The Builder (The Young Ancients) (37 page)

The woman's eyes went wide.

“You'd part with them? Patricia can already fly? She has her own Tor-flying rig? How much are you asking for them, even the loan of them must be... pricey right now.”

He waved that away, Connie covering another laugh.

“Not a problem. I brought them as gifts anyway in case someone wanted them. Turns out all the counselors get nervous about the idea of the King flying about for some reason, possibly because they fear he'll escape? Connie won't even try it, being chicken. A sad thing really, since it's a lot of fun. You should work on her there. Trice is a good flyer already and Rolph would be glad to show you how as well I bet, I mean Alphonse, or... Count Thomson, who has to be one of the best flyers I've seen so far. I haven't seen him in a couple of weeks, probably actually working in his off time instead of lazing about like I am, seeing to his district and all that. Though, you know...” Tor, felt awkward suggesting the next bit, not knowing if it was rude or something or if he could even pull it all off, but it seemed like too good a chance to pass up.

Mercy smiled at him encouragingly, as if she suspected he had something good to say. Connie reached out and touched his arm, holding it briefly, not letting go until her sister raised her eyebrows at her, then the Queen patted it gently, signaling him to just rush in and hope it wasn't too bold of him to ask.

“Alright, I guess I should just jump in then. Please excuse me if this is out of turn or rude... I can get you those fast food dryers and, I think, rapid shipping for your fruit to other places. You'll need flyers for that, but I can get that done too... Do you think that you'd be willing to... trade for that? Um, about half of what would have spoiled without it?” He held up his right hand quickly, hoping she wouldn’t think he was trying to rip her off.

“It's not for me personally, or anything like that, county Ford is having a drought that took about half their mid-summer crop, that means lean times even if the irrigation can get the late summer crops in. I was thinking of shipping things there. Well, not by ship, of course - air transport. I can’t do ships yet. It should be a lot faster anyway.”

The woman blinked, then smiled and batted her pretty blue eyes at him until the Queen cleared her throat. Trice's mom winked at Connie happily though.

“You can get all that done?” The woman asked, laughing gently. She stopped when the Queen looked at her and gave a single nod of the head, looking very regal.

“Mercy, I think that if Tor says that he can do something, it would be best to just assume it's so. He's rather good at... getting things done. Richard did no more than mention the drought in front of him, and he's already done all this...” The words were soft, but not unkind.

“Oh... Oh! As in that Tor?” This was addressed to Connie not him. That Tor? It sounded like a funny question, he was just a student that had made a few devices that, while interesting and hopefully useful, weren't all that special. Well, the river was impressive he had to admit, but it wasn't like that meant he was anything special.

The Queen just nodded.

The agreement came fast, and even though she claimed that she couldn't make deals for her Duke, she hinted that if he'd be willing to double the deal they might be able to swing a large fall wheat harvest as well. That would only take shipping, so wouldn't be quite as large for Tor's portion, still possibly worth doing, the Baroness said, a little wheedling.

Tor agreed and had to stop himself from just jumping up and going to work right then. Easiest thing to do would be to borrow the template he'd given to Debri house for the dryers. He could rebuild the original field, but that would take extra time. Besides, he really wanted to play with the cold box idea first. It was selfish and silly of him, but sounded like a more interesting way to spend the afternoon. New things usually were more fun to work on, device wise at least.

The women let him go back to his room to rest for the afternoon, Connie telling him that he was expected at dinner later, about nine. As he left she imparted a gentle kiss on the cheek, which made him blush, but her sister didn't blink at it, so it must be a normal thing, he decided. One of those royal things a bumpkin like him just hadn't learned yet.

That gave him hours to work in. Nearly ten, which should be plenty. Back in his room he found a nice cabinet about three feet on a side with walls about four inches thick, it was wood on the outside and silver metal inside. It had a block of fresh ice in it and a pitcher of water. It would do nicely, Tor thought.

He didn't have an oven for the corresponding heat, so he just sunk it into the ground, about a hundred feet under the copper piece he used to hold the field in place. Thinking about it, Tor didn't want to bother going outside to do acid etching, afraid that the Queen may have left orders to stop him from doing something like that. He really didn't want to get nabbed by the Royal Guard. Those guys were nice enough, outwardly at least, but always seemed like they were ready to execute him on a moment's notice with a single word from... anyone really.

Rolph, the King, one of the Princesses, the maid that cleaned the room... Tor really didn't want to push them if he could avoid it.

Instead he used a bit of sharp rock to make a simple design to act as a sigil. It was just a circle with two arrows inside, to represent the heat leaving the box. It took a few hours to make, then an extra few to form a template and make a full set of copies. He put one in the box for testing and waited. And waited.

At first he thought it had failed. That happened sometimes after all. Normally not to him, not with work like this that he had a pretty good grasp on already, but maybe he'd forgotten a step? Sighing he took the pitcher out of the box to get a drink of water.

It was frozen solid.

So was the ice, no melting on it at all, just a frozen puddle at the bottom spreading out gently. Tor smiled. It didn't feel that cold to him, because he was wearing one of the temperature equalizing amulets. Oops.

Laughing he called for Burks, who'd taken the duty of watching after him for some reason. Possibly as a punishment for some transgression that Tor didn't know about, though it was hard to imagine the man ever doing anything wrong. He was incredibly good at his job.

He tried to be an easy person to take care of, but knew that a sick or injured person was always a pain. Burks handled it like a trooper, always showing up in the morning first thing with his breakfast and making sure that he ate regularly and had whatever he needed. He'd kind of thought that the man was the one that had kept him... clean, when he used the restroom and had been working. It was embarrassing, but the guy never mentioned it, thankfully.

The man boggled a little at the frozen pitcher of ice, but recovered when Tor explained what he thought would work. Just taking the remaining new devices to the kitchen and setting them up there. He'd go himself, he assured the man, but was afraid that he wouldn't be allowed in directly and was a little obvious with his leg in a splint to sneak in pretending to be one of the servants, a pot washer or something.

“Just so sir. I'll take care of this. I won't be but a moment.” It took longer than that, but gave Tor some time to work out the large shipping floats. He'd promised them to Debri house anyway.

Stopping himself he realized that he hadn't promised anything. They'd asked if he could do something for mass shipping in general, just one of the ideas they thought could make gold, not that he have it ready within the month. Still, he had a reason to now anyway, so it made sense to get it done. He needed a float plate like what he'd already made, only with a bigger field on it, so it would lift more. A whole lot more. It would take time, but it wasn't building a river in the air, so three or four days?

Now he just had to convince everyone to leave him alone for a while to get the work done before his break ran out. The people at the school really didn't like it when he stopped going to classes for days at a time, which made sense, he was there to work and learn, not play with his own projects and ignore the lessons.

Burks made it back about two hours later and told him that all the plates had been installed and seemed to be functioning very well. The cooks were impressed at least. Burks smiled and went to fetch clothing for him to wear to dinner. The tunic top was a nice black and purple velvet thing, with a smaller King's livery patch on it than the last one, but they didn't have real trousers that would fit over the leg splint, so the man took a cutter from his jacket pocket and carefully slit a pair of black silk pants down the side and punched holes for black ribbon along the perfectly smooth slit so that Tor could be tied in. Tor winced when he saw him doing it.

That much silk! It was one thing for him to borrow the clothes, but to ruin them like that... He'd be working for years to pay for them, he was afraid.

It looked alright when it was finished, so he tried not to worry over it. Tor owed everyone here so much already, having cared for him like they had after he'd gotten himself hurt. The King and Queen for opening their home to him, certainly, and Burks who'd done a lot of the personal work himself. He wondered what he could do to repay the man. He didn't have a lot of money, so just giving him gold wouldn't work. He'd have to think of something.

A walking stick was provided to him to aid his getting to dinner on time. It was an interesting thing, nearly as tall as he was, gnarled and thick at the top, lacquered, a shining black that, to his amusement, matched the outfit he was wearing. He made sure to slip on his temperature equalizing amulet and his shield, thinking about the last “dinner” he'd gone too at the palace. Tor wanted to be ready just in case that kind of thing happened again. Even if some of them were his friends, royals could be dangerous.

Though it wasn't lost on him that Rolph, even when in a full combat rage, hadn't touched him, or even hit at him directly. Ward had, but his friend was looking out for Tor, even when not strictly in his right mind. Even when, if asked, he probably would have said he didn't have any control of himself at all.

Remembering his promise to Mercy, he went to his chest and took out the remaining two flying rigs. Looking around he realized he didn't have anything to put them in and the Baroness probably wouldn't want to wear them around all night. Especially if they didn't go with her outfit. The problem with all his stuff so far was the copper. A good sturdy metal for fields, but not great as far as jewelry went all the time. Silver would have been a better gift, but he couldn't afford things like that yet, not really.

“Hey, Burks...” He turned to look at the man, holding up the devices. “I need to wrap these up for a Duke and a Baroness, they're married, so it can go in one package I think, any ideas?”

The man bowed a quick and choppy thing and left the room at a quick walk, coming back with a small chest that was intricately carved and made of soft looking light colored wood, sanded so that there were no rough edges. The man presented it formally holding it over his left arm.

“These are kept in the closet down the hall for the purpose of presenting fine gifts. It should work for this, I hope?” The man spoke evenly as if Tor's little handmade presents counted as “fine”. The guy was really being kind, he'd have to remember that and figure out some way to repay the man later. Maybe he'd like a shield or flying gear? Would he even have use for it though? Something special to make his life easier would be better, but nothing in particular came to mind.

That reminded him, so he slipped two of the newest shields in as well. Flying without them was nearly insane. He'd heard of people doing it, but Tor wouldn't, and really, he wouldn't ask anyone else to either. Even if it meant giving away the shields for free.

The copper looked nice in the box, being wrapped in purple silk; the whole thing didn't weigh too much, about two pounds, thankfully, because he had to carry it under his right arm so that he could hold the walking stick in his left. It took him a while to find the right dining room, since dinner was being held in one of the larger ones tonight and he hadn't been that way in the palace before.

It wasn't that hard to find, since all he had to do was follow the line of people going in. There must have been hundreds of them. He almost turned around and went back to his room seeing them all slowly headed towards the vast double doors, moving slowly in rows of twos. For one thing he wasn't sure he was in the right place. He'd thought it was just a small family and friends thing. Then again, maybe this was what having a few friends over looked like when you were a King or Queen?