Shane suddenly contracted Davith’s cough and the other man pounded his back with retaliatory enthusiasm.
“It’s not high art,” said Ashes. “Once you’ve figured out how to rig the springs, they’re rather boring to make. But it left me plenty of free time to invent the things I was really interested in.”
A moment or two passed while everyone recovered themselves. Wren looked deep in thought.
Marguerite’s lips kept twitching every time she looked in Shane’s direction. He cleared his throat and moved away from Davith to avoid any more thumping.
“So you invented a magic box that makes salt?” he asked, praying to the gods that this would lead to a change of subject.
“It’s not magic,” said the artificer. “There’s a tiny bit of the mechanism that has to be done by a blacksmith-priest of the Forge God, but that’s not exactly magic, is it? More of a miracle. Are miracles magic?”
The paladins of the Saint of Steel were primarily known for being unstoppable killing machines, and rather less for their grasp of applied theology. “Uh…I…ah…maybe?”
“Hmm, that would be an interesting question. At any rate, only one part of the box requires intervention beyond that of ordinary mortals, and that’s the bit that moves heat from one part to another.” She waved one surprisingly delicate hand. “It’s really a very simple device. Fresh water freezes faster than salt, yes?”
“Yes,” said Shane, back on firmer ground.
“Of course it does. That’s one of the ways they harvest salt up in Morstone, they freeze off the fresh and concentrate it into brine. That’s basically what my device does. Fresh water floats on top of salt because of the difference in specific gravity, we freeze the top, we output the ice, we freeze the top again, until we’re down to a concentrated salt brine. Then we boil it. The really impressive bit happens after, if you ask me, since seawater is full of impurities and of course nobody wants to be putting dried fish piss on their potatoes.”
Shane paused a moment to give this turn of phrase the attention it deserved, then frowned. “But if it is so simple, why are people not doing so already?”
“Oh, they can,” said Magnus. “They did it all the time. That’s the method behind a saltworks, usually, you have a series of brine tanks that are getting evaporated down. But in order to do it on a large scale, you need the right climate for it. Most of the coastline between Morstone and Delta is rock cliffs, you’d have to build floating platforms—and people do that, too—but of course one good howling windstorm through the Toxocan Straits and your saltworks is on the bottom of the ocean. And Delta’s a marvelous city, but it rains five days out of six and on the sixth, the air is humid enough to chew.” She grinned. “The food’s amazing, though. One of my favorite cities.”
“So how is your machine different, then?”
“Because you only need a little bit of heat to prime it. A log now and again. I was annoyed by the waste, you see. You need heat to evaporate the brine, but most of that heat is lost and not good for
anything. And we want to take heat out of the water to make the ice. So why not just take the heat out of the water and store it and then use that heat to boil the brine with? So I invented a device to do that.
The Forge God’s people were very helpful, although I think I confused them. But once I convinced one to make an element that took out the heat and stored it, then put it back again, a couple of their brighter youngsters worked it out. It’s just two little pieces of steel, although we had an exciting time working out the right sizes and shapes.”
“And that’s not magic?” asked Shane skeptically.
“Nah, it’s just the trick they do to make steel heat evenly in the forge, only a bit more so. Their smith-priests learn to do it practically out of the cradle, or whatever the equivalent is for baby priests.”
“Acolytehood,” said Shane, on slightly firmer ground now.
“This is all quite fascinating,” said Marguerite, scrambling forward to the front of the wagon, “but we have a problem.”
“Problem?”
“We’re being followed.”
FORTY-ONE
SHANE LOOKED BEHIND THEM, startled, and saw Wren sit up abruptly, though he could not make out anyone on the road behind them. Ashes only nodded. There was a sudden grim set to her lips. “The horseman from earlier?”
“I think so, yes.” Marguerite scowled. “They’ve been very good about staying one turn back, but the few times they couldn’t, it looked like him. And a few friends. I think…five.”
“How do you know they’re following us?” asked Shane. Too late, it occurred to him that might be taken as skepticism, and he hurriedly added, “I’m not doubting. Just curious.”
She cast him a wry look. “On these roads? A group on horseback should have overtaken us within minutes. The only reason they haven’t is because they’re hanging back.”
Ashes was already slapping the reins across the backs of the mules. “Time to move,” she told them.
“Can we outrun them?” asked Shane, looking dubiously at the mules.
“Not a hope in hell,” Ashes said. “But at least they’ll have to work for it.”
He scanned the landscape, looking for cover. If they had been in a forest—a city—even somewhere with decent bushes, he could have waited until they had pulled around a bend and the others could hide while he took the wagon on alone and drew pursuit. But there was nothing. They had crossed a river not long before, which had actual trees, but now the shrubs were all knee-high heather that wouldn’t hide a toddler. The only cover was occasional knots of boulders that had fallen from farther up the mountain, and it would be immediately obvious to any pursuer where their quarry must have gone to ground.
Far up on a distant hillside, he saw a cluster of buildings. Would the residents help?
“If I get off the wagon,” he said slowly, “I can try to slow them. Maybe you can get to that steading up there.”
“Slow them? On foot?” asked Marguerite dubiously. “How—no, never mind, I know how. That’s suicidal! One man on foot against five horsemen?”
Shane shrugged. “After a point, a horseman is simply a larger target.” He didn’t enjoy killing horses, but the black tide did not distinguish. When the Saint of Steel had still lived…well, that was
before and this was after and there was no point in dwelling on it.
“I’m more concerned that they aren’t going to stop and fight you,” said Ashes, her eyes still on the road. “You’re not the one they’re after. I expect a few of them will simply go around you. Possibly all of them.”
“That is my fear,” Shane acknowledged. “You’ll have Wren here, but if they all break around me...”
Wren looked at Shane, then at Davith, then back at Shane. She nodded.
“Ah…you know, I think maybe I’ll come with you,” said Davith. “Buy the ladies some time, right?”