Sword of the Bright Lady (46 page)

“Last? I already told you the bottles are at least a hundred years old.”

“You mean,” Christopher said with amazement, “they were pumping water for all that time?”

“Yes,” Svengusta said. “The fountains of the Cathedral. Bathed in colored lights, they were a beautiful sight. And now they are stilled. The Saint favors your cause. He signals to the city that no beauty can thrive when unjust war rages.”

“Or more likely, he feels guilty.” Rana glared at them, having been summoned by the commotion. “He rewards you for surviving his unintentional war. Note that he does not send any pretty presents to me, seeking my pardon for the uproar he has caused in my town.”

Before Christopher could utter his usual apology, she spoke again.

“You must learn more caution, Pater. Not all magical devices are so benign.”

Then she was gone, in an imperial splashing.

Dereth was not overly impressed with the results of the new blast furnace.

“A Master could make better steel,” he said.

“It's not supposed to be better,” Christopher answered, “just cheaper.”

And it was, which was why they now had sixty feet of heavy steel pipe standing up in the air, supported by scaffolding that cast the new buildings going up around the Old Bog in an industrial light. Christopher sent an apprentice scrambling up the side and coached him through the pronunciation of the command word for the bronze bottle's screwed-on top.

The pipe rumbled under the pressure of the geyser. Then the falling water hit the wheel attached to the bottom, and Christopher's new lathe began to spin like a demon.

After a brief moment of shock, the assembled smiths broke into spontaneous applause for Jhom, who stood with his hands behind his back and tried to look modest, but failed.

“You did well, Journeyman,” Christopher said. “Very well. Here you go.” He handed the smith a sheaf of papers.

“Is this my reward?” the young smith asked, but then became enraptured in the drawings.

“No, it's the next one. It's an inverted lathe, called a mill. And these things, these are ball bearings. The first set you make goes on the lathe.” The squealing of the axle was already driving him nuts. “You'll need the lathe to make them, though.”

“But Pater, you own the lathe.”

Christopher put his hand on the younger man's shoulder.

“I will pay you like a Senior and treat you like an equal. You'll hire and manage at least a dozen other men. Will you take the job?”

“My father needs me,” Jhom said. “I cannot abandon him.”

Christopher took a deep breath. “Your father is one of the smiths I want you to hire. Along with every man in his shop.”

Jhom was dumbfounded. “You would buy my father's shop and give it to me?”

“I can't afford to buy it. I don't have that much cash. But if you convince him to join our operations, I'll give him a share of the profits. And you, too.”

Jhom got right to the point. “How big of a share?”

Christopher didn't care about the money; he just needed the men. “An equal share. Me, you, Dereth, your father, and Palek. All equal shares.”

“That is a mighty shop you assemble,” Jhom said, stars in his eyes.

“And you can run it for me. All you have to do is convince them to join it. I'll pay everybody standard guild rates. They'll have to work for another man, but then, most of them already do. And they'll get paid regular and only work eight days a week, ten hours a day, with an hour off for lunch.”

Christopher's conscience would not allow him to faithfully re-create the dawn of the industrial age. It remained to be seen if it was possible to build a commercial empire without savage exploitation.

“Can you make it happen?” he asked the young man.

“They are proud,” Jhom said dubiously.

“They are idle,” Christopher said. “I'll let you in on a little secret: when the draft contracts are finally released, they'll
all
go to one shop.”

Jhom was properly scandalized.

“They'll kill you, Pater.”

Christopher winked. “They're nowhere near as mean as Bart, and he didn't kill me.”

Jhom laughed. Christopher's final victory over Bart had made him the local hero. The townspeople's attitude was more in line with that of Karl and Gregor than with official Church doctrine.

“I will do my best,” Jhom told him, “but I might not have much clout until you award the contracts. The bird in the bush always looks tastier than the one in your hand.”

“As long as you get the lathe running. We'll need those ball bearings.” Ball bearings were one of those things you took for granted, until you didn't have any.

His new popularity paid off in more ways than one. Fae told him that people kept asking her if they could buy more bonds.

“Why won't you sell as many as you can?” she wanted to know.

“We want to keep demand up,” he told her. “If we flood the market, we'll have trouble selling them. They're only worth anything because there aren't very many of them.” He could see she was struggling with the concept, but it looked like a fair fight.

Lalania, back again from one of her many jaunts and sharing dinner with them all in his chapel, confirmed the wisdom of his restraint. His bonds were trading at face value. Although they couldn't be redeemed for another ten years, people were accepting them in lieu of a gold piece.

“And now what will you do?” she asked intently.

“Spend it. Unless you tell me we can issue more bonds without collapsing the market.”

“What makes you think I support this scheme?”

“I offered to put you on the payroll. Do you want a cut instead?”

The girl was getting angry. Christopher was a little mystified until Gregor sighed in the background, and suddenly it came to him in an epiphany.

“You've been spying on me. You left Gregor here to watch me.”

“Now what makes you think that?” Lalania asked, impossibly innocent.

“Who are you spying for? Your College? The Saint? Tell me, dammit.” He didn't care that she was spying; he just wanted to know who his enemies were.

“Myself.” She glared at him. “I undertook to protect the common folk of my own accord. Does this surprise you?”

Now he was back to being mystified. “Protect them from whom?”

“From you,” she snapped. “Look at you. You live like a lord with chapels and armies, and yet last year you did not even
exist
. How should I not be suspicious?”

“Like a lord?” He looked down at the chicken leg he'd been stripping with his teeth.

“It's true, Lala,” Gregor said gently. “The Pater eats from the same pot we do. His money does not buy him luxuries. Nor does he revel in the command of others. If anything, he shirks it.”

Well, of course he did. Telling other people what to do was a lot of work. He had better things to do with his time, like figure out how to increase iron production. He wanted to start selling efficient Franklin stoves before the cold returned.

“Tell me where you came from,” she demanded, point-blank.

“A distant land. Where things are done differently,” he fired back. “Do you disapprove of my changes?”

“You take their gold and give them paper. You take their shops and give them work. You take their hopes and give them dreams,” she said menacingly. “They believe in you, Pater. They believe you will arm them with your sky-fire magic and overthrow the Dark. They can live without money or shops, but they cannot live without hope. If you steal their dreams, I will find a way to kill you, your luck be damned.”

“If I fail their dreams,” he answered, “you won't have to, because I'll be dead. They're my dreams too, you know.”

“Pass the butter, please,” Svengusta said.

“I see your mark,” Lalania snapped at the old man, tears in her eyes. “Your Saint has declared for him, so who am I to question? What matter is the opinion of a foolish young troubadour?”

“I keep trying to pay for your opinions,” Christopher said, “so obviously they matter to me.”

“I just want the butter,” Svengusta protested. “I don't need to argue the Pater's case. If you'd stick around long enough, you'd see for yourself. Like your man has.”

Gregor hung his head in silence. Apparently Christopher had won the man over, passed his tests, without even knowing it.

“I'll argue it then,” Karl said. “Who are you to question the Saint? He carries twenty thousand on his shoulders. If he thinks the Pater can ease that burden, who are you to object?”

“Peace,” Helga said, “there'll be no more politics at the dinner table.”

“Lalania, what can I do to prove myself to you?” Christopher said earnestly. “Ask me any test. Let me show you what I've spent the money on. Heck, you can go over my books. In fact, could you go over my books for me? I don't want to make Fae feel slighted, but I'd sleep a lot better at night if I had an independent audit once in a while.”

“Tell me where you are from,” she said, but instinct made her cloak this dangerous repetition, and she spoke in Celestial. Christopher was impressed, again, with her staggering array of skills. One of which was keeping secrets. The mere knowledge that she wanted the answer to this particular question above all else would naturally draw undue attention to the question.

“Anything but that,” he said sadly, in the same beautiful language. Krellyan had told him not to reveal his origin, and nothing that had transpired since that first day had given him any reason to doubt the Saint's wisdom. “But I promise you this, someday I will tell you. When the Saint gives me leave to, then I will tell you.” A promise made in Celestial felt terribly binding, like he'd just sworn on his mother's grave.

“Pass the butter, please,” Svengusta said in the same musical language. It sounded rather silly in that holy tongue. But he made his point. They were not the only two in the world who could speak it.

“I'm sorry,” Lalania said to the table, in the common tongue. “That was rude of me.”

“I don't mind,” Helga said. “I've always loved the sounds. Pater used to sing to me, when I first came here and could not sleep.”

“You should hear how he sings to the widows in town,” Karl smirked.

Helga blushed, Gregor chuckled appreciatively, and Lalania rolled her eyes.

Svengusta put his hands up in defeat. “What in blazes does a man have to do around here to get the butter?”

The first day of summer crept toward them. Christopher was busy, riding into Knockford most every day of the week. He couldn't believe he had an hour commute, but that was the price of living in the suburbs. Royal needed the exercise anyway.

Building the new machinery went a lot faster with the lathe. Jhom had it running full-time, using his father's men. Technically, everybody still worked for Jurgen, but the lure of machine tools was stronger than family loyalty. Christopher could see the men getting into the habit of walking to his shop every morning. Any day now, Jhom was going to make his move. It would have to be soon. The tension was becoming ugly.