“I did not do it because I cared about you. You are nothing,” Alain said impassively.
It did not take a Mage to see the resentment that statement aroused in the Mechanic. “Thanks.”
“I do not understand.”
“I’m being sarcastic, Mage. What’s your name?”
Alain eyed her, trying to guess why the Mechanic had asked for that information.
“If we’re going to depend on each other to live I deserve that much,” the Mechanic insisted. “And I need to know what to call you besides ‘Mage.’ ”
His elders would be angry if they knew he was even talking to a Mechanic. They would be angrier yet if they knew he had accompanied her this far. Even though the elders, like all Mages, were supposed to feel no emotions, every acolyte learned to fear the anger the elders would never admit to.
Many of those elders had also made clear their belief that he did not deserve to be made a Mage so young, despite his ability to pass the tests.
And the elders had sent him here, alone, as if wishing for him to fail.
The defiance he had kept carefully buried in recent years rose close enough to the surface to bring the words to Alain’s lips. “I am Mage Alain of Ihris.”
“Mage Alain of Ihris.” The Mechanic studied him for a moment, her nervousness fading a bit as she examined him. Now, resting close to each other, he could see clearly how young she was. “Ihris is a long ways north of here. I’m Master Mechanic Mari of Caer Lyn.”
“Caer Lyn.” Islands, to the west of the Empire. “That is also north of here.”
“Not nearly as far as Ihris.” She closed her eyes, breathing deeply. “We need to keep moving, but I think we should rest a little longer. Climbing in this heat is very tough and we’ll kill ourselves if we push it too hard.” After he said nothing, the Mechanic opened her eyes to glare at him. “Well?”
“What?” Did all Mechanics act in such strange ways?
“I expressed an opinion. What is your opinion?”
“It does not matter.”
Her expression changed from disbelief to anger to resignation so quickly that he barely had time to recognize each emotion. “Fine. I’m in charge, then. Why does everybody always want me to be in charge? Have you ever been in anything like this situation before?”
“No. This is my first contract.”
She frowned this time. “Mine, too. What’s such a young, inexperienced Mage during out here by himself?”
He knew no Mechanic would catch any bitterness leaking through his control of his voice as he answered. “My Guild has declared me a Mage, but being inexperienced, my price is less than that of older Mages. The caravan could not afford more.”
“If you’re so inexperienced, they should not have sent you out alone to face this kind of danger!” Strangely, the Mechanic’s anger now seemed aimed at his own Guild’s elders.
“The commands of the elders are not to be questioned.”
What did her expression mean now? But her brief gasp of laughter did not sound like she was happy. “I never expected to hear something that made your Guild sound like my Guild.”
This talk was treading onto dangerous ground. Guild secrets. If there were another Mage here…
If there were another Mage here, he would never have spoken to this Mechanic. He would not have gone with her. He would never have known anything about her or any other Mechanic.
If Mechanics were enemies as he had always been told, then he had a duty to learn more about them. And perhaps he would learn that this Mechanic, at least, was not an enemy. She did not act like an enemy. But she was not a Mage. What was she then? “Why are you here alone, young, inexperienced Mechanic?”
She flushed slightly at the question. “I wish I knew all of the answers to that. I asked for some of those answers, but Senior Mechanics aren’t in the habit of giving explanations when they issue orders. The short answer is that I have some unique skills that Ringhmon needs.” Her voice held undeniable pride as she spoke that last sentence.
Alain almost frowned, too, barely catching himself in time. If everything the Mechanics did was a trick, why import this girl when more experienced tricksters surely lived in Ringhmon? How could she have unique skills? But it was obvious now that what he had been told about Mechanics, or their weapons at least, was at best incomplete. “Are these unique skills of yours the reason why the bandits seek you?”
“No. No, that’s impossible. They’d have no possible use for my skills, unless they were thinking of ransom,” she said. “But kidnapping a Mechanic? The Guild would never stand for it.”
“The attackers had many of the weapons made by your Guild,“ Alain pointed out.
“Yeah.” The Mechanic’s lips twisted, her feelings once again hard to read. “A bandit gang with as much firepower as an army could afford.”
Twelve years of Mage Guild training had never been able to suppress Alain’s curiosity. “Why would your Guild elders permit that?”
“I told you that my…elders…don’t provide reasons for what they do. They don’t listen and they don’t explain.” Her feelings didn’t seem so much anger as frustration now. “I wish—” The Mechanic’s eyes went to him, startling him with the intensity of her gaze. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be talking about things like that with a…”
“I am a Mage,” Alain said. That was not a matter for the comfort or discomfort of others, whose feelings did not matter anyway, but he understood the Mechanic this time. There were things that should not be discussed with any outsider, and especially not with a Mechanic. But perhaps there other things she would explain. “I have been trained in tactics, since my work would involve the military forces of the common people. Perhaps that is why I was thought able to handle this contract alone. Tell me your thoughts on your tactics. Why did you choose to run up the side of the pass instead of back down the road along the way we had come? Why did you choose the harder path?”
The Mechanic slumped, then to Alain’s amazement began laughing softly. “That’s who I am, I guess. If I’m working on a piece of equipment, say a locomotive or a far-talker, I do things the best way I can. Not the easy way. And I’m like that in everything. I don’t do what’s easy. The Senior Mechanics, my elders, haven’t always appreciated that.” She sighed, her eyes gazing bleakly at nothing. “From what I’d seen of the road to the pass, it was wide open. We’d have been spotted and run down in no time. So going up the side of the pass was the harder road, but the right one.”
“You were correct,” Alain said, then wondered why he had felt any need to tell her that. “Once I had the opportunity to think it through, I realized that you were right.”
Her gaze went back to him, puzzled. “Why is a Mage telling a Mechanic that she was right?”
“I…” do not know. “Because we survived and have a chance to reach Ringhmon.”
“Yeah. A chance.” The Mechanic closed her eyes again. “Do you have any food or water? I don’t.”
“I do not, either.”
“How long can we survive in the Waste without water?”
It took him a moment to realize she was not expecting him to answer that with some exact number of days. “The caravan master’s map showed wells farther up the road once we had cleared the pass.”
She opened her eyes, looking at Alain with hope. “You’re sure? How far?”
“I am sure, but I do not know how far.” Mechanic Mari nodded wearily, leaving Alain wishing he had been able to tell her something more hopeful. She is a shadow. Do not forget. Nothing more than those you have fought today.
He felt a cold hollowness inside himself. He had never fought in earnest before today, never killed before today. The common folk he had seen among the caravan now lay dead themselves. People who had depended upon him for protection. All of them were shadows, so none of that should matter, but it did.