Telepath (A Hyllis Family Story #4)

by Laurence Dahners

  Tarc went at it with the sledgehammer and the section of wall readily broke free. He turned to her, “Wow! This is way easier! You’d be a natural at a construction site.”

  “Oh, that’s just what I’ve always wanted to hear,” Daussie said, shaking her head as if in disgust, though Tarc thought she felt proud of what she could do.

  Tarc dropped the end of one of their ropes down through the enlarged hole and said, “Give me a minute to climb in. I need to figure out how big the hole needs to be for us to get the stuff out.”

  It was much easier to climb through the newly enlarged hole. Daussie passed in a lamp and Tarc climbed down. “Okay, you can keep weakening the right vertical limb of the opening I marked out. I’ll look around.”

  He quickly surveyed the shelves he’d seen the first time. Everything was gone off the lower shelves, but the upper shelves still had clumps of material on them. The kid they were letting down in here wasn’t tall enough to get the stuff off the upper shelves, Tarc thought.

  Rather than spend much time on the shelves, he went back to the buried tubing under the opening. It didn’t look like any of it’d been removed. The kid was too small to dig too, he thought. Besides, they couldn’t have gotten those things out through the hole. He started measuring the wheelchair against the length of his arm.

  ~~~

  Daussie slowed how rapidly she was punching out wafers of concrete to one every two seconds. She hoped the slower rate would let her work for an extended period without getting a headache.

  Tarc asked her for a shovel and she passed one down. She’d punched a few more holes when a voice behind her said, “What do you think you’re doing?”

  Daussie gritted her teeth in frustration that she’d failed to send out her ghost occasionally so nobody’d be able to sneak up behind her. She slowly stood and turned. Two men stood behind her. She stretched her back—tired from crouching down to put her head close to the wall—and said, “We’re the people who just leased this land. Who are you and what are you doing on our property?”

  The closest man grinned, “Well, hello, little lady.”

  Daussie didn’t need Kazy to tell her the guy was impressed with her looks. She fixed him with a steady look, “Again, who are you?”

  “Well now,” he said, as if disappointed by her tone. “We’re the folks who’re salvaging the ancient stuff outta that room behind you. Our work won’t keep you from using your lease on the land.”

  Daussie shook her head, “Sorry. We rented the land just so we could salvage the stuff ourselves.”

  The man arched an eyebrow, “Well now, I can see that you’re new around here. You don’t know how things are done.” He grinned, “I’ll be happy to explain it to you.” He pointed his chin at the opening into the room, “Who’s down in there?” His eyes widened as they ran around the opening, “And how’d you make that opening so much bigger?”

  “My brother,” Daussie said flatly. “He made the opening bigger with a hammer.” She sent her ghost back down into the room to see if Tarc had noticed they had visitors. He was just pulling himself up into the opening.

  The man evidently noticed Tarc at the same moment. He nudged his companion with an elbow, and spoke in an ugly tone, “Looky here. The purdy girl has a punk-ass brother.”

  Daussie felt Tarc climbing through the opening and moved a little to the side to let him out. She hoped he had a good idea for dealing with these guys. She didn’t want to give them permanent injuries but didn’t think putting pepper in their noses would keep them from sneaking back. Besides, she’d realized peppering too many people could result in the phenomenon being associated with her. That could result in her being accused of witchery.

  When Tarc stood up, Daussie thought the two men looked surprised, perhaps by his muscular height.

  Tarc gave the men a hard look as he said, “This particular ‘punk ass brother’s’ been trained in the ancient fighting arts. I’d suggest you not ogle his sister.”

  The man in front drew a short sword. Daussie tensed. She hadn’t noticed it because its short length had hung mostly behind him. He said, “Yeah, well, I carry this big ass knife. Do your ‘ancient fighting arts’ help you survive getting stuck by a sword?”

  Tarc’s voice seemed to come from inside Daussie’s right ear canal, “Cut the sword most of the way through, obliquely, near its base.” Aloud, he spoke to the man while bending over as if he were stretching. He spoke calmly, as if bored. “That sword doesn’t frighten me, but it does put you at great risk if it makes me angry. I’d advise you to apologize.”

  Anger exploded across the man’s face and he started to step forward. Tarc threw a handful of dirt at him—evidently what he’d actually bent over to get when he appeared to be stretching.

  The man pitched to the side—Daussie assumed because Tarc had just spun the fluid in his semicircular canals.

  Unable to help himself, the man reached down with his sword, bracing himself with it.

  The sword promptly broke through the area at the base that Daussie’d weakened.

  Tarc was on him as he fell, driving him to the earth. The man had already been incapacitated, but Daussie thought Tarc wanted him to believe that what he was feeling came from Tarc’s attack, rather than some mystical witchery.

  The second man stumbled back in surprise. By the time he recovered and surged forward to help his friend, Tarc was already rising. Tarc slapped the second man. His eyes widened, then twitched to the side as he pitched over—sans equilibrium.

  Neither of them threw up, though from the expressions on their faces Daussie thought both of them felt like it. By the time they’d gotten their wits about them, Tarc had used one of their ropes to tie their wrists behind them—one end of the rope for each of the men. When the one who’d had the sword glared at Tarc and began to tell him how sorry he’d be, Tarc slapped him lightly on the side of the head and spun his canals again. “This is called a ‘Eustachian blow,’” he said conversationally. “An ancient fighting technique that makes your opponent dizzy. I’ll be happy to keep smacking you until you develop a better attitude.” He barked a little laugh, “Hopefully sooner rather than later.”

  Tarc picked up the broken fragments of the man’s sword and stepped over his moaning form. Giving the second man a hard look, he said, “You need another Eustachian blow like your friend here?”

  Wide-eyed, the man slowly shook his head. Daussie didn’t think he wanted to shake it rapidly for fear it might bring on his dizziness again.

  Tarc climbed back down in the pit around the opening in the concrete. Daussie had climbed out of the pit during the confrontation. She followed him down and leaned close so they could speak quietly. “Eustachian? The Eustachian tubes have nothing to do with balance!”

  “Yeah, but it sounds good. I thought ‘semicircular blow’ lacked pizzazz.”

  Daussie snorted a little laugh, “Thanks for stopping those guys so I didn’t have to do something drastic.”

  “Why didn’t you pepper their noses?”

  Daussie explained her concern that, if everyone who irritated her started sneezing, someone would decide she was doing it through witchery. “When you get in a fight, everything happens so fast they just think you’re an astonishing fighter who knows some fancy strikes. They don’t have any idea you’re cheating.”

  Tarc gave her a disbelieving look out of the corner of his eye. “I am an astonishing fighter,” he said quietly, “What do you mean, ‘cheating’?”

  Daussie rolled her eyes, “You spun the fluid in their canals! That’s not fighting, it’s cheating.”

  Tarc didn’t respond to the accusation. He measured out the opening, using the length of his arms or forearms as units. As he scraped new lines for Daussie to cut, he said, “We need to figure out something you can do that’ll give people pause, but not make them think you’re a witch.”

  “Yeah,” Daussie said with a sigh.

  Tarc picked up the broken sword and held it out to her. �
��Do you think you could make a perfectly flat smooth cut all the way across this sword?”

  Daussie frowned, “Yeah, but why? It’s already broken.”

  “I’ve been wondering if I can weld metal.”

  “Weld?”

  “Melting pieces of metal together. The ancients did it all the time.”

  Daussie drew back, “Surely you don’t think your ability can produce enough heat to melt steel?!”

  Tarc shrugged, “Maybe? I can probably only melt a few molecules on either side of the joint and I don’t know if that’s enough, but I’d like to try it. I’d need you to cut perfectly flat surfaces on each side. That way I could fit them back together perfectly. Cuts so smooth that there’d be complete contact of the metal on each side so I wouldn’t have to melt big puddles of metal to bridge the gap.”

  “I don’t know,” Daussie said slowly, staring at the break in the sword. It was a mixture of the smooth area where she’d cut it and rough spots where the remaining metal broke.

  Tarc tilted his head, “I thought of welding a while ago but didn’t think you could make smooth enough cuts. Then I saw how smooth you cut those agates. But, can you make flat cuts, or only spherical ones?”

  “I’ve been making flat ones to break the concrete, but I don’t know whether they’re as flat as you need.”

  “Give it a try. Make them as parallel to the ‘weakening’ cut as you can,” Tarc said.

  “Why?” Daussie asked curiously, staring at the broken surface of the metal.

  “If they’re not, the sword’ll be crooked when I weld it back together.”

  Daussie exerted her talent and a sliver of metal fell off the broken surface. It left a gleaming mirror finish on the cut surface. Tarc said, “Oh, that looks good.”

  Daussie reached to feel the cut but Tarc stopped her. “From the little I’ve been able to read about welding, it helps if the pieces you’re welding are really clean.”

  “Do you think it’s flat enough?”

  Tarc held it up and stared at the surface from several different angles. “It looks flat, and the little image it reflects doesn’t look at all rippled.” He laid the two pieces of the sword together and lined them up so the blade looked straight, packing little piles of dirt underneath parts of each piece to hold them in place. “Can you make a cut on the blade piece that’s parallel to your new one on the handle piece?”

  Daussie leaned down so her head was only inches from the sword, saying, “I’ll try.” She leaned up and nudged the blade end closer to the handle fragment, then leaned close again. When she rose, she said, “Hmm, with my head so close, my ghost gives me a really good image. I think the cuts are flat and in good contact. Tell me what you think.”

  Tarc leaned down so his head was as close as Daussie’s had been. “Wow. You’re right the image really is good.” He used his ghost to move the pieces of the sword into even closer together and then to push a few grains of sand around beneath them so they’d be more precisely aligned, achieving even better contact.

  While Tarc adjusted the alignment, Daussie said, “Of course the image is good. Didn’t I just tell you that?”

  Tarc snorted softly and said, “Please hold the stupid comments for a moment while I try a weld.”

  His eyes showed him a small red glow where his ghost was heating a tiny area at one edge of the cut in the sword. He thought he might feel the heat on his skin, but couldn’t be sure. His ghost could feel the metal flow together though. When he let it cool his ghost showed him a spot of bridging metal.

  However, as the metal cooled, it contracted. A gap appeared at the other edge of the sword. “Damn, I should’ve welded the center first!” He looked up at Daussie, embarrassed. “Can you cut the weld I made at the near edge?”

  She snorted, “You should’ve let me keep heckling you. It throws you off if I’m not riding your case.”

  Tarc shook his head and stood, “I’m going to go talk to our friends while you delicately undo my mistake.” He climbed out of the pit and stepped over to the two men.

  They’d pulled themselves up and were sitting back to back, leaning against one another. Tarc saw their hands moving when he climbed out of the pit. He suspected they were trying to undo one another’s knots. The one who’d had the sword looked sullen and angry.

  Tarc smiled at them, “How’re you guys doing?”

  The swordsman only glared. The other man sounded apologetic, “Sorry we troubled you. We’re just trying to feed our families.”

  Tarc walked around to the second man and said, “I’m Tarc Hyllis. Would you mind giving me your name?”

  “Keller Sarno.”

  “My dad always said to respect a man who’s trying to feed his family, would you like a job?”

  The man gave Tarc a surprised look, “Doing what?”

  “I’m pretty sure there’s quite a bit of stainless steel buried under a big mound of dirt down in that concrete room,” Tarc said, jerking a thumb over his shoulder to make it fully evident what room he was talking about. “We need help digging it out.”

  “What’re you paying?” Sarno asked suspiciously.

  “Twenty-five standard coppers for a good day’s work.”

  Sarno looked doubtful, “If there’s stainless under there, it’s worth a lot more than twenty-five coppers.”

  Tarc shrugged. “You want to pay your share of the rent and the price of the shovels and rope, whether we find any steel or not?”

  The guy’s eyes widened slightly, “No!”

  “Okay. Twenty-five coppers for a day’s digging?”

  Sarno looked thoughtful, then gave a nod.

  Tarc squatted down, “Lean forward and I’ll untie you.”

  Once Sarno stood up, the guy who’d had the sword asked, “What about me?”

  Tarc stepped around to look at him. He still looked sullen, though no longer angry. “What about you?”

  The guy blinked as if surprised by Tarc’s question. “Do I get the same deal as Keller?”

  Tarc rubbed his chin consideringly, “I don’t know. You seem like kind of an asshole.”

  “I’m not!” the man said belligerently.

  Tarc slowly shook his head, “Now, see there? That was just the way an asshole would say it. I think you need to stay tied up a while longer.” Tarc stood up and stepped over to the pit. Seeing that Daussie was kneeling near the end of the line Tarc had marked out, he said, “Hey Dauss, I’m gonna make that hole bigger before we get down in there to start work.”

  Daussie blinked up at him for a moment, then seemed to understand what he wanted. She climbed out of the hole.

  Tarc stepped down into the pit and picked up the sledgehammer. It took him about ten massive swings to knock out the section Daussie’d weakened. He climbed up out of the pit, coughing, “Let’s give it a few minutes for the dust to clear.” He glanced surreptitiously at the two men

  They were gaping at the opening he’d created.

  Tarc went over to the swordsman and lifted him to his feet, saying, “We can’t leave a hostile guy like you in a position to cause us harm while we’re working down in there.”

  “What do you mean?” the man asked fearfully.

  Realizing the guy thought Tarc meant to kill him, he said, “I’m going to tie you to that tree over there… where you can’t get up to any mischief.” At the tree, Tarc checked the binding of the man’s wrists, finding the knots loosened. He tightly re-tied them and then secured the man to the tree with the remainder of the rope.

  Stepping back around, he looked the man in the eyes again. “Nope,” he said, “you still look pretty bad-tempered. I’m thinking you aren’t the kind of guy we’d want working with us. Why don’t you try to think of how, if we let you go, you’d guarantee us you wouldn’t come back?”

  With that, Tarc turned on his heel and went back over to the opening down into the room. He talked briefly to Daussie, then he and Sarno climbed down into the room. Tarc took both sword fragments with him. He set
Sarno to digging out the wheelchair while he took a lamp over to the shelves and laid out the sword fragments. Collecting a few handfuls of dirt, he made some piles that lined up the blade approximately, then adjusted them with his head right next to the gap so he could judge the contact of the polished metal surfaces. He worked on it until the remaining gap was essentially undetectable. Daussie really did make perfectly flat cuts, he thought.

  Tarc used his ghost to make sure Keller was still over digging around the wheelchair, then leaned his head down close to the break in the sword. This time he heated a tiny spot in the center of the break. Centered not just edge to edge, but also front to back. When the expansion of the metal there caused the gap to widen in the area surrounding the heated metal, he almost used his ghost to try to squeeze the surfaces back together. Just in time, he realized that he might squish some of the molten metal out into the gap where it would hold the surfaces apart for good even after it cooled. Instead, he just waited for the metal to barely melt and puddle together. Once that happened, he stopped heating and backed carefully away.