Klaus leaned close to her, his voice low so that only Alain and Mari could hear it. “Given the size of the Imperial force, it is a certainty that we will be forced to retreat to the third wall, Lady. But we can make the Imperials pay a mighty price for this wall.”
“Why do you not wish others to hear this?” Alain asked in the same low tones.
“Because, Sir Mage, they must fight for this wall as if they never intend to retreat. Tell people they are expected to retreat and they will do it, most likely much faster and much more easily than if they believe they are expected to hold.”
Alain nodded, thinking that even soldiers worked with illusions. Field Marshal Klaus felt that giving his soldiers the illusion that they could hold this wall in the face of the Imperial onslaught was vital to winning the battle. Whereas giving them the illusion that the wall was certain to fall would guarantee that to happen. “I see,” Alain said out loud, pitching his voice to a louder volume. “So we will hold this wall.”
“Yes, Sir Mage,” Klaus agreed.
Mari gave them both a look that said she wasn’t happy with misleading people, but she only nodded as well.
Alain looked north. The fires burning in the buildings there shone off the armor and weapons of countless Imperial legionaries flooding into the area between the first and second walls.
“They’re moving fast down there, but you can see the lack of scaling ladders. They left the burden of those behind in the hope of catching up with us before we got the gates closed. I think it very likely that they won’t hit us again until dawn,” Klaus remarked. “This time Maxim may insist on using his legions first and not waiting for the Great Guilds to fail. It will be a hot day and a long day.”
After the field marshal and his aides had walked down the wall to inspect other areas, Mari went to the surviving rifles from Tiae, handing out some of the remaining ammunition. “We might see another dragon tomorrow,” she cautioned. “If we do, aim for its eyes and inside its mouth. That’ll be your best chance to hurt it.”
“Gast’n’s weapon was broken when he was killed,” one of the cavalry told her. “But we saved Lind’s.”
“I’ll take it,” Mari said. “Keep on fighting well. I know your Queen is very proud of you, Tiae is very proud of you, and so am I.”
“Lady?” one asked. “Will you tell her we died well?”
Alain saw Mari stare at the soldier, then inhale slowly before replying. “Yes. If it comes to that. Let’s all focus on making the Imperials and their Great Guilds masters die in enough numbers to discourage any more attacks on us.”
When they had returned to the spot on the battlement where they had started, Mari set the rifle with the packs of ammunition. “Could you watch these for a while?” she asked Sergeant Kira. “Field Marshal Klaus says the Imperials won’t try anything else tonight.”
“Probably not,” Kira agreed. “They’re worn out, too, and you see those clouds coming in? On top of the smoke that’s already out there, those clouds will cover the moon and stars so it’s too dark to organize another attack once the fires across the way burn down enough.”
Mari nodded, grimacing. “Alain, would you like to take a walk? There’s something I need to check on. I’ll be back,” she told Sergeant Kira.
“I’ll come along, Lady,” Sergeant Kira said.
“No need. Stay with your unit. Get some rest.”
“But, Lady—"
“We’ll be fine.”
Alain followed Mari back down the stairs to street level. “What is this thing you must check on that you do not wish to do?” he asked her.
“I’ll explain when we get there,” Mari said, walking down the wide street from the gate toward the third wall. “Are you from Dorcastle?” she called to a woman controlling military traffic at an intersection. “Where is the Mechanic rail yard? Where the trains come in?”
The woman pointed to one side. “Just a little way in that direction. You’re almost there.” She stared, hauling out her sword, clearly ready to shout a warning. “A Mechanic?”
“Yes,” Mari called, holding her arms out as she walked closer. “It’s all right. I’m Lady Mari.”
Soldiers rapidly converged, surrounding them with open hostility that led Alain to place one hand on the knife beneath his robes, wondering if he would have to use it to protect Mari from “friendly” forces.
But the emotions Alain sensed changed quickly when an officer bulled her way through the sudden crowd. “It’s the daughter, you fools! I saw her ride by two days ago with the field marshal! How many Mechanics have you ever seen walk around with a Mage by their side?”
Anger and fear changed to joy and reassurance as the soldiers relaxed and stammered out apologies.
“Lady,” the officer said, “you should have an escort. In the dark, when fighting has left nerves raw, mistakes are too easily made.” She stepped to one side, stopping a small unit marching by. “Where are you headed?”
“The wall,” the commander said, saluting.
“Not yet, you’re not. You are to escort the daughter, Lady Mari, where she wishes to go, and then escort her back to the wall. After that, return to your other orders.”
The commander, obviously worn out and apparently disposed to argue the orders, shut his mouth at the officer’s words. “The daughter? It will be our honor to escort her to the ends of the world if need be.”
“It’s not that far,” Mari said. “Thank you,” she told the officer.
“It was my honor to assist, Lady,” the officer said, turning to the other soldiers present and ordering them to spread the word about how the daughter looked and that she always traveled with a Mage by her.
Mari nodded to her new escort, then set off in the direction of the Mechanic train yard. Alain, surprised that Mari was able to maintain such a brisk pace after the labors of this day, walked beside her. After only a short time they encountered a pair of guards.
“Halt!”
“It’s the daughter,” the commander of their escort called. “All’s well.”
Mari smiled reassuringly at the guards and kept going. A short distance farther, Alain found himself gazing on a familiar place. “This was where the Mechanic train brought us when we came to Dorcastle from Ringhmon.”
Mari nodded, bringing out a Mechanic hand light and pointing toward two hulking shapes. “I figured the Mechanics Guild would leave these here.”
“Locomotive creatures?” Alain asked. “Why would your former Guild have left their locomotive creatures instead of taking them, or causing them to cease?”
“Dearest husband, some day I am going to get you to understand that locomotives are machines, not creatures like dragons or trolls.” Mari looked toward her escorting unit, who appeared nervous at the idea of entering the Mechanic facility. “You can wait here. I shouldn’t be too long.”
She walked toward the locomotives as Alain, reluctant to approach the creatures, followed her. “They can’t leave their tracks, and they don’t just cease like a Mage creature,” Mari explained to Alain. “How many times have we talked about this?” She paused, standing near the closest one, running her light across its surface and looking at it with a sad face. “As far as I know, only one new locomotive has been hand-built by the Mechanics Guild in the last few decades. These very likely are several decades old, if not older.”
“Why have we come here?” Alain asked.
“Because I’m going to make them cease, Alain. Do you remember how we killed the dragon on our first visit to Dorcastle?”
He stared at her. “You wish to do that again? Using these?”
“I don’t wish to,” Mari said, sounding sick at heart. “But if we have to fall back to the third wall, these can ensure that the legions get a very warm reception when they chase us. You can wait here or come with me.”
“I will come with you.” Alain stayed close to Mari until she climbed into the back of the nearest of the creatures, the light she held shining from the windows on t
he back. He touched the side of the creature tentatively, surprised to feel the hard surface cold to the touch. Always before when he saw a locomotive creature it had been hot, rumbling inside as it breathed out clouds of warm mist. “Is it dead?”
She stuck her head out of the back. “It was never alive,” she said with a pointed look before disappearing inside again.
“Like a troll,” Alain said.
“Not like a troll!” Mari came out, dusting off her hands. “They safed them as well as they could. Fuel tanks drained, throttles removed, brakes locked. Unfortunately for them, that won’t be enough to stop what I have to do.” Alain watched her clamber along the outside of the creature, stopping to examine one of the things sticking up from the rounded top. “Alain? Can you get me some ballast?”
“What is ballast?”
“Those rocks over there. The ones that get laid along the rails in open country.”
“Why do you not just call them rocks? Are these like the rocks that burn?”
“We call them ballast because they’re special rocks,” Mari said. “And no, they are not coal. Coal is black and sort of shiny, remember?”
“It is very dark,” Alain pointed out.
“Oh, yeah. Sorry. I guess the ballast does look black from here. Everything looks black from here.” She waved the light around, pausing it on a few places. “I’ve never seen a train yard deserted, Alain. It’s sort of unnerving. I have to keep telling myself that when we win there will be a lot more train yards, and more trains and tracks, and places like this will be alive like never before.”
He went to the pile and collected an armload of the rocks. They were a mix of sizes but none larger than his fist. Mari took them one by one, examining them, tossing some away and carefully pushing others into the thing sticking up from the top of the creature. “This is the safety valve, Alain. Do you remember what we tied down on that barge? This is like that, only the way it’s designed on this locomotive it can’t be tied down. But I can jam rocks in here that will prevent the valve from lifting. Are you understanding any of this?”
“No.”
“All right. Bring me some more rocks.” Mari went to do the same thing to the other locomotive creature, but stopped moving when she got into the back. “Oh, no.”
She sounded so upset that Alain forgot about getting more rocks, overcame his worries about the creature, and jumped up into the back as well.
Mari sat staring at the controls before her. “Alain, this is Betsy.”
“Betsy?”
“This locomotive. It’s Betsy. I trained on her.” Mari hit the inside of the cab. “Why did Betsy have to be here?”
Alain bent to look, surprised to see tears in Mari’s eyes. “I do not understand. You keep telling me they are not alive.”
“They’re not! But Betsy…she’s over a hundred years old, Alain. Betsy’s a legend! She’s trained countless Apprentices how to be Mechanics. I helped fix her once. And I’m going to have to…” She hit the side of the creature again.
Alain rubbed the back of his neck. “I do not understand. Always you tell me that the creations of Mechanics are not like Mage creatures. But I see you here, I see how you feel, and all I can think of is Mage Alera bidding farewell to her roc Swift.”
Mari sat wordlessly for a little while. “I guess you’re right after all. We Mechanics tell ourselves that these are just machines formed of metal and fired with oil, soulless creations who owe their existence only to us and that have no feelings and no sense of their own. But we give them names and we feel their moods and we talk to them…and when they reach their final end we feel very sad to lose them.”
She got up. “I can’t do it. I’ll rig the other one, but not Betsy. I will not be the one who kills her.”
Mari jumped down, enlisting Alain’s help in pushing a cart with a barrel on it to the first of the creatures. “This locomotive runs on fuel oil. I couldn’t do this if we were up north or in the east where the locomotives burn coal, because someone would have to stay here and keep feeding the fires. But here they burn oil. I need to load enough into this tender to keep the fires in this locomotive burning hot enough and long enough to overpressure the locomotive’s boiler.”
“I remember those words,” Alain said. “Master Mechanic Lukas said that must never be done.”
“Yes,” Mari sighed as she worked a hand pump. “And he was very unhappy to hear I had already done it once. He’s not going to be thrilled that I’m doing it again. If we can hold the second wall, I won’t have to.”
After she had finished that task, Mari went into the back of the creature. “I’m presetting most of the controls and locking them,” she told Alain. “If we’re falling back through here, I might need your help starting the fires, so save one of your heat spells for that.”
“Will we have to wait by it again?” Alain asked.
She paused to stare at him. “I can hear that you’re worried. You must be really scared of doing that, and given how much damage an exploding boiler can do you’re right to feel that way. No, we won’t have to stay by it this time. I’ll get the fires going, make sure there’s enough water flowing into the boiler, and then we run. With the safety valves blocked and the fires going hot, this locomotive will explode when the pressure gets high enough, and when it blows hopefully the only people nearby will be Imperials and Senior Mechanics and Mage Guild elders.” She looked over at the other Mechanic creation. “And hopefully Betsy won’t be too badly damaged.”
When they had finally finished, Mari paused, shining her light around the rail yard. “Destroying this place really feels like a crime to me. I hope we don’t have to blow it up.”
“I hope this as well,” Alain told her.
“We’re not going to be anywhere near it this time!”
“It is not that,” Alain said. “It is because the idea of doing it makes you sad, and you do not wish the locomotive creature Betsy to be harmed.”
“I’ve done worse things,” Mari said, “when I had no other choice. But thanks. Let’s back to the wall and try to get some rest.”
The unit escorting them seemed as relieved as Alain to leave the Mechanic rail yard and head toward the wall. Alain noticed Mari looking back and off to the side a few times, and guessed she was gazing toward the place where the Mechanic Guild Hall lay. But she said nothing, and since the soldiers escorting them were close enough to hear any conversation, Alain also stayed quiet.
At the stairs leading up, Mari bade farewell to her escort, ordering them to tell their superior that they had done an important service for her. She watched them go, holding herself with her arms. “I got scared back there, Alain, when all those soldiers crowded around and yelled Mechanic at me. I’ve gotten used to having commons be happy to see me, and forgotten what can happen to a Mechanic who isn’t the daughter. What if that had been Alli or Calu? They could have been badly hurt, or killed, because they looked like the enemy.”
“I was worried as well,” Alain said. “It did not occur to me to worry, either, until we were surrounded. Our perception of the world illusion has changed in ways that do not fit the illusion others still see.”
“Like when everybody here looked at you and saw only a dangerous, inhuman Mage?” Mari asked. “That’s just one more thing we have to change, right?”
“Yes. We will change it.” When Mari said such things, Alain found himself believing they could happen.
Once more on the battlement, Alain looked upwards, thinking the darkness had grown. As Sergeant Kira had said, clouds were moving in, further obscuring the starlight. Mari lay down, her head on one of the packs holding ammunition for her weapon. Alain sat right next to her, his back to the battlement.
Sergeant Kira saluted Mari. “Welcome back, Lady. I’ve been looking for targets lit up by the fires, but all the high-ranking Imperials seem to have figured out that showing themselves within range of your new rifles is a bad idea.”
“I hope they learn quickly enough to giv
e up trying to beat us. I’m pretty tired, Kira. We’ll have to do that sword training tomorrow,” Mari told her. “Tell whoever stands sentry to wake me just before dawn.”
“Yes, Lady.”
“And get some sleep yourself. I don’t want you staying up all night standing guard over me.”
“Yes, Lady.”
“And stop calling me Lady all the time.”
“Yes, Lady.”
Alain, huddled into his robes, reached out to touch Mari’s shoulder. “You may have met your match in Sergeant Kira.”
“You may be right.” Mari looked at him. “Don’t you dare die.”
“Don’t you.”
“All right. I guess we’ll both have to live through this.”
Alain closed his eyes, wondering how long the illusion of the world would have both him and Mari in it.
* * * *
“Alain?”
He blinked, trying to come out of the fog of a deep sleep. Alain usually woke up quickly and cleanly, but he usually wasn’t as physically exhausted as he had been last night. The air held a chill, and the stars had not yet begun to dim in the east. “Are the Imperials coming?”
“Not yet.” Mari looked toward the east as well. “It’s about an hour before dawn. Field Marshal Klaus thinks the Imperials might jump off early to try to catch us unready.”
Alain got to his feet, trying to stretch his muscles as he stayed behind the protection of the battlement. “I am hungry. If it is going to be a long and hard day, I would like something to eat beforehand.”
“That’s the other reason I got you up. They’re bringing around food and water.”
Alain accepted a small loaf of bread and some hard cheese from a young auxiliary who appeared to be terrified of being touched by a Mage. Mari must have noticed, because she made a point of reaching to hug Alain while the young man was still nearby. Alain ate quickly, reverting to Mage ways and not tasting what he was chewing, then washed it down with some of the watered wine from buckets being carried along the battlement.
“They didn’t give us any chocolate,” Sergeant Kira remarked as she finished her breakfast. “That’s good.”