Magic Engineer

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  Liedral wakes with a start, then turns and touches Kadara. “Easy, easy. You’re all right.”

  “Where… who?”

  “Liedral… Dorrin and I are here.”

  “Brede… where is he?”

  “He’s still in Kleth,” Liedral says quickly. She eases out from between the two injured forms. “Let me get you some water.”

  “… never leave there… darkness… arm hurts…”

  “It will take a while to heal,” Dorrin adds.

  “… took four of the bastards… head hurts… Brede… miss you…”

  “Drink this,” Liedral says.

  Dorrin sits up. “Can you get my small pack? There’s some astra in it.”

  “Why didn’t you think about that- Sorry.”

  “It’s hard to think when white knives are slashing through your skull.”

  “I said I was sorry.”

  “It’s all right.” Dorrin takes the pack and fumbles for the packets, identifying them by shape, scent, and sense. “Put this one in place of the dressing on her arm. Can you?”

  “I’ll need to light this candle.”

  Dorrin waits until Liedral takes the first dressing, then searches for the crushed astra.

  “Oh! Light!… hurts,” moans Kadara.

  “Anything else?” asks Liedral. Her voice is curt.

  “Is there any way to get this in her?”

  “I’ll try.”

  A clinking and other rustling sounds follow. Dorrin can sense that Liedral is working with some utensils.

  “Open your mouth, please… Kadara.”

  “… so bitter… like poison… You aren’t hurting me, are you?”

  “I’m not hurting you. This will make you feel better.”

  “…so bitter…what… ?”

  “It’s astra mixed with beragin,” Dorrin explains calmly.

  Liedral continues to rattle things for a time, before returning and stretching out between Dorrin and Kadara again.

  Dorrin reaches out and squeezes her hand. “Thank you.”

  She squeezes his in return. “Go to sleep.”

  In time, he does, not to wake until the chirpings of the dawn birds seep into his awareness. He still cannot see, but his headache has subsided into a duller ache. Liedral is already up, moving quietly, watering the horses.

  Dorrin slips out from under the cart, careful not to touch it or the braces that hold it in position.

  “There’s still some bread and cheese,” Liedral offers.

  “Thank you.” Dorrin takes the chunk of bread and the slab of cheese that she has sliced, then sits on the stone wall by the road. “Still using the cheese slicer?”

  “It’s a lot more comfortable. I still shiver when I look at a knife.” Liedral sits beside him. “It’s pretty this morning.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  “It wasn’t your fault.” Liedral’s fingers touch his cheek.

  “I wish I could believe that. They went after you because you loved me.”

  “I still love you, you impossible man.” She reaches out and squeezes his wrist. “I wish you could see the trees on the hill. They look like shining silver in the light, with the dew on the leaves.”

  “So do I.”

  They eat silently.

  “Kadara’s still sleeping. Is that good?”

  “If we can keep getting her to drink, and get more of the medicine in her. She needs liquids.”

  “Do you want any more bread or cheese?”

  “Is there enough?”

  “Merga sent me off with as much as she could get together. We still have four loaves left-stale, but we won’t go too hungry before we get back.”

  Dorrin eats another half loaf of bread and more cheese. While he is finishing, Liedral gets up, and his thoughts turn back to order again.

  While some believe in order as a god, almost, order has to be more mechanical than that. Otherwise, how could good people be punished for the means they use? He sips from the jug. Or do the means compromise the ends? Always?

  He thinks of Fairhaven. The city, despite the rule of those who espouse chaos, is orderly, and there is little crime. There seems to be less poverty than in Spidlar. But is that because Fairhaven has become wealthy from its conquests?

  “Dorrin, if we want to get back to Diev without being… caught by…”

  Dorrin understands. Who knows who will be on the road behind them before long? He slowly makes his way into the woods for certain necessities. By the time he returns, Liedral is kneeling, spooning more of the astra and beragin into Kadara’s mouth.

  “… uuugggg…” Kadara swallows and coughs, but most of the mixture goes down, and Liedral eases water into her mouth.

  While Liedral ministers to Kadara, Dorrin manages to saddle Meriwhen by himself, although he pinches one finger in the girth buckle in the process. He mutters grumpily under his breath at his clumsiness, but continues finishing saddling the mare.

  For just an instant, when he touches the black wood of his staff, he can see-the grass is damp with dew, and the trees dark green in the early dawn light. Then the blackness drops across his eyes. He turns toward Meriwhen so Liedral will not see the tears of frustration that ooze from his eyes.

  Order! Why is order so unfair? Pure order seems unable to stop chaos, and whenever he tries to focus order against chaos, he is punished, just as the Whites and the traders of Spidlar have together, in a way, punished Brede because of his talent and reliance on the tools of order.

  He tries to reason as he places the staff in the lanceholder. Is it because death is the ultimate form of chaos, the destruction of human order, so to speak? Certainly, despite the complaints by his family and Lortren, he has not suffered for his use of order to make his models or his machines. Nor has he been punished much for making his devices of destruction-only for using them.

  “Can you help me get Kadara into the cart?”

  Dorrin wipes his face with the back of his sleeve and turns toward the cart. His shoulder barely twinges as he lifts Kadara.

  “… hurts… don’t leave me…”

  “You’re with us,” Dorrin says softly, trying to keep his voice level, trying to keep the frustration and anger from showing. His senses tell him that she is slightly better, but she is still fevered and weak, and it will be a long time, if ever, before she regains full use of her right arm.

  Terwhit… terwhit. Despite the cheerful tone of the bird in the low oak trees, Dorrin is not encouraged.

  CLI

  THE CART CREAKS as Liedral turns at the hillcrest overlooking the river valley. “Everything looks all right.”

  “We still haven’t run into any other travelers.” Dorrin can extend his senses to some degree now, without headaches, but he still cannot see, except every once in a while when he touches his staff. Even that vision is neither predictable nor more than fleeting.

  “You wouldn’t expect any. People were leaving Kleth when I came back with that troop of cavalry and the last levy.”

  “I’m glad you had an escort.”

  “So was I. There were some rough souls on the road.”

  Dorrin touches the staff again, but he receives no glimpse of the sunlit expanse of the valley that lies between them and Diev. “How is Kadara?”

  “Not much different. Sometimes, she seems awake, but mostly she sleeps.”

  “For now, that’s probably better.” Dorrin eases Meriwhen up beside Liedral as the road widens.

  “For now…” Liedral says quietly. She looks behind her and lowers her voice. “What do you think about Brede?”

  Dorrin shakes his head, hoping Liedral is locking at him.

  “That’s what I think, too.”

  Neither wants to confirm in words what both know must be true. The Whites will not allow anyone to survive, particularly a man from Recluce who has cost them so many troops. They continue silently until they near the turnoff from the main road that leads to Dorrin’s cottage.

  “… there yet
… ?” asks Kadara.

  “We’re almost home.” Liedral turns slightly and bends toward the rear of the cart where the injured woman lies. “Oh…”

  “What is it?” Dorrin asks.

  “Darkness…” mutters Liedral.

  “What did you see?” asks Dorrin.

  “Rylla’s cottage-it’s burned down. But your barn and the cottage are all right. There’s a barricade of sorts around the yard… and some people. It looks like Pergun and another older man, and Reisa. She’s wearing a blade.” Liedral turns the cart off the main road and up the ridge drive.

  Dorrin wishes he could see, but follows the cart until they are past the barricade and in the yard.

  “It’s master Dorrin! And Liedral! They’re back!” Frisa’s voice echoes across the yard and past the barricade.

  “Master Dorrin…” Pergun begins.

  Dorrin turns in the direction of his voice. “Yes?”

  “What’s wrong with you? You’re not exactly looking square at me.”

  “He’s blind,” Liedral says quietly. “And Kadara’s in the wagon here. She’s badly wounded. We need to carry her inside.”

  “Put her in the bed I was using,” Dorrin suggests.

  “Blind? Blind… ? Was it the Whites? The evil bastards!”

  “No. I did it myself.” Dorrin dismounts and leads Meriwhen toward the barn, letting his senses guide him.

  “Is he daft?” Pergun turns to Liedral.

  “Can I help?” Reisa’s voice carries to Dorrin.

  “He’s not daft.” Liedral descends from the cart. “He’s an order-smith who forced himself to create devices to kill more than a thousand people.”

  “A thousand?”

  “More or less. It wasn’t enough. Between Brede and Dorrin, I suspect that the Whites lost more than half their army. That would have left more than five thousand under arms.”

  Dorrin ignores the conversation as he opens the barn door. The scent of horses is strong, and Dorrin stops when he is just inside, trying to sense how many there are. Five, he thinks, two tied in the far corner in what seems to be makeshift stalls. He leads Meriwhen to her stall, slowly unsaddling her, racking the saddle, setting the staff aside, and beginning to curry the mare in slow and even strokes.

  “You can’t stay here.” Reisa Stands by the stall. “They’ll burn the whole countryside to get you.”

  “Me? A humble smith?”

  “You and Yarrl.” Reisa snorts. “Do you ever think you can escape what you are? What about your ship? It’s still floating. Yarrl saw it from the hill on the way here.”

  “Yard’s here?”

  “Of course. It made sense. Your place is easier to defend. We loaded most of his smithy into the big wagon, except the anvil. No one can get that quickly anyway. Pergun wanted to be here, because of Merga, and when the troopers took Liedral, we decided…”

  “You didn’t have to… I’m grateful, and thankful…”

  “Dorrin, there’s a lot you never had to do. You didn’t have to heal Honsard’s son. Shameful-that man. You didn’t have to take Merga in. Or heal all those people who couldn’t pay. Or refuse to take any of Yard’s customers. Or expand Rylla’s herb garden and share what you got with her.” Reisa coughs. “So… for once, let someone help you. Darkness knows, you need it right now, you stiff-necked and proud…”

  Dorrin puts aside the brush and fumbles with the barrel to dig out some grain for Meriwhen. Reisa holds the top and hands him the iron scoop, one of the miscellaneous items he has forged along the way and almost forgotten. The iron is cool to his fingers, almost healing.

  “You need to rest.”

  After Dorrin dumps two scoops of grain into the manger box and closes the stall on Meriwhen, he slumps onto a bale of hay and leans back against the stall wall. “Where are you all sleeping?”

  “Pergun…”

  “I can figure that out. I meant…”

  “We took the liberty of using the front room. There’s space there, and we did bring mattresses.”

  “That’s fine.” Dorrin takes a deep breath, realizing that he is more tired than he thought as his eyes close.

  CLII

  DORRIN WANDERS THROUGH the cold smithy, his fingers brushing the forge, his tool rack, wondering when, or if, he will regain his sight. He has not realized, truly understood, how much of his smithing required vision. Why is he being punished? Or why is he punishing himself? For not having the ability to stop chaos without destruction? For trying to help good people?

  “Darkness!” His eyes burn in frustration. Within days, the Whites will be back on the road to Diev, unless, miraculously, Spidlaria holds out. He snorts. With what? Less than a few hundred soldiers and mounted horse escaped the carnage at Kleth.

  He walks to the smithy door and out into the sunlight, listening to the sounds of the wooden wands that Yarrl has produced for blade practice. Even Rek, with his foot twisted beyond Dorrin’s poor ability to heal, has insisted on learning.

  “Keep your guard up!”

  Dorrin grins, imagining how intimidating Reisa once must have been. The grin fades. He is helpless with chaos about to pour out of the south. He supposes he should go to see the Black Diamond, but what good will seeing his ship do? Pergun and Yarrl have both assured him that it is fine, and that Tyrel is working on the rigging. Dorrin still needs to forge the replacement sections of the clutch and build the recirculating collector for the condenser, and he can forge neither while blind.

  He pauses. Yarrl could forge the collector and tubing, but the additional slip plates need to be forged from black iron, and Yarrl has never forged in black iron. Still… once Dorrin worked with Hegl… and there isn’t much time left.

  “Are ye still moping, still feeling sorry for yourself?” Rylla’s rasping voice intrudes.

  “Not too sorry. More like planning… how to fix the ship.”

  “How about planning to fix you?” The healer sits on a stool on the porch.

  “And just how would I do that?”

  “Well… I’m no great master Black healer… but were I one, I just might wander over to the herb garden and meditate…” Rylla laughs.

  “Meditate?”

  “What ails ye isn’t in your body. It’s in your soul.”

  Dorrin shrugs. Order has a basis in growing things. Why not? He turns his steps toward the ridge and the garden that lies outside the barricade of hastily felled trees and brush.

  “Vaos! You can’t handle that heavy a blade with just your wrist.” The voice is Yard’s, not Reisa’s.

  “You can,” adds Reisa, “but no one here besides you could.”

  “Hush, woman.”

  Dorrin can sense both Vaos and Rek, Pergun, Liedral and even Merga, all with wands in their hands. Will it do any good? What can they learn in an eight-day or so? Enough to hold off conscripted levies?

  He trudges up the gentle incline toward the garden. The early summer day is cool, with a northern breeze, and bright sun falling on his face. Dorrin sits carefully on the ground between the rows of astra and the brinn. His fingers brush across the brinn, drinking in the coolness that flows within the stalks and leaves.

  Meditate? Upon what? The nature of order. What is order? Why can those who follow order be punished-even if they seek a good end? Is it just because their actions increase chaos? Does that mean that order represents merely a set of laws? Or that no goal, no matter how good, can justify use of order to create great chaos?

  He takes a deep breath, and a second, trying to relax.

  Chaos breaks things apart-people, armies, cities…

  The once-and-still healer frowns. Is it order when two people are bound together, be it through friendship or love? Then love cannot exist in true chaos. In a way, that follows. Men who truly love women normally do not hurt them. True friends do not knowingly hurt each other. Pain is usually a result of chaos of some sort-a disruption of bodily order for some reason or another.

  Dorrin tries to drink in the herbs ar
ound him, but the nibbling whitish-red of root-rot in the brinn gnaws at him, disrupting his concentration. He turns to trying to strengthen the plants against the rot, projecting what little sense of order he can find within himself into the brinn.

  “Master Dorrin? Why are you sitting in the garden? Can I sit here?” Dorrin has to smile. “Yes, Frisa. Try to sit between the plants, not on them.” Frisa plumps herself down by Dorrin’s right knee. “I like your garden.”

  “So do I.”

  “Why don’t plants go places?”

  “They don’t have legs,” Dorrin answers slowly. “And it’s very hard to move without legs.”

  “Fish move. They don’t have legs.”

  “They live in the water, and their tails and fins are like legs. Even water plants don’t have fins or tails that move.”

  “I’m glad I’m not a plant. I like to go places,” Frisa announces. “Can we go on your ship some time?”

  “Where would you like to go?”

  “Some place where people are happy. I want Mommy and Pergun to be happy. Then I’ll be happy all the time.”

  Dorrin represses a sigh. “It’s not always like that.”

  “I know that. You want Mommy to be happy, don’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Then you’ll take her and Pergun on your ship, won’t you?”

  Dorrin laughs softly. “If I can make the ship go, they can come.”

  “Good! You always make things work.” Frisa skips to her feet. “Can I tell Mommy?”

  “Only if you tell her that I’ll try to take everyone.”

  “Mommy will be happy. So will Pergun.” Frisa skips down the ridge toward the brush barricade and the house and barn… and the weapons practice. Dorrin rubs his chin. Reisa had been a blade, but why has he never considered Yarrl as one? Because the smith never mentioned weapons?

  His fingers touch the brinn again, as he lifts his head toward the house and the slope leading to the pond, his ears picking up Frisa’s announcement.

  “Master Dorrin says he’ll take everyone on his ship. If he can make it work. But he’ll make it work. He always does.”