Mad Tinker's Daughter Page 8

  “You his?” After reading the whole of the document, which Erefan knew spelled out Kezudkan’s expectations in painstaking detail, it was all the freightmaster saw fit to ask.

  Erefan held his chin up, putting his collar in better light. The freightmaster leaned close enough for Erefan to smell stale coffee on his breath. He looked to the paper and the collar and back to the paper again.

  “Well, get!” the freightmaster said. “Don’t be making me miss my schedule. This car’s supposed to be unloaded by quarter after eleven.”

  “Shouldn’t be a problem ... sir,” Erefan said. He nearly forgot to add the last. It was a stray bit of spoken punctuation that he had little use for save for his excursions into the city. In Tellurak he didn’t make such a concession to kings or lords. In his owner’s home, he was lax. In the city, omitting the honorific was an accepted excuse to take the back of a hand to a slave’s face.

  He scurried out of the freightmaster’s way as the kuduk went back to the business of directing crane operators and human laborers. He had to double back to get down to ground level from the passenger platform. Erefan tried to avoid looking back at the workers, but couldn’t help himself. He saw beardless, collarless humans, most of them twice his heft. They were “shavers,” free humans who took work with kuduk patrons. Not everyone appreciated the work they did: lower class kuduks begrudged them the jobs and most free humans considered them collaborators, but slaves saw their brothers willingly doing work that they would kill to be free of. Erefan saw merely men doing what they had to in order to survive. He was doing much the same.

  Making his way along the thunderail, he admired the craftsmanship. The passenger cars were works of art, with sleek, brass-rimmed windows and polished wooden handrails. The steel plates that formed the cars’ bodies were painted red and riveted together air-tight. They gleamed in the light of spark lampposts that lined the platform.

  Toward the end of the thunderail, glitz and style were stripped away as utilitarian concerns prevailed. Car forty-two was nothing but a rusting box with a sliding door in the side. The corrugated steel panels were warped, and paint clung to the surface in flakes where the rust had yet to take hold. Erefan reached for the padlock, ready to dial in the combination, when he noticed the lock. It was popped open but aligned in such a way that, from a few paces away, it looked closed. The chain that held the door closed was loose as well. Erefan pulled the door open until the slack pulled taut and it was open wide enough for a thin man to squeeze through, by the reckoning of Erefan’s practiced eye. One couldn’t spend years as a tinker without becoming a keen judge of relative size.

  Erefan reached into his satchel and found the revolver. He closed his hand around the grip, feeling nervous and powerful at once. He looked back to see if any of the workers or crane operators had taken note of him, and when he was confident that they had not, he put the revolver in his pocket, finger ready on the trigger. Throwing the satchel back over his shoulder, he used his free hand to unchain the door. He slid the door open with a screech of steel, just wide enough for him to fit through, and slipped inside.

  Aside from what light the door allowed to enter, the interior of the car was completely dark. Erefan’s eyes took a moment to adjust, but he had expected that. He did not linger in front of the door, but slid to the side, into the shadows. The sounds of the busy rail yard grew muffled with the corrugated steel walls intervening.

  The interior of car forty-two began resolving itself into greys and blacks, outlining the equipment that Kezudkan had purchased. When he was confident he could see well enough to shoot, Erefan spoke. “Who’s in here? I don’t want trouble, but you picked a sorry place to hide out.”

  Click-kik.

  Erefan knew the sound all too well: the hammer of a revolver being cocked. Modern multi-action guns didn’t have to be manually cocked, but they still could be when you wanted to send a quiet message in the dark.

  “I been holed up here days,” a voice called. A slight echo from the ceiling panels made it hard to pinpoint where the speaker was hiding. “Bettin’ my eyes are better than yours in this dark. I don’t think neither of us wants to be firin’ though.”

  “Of course not, you cow-brained fool,” Erefan said. “Now tell me what you’re doing in here, so I can figure out a way we don’t both get arrested or killed.”

  “What you got to worry about?” the voice asked. “You rat me out, they don’t do nothing to you.”

  “Because I’m not ratting you out,” Erefan replied. “We look out for our own. I’ll figure a way out of this, but I need you to tell me who you are, what you’re doing in here, and what you’re hoping to accomplish.”

  “Why should I trust you?” the voice asked.

  “The other option is that you shoot me and make a run for it,” Erefan replied. “Make up your mind quick, because I’m on a deadline.”

  “You’re a cold one, mister. Don’t know I could flap my lips like that with a gun pointed at my head.”

  “Indecisiveness irks me,” Erefan replied.

  “Fine, mister,” the voice agreed. “No names though. I’m with the rebels. I’ve got dynamite and a bundle of paper coin I’m trying to sneak into the city. I figured this fancy stuff was heading up to the university—they’ve got security like a tea strainer. Should have been an easy out.”

  “It’s not going to the university,” Erefan replied. “It’s going to my owner. And what in the burning blazes are you planning on doing with dynamite?”

  “Hey mister, I gave you the hangman’s version already. No way I’m giving away the plans for the boom-booms.”

  Erefan ground his teeth. He shoved the revolver into his pocket, dropped the satchel to the floor, and started to pick his way around the equipment and the ropes that held everything down. The shadows made the footing treacherous, but he knew exactly what each piece was and what it looked like, even if he couldn’t make out the details.

  “Hey, keep back.” There was a scuffling in the rear of the car, and Erefan headed for it. “I don’t know what your problem is but I’ll shoot if you get—”

  Erefan took up the speaker’s collar in both hands and jerked him to his feet. The stowaway’s threat was cut short, but he still managed to aim the gun at Erefan’s head.

  Erefan leaned close, putting his lips up to the man’s ear. “Listen to me, you halfwit,” Erefan whispered. “I don’t mind you rebels putting holes in a head-knocker once in a while, robbing mine owners, or even derailing the occasional trolley. Someone has to fight back, or the thought of fighting will die out in our kind. But I’ll be damned if I let you talking monkeys play with explosives in Eversall Deep. I have plans for this place, and none of those plans involve collapsing the city.”

  “You nutter, I’ve still got a gun pointed—”

  Erefan released one hand on the man’s collar and grabbed the wrist of his gun hand. Erefan’s thin frame concealed tightly sprung muscle, and the man was no larger than him. He forced the gun against the rebel’s head.

  “...at me,” the man finished. “Fine, you win.”

  “Hey in there,” came a call from outside. “That thing ready to have the lid hoisted?”

  “Another minute or two,” Erefan shouted back. “A couple crates shifted and the sides might be the only thing holding them up.”

  “You,” Erefan whispered, “get back in that crate you pried open. You’re coming to my owner’s house. I’ll figure out how to get you out of there later.”

  “But—”

  “No time,” Erefan replied. He grabbed the gun from the man’s hand, shoving it into his pocket with the revolver. Pushing the bewildered stowaway to a half-open crate, he shoved him inside. Almost as an afterthought, he reached into the crate and fished amongst the packing straw until he found a bundle of dynamite.

  Erefan closed the crate and hammered home loose nails until the stowaway was sealed inside. Some banging on the sides of car forty-two kept up the pretense that the crates had been lean
ing against them. He then picked his way back to his satchel and buried the dynamite and both guns at the bottom.

  Erefan hopped out of the car, down to ground level. A two-finger whistle got a crane operator’s attention, and a twirled finger in the air signaled his intent.“It’s all clear, sir. Lift whenever you’re ready.”

  The top and sides of car forty-two lifted away, leaving just the flat bed that supported Kezudkan’s property. Erefan boarded the car once more and conducted a cursory inspection and inventory, making measurements more for form’s sake, given how much he had been delayed; if there were problems with the equipment, he was just going to have to repair them later.

  Erefan and the freightmaster jointly oversaw the loading of a small convoy of steam wagons that would take the shipment to Kezudkan’s estate; there was no trolley line running that would reach the remote corner of Eversall Deep where the eccentric daruu dwelt.

  All the while along the lengthy journey, Erefan kept close watch on one crate in particular, dreading any noise his stowaway might make.

  The trip from the rail yard to Kezudkan’s estate took most of the afternoon. The steam wagons chugged along at a walking pace as a pair of flaggers waved away traffic ahead of them. Each time they crossed trolley tracks, Erefan worried that the jolt would damage something, and had them slow even more. At the lifts, each wagon had to go down separately (and the freight lifts were notoriously slow).

  By the time they arrived at Kezudkan’s home, the daruu was waiting for them in the cavernous front courtyard. He was driving a miniature steam wagon of his own design; it was little more than a chair on wheels, with the addition of a steering crank, brake lever, and the steam engine itself. Rather than a coal furnace like the thunderail used, glowing runes on the side of the boiler provided the heat, and opposing runes on the condenser cooled the steam.

  “About time you returned, Erefan,” Kezudkan said as the first wagon pulled up front. “What was the trouble?”

  “No trouble aside from the city outgrowing its tunnels,” Erefan replied. He jumped down from the steam wagon. “We need a new freight lift.”

  “I’ve thought about having you build me one of my own,” Kezudkan replied. “Never seemed worth the cost before today.”

  “Probably still isn’t.” Erefan turned his back on his owner and shouted orders to the human slaves who emerged from the estate. Kezudkan’s orders had been to see to the delivery of the equipment, not merely park it out front.

  Two hours later, Erefan and Kezudkan were alone in the workshop with the newly arrived equipment. Some of the pieces were laid bare, as they had been deemed rugged enough to ship without protection. The rest were concealed in a variety of crates.

  “Want me to get this all unpacked?” Erefan offered. “I can probably have it all uncrated by morning.”

  Kezudkan hobbled around the workshop, his rocklike joints crackling as he leaned on his cane, lost in inspecting his newest purchase. Erefan took a deep breath. There was no hurrying the old daruu sometimes. He could only hope that the dynamite smuggler in the crate of induction coils would stay quiet. Erefan’s heart quickened each time Kezudkan looped around the crates near the one concealing his stowaway, and he caught himself just before crying out when the daruu put a hand on the side of it during one pass.

  “No,” Kezudkan replied at length. “I think I’d like to stay and see it all unpacked. I’ve paid a mincing sum for all this rubbish. I want to feel it.” He patted a tank of acetylene gas.

  There was a rustle from within one of the crates. Erefan didn’t need to guess which.

  “What was that?” Kezudkan demanded. He rapped his cane against the side of the offending crate. It answered with a hollow echo. “Erefan, I thought you inspected these.”

  “It’s rats,” Erefan said. He hung his head, but was still able to see Kezudkan recoil from the crate.

  “Ghastly. Why didn’t you remove them?” Kezudkan asked, taking another step back.

  “Rat-catching isn’t one of my talents,” Erefan replied. “It could have taken me hours. We were on a schedule. Besides ... why waste good rats?”

  Kezudkan squeezed his eyes shut and covered his mouth with a stony hand. “Ugh. I forget you’re human at times. Take care of this. By morning, I don’t want to see any sign of rats. Is that understood?”

  “No rats by morning. Got it.”

  Erefan waited until the daruu had closed the door behind him, then a minute or so more. He took a crowbar and pried open the crate with his stowaway inside.

  “Damn, thought we were goners there,” the stowaway said. The man was sweating, and he had knocked over one of the waist-high induction coils.

  “We?” Erefan asked.“I’d have admitted cutting corners and not opening the crates, then shot you.”

  “Well, when you put it that way, I—”

  “Shut up.”

  The stowaway nodded.

  “Make yourself useful while you’re down here,” Erefan said. He tossed his crowbar to the stowaway and grabbed another. The man gave the tool a skeptical look, but set to work on the crates.

  “What is all this stuff?” he asked. “I ain’t never seen anything like this. It’s like something out of them kids’ stories about mad scientists.”

  “Scientists don’t build shit,” Erefan snapped. “Tinkers invent things. Mechanics repair them and make more. A scientist is just a good brain gone to rot.” He gave a heave and one side of the crate fell away. There were a number of smaller wooden boxes within.

  “So what is it, then?”

  “You wouldn’t believe me if I told you,” Erefan said. “Besides, why should I trust you? I don’t even know your name.”

  “Pick,” the man said. Erefan raised an eyebrow. “That’s what they call me: Pick.”

  “Well, Pick, that archway with the wires all over it is going to be a bridge to faraway places,” Erefan said with a smirk.

  “You’re a shitty liar, brother,” Pick said. He shook his head and set to work once more on opening crates. “So how you gonna get me outta here?”

  The temptation was there. Some part of Cadmus Errol within him, with Telluraki sensibilities, told him that this “Pick” was more trouble alive than dead. Kezudkan’s estate generated its own steam and had a furnace large enough to power a village. He could dispose of the body and no one would be the wiser.

  “I’ll dummy up a collar for you, you’ll shave, and I’ll have the kitchen staff sneak you out when they go to the butcher’s in the morning.”

  “I ain’t shavin’,” Pick said. “I’m no shaver!”

  “Look at you. You call that gnarled mess a beard?” Erefan asked. “It’ll grow back, and maybe you can take proper care of it next time.”

  “What about my dynamite?” Pick asked, switching to a more practical topic.

  “Not on your life. Be thankful I’m letting you keep whatever coin you smuggled in.”

  Morning came, and with it, the promised visit from Kezudkan. Erefan had finished clearing out the remains of the shipping crates and the troublemaker Pick had been packed off to the market with Mifa. Erefan had little worry of her giving Pick away; humans just didn’t betray one another to the kuduks or the daruu.

  “This plan of yours is illegal, you know,” Kezudkan said. He browsed the equipment: copper wire by the mile-long spool, coolant tanks, welding gear, an entire crate filled with lodestone in individual boxes; the list went on and on. “I checked into it, and the General Spark Services Company has a statutory monopoly on spark production at the scale we’re talking.”

  “If anyone notices, tell them it’s for research,” Erefan said. He went back to carefully unpacking lodestone bricks. If any of the bricks got too close to one another, the sympathetic forces would bring them together with the force of a snapping rat trap, and the brittle material would shatter.

  “This is a hundred times more than any research exemption could cover,” Kezudkan protested. “They’d never accept that excuse.”
<
br />   “Apologize and pay the fine.”

  “Easy for you to say—spending my money!”

  Erefan stopped working. “Tell me something. You’re having money troubles, aren’t you?” Kezudkan sputtered for a moment, but could muster no response before Erefan continued. “Don’t deny it. I see it in your eyes. This is your gamble—to make a huge return in mining without having to open mines across the continent.”

  “Well, just think of it,” Kezudkan said. He seized the opportunity to wrest the conversation away from his finances. “Unexploited worlds out there, begging to be mined. We have but to look where we know ore was once buried in Korr.”

  “You’re that certain they will be identical?”

  “You’ve seen the little diagrams by the names,” Kezudkan said, waggling a finger. “I don’t think a book like that makes three worlds look identical by accident. We’ll mine Tellurak for all it’s worth, and if we haven’t died of age by then, we’ll move on to that one past it ... that ... that ...”

  “Veydrus,” Erefan said.

  “Yes. So no slacking about. Get the viewfinder up and functional again as soon as you can. I want to start browsing my new mines so I have the ideal spot picked by the time the gate is ready. I want to find the old gold vein that first brought settlers to these mountains. If that’s there in Tellurak, my money troubles will be long forgotten. I can just buy General Spark and be done with any concerns about power.”

  Gold in Tellurak ... dammit, Madlin’s heading into an invasion that I’m leading!