by Aidan Harte
Pulling off the stencil, his shearer told him flatly, ‘Your name is’ – rippp! – ‘Sixty.’ He poured a foul-smelling orange oil onto to Torbidda’s head which burned as he rubbed it in. Cold drips streaked Torbidda’s neck and back. ‘Let the scabs heal by themselves. Stand and dress yourself, Cadet.’
He was finished just before the other two. The side of Leto’s head read LVIII and the stupefied city boy’s read LIX. Torbidda was walking away when he turned and glanced back as three new naked children took their place. Already he felt different. They were civilians. He was a Cadet, Cadet Number LX. His name was Sixty.
CHAPTER 2
His mother screamed curses at the Grand Selector as they dragged him away. ‘My baby! Don’t take him from me, please!’
It was too unbelievable not to be a dream. Torbidda opened his eyes and listened instead to the storm outside the dormitory, and children weeping in the dark, weak islands adrift in a predatory archipelago. Other voices catcalled and teased, but no one ventured out of their cubicles. That first night was a period of watchful waiting, of study. Like an al-Buni grid, they had to learn the rules before advancing.
RATATATATATA TATTARATA TA TARA RAT AT AT AT T T T
The bell was the lambs’ first lesson: that belligerent mechanical rapping would henceforth marshal Cadets’ hours, dictating when to study, eat and bath; when to sleep and when to rise—
‘Let’s go, maggots! An engineer’s got to outpace the sun!’
The second-year who’d processed them yesterday was monitor today, and her first duty was to familiarise the lambs with early rising. ‘Anyone still sleeping when the bell rings tomorrow gets a visit to Flaccus’ tower. Next week, it’s automatic expulsion. That’s right: back to the mills. Back to mines. Back to the streets. You don’t want that, and I don’t care. Let’s go! Let’s go!’ Torbidda was learning already to distinguish between the babble of new accents; her broad singsong came from the Concordian contato.
The dormitory was a long, wide hall with a curved roof. Light beams from high circular windows crisscrossed the dusty space, making Torbidda think of the belly of an overturned ship. There were four rows of cubicles, with a corridor running alongside either wall and in the middle; the two doors were in opposite corners. Each cubicle had a single bed and a wardrobe, and a modicum of privacy was provided by thin blue curtains hanging from a steel bar. The back-to-back wardrobes formed a narrow walkway for adventurous midnight prowlings.
‘Keep Flaccus waiting down at the shooting course and he’s liable to use you for a target!’ the monitor shouted as the last of the lambs ran out. Somehow, Torbidda didn’t think she was making that one up.
Bernoulli, the Guild’s founder, had wanted his Cadets as deadly as possible, as quickly as possible. They would first be taught to use projectiles, including hand-cannons and bows, and then knives. Only those who survived the initial cull to become Candidates would learn the more sophisticated martial arts, which were more deadly than any weapon.
The lesson took place on the shooting course. The mountain face above the course was upwind from the factories, and pockmarked with craters. Though yesterday’s gales had ebbed somewhat, a misting rain obscured their targets – but Grand Selector Flaccus made no allowance for these difficulties. ‘Think the Forty-Seveners had your advantages?’ he drawled. ‘Conditions in battle aren’t always favourable, Cadets.’
By the day’s end, their brains would be exhausted from calculating arcs and rates of descent, their eyes and throats raw from the gunpowder and their fingertips bleeding from plucking bowstrings – but everyone’s aim would have improved. Flaccus was an impatient, harassing tutor, and the Cadets were soon grumbling, and taking revenge by making up increasingly fanciful reasons for his missing finger, from condottieri proof-of-life to the Guild’s punishment for incompetence. Leto said Flaccus was a field commander who had lost his first command, and the Guild had had to pay his ransom; teaching Cadets was his demotion.
‘For which he’s determined to make us pay,’ Torbidda said grimly.
Although Leto couldn’t match Torbidda’s speed at calculating distances and gradients – none of them could – he proved to be an adept archer. Leto had grown up on the Europan frontier, in the legionary camps commanded by his famous father, Manius Spinther. Most of the aristocracy lucky enough to survive the Re-Formation held onto their empty titles until their purses were empty too, but the Spinthers were different; they adapted to the changing times. While Bernoulli’s star was rising, various prominent Spinthers renounced their titles and sent their sons off to learn the mechanical arts, and when the storm came, they escaped the worst ravages of the mob – by being part of that mob. ‘Engineers have no family,’ Leto liked to say, ‘but a Spinther is always a Spinther.’ His cousins had all been through the Guild Halls and now it was his turn. Torbidda, perceiving that Leto’s first loyalty was to family, stored that away and counted himself lucky to have found such an ally.
He was clumsily nocking an arrow when Leto whispered, ‘Torbidda, look! That’s Filippo Argenti!’
Flaccus was whispering deferentially to the newcomer, a stolid, middle-aged man with the blank, weatherbeaten face of a mason. The vivid red of the First Apprentice’s gown looked unreal against the scarred landscape of the firing range. Others began to notice his presence and soon every Cadet was hitting wide of the mark – all except Leto, who continued to hit bulls’-eyes with perfect nonchalance. After watching for a few minutes, the First Apprentice clapped his hands and walked onto the firing range. The Cadets immediately lowered their weapons.
‘I need a volunteer. Someone willing to shoot me. Anyone?’ He paused, then sighed with theatrical relief when none stepped forward. ‘Well, that’s gratifying.’
Laughter dispelled the tension still remaining from yesterday’s induction.
Argenti looked around, and then started, ‘Brothers and sisters, welcome. I once stood where you stand. You’re asking, will I make it?’ He looked from face to face, nodding as if to say this was quite natural. ‘I won’t lie, some of you won’t. First year will be tough, but just remember that you’re not alone. If the Guild seems cruel, remember: it is not senselessly cruel. We winnow with reason. We need the best.’
He looked up at the brutalised crags behind the range. ‘The Guild is a mountain with many peaks – Old Town, New City, the Guild Halls – but really, they are one. Our strength is our unity. What is our strength?’
‘Unity,’ came the eager response.
‘Just so. Unity depends on team spirit. No tower can stand with each brick vying to be higher than the others.’
He stopped in front of Torbidda. ‘Each must be content in its place. The mortar that binds them must be—’
‘Trust?’ said Torbidda in a dry whisper. He felt Leto’s unease.
‘Trust! Exactly. I am First Apprentice not because I learned how to climb, but because I learned how to trust. It’s all very well to say so; you need to see it.’ Like a cheap magician he produced a small red apple from his sleeve and looked around brightly. ‘I need a volunteer. Whom can I tempt?’
Leto subtly shook his head, but the warning was unnecessary; Torbidda had already spotted Flaccus’ ill-concealed eagerness. The boy who’d been crying in the queue yesterday put his hand up.
The First Apprentice smiled kindly. ‘What’s your name, son?’
The blond boy had to think for a moment. ‘… Forty-Two, First Apprentice.’
‘Not your number. Don’t you have a real name?’
‘Oh! Yes, First Apprentice. Calpurnius Glabrio.’
‘Well, Calpurnius, I am a decent shot, and I need a volunteer.’
‘What must I do?’
‘That’s the spirit. Step up to the target. Place this on your head.’ There was an intake of breath and the Apprentice said in a loud voice, ‘Go back if you’re afraid. There’s no shame in it.’
Calpurnius solemnly took the apple and walked up to the target. ‘I trust you, First Appre
ntice.’
The Apprentice took careful aim and released. The arrow took the apple with a wet thunk-kuh-kuh. Calpurnius joined in the applause. Quickly, the Apprentice nocked another and shot again. The force drove Calpurnius back and pinned him against the target.
As the boy screamed, the Apprentice turned around. ‘Why have you stopped applauding, children?’
He looked back at Calpurnius, took another arrow, drew back and released. The screaming stopped. ‘What are you thinking now, Cadets?’ he snarled. ‘That this was unfair? I tell you: it is necessary. The Guild is an army, and an army is only as strong as its weakest member. You’re here because you’re clever, so I won’t patronise you. We take you young, when it is still possible to change you – to mould you. You have begun to climb the mountain, and now the only way out is up. Your peers will not help you. They will do everything to make you stumble. Each summit is further up, and the higher you go, the purer the competition – and the further to fall. There’s no safety down here, either. Believe me, the laggard will quickly find himself without allies.’ This time his smile was sour and weary. ‘As you climb higher, you’ll appreciate that we Apprentices are not to be envied. Having reached that final peak, we can only watch as our competition surrounds us. But that’ – he looked around with hostility – ‘is as it should be.’
He turned once more to Torbidda. ‘You, boy: what is your name?’
‘Sixty, sir.’
He smiled kindly. ‘I mean your real name.’
‘Sixty, sir.’
The smile disappeared. ‘Fetch me that apple, Sixty.’
‘No, sir.’
‘That’s the correct answer.’ The Apprentice turned and walked over to the target. ‘You will hear talk of factions: engineers against nobles, Empiricists against Naturalists. Ignore these chimeras. All alliances are temporary. Your competition is all around you. Make alliances, by all means, but know this: all friends must eventually become rivals.’ He pulled out the arrow and removed the apple. ‘Calpurnius wanted to be loved. You must rise above that temptation.’
‘This’ – he threw the apple to Torbidda – ‘is for saying no to me.’
As Torbidda caught the apple, the First Apprentice’s fist moved.
After a moment’s numbness, sharp pain spread throughout Torbidda’s chest. He sat up and coughed blood. He was several braccia from where he had been standing. Every Cadet was staring open-mouthed. The man in red looked down at him. ‘And that is for not shooting me when you had me in your sights. I wait for you, all of you. Come and cut my throat someday.’
Torbidda watched the First Apprentice walk slowly back to the Guild Halls, wondering how, if that day ever came, he would find the courage to do it.
First Apprentice Argenti’s demonstration had left Grand Selector Flaccus almost giddy. ‘That’s what it’s all about, Cadets,’ he huffed with admiration. ‘Man domesticated himself along with the dog. We must be wolves again.’
One of the Cadets threw up, and Flaccus snatched Torbidda’s apple and threw it at him viciously. ‘What did you expect? The Guild is not the Curia. The Guild Hall is not a seminary. Don’t start feeling sorry for yourself. You’re receiving an unrivalled education at great cost to the State. Some say war’s a cheaper and better school for engineers; some say it’s wasteful to educate so many when so few of you will survive …’ Flaccus obviously shared this view. ‘… but the Colours say waste’s inevitable when mining. They want the best, and the best are those who survive. All right, break’s over. Back in line.’
As they reassembled, Torbidda caught the eye of the boy who’d vomited. The boy blushed in anger as he wiped his mouth. He stood shoulder to shoulder with the others and nocked an arrow. Torbidda looked away and did likewise.
‘Take aim—’ Flaccus roared.
CHAPTER 3
Argenti’s demonstration had strange results on the children. While some became cautious, others took it as licence to indulge all their passions unrestrainedly. That night the city boy, Fifth-Nine, cornered Torbidda in his cubicle. Three other city boys joined in, while a fourth stood at the curtain, watching proceedings. The onlooker was the boy who had caught Torbidda staring. When he said, ‘Enough!’ they stopped. He was handsome, and had a New City accent like Leto’s.
Curtains had to be drawn in the morning to display tidy cubicle, locked wardrobe and neatly made bed. Torbidda was just pulling his open when the monitor walked by. She must have seen his black eye, but all she remarked on was his tardiness: ‘Do better, Sixty. It gets faster.’
And she was right. Those who made it would be landed on the front line, so the Cadets had to become accustomed to the pressure from the start. As days turned to weeks new subjects kept coming, as if there was no time to waste. Flaccus taught the ‘hard’ arts, including Mechanics and Geometry; those subjects requiring anything resembling intuition and imagination he left, contemptuously, to Selector Varro.
The Anatomy Hall had no viewing gallery. ‘Dissection’s not an art learned from afar. We must get our hands wet!’ Varro said gleefully.
It was situated in the large cavern where the main canal entered and exited the mountain. The floor was solid rock, interrupted by a metal grid under which dark channels of water flowed from deeper caverns within Monte Nero. High circular windows allowed smoke-stained swallows and exhausted daylight to enter the cavern, though the shafts of light were bisected by the gauntlet of thin stalactites and dripping chains that hung from the roof and soon dissipated into the larger gloom within. At the back of the cave was a wall of metal which turned constantly, producing a dull animal groan that vied with the water’s roar. On some of the dozens of workstations suspended from long chains were the drying remains of previous dissections. They were bloated with formaldehyde, which added to the stench hanging in the frigid atmosphere. As well as the weight-bearing chains, there were others, great swathes of links that shivered with the same icy luminescence illuminating the orbs of New City. The blue crackling current gave the cave a shifting twilight quality that made even those occupants with peeled skin and gaping chest cavities seem nervously animated.
The Cadets were still searching for tools and fighting for workstations when the selector shuffled to the podium. Varro was short, compact and profoundly hairy. His large, ape-like hands and long dexterous fingers were, like every other part of him except his skull, covered in wiry reddish-brown and grey hair. His heavy red beard, braided in the Ebionite fashion, was a startling contrast to his pale skull.
Ignoring the chaos around him, he launched into his first lecture.
‘You weren’t thinking of taking my workstation, were you?’ The boy’s drawl sounded bored, almost a yawn.
‘I don’t see any names,’ said Torbidda, defiantly.
‘They oughtn’t let slow learners be Cadets.’
The boy’s followers laughed on cue. They were straining with anticipation, like a dog pack, but the boy moved leisurely as a peacock, raising his fists up to Torbidda’s face as though inviting inspection. ‘No names here either. Or didn’t you get enough last night?’
His number was Four. His striking face was perfect, except for the fleshy lips that were set in a perpetual sneer. He had been one of the first inducted on Examination Day, and he acted as if he had been privy to deep secrets his whole life. Four’s swagger drew the rowdier first-years into his orbit; there were a few nobles, including the Fuscus twins, but most were poor city boys, including Fifty-Nine, of course. Like Leto, Four was from the New City, but unlike the Spinthers, his family had only just taken the leap; he was the first son to be sent to the Guild, and he was loud in denigrating both the Curia and aristocracy as yesterday’s men. The nervous boys admired his bluster, and anointed him their seer, to lead them through this strange land and chase away its shadows.
‘Well?’ said Four.
Torbidda recognised there was no way of winning the contest; Four had the high ground. He abandoned his claim to the workstation and found another.
‘—by creating opportunities for his crew to prove their loyalty. I know that.’
‘You did the right thing backing down. Don’t let yourself become an object-lesson.’
Leto was right, of course, but Torbidda looked up with dissatisfaction from his colourless lunch and scanned the other tables in the refectory. The Apprenticeship Candidates sat at the high table at the far end of the room. To reach the third year was no small achievement, but still only a handful – a maximum of twelve, usually fewer – were deemed worthy to apply for Apprenticeship; the rest were posted abroad, scattered across the empire. The Candidates’ solemn intensity was a fascinating spectacle, but one might as well look for example to the saints. The second-years at the table opposite, however: they were still mortals.
Usually Leto’s evaluation of military problems was sound, but though Torbidda had backed down to Four, just as the first-years deferred to the second-years, he knew servility wasn’t a long-term stratagem. He looked across at the monitor, who was discussing something while the Cadets around her listened courteously. Compared with the first-years’ rowdy jousting and posturing, the second-years were serenity itself. How was it that peace reigned on that side of the room? How had they learned to cooperate?
Leto saw the direction of his glance and said softly, ‘Forget it, Torbidda. Second-years won’t help – they’ll kill you faster than Four will. At least he needs an excuse.’
But Torbidda was looking for answers, not allies. It would have been easy for the Guild to segregate the lambs from these veterans, so this example had been placed before them for a reason. His life depended on discovering why.
‘Come on,’ said Leto. ‘Flaccus will kill us both if we’re late for Mechanics again.’
The water cut through the stone like paper. Torbidda held the gem to the light, examining it with the intensity of a poacher stalking prey. Gem-cutting had something of Geometry’s precision: the light was perfect or flawed, just as an equation was correct or incorrect. Others complained, but Torbidda understood why they were expected to master practical arts as well as theory. The Guild needed more than rote-trained mules; each Cadet was expected to travel the same road Bernoulli had.