“Sadly, yes. Said people might get the wrong idea. Mind you, this was just after those fakes a bunch of bored squaddies made in the back of a three-tonner in Aldershot were splashed all over the redtops as the real McCoy, and they weren't half as convincing as ours.”
“Do I want to know how you know they were taken in Aldershot?”
“We'll never find out, because I don't propose to tell you.” Matt attempted to stifle a yawn. “Excuse me.”
The Pioneer Companies are a uniquely dwarven institution, a hybrid military and commercial organisation that arose after groups of dwarven prospectors began falling victim to bandits in the remoter regions in the early 1100s, and demanded either protection from the military or the right to better protect themselves.
Mother did not let me burn the candle, or rather I did not ask her. Our older guest asked for me. It is bad manners to refuse a guest, and doubly bad when the request is so commonplace, so she did not dare say no. Now I am writing by candlelight in my corner of the loft and watching our guests sleep.
This has not been an ordinary night at all.
The fires at the boundary of Renth are only lit when greatcats have been seen, to frighten them away.
I wish that Sunday could be more like it is in the stories Teacher read us last week about the history of ancient worlds, where people thought it was sinful to work. Mother thinks it is sinful not to work, at any time, for any reason. If she could find a way for us to work in our sleep, I think she would. I know why she does it—she does not like being poor, and neither do I—but I still wish I had a little more time to myself. Oh well, I must be content with what I have. That is all anyone can do.
The town of Ironholt is sometimes referred to as 'the outstretched hand of dwarven industry and commerce' by the more high-minded merchants and scholars of Veropa. Most of its permanent residents are of the opinion that anyone shaking said hand will need a wash afterwards.
The town's raison d'etre is the steady two-way flow of wagons and barges between the Southern Heights and the plains and forests of Ardale and Ramela. Virtually every commercial enterprise in the entire city revolves around them, the more successful entrepreneurs living off their accumulated funds through the winter and the rest commuting back uphill to the more prosperous uplands; estimates vary, but the town council reckon that somewhere between one-third and half the town's population is made up of seasonal migrant workers when the caravans are running, and most of those who remain are employed by the public sector. The fact that such a massive chunk of its population up sticks for the Mountainhome as soon as the money dries up is probably symptom and cause of Ironholt being such a complete and utter dump.
“Ow fuck ow my fucking neck... Arrrgh.” Something went click as Matt half-fell out of the back of the Land Rover. “This is why I try not to fall asleep in cars.”
Before he knew it, Matt was in a large but surprisingly cosy room that had once been the manor house's banqueting hall, being introduced to one Septimus MacCready by a still-gushing Maeve. “Quite the hero, then, what?” the man chirruped, shaking Matt firmly by the hand.
“Right place, right time and apparently right combination of genes,” Matt replied diffidently. “It was somewhat thrust upon me. Though I made the acquaintance of a most charming young lady as a result, so all things considered I think I rather came out on top.”
Thobatol had been a lovely town, before... well, before whatever the hell happened. They must have spent weeks smoothing off the passageways, and almost every available wall had been engraved with images of the local wildlife, or scenes of everyday fortress activities and events out of history. Dwarves working in the forges and workshops, or digging coal and iron or working in the fields. Town meetings, elections of new mayors, visits from caravans or diplomats.
"Sergeant Adzasit, reporting as ordered, sir." The captain took his time returning my salute, measuring me up I suppose, or maybe trying to intimidate me; it's a trick I've seen a thousand times, though it loses its efficiacy after you've been on a few battlefields. He gave up after a bit, and motioned for me to sit down. I made myself as comfortable as possible on the minimally-padded stone seat, probably hand-picked from some apprentice's reject pile for use by subordinates; odds were that if you were in his office long enough to be bothered, you weren't popular.
“Only two stops between here and London, so we should have three quarters of an hour or so before we need to start worrying again,” he told Ariana, handing over her drink and another sandwich.
“Mary?” Helen murmured, half-awake. “Zat you? Time izzit...”
My sister is on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean. Why am I talking to
her?
And I can feel Nessie sleeping on my feet—so what is this right beside
me?
She cracked one eye open and looked.
Oh.
Moxie’s small form was curled against her side, breathing deep and even. Which
explains why I thought my sister was here. Mom and Dad used to laugh at us and
the boys, claimed we played Musical Beds all night long...
Briana shifted gears and pressed harder on the gas. Her jeep shot forward through the underbrush that had grown since the last time she'd made this trek.
"Don't go out there in that old thing," her mother always said. "It isn't an off-road vehicle!"
...well, technically this was a road. And Briana was in no mood to care.
The offices of the Bureau of Therianthrope Control had been hastily erected just outside the Denver city limits at the same time Sanctuary was built, a prefabricated barracks for a small army of bureaucrats and paper-shufflers. They’d been promised a proper building as soon as their budget allowed it.
Four years later, the rain still comes in every window and the air conditioning still quits if you look at it funny.
Of course, we have more important items in our budget than our own comfort.
I made my way down the river the next morning, mulling over the peculiarities of the Luxians. Cara hadn’t understood my question about the various gestures the women had used when talking about nightwalkers. “Of course they ward off evil differently,” she’d said, looking at me oddly. “Everyone finds her own wardings, and improves them over the course of her life. It’s what life is for.”
The differing timbre of
the cry she’d heard, and the remark about “air support,”
became clear the moment Amy stepped through the door. A bird of prey,
sleek and streamlined, was perched on Dale’s welding-glove-clad
arm, preening a wing.
“This is Perry,”
said Dale, lifting her arm. “He’s a peregrine falcon. No
one dives faster.”
I was a bit stuck on
how to introduce the topic of my water jug the next morning. “Excuse
me, but someone’s trying to poison me and I think it might be
you” isn’t the best opening line for conversation over
breakfast. Especially if the person you’re talking to was the
cook.
Amy whipped around.
Behind her, the bear-girl snarled.
A black-pelted panther
bounded out of the trees, voicing its scream of challenge again.
Behind it ran a red-furred wolf, a coyote, and a fox, fanning out as
they left the forest’s cover, their teeth bared and a
three-part growl sounding.
Oh, God, what now?
Amy felt her knees begin to give as the panther and the fox
closed in, the wolf and the coyote hanging back. I don’t
think I can take much more...
The first thing you
need to know is that Recorders don't lie.
I don't mean the
musical instrument, of course. Those lie all the time. Mostly they
lie around in a child's desk drawer after that child has
finished an embarrassing year at school learning to play hesitant
renditions of old tunes on them. But I digress.
Alex was saved from his momentary doubt by the lifting of his rescuer’s head. The oval face was as clearly female as any he had ever seen. He forced himself to concentrate on its contours rather than its surroundings and began again. “I thank you for the favor of our lives, mistress. Might I know your name?”
She didn't know the
town's name, or how far she'd run. There had only been brief snatches
of sleep, grabbed wherever she could find somewhere to hide as she
fled from the burned-out shell that had once been her home and those
who sought to finish what they'd begun there.
Alexander, the second son of Baron Steven Redstone, was hiding again.
Let me try to sum this up. I know myself to be one of the best spell-singers in England—one of the handsomest as well, if I can believe the girls I meet in the village with all their swooning over my “fine green eyes” and “beautiful black hair”—and twenty-five years old, a full adult by anyone’s reckoning. And where do I spend most of my time? Up a tower or out in the forest, hoping my oh-so-loving father and my even-more-loving brother Matthias do not seek me too hard.
