Haplo had no idea how the political situation might have changed during his absence, but when he’d last left Arianus, Limbeck had made Wombe his power base. It was necessary that Haplo find the leader of the dwarves, and he judged that Wombe would be as good a place to start searching as any. The nine arms, each with an outstretched golden hand, were easy to spot from the air. The storm had died down, though more clouds were massing on the horizon. Lightning reflected off the metal, the frozen hands were silhouetted against the clouds. Haplo landed on a patch of empty ground, bringing the ship down in the shadow of an apparently abandoned portion of the machine. At least he assumed it was abandoned, no light shone from it, no gears were grinding, no wheels turning, no “lectricity,” as the Gegs termed it, was rivaling the lightning with its blue-yellow voltage.
Once safely on the ground, Haplo noticed that there were no lights anywhere. Puzzled, he peered out the rain-streaked window. As he recalled, the Kicksey-winsey turned the storm-ridden darkness of Drevlin into artificial, perpetual day. Glimmerglamps shone everywhere, ’lectric zingers sent jagged bolts sparking into the air.
Now, the city and its surroundings were lit only by the light of the sun, which, by the time it had been filtered down through the clouds of the Maelstrom, was leaden and sullen and more depressing than darkness. Haplo stood staring out the window, recalling his last visit here, trying to remember if there had been lights on this part of the Kicksey-winsey, or if he was, in fact, thinking about another portion of the great machine.
“Maybe that was in Het,” he muttered, then shook his head. “No, it was here. I definitely remember—”
A thump and a warning bark jolted him out of his reverie.
Haplo walked back to the ship’s stern. Bane was standing beside the hatch, holding a sausage just out of the dog’s reach.
“You can have this,” he was promising the dog, “but only if you quit barking. Let me get this open. All right? Good dog.”
Bane shoved the sausage in a pocket, turned to the hatch, and began to fumble with the sliding latch that would, ordinarily, have opened the door. The latch remained stuck firmly in place. Bane glared at it, beat on it with his small fists. The dog kept its eyes fixed intently on the sausage.
“Going somewhere, Your Highness?” Haplo asked, leaning casualty against one of the bulkheads. He had decided, in the interests of portraying Bane as rightful heir to the Volkaran throne, to use the title due to a human prince. He supposed he might as well get used to it now, before they appeared in public. Of course, he’d have to blunt the ironic edge.
Bane glanced reproachfully at the dog, gave the recalcitrant latch one final, futile push with his hands, then looked up coolly at Haplo.
“I want to go outside. It’s hot and stuffy in here. And it smells of dog,” he added scornfully.
The animal, hearing its name and thinking it was being referred to in a friendly manner—perhaps in regard to the sausage—wagged its tail and licked its chops.
“You used magic on it, didn’t you,” Bane continued accusingly, giving the latch another push.
“The same magic I’ve used throughout the ship, Your Highness. I had to. It wouldn’t do to let one part remain unprotected, just as it wouldn’t do to ride to battle with a gaping hole in your armor. Besides, I don’t think you want to go outside just yet. There’s another storm coming. You remember the storms on Drevlin, don’t you?”
“I remember. I can see when a storm’s coming, same as you. And I wouldn’t have stayed out that long. I wasn’t going that far.”
“Where were you going, Your Highness?”
“Nowhere. Just for a walk.” Bane shrugged.
“Not thinking of trying to contact the dwarves on your own, eh?”
“Of course not, Haplo,” Bane said, eyes round. “Grandfather said I was to stay with you. And I always obey Grandfather.”
Haplo noticed the emphasis on the last word, smiled grimly. “Good. Remember, I’m here for your protection, as much as anything. It’s not very safe on this world. Not even if you are a prince. There are those who would kill you just for that alone.”
“I know,” said Bane, looking subdued, somewhat ashamed. “The elves almost killed me last time I was here. I guess I didn’t think about that. I’m sorry, Haplo.” Clear blue eyes gazed upward. “It was very wise of Grandfather to give you to me for a guard. You always obey Grandfather, too, don’t you, Haplo?” The question caught Haplo by surprise. He glanced swiftly at Bane, wondering what—if anything—the child meant by it. For an instant, Haplo thought he saw a glitter of cunning, sly and malevolent, in the wide blue eyes. But Bane stared at him guilelessly, a child asking a childish question.
Haplo turned away. “I’m going back up front, to keep watch.” The dog whined, looked pathetically at the sausage, still in Bane’s pocket.
“You didn’t ask me about the leaks,” Bane reminded Haplo.
“Well, were there any?”
“No. You work the magic pretty good. Not as good as Grandfather, but pretty good.”
“Thank you, Your Highness,” Haplo said, bowed, and walked off. Bane took the sausage out of his pocket, smacked the dog lightly and playfully on the nose with it. “That’s for giving me away,” he said, in mild reproof. The dog slavered, regarded the sausage hungrily.
“Still, I guess it was for the best.” Bane frowned. “Haplo’s right. I’d forgotten about those damn bastard elves. I’d like to meet the one who threw me off the ship that time. I’d tell Haplo to throw that elf into the Maelstrom. And I’d watch him fall, all the way down. I’ll bet you could hear him scream a long, long time. Yes, Grandfather was right. I see that now. Haplo will be useful to me, until I can find someone else.
“Here you go.” Bane handed over the sausage. The dog snapped it up, swallowed it in a gulp. Bane petted the silky head fondly. “And then you’ll be mine. You and me and Grandfather. We’ll all live together and we won’t let anyone hurt Grandfather anymore ever. Will we, boy?”
Bane laid his cheek on the dog’s head, cuddled the warm body.
“Will we?”
9
The great Kicksey-winsey had stopped.
Nobody on Drevlin knew what to do. Nothing like this had ever happened before in all the history of the Gegs.
As long as the Gegs could remember—and because they were dwarves, that was a long time indeed—the wondrous machine had been at work. It worked and it worked. Feverishly, serenely, frantically, obtusely—it worked. Even when parts of the Kicksey-winsey broke down, it worked; other parts worked to repair those that didn’t. No one was ever quite certain what work the Kicksey-winsey did, but all knew, or at least suspected, that it worked well-But now it had stopped.
The ’lectriczingers no longer zinged, they hummed—ominously, some thought. The whirly-wheels neither whirled nor wheeled. They held perfectly still, except for a slight quivering. The flashrafts halted, disrupting transportation throughout the Low Realm. The metal hands of the flashraft that grabbed the overhead cable and—with the help of the ’lectriczingers—pulled the flashraft along were stilled. Palms open, the metal hands reached futilely out to heaven.
The whistle-toots were silent, except for a sigh that escaped them now and then. The black arrows inside the glass boxes—arrows that must never be allowed to point to red—had sagged clear down to the bottom half of the boxes and now pointed at nothing. When it first quit, there had been immediate consternation. Every Geg man, woman, and child—even those off duty, even those involved in the guerrilla action against the Welves—had left his or her post and run to stare at the great—now inactive—machine. There were some who thought that it would start again. The assembled Gegs had waited hopefully... and waited and waited. Scrift-change had come and gone. The marvelous machine had continued to do nothing.