“If we had windows and that furnace,” suggested Siret, with a shiver, “that would help, too.”
Nylan glanced at her, and she looked away.
“You’ll warm up a lot before long,” added Berlis.
The silver-haired Siret flushed.
Nylan felt sorry for the pregnant marine and added, “I’m working on the furnace … as soon as we have more bricks.” Gingerly, he used his fingers to take several strips of the fried rodent, and two slices of bread. There was no cheese, but there was a grass basket filled with green berries. He tried one, and his mouth puckered.
“Those green berries are real tart, ser,” said Berlis, glancing at Siret.
Siret flushed, but said quietly, “It might have been better if that arrow had been centered between both thighs. It would have fit right there.”
“Enough,” said Ryba, but Siret was already walking pastthe end of the table with no intention of returning. The marshal turned her eyes to Berlis. “Comments like that could get you killed.”
“Yes, ser.” Berlis’s voice was dull, resigned.
Nylan ate more of the green berries and the fried rodent strips without comment. The bread was good, and he finished both slices down to the crumbs.
“What are you planning today?” Ryba asked.
“I’ll try to squeeze in two more blades before I go back to the bathhouse. What about you?”
“Trying to put up a more permanent fence for the sheep. They got into the beans last night.”
“I’d rather have mutton anyway,” came a low voice from down the table.
“I would, too,” admitted Ryba, “but we need both.”
Those left at the table laughed, and Ryba took some more rodent strips. So did Nylan. Before he had finished eating, Ryba stood and touched his arm. “I’ll see you later.”
His mouth full, Nylan nodded.
After he gulped down the rest of his breakfast, he walked out the causeway and down to the “washing area” of the stream. In the shade of the low scrub by the water were a few small ice fragments, which reminded the engineer that the bathhouse would soon become a necessity, not a luxury. He took a deep breath, and then an even deeper one when he splashed the icy water across his face. The sand helped get the grease off his hands, but he wished they had soap, real soap.
“Along with everything else.” Nylan snorted and mumbled to himself. He tried to ignore the basic question that the soap raised. How could he or Ryba turn Westwind into an economically functioning community?
Because the south yard had become the meeting place, training yard, and thoroughfare, Nylan carted the laser equipment out to the cleared space beside the bathhouse structure on the north side of the tower.
After he checked the power levels and connected the cables, Nylan looked from the laser powerhead to the endurasteelbraces, then at the half-finished north wall of the bathhouse. Huldran was mixing mortar, while Cessya and Weblya were carrying building stones.
He lowered the goggles, pulled on the gauntlets, and flicked the power switches. Huldran had finished mixing the mortar and had begun to set the higher stones in the north wall by the time Nylan had finished the rough shaping of the blade.
He cut off the power, pushed back the goggles, and sat down on the low sills of the unfinished east wall of the bathhouse. Working with the laser was as exhausting as lugging stones. While his mind understood that, it still felt strange. Then again, the whole planet was strange.
After he felt less drained, he stood and walked around the bathhouse and uphill to the spring where he filled the plastic cup that would probably wear out even before he did. He sipped the water, too cold to drink in large swallows, until he had emptied the cup. Then he refilled it and walked back down and checked the firin cells.
“How many more blades will you do, ser?” asked Huldran.
“I don’t know. There are enough braces for another dozen, but whether the laser will last that long is another question.”
“Do we have enough stone?”
“Probably not. This afternoon, I’ll cut some more. We may have to finish this with bricks. I asked Rienadre to create some molds for bigger ones, closer to the size of the stones.”
“That’s good, but I’d rather have stone.”
“So would I, but we’re lucky we’ve gotten this far.”
“I’d not call it luck, ser.” Huldran flashed a brief smile.
“Perhaps not,” said Nylan, thinking of the nine individual cairns overlooking the cliff. He lowered the goggles and triggered the power, beginning the final shaping of the blade.
When he looked up after slipping the blade into the quench trough, Huldran had finished the north wall and was beginning on the east wall. He removed the blade and set it on the wall to finish cooling.
Clang! Clang!
“Bandits!”
A half-dozen horses clattered over the ridge and down toward the tower. The riders had their blades out as they headed for the tower. Behind them, Nylan could see two marines following on foot.
Crack! Crack! The two shots from one of the rifles-presumably from the lookout at the tower’s northern window on the upper level-resulted in one horseman dropping a blade and clutching his arm. He swung his mount around and back uphill, but the others galloped toward the tower, directly at Nylan.
The engineer groped for the blade that wasn’t at his side. Then, with a deep breath, he flicked the power switches on the firin cells back on, and dropped the goggles over his eyes.
“It ought to work …” he muttered.
As the power came up, he forced himself to concentrate, trying to extend the beam focal point through what he thought of as the local net, creating a needle-edged lightknife.
“Get the mage! There!”
The remaining five riders turned toward Nylan. The ground vibrated underfoot as they pounded downhill.
A field of reddish-white surrounded the focal tip of the weapon as Nylan, more with his senses than his hands, slewed the lightblade across the neck of the leading rider, then the second.
Nylan staggered, as his eyes blurred, with the white backlash of death, and his head throbbed. He just stood, stockstill, trying to gather himself together, to see somehow, through the knives of pain that were his eyes.
Another set of hooves clattered across the hard ground, these coming from the south side of the tower. As the second rider finally went down, Istril and Ryba rode past the tower, their blades out.
Ryba’s throwing blade flew, and the third rider-his mouth open in surprise-collapsed across his mount’s neck. The horse reared, throwing the body half-clear, and draggingthe rider by the one foot that jammed in the left stirrup all the way to the edge of the upper field before the horse finally stopped.
Crack! Crack!
The fourth horse staggered and fell, but the rider vaulted free and ran toward Nylan, his blade raised, and his free hand reaching for the shorter knife at his belt.
The engineer swung the laser toward the attacker, readjusting the focal length with his senses, fighting against his own headache and the knives in his eyes. The white-red fire blazed, and the flame bored through the man. The corpse pitched forward, and the blade clattered on the stones less than a body length from Nylan’s feet. Nylan went down to his knees, and stayed there, flicking off the energy flow to the powerhead as he swayed under the impact of another death, yet worrying that he had not cut the power earlier. They had so little left and so much to do.
The single remaining raider ducked under Istril’s slash, started to counter, and looked at the stump of his forearm as Ryba’s second blade flashed downward.
“Yield!” demanded the marshal, her eyes cold as the ice on Freyja.
The redheaded man, his hair a mahogany, rather than the fire-red of Ayrlyn or Fierral, clutched at his stump without speaking.