by K. J. Parker
A splash of water, and the unmistakable quack-quack-quackquack of a drake sounding the general alarm. Valens tensed with anger, because he hadn’t made any noise; if the ducks had taken fright and launched out onto the river, they were cheating. He scowled, and realized how ridiculous his reaction was, but that didn’t really make it any better. He leaned round the tree trunk and saw a solitary drake, head up, floating on the calm, deep water of the river-bend. Bastard, he thought, and nocked an arrow. The drake looked at him smugly, as if he knew he was a sitting target and therefore safe. Valens whistled, then shouted, but the drake stayed where he was. Fine, Valens thought; he pushed the bow handle away with his left hand and drew the string back with his right until his shoulder blades were jammed together and his right thumbnail brushed against the corner of his mouth. He glanced along the arrow shaft until he could see the duck on the point of the blade, then dropped his aim a hand’s span. At that point, the three fingers of his right hand against which the bowstring pressed should have relaxed (you don’t let go of the string, they’d told him when he was a boy, you drop it); but nothing seemed to be happening. The countdown was running in his mind: three, four, five, and then it was too late. Still restraining the string, he let it jerk his arm forward; the jolt hurt his shoulder and his elbow, and he dropped the arrow onto the ground. The drake made a rude noise, unfolded its wings and lifted off the water in a flailing haze of spray.
He stooped and picked up the arrow. Obviously not my day for killing things, he thought. He lifted his foot to step into the bow and unstring it, then changed his mind. Nocking the arrow once again, he walked slowly and steadily along the bank, trying to persuade himself that it didn’t really matter whether he put up anything to shoot at or not. No sign of any ducks; but that was just as well, since they weren’t in season yet. At the point where the coppice was too thick to pass through, he turned away from the river and started to walk back uphill. He’d taken no more than five steps when a young pricket buck stepped out of nowhere, stopped, turned its head and looked at him.
He felt the breath go solid in his throat. Ten yards away, no more, and broadside on; but if he moved at all, he’d lose it; there’d be a flash of motion and the buck would be gone. He forced himself to keep still, as the deer studied him, trying to reconcile the lack of movement with the presentiment of danger. To take his mind off the pressure building in his lungs, he made a dispassionate assessment of the quarry. One stud horn, he noticed, the other broken off about half an inch above the crown; a fairly miserable animal all round, thin and spindly-legged, with a narrow chest and too much neck; a weakling, no use to the herd, no prize for a hunter. It watched him, eyes wide, ears forward. I was you once, Valens thought, but not anymore. Nevertheless, I shall ask your permission. I’ll make a mistake, and if you run, so be it. As slowly as he could, he lifted the bow, watching the deer’s neck all the time over the arrow tip. When he’d put the point on the spot just above the front shoulder, he dropped his aim to allow for the arrow’s jump and trusted his fingers to know what to do. He felt the string pull out, dragging against the pads of his fingertips. For a fraction of a second, he closed his eyes.
The sound was right; both shearing and sucking, as the sharp edges of the arrowhead slit open their channel. He opened his eyes and saw the buck stagger a little against the shove of the penetrating arrow. Inch-perfect in the heart. He saw the moment of death, and watched the fall of the carcass, like an empty sack flopping.
He let go the breath he’d been holding for as long as he could remember, and in his mind he was carefully phrasing a paradox for a letter he’d never write; about how a living animal is a pig, a cow, a sheep or a deer, but a dead one is pork, beef, mutton, venison; the two are so completely different that the same word can no longer be applied. The thing lying on the leaf mold in front of him was venison now, so completely changed that it was almost impossible to believe it had ever been alive. He thought of the battlefields he’d seen — all Jarnac Ducas’ fault, for mentioning the corpse-robbers he was planning to deal with; if anybody had a word for it, a trade or technical term, it’d be them. Maybe there was one, but he doubted it; the difference being that the dead meat of human beings is no use to anybody.
He went forward, knelt beside the carcass and forked the fingers of his left hand round the shaft of the arrow at the point where it entered the wound. Drawing slowly with his right hand, he pulled the arrow out, and winced as a spot of blood hopped off the blade onto his cheek. I could still prevent the war, he thought. It would be the right thing to do, and I’d do it, if only …
If only Orsea wasn’t her husband. But he is; which means there’ll have to be a war, and killing, a wholesale conversion of life into waste, and one of those lives will quite probably be mine. He looked up sharply, as if expecting to see the hunter watching him, surprised in mid-breath, over the blade of his arrow. Nothing to see, of course; but just because he’s not visible doesn’t mean he’s not there, and now it’s his turn to ask my permission.
He wiped the arrow and put it back in the quiver, then stood up and unstrung the bow. Ask away, he thought, I’ve already made that decision; nor do I begrudge you your shot.
He paused, listening. He could hear the river, the creaking of the tall, spindly birches behind him on the slope, the distant miserable voices of crows. Nothing unusual or disturbing, nothing to put him on his guard. Maybe he couldn’t see the hunter for the same reason the deer hadn’t been able to see him; not that it mattered. So, he told himself, now I know: there’ll have to be a war, and I won’t survive it. Query, though: if I’d cheated and shot the drake sitting on the water, thereby scaring off the buck, would that have made a difference?
It was only a pricket, no more than thirty-five pounds dressed-out weight, but lugging it back up the hill on his shoulders left him aching and breathless. The warmth of its blood, trickling down under his collar and mixing with his own sweat, made his skin itch, and he had to stop halfway to adjust his grip, to stop the carcass sliding off his back. He startled the life out of the sentry at the sally port, now closed for the night, as he staggered out of the wood covered in blood.
He left the carcass for the guards to carry the rest of the way, and hurried up the back stairs to his tower room for a wash and a clean shirt. Unfortunately, there was someone lying in wait for him on the landing, hidden in the shadows. He was about to tell whoever it was to go away when he recognized the voice saying his name.
“Oh,” he said, “it’s you.”
Ziani Vaatzes; staring at him as though he was some sort of extraordinary monster. “I’m sorry,” Vaatzes said, “it’s obviously a bad time. I’ll come back later.”
Valens grinned. He was exhausted, bloody all over and visibly in no fit state to conduct official business; but Vaatzes was an outsider and didn’t count. “Don’t worry about it,” he said. “Come in and talk to me while I get cleaned up.”
By the time Valens had pulled off his sodden, sticky shirt, three middle-aged women had appeared out of nowhere with hot water and towels. Valens knew who they were — he knew everybody in the castle, naturally — but he had no idea how they’d got there, and it wouldn’t have occurred to him to ask. He dipped a towel in the water jug and scrubbed the back of his neck.
“So,” he said, “what’s on your mind?”
Vaatzes was looking away. “You wrote me a note asking for suggestions about how to block up the silver mines,” he said. “I’ve been thinking about it.”
“What? Oh, yes. Excellent. What’ve you come up with?”
“That depends,” Vaatzes said to the opposite wall, as Valens poured the rest of the water over his head. “Really, it’s a case of how thoroughly you want the job done.”
“I see.” Valens nodded. “Well, you know the reasoning behind it. First priority’s got to be making sure the Mezentines can’t open the mines up again in a hurry. If they got hold of them and got them back into production, they’d have all the money they need to p
ay for the war against us. On the other hand, if and when the war’s over and the Mezentines have gone away, we’ll need to get the mines going again as soon as we can. Basically, it comes down to cost-effectiveness. Our labor won’t cost us anything, because we can use the army or conscripted workers. They’ve got to pay labor costs and make a profit. Is that any help? It’s all right,” he added, toweling his hair and pulling on his fresh shirt, “you can look round now and it won’t be high treason.”
Vaatzes nodded. “Seems to me,” he said, “you want to make it look like the mines have been sabotaged beyond economic repair, enough to fool the Mezentine engineers, but really you’ve only damaged them a little.”
“Exactly.” Valens sat down on the bed and dragged off his muddy, ruined shoes. “Not much to ask, but presumably you’re going to tell me it’s not possible.”
“Oh, it’s possible,” Vaatzes replied. “Everything’s possible in engineering; it’s just that some things take more time and money than they’re worth.”
Valens shrugged. “Go on,” he said.
“Well.” Vaatzes hovered for a moment, then rested his back awkwardly against one of the bed pillars. Not someone, Valens decided, who thinks well standing up. “Everybody knows how you collapse a mine. You stuff the weight-bearing gallery full of brushwood and charcoal, soak it down with gallons of lamp oil, set light to it and run like hell. You might need to set up a few big double-action bellows at the outlets of the ventilation shafts, but in most cases the fire’ll draw enough air on its own to do the job. Anyhow, you light your big fire, which burns out the prop shafts, and down comes the roof. Entirely effective, but if you want to open the mine up again, it’d be easier to dig new shafts than try and clear out the old ones.”
Valens nodded. “Everybody knows that, do they? That’s encouraging. Sorry, carry on.”
Vaatzes shifted his back a little. “My idea,” he went on, “is to build a reinforced chamber, sort of like a cage, about a hundred yards down the main gallery. Instead of wooden props, you use iron, and you have a big, thick iron fire door to close it off. You burn out the first hundred yards in the usual way, but because the reinforced chamber’s got iron props, they won’t burn out, and the fire door’ll stop the fire spreading past the chamber and damaging the gallery beyond. So long as the enemy don’t know about it, they’ll assume you caved in the gallery and the mine’s useless. Once they’ve gone home, you’ll have to excavate the first hundred yards, but the rest of the mine ought to be intact.” He paused, then went on, “It’s fairly simple and straightforward, but it’d have to be done right. The ironwork needs to be pretty massive, and it’ll have to be prefabricated above ground, carried down the mine and assembled down there in the dark, so you’d need precise measurements and close, fine work.” He hesitated, though Valens was fairly sure it was mostly for effect. “To be honest,” he went on, “I’m not entirely sure you’ve got enough skilled workers available to do the job.”
Valens smiled at him. “Except, of course,” he said, “I’ve got you.”
“Me.” Vaatzes smiled. “I’m flattered, but I don’t think I’d be quite enough, somehow. I’ve done a few rough calculations, and I reckon you’d need a dozen good blacksmiths, plus strikers and men to work the bellows, so that’s three dozen; then you’ll need carpenters, masons, carters …”
“Fine.” Valens shrugged. “I’ll have them recruited. We do have skilled artisans in this country, you know.”
“Actually,” Vaatzes frowned, “you don’t. Not what I’d call skilled, anyhow. No disrespect intended, it’s simply a fact. You’ve got men who can make horseshoes and door hinges, but that’s not the same thing.”
Valens looked up at him. “Is that right?” he said.
“I’m afraid so. I’ve been wandering around the city over the last few weeks,” Vaatzes went on, “poking my nose in, that sort of thing. I’ve visited pretty well every smithy in town, but I haven’t seen anybody I’d give a job to. It’s perfectly simple,” he added. “The Vadani are a nation of shepherds who suddenly came into money about a century ago, when the silver mines were opened. Since then, you haven’t needed home-grown craftsmen; you’ve got the money, so it’s easier to buy stuff from abroad than make it here. You go into any barn or workshop and look around, you’ll find most of the tools that aren’t a hundred years old were made in Mezentia. Mass-produced good-quality hardware, everything from nails to scythes and plowshares. The Republic trades with your merchants, finished goods for silver; the merchants sell the stuff to the pedlars, who go round the villages and farms and take payment for what they sell in wool, cheese, flour, whatever. It’s actually a pretty advanced way of running an economy — you concentrate on doing what you do best, and leave manufacturing to specialists. The problem comes when you’re cut off from your supplier — or when you suddenly need home-grown craftsmen, as you do now. Has it occurred to you that every time one of your archers shoots an arrow, you can’t replace the arrowhead? All imported, from the people you’re currently at war with. Same goes for armor; I’ve been taking a professional interest, so to speak, and all your guards’ kit was made in the Republic. Best-quality munitions-grade equipment, but there’s no more where that came from. I’m sorry,” he added, “I’d have thought you’d have been aware of that.”
Valens was quiet for a moment. “Apparently not,” he said. “You know,” he went on, “it’s a bit hard. I’ve never had many illusions about myself, but I’ve always kidded myself that I’m not a complete idiot. Oh well. I guess it’s better to find out now rather than later.” He sighed, and stood up. “I don’t suppose there’s anything I can do about it, is there?”
Vaatzes smiled. “As a matter of fact,” he said, “there is.”
“Really?” Valens turned and looked at him. “Oh, sit down, for crying out loud, instead of hopping about on one foot like a jackdaw. Go on then. Tell me.”
Vaatzes looked round, found a chair and sat on it. “The Eremians,” he said. “Because they’ve never had the advantages your people have had, they’re used to making the things they need. Not to Mezentine standards, obviously, but their craftsmen know the basics, and they can be taught. I found that out when I was working for Duke Orsea. Now, thanks to the war, there’s a fair number of Eremian refugees who’ve been forced out of their villages by the Mezentines. As I understand it, you’ve been cautious —understandably — about letting them cross the border. Fair enough; you’ve got enough problems as it is without several thousand extra hungry mouths to feed. But as I understand it, every Eremian village had its own smith, carpenter and so on. You don’t need that many; a couple of hundred, that’s all. They’ll do your skilled work for you, and they’ll train up your own artisans while they’re at it. It’s not going to happen overnight, particularly since we’re evacuating, so everything’ll have to be done in tents or off the backs of carts. Fortunately, making arrowheads isn’t all that difficult, your people can learn it quickly enough.”
Valens nodded. “All right,” he said. “What about armor? Can you teach them to make that?”
Vaatzes shook his head. “That takes time,” he said. “Also, there’s more to it. You don’t just need armorers, you’ve got to have furnaces to smelt iron ore; mills, preferably, for rolling pig iron into sheet, but that’s rather a big leap forward; in the meanwhile, you need a lot of strong men with big hammers. In the short term, I’d recommend killing as many Mezentines as you can and robbing their corpses.”
“Funny you should mention that.” Valens shook his head. “All right,” he went on. “Point taken. Congratulations on your appointment as controller of ordnance. Make a list of everything you need and I’ll see you get it as a priority.” He paused. “That’s why you came to see me, I take it.”
“Yes.”
“Then I’m obliged to you,” Valens said briskly. “My father always used to say, it doesn’t matter if you’re ignorant so long as you can find people to know stuff for you. Stupidity is staying ignoran
t when you don’t have to. He said a lot of sensible things, my father; it’s a shame he never acted on them.” He looked up and grinned. “Why are you still here? Suddenly you’re the busiest man in the duchy, you’d better get a move on.”
“The mine project,” Vaatzes said gently. “My idea about using reinforced sections. Do you want me to make a start on that?”
“Yes, if you can. Can you?”
“I expect so,” Vaatzes said. “I’ll need to get accurate measurements of the shafts of the mines you want blocked off. Who should I see about that?”
“They’ll come and see you,” Valens replied. “You’re too busy to go traipsing about visiting people. Oh,” he added, “while I think about it. Presumably if you’re going to be doing all this important work, you’ll want paying for it.”
Vaatzes raised his eyebrows. “That’d be nice,” he said mildly. “I hadn’t given it any thought, to be honest with you.”
Valens frowned. “You know what,” he said, “I believe you haven’t. That’s curious. Is it a burning desire to help the beleaguered Vadani people, or are you just bored with sitting around all day with nothing to do?”
“Something like that,” Vaatzes said. “But I’m happy to leave all that up to you.”
“Really?” Valens said. “Well, the way things are at the moment, money wouldn’t be a lot of use to you; there won’t be an awful lot you can buy with it, and when we’re all living out of wagons and wheelbarrows, carting it around with you is likely to be a nuisance. You’ll just have to trust me to make it up to you if and when life gets back to normal.”
Vaatzes shrugged. “Fine,” he said. “Right, I’ll go and make the list of things I need. When I’ve done that, who should I see?”
