"Oh, yes." Sulun peered up and down the length of his contraption for the hundredth time, shaking his head over its bizarre shape: the turbine (more like an upright disk than its original globe shape) with its angled escape jets, the copper boiling-tube and brass steam-feed line with their carefully fitted valves and sockets, the short axle with its sturdy gearwheel waiting to engage, the fussy little forest of supports, the bolted-down brazier and the platform they all rested on. It looked utterly eccentric and ridiculous, but he knew it would work. This part of the assembly would, anyway. "He's been nagging me for days about the cost of keeping that expensive gear stored and idle."
"I just hope his carpenters got all the measurements right," Omis worried. "Proper fools we'll look if we get this set on the paddle wheel axle, take it all down to the ship, and the sockets in the deck don't fit."
"Then he can belabor the ship's carpenters, not us. Ah, I think it's warm enough. Pour in the water."
Omis shook his head, lifted the pitcher of water, and poured, carefully, into the upright funnel.
Both men took a few steps back, and waited.
Water gurgled down the funnel, through the first valve, and into the heated copper tube. There was an angry hiss, more gurgling, near-human belches as the steam tried and failed to escape back up the valve, then a faint groan of protest and a puff of steam from the turbine's jets.
Sulun and Omis held their breath and made assorted handsigns for luck. They had made all the parts to triple strength, but still . . .
Slowly, then faster, the turbine moved. It turned, rolled, spun, wreathed in a cloud of dissipating steam like a dimmed sun among roiling clouds. Its attached axle spun with it, and the final gearwheel too.
"It works!" Sulun whooped. "Praise all the gods I ever heard of, it works!"
"And the supports are holding! Look, they're not even shaking! We've done it!"
By the time their combined noise brought the apprentices running in to look, Sulun and Omis were dancing a clumsy version of the Vulgar Hop-Step around a workroom full of warm fog to the tune of the whining, spinning engine. Even Ziya cheered.
"Those sailors will have to cut extra portholes to let out all that steam," Doshi noted, but he was grinning all the same.
"Master, the engine is ready for installation." Sulun did his best to keep his face politely expressionless.
"Excellent." Entori almost smiled, then caught himself. "It took you long enough. Fortunately, the ship is in port at the moment. Do the fitting today, and tell me how well the ship performs. You are excused."
Sulun stifled a sigh, bowed, and went out. There was, he decided, no use expecting any further reaction from the Master.
He supposed he should be grateful for having a whole day to install and test the completed assembly.
"No, no! Great gods, we needed to place the engine first, then the paddle wheels!" Sulun tugged his hair and glared at the sullen ship carpenters. "Now we may have to reset that whole damned axle. Gods! Never mind. Omis, is that platform socket the right size, at least?"
"'Tis. No trouble there." Omis peered once more at the ironbound hole in the second deck, shrugged, and stood up. "Bring up the muscle-boys, and let's get this thing mounted."
Sulun, still pulling nervously at his hair, stood back and let the assorted crew manhandle the engine's platform into place. Omis did all the directing, complete with howls for careful handling, and the platform settled onto its mounting with a satisfying thud. Omis rotated the platform this way and that, glared for a moment at the huge iron axle cutting across the cabin, frowned at the two iron gears set on it, and finally swung the platform around to meet the right-hand gear.
Sulun squeezed his eyes shut, not wanting to see the expected failure. Surely the axle would turn out to be set too high or too low, or the drive gear from the engine wouldn't meet the gear on the axle, or the gear sizes would be wrong, or the perverse things just wouldn't engage. The house wizard was an unreliable drunk, and who could tell what the ship's wizard was up to? He'd have to go back to Entori and report another delay.
"Deese of the Forge," Omis breathed. "The gears meet perfectly."
Sulun opened his eyes and stared. Sure enough, there stood Omis, smiling as if at his own children, studying the juncture of the two neatly meshed gears.
"So the ship can move forward, at least," Doshi commented at his shoulder. "Now, can it stop and move backward too?"
"No reason it shouldn't," said Omis. He gripped two of the handles at the edge of the platform, and pulled. The platform turned smoothly, pulling the drive gear away from the wheel axle, swung in a neat half-circle, and settled against the opposite axle gear with a smug click. "See? Works fine." Omis grinned. "I'll say this much for Entori's other workmen; they can follow instructions to the last number. And his various wizards aren't all bad."
"Gods be praised." Sulun wiped his forehead with his sleeve. "Now all we need do is light the coals, pour in the water, and see if this engine will actually drive the ship."
"No trouble there." Omis went to the open hatchway in the deck above and bellowed up through it. "Captain, prepare to cast off. We're about to test the engine."
Groans and curses of dismay echoed down with the sunlight, but Omis ignored them and turned away. "Who has the coals?" he bellowed to all and sundry. "And the bucket?"
Ziya waddled up, toting a dipper and a sloshing bucket nearly as big as she was. Behind her Arizun dragged a huge sack of coals. Yanados followed with the bottle of wine spirits and the flint and steel striker. They filled the brazier, poured on the spirits, lit the coals, and stood by with the water in a neat little ceremony that impressed the watching sailors.
"We're cast off," filtered down through the hatchway. "Are you ready?"
"Wait, wait," said Omis, turning the platform until the gears engaged exactly.
"Wait, wait . . ." said Sulun, watching the copper tube above the brazier. "Now. Pour."
Ziya solemnly lifted the ladle, but couldn't quite reach to the top of the funnel. Omis, smiling, took the ladle from her and poured the water himself.
The engine hissed, gurgled, and belched. The sailors took several respectful steps backward. The captain poked his head down through the open hatchway to watch the proceedings. The first plumes of steam curled out of the jets; the turbine muttered, groaned, began to turn.
Sulun chewed his lip nearly raw and crossed his fingers under the concealment of his sleeves. Had they made the boiling-tube thick enough, the turbine sturdy enough, the valves strong enough?
A faint groan came from the main axle, and a heavier gurgling of water from the unseen paddle wheels outside. Slowly, ponderously, the gear and axle and grumbling paddle wheels began to turn.
Mixed yells came from topside. The captain snatched his head back up through the hatchway. A massive thumping, as of heavy oars, sounded rhythmically through the hull.
The captain stuck his head down through the hatchway once more. "We're moving!" he yelled, as if he couldn't believe his eyes. "We're moving!"
Now they could all hear it: the steady thump of the paddles and the sloshing of water moving against the hull. The sailors swapped looks, then cheered. More cheers and yells sounded from topside, along with curses from the steersman and exhortations from the captain. The apprentices hugged each other and danced clumsily around the platform. The rolling turbine shot out steam until the whole engine cabin was fogged and hot. Omis poured another ladleful of water down the funnel and smiled at his sturdily laboring engine much as the gods must have smiled at the new made universe.