Intrigues (56 page)

"A lot of good that does me here," Kail muttered, but it was still an effort not to show his embarrassment. The women among them
did
seem to pay him a lot of attention, but even if privacy had been available he couldn't imagine himself returning the interest. Most of the women were older than he, and even those that weren't reminded him too much of his mother. Kail's mother had always had enough charm for three women, and too often had expended it on men other than his father.

Renton chuckled as they moved outside and joined the lines of people waiting for their turn at the facilities. Everyone knew it wasn't possible to dawdle and waste time, but standing on line in the morning made you forget that. It might be a good idea if they were awakened in shifts, Kail decided, and he would have to find a chance to suggest that to the Astindans. They seemed to have as little experience in handling prisoners as Kail and the others had with being that thing.

By the time everyone had used the facilities and had washed a bit before getting into the very plain clothing they'd been given the day before, their breakfast was ready. A thick cereal grain had been prepared along with slabs of bread and butter and gallons of tea, and there was even honey available for those who liked their cereal sweetened.

Some of the older prisoners had been given the job of preparing the food and then handing it out, and Kail couldn't help feeling a bit of grim amusement as he accepted his portions. He couldn't remember the name of the man serving him, but the former noble had been one of Kail's father's cronies. Fury filled the man's eyes as he was forced to perform such menial work, and for his social inferiors at that. As far as Kail was concerned, there were few better people it could have happened to.

"I believe I'm actually beginning to enjoy myself here," Renton murmured as they left the food line to find some place to sit and eat. "That man you were glaring at once turned me down for a position in the government that my father wanted me to take. I struck him as being much too common for a noble, and he suggested that I consider manual labor in place of a position of importance."

"He never lowered himself to the point of actually speaking to
me
," Kail responded with a satisfied smile. "I was always much too unimportant for him to notice. I wonder if we'll come across our fathers at some time in the same way. I can't decide if I like the idea or not."

"Yes, I understand what you mean," Renton said as they claimed a bit of grass among the rest of their shedmates. "I would love to see my father's comedown in life, but some part of me is convinced that if I did I would pay dearly for the sight. I doubt if I'll ever get over being terrified of the man."

Kail gave most of his attention to the breakfast he'd been waiting to dig into, but part of his mind insisted on repeating over and over what Renton had said.
Terrified of the man, terrified of the man
, echoed and rang in his head until Kail had to face the idea squarely. Yes, it would be fair to say that he, too, had been terrified of his father, and it was perfectly possible that nothing had changed.

But it was also possible that a lot had changed. Kail took a bite of his bread, savoring the taste of butter after much too long a time without it, and chewed over his thoughts as he chewed the bread. Kail hadn't been sure if it was his father's personality that had cowed him, or the man's power and position. Kail's future and his very life had been at the mercy of the man, but that was no longer true.

"I think I
am
getting over being terrified of the man," Kail said to Renton after a long moment. "I may be a prisoner here in Astinda, but I'm less of a prisoner than I was at home. What happens to me depends on
me
, not on the whim of a man who was never denied anything he ever wanted. I wouldn't have believed it was possible, but I'm beginning to think that being taken captive might be the luckiest thing to ever happen to me."

"I'll reserve opinion on that until we see what we're expected to do," Renton answered after swallowing some of his own bread. "But as far as being less of a prisoner is concerned, I really do have to agree. I may be forced to obey orders here, but our captors don't also make me feel like a total inferior and failure."

And that was the major difference, Kail thought as he continued to eat. Not being made to feel like a failure. It might be worth what had happened to them, but as Renton said, that remained to be seen. They still didn't know what would be expected of them as a day's work…

But once everyone was through eating, they found out. The group Kail and Renton were a part of was called together by two Astindan men, and as was becoming usual, the older man spoke.

"You people here will work with the others sent out, but not precisely in the same way," the man informed them. "The contaminants must be removed from the soil before it can be made viable again, and much of that labor will be done by hand. You will each be assigned a group of people to do that labor, and when necessary you will join their efforts. At all other times you will coordinate and supervise their efforts, making the most efficient use of your resources and time. Does anyone have a question about what I've said so far?"

Kail's brows had risen and he wasn't alone in that reaction, but he had no questions. Nor, it seemed, did anyone else in the group.

"Good," the Astindan said after looking around. "You'll now be taken to where you'll work, and more detailed assignments will be given out there. Everyone in your groups should be making the same effort, but there may be one or two who don't. If you happen to find one of that sort in your group, you aren't to permit them to continue with slacking off. If you aren't able to administer discipline yourself, you're to ask an overseer to do it for you. Now you may follow my associate."

His associate was the younger man, who lost no time in turning and heading for a large, open wagon. Kail and the others all followed and climbed into the wagon, and once they were moving Kail turned to Renton.

"Ren, how would it be possible for anyone to slack off?" Kail asked, surprised that the possibility had been mentioned. "We've all been given the same orders about obeying, haven't we?"

"Yes, but different talents react to those orders in different ways," Renton answered in a murmur. "I, for instance, have Spirit magic, and I have to admit that I've found I needn't obey
everything
I'm told to do with the same single-mindedness you others are showing. Do you hate me terribly for that?"

"I'll think about it and let you know," Kail responded with a faint smile. "In the meanwhile, continue to be smart and don't tell anyone else. They might not have to think about what their reaction should be."

Renton nodded his agreement, and they lapsed into silence. After a moment's reflection, Kail discovered that he was glad not to have Ren's resistance to the orders. If he'd had a choice about obeying, he might well have gotten himself into trouble rather than into a supervisory position. A supervisory position. Kail smiled at the thought of that for the rest of the ride. What a really bizarre joke…

Once they reached the area where they would work, Kail discovered that there was nothing left to smile about. The day was cool but should have been a fairly pretty one, and would have been if not for the decimated landscape. The barren soil had obviously been poisoned, and what trees still stood looked like they were about to fall over. Some of the land had simply been burned, but the rest…

"All right, form a group, please," the younger Astindan they'd followed to the wagon said. He now stood at the wagon's tailgate, after having ridden to the area with the wagon's driver. Everyone left the wagon without delay, and once they all stood on the ground the young man led them toward the place where a large number of other people waited.

"There will be twenty workers for each of you to supervise," the young man said to the group in general without turning to look at them. "Each group will be responsible for clearing a set amount of ground, and your people will continue to work until their part of the job is done. If you allow your people to falter, you could still be here working after everyone else has gone back to the barracks. Don't forget to rotate workers for the harder jobs, so as not to wear out certain people while the others are left untroubled. After your workers are assigned to you, take them over to where you'll be issued tools and such."

The young man gestured to a place beyond the large group of waiting people, then turned to point at one of
their
group. The man pointed to stepped forward, and twenty people were counted out from the larger group. None of the twenty looked very happy, but they still produced nothing of an argument as they followed the man who would supervise them.

It soon became Kail's turn to have a work force picked out for him. After the twentieth had joined the rest, Kail led the way to the spot where shovels and rakes and wheelbarrows were being given out. Strong Earth magic users might have been able to do the job with less work, but strong Earth magic users were busy elsewhere.

"How does it feel to betray your own kind?" a voice asked from beside Kail once they'd left the Astindan behind. "You must be really proud of yourself."

The woman who had spoken showed a definite sneer mixed in with the haughtiness that hadn't yet left her. She wasn't a very young woman, but neither was she terribly old.

"Betray my own kind?" Kail echoed with a snort of ridicule. "You've got to be kidding. My former 'own kind' specialized in betrayal, turning it into what they considered a fine art. That's probably why you mistook this situation for betrayal, because that's all you know about. I'm following orders just like everyone else around here, and pretending to be disappointed in me won't buy you a thing. My father has the exclusive license for being disappointed in me."

The woman sniffed her dismissal as she looked away, but Kail recognized defeat when he saw it. She couldn't make him consume himself with guilt and she couldn't force him to defer to her, so she turned her back on the confrontation she'd started to keep people from noticing she'd lost. A glance at the rest of his group showed Kail that she was fooling no one but herself with the tactic. The others were too miserably unhappy to be fooled.

Four of Kail's people were given wheelbarrows, and of the remaining sixteen, eight were given shovels and eight rakes. An Astindan then pointed out a large pile of wooden crates as the place where the loaded wheelbarrows were to be emptied. After that another Astindan showed them where they were going to work, and they were left alone. Their assigned area looked to be a mile square from where Kail stood, and probably looked even larger to the people of his group.

Kail established four smaller units of two people with shovels, two with rakes, and one with a wheelbarrow. He then took his units out to the farthest reach of their assigned territory, and started them working there. It made sense to have the wheelbarrows travel the longest distance while the people behind them were freshest, but no one seemed to appreciate the consideration. They muttered when he set them to digging and raking, and most of them looked scandalized.

The day wore on very slowly. Kail started out regretting that he hadn't taken a shovel for himself, but it became more and more obvious that he wouldn't have had the chance to use a shovel or any other tool. He had to move constantly from unit to unit, keeping his workers from taking endless rest breaks, from going through the motions without accomplishing anything, from bickering among themselves. They did have to obey his orders just as they all had to obey the Astindans, but they been left a lot of latitude in
how
they obeyed.

After the first hour, Kail had the shovel people and the rake people swap tools, and the worker who had given him the least amount of trouble was appointed to the wheelbarrow. The former nobles hated the idea of actually extending themselves, but the lure of being assigned to the wheelbarrow was too great. A number of the workers decided that
they
wanted the chance to stand around while everyone else worked, so a bit more got done during the second hour.

They were only a few minutes into the third hour when Kail saw someone approaching. It was a woman pushing a small cart of some kind, and when she finally reached Kail she wiped at the sweat on her brow with one forearm.

"Water delivery," she announced to Kail in a tone that sounded downright merry. "Would you rather have everyone come here to the barrel, or would you like me to push it from work group to work group?"

"Why don't you take it to the first group on the left," Kail suggested with a smile he couldn't hold back on. "After they take their drinks, the wheelbarrow person can push the cart to the next group over, and so on until everyone has had a drink. That way you can have a minute or two to rest."

"I accept your offer with thanks," the woman said with an answering smile. "I'll be right back."

She pushed the cart to the first group on the left, and while they were busy getting themselves drinks she walked back to Kail.

"You're the first supervisor so far today to let his workers drink first," the woman informed him with what looked like approval. "I'm glad to see there's
someone
around capable of caring."

"It was one of my most terrible failings back in the city I come from," Kail answered, finding the woman incredibly attractive. She wore the same cheap clothing they all did and looked hot and sweaty, but there was something about her… "And I'm equally as glad to see that there's at least one citizen of Astinda who knows how to smile. I'll grant there isn't much to smile
about
, but people should keep in practice so they don't forget how to perform the act."

"But I'm not an Astindan," the woman returned, now looking surprised. "I'm from Gan Garee just like everyone else, but I think of myself as having been freed rather than captured. My husband was an absolute beast, and when he said something about taking my son away from me so that I'd have nothing to distract my attention from
him
, I tried to run away. My own parents betrayed where I was, and his people had caught me and were taking me back when the Astindans started to round everyone up. They saved both
my
life and my son's, and I'm happy to do whatever I can to repay the debt."