Gorgas scowled. ‘Certainly not,’ he said. ‘Quite apart from anything else, it’d be far more trouble than it’s worth. No, I don’t want anything like that.’
‘Then I give up,’ Poliorcis said. ‘Tell me what it is you do want.’
‘Like I said,’ Gorgas replied. ‘Friendship. The beginning of a long, smooth and mutually beneficial relationship between the western provincial office and the republic of the Mesoge. What’s so strange about that?’
‘I see,’ Poliorcis said. ‘You’re prepared to help us defeat the plainspeople so that we’ll then owe you a favour. Am I right?’
‘That puts it quite well, yes.’
Poliorcis rubbed his chin. ‘Actually,’ he said, ‘I can see how that would be a tremendous advantage for you. I’m not sure it’d be worth our while, though. You see, we have an annoying habit of sticking to our treaties. If we were really as hell-bent on conquest as you seem to think we are, wouldn’t we be making a rod for our own backs here? Hypothetically speaking, of course.’
‘Up to you,’ Gorgas said quietly. ‘We have a saying here: don’t kid a kidder. I’m making this offer in good faith, we both know perfectly well why. Now you can tell me what I can do with my offer and I’ll just have to live with it. But it doesn’t have to be like that. Whatever else I may or may not be, I’m a realist.’ He smiled. ‘That’s what makes me such a pleasure to do business with.’
‘So I gather,’ Poliorcis replied. ‘Well, I think that’s about as far as we can get at this stage; I’ve got to go back to my superiors in the provincial office, give them my report, let them make up their minds.’ He stood up. ‘As you’ll appreciate, I’m basically just here to find out a bit more about you and your people here, give the decision-makers back home a little bit more to go on. And I think I’ve got enough from our meeting here; with your permission, I’d like to have a look around before I go. Please, feel free to point me in any direction you feel I ought to be taking. For instance, I’d be interested to see these archers of yours. We have a saying of our own: always try the goods before you buy. Before I can make a valid report, I do need something a bit more solid to go on than what I’ve heard from you and what I’ve seen so far here in Tornoys. I’m sure you see my point.’
‘Oh, absolutely,’ Gorgas said. ‘No, please, go right ahead. In fact, if you’ve got the time I’ll happily be your guide for a day or so; the main garrison camp, that sort of thing. Or if you’d rather not – I mean to say, if you think having me round your neck all the time you’re wanting to go see for yourself-’
Poliorcis smiled gracefully. ‘A guided tour of the republic with yourself as my guide,’ he said. ‘What better way to find out about things could there possibly be?’
On his third day as deputy inspector of the proof house, Bardas actually managed to find it.
It was at the end of the longest gallery, down another of the speciality breakneck staircases, along a dark, narrow corridor, down another staircase, along another corridor, down another staircase; by which time Bardas could sense he was back underground where he belonged -
(It’s customary to die first, but in your case we’ve made an exception.)
– Along another corridor, seventh on the left, third on the right, down another staircase, there you are, can’t miss it. He stood outside the massive oak door feeling like a very junior clerk on his first day at a great merchant’s counting house (which was silly, because he was in charge of the place. Or so they’d told him back among the ruins of Ap’ Escatoy, above ground where the rules are subtly different).
He pushed the door with his hand, then pushed harder, then put his shoulder to it; it gave an inch or so, which encouraged him to keep shoving.
‘It sticks,’ said a voice as he tumbled into a cold, echoing room. ‘But we keep it shut anyway, because of the noise. Who are you?’
At least there was a certain amount of light, coming from a row of oil-lamps up on a ledge over the door. The draught made their tenuous flames dance, swirling the light.
‘My name’s Loredan,’ Bardas replied, trying to see who he was talking to. ‘I’ve been posted here.’
‘The hero,’ said the voice. ‘Come in. Shut the door.’
Bardas put his back to the door and managed to walk it shut; then he looked around. The room was lined with large, raw stone blocks, and the walls formed a high arch. In the middle was a pile of armour – breastplates, helmets, vambraces, gorgets, pauldrons, cops, cuisses, sabatons, gauntlets, all mangled and ruined, twisted and dented and crushed, pierced and skewed. The voice seemed to be coming from behind the pile; and when Bardas looked there, he found a little old man – a Son of Heaven – and an enormous boy of about eighteen. Both of them were stripped to the waist; the old man was all sticks and sharp edges pressing against the skin, while the boy was muscle and fat. Between them was an anvil on which sat a helmet. The old man was holding it down on the anvil with a pair of very long tongs. The boy was holding a huge hammer.
‘Well,’ said the old man, ‘you found us all right. Pull up a helmet, sit down.’
The air in the room was cold, but both men were sweating. The boy’s long, sandy hair was plastered round his forehead, as if he’d been dipped in tallow like a candle. The old man didn’t have any hair at all, and the sweat sparkled on his egg-shaped skull. Bardas looked round, saw a pile of helmets, pulled one out and sat on it.
‘I’m Anax,’ said the old man. ‘This is Bollo.’ He smiled, revealing a dazzlingly wide array of teeth. ‘Welcome to the proof house.’
‘Thank you,’ Bardas said.
Anax nodded politely (Bollo didn’t seem to have noticed Bardas yet). ‘You don’t mind if we carry on, do you?’ he said – his voice was refined, cultured, very Son-of-Heaven. ‘We’ve got a lot to get through today, as you can see.’
‘Please, carry on,’ Bardas said; and at once Bollo hefted the hammer, swung it over his head and brought it down hard on the apex of the helmet. The clang made Bardas jump. Then the helmet rolled off the anvil and clattered on to the stone floor.
‘No good,’ said Anax sadly. ‘You heard the harmonics? Garbage.’ He stooped painfully, picked the helmet up and put it back on the anvil. There was a slight dent on the left side of the crown. ‘You can tell everything from the sound,’ Anax went on. ‘Listen. This is what it should sound like.’ He stooped again – bending down seemed to trouble him inordinately – and came up with another helmet, as far as Bardas could see identical to the first. Anax gripped it in the tongs, and Bollo thumped it.
‘You hear that?’ Anax said. ‘Completely different. Good helmet. Well, good seam. The rivets are garbage.’
Bardas looked at the good helmet; it too had a slight dent in the crown. ‘Sorry,’ he said, ‘but I don’t see-’
‘Really?’ Anax nodded, and Bollo swung again. The sound hurt Bardas’ ears. ‘A fifth higher; sort of a purer, whiter sound. It’s a bit flat, of course, because of the garbage rivets. Here, it’s easier to tell on a cuirass.’ He groaned this time as he bent down; he came up with a dull grey breastplate which he laid over the top of the anvil, having first swept the two dented helmets on to the floor with the back of his hand. ‘Listen for the high note,’ he said. ‘You should hear it quite clearly.’
Bollo shifted his grip slightly on the hammer handle, then dealt the breastplate five enormous blows, two on each side and one on the ridge that ran up the centre. To Bardas, it sounded like an awful clanging noise.
‘I see,’ he said. ‘Yes, quite different.’
The old man laughed. ‘Fooled you,’ he said. ‘That one’s garbage too. Not that it seems to matter any; I test ’em and reject the batch, they issue them anyway, but with a little stamp on the inside: FP. It stands for Failed Proof. Wonderful, isn’t it?’
Bardas coughed. ‘I’m holding you up,’ he said. ‘You carry on, I’ll just watch for a bit.’