"It's good enough for some," the brunette replied through sharp teeth. "Once they adapt to certain realities."
All the women nodded in agreement. Haddad looked at them. All were in good health and on the backside of thirty, and all of them exuded confidence and power. Any of them should have appealed to his senses, but he felt numbed by their presence.
"What realities are we speaking of?" he asked. The response was stunning.
"The hardest for some is giving up their children. Even though they know the babies will receive good care, some can't overcome their feelings. No matter how firmly one tries, some breeders won't adjust," the muscular blonde explained. Haddad wondered what sort of people considered loss of a child something to ignore.
"One woman from down south, who shares your coloring," the brunette interjected, "wouldn't stop crying after her first child went into the nursery. Even though there was a good chance that it might become a war leader."
"And at least hers didn't die like so many others have done of late," the slender blonde added. Something about this comment set the others staring at her. Haddad now saw the women as they saw themselves, hard and indifferent. They had closed off their empathy and been rewarded with positions of authority inside the cradle house. Haddad heard the Keldon women returning, and he withdrew as the others stood. He went to his room to consider what he had learned.
That night he wrote notes regarding all his experiences and what he had observed. He dared not keep it in his room and decided that he would hide it somewhere in Latulla's workshop where it was unlikely to be discovered. He blew out the candle and went to sleep.
Haddad dreamed. He was inside the walls of the cradle house, and instead of buildings, there was only a small basket in the middle of the yard. The women he had met stood at either side, and a long line of new mothers stretched out into the distance. As the line moved forward, each baby was ripped away and thrown down into the wicker container. As each child disappeared, the basket swelled and grew until the women were throwing children high into the air. Each was gulped down, and then something broke out of the cradle house and fell upon every living thing.
Dawn woke Haddad, and he rose from bed with a will. He stuffed the papers that he worked on the night before into his wallet. Best to get to the workshop as early as possible and let Iola find him toiling away like a good little slave. This time he thought to stop by the kitchen after freshening up.
The baker and her assistants were just putting out the bread from the pre-dawn baking, and Haddad snared a loaf. He ignored the baker's indignant utterance and snatched a sack of ale that he spotted lying unattended. He stepped outside into the crisp air. Despite a touch of frost, Haddad found he was warm in the clothes he had selected from his gear. If the workshop was too cold, he would check the small stove to see if he could start a fire. He remembered that a load of wood was stacked to the side. The door opened easily to the workshop, and he locked it behind him.
Hours passed as he worked on the parts for the steel ant. Perhaps by cannibalizing several machines he would be able to create a fighter for himself. He certainly would trust the loyalty of a mechanical construct over the other house slaves. Haddad remembered the advice two nameless men had provided him. Seek to escape and trust no one.
He lost himself in sorting through a box of gears, looking for a replacement he could use in a leg assembly. The day passed quickly with no interruptions. Haddad considered the assembly project against the parts he had available. He could finish it if only he had enough time. The most difficult part would be closing and filling the modular sections that were picked apart. The League machine was near perfect in its performance, but it depended on the high quality control of the sealed modules. A steel ant might go months without maintenance, barring battle damage. If he could contrive some plan of escape, the ant might be the key. In addition, just completing the repair would boost his confidence in a time when he needed some small victory. He wasn't even sure where Keld was, much less how he would get home. Finding the information he needed would take time.
He grew increasingly drowsy as he tried to plan his escape. Who could he talk to? How to keep from raising suspicions? Who to bribe and how? All questions that needed to be answered and soon.
He rested his head against his arm, the metal armband cool and soothing against his skin. When he awoke it was growing dark. He didn't know how he could have dozed off. Perhaps the ale he had drunk was far stronger than he realized. He thought no one had checked up on him the night before, but he couldn't be sure. It was possible that he had already missed the bed check or closing of the house doors. He needed to get back to his room. He reached into his wallet for the shop key and found the notes he had written still inside. Carrying them back to the house seemed incredibly foolhardy to him now. He needed a place to hide them, but while he had identified which cabinets and tool chests saw frequent use, there was no guarantee if he hid the papers in one seldom used they might not be discovered.
He needed a hiding place where no one would look. Haddad fell to the floor looking for a loose board, a crack under a table, anyplace to hide the incriminating words. He was back among strange tools and books he could not read when he found what he was looking for. His hand brushed a board, and it rocked. He gripped it, and to his surprise, it lifted completely free. The gap it left was approximately six inches by eighteen inches. Haddad wondered what purpose the cutout had served. The pattern of rust and signs of brackets told Haddad that a tank had been removed in the past. The cutout must have allowed hoses to carry liquid up and down from the floor below.
On his knees, he peered through the hole. There was a small ledge along the wall, but it was almost impossible to see anything in the floor below. Haddad thought a moment then walked to his tool kit. Yes, there were several metallic mirrors for examining inside war machines. He selected the largest and maneuvered it, scanning the space below. The second floor was reinforced with extra large beams. There was a gap between a beam and the floor plank right by the cutout. The removal of the tank had allowed the flooring to rise. Haddad could just shove the papers into the gap. Let someone try to find them now, he thought.
It was the creak of an opening door that made him freeze. He could not conceive of a more suspicious situation to be caught in. He breathed a sigh of relief as he realized the noise was coming from the first story. He heard the sound of rustling fabric.
"Make sure that the curtains completely seal the windows," whispered a voice. Haddad could make out light footfalls as someone complied.
"They are all closed, Erissa." The voice was the high piping of a child, and Haddad wondered what was going on. He was sure that it would be suicidal to call down and ask. A candle was lit, and Erissa and a young Keldon boy were revealed in the mirror. A cloak covered the woman, and she leaned against a crate as the boy hurried through the room, closing shutters and pulling curtains. His figure went in and out of Haddad's field of view as the League technician remained frozen, staring in the mirror.
"Now Greel," Erissa said, "let us talk of your journey south to Jamuraa." The child seemed petulant as he kicked at the floor with his heel. He appeared a sturdy boy of eight in well-made clothes.
Perhaps he's family, Haddad thought. I wonder why they are talking here?