The stones were gently laid one by one. A moving tent enclosed the last touches of the installation and the refilling of the trench behind. ‘Interment’ the two overseers called this final series of hidden steps.
One worker, levelling-board in hand, often lingered close to the flaps of the heavy canvas tent. His fellow crew members frequently had to call him back to task. ‘If we fall behind I’ll not take a lashing for your laziness,’ one grumbled to him while they tamped down a layer of fine sand.
‘Walk away then,’ the new fellow answered. ‘There’s other work.’
‘Ha! Other work! Listen to this one, would you? There is no other work at all! Everything’s shut down. The mines, the ironworks, all road crews. It’s work here or starve for all of us. Where’ve you been, anyway?’
The newcomer shrugged. ‘Been working in a tavern lately.’
‘So that’s what you call working?’ another of the crew said, laughing. ‘I can believe that.’
The new hand pulled on the long ratty shirt he wore, mouth clamped against any comment.
The man next to him grimaced his distaste, covering his nose. ‘And it doesn’t cost anything to douse yourself with water once in a while too, you know.’
‘Back to work!’ came a barked command followed by a slap of wood against the shoulder of the newcomer, who straightened, glaring, hands fisted.
But the overseer had moved on, his back turned. Another of the crew dragged the newcomer back down to the bottom of the trench. ‘Don’t try it, friend. And what’s your name, anyway?’
The newcomer looked startled, as if the question was completely unexpected. He pulled at the greasy long shirt. ‘Ah … Turn- er. Turner.’
‘Turner? Harmon. Well, friend, a word to the wise. There’s much worse they’ve done to some.’
‘Oh? Such as?’
They were levelling a layer of gravel over the foundation. Head down, one answered, ‘A fellow dropped a tool on one of them stones and what happened to him was a terrible thing to see.’
‘So? What happened?’
Eyes met to share gauging looks. ‘Magery happened,’ whispered a crew member. ‘The tall one with the staff — he just points, he does, and the man goes down screaming in agony. Bites his own tongue off.’
‘No!’
‘Aye. There’s Warren magics here. Maybe these two are Free Cities mages from up north. Maybe Pale necromancers. Who knows?’
The crew had a break as more gravel was sent for. They stood, stretching and grimacing over their aches and pains. ‘What’re they up to?’ Turner asked.
Gazes slid aside, feet were shifted, uneasy. Harmon peered right and left then edged closer. A pained look crossed his face and he backed up a step. Then, taking a great breath, he leaned in. ‘Some kinda protection for the city, right? This is one o’ the new Legate’s improvements, right?’
‘One?’ grumbled another. ‘Only one I knows.’
Turner looked suitably impressed. ‘Damn … you don’t say. Must be them stones, hey?’
Harmon frowned, suddenly a touch uneasy. ‘Well, I suppose so.’
‘Only one way to find out, don’t you think?’ And Turner picked up a shovel and headed back up the trench for the tent.
‘Gods, man …’ Harmon hissed, appalled.
‘Don’t be a fool!’ another called, voice low.
After that, hammers started clanging and chisels ringing as the crew was suddenly very busy.
Spindle was damned terrified, but he bet that these two Adepts — and he knew the two as such: as far above his capabilities as any Imperial High Mage — would see only what they expected to see: an empty-headed labourer.
He pushed through the hanging flap to find himself almost blind in the shrouded darkness. Burn take it! Didn’t think of that.
‘What in the name of the Cursed Ones do you think you’re doing?’ a voice snarled down the length of the tent. Spindle bowed, touching his forehead repeatedly. ‘Just reportin’, sir. We’re almost done with the-’
‘I don’t give a shit what you’re finished with or not. Never come in here. Get out! Now!’
Spindle could just make out a hunched figure, lantern set before him, bent over the glowing white blocks, instruments in hand. He bowed again, touching his forehead. ‘O’ course, sir. Yes. Course. Sorry.’ He backed away, bowing, feeling behind himself for the flap.
‘Out!’
He scuttled backwards through the flap, turned round and ran straight into the other overseer, the tall quick-tempered one. This mage grabbed his arm, glowering murder. At his touch Spindle felt his hair shirt writhe as if it had come alive. The mage let go, obviously quite shocked. Spindle froze; he’d been found out. This Adept had him. But the tall fellow, scars healing on his face and hands, simply regripped his staff, slowly and stiffly, his knuckles white with strain. And the eyes, black pits in yellowed orbs, shifted to the side, urging him onwards. Spindle bowed again in his role of a normal labourer returning to his work, though this man had seen through his facade.
All the rest of his shift he shared in the loading, levelling and tamping of dirt, sand and gravels, but he hardly saw any of it. Nor did any of the crew bother him. They’d marked him as either touched or irredeemably dim. Trouble to be avoided, in either case. His hands did their tasks but his mind puzzled over what he’d glimpsed inside that tent. That strange hunchback bent over the stones — and such stones! Glowing, they were, as if lit from within. But what had captured his attention were the tools. Magnificent iron etching styluses, and an assortment of engineering instruments any saboteur would give his left hand for. A compass for inscribing arcs, a spirit level — only the second one he’d ever seen outside the Academy in Unta — and an eyepiece of what he suspected might be part of a surveyor’s instrument, one he’d only heard described: an alidade. Gods, he’d never even touched an alidade!
How he wished he could talk to Fiddler or Hedge about this. Those two knew more engineering than he. With such tools you could lay down a perfect wall — straight or curved.
And no one needs that kind of precision for a battlement!
In the auditorium of the assembly chambers Councillor Coll had lately had a great deal of time on his hands. Fewer of his fellow Councillors than ever were now comfortable being seen in his company. The faction supporting the reinstallation of the Legate was pre-eminent and the subsequent favours, funds and prestige flowed accordingly. So now, in assembly, Councillor Coll sat surrounded by empty seats, hands clasped over his wide stomach, tapping his fingers. He used the time to think.
That day it occurred to him that in fact it had been some time since he’d even seen Lim; not that this ‘Legate’ was legally obliged to officiate here at the Council. Around mid-morning he heaved himself out of his seat — Ye gods but I am starting to get a touch heavy — to walk the steps down to the debate floor. Among the councillors present he selected one clearly in the Legate’s camp, one who would have nothing to risk in actually being seen talking to him. Conversation quietened in the man’s group as he drew near and the three councillors sketched the briefest greetings his way. Coll bowed to Councillor Ester-Jeen, who merely arched a supercilious brow.
‘Councillor Coll,’ he murmured.
‘Ester-Jeen.’
The other two councillors remembered pressing business and bowed their leave-taking. ‘Yes?’ Ester-Jeen said, his tone implying the relationship of a superior to a petitioner. Coll let that pass, though in his youth such a peremptory and disrespectful greeting would have drawn a challenge from him. He noted an unusual ornament on the man’s breast, a gold brooch worked in the shape of a tiny oval mask.
‘I was wondering, Ester-Jeen, just where is our illustrious leader? He doesn’t seem very interested in actually leading.’