'I mean, yes,' a melt hand called Chainbura explained to the two dozen or so men who'd gathered from force of habit round the curing fire in the south corner of the yard, 'the whole idea's bloody ridiculous, just like you'd expect from a bunch of army blokes who wouldn't know hot metal if you poured it down the back of their trousers. So bloody what, so long as we get paid. And since it's not like we got any choice in the matter, I can't say as I can see what you buggers're cribbing about. Quit whining and let's get on with it, I say. I mean, it's got to be better than work.'
'Missing the point's what you're doing,' someone objected at the back, 'which is about right for you front-yard buggers. We aren't working for the government, we're working for the fucking army; and that's a completely different kettle of fish, you hear what I'm saying? Army's all bull and procedure and chits for every bloody thing you use and checks every five minutes to see if you're doing it right-and if they don't know bugger-all either, they just make it up as they go along, anything so's they can give you a bollocking. I was in the army nine years, I know all about it, and I'm telling you-'
Poldarn had tried to take an interest, just to be sociable, but he found he couldn't even muster a convincing pretence. One significant difference between the others and himself was that he'd actually seen a Morevich Thunder-pot in action, and the more he thought about it, the more convinced he became that the army's wild scheme might turn out to be feasible after all. The implications of that weren't appealing, given who was likely to be underneath the flying stones if ever they got launched in anger. Needless to say, this wasn't a concern he could share with anybody. Neither was the matter that occupied far more of his attention than the new project.
He hadn't had any dreams (that he could remember) since the one about the lecture, when he'd been staring at Xipho Dorunoxy when she wasn't looking. Probably just as well; there'd been enough solid material needing to be digested in that dream to last him a month. And the unavoidable conclusion, which he'd tried to dodge and fence away from but which kept coming back at him like two crows mobbing a hawk, was that Gain Aciava had been telling the truth, or a part of it, at any rate.
What about that?
Poldarn thought about it for a while, as the foundrymen argued the toss and grew steadily more angry with each other. In the end he came to the conclusion that it was like being chased by his own shadow; it could never actually catch him, but it'd never give up trying.
On the third day, Spenno the pattern-master came down from his loft like some ascetic prophet from a mountain top, with three days' stubble on his usually butter-soft chin, and a huge grin. He'd got it figured out, he announced; basically, it was the same as founding a bell, only At that point, somebody cleared his throat and invited Spenno to meet the armoury men.
There were four of them: a bearded man, very short, with arms as thick as an ordinary man's legs, and three long, thin clerks, spindly like unthinned trees in an unmanaged forest. The short man smiled, stepped forward on recognising his opposite number, and identified himself as Galand Dev, chief pattern-maker to the royal arsenal at Torcea. He'd been looking forward to meeting Spenno, he went on, because he'd heard a great deal about his innovative work in hinged cupola casting, and the initial designs he'd come up with depended heavily on the use of a cupola furnace. Spenno glared at him for a few long moments, then pretended he wasn't there; looked past him, and carried on with his announcement where he'd left off. He'd finally cracked it, he declared; basically the same as casting a bell, only 'Excuse me,' Galand Dev interrupted quietly (far more effective than shouting), 'but there seems to be some confusion here. I'm sorry, somebody should have told you. I'm in charge of the design work-'
Spenno stared at him, as though the short man had just materialised out of thin air. 'Who the fucking hell are you?' he asked politely.
'Galand Dev,' the short man repeated, in a soft, reasonable voice. 'Chief pattern-master at the Arsenal. I designed the tubes. And what I've been meaning to ask you is, do you think your local greensand has enough body to hold a simple wired core, or-'
'Piss off,' said Spenno.
One of the clerks tried to punch Spenno in the mouth. A huge foundryman by the name of Salyan grabbed the clerk's fist in mid-air and yanked his arm behind his back. With a mild sigh, the short man took a step forward, kicked Salyan in the groin so hard that the crack echoed off the barn roof, and finished the job with a short, horrible punch to the side of the head. Salyan rolled sideways and lay still. Nobody moved.
'He'll be all right,' the short man sighed. 'Now, please, if we could all get back to the job in hand. This greensand of yours-'
Poldarn left them to get on with it. He remembered that he had a little job of his own to finish, and chances were that once Spenno and the government man had sorted out their professional differences, there wouldn't be much spare time to waste on personal projects. He wandered across to the forge and got a fire in.
He'd left it about half done; the shape was more or less there, but so vague that only he could see it, because he knew what he was looking for. He forged in the bevels, trapping the inside edge of the flat tapered bar between the anvil's horn and the hammer; it was slow, patient work, only a few hard, careful hammer-blows each time before the steel had to go back in the fire and take on more heat. The profile and geometry of the bevels had to be perfect, since each hammer-fall squeezed a dab of orange steel up into the body of the work, subtly twisting and distorting the shape, which meant that for every strike he made on the edge, he needed four on the flat and the spine to maintain the lines he'd drawn in his mind. Every so often he had to spend a whole heat renewing the angle of the back curve, either hammering over the horn or fixing the work in the vice and twisting it with a long rod with a U-bend on the end. It took him the rest of the day to get the bevels done, and he decided to leave it at that. No point starting on the fullers and having to abandon the job part-way through. And he was still on the easy bit.
After what passed for dinner (the rains were still up on the road, though the level was perceptibly dropping, half an inch a day; fairly soon it'd reach the point where the drainage rhines began drawing again, the level would drop by a foot overnight and the food wagons from Tin Chirra could get through again) Poldarn drifted over to one of the watchfires to toast a slice of cheese onto a slab of stale grey bread. Nobody looked up as he joined the ring round the fire; theirs was a circle that could be broken into without risking bloodshed.
'That woman they got with them,' someone was saying, 'the crazy bitch who's into all that religious stuff. They reckon she's the worst of the lot.'
'Worse than the Mad Monk?' Someone on the other side of the circle wasn't convinced. 'Don't believe it. Women aren't like that.'
That amused someone else. 'You never met my old lady,' he said. General laughter. 'No, I mean it,' whoever it was went on. 'I remember one time-she'd been on the cider, mind, and I'd done something or other, never did find out what; anyhow, she got really mad at me, came and stood over me while I was eating my dinner, yelling and carrying on, scaring the kids to death. Well, I wasn't in the mood for a fight just then, I'd had a long day and you've got to feel right for a really good row, so I just got up and walked out, didn't say a word or anything. So what does she do? She follows me, still yelling her daft head off; so I go through the house into the barn, and she comes after me, still yelling and screaming, not getting the point at all-but they're like that, aren't they? So I push on through the barn to the outhouse, nip in, shut the door and put the latch across. She's hammering on the door, I'm shouting at her, fuck off, you stupid cow, I'm having a piss-which was true, as it happens. And next thing I know, she's fetched the axe out of the barn and she's smashing up the outhouse door-and I'm in there, for crying out loud, and I can see the axe blade coming in through the wood. Scared? I'm telling you, I was in the right place, or else I'd have pissed myself. If she hadn't swung wild with the axe and bust the head off the shaft, Poldarn only knows what'd have happened. Anyhow, she went inside, I waited till I thought it was safe and buggered off over the hill into town. Three days before I reckoned it was all right to come home, and then only because she sent the boy over to say that maybe she'd gone a bit too far. A bit too far-those were the exact words. Women? I promise you, when they lose it, they really lose it bad. And I guess this Dorun-whatsemame's like that, only she hasn't calmed down yet.'