Outlanders 20 Prodigal Chalice, page 26
"I'll try."
"Tell them to give up the stores," Lindstrohm suggested. "The amount of time they cut down on the news that I'm going to be doing business with Qiang will allow them to return for more supplies sooner. You don't need to camp out there. I cut a deal with you or I'm dead in the water here."
Ren quietly stared at him
"Deal with me now," Lindstrohm said, "or die with me later. I'm sure the last thing you want to tell Qiang is that this deal just went to hell in a handcart because some people down here got hungry while you had a fleet of ships out there with food."
"That's not what's going on," Ren objected.
"If I was Qiang," Lindstrohm promised, "one of the first things I'd ask was what you could have done to alleviate the situation."
"The ships' stores—"
"Are expendable where you're concerned," Lindstrohm said. "The oil we're bringing in isn't." He leaned back and let out a tense breath, feeling better and more in control after having said everything he had to say. He glanced at Narita.
She smiled slightly at him, a mere flickering of an amused expression, then she nodded.
"I think we're done here," Lindstrohm said. "I know I am. Get those ships' stores in by morning."
"At best," Ren said, looking away, "you're only buying yourself a few more days before this crude empire of yours collapses under its own weight."
"It's a few more days than I had when we first sat down," Lindstrohm said. "I'll take that."
"If Lord Qiang had known how things down here were—"
"He'd still have wanted the fucking oil." Lindstrohm glared at the Tong representatives. "Don't try to shit me about that. We both know the truth when it comes to that."
"Perhaps," Ren admitted. "But dealing with you now is going to be less pleasant than I'd hoped."
"If we both come out of this alive, let's just count our blessings and be done with it," Lindstrohm suggested. He leaned over and blew out the lantern, leaving the table an island mired in the shadows that filled the gaudy. "I expect to see those ships in the morning. No later than noon." He pushed up from the table and forced himself to walk out of the gaudy without turning back.
Vasquez walked at his side. "You did very good in there," she said when they were outside.
"Mebbe." Lindstrohm gazed at the night-dark street and the buildings around them that held pools of shadows. He hadn't forgotten that there were people in the ville who would kill him if they got the chance. Vasquez's personal escort flaring out around them was a grim reminder of that. "I'll believe it if those Tong ships show up tomorrow and start unloading on the docks."
"They will," Vasquez said. "They don't have a choice."
"Neither do we." Lindstrohm said angrily. He gazed at the ville around him. Nearly all of the streets in this area were picked clean, neatly arranged. A few shops had even opened up for trade to ship crews. Campecheville was showing signs of growth. "This is insane, Narita."
"What?"
"I've given these people homes and freedom, and I know they'll turn on me in a moment if they think it's in their best interests. I'm not just offering them their own lives—I'm offering them futures for their children. Children that they can live to see."
"I know, Harry." Her tone was sympathetic.
Lindstrohm blew out his breath. Vasquez did know. And she'd told him that the people he'd imported wouldn't appreciate his efforts. He just hadn't believed her. Now, as he walked through the streets of the ville he'd built from his dreams and hard work, he felt eyes on him, watching his every move.
Chapter 23
"That's Lindstrohm. He's more or less the baron of Campecheville. Only he don't call hisself that."
Kane stood at the second-floor window of one of the temporary housing units that had been established in the structures behind the dockyards. Not all of the structures were completely habitable. Work crews had evidently removed debris from the rooms and cleaned them up to a degree, but repairs hadn't been made yet.
He watched Lindstrohm walk from the gaudy and continue down the street. The low, full moon painted long' shadows against the cracked street. Kane nodded to the sec man that had pointed Lindstrohm out to him
"In the morning," the sec man continued as he stood at Kane's side, "after breakfast, you'll be offered a list of jobs. Everybody in Campecheville works."
Kane nodded, still feeling the heat of the low-grade fever that filled him The sec men had broken the new arrivals aboard Jeweled Lady into groups of ten, then took them to the barracks and started explaining the ville's expectations as well as what was offered.
It had taken hours to clear the sec posted in the harbor before they'd been allowed off the ship. An accounting had had to be made, and Blakeney's complaints had been listened to.
Fiddler's insistence that Kane had only acted in the best interests of all concerned—except for maybe Blakeney and his crew—had gone a long way to seeing them cleared. When the vote had been taken about whether to stay or go, Fiddler had opted to remain on Jeweled Lady, intending to go back "We start work in the morning?" Grant asked.
to the Gulf coastal areas and establish the fourth Fiddlerville. The sec man nodded. "If you ain't bleeding or injured, it all starts bright and early. When you get up, just follow the crowd that's up and moving. You get where they're going, that'll be breakfast."
Kane wished the woman luck, and she'd told him that if he didn't find what he was looking for in Campecheville he should look her up. Kane hadn't commented on the offer. Fiddler stayed aboard ship with Blakeney and his crew while the cargo was off-loaded. "Hungry now," Domi commented.
Work crews quickly repaired the superficial damage to Jeweled Lady's sails. She was loaded with fuel drums to replace the food stores that had been taken off, then she was escorted out of the harbor by gunships. Kane knew the albino was testing the water more than anything else. They'd eaten well aboard Jeweled Lady before the ship sailed an hour or so before dusk.
"You got any special skills?" the burly sec man asked. He actually had a small note pad. The sec man pointed to the water barrel in the community room. "Drink plenty of water. Fill up your belly and you'll keep just fine till morning."
"Like what?" Grant asked. "Got plenty food here?" Domi asked in a challenging voice.
"Machinery operator." The sec man shrugged. "Skilled labor. Something like that." The sec man looked only a little defensive. "We got plenty of food. You saw all that unloaded off that ship you come
"Wags," Grant replied. "We've all got wag experience." "Do repairs on them?" the sec man asked. "Thought that was going somewhere else," Domi persisted.
"Small stuff. If it's running, I can generally keep it running. If you're talking about a major overhaul, I'm not your man." "Well, it's not now," the man said. He looked at Domi, then at Brigid. "There's extra work for women. If you want it. Seem to get more men down this way than women."
"Something's better than nothing," the sec man said, making notations. "You're Kane?" "What kind of work?" Brigid asked.
"I'm Grant," Grant said, jerking a thumb at his friend. "He's Kane." The sec man nodded at the window. "There's a gaudy across the street. And we got more—"
Kane hadn't seen any reason to sign up under an assumed name. It would have been a pain in the ass to keep up with. Unless they -ran into someone from Cobaltville, it wouldn't be a problem. And if they did run into someone who remembered them from Cobaltville, an assumed name wouldn't offer much in the way of protection. Even though he knew Domi's reaction was coming, the fever aching within Kane's skull slowed him somewhat. He reached for the albino's wrist as her knife flashed for the sec man's throat. The point hovered less than an inch from the sec man's throat.
"You willing to work on the floating platforms?" the see man asked. The sec man dropped his hand to the blaster on his hip.
"Sure," Kane answered. "Do you get more jack for working the platforms?" Grant covered the sec man's hand with his own, restraining the man's hand so the blaster couldn't be drawn. "No," Grant advised in his deep voice. After the sec man looked at him, he slowly released the trapped hand.
"Some. Enough to make it worth your while if you decide you want to try it on." The sec man took his hand from the blaster. "Remember me, you little bone-colored bitch, because if you try something like that again I'll chill you."
Domi smiled sweetly at the sec man and sated her eyes. "I try again, I not have anyone there stop me."
"Put us down for general cleanup," Kane said. "If we change our minds, we'll let someone know."
"Sure." The sec man made a notation and left.
Head spinning slowly but surely, Kane turned to glance back at the room. Bug-infested pallets and bedding covered the floor, and occupation seemed up to those who were daring. A half-dozen people were in the room: four adults and two children. Only one of the adults and a young child still nursing remained awake.
"What do you know about the food supply here?" the thin woman with the nursing child asked She appeared pale and sickly, and only made a halfhearted attempt to cover her breasts.
"Nothing," Brigid replied. "We just know it's got to be hard to feed this many mouths."
The woman glanced down at the child she held. "There's more all the time, too. But I been noticing things since I've been here."
"Things like what?" Brigid asked.
"Like them taking food back off them two ships today," the woman replied, shifting the nursing child to her other breast. "I've never see that happen before."
"How long have you been here?"
"Nearly two years."
"Has there ever been a food shortage?" Brigid asked.
The woman shook her head. "We work hard here, but we eat, and nobody bothers nobody else. Baron Lindstrohm won't stand for it."
"You've met him?"
"No. Just seen him a few times, listened to him talk occasionally."
"Then why wonder about the food?" Kane asked.
The woman shrugged. "There's just been some talk that mebbe we don't have as much as we once did. And there's new people coming here all the time." She stared at the four of them. "People like you folk what wasn't here when all the real work to clean this place was going on. Mebbe there's a few folks wondering if everybody should keep coming here."
"Things have gotten worse over in Samariumville," Brigid said. "Are you saying those people should stay there?"
"Not me." The woman stroked her child's hair. "But mebbe there's some that feel those folks should find someplace else to go. This is our place. We cleaned it up and made it what it is. Ain't right somebody else should just up and come along and drink up the gravy of our hard work."
"And if there's plenty of food for everybody?" Brigid asked.
The woman shook her head. "Won't be. There never is. I never been no place where food was always around. You had to chase after it. And if you sit in one spot and tried to grow your own, there'd be coldhearts and other folks by in a short time to come take if from you. Or die trying to get it."
Kane retreated from the conversation. Just in the past few moments his fever had risen. His skin felt cold and clammy while he was burning up inside. He walked to the corner of the room nearest the window and moved the thin pallets on the floor, electing not to sleep on any of them.
He was well aware that the vermin crawling through the angle of bedclothes could just as easily crawl across the floor to get him, but he felt a little better at putting the distance between them. He sat in the corner, putting his back to the two walls. He gazed out the window at the big silver moon hanging in the horizon.
Kane, Balam's voice called.
Blinking against the throbbing heat flooding his skull, Kane stared at the moon and tried to will the pain and the fever away. It didn't work. Perspiration covered his body, running down his cheeks to drip from his stubbled chin.
Brigid came to him and sat beside him. She glanced at him worriedly. "Kane."
"I'll be all right, Baptiste," Kane whispered. He breathed out constantly, striving for the control he needed. He flicked his glance at Grant. "We need to set up watches."
Grant nodded. "I'll take first up."
"Wake me," Kane said.
"I'll take third watch," Brigid said.
Domi yawned and stretched. "I don't mind all my sleep at one time." She smiled, then curled herself into a ball under the window on the bare floor.
Grant took up a position on the other side of the room, leaving the window on his left and the door on his right. He put his Copperhead across his knees.
Kane shifted against the wall, trying in vain to find a comfortable position. He didn't lie down because he knew his head would throb even worse if he did.
"Maybe we need to find that mat-trans unit tomorrow," Brigid suggested. "We could use it to jump to Cerberus redoubt. DeFore could find out what's wrong with you."
Kane nodded, not wanting to waste the strength to argue. He concentrated on the moon, amazed at the way that he could almost see a face in it.
"THE KING NEEDS you! Fight for the king! For Arthur!"
Kane opened his eyes and narrowly avoided a sword swinging straight for his face. He sidestepped, then raised his arm, not entirely surprised to see the sword he gripped himself. His blade flicked out quick as thought and crashed through his opponent's ribs below the small shield he carried.
The Roman soldier knew that his life had been spent and stumbled back, a look of anguished surprise on his face. He was at least thirty years old and had probably spent a lifetime in war. His face and limbs showed terrible scars from past wounds. He stumbled and went to one knee, allowing the man behind him to step forward.
Kane whirled, bringing his sword around to meet that of his newest opponent. The wet ground and loose leaves beneath his boots slipped, and he almost fell. The Roman soldier pressed on against him relentlessly, lifting and swinging the short gladius as if he could do it all day.
Armed with a sword and knife, Kane lifted a foot and drove it into the Roman's shield, connecting high on the shield and knocking it back into the man's face. Blood sprayed from a cut across the man's forehead, dripping down into his eyes and blinding him. Still, being Roman and trained by the harshest taskmasters in the world, he continued to battle.
Stepping in toward the man, Kane blocked the Roman's sword with his knife, then cut his head from his shoulders with the sword. The dead man stumbled back, then sat down slowly as if suddenly fatigued.
Kane took the moment's respite to gaze around at the battle. They were fighting deep in a forest that appeared familiar. Tall trees soared up toward the night sky. Normally battles weren't fought that late in the evening, but he remembered that the two groups had come up on each other unexpectedly.
Wagons filled with hay, bound for the king's stables, blazed now and provided uncertain light for the treacherous and uneven battlefield. The full moon hung above them, streaming down silver light that made the blood look black. Sparks flared when forged iron clashed against forged iron. Men cried out in pain and fear and anger amid the meaty smacks of weapons cleaving bodies, flesh against flesh, and the clangor of shields rattling against shields. Horses snorted and whinnied in the distance, and Kane knew there were those who observed the night's battle from a safe distance.
"For the king!" someone shouted again. "For King Arthur and Britain!"
Mind reeling, Kane remembered a little about the tales of King Arthur, the once and future king. There had been an old than in the Cobaltville Magistrate division that had possessed a fascination with the subject. And Lakesh's and Brigid's own research into different avenues had turned up more information regarding the myths and legends. Even reading up on the Celtic lore of Mother Fand and the Tuatha de Danaan had brought further information about King Arthur and his knights of the round table.
Kane knew of no reason why his dreams would take him to that time. But then, he hadn't known why he'd dreamed of Egypt, either.
He returned to the battle. While the Romans held the line they were so famous and feared for, the knights and warriors who served Arthur picked their battles. Maybe the stories that had been later written of them commented on the honor and bravery of the knights, but Kane saw little of that now. The men were scared, willing to kill anyone who tried to kill them.
The Roman soldier froze suddenly in front of Kane.
Warily, Kane turned, knowing that Balam had to have stopped time in the dream. "Balam."
"Here, Kane."
Following the direction of the voice, Kane gazed more deeply into the forest behind the battle. The camp women hid in the brush and trees there, their faces filled with fear. Those women hadn't been written about in any of the tales of Arthur, but Kane knew it was right that they were there.
When warriors weren't fighting for their lives, their thoughts turned instantly to sex and drink. All the large armies of those times, and even later, had women that were wives, as well as harlots, to follow them around. They looted the dead and took coin from the warriors for their services as cook, tailor or bedmate.
"What do you want, Balam?" Kane demanded. He held on to the bloody sword and knife in his hands, not knowing if they would have any effect on the Archon in this dream state.
"The ending is upon us, Kane," Balam said. "A time when things are won—or they are lost."
"What things?" Kane stepped in front of the robed figure.
With the moon burning down on him, Balam looked like a two-dimensional shadow cutout. "The manna machine. The one that I showed you in Egypt. The one that the Israelites used to feed themselves as they wandered toward their promised land."
"It still exists?"
"Yes," Balam said. "It was lost to the Israelites. Even until skydark, those people never knew peace. They were always persecuted and destroyed. People who were their friends and allies one day could just as easily turn on them in the next."
"That's the story of people everywhere," Kane argued.
