Maldynado rarely fantasized about causing evil things to happen to his enemies, but he did find himself wishing the foreman would end up being the one sabotaging the site and that Maldynado could escort him to the magistrate personally. Basilard returned before his mind traveled too far down this path.
Are you all right?
Maldynado was still on the ground, so he stood and brushed himself off. “Yes.”
What’s next?
“What’s the matter, Bas? Not enjoying the work? I know you’re a fancy diplomat now, but this isn’t anything worse than we had to do for Sicarius.”
The work doesn’t bother me. As for the rest... I haven’t had much of a chance to practice diplomacy on anyone yet, so I’m not sure how fancy I can be considered. The president saw me and wrote down my people’s concerns, but I think he’s too busy with local matters to worry about international relations right now.
Maldynado found himself gazing at the prisoners again. How long had they been working on the site? Might one of them be tempted to perform sabotage? Especially if they were being paid or bribed somehow by men in green robes?
“I may have an opportunity for you to practice diplomacy right now,” Maldynado said.
Basilard followed his gaze. I had hoped not to have to practice that sort of diplomacy any more. As you noted, my people are peaceful. They wish their representative to be peaceful as well.
“Who said anything about not being peaceful? Just because they look brutish doesn’t mean we can’t have a friendly conversation with them. Maybe you can offer to cook them something.”
A pee-soaked weed?
“I thought you didn’t use those.”
Not in most people’s dishes.
“Basilard, if you tell me you’ve gotten Sicarius to eat something doused by a dog, I might just kiss you.”
Basilard’s cryptic smile wasn’t a solid confirmation, so Maldynado held back on a physical display of affection. He was, however, grinning like a birthday boy in a whore house when he sauntered up to the prison crew. This caused them to glower with suspicion.
He tamed his smile and offered a congenial wave. “Afternoon, gentlemen. The foreman said for us to help you.”
Most grunted and ignored him. One said, “That street licker.”
“He’s the one who ought to be in prison, eh?” Maldynado picked up the corner of a crate two men were struggling with. Basilard got into line to receive a bundle of rods from a prisoner pushing things out of the back of the lorry.
“That’s the truth,” the talkative man said. He had a beard divided into six intricate braids that extended to his belt. The sign of someone with a lot of time on his hands.
“We don’t get paid enough to put up with him,” Maldynado said, hoping to establish some common ground with the men by complaining about the boss. That was an age-old tradition for the working class, wasn’t it?
Braids glared at him. “We don’t get paid at all.”
Oops, so much for common ground. Maldynado walked back to the lorry to help with another crate. He caught Basilard’s eye, wondering if he had any ideas for diplomacy. Basilard tilted his chin toward the worker unloading the vehicle bed. He wore the same unappealing uniform as the others and had a nondescript face. Tattoos ran up the backs of his hands, disappearing beneath his sleeves, but that wasn’t uncommon in the group. A cigar dangled from his lips.
Maldynado shrugged at Basilard, wondering what he was thinking. Basilard pursed his lips. At first, Maldynado read that as a kissing gesture, but he realized it was more of a blowing smoke motion. The cigar. Maldynado took another look.
“Say,” Maldynado said to Braids—they had grabbed a second crate to carry together, “if you fellows don’t get paid at all, how did the man in the lorry get that cigar? It’s a Bridgecrester, isn’t it? That’s an expensive smoke.”
“None of my business.” Braids squinted at him. “None of your business, either.”
Maldynado caught the man in the lorry bed eyeing him. He wondered if his hunches had led him to the right place, or if this was simply someone who engaged in prison yard bartering. For all he knew, the man had received the cigar in exchange for taking someone’s shift out here. Of course, Bridgecrest cigars cost enough that none of the other workers here were likely to buy them, either.
“You boys been working here all week?” Maldynado asked.
“You talk a lot,” a new man said, walking over to block Maldynado’s return to the lorry. He possessed all of Maldynado’s height and breadth, plus an extra fifty pounds of fat he could throw into a fray. Neither the man or his heft concerned Maldynado, but he took it as a sign that he had been prying. How did Amaranthe get so much out of people without them knowing she was getting it out of them?
“Yes, I do,” he said. “Some find it endearing.”
“We don’t.”
“Why don’t you head back over there, buddy?” the first man asked, pointing toward the pallets of bricks.
Maldynado hated to leave before he had more thoroughly investigated these men, but maybe he would have to observe from afar. With eight of them around the truck, picking a fight wouldn’t be wise—besides, the foreman would probably blame him for starting it.
Maldynado lifted his hands in surrender. “Whatever you say.” He nodded toward Basilard, then turned away from the big fellow.
Gravel crunched behind him, the only warning he got. He spun back, throwing up an arm in a block. When he spotted a thick board swinging toward his face, he changed his mind, ducking instead of blocking. The board swished past overhead without knocking his hat off.
He lunged at his attacker before the man had finished the swing. Maldynado threw his weight into a punch to the kidney. He didn’t hold back, striking with enough force to send the brute tumbling backward. Aware of all the other men, he didn’t follow the man to finish him. He expected more attacks to come in from both sides—he wasn’t disappointed. Fortunately, Basilard had thrown himself into the burgeoning fray.
Knowing his friend was on the right, Maldynado concentrated on the two prisoners coming in from the left. He darted to the outside and threw a series of preemptive punches at the closest man. His opponent wasn’t fast, but he was sturdy—he took several hard blows without so much as tilting backward, then launched a meaty fist of his own. Maldynado grabbed the punch out of midair—it was slower than forming ice when compared to Sicarius’s lightning strikes—and pulled on the brute, simultaneously jamming a knee into his stomach with enough force to knock a tree off its roots. This time the big prisoner went down.
A shadow at the corner of Maldynado’s eyes warned him of a new attack from behind. He ran forward instead of ducking, throwing himself at a target in front of him. Something—a shovel?—clanked into the gravel behind him. His new opponent had been watching that attack, perhaps expecting it to brain Maldynado, and didn’t react quickly to the fist sailing toward his face. He took Maldynado’s blow in the nose and staggered backward, clutching at the spattered proboscis.
Maldynado spun in time to catch the shovel man preparing a second attack. The iron blade swept toward his head. Maldynado stepped in, caught the shaft, and launched a side kick at the man’s gut. His attacker stumbled backward, releasing the shovel. Maldynado kept the tool, brandishing it in case anyone else wanted to brawl with him.
Four men lay rolling on the ground—or were flat-out unconscious—at Basilard’s feet. Only one convict remained standing, Braids. He lifted his hands and stepped back, clearly wanting nothing more to do with either of them. Or with Basilard more specifically, for it was Basilard he was stumbling away from, eyes wide. Maldynado didn’t think Bas looked any fiercer than usual—he wasn’t dripping blood from his teeth or anything of that ilk—but his hat had come off, and the scars did give him some natural menace, whether he wanted it or not. Maldynado would have to work hard to get that lady to hold hands with him.
The downed men were crawling away, the conscious ones anyway, so Maldynad
o lowered his shovel.
Basilard’s shoulders slumped. The diplomacy failed. I wonder sometimes... perhaps the chief merely wanted me out of the country. I am not truly fit to be a diplomat.
“You didn’t talk to them. I did.”
This is true.
“I’m the one who isn’t fit to be a diplomat. No surprise there.” Maldynado pointed at a crumpled and unmoving form below the lorry bed. “That’s Cigar Breath, isn’t it? Let’s search him and see if he has anything more suspicious than tobacco.”
Basilard helped him turn over the big prisoner. His eyes were rolled back into his head. Basilard did make a deadly fighter, but that didn’t mean he couldn’t be a good diplomat with some practice. Maybe he would learn to use his scars and his reputation to his advantage. Starcrest certainly did that.
Basilard patted the convict down, then shrugged up at Maldynado. No pockets.
“Where does he keep his cigars, then?”
Basilard surveyed the fallen man, shrugged again, then pointed at his crotch.
“In his smallclothes?” Maldynado asked. “I’m not poking around in there.”
Perhaps he was counting on people’s disinterest in doing so. Basilard tilted his head. It seems... large.
Maldynado was torn between sneering, looking away, and telling Basilard to search the man. “Why don’t you, uh, check then?”
Me?
“You’re the one down there. Looking at... him.”
This is your mission.
“Just search him, Bas. He’s going to wake up soon.”
Basilard stood back, folding his arms across his chest.
“I take it back,” Maldynado grumbled, kneeling beside the supine figure. “You’re going to be a lousy diplomat. A real diplomat would look in a man’s pants for another man.”
Basilard shook his head once.
Sighing, Maldynado unfastened Cigar Breath’s belt. Best to get unpleasant tasks over with quickly... and before anyone else witnessed them. He lifted the man’s trousers and smallclothes, peered inside, and pulled out two sweat-stained cigars with the tips of his fingers. He wished he had tweezers and gloves.
“Way to ruin a luxury smoke, buddy,” he muttered and peered into the dark recesses again. “Ah, what’s that?”
You of all people should know, Basilard signed. The amusement had returned to his eyes. Bastard.
Maldynado pulled out a folded piece of paper, the outside even more sweat-stained than the cigar wrappers. Wishing again for tweezers, he pried the soggy edges apart to read the five words within.
Place and set before midnight.
Basilard, reading around his shoulder, signed, Place and set what?
“Something of Sarevic’s, I’m guessing.”
Is that in there too? Basilard waved to the man’s trousers.
“No.”
You’re sure? You didn’t root around much.
“I rooted around plenty, but you’re welcome to go exploring if you like.” Maldynado stuffed the note into his pocket. “Maybe he’s supposed to pick up one of those timing switches and install it somewhere on the site.”
Maybe it’s in the lorry.
Maldynado eyed the crates in the bed. They had stamps on them from freight stops, but nothing else indicated what might be inside. Perfectly legitimate construction-related items for the most part, he guessed, but someone could have arranged for something to be tucked in among the cargo, and since their fellow had been the one unloading, he would have been in an easy spot to see such an item.
Better hurry, Basilard signed. The foreman is coming.
“Dead, bloody ancestors, does that man’s job consist of anything more than prowling the site and harassing workers?” Maldynado pulled himself into the lorry bed. “Distract him for me, will you?”
Only after he was pawing through the remaining cargo did he realize how hard that would be for Basilard, given that the foreman wouldn’t understand a word he signed. Explaining a bunch of unconscious and missing workers would be difficult under any circumstances, especially when the foreman already found Maldynado suspicious. He needed to find some condemning evidence to share.
Most of the crates were sealed with nails. Maldynado had a knife on him, but the prisoner hadn’t had one or any type of tool for opening the lids. He shoved the sealed crates aside, searching for something else.
“What in that twice blasted pile of slag is going on over there?” came the foreman’s voice. It wasn’t nearly as far away as Maldynado would have liked.
He glanced back to see Basilard jogging toward the man, but knew his search time was about to be cut short. He shoved aside a last crate and was about to jump over the side and search inside the cab, but he spotted a blanket jammed in the corner beneath a wooden bench that could fold down for seating.
“What’s wrong with you, man?” the foreman growled. “Say something. Who started this fight? Why are that man’s pants down? Is he dead? Shovel Head!”
“Be right with you,” Maldynado called without looking back.
He grabbed the blanket. There was something lumpy inside. He hoped it was some evidence that would keep him from being kicked off the site—or hauled away by enforcers—and not simply someone’s lunch bucket. He tore the blanket free and held aloft... a ceramic jug.
Maldynado’s shoulders drooped. Aside from some garish artwork, it looked like the sort of thing one might use to store milk. He tried to unscrew the lid, but found it secured tightly. It was made of the same ceramic as the rest of the jug. Maybe it hadn’t been screwed on at all, but glued.
“That’s a little odd,” he murmured.
Something heavy thumped on the end of the lorry bed. The foreman had pulled himself up. Maldynado had never seen his face that shade of red. It was almost a purple really...
“What are you idiots doing?” he roared, stalking toward Maldynado with a fist cocked. “I’ve sent for the enforcers. You’re more of a menace than the prisoners. Baskun said you started the fight!”
“Not true,” Maldynado said. “They swung first. We merely ended it. And if you call the enforcers, you’ll want to have that man directly below the lorry arrested, as he’s part of a conspiracy to commit sabotage on this site.” Maldynado managed to sound confident, though he wasn’t certain his milk jug was quite the condemning evidence he had sought. Perhaps in conjunction with the note...
The foreman lifted his balled fists, his face growing angrier—and darker—rather than enlightened.
Basilard stood on the ground, his hand on the edge of the bed. He was ready to help, his posture said, though his shrug said he wasn’t sure if they should be beating this man up. Probably not.
Maldynado stood to his full height and lifted his free hand. “Listen, if you want to squabble, we can do it down there, but I’m not sure it would be wise to break this jug.” He thrust it out so the foreman couldn’t miss seeing it. At the least, maybe it would make him curious.
“What the blast is it?” The foreman didn’t sound curious precisely, but at least he wasn’t flinging those fists around.
“I believe it’s intended to sabotage more equipment. Or perhaps the building itself.”
Basilard’s eyebrows rose.
“Unless it’s full of black powder, I don’t see how.” The foreman glowered suspiciously at Maldynado, no doubt wondering if this was meant as some diversion to keep him out of trouble.
“Why don’t we see what’s in it?” Maldynado set it down in the bed, keeping his eyes on the foreman as he did so. Given the fellow’s mood, he might be ready to kick Maldynado in the teeth.
The foreman jammed his fists against his hips but didn’t do anything more threatening. Maldynado pulled out his knife and stabbed experimentally at the lid. There ought to be a seal or something he could break...
Basilard knocked on the side of the lorry for attention. That looks like a bull’s eye, he signed.
“What does?” Maldynado asked.
The side. Look at it from a
distance.
Skeptically, Maldynado leaned back and eyed the swirling patterns painted on the jar. There was a big yellow dot on one side, but he would have called it modern art rather than a target.
“Is that some sort of language?” the foreman asked. “What’s he saying?”
“Mangdorian hand code. He’s a diplomat.” Maldynado returned his attention to trying to cut or pry off the lid, though he was wondering how wise of an idea that was, now that someone had mentioned black powder. The jar was big enough that there could be a few blasting sticks crammed inside. Perhaps attached to one of those timers or to a booby-trapped lid that would cause an explosion when someone opened it. Basilard’s suggestion that the outside had a bull’s eye on it was double cause for concern.
The foreman shifted his weight from foot-to-foot, harrumphing under his breath. Maldynado leaned back again and held up the knife, hilt first. “I don’t suppose you’d like to try opening it?”
The man started to reach for the knife, but stopped with his hand in the air and eyed the jug while working his cigar back and forth in his mouth. “Nah, you go ahead.”
“Lucky me,” Maldynado muttered. The edge of his knife had some brownish gunk on it. He sniffed it, but it didn’t smell like much. He scraped at it with a fingernail. “Some kind of glue, I think.”
“Get the rest off,” the foreman said.
Oh sure, now he cared about what was inside.
More gently than before, Maldynado slipped the knife into the crease again. He worked it along the edge, digging out more glue. Finally, he was able to jostle the lid. Using the knife to pry it upward, he eased it open a few hairs. He found himself leaning back and holding his breath, waiting for an explosion.
Nothing happened. He opened the lid the rest of the way. It wasn’t powder, but some sort of viscous liquid inside, filling the jar to the brim. The glue might not have smelled, but this did. The acrid scent seared the inside of his nostrils.
“Whatever it is, it’s not milk,” he said.
“Over there,” someone said from a few meters away. He was pointing at Maldynado’s lorry.
Four enforcers had walked onto the site, three men and Evrial. He didn’t know whether to find her presence comforting or not. She might throw him in jail even quicker than the others if she suspected him of breaking the law—or of stupidity.