That decided, she took up the scroll and proceeded with the lesson.
The new forge was beautiful, clean, and cold: a virgin, waiting to be initiated into the delights of her natural fire. Omis walked around her once again, eyes measuring her splendid dimensions and features, itching to fill and light her properly. There, that enormous bellows made of two whole oxhides, waiting to be geared into the driveshaft from the mill. With such a pump, in such a furnace, he could refine purest iron out of raw, red earth in a day's work or less. There, the great pulleys and chain hoist braced into the new ceiling. Once the huge ladle was finished, he could melt and pour iron by the hundredweight as easily as if it were wax in a cup. There, Sulun's precious lathe and the new grinding wheels, likewise waiting to be hitched to the mill's driving shaft. Gods, what he could make with those. He'd made little but toys since they'd settled here—farming tools, buckles, sockets for wooden wheels, even pins and needles—good quality, but such puny common things, small items readily made in the sturdy little portable forge from Sabis, on his old and admittedly worn anvil. But with tools like these, once they were ready . . .
Omis shook his head and turned away. Patience, patience, he reminded himself. All goes well, better than we could have dreamed just a year ago.
Indeed, a year ago he could never have imagined working in such a manufactory as this. Possibly there was nothing near like it in all the world. What irony to see it here, in this forgotten country estate, when Sabis and all her glory lay in ruins. . . .
Omis turned away from the forge, went to a freshly oiled cabinet under the new workbench, opened it, and tugged out the cloth-wrapped shape within. He lifted the object to the bench, laid it down, and pulled up a stool.
The bombard's outside was still pebble-rough and unfinished, but the interior gleamed like a mirror. She was seamless, flawless, as perfect as human skill could make her, needing only a few finishing touches. Omis didn't ask himself why he felt obliged to work on her whenever he thought of Sabis; her original purpose was long lost, fallen with the city.
Still, the Bombard Project led him on, led all of them still, had led them like a god's sign to settle here in the vestibule of a sulfur mine. Why sulfur, save for firepowder? Why firepowder, save for the bombard? Why the bombard? No answer—yet the pursuit of that idea had brought them here, to safety, protection, promised wealth, even the respect of the local people and the friendship of the local lord. Even a workshop such as this.
Omis cast a glance at the nearer of the two figures carved beside the door. "Deese, thou knowest," he said.
Then he took up a narrow circular brush and a pot of pumice paste, and began polishing the recently drilled fuse hole at the base of the bombard. After this would come the building of its carriage.
He barely heard the footsteps approaching behind him, managed to ignore them until Zeren spoke, almost in his ear.
"Where's Sulun? We have a problem."
Yanados perched on a finished section of the wall, supposedly watching the small flock of goats that foraged contentedly downslope. Under the hood of her cloak, no one could tell at this distance that she was actually watching the work crew busy on the unfinished part of the wall. Biddon sat beside her, clenching his corded hands with the effort not to point. Sulun, Zeren, and Doshi came padding up behind her, climbed the broad stile to the walkway, and peered toward the work gang. Zeren clapped a hand on the blacksmith's shoulder.
"Which one is he?" he asked.
"That'n, sir." Biddon pointed, just briefly. "Yonder thickset fellow in the brown leggin's and yellow shirt. The one up on the stones, layin' mortar. I've seen him before, a'right, comin' to my shop for stone chisels, braggin' to wear me ear off. He's head stonemason of Yotha's temple, and what business, sirs, would he have here?"
"You all know more than I do," Sulun puzzled. "Who is Yotha, and why shouldn't his temple's chief stonemason come to work here?"
"Yotha, according to our friend Biddon, is an ill-tempered fire god," said Yanados, still watching. "His priests came and settled here some eight years back, built a temple some six leagues north, and have been doing well for themselves ever since. As to your second question, the chief stonemason of Yotha's temple is ordinarily paid quite well enough that he'd have no need to come work common labor on our walls. Do you see nothing suspicious there?"
"I see a mystery, and I wish you all would explain it."
"We seem to have some rivals," Zeren sighed. "Yotha's temple was the biggest and wealthiest in Ashkell Vale, before we came."
"What, simple jealousy?" Sulun asked. "How would that explain their mason working here?"
"More nor simple jealousy!" Biddon laughed. "See you all these folk workin' on your priest house, these many moons? Ye've paid 'em for their hire, day by day, not bought their service outright by the year. You folk pay well, too—in good copper and useful spells, not to mention yonder school at Ashkell House. And ye're none so haughty as Yotha's folk, nor has your Deese done harm to any. Need I tell you, then, how many folk would rather come to you than to Yotha's house?"
"We've drawn away many of Yotha's worshippers, you mean? And his priests don't like it?
"Neither like it nor accept it philosophically, I imagine," said Doshi. "So their chief mason has shown up here: for spying, spreading disaffection, spoiling the work, or what?"
"Spying, certainly," Yanados guessed. "We may as well assume the rest, too. Now, what shall we do about it?"
"First off, I would have Arizun inspect that section of the wall," Zeren put in. "See if it's made as well as the rest, or if some charm has been set into the mortar."
"Good thought," said Doshi, turning to go back down the stile steps. "I'll fetch him."
"Now wait," Sulun complained, feeling a bit left out. "What harm can a man do, setting mortar on a wall? What harm can his spying do, for that matter? Why not leave him where he is, lest these—these priests of Yotha send another spy who we don't know?"
Zeren laughed. "Sulun, my wonderfully innocent old friend, think; we've seen whole houses ill-wished, and from a distance. Why not a wall? Or the whole house, starting from the wall? That's the harm our insidious mason there can do."
Sulun thought about that, about the curse placed on Entori House, about the possible effects of such a curse in a house full of hot iron, firepowder, heavy tools—and a cellar full of sulfur. He shuddered.
"Very well, get rid of him. What will happen when his friends learn of his failure, I don't know."
"They'll know we're no fools," said Yanados. "That alone might make them behave better."
"High hopes," Zeren muttered. "More like, they'll just take another tactic. We must be watchful."
"Which is the man?" Arizun asked, climbing up behind them. "Where has he been working?"
Biddon gleefully pointed out the suspect, and the stretch of wall, adding: "There's more I could watch out for you, Masters, did I but live here. Would I not make a good initiate of Deese?"
"Soon, soon," Yanados promised, patting his shoulder. "Once Eloti says you're ready . . . Hey, the lunch bell!"
Sure enough, the iron bell so recently hung in its niche over the front was ringing the announcement for the midday meal. All the workmen on the wall cheered happily, put down their tools, settled the last stones they'd been working on, and sat down to eat. The brown-legged spy made haste to join them.