Eifelheim - Michael Flynn [104]
Manfred gave his grace to the enterprise with marked reluctance, not because he expected little success but because he feared too much. “If this cog of theirs is restored,” he confided to Dietrich afterward, “the Krenken will steal away, for I doubt Grosswald understands an oath of fealty. When it suits his convenience, he will discard it without a qualm.”
“Being in this very different from mankind,” Dietrich said.
AND SO Lorenz drew the ingot into wire, and Gottfried arranged it on a board that mimicked the pattern on the “circuit” drawing. When his magic wand touched a spool of dull gray metal, the metal flowed and dripped upon wire and pin alike, turning instantly solid once more and binding the one to the other. Metalworkers used such “plumbing-metal,” but needed fire to make it flow, and Dietrich saw no sign of a fire. The wand, when Gottfried allowed him to touch it, was not even warm.
The work required a jeweler’s touch and, when something had not been done precisely right, Gottfried would cuff his apprentices or engage in a scuffle with Hans. Even among Krenken, Gottfried was noted for his choler.
The Krenk worried over the “unclothed” nature of the wire, but his meaning remained occult, as no German word signified the clothing. When the “circuit” was ready at last, Gottfried tested it with a device he wore on his belt and—after much discussion with Hans, the Kratzer, and Baron Grosswald—pronounced himself satisfied.
THE NEXT day, an indifferent snowfall littered the still air. The party gathered in the Burg courtyard. Gottfried, bundled in furs, strapped a flying harness on, from which hung in a protective sack the device he had built. His muchabused apprentice, Wittich, would carry Lorenz to the ship in a sling. The smith had begged the boon of watching; and Baron Grosswald, at Herr Manfred’s urging, had consented.
Dietrich prayed a blessing on their efforts, and Lorenz knelt upon the icy flagstones and drew the sign of the cross over his body. Before climbing the tower from which the fliers would depart, the smith embraced Dietrich and gave him the kiss of peace. “Pray for me,” he said.
“Close your eyes until you are again on solid land.”
“I don’t fear height, but failure. I’m no copper-smith. The draw is not so fine and regular as Gottfried had asked.”
Dietrich remained at the base of the tower while the others climbed the narrow, spiral stairs to the top. Just around the bend of the spiral, the two Krenken tripped on the stumbling blocks. Hans, who had stayed behind with Dietrich, commented on the mason’s evident lack of skill.
“But no,” Dietrich said. “The stumble-steps are so attackers climbing the tower ‘trip up.’ The stairs spiral right-handwise for similar reason. Invaders cannot wield their swords; while the defenders, fighting downward, have a full swing.”
Hans shook his head, a gesture he had acquired from his hosts. “Your ineptness proves always cunning.” He pointed skyward, though without tilting his head back. “They go.”
Dietrich watched the fliers until they had become dark specks. The sentries on the walls pointed, too, but they had seen such flights now many times and the novelty of the feat had begun to fade. They had seen even Max Schweitzer fly, though with indifferent success.
“Blitzl has no little optimism,” Hans said.
“Who is Blitzl?”
Hans pointed toward the fliers as they vanished into the woodland. “Gottfried. We call those who follow his craft ‘Little Lightnings.’ During thunder-weather great bolts of the fiery fluid cross our sky, and Gottfried works with smaller versions of the same spirit.”
“The elektronikos!”
A Krenk’s face could not show astonishment. “You know of it? But you said nothing!”
“I deduced its likelihood from philosophic principles. When your cog failed, a great wave of elektronikos washed across the village, creating no small havoc.”
“Give thanks then that it was but a ripple,” Hans told him.
IT WAS difficult to reconstruct afterward