Off Center (The Lament) (17 page)

Pran
finally nodded and put the last of the soiled clothing they were going to get to
that day into the water.

"I'll
get a wagon or cart. We need to get Will out of here before he seems well enough
for his trial. He can't last, standing in front of a Judge."

The
man smiled and took out another handful of sodden clothing.

"Why
not? You speak about these Judges as if they're almost magic."

She
blinked at him, and almost didn't say anything, but decided that would seem too
surly. So she took a breath and relaxed, then turned to look at him with a sweet
expression on her face.

"They
very nearly
are
. Don't underestimate the people here, Zeke. We don't have
what you did, before. Machines that do everything for us. It means that, in a lot
of ways, we had to become stronger in order to get by. If you forget that, you won't
just lose, but get a lot of people killed."

She
didn't know that for certain, but it sounded decent, didn't it?

After
that she kept working. They were going to lose the light, otherwise.

It
occurred to Pran, as Paul showed her where all the different tools were stored,
each having their own box or rack, that she wasn't doing very well. Not when it
came to relaxing. Then, while she still felt a bit sick, she really was doing better.
If nothing else the tiny woodworking shop was warmer than the world outside. Things
had cleared a lot, but not gotten warmer. The freezing rain hadn't come in, and
it was only a little breezy out, which meant the ship swayed, and if you listened
hard you could hear the ropes creak a bit, but it wasn't scary at all.

"Now,
I won't belabor the point, being as it's you and not one of the other fools on the
crew, but keep things clean all the time. Dust travels, so keep everything well
wiped down, if you don't want Mina riding your behind for the next three weeks.
I was told that I should ask you about working up some footlockers for gear? A meter
long, half that high and wide. They should be sturdy, and we have some solid hinges
for them. Other than that, Captain said you can do what you want. That good? You
can do that in the time you have left here?"

"Oh,
sure. I'll do those first. Where are the hinges?" She was shown and the man
didn't hover over her for too long, as she pulled out some of the ship's store of
wood and started to measure things off for cutting. That part took a while, but
the saws were good, and sharp already, and the wood dry enough. By the time she
was ready for bed, still not having eaten, she had all three of the basic boxes
laid out, and drilled holes for the pegs to hold them together. She was sleepy,
but kept her eyes open until the tenth bell, deciding to call it a day early.

It
felt like she was forgetting something, so she went over the whole shop first, sweeping
and wiping it down, and then triple checked all of the tools, to make certain they'd
gotten back into the right places. They all had, but still, something niggled at
the back of her mind.

Not
able to place the idea at all she started to leave, only to notice that she really
didn't want to. It was like something wanted her to stay and keep working, until
she had the glue out, heated and painted on the pegs, which she gently hammered
in with a wooden mallet. Then she used some rope to tie the boxes together, leaving
the tops off.

That
was it, she understood. The tops. She needed to put some carvings on them. Mina
had mentioned that, hadn't she? Oh, not on the boxes specifically, but wood carving.
She just drew the pattern out and then went to bed, because exhausting herself wasn't
going to really help. Working until she became a burden wouldn't make anyone love
her after all.

It
was as she lay in the dark, listening to Apprentice Roy breathing gently that she
realized she was probably insane. It was what Doctor Millis had said that confirmed
the idea. The kids at the Grange were there because their parents had been too crazy
to be useful. Too far gone to raise their own brats. It meant that the children
of the Grange were soiled, innately, didn't it? That people like her were just...
Wrong. Bad, and probably evil.

Look
at the things she'd done, after all. She'd stabbed people as well as shot them,
almost every time she had a gun of any sort on her. She didn't even hesitate most
of the time. Just pulling the trigger when she got scared or annoyed. Then she lied
all the time and did it really well. Oh, it was training and practice that made
her good at it, but she
was
.

Her
obsession with work wasn't normal either. She almost couldn't stop doing it, because
she was afraid that if she did, the world would collapse in on her. True, everyone
on the ship did their share, but the others did things that weren't work too, didn't
they? They had hobbies and took breaks to chat, or drink coffee. Sometimes other
things, which was why Bill kept getting into trouble.

Not
her though. It was always just moving from one bit of work to the next.

She
knew why that was, but it was...

Not
sane. Not really.

She
was thinking that when she woke up, a gentle hand on her shoulder. She didn't flail
at the person, which was good, since it was just Roy. He was standing with his shirt
off, staring at her.

"Pran,
are you okay? You were crying." He sounded worried.

She
sat up, but found her eyes weren't wet at all. Then, given the dream she'd been
having, it probably wasn't what the boy had thought. She wasn't crying, but grunting,
rhythmically. In a pained fashion.

Now
that she was awake though, the memory didn't hurt. Blinking she took a huge breath
and then stood.

"Bad
dream, that's all. Nothing to worry about now. It's time to get up?" She pulled
her own shirt off, to change, not thinking about it. Roy stared a bit, since she
didn't have anything on underneath it. She normally did, and hadn't really been
thinking about that. Worse, her nipples hardened, thanks to the chill. At least
Roy was doing the same. He did look away though, smiling.

"That,
is hardly fair. Now I'm going to be distracted all day, thinking about
you,
instead
of my job. If we all catch fire and die, I want you to remember that it's your fault."
He turned his back a bit, and changed from his sleeping clothes to his work pants,
with his back turned so she couldn't see if he was really "happy" or not.
Pran was good with that, at the moment.

Roy
was cute, in a goofy way, and she wasn't going to say no to a bit of company, if
she ever had the time and energy, since she was already on birth control, since
all the students at the art school had to be, but coming off of that particular
dream, it might be best for them to wait a bit.

"I
wouldn't bother." She said it lightly, but Roy spun and made a face at her,
the front of his pants indeed sticking out a bit more than normal.

"Oh?"
He sounded hurt for some reason, which she got after half a second.

She
kept dressing, and spoke as her black tunic went over her head.

"Yeah,
I'll be here later. I think that today it's mainly practice, some carving and possibly
a trip into town. That won't have me gone all night, I don't think. If you want
to do something later?"

Roy
nodded.

"Sure.
Just to be clear you mean something naked and cuddly, right? Not chores or standing
guard in the dark?"

"Yep.
That's the one I meant. Not that I'm any good at it, but you know, I'm here and
willing. That's half the equation, isn't it?"

There
was a distracted nod, but he didn't tell her he wasn't interested now that she'd
mentioned that part of things. The truth was, she'd had a lot of boys inside her,
over the years, and done things with girls too. Almost never on purpose, but she
knew what went where. But that didn't lead to any particular skill at it. It also,
as she kept telling herself, didn't
count
. Everyone knew that.

Everyone
in the whole world.

Her
roommate smiled and looked at her in a way that seemed a lot more practical than
she'd have thought he'd be about the whole thing. More adult.

"Great.
Let's do that? I haven't been even, you know, with my hand? Because you've been
right here the whole time. I know, not the best way to sweet talk a girl, but it
will really help. Yeah." He left then, not waiting for her at all. It meant
he got to the shower first, but when he came out, smiling, he was blue and his teeth
were chattering. There was no steam in the shower area either.

She
hurried too, since it was the rule on ship, and scrubbed hard, trying to get clean.
Then she got an early bowl of oatmeal, with some dried peaches mixed in for flavor
and got to her carving. It would take a while, but she was just doing some basic
designs. Complex pictures would be more interesting, but she wanted the bulk of
her time to be for her own work. By lunch time she was sanding the boxes and lids,
and made sure to sweep and wipe the whole place down before getting anything to
eat. After that...

Well,
she had too much to do, didn't she?

She
needed to talk to Clark or Mara, to pass what she'd learned from the others. She
also needed to get to town to see if she could buy or bargain for a wagon and a
horse or two. With what, she didn't know, but she needed to find something. Stealing
would be a bad plan, since people complained when things went missing, and Judge
Claire would find it too easily. So the best way to hide that was to...

She
rolled her eyes and finished eating her potatoes with gravy, and the thick slice
of bread that went with it. There were canned carrots too, on the side.

When
she finished, she got food for Doctor Millis and the sick man, who was sitting up
when she got to the room they were keeping him in. Then she closed the door, pretending
to help feed him. The Doctor looked a bit skeptical for some reason, as if it had
occurred to him too that she might not really be with them still.

 Some
people just couldn't trust, could they? She smiled at the man and winked, to hide
her own expression, which was slightly bemused, she thought.

"Beef
broth for you, Will. You seem a bit better today. We'll need to get you out of here
soon. Do you think you can travel?"

"If
I have to, I will. I... Why are you helping me?" He sounded like himself, and
if he had an accent, it was a lot closer to what she was used to than not, because
she couldn't hear it.

"I
help you now, you help me later. You know how that works. Besides, I don't think
that the people of Pumpkin Hollow will really let you go, even after Judge Claire
tells them that you really didn't touch Hadis like was claimed. Next time don't
threaten a woman with as much power as Mildred Milner like that. Did you really
think she was just going to let you keep having sex with her slow daughter like
you were? It's nearly as bad as if you
had
been raping Hadis." It was
an odd thing to say maybe, but she kind of meant that.

For
one part of it, she knew that it was wrong and a horrible thing to do to another
person. Just like hitting them would be, or calling them vile names. The other part
made it feel empty to her. Devoid of meaning. Still, she felt bad for everyone involved,
which would have been on the third hand, if she'd been counting that way, and it
were a comedy routine.

Doctor
Millis nodded.

"I
have to agree. I nearly let you die over that bit of things. The woman is clearly
mentally handicapped, and
don't
tell me you didn't notice it. It was wrong,
and in any civilized situation, you'd have to answer for it. Worse, you endangered
our operation here. These people have been kept enslaved, in a very real way, in
order to repair the damage of a world they don't even know about. They need us to
release them from that burden, to help them rebuild the world, now that it's safe
enough. And you go and nearly bring it down on us all, so that you can have sex
with a woman?"

Will
went red faced, and it was in anger, not embarrassment.

"I'd
been there for ten years, cutting
meat
, with a
cleaver
. Do you know
what it's like, being the new man in a tiny place like that? These people wouldn't
accept me at all. Lyse was the only one that would give me the time of day, and
yes, after a while I let my emotions cloud my judgment. She's smarter than you think.
She has her own business, and she wasn't having sex with me because I
tricked
her. She knew exactly what we were doing." He sounded a bit bitter about it.

Probably
due to the fact that he'd had to live that particular lie for nearly a decade. Pran
shrugged.

"Fine.
What I need from you is a wagon, and a horse or two. I didn't see anything like
that at your place the other day, but I didn't look. Barring that, do you have enough
coin hidden somewhere to buy some?" It made sense to her, now that she'd thought
about it. Why shouldn't he help pay for it?