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the workmen dig up the pipes.
"Show me, my lord," said Vona, coming to stand beside Lenardo.
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"She was in her midforties, hair graying from auburn, calm and steady and
easy to work with. She was also, Lenardo realized for the first time, a soft,
warm woman. His reaction startled him, but it vanished instantly once he
recognized it.Thank the gods, I can control the beast when I try!"
To enable Vona to visualize the blockage, Lenardo chalked the dimensions of
the clogged pipe on the paving stones and then held a stick upright over the
center, marking it as he said, "This deep to the top of the pipe, this deep to
the bottom."
Vona studied the markings and then sat down cross-legged in the roadway and
began to concentrate. Heat smoldered through the debris in the pipe. Parts of
it charred, but not enough to unblock the pipe. Lenardo told Vona what was
happening, encouraging her. But as her heart pounded and her breathing grew
ragged, he had to stop her.
"Sorry, men, you'll have to dig this one up," he told them, and chalked the
joinings of the pipe on the roadway.
When Vona had rested, she and Lenardo moved down the street, where they
removed two other clogs in the pipe and located another that would not
respond. Soon lunch arrived. Lenardo, who had not been able to face breakfast,
found his appetite returned. The workmen and Vona ate at least three times
what Lenardo did, including the usual large slices of meat, but the novelty of
Lenardo's vegetarian diet had worn off, and talk was of other things.
When he was sure that Vona would not faint along the way, Lenardo sent her
home and directed the workmen to the second section of pipe to be dug up. The
second pipe was harder to get at, for it had at some time leaked around the
joining, and the earth surrounding it had become as solid as stone. Clay pipe
was scarce. They had enough to replace without breaking any that could be
salvaged.
As they approached the pipe, Lenardo took a pick and began to work around the
most delicate area himself, enjoying putting his back into the hard labor. The
afternoon was warm, and all of them stripped to the least clothing possible.
Lenardo took off his tunic and refastened it around his waist as a sort of
loincloth.
He was concentrating on the difficulty of landing heavy blows to break
through the mortarlike earth without striking the clay pipe, when he was
interrupted by a feminine voice.
"What in theworldare you doing?"
Lenardo turned to find Aradia watching him in surprise and amusement.
"My lord's doing work we can't, milady," the head of the work crew
immediately said defensively, "nor our Adept talents can't handle it."
"We're clearing a blocked pipe," Lenardo explained.
"By hand? When you have a Lady Adept available?"
"Lady Aradia, you are my guest," said Lenardo. "I did not invite you to clean
the sewers."
She burst into rich laughter and said, "Come out of there, all of you. Why
should you put such hard labor into something I can do in a moment?"
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The workers were quick enough to scramble out of the hole, with a grateful
"Yes, my lady." Lenardo climbed out more slowly and explained the situation,
trying very hard not to be embarrassed.
As Aradia did it, the job was easy. The pipe did not have to be dug up and
its contents scraped out; rather, when fire did not work, she concentrated,
and the impacted mass crumbled into dust that would wash away as soon as water
was turned into the pipe.
"Now," she said, "is there anything more like that? As long as I'm here,
Lenardo, let me help you. I will certainly never hesitate to call
onyourservices."
It occurred to him that she might be testing her powers, and so he said, "If
you really don't mind, you can save us several days of work," and led her into
the next street on his agenda, telling the workmen to quit for the day once
they had filled in their last dig.
Aradia made no reference to yesterday's debacle; nor did she seem the least
bit embarrassed. She wants to forget it, Lenardo thought.So do I, if I only
could. But he was surprised at her ease with him.
They worked their way up the street toward the forum, with Lenardo Reading
and Aradia clearing the pipes. Where there were broken spots, Lenardo chalked
instructions for the workmen to follow tomorrow, but with Aradia's help he
completed as much in an hour as he could do with the workmen in two days.
Perhaps it was the incredible mundaneness of the task that made it so natural
for them to work together. Healing a sorcerer of a brain tumor, fighting in a
battle won by Adept power those were rare occurrences that by now seemed
almost dreams, or stories the bards sang. Their repair of pipes wasreal, the
sort of unromantic but extremely important work that Readers and Adepts would
one day routinely do together.
"Why are you so intent on the pipes?" Aradia asked.
"It's easy to repair them now," Lenardo explained. "Once there's heavy
traffic in these streets, such repairs become a nuisance. This quadrant of the
city will house everyone for the winter. These are old Aventine buildings. The
houses have hot-water heating systems that I hope to restore. But maybeIwon't
have to restore them."
"What do you mean?"
"Drakonius rewarded his officers with property like this, letting them take
whatever rent they could force from the tenants. I also plan to give out some
of these buildings as rewards, but I hope the new owners will put them in
repair and rent out the apartments reasonably."
"Apartments," said Aradia. "Rents." She shook her head. "I chose the right
person to give a city. I've never lived in one, so I had no idea how a city is
run. It doesn't have to be ugly and duty, overcrowded, and infested with rats,
does it?"
"I take it you were in Zendi when it was under Drakonius' rule?"
"Only when I had to be. I don't think it would have occurred to me to begin
improvements with the underground pipes. In fact, I wouldn't have known they
were there."
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"But you would never have allowed garbage in the streets," said Lenardo.
"Before we cleared the first sewer line, our biggest problem was persuading
people not to throw everything into the streets but to take it to the waste
stations to be burned. Now we're trying to teach people what cannot go into
the drains. I didn't realize they didn't know, and our newly cleared sewer
line was clogged the very day it was opened."
Aradia laughed. "The glamorous occupation of ruling a land. No, I'm not
laughing at you. I'm remembering two years ago, when in the worst heat of the
summer, Wulfston and I had to go out among the swine to stop an epidemic of
running sores. It was bad enough going into the mud wallows, enduring the
stink, but there were also clouds of stinging flies. I could keep them off me
until I would focus on healing an animal. Then, while I was concentrating, the
flies would settle all over me." She shook herself as if shaking off the
insects. "I prefer a nice comfortable job like cleaning out sewers."
They reached another clog in the pipe. Lenardo Read it carefully and said,
"There's a pocket of explosive gas here."
"Explosive gas?"
"Yes, the matter in the pipes creates it. Occasionally, we find a spot like
this, so airtight that the gas has not leaked away over the years. There's a
huge pocket of it underSouthgate , where the culvert out of the city collapsed
years ago. It's very deep underground."
"Isn't that dangerous?" [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]