Eric Flint's Blog, page 294

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 30

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 30

Chapter 11: Dealing with the New Emperor

September and October, 1634

Race Track at Simmering, Austria

“Did you point a gun at Baron Julian von Meklau?” Emperor Ferdinand III asked Ron Sanderlin as he entered the garage. It had taken a while for word to reach the emperor and Ron wondered if the youngsters had talked or just someone that had seen the confrontation.

“Uncle Bob did, Your Majesty. But only because it looked like the boy was going to try and take a horsewhip to me.” Ron looked at the retinue that followed the emperor around everywhere. “Mostly it was to warn the kids off so things didn’t get out of hand.” Ron considered, then added, “Actually, I’m a little surprised that there hasn’t been more trouble. We’ve had a lot of gawkers, but no one trying to take anything. And aside from von Meklau and his friends, no one trying to throw their weight around.”

“Now that I think about it, Herr Sanderlin, I’m a little surprised myself.” Ferdinand motioned and Ron followed him out of the garage to the muddy field. The gaggle of hangers-on surrounding them both. Ferdinand III continued, “This is to be the road for the 240Z?”

“The track, yes,” Ron told him and went on to explain what he, Bob, and Sonny had worked out. There were several side trips into up-time terminology, what an automobile race track was and how it differed from a horseracing track.

About halfway through the explanation, Ferdinand interrupted. “Take me for a ride.”

“Your Majesty . . .” Ron started to object, then seeing the excited expression on the emperors face, gave in. It was his car, after all. They got Ferdinand in the passenger seat with the seat belt fastened. Then Ron put the key in the ignition and Ferdinand stopped him.

“What’s that?”

“The key.”

“Like a key to a lock?”

“Yes, Your Majesty. You can’t start the car without it.” Ron chose not to get into the whole issue of hot wiring.

“That’s clever. But what if the key is lost?”

“We have three sets, Your Majesty. I had one and Gayleen had one before the Ring of Fire and we had a metal smith make up another one when we sold you the car.” More time spent while Ron showed the emperor the key and that it was a perfectly ordinary piece of metal, nothing particularly high tech.

Finally Ron got to start the car, describing what he was doing as he did it. He pulled the car out of the converted barn and drove it around the muddy field. It had rained last night, sleeted actually, and then thawed this morning, soaking the ground. Ron was careful and the field was still covered in grass, so they managed a loop, with only a little sliding. It was a slow loop. Ron didn’t think they had topped fifteen miles an hour.

“I want to drive!” the emperor said. Ron tried, without much hope, to talk him out of it, then traded seats.

By this time, Sonny and Bob were watching, as well as a couple of crowds of down-timers. There were the villagers and the courtiers — not mixing — and the workers that Ron and Sonny had hired — not really mixing with either group, but closer to the villagers.

Ferdinand III did fairly well. He had the standard gas-brakes-gas issues of new drivers, but not bad. And he had good control for the first loop. He started speeding up on the second loop. When he hit the back end of the second loop, he pushed it and they were doing thirty-five into the next turn. Two previous trips over the same ground had ripped up the grass that was holding the mud together. When they started to turn, the rear wheels decided that Newton’s first law of motion should guide their actions, since friction was on a vacation. The emperor slammed down on both the gas and the brake pedal, and the 240Z did a 540 degree turn. They stopped, facing the way they’d come, rear wheels buried in mud up to their axles and the front wheels not much better off. The combination of brakes and gas had killed the engine and — Ron sincerely hoped — flooded it.

Ferdinand III sat still for several seconds, white knuckled hands gripping the plastic steering wheel hard enough that Ron was afraid he might break it. Then he took several deep breaths and smiled. “My, that was exciting.”

Ron took a couple of deep breaths of his own. “Yes, Your Majesty.”

Ferdinand III reached for the keys again.

“You may have flooded the engine, Your Majesty.”

“Flooded it?”

Ron explained. The emperor listened. Then, with his foot carefully off the gas pedal and the car in park, turned the key. It started right up. The emperor grinned and Ron suppressed a groan.

The emperor put it in drive, and hit the gas. The wheels spun and mud flew.

All this had taken a few minutes and about the time the emperor hit the gas, there were half a dozen people of high estate in range of the flying mud. They retreated faster than they’d come, but the car didn’t move more than an inch. And as soon as Ferdinand let of the gas, the car settled back into the mud.

“We’re stuck, Your Majesty. You might as well turn it off and save the gas. We’ll have to pull it out.”

Ferdinand looked rebellious, but after a moment he turned off the car and unbuckled his seatbelt. He opened the driver side door, and swung his legs out of the car. The imperial boots sank half way up the calves, in peasant mud. It was a good thing he had hands to help him or the emperor of Austria-Hungary would have landed face first in the mud.

Ron was expecting royal distaste, at least. He didn’t get it. Ferdinand had ridden horses all his life, and even if there was usually a groom to handle the beast when he was done, Ferdinand was familiar with the effects of hooves on muddy ground and was unsurprised to find out that spinning wheels had a similar effect.

 

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 29

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 29

“More than you might think, but we’ll give them a bargain anyway,” Hayley said. “Sell boat passes that are good for a month for twenty-five pfennig each, or even twenty.”

“Or you could do it like some of the bus companies did up-time,” Frau Fortney said. “Sell tickets and give your boatman a paper punch. The ticket has however many circles or boxes printed on it. Each time they ride, the captain or someone punches out a circle or box on the pass. When they’re all used up, they have to buy a new ticket.”

Herr Pfeifer wasn’t sure what they were talking about, but decided to let it ride for now. “However they pay, it costs money to run a barge on the river.”

“Sure, but not that much,” said the young girl. “Put in seats and maybe an awning to keep people dry when it rains. There are around a hundred people who come out here every day, working on the track. Fifty people per trip and four trips a day — two here, two back. That’s two hundred tickets at a half pfennig per head . . . a hundred pfennig a day, every day. A bit over a reichsthaler every three days, gross. Your boatman will get a couple of groschen a day and there will be docking fees . . . but even with the cost of the boat and steam engine amortized in, you should make a decent regular profit. Not a great big profit, but a steady one.” Two groschen a day was fair pay for a worker. It was what the day laborers at the race track were getting. But the surprising thing for Hayley — all of the girls, for that matter — was what a groschen would buy. There were twelve pfennig to a groschen. In Grantville or Magdeburg a pfennig was about equal to a quarter, but you could buy a small loaf of bread, about half a pound, for a pfennig in Vienna. Gayleen Sanderlin had said several times that it was like the prices in Mexico, back up-time.

****

By the end of their conversation, several things had happened. One was that Jakusch Pfeifer got his name shortened to Jack. He also figured out that Hayley Fortney was actually running things, not Frau Fortney acting for her husband. Perhaps more importantly, he was smart enough to guess some of the reasons for the subterfuge and to keep the secret. Jack became the lawyer for the Sanderlin-Fortney Investment Company and Jack’s family got in on the ground floor of the Vienna ferry business.

****

Annemarie reported two days later, when she had her contact, that the Sanderlins were going to try to build a canal to the race track. She didn’t report that it was the women arranging it. She just assumed that they were acting on instructions from their husbands.

It took Bernhard Moser an extra couple of days to report the development. Not because of any incompetence on his part, but simply because he was working out at the shop and it had taken a couple of days for the news to come up in conversation.

Vienna, Austria

“They seem harmless enough,” Bernhard told his contact. “Even the canal they want to build seems to mostly be about giving people work.”

“And who’s going to pay for the work?” his contact asked. “That money’s got to come from somewhere and I don’t see where.”

“Neither do I,” Bernhard acknowledged. “Then again, I’m not an up-timer.”

It wasn’t a really satisfying meeting. Not because Bernhard had been unable to get the information. About the only thing he had missed was that Hayley Fortney was the one in charge. He’d even figured out that it was the women running things. Mostly that was by the process of elimination, because he couldn’t see Ron Sanderlin — or either of the other two men — running a business. But Hayley Fortney was just a teenaged girl. The idea that such a person could be able, much less trusted, to manage large sums of money and major projects was so ridiculous that it never even occurred to him. As well to think it was all being run by Brandon’s chickens.

Magdeburg, United States of Europe

Francisco Nasi brought up the next report. He’d already read it, of course, so all he needed to do was give the contents a quick scan to refresh his memory.

“This is from our correspondent in Austria.”

Mike Stearns got a crooked little smile on his face. “‘Correspondent.’ Sounds so much nicer than ‘spy.’ I assume we’re talking about Sonny Fortney, right? Or is that ‘need to know’ and I don’t?”

Nasi pursed his lips. “Interesting protocol issue, actually. Since you’re the head of government, I suppose you technically need to know everything. In any event, you’re my employer, so if you tell me you need to know I’ll take your word for it.”

Mike shook his head. “I’m not sure how that worked back up-time. At a guess, judging from the screw-ups, the CIA and the other spook outfits didn’t tell the U.S. president more than half of what they should have. In our case…”

He pondered the problem, for a moment. “I’ll take your word for it, whether I need to know something or not. Just make sure you let me know there’s something I might or might not need to know in the first place. If the grammar of that sentence doesn’t have you writhing in agony.”

Nasi smiled. “In this case, as it happens, Sonny really is more in the way of a correspondent than a spy. He does report to me — as I’m sure the Austrians have already figured out — but I don’t have him creeping around listening at keyholes or peeping into windows.”

“For that, I assume you have other people. Call them ‘real spies.’”

“I don’t believe you need to know that, Prime Minister.”

“Spoilsport. So what’s happening in Austria?”

“To summarize… The Austrians are adjusting to the American presence. More slowly and with greater difficulty than they should, of course, but they’re doing better than I expected.”

He set down the report. “But it’s very early days — and now we have a new emperor. Ferdinand III will be one mainly setting the tone and the pace.”

 

Polychrome – Chapter 14

Polychrome – Chapter 14

Chapter 14.

I sat down at the small table; this time it was just me, Iris Mirabilis, Nimbus, and Polychrome. “So… what’s on the agenda today?” I said after a pause.

“Nimbus tells me that you have… made considerable progress.” The Lord of Rainbows’ tone showed that there were still reservations in that assessment. “While we have many concerns, it is clear now that you have the potential and the will needed, and that — for good or ill — we shall have to rely on you truly fulfilling the role of prophecy.”

I really hate hearing that line. Too much on my shoulders. Yes, I know it’s all there anyway, but whenever they say it, it just looms up that much more. “I don’t think I’m done with my training yet.”

“No, not quite,” Nimbus agreed. “But we are nearing the point at which I will be unable to teach you much more without taking vastly more time. A few more months, at the most, and you will be ready for the final test. We cannot wait for much longer.”

“No,” Polychrome said. “We evaded Tempests on the way here, so the enemy surely knows I went to the mortal world and did something. They probably even know I brought someone back with me. So they must guess we’re planning to do something…”

“… and the longer we wait, the greater the chance that they will decide to act, rather than react.” Iris Mirabilis finished. “So now we must begin the real planning of what you will do, how it will be done, and how we can best assure our victory in the end. You have heard the Prophecies of the Bear many times. Have they enlightened you at all? For I admit that often they remain opaque even to me, and I have spent many years indeed reading them.”

I grinned. “In some ways, yes, I think they have. Though in most cases it might be best for me to keep things to myself, if you understand what I mean.”

The Rainbow Lord’s immense head tilted slightly, but his lips were touched with a smile. “I believe I may, Erik Medon. For your journey, your guesses and judgments must be your own.” He turned to Nimbus. “Have you solved the riddle of his arms and armor?”

“I’m afraid not,” the Captain of Hosts said reluctantly. “We do not generally work in mortal materials, and such materials would be too heavy and clumsy without proper modification. Our own materials, alas, simply cannot survive his use.”

“Never mind,” I said. “I already have my own answer for that problem. It’s in the Prophecy.”

The three looked at me in surprise. “In truth? I remember no lines that address your equipment. Not even thinking on them now,” Iris said finally, “can I find a reasonable interpretation that would lead me to that conclusion.”

Now it was my turn to chuckle. “Well, maybe it’s not in the Prophecy literally, but it’s sorta implied. Anyway, don’t worry about it.” I ran over the lines in my mind. “I’m more worried about the bit involving fighting a battle there when I happen to know that — as you’ve mentioned more than once — the Great Barrier around Oz prevents any Faerie from entering Oz. I’ll admit I’ve managed to become a lot tougher than I would’ve thought, but I’m not an ‘army of one’, so to speak.”

Iris nodded slowly. “You are correct. This is a matter to which I have had to devote much thought.

“The Barrier cannot be broken from without. From within, however, it can be opened, and by careful examination of the magics used and what we have learned from the enemy’s actions, I have devised a solution.” From a pouch at his side he pulled a crystal — to him, the size of a large marble; to me, more like a golf ball — that flickered with the colors of his Rainbow. “Place this upon the soil of Oz and my Rainbow will bridge the gap, become a path from one side of the Deadly Desert to another.”

That was a relief. “So — if you’ll pardon me for trivializing something that’s undoubtedly anything but trivial — all I have to do is get across the desert and I can bring through my reinforcements?”

The other three laughed. “Yes, indeed, that is all. An afternoon’s work for one of your might, Erik,” Nimbus said with a half-smile. “But there is more to concern us.”

Poly nodded. “The lines that go:

Army faces army, fifty thousand strong

          Both of faerie, neither yielding

          The battle will be long;

…yes?”

Nimbus grunted. “Any way I read that, I cannot come up with enough men. Even if I assume both armies together are fifty thousand strong, which would strike me as a most unlikely reading. I have ten thousand men, fifteen perhaps if I call for more volunteers. All of these I will commit, but that leaves us many short.”

I nodded. “I know. What about the other Faerie kingdoms?”

Iris shook his head. “None of them will commit anything. They all see any attempt at attacking Oz as foredoomed, and any who attempt it will be destroyed. The only forces of warriors that might have been capable of being a significant factor in such an assault were taken by Amanita herself.”

“The Phanfasms and some of the other nastier Faerie types.”

“You speak truly. Not that they would have been inclined to aid us; though they were partially neutralized many years ago, still their nature was capricious and often cruel, and uninterested in aiding others.”

Nimbus picked up the thread. “You of course represent a new factor… but we cannot discuss that factor with them. You are our secret until you leave here, and when you do so, you must be greatly cautious about those you contact, for any of them could be a spy or ally of our enemy.”

I nodded. “I understand. I’m not planning on taking too many risks. But… I’ll have to take some. Hell, the endgame means I’m going to be risking everything, so I think you — and I, for that matter — will have to trust my judgment on a lot of these things.”

“Yes. We have little choice. But that ‘endgame’ is of grave concern. I am not even sure how to help you there. You would have to understand a great deal, especially about the basic nature of Oz and the power of Faerie, before you could even begin to wield it. And you will have no time to practice… yet there really is no way to teach it to you except in theory. In the end, you will have to have clear in your mind the way in which you will wield the Power of Faerie, and keep that clarity…” Iris frowned. “How to begin? The essence of Oz –”

“–Is the Five Elements.” I said.

The startled, gratified look Polychrome gave me made my heart stop and restart. “True enough,” the Rainbow Lord said slowly. “But can you say what that means?”

“It’s pretty clear after I thought about it a bit. Oz is divided into five areas — four quadrant countries and one central area linking all of them. Then you have the clue of the Tempests, which Polychrome once mentioned were derived from Gillikins, at least in part. So I guess this means that the Gillikin country represents Air, the Quadling country Fire, the Munchkin country Water, and naturally the Winkie country is Earth.”

“And the Emerald City?”

“Emerald, the color of growing things, and the center of Faerie? Spirit, soul, the power of life itself. So if I’m right, Ugu and Amanita have not just storm-based Tempests but other twisted elemental spirits. Am I right?”

Nimbus looked pleased. “You are exactly right. There is much more to each element than their simple natures, though.”

“Yes, I realize that. Together the five make up, well, everything, so things like, oh, intelligence have to be characteristic of some element or another. I’d guess fire, for that one in specific. Toughness is probably earth. And so on.”

“Does this…” Polychrome began.

“…Help? Hell yeah. If you can give me a list of the associated properties for each element, I can get quite a bit of practice envisioning how I might be able to use them in an actual conflict. And with luck, it might even work the way I envision it, if the power combines with me as you say.”

We all carefully avoided the issue of exactly what was going to be happening to me WHILE I tried to use all that power.

“Polychrome? Please gather all this information for Erik. What he asks for we indeed have.” For the first time, I saw actual hope on Iris’ face, and I was glad. The longer I’d been here, the more I’d started to understand what a terrible burden he lived under.

Just as long as it isn’t false hope, the nagging part of me said. But it was right. I had come a long way, I had to admit. I had figured out several parts of the prophecy, and I was starting to see a path to the end of the journey… but any part of it could come unglued with just one wrong guess.

And boy, was I having to make a lot of guesses.

 

Belisarius audio drama

There will be a performance next Wednesday of an audio drama based on a novella I write set in the Belisarius universe. The novella and the drama based on it is titled “Islands.” The script was written by Tony Daniel, another author who publishes through Baen Books. Here are the details for anyone interested:

https://www.facebook.com/events/289227797946840/

– Eric

Paradigms Lost — Chapter 35

Paradigms Lost — Chapter 35

Chapter 35: A Test of Trust

“Good evening, Master Jason.” Morgan said, opening the door.

“Evening, Morgan.” I answered, glancing around. There were still lots of pieces of clutter around from the work that was being done on the house. “Verne around?”

“He and Master Kafan are in the library at the moment, sir.”

I opened my mouth to ask who “Master Kafan” was, then remembered Verne calling Tai Lee Xiang “Raiakafan.” “Thanks, Morgan.”

“Your coats, sir, Lady Sylvia?”

Though impatient, I didn’t show any sign of our concern. Neither did Syl; we both knew that if it was a werewolf, any hint that we suspected it could be fatal.

The library was much neater than the other areas. I remembered that Verne pushed the contractors to finish that room first and to clean it up each day; he valued the library more than just about any other room, except naturally whatever room it was that he slept in during the day. Verne and Tai were sitting together, bent over what looked like an atlas, with other books scattered about the table. Both looked up as we entered.

“Jason!” Verne rose. “I did not expect you. And Lady Sylvie.” He took her hand and bowed deeply over it.

I felt slightly jealous as Syl developed a slight blush and thanked Verne for his courtesy. She used to be scared stiff of Verne, but that seemed to be a thing of the past now.

Tai nodded to me and stood up at a gesture from Verne. “Tai, please meet my good friend Sylvia Stake,” Verne said.

We’d hoped for a setup like this. As he reached out, his attention focused on Syl, I pulled my hand out of my pocket and flung what was in my hand at him.

Neither of us saw everything that happened; from Syl’s point of view Tai suddenly disappeared. I, on the other hand, saw a blur move toward me and felt myself lifted into the air and slammed into a wall so hard that breath left me with an explosive whoosh and red haze fogged my vision. I struggled feebly, trying to force some air back into my lungs.

The pressure on my windpipe vanished suddenly as my attacker was yanked backwards. “Raiakafan! Jason! What is the meaning of this?” Verne demanded.

“I saw him move quickly; the characteristics of his motion strongly implied an attack.” Tai’s voice was level, cold, and flat, almost like a machine rather than a living being. “I therefore moved to neutralize him.”

“No one ‘neutralizes’ a member of my household or my friends.” Verne stated flatly. “As to Jason’s action, I am sure he will explain himself… immediately.” The last word carried a considerable coldness with it.

“Urrg …” I gurgled, then managed to gasp, pulling precious air back into my system. “Sorry… Verne.” I studied Tai carefully. Yes… I could see traces of the stuff. It had definitely hit him. Hell, he’d charged straight into it. Obviously he didn’t realize what kind of an attack it had been, if it had actually been an attack. “In a way, Tai was correct. Under the right circumstances, what I was doing would have been an attack. A lethal one.”

Verne’s eyes narrowed, fortunately showing more puzzlement than anger; we’d been through enough that he knew that I’d never do anything like this without damned good reason. “And just what circumstances would that have been?”

Syl answered. “If Tai had been a werewolf, he’d be dead now.”

Tai blinked, brushing away the silver dust I’d thrown in his face.

Verne’s expression softened in comprehension. “Ahh. Of course. You could hardly be blamed for such a suspicion, Jason. Without knowing the extent of my senses, you had no way of knowing that I knew this was the real Raiakafan, no matter what his outward seeming. And he has confirmed it in other ways since then.”

“According to what you told me,” I said, “a werewolf could foil even your senses.”

“True,” Verne admitted. “But there are other things that mere duplication of the soul and body cannot achieve, such as the memories that would have to be derived from… well, from someone supposedly dead a very, very long time ago. You still seem unsure, Jason. Please, tell me what troubles you.”

Without a word, I pulled out a printed copy of the pictures and articles I’d located and handed it to Verne, who read them in silence, then studied the picture and Tai carefully. Finally he handed them back.

“As we expected, Raiakafan,” he said. “I am of the opinion that we must tell them everything.”

That dead-black gaze returned; I saw Syl shrink back from it and it took some effort not to do so myself. “Are we sure?”

Verne waited until the strange young man was looking at him, and then answered. “Jason has risked his life to protect me. He has rekindled the Faith that was lost. And the Lady Sylvia is his best companion, a Mistress of Crystal, and born with the Sight. If I cannot trust them, then I cannot trust you, and if you cannot trust them, then I am not who you believe.” His words were very strange, half-explanation, half-ritual, spoken in a measured, formal manner that sent a shiver up my spine; that alien accent had returned again.

Tai studied me again, less ice in that gaze than before. Finally he nodded. “As you wish, Father.”

Verne relaxed, and so did we. The last thing any of us wanted was a real conflict. Whatever was going on here, it was obvious that Raiakafan — Tai — whatever his name was had some real problems in his life, and they might be coming after Verne too.

“Morgan!” Verne called. “Send in refreshments for everyone.” He turned to us. “Make yourselves comfortable, Jason, Lady Sylvie. This will be a long and difficult story, but a necessary one, for I see no other way around it but that I — that both Raiakafan and I — will need your help to solve the difficulties that face us.” Morgan came in, bearing a tray of drinks, and went out to return a moment later with two trays of hors d’oeuvres. Verne took a sip of his usual and frowned faintly. “How to begin, though…?”

“How about using the White King’s approach?” I suggested. “Start at the beginning. Go on to the end. And then stop.”

Syl and Verne chuckled at that; Kafan (I’d decided to use Verne’s name for him) just looked puzzled. Verne smiled sadly, his eyes distant. “Ahh. The beginning. But it’s always hard to mark the beginning, is it not? For whatever beginning you choose, there is always a cause that predates it. But it is true that for most great things there is a point at which you can say, ‘Here. At this point, all that went before was different.’ Perhaps I should start there …”

“No, Father! It is too dangerous — for them.”

Verne sighed. “It would be too dangerous not to tell them, Raiakafan. Jason works best with maximum information. But you are correct, as well.” He turned to us. “Before I proceed… Jason, Sylvia, I must impress upon you these facts.

“First, that much of what I am going to tell you contradicts that which is supposedly scientific fact.

“Second, that these contradictions — though they be on a titanic, global scale — were nonetheless designed; that it was intended by certain parties that the information I possess would never again be known to a living soul. My own existence is due as much to blind luck as it is to my own skill and power.

“Third, once you have been told these things, you become a potential target for the forces that would keep these things secret… and so will anyone to whom you reveal these things. And the forces behind this are of such magnitude as to give even Virigar pause, so powerful that the mightiest nations of this world are as nothing to them.” He gazed solemnly at us. “So think carefully; do you still wish to involve yourselves in these matters? I will think no less of you either way, I assure you. But once I speak, there is no going back. Ever. Even my ability to hide memories will not save you; they will never believe a memory completely gone when they can ensure it by killing the one with the memory.”

Verne’s deadly serious warning made me hesitate. He had only been this concerned when Virigar had come, and at that time there was no doubt that all the Great Wolf’s forces were directed towards him. Now, he was speaking of forces that didn’t even know he existed and yet were so fearsome as to warrant the most frightening warning he could give me. Not a reassuring thought.

I remembered the time he’d suddenly stopped a conversation. “The subject we discussed once before. Who you were, where you came from… the fact you’re not, exactly, a vampire… that’s part of it?”

“It is,” he said.

Syl replied first. “I want to hear the truth, Verne. I believe we were meant to hear it. If not, I would not be here.”

I nodded. “I didn’t think I’d be able to make friends with a vampire and not get into trouble sometimes. Might as well know what’s really going on. Seriously, Verne… if you have troubles on that scale, you’re going to need all the help you can get someday.”

Kafan studied us for a moment, and then smiled very slightly. “They are strong friends, Father.”

“They are indeed.” Verne leaned back in his red-cushioned chair. Light the color of blood flashed from his ring as he folded his hands. “Then, my friends, I start… or no. Raiakafan, would you begin? For what I must tell them is not only the more dangerous part, but the one that is less immediate. Your story is immediate. Mine is important to explain why even your story is insufficient.”

Kafan nodded. Turning to us, he began.

 

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 28

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 28

“Do we really need all that?” Gayleen Sanderlin asked.

“No, of course not, Mrs. Sanderlin. But the people out there waiting around hoping to be hired . . . they need it. If we are going to do more than set up a soup kitchen for the poor of Vienna, we need to get things organized so that the business pays for itself after the initial investment. Even if we were just setting up a soup kitchen, we would need staff to run it and it would take up a fair amount of time.”

“Why not hire people to manage the business instead of to do the cooking?” Hayley’s mom asked. “I’d rather cook than do accounts.”

“Because we don’t know them, Mom. Sure, I figure most people are basically honest, but if they start looking at us as rich idiots with more money than sense, at least some of them are going to decide that it’s not really wrong to rip us off.”

At that point both women nodded. A lot of up-timers, including the Sanderlins, had gotten suckered in the first few months after the Ring of Fire. Often by people who wouldn’t even think of such a thing when dealing with a fellow down-timer. Up-timers were often seen as rich sheep to be sheared, who had arrived with too much wealth and too little sense, easy marks that deserved to be taken, because of their naivety, wealth and arrogance.

Hayley continued, “We have to be seen to know what we’re doing.”

“So you’ll be in charge of the business?” Mrs. Sanderlin asked.

“No. I’ll put up the money, or most of it, and I’ll advise about which products are buildable. If you guys want to do this, it’s going to have to be you, Dad and Mr. Sanderlin, maybe both Mr. Sanderlins . . . but with them busy working on the emperor’s projects, you two will be the ones actually running the business. I shouldn’t be in charge for a couple of reasons. One is that it’s going to be really hard for them to take me seriously as the boss. The other is . . . well, you’ve had people coming to you for two weeks looking for work. I’ve had it for two years. Since Karl and Ramona’s wedding. ‘Invest in this give me a loan for that.’ It was bad enough just being part of the Barbies. I don’t want it to be all on me.

“And that’s another thing . . . we want to keep the business under the radar as much as we can. Because if you think people looking for work is bad, wait till you get hit by people looking for investors. You don’t want to turn them down because it’s their dream you’re killing. But suppose it’s a really crappy idea? Or it’s a good idea, but they aren’t the people to run it? Another reason to keep quiet is because even if it’s not a zero sum game, there are winners and losers. Just the fact that some people get jobs from us is going to pis . . . ah, upset people, the people who wanted to hire them for starvation wages. And if the business gets too big, they will try to shut us down. We don’t have Mike Stearns and the army to protect us this time. All we’ve got is Emperor Ferdinand’s interest in cars. If we get to be too much trouble, he’ll stick the cars in the garage and send us packing or lock us in a dungeon somewhere.”

“I’m starting to think maybe this wasn’t such a good idea,” Dana said.

“It’s not, Mom. But you and Dad are right about one thing. Creating jobs for people is the right thing to do, even if it’s not the smart thing. If we’re careful, we can help a lot of people before they shut the business down. If we’re careful enough, they might not shut it down.”

Fortney House, Simmering, Austria

Annemarie Eberle showed Herr Pfeifer into the sitting room and then went out to fetch coffee.

Jakusch Pfeifer smiled at the three women. Two were older than he was and the third was younger. He wondered why she was here but didn’t let it show on his face.

“Have a seat, Herr Pfeifer,” said one of the older women. “I’m Gayleen Sanderlin. This is Dana Fortney and her daughter, Hayley.”

Once Jakusch was seated, it was Dana Fortney who got down to business. “What can you tell us about business law and the management of trade in Vienna?”

“Not as much as I would like, if you’re talking about the guild restrictions on manufacturing in Vienna itself. On the other hand, you aren’t in Vienna. You are three miles outside it, and I am familiar with the laws governing trade into and out of the city. Vienna’s rules don’t apply here.”

“Yes. . . .” Hayley paused a moment. “I guess it’s a pretty long walk from Vienna to the race track.”

“It’s not so bad,” Herr Pfeifer said. “Only four miles and I caught a ride with Cousin Paul. The race track is only a mile or so from the Danube. Though, it is a bit muddy right at the shore.”

The maid laid down the coffee service and Mrs. Sanderlin thanked her.

Dana Fortney smiled. “You know all those stories grandparents tell, Hayley? The ones about walking two miles in the snow to get to school.”

“Yes,” Hayley muttered, not really paying attention, “uphill in both directions.”

“I’m starting to think that at some point, maybe in my grandparent’s day, there was some truth to them.”

“Um.” Hayley still wasn’t paying that much attention, Herr Pfeifer noticed. He looked at Frau Fortney, then at Hayley. Frau Fortney grinned a bit and touched a finger to her lips. Hayley was oblivious to it all.

“The workers, to come from Vienna to the track each day and go back each night, have to walk four miles, sometimes more. It’s shorter from the banks of the Danube and if we were to use the Fresno scrapers to dig a canal and put in a dock next to the track, it would change a two-hour walk each way to a comfortable half-hour boat ride. That would be worth paying for.”

“It would also make it easy for people to come see the cars race around the track,” Dana agreed. “Maybe it’s something that Ron ought to talk to Emperor Ferdinand about.”

“Yes,” Hayley said. “As soon as he can get an appointment.”

“It’s too expensive,” Herr Pfeifer said. “How many people working on the track can afford even a pfennig a day for just a ride to work, much less two?”

 

Paradigms Lost — Chapter 34

Paradigms Lost — Chapter 34

Chapter 34: Reunion Jitters

“Guess who!”

Two soft hands covered my eyes in time with the words. To my credit, I managed to keep from jumping, though she probably knew how much she’d startled me anyway.

“Madame Blavatsky?”

She giggled. “Nope.”

“Nostradamus?”

“Do I feel like I have a beard? Try again!”

“Then it must be the great Medium of the Mohawk Valley herself, Sylvia Stake!”

The hands came away as I turned around. “You guessed!”

“No one else has a key to this place, and Verne’s voice is two octaves lower and his hands five sizes bigger.”

Sylvie was looking good this evening, in one of her gypsyish outfits, black hair currently styled in tight ringlet-like curls pulled back by several colorful scarves, a low-cut dress with a long skirt, and a big over-the-shoulder bag that was hand-woven with enough different colors to supply a dozen rainbows. “Oh, is that the only difference?” she said, leaning forward.

Sylvie always makes me nervous. I don’t know why; she’s not the only woman or girl I’ve ever dated, and I never got this nervous around them or anyone else for that matter. Because she always saw it, Syl assumed it was all women who made me nervous. And she always enjoyed flustering me. Leaning forward in that dress was just another such approach. “C’mon, Syl, cut it out. I can’t take the games today.”

She switched gears immediately. “Sorry, Jason. I noticed you seemed tense, but I thought it might be just work and the fact I’d been away so long.”

“It’s not like I fall apart when you go away, you know.”

“Then what’s bothering you?”

I turned back to the computer screen. “Sorta business, sorta personal.”

“Verne.” It was a statement, not a question.

“How did you know?”

“Just a feeling.”

“You know, it’s tough to hide anything from you. A guy came in the other day, asking me to find his father, who he’d been separated from for years. It turned out that his father is Verne.”

“Well, that’s wonderful… isn’t it?”

“I dunno.” I pointed at the screen. “Verne didn’t recognize his face at all, just said something about recognizing his ‘soul,’ and then the two of them went off to talk together. Verne seems convinced that he’s bona fide, but I have to wonder. Even if he is the real McCoy, that doesn’t mean he couldn’t have something nasty up his sleeve.”

“Jason, it’s not like you to be this paranoid.”

I told her about that cold gaze. “That just started me thinking, though. I wouldn’t go around worrying if that was all it was. But because of that, I decided to just run a background check on this guy, and I didn’t like what came up.”

Syl looked at the screen. It showed a front-page story from a Vietnamese paper of several months ago, accompanied by two pictures. One showed a Vietnamese in a business suit in one of those typical “ID Photo” poses; the other showed a blond-haired, sharp-featured young man with a cold, angry expression.

“If you color that hair black,” I said, hitting the command as I spoke, “that guy’s a twin for our ‘Tai Lee Xiang.’ ”

“What does the story say?”

“Says that the unnamed subject — the blond guy — here killed the man in the picture while escaping from a maximum-security hospital for the criminally insane. Doctor Ping Xi, the dead man, was a very important man, apparently.” I hit a few more controls, and another newspaper headline appeared. “A couple days later, they claim he killed off a colonel in their army, and he’s been hunted ever since. International warrants, the whole nine yards.”

“You don’t really think even a madman would be a threat to Verne, do you?”

I chuckled slightly in spite of myself. If I glanced out the righthand window, I was able to just make out one of the two girders left standing from the warehouse that Verne had single-handedly demolished while killing Virigar’s brood of werewolves. “It does sound a little silly, doesn’t it? But this guy isn’t an ordinary killer. According to the files I’ve been able to worm out, this colonel was practically torn apart.” I felt a spike of ice suddenly form in my chest as I spoke those words, and remembered a particular clearing in the woods.

Sylvie paled suddenly. “You don’t think …”

“… Yes, I do think. We’d better get over there.”

Neither of us had to explain the hideous thought that had occurred to us. Werewolves. If Virigar knew something about Verne’s background… how very easy to have one of his people change into some form with a good background story. If Verne knew no way to tell a werewolf from a real man, that meant that they were even capable of imitating souls.

Pausing only to grab a couple pieces of equipment, we headed for the car at a dead run.

 

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 27

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 27

Race Track at Simmering, Austria

The unemployment situation in Vienna became increasingly clear over the next few days. Demonstrated not by numbers reported on TV, since they didn’t get any TV in Austria, but by the numbers of people showing up looking for work on the new race track. Ron Sanderlin couldn’t hire them all; he couldn’t even hire an appreciable fraction of them. At the same time, he hated turning away hungry people.

“Sonny, can you hire some of these guys to do something, anything?” Ron asked their third day in Simmering.

“What? Why me?”

“Well, you know.” Ron shrugged. He didn’t want to come right out and say can you get your teenage daughter to hire a bunch of these people? The up-timers had only been dealing with newly rich relatives since the Ring of Fire and asking those newly rich relatives for money was handled in different ways by different people. Everything from the assumption that what they had was yours to I’ll starve before I drag them down with me. It became especially difficult if those newly rich relatives were sons and daughters, because of the embarrassment factor. “Why am I still a working stiff when little Billy — or, in this case, little Hayley — has managed to turn herself into a millionaire?”

The elder Fortneys took a not-fanatical hands-off approach. They didn’t ask Hayley for money or stock tips but if she volunteered they would mostly let her help if it wasn’t going to endanger her future prospects. Ron knew, for instance, that Hayley had offered to pay for the tutor. Which Sonny and Dana had agreed to, but the maid was paid by Dana.

“I know how you feel, Ron, but . . .”

Just then another person showed up. He wasn’t a prepossessing fellow. He was balding, with bad teeth and a wart over his right eye. But it was also clear that he was desperate for work.

Ron looked at Sonny then back at the man. “Check back in a couple of days. I can’t promise anything, but maybe we’ll have something.”

After the guy had left, Ron just looked at Sonny.

“I’ll talk to Dana. That’s the best I can do,” Sonny said.

Fortney House, Simmering, Austria

Sonny talked to Dana and Dana talked to Hayley.

“The thing is, Mom, I’m not really all that good at business.” Hayley looked around the sitting room in their new home as though she could find the explanation in the whitewashed walls. “That’s mostly Susan, Millicent and Vicky. I’m the tech geek. In most of the businesses we’ve taken over, it wasn’t that the tech didn’t work. It was that the business didn’t work.”

“I understand, Hayley, and neither your father nor I want you to endanger your future over this. It’s just really hard to say no to hungry people looking for work.”

“I’m not saying no. At least not yet. Let me think about it. Okay?” Hayley looked around the sitting room again. There were windows with glass in the standard down-time diamond pattern, a big fireplace with no fire at the moment. A polished wood floor with a rug. It was a nice room in a nice country house, that was easily three times the size of their place back in Grantville. No indoor plumbing. Instead they had people lining up to empty their chamber pots. No microwave, electric toaster or natural gas oven. In this day and age, cooks worked from before dawn to after nightfall to make bread and stew. It was, to Hayley, as if the Ring of Fire had just happened.

****

“Doctor Faust?” Hayley knocked on the third door of the third floor room.

“Just a moment.”

Hayley waited as Doctor Faust got himself together. Then he opened the door to a room that was a bit bigger than a closet but not much. There was a bed about the size of a camp cot, but probably not as comfortable and a stack of books on the floor.

“What can I do for you, Miss Hayley?”

“Do you know anything about business law as it is practiced in Austria?”

“No, I’m sorry. I studied natural philosophy and for a while medicine, but the law never held any interest for me. Why?”

“Well, do you know anyone who does?” Hayley asked.

Doctor Faust looked at her a moment. “Jakusch Pfeiffer was studying law to work with his family in shipping, but they lost several craft, ah, upriver. They had to stop going that far and he’s short of tuition money. But again, why?”

“Just a plan Mom and Dad are thinking about.”

****

As it happened, Dana Fortney was the keeper of the family accounts, as was Gayleen Sanderlin for the Sanderlin family. Between them they had a pretty complete listing of what the families had brought to Vienna. It was quite a lot. It included a Higgins Sewing Machine, a typewriter — also down-time made — an adding machine, but not, unfortunately, a computer. The Sanderlins had had a computer, but they sold it to the Higgins Hotel when they moved to Vienna. They had Brandon’s rabbits, his roosters and hens and thirty-eight chicks that were starting to turn into cockerels and pullets, and a Rosin Foam incubator ready for the next batch. There was a lot more stuff on the list.

“I can’t run the business on my own, Mom,” Hayley said. “If you and Dad want me to hire people, you and Mrs. Sanderlin get to keep the books. And keeping those books is liable to end up as a full-time job for the both of you. We’re going to need extra household servants, because between the lack of things like vacuum cleaners . . .”

“We knew we were going to need servants when we came, Hayley,” Dana said. “We already have two maids and a cook. Not to mention Doctor Faust and . . .”

“But not how many, Mom,” Hayley said. “We’re not going to have a couple of maids to help out; we’re going to have staff. A cook and probably two undercooks, four or five maids and an overmaid to run them. Also a couple of groundskeepers. And the Sanderlins are going to need the same because you and Mrs. Sanderlin won’t have time for housework, not even for much in the way of supervising. Neither I or Brandon are going to have time for chores, because Brandon — the little creep — is going to be managing the groundskeepers. Teaching them about those silly rabbits and chickens of his and modern corn, tomatoes, watermelons and stuff. And I’m going to be looking for stuff to build using what we have. Not to mention instructing master craftsmen in the crafts they have spent the last forty years learning. Between that and our school work, we won’t have time to turn around.”

 

Polychrome – Chapter 13

Polychrome – Chapter 13

Chapter 13.

Polychrome watched from the doorway as the group of Guards prepared for training combat. She knew that Nimbus and her father were deeply worried; Erik had the intellectual and, somewhat surprisingly, physical potential to be a good, perhaps even better than good, warrior, but when it came down to actual fighting, sparring with the men, the closest thing to real combat they could manage to give him… he just couldn’t seem to use what he’d learned. He hesitated, he backed off, he was perhaps one-half or one-tenth as effective as he might be. She had decided to watch and see if she could figure out what was going wrong.

Erik stood at the center of the room, waiting. He was dressed in twilight-indigo crystal-metal armor and holding a shining silver sword, touched with a hint of emerald, that was about as long as he was tall. He held it in one hand, moving it absently as though it were a fishing rod instead of a huge blade of metal that, she knew, she could lift but would never be able to wield even with both hands even for a few seconds. His True Mortal nature rendered the mystical blade effectively massless for him — and not for his targets, making it terrifyingly effective if he was willing to actually use it properly.

Willing… is that it? No, I’ve been watching him these months. He was only telling the truth about his laziness — he doesn’t like working hard, but he’s also told the truth about his dreams, and he’s really been working hard for this dream, even though I’ve heard him complaining to himself a lot when he thinks no one’s listening.

Part of that work showed just in his appearance. The armor he wore made his shoulders look very broad, but they were broader than they’d been when he first arrived, and the belt holding the mail was now defining a waist instead of something more rounded; his face had become more defined, square and sharper with less rounding. She approved.

Unfortunately, appearance didn’t mean much. It was performance that mattered, and he was consistently failing to perform. She’d heard the Guards whispering — and suspected he had, too — that he was already a failure. They would not speak unkindly to his face, they were too well disciplined and trained to do so to a guest of the Lord of Rainbows, but she knew that his failures were causing the Storm Legions to fear that already the Prophecy had failed and their cause was lost.

The Guards spread out, encircling Erik Medon; his eyes checked their positions carefully as he turned to watch their movements. Then he noticed her watching, and she could see his eyes widen slightly.

“Ready, all…” Nimbus called, raising his hand.

The blond mortal gripped the sword now in both hands and seemed to gather himself.

The armored hand dropped. “Begin!”

The Guardsmen charged in a synchronized attack; Erik, recognizing that the last thing he needed was to get caught in the center of that mess, charged in the direction he was already facing, swinging the huge blade in front of him to clear a path.

One of the guards behind hurled a spear, but it glanced off the armor and Erik only winced slightly, bowling over one of the Guards in front and clearing him with an impressive leap that took him well out of the encircling group of Guards. But he didn’t do anything to make sure the one who went down doesn’t get back up!

He whirled, delivering a sweeping strike that shattered two spear shafts jabbing at him; she saw the sword actually bend slightly from the impact, springing straight but, she thought, possibly with a notch in one side. He caught a hard-swung mace in one hand and ripped it out of the Guards’ hand like taking a toy away from a toddler, threw it over his shoulder, shoved the Guard away, and smacked another sideways with the flat of the sword.

But the Guards were faster. The ring was closing in around him again and they were matching his movements better, hemming him in. Half of them were disarmed by now but they grabbed onto his arms, his legs, and those with weapons remaining were starting to get in hits. She winced as she saw one point slip through the guards to prick his leg, heard him curse. He staggered as a pair of Guards struck the back of his knees, and he went down under a pile of Guards who were now systematically beating on him; she saw him raise his head and see her still watching. She realized her hand had involuntarily gone to her mouth in sympathy. Then even that sight vanished as the Guards really piled on. She could see Nimbus’ eyes roll upward, his head shaking in frustration.

Then she heard a low, baritone snarl from under that pile, a pile that suddenly shuddered; she thought she heard a couple of nonsensical words in that sound that became a full-fledged roar as the entire mass of Guardsmen was heaved skyward, flung away from the figure at the center like straws in a hurricane, and she felt her jaw drop at that display of furious power. A hand whipped out, grabbed a Guard, crushing the armor on his shoulder, and hurled him through the mass of his fellows, bowling them aside, human tenpins hit by a living bowling ball. A silver streak spun about in a complete circle, batting the still-recovering guards away in a shower of metallic fragments.

Erik Medon stood there alone, breathing heavily, a sharp whistling undertone becoming evident, but triumphant. His armor was hanging on him in fragments, there were trickles of blood from a dozen minor wounds and red welts of bruises which would undoubtedly become blue soon enough, and the mighty sword was a shattered, unrecognizable mess except for the hilt, and his expression was wide-eyed, shifting from anger to concern.

Nimbus’ expression, by contrast, had just changed from worry to savage delight. “Now by the Seven Hues that is what I was seeking, Erik Medon! THAT is the power, the strength, the skill I’ve been trying to get you to reach for these six months! Well done, well done indeed!”

Erik didn’t seem to hear him; instead he had run over to the Guards, especially the one he’d used as a bowling ball. “Jesus, holy crap, Rain, you okay? Stratos? Mist? I’m sorry, guys, I–”

Rain winced and panted; red showed under the torn and crumpled armor, but even so the Guardsman managed a pained smile. “Think… nothing… of it, Lord Medon. I am … honored to have been… one of the first to learn that our hope is not gone.” The others nodded, lines of restrained worry smoothing out despite pain.

“What? I could have killed you with that stupid –”

“Peace, Erik.” Nimbus placed a hand on his shoulder. “None died, and the injured will be tended to.” He shook his head with a wry smile, studying the mortal before him as another piece of Erik’s armor — most of the breastplate — fell off. “Finding you equipment that will survive your use, however, may prove more problematic. Still, now that you have gotten past whatever had restrained you, let us continue.”

Erik shook his head emphatically. “No way. I’m done for now. Maybe for good.” He turned and walked away, slower now but with clear decision.

The Captain of the Legions went to stop him, but Polychrome shook her head, and went to follow.

She hung back, but caught up with him halfway back to his quarters when he slowed to a stop. “Erik–”

The whistling undertone had gotten louder, and she saw him suddenly grope under the remains of his armor, tearing it off and reaching into one of his pockets, pulling out the plastic-and-metal device he called an “inhaler”.

It did not make quite the same sound as she remembered, and he triggered it twice more before she heard something more like the original quick, sharp hiss. He held his breath for a moment then let it out; slowly that undertone retreated, but it did not seem to be going away. “Sorry… I may be in trouble. That sucker’s running out, and you don’t seem to have a decent pharmacy around here.”

“You need that … device often?”

He grimaced and leaned against the wall. “If I do exercise, yeah. You remember our little run, of course. Well, Nimbus has been driving me hard. I’ve tried to pace myself as much as I could, but it’s not easy.”

“Maybe Father could –” She broke off. “Oh.”

“Yeah. There’s all sorts of miracles your dad could do, I think. He thinks he can get away with fixing my vision; that’s basically a one-time shot that just re-molds my lenses and softens them up, doesn’t really change ME. But fixing my asthma and allergies? That’s a full-body biochemical change, maybe genetic, or it means I have to have magic running in my bod 24/7.”

That would be self-defeating, she knew; the more magic that was made a part of him — even willingly — the greater the chance that it would compromise his True Mortal status, at which point the entire reason for his presence here would be in jeopardy. “Perhaps we can at least find a way to duplicate or re-fill your inhalers and your other medicines.”

He nodded, clearly still recovering from his own body’s attempt to suffocate him after that last huge exertion. “Yeah. I sure don’t want to have to try to do this whole gig while having to guess when and how I’m going to keel over suddenly.” He straightened. She noticed that he still kept his eyes focused exclusively on her face, or away from her entirely. “Poly, I’m sorry you had to see that mess.”

“Mess? I got to see you succeed for the first –”

“I got mad for a minute and I almost killed the guys who are supposed to be teaching me!” he snapped, and there was brittle edge in his voice. “It felt real good for a couple of seconds, until I realized I might really have hurt someone there.”

That explains a lot, she thought, and filed it away for her later discussion with Nimbus. “So why then? That can’t be the first time you got… overwhelmed.”

He looked away for a moment, a sheepish grin on his face. “You weren’t there the other times. It’s probably pretty stupid, but the last thing I saw as they hogpiled me was you looking at me as though I was so totally pathetic… and I just couldn’t stand the thought of lying there being beat to a pulp while you watched. And with all of them punching and kicking… I just suddenly got really pissed and let it all out.” He looked down at himself. “Er, look, I’m hardly in any condition to be talking to you right now, I hurt all over, I probably stink, and as soon as I get over my upset I’ll probably just have to head back to training.” He went to the door of his quarters.

She wanted to inquire more, but she thought she understood now. “All right, Erik. I’ll… see you later?”

His face lit up. “If… if you want to, sure.”

As he started to open the door, she said, “Wait. Just one little question before you go.”

“Oh?”

“Well… it was something I heard when you finally acted…” She concentrated to make sure she remembered it right. “Um… ‘Mortal smash’?”

He burst out laughing, and there was a touch of red on his cheeks. “Oh, that… um… Look, that’d take a while to explain. Later, all right?”

He is so hard to understand sometimes, she thought. “All right.”

She retraced her steps to the training area and found Nimbus examining the shattered pieces of sword and armor. “Lady Polychrome,” he said with a nod. “Did you learn anything of value?”

“I think so.” She recounted most of the conversation. “So… I think the problem is that he really just doesn’t want to hurt people.”

“Um.” Nimbus wrinkled his brow. “That’s common for Faerie of a certain sort. You’ve got much of that in you, of course, though I’ve noticed you seem willing to overcome that. Most of your sisters. The Lady Ozma, of course. But he’s talked about dreams of being a great warrior of various sorts, some I just can’t quite understand. Does his dream, then, stand against his soul?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know for sure, Nimbus. But I think that’s the problem you’ve been seeing.”

He sighed. “That could be fatal. Thinking along those lines, there’s some things I can do to make him more effective, but in the end he has to be ready to hurt — or even kill — because sure as the Rainbow, our enemies will kill him if they get the chance.”

“I know, Nimbus. But … is it not better that he be unwilling to kill, than too willing?”

“I suppose,” the Captain of Hosts said grudgingly, “but I just hope we won’t pay for the luxury of a conscience.”

 

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 26

1636 The Viennese Waltz – Snippet 26

Vienna, Austria

“They pointed a gun at Julian, Father,” Amadeus von Eisenberg said.

“I don’t need this, Amadeus,” Peter von Eisenberg said. “Karl Eusebius wants to put a railroad up to Teschen. And Sonny Fortney is a qualified surveyor. You and that drunken rabble you run with getting yourselves shot by the emperor’s pet up-timers is not going to make things easier. I will discuss it with the emperor, but in the meantime you and your friends stay away from the up-timers. I don’t need you in drunken brawls with peasants. Especially useful peasants. Leave them to the local peasants.”

“Yes, Father,” Amadeus said resentfully. He wasn’t happy about it but he would do it.

Village of Simmering, Austria

Hertel Faust, the new tutor, smiled as he looked at the carefully preserved insects in the four glass cases. “These are marvelous. You have examples from up-time America?”

“Uh huh,” Brandon agreed. “That’s this one and that one.” He pointed at two of the cases. “The others are from down-time Germany. Well, around the Ring of Fire anyway. Some of ‘em are American insects that I caught after the Ring of Fire but–” He pointed. “–that one and that one are maybe crosses between up-time and down-time insects.”

“That would seem unlikely on the face of it,” Doctor Faust said cautiously. “On the other hand, I have never seen ones quite like these.”

Hayley kept her peace. Herr Doctor Hertel Faust was a reasonably handsome young man, well-read and open-minded. If he had the normal male interest in icky, squishy bugs, well, it was unlikely that they were going to find a tutor that didn’t.

After he and Brandon finished ooh-ing and aah-ing over the skeletons of dead bugs, Hayley managed to get Faust back onto something interesting. She showed him an electromagnet and demonstrated the effect of moving a permanent magnet across it.

Dr. Faust looked at the needle on the voltmeter moving and asked, “Please explain to me again why moving a magnet across a coiled wire produces electricity and moving it across a straight wire doesn’t. Does the curve cause the effect?”

“A straight wire does produce electricity when a magnet is moved across it. But it’s just one wire. A coil has lots of strands of wire being affected. You coil them to make the magnetic field produce more electricity.”

“Why not use one big wire? They carry more current, don’t they?”

Hayley wasn’t sure how to explain. “Yes, but the movement of the magnetic field would only produce a little energy no matter how big the wire is. With the coil the magnetic field is acting on lots of separate wires.”

“Then what would happen if you had hundreds of parallel wires, rather than hundreds of coils?”

Hayley started to say something but was stopped by the fact that she didn’t have a clue what would happen. “I don’t know. Maybe you’d get lots of very weak currents of electricity?”

“Perhaps. But assume that all the wires split off from one wire on one side of the magnet’s path and recombined on the other?”

“I don’t know . . . ?”

“Sounds like a neat experiment, though,” Brandon said.

Doctor Faust was going to fit in just fine, Hayley thought.

****

Hertel Faust gave a little half bow to one of the gawkers they passed and Hayley wondered why. She didn’t interrupt, though. She, Brandon, and Dr. Faust continued their walk, identifying tree and birds. Once they were out of earshot of the person Dr. Faust had bowed to she asked, “Who was that you bowed to back there?”

“Herr Weber, you mean? He is of the They of Vienna.”

“What’s that?” Brendan asked. He had clearly heard the emphasis as well as Hayley had.

“The They or the Them of Vienna are . . .” He paused searching for a word. “Elite. Yes, I think that is the word. The elite of Vienna. Not exactly the nobility, more the patrician class of Vienna. It is important that you know the social rules. The They of Vienna run the city. They hold the important posts and are the most important of the merchants and master craftsmen in the city. They are often titled in some way, but not always. Herr Weber, for instance, is simply a very wealthy merchant, but he and members of his family have been involved in the politics of Vienna for the last half century at least. He has influence over which laws and regulations are passed and what exceptions are available.”

“So why the bow?” Hayley asked.

“A lack of respect might cause you trouble.”

“They better not try,” Brandon said belligerently. And Hayley felt tempted to agree with him. But Dr. Faust was shaking his head. “It could cause your parents trouble to show them a lack of respect. It’s better to give them the bow and avoid the trouble.”

****

Bernhard Moser was one of the better qualified applicants to the race track work force. He was a journeyman blacksmith who had been let go when his master had gotten a steam hammer. The master had three journeymen working for him, including his two sons. So Bernhard was the one who got cut when the steam hammer had arranged for them to need one less worker. He was a friendly sort and had the solid muscles expected of a blacksmith. Better yet, he was at least a little familiar with steam hammers. Ron Sanderlin hired him on the spot to work in the shop. Bernhard started out on Fresno scrapers.

Vienna, Austria

“So far, sir,” Bernhard told his contact, “it’s just what you would expect. They are making Fresno scrapers, picks, shovels, all the sorts of things that you would expect to build a road. The up-timers themselves seem friendly and down to earth, but they have a truly horrible accent.” Bernhard shook his head. “It’s like nothing I’ve ever heard before.

“This is not about the up-timers themselves, but one thing. The housekeeper that the Fortneys hired is Annemarie Eberle, and I am fairly sure she works for Janos Drugeth.”

“Did she recognize you?”

“I don’t think so. It wasn’t that we had ever worked together, but someone pointed her out to me once when she was acting as an under maid in the palace.”

The contact nodded. “Come and see me once a week for now. If anything urgent comes up, you know the signals.”

“Yes, sir.”