“You mean, it will look like out there?” one of the students asked, pointing toward the ruined city.
“Yeah. Pretty much. Trust me. I purposely over-pressured a boiler smaller than this and it blew apart a really large building.” The students watched her with wide eyes, but none asked why she had blown up a boiler. It was a bit disconcerting to realize that like Alain, these students just seemed to accept that Mari would sometimes blow up stuff.
Mari went over the safety rules again and again, thanking fate that her students could all read the Mechanic warning postings on the walls. The pressure built steadily, the relief valves started hissing at the right points in the process, and Mari took her students over to crank open the valves to feed steam to the still-occupied buildings where classes were held and everyone lived and worked. The steam hissed out and she waited for shouts of pain or alarm as major leaks announced themselves. But the checks of the pipes had done their job, and to her own surprise Mari heard nothing but whoops of excitement. There would be plenty of smaller leaks to patch, but this was a low-pressure system so that wouldn’t be hard. Wearisome, but not hard.
She spent the next few hours supervising the students, making sure they watched the boiler and the fuel and the water, adjusting the flow of steam as necessary. There was an art to anticipating when to increase or lower the fuel supply, but some of the students were picking it up quickly.
When Mari staggered away from the steam plant, it was well after midnight. Leaving the building that housed the boiler, she heard a prolonged cheer go up. Staring across the open area outside the building, she saw apparently every inhabitant of the university applauding her.
Turning to flee the adulation, Mari saw Alain standing there, openly smiling as much as she had ever seen. “Get me out of here,” she pleaded.
“As you wish, my Lady Mechanic.” Alain waved off the crowd of well-wishers, taking her back toward their room. “How do you feel?”
“Totally worn out. Totally marvelous. I did it! I made it work! I taught all those commons how to do it! They can! I was right, Alain! They can do that kind of work!” She hugged him fiercely with one arm as they walked. “I’m so happy and excited! And you suggested it! Alain, if we were promised right now you’d get a night you’d never forget.”
“You did not have to tell me what I will be missing this night,” he responded, the tiny smile flickering on again to take any sting from the words.
“Sorry, but I can give you this.” Ignoring the fact that they were still outside, Mari stopped, turned Alain to face her and kissed him passionately, again and again. Somewhere she continued to hear cheering and hoped it was still for the steam heat and not for the show she was putting on, but she didn’t really care. Alain didn’t seem worried about it, either.
* * * *
The masters of the University of Marandur stood behind the same table they had occupied the night Mari and Alain had arrived. Alain watched them, trying not to look too tired; Mari had kept him up half the night describing over and over again what she had done to get heat into the buildings once more. Alain had understood practically nothing Mari had said but had listened and nodded at what he hoped were the right places. He must have succeeded, since every once in a while Mari would stop her explanations long enough to kiss him for a while before jumping into another rapid and incomprehensible recitation of Mechanic work.
Overall, it had been a very enjoyable night, given that both he and Mari had as usual remained clothed the whole time, and the masters of the university had been diplomatic enough not to comment on Mari and Alain’s obvious state of sleep deprivation.
“Lady Master Mechanic,” Professor Wren said. “We owe you more than we can say. The most serious threat to our existence has been the cold of winter, and you have given us a way to fight that.”
“It was my pleasure,” Mari replied.
Another professor spoke. “Professor Wren says that you did not request payment for this service.”
“That’s correct.” Mari looked down the rank of professors. “Make no mistake, I gained some important knowledge by what I did. But I also wanted to do something because it was right, not because it would profit me.”
The masters shifted in their seats, gazing at each other and murmuring in voices too low for Mari or Alain to hear.
Finally Professor Wren addressed Mari again. “You told us that you wished to change the world, and that you sought manuscripts from your Guild’s old headquarters. Is that truly why you seek these manuscripts?”
“It is.” Mari looked in the direction of the nearest window, then gestured toward the ruins of the city beyond the university’s walls. “Things must change. The world is headed for a fate like that of Marandur, only multiplied countless times. I need the technology in those manuscripts if I am to have any chance of altering that.”
Wren looked at Alain. “And you, Sir Mage, do you agree with this goal of Lady Mechanic Mari?”
Alain nodded. “I agree with her. It is my goal as well, to do what is right.”
A male professor leaned forward, clasping his hands on the table before him. “To do what is right? We have weighty responsibilities, Sir Mage. Not everyone agrees on what is right. How do we know this Mechanic’s words are true? How do we know that she does not serve other ends than she proclaims?”
“What other proof can we ask for?” Professor Wren said, looking at her companions. “We have seen what this woman did freely, without any compulsion, without knowledge of any reward we might give her.”
Yet another professor spoke, his tone challenging. “I will accept that, but still I must know this answer. Do you act against the emperor, Lady Mechanic?”
“No,” Mari replied.
“But you defied the emperor’s ban to come here.”
Mari fixed the man with a cold look. “There’s a new Imperial capital down the river from here. The city’s name is Palandur. If nothing is done, then someday, someday not too far in the future, maybe only a few years, Palandur will suffer the same fate as Marandur. Cities in Tiae have already fallen prey to chaos and lawlessness. Some day soon, that rot will reach the Empire, and Landfall will crumble, and Palandur, and Severun, and Umburan, and there will be nothing but barbarism like that outside your walls from one end of Dematr to the other. I want to prevent that.”
His voice impassive, Alain added one more sentence. “Is such a goal contrary to the welfare of the emperor and the Empire?”
“And what of your Guild, Lady Mechanic?” asked a female professor. “How do they feel about this goal?”
Mari met the woman’s gaze. “Many Mechanics know that something must be done.”
“But does your Guild approve of your mission?”
“No.” Mari spoke quietly, with only a trace of defiance. “But change is necessary if this world is have a future.”
The woman spoke again with careful deliberation. “You would…overthrow…your Guild?”
Mari took a deep breath, then nodded. “And the Mage Guild. It must be done.”
The masters of the university gazed at Mari with the expressions of people who had just seen a myth come to life before their eyes. Alain saw reaction to Mari’s words ripple down the ranks of the masters, then the professors returned to quiet but animated discussion among themselves.
Finally Professor Wren spoke in a clear voice. “We have decided. We have decided to trust in you. I must now confess that we have kept something from you. It was because of a promise made long ago. But your actions and your words have proven that you are the person we have been waiting for. Perhaps…perhaps the person all of Dematr has been waiting for. The manuscripts you sought from the Mechanics Guild Hall…we have them safe here.”
Alain felt Mari quiver and her hand tightened convulsively on his. “Intact? Readable?” she asked.
“Yes, though we have never read them, in keeping with that promise. Please follow me. There is something else we must show you first.” Wren led the way for Mari
She stepped in, pulling Alain with her. He saw a room like the ones they had been assigned to sleep in, but this room bore numerous personal items, all heavily coated with dust. Mari was examining the objects with intense interest, then something caught her eye and she lunged past Alain. He turned to see a dust-covered Mechanics jacket hanging there.
Professor Wren cleared her throat apologetically as Mari stared at the jacket. “When the ban was put in place by the Emperor Palan, one Mechanic remained. He had been ordered by his Guild to ensure that the destruction of the Mechanics Guild Headquarters begun by the battle was complete, and to ensure that the manuscripts vaults were destroyed as well, before leaving the city with the last of those allowed to do so. He would not destroy the manuscripts as ordered. Instead he came to our ancestors after the city had been sealed, telling us what still lay there and begging the university’s help in rescuing it from destruction. Our ancestors agreed, and only after all of the documents had been taken from the vaults did the Mechanic set off some more explosions which finished leveling the Guild Hall. This knowledge of events has been passed down from that time, and none of us doubt its accuracy.”
Mari had found a sheet of paper, brown with age, sitting in the center of the desk. She read the words on it out loud. “To the Mechanic who comes here someday. Greetings. Do not think ill of me because I did not follow the Guild’s orders. The manuscripts we have saved are the Guild’s past and the future of our world. I could not see such knowledge destroyed. Use these texts wisely. If you should go to Midan, tell the family of Mechanic Dav that he died content, having done what he deemed best for all, Mechanic, common, and even the Mages, for we all share this world.” She closed her eyes, then looked at Alain. “Mechanic Dav of Midan. Don’t ever let me forget that name.”
“I will not,” Alain promised.
Mari looked at the masters of the university. “The future of our world.”
Professor Wren spoke again. “Yes. When you said that, it erased our final doubts, because you echoed the words of the man who saved those manuscripts long ago. It was Mechanic Dav of Midan who kept the steam plant running for many years after the ban. But when he grew old he said he had to stop it and prepare it to last until someone else could start it again. He is buried in a place of honor.” She gave a small, sad smile. “When we heard a Mechanic was at the gate, we feared you had finally come from his Guild to find out whether he had followed the last orders he had been given. Mechanic Dav had left instructions that we needed to be sure the next Mechanic who came was a good person before we let them know what he had done. He did not want his work to have been for nothing. He did not want his Guild to destroy what this world needed.”
“He was a very good Mechanic and a very good person,” Mari said, her voice tight. Alain saw tears welling in her eyes. She wiped her sleeve across them, then faced Wren. “I’m proud to wear the same type of jacket he did, and let me tell you there have been times in the last few months when this jacket brought me no pride at all. But now I know I share it with someone like him. Where are the manuscripts?”
“In our safest storage area. We will show them to you now.”
Alain followed Mari, seeing the tension rising in her as they went down stairways and through stout doors, at last stopping before a heavy entrance below ground level and sealed tightly. Professor Wren gave her the key, then stepped back. “This is yours. We hope what you find here will aid you in your task.”
The other professors left, but Wren paused, studying Mari as she put her weight on the key to turn it in the reluctant lock. Mari leaned into the door to push it open, revealing a room lined with shelves bearing rows of bound texts. “Lady Mechanic,” Wren began, “I am familiar with certain legends. Are you…?” She took a deep breath, then spoke again. “Are you truly a Mechanic? Or are you one who wears the seeming of a Mechanic but is much more? The…daughter of someone famous in history?”
Mari gave Alain a resigned look. “I am who I am, Professor. I’m just trying to do what I think is right.”
Wren nodded. “Those who study legends never expect to actually meet one. I do not know if you are that woman in truth, Lady Mechanic. But I hope that you are. A changed world could someday free those in the university as well as the common folk in the wider world.”
“I understand.” Mari waited, staring into the room, as Wren left to follow after the other professors.
Alain spoke quietly to her. “The masters of the university are right. This is yours. I will go elsewhere.”
“Thank you.” Mari shook her head, her expression disbelieving. “It’s hard to believe that I can look at the banned manuscripts from the vaults of the Guild. Nobody ever expects to see those. Nobody. But all of those texts are here.”
“I will keep watch.” He walked to the end of the hallway and sat down on the stairs, looking back once to see that she had gone inside.
When he thought it was about noon, Alain went to get food and drink, returning to find Mari engrossed in a text laid on the table before her. She did not even notice him until he had set the lunch in front of her. “Alain? Look at this, Alain.” Her voice was hushed. “It’s talking about something called coherent light. A lass-er, they call it. It’s astounding.” She stared at him. “This is so far beyond what the Mechanics Guild is using that I can barely grasp it. These manuscripts are filled with terms I can’t understand. I can’t even imagine how to build some of this stuff. We’ll need to build tools that build tools that will build something that can maybe make these things. If I could only show this stuff to Professor S’san.” Mari rubbed her forehead, looking dazed. “I’ll need to cull out what seems best, what can be done with what we’ve got now. The things we’ve lost, Alain…”
He sat down next to her. “These things you are seeing are powerful, then?”
“Very powerful. I think. Some of them, I’m just guessing what they can do. I mean, I’m not just talking weapons. I’m talking things that would in time change society, change the lives of everyone, every common as well as Mechanics and Mages. Transportation, healing arts, communication, everything.”
“Why would your Guild have suppressed things which would have allowed it to exercise more power?”
“I’m not sure.” Mari frowned down at the text in front of her. “But you’re right. I said we’ve lost this. That’s not true. It was deliberately kept away from everyone, deliberately suppressed. I think these things would’ve made it too hard for the Mechanics Guild to claim mastery and control if this sort of technology had been available.” She laughed briefly and harshly. “Or maybe they were just afraid, those old Guild leaders and the Guild leaders now, afraid to take any risk, so they suppressed things right and left just in case.”
Alain nodded. “To keep things from changing.”
“Yeah.” Mari abruptly slammed her palm onto the table, making the text in front of her jump. “But where did it all come from? This stuff couldn’t have been dreamed up by a Guild Hall or a city or even the Empire. It’s got to be the end product of a huge number of scientific and technological advances. Where and when did that happen?”
“Some say there is another continent to the west,” Alain reminded her.
“I know all about that legend. But with all this? And we’ve never heard from them? Maybe if they didn’t want to hear from us and kept a tight quarantine—but surely over all the centuries of our history someone would’ve seen something.” She leaned back, the explosive frustration of a moment before gone. “I’ll keep looking, but I’m not finding anything but technical and scientific texts. No histories that might explain where the science and technology came from. It’s enough to make me seriously consider that thing you keep bringing up about us all coming from the stars. That would at least help explain this where nothing else does.”
“Could learning the answer to that help you understand what is here?” Alain pointed to the texts piled around her. “Could it provide some insight into these things you are having trouble understanding?”
“It’s possible. I have no idea.” Mari stared around at the stacks of documents. “If only I could take all of this with us. But that’s impossible. There are some things I need, texts that describe weapons and other equipment or devices better than those the Mechanics Guild allows and yet within our capability to build. I’ll choose what can fit in my pack and—”
“Our packs,” Alain corrected.
She laughed again, but this time happily. “Oh, yeah. Not only do I go into the forbidden city of Marandur, not only do I read forbidden texts, not only do I teach forbidden Mechanic arts to the commons here, but I’m also going to hand some of the most secret Mechanic texts to a Mage! I’m running out of truly epic crimes to commit.”
“I am certain that you will think of some new ones.”
“That’s right. It’s good to know that you have such confidence in me.” Mari smiled wearily. “Thanks for the food. I need to get back to work.”
“I will be back with dinner.”
Mari did not answer. She was already absorbed in the text in front of her. Alain watched her for a moment, wondering what secrets she would find, just what weapons and other devices might be hidden in those old texts. The possibility of change seemed to be filling the air around them, but he felt the tug of urgency again. “Mari?”
She looked up, blinking at him as if having to refocus on the world around her. “What?”
“Are these the tools your elder spoke of?”
“My elder? Oh. You mean Professor S’san.” Mari grimaced, thinking. “Yes. I think so. But Alain, I can’t just walk out of here, wave a magic wand, and have these, uh, tools appear for use. It will take time and resources and trained Mechanics and lots of other things.”
“How much time?” Alain asked.
-->