -But don't you tell him I said that. I'd
like to keep him on his toes."
Richard shrugged. "If you don't want me to, I won't tell him you know
how to smile. I know, though, that you're in a tighter spot than Ishaq. You
have to deliver goods for the Order, but you're at the mercy of their
methods."
He smiled again. "So, Richard Cypher, what time will you be here with
your wagon?"
"I don't have a wagon. But, if you agree, I'll have your fifty iron
bars right there"-Richard pointed at a spot out the double doors beside
where Jori had parked the wagon-"in a pile, by dawn."
Mr. Cascella frowned. "If you don't have a wagon, how you going to get
the bars here? Walk?"
"That's right."
"Are you out of your mind?"
"I don't have a wagon, and I want to earn the money. It's not all that
far. I figure I can carry five at a time. That only makes ten trips. I can
do that by dawn. I'm used to walking."
"Tell me the rest of it-why you want to do this. The truth, now."
"My wife isn't getting enough to eat. The workers' group assesses most
of my wages, since I'm able to produce, and gives it to those who don't
work. Because I can work, I've become a slave to those who can't, or who
don't wish to. Their methods encourage people to find an excuse to let
others take care of them. I intensely dislike being a slave. I figure I can
entice you to go along with the deal by offering you a better price. We each
gain a benefit. Value for value."
"If I were to go along, what do you plan to do with all that money-go
live off it for a while? Drink it away?"
"I need the money to buy a wagon and a team of horses."
The frown knotted tighter. "What do you need with a wagon?"
"I need the wagon to deliver you all the iron you're going to buy from