Stonewielder by Ian C. Esslemont Read Free Book Online

quickening autumn surf. His arms were sweaty beneath the sweltering cloak. ‘Very good, Quartermaster. I won’t keep you from your duties any longer.’
    Quint tilted his head suspiciously. ‘Where’re you off to?’
    ‘To find our good Master Engineer.’
    ‘Ha! You’ll likely find him on his hands and knees, sniffing around our foundations like a dog, no doubt.’
    ‘Carry on, Wall Marshal – and stay out of Stimins’ way.’
    ‘With pleasure.’
    It was not until late that afternoon that the Lord Protector finally tracked down Master Engineer Stimins. And – true to Quint’s prediction – the man was sniffing around the base of the wall. By that time Hiam had picked up an escort: two veterans, Stall of Korel and solid Evessa out of Jourilan, whom many suspected of carrying more than a drop of the old blood. They’d arrived care of Quint, whose message was that it was unseemly for the Lord Protector to be wandering about without guards. Hiam did not bother pointing out that it was just as unseemly for Quint to allow the Master Engineer to do so.
    He heard Stimins long before he found him, among the huge tumbled boulders of the slope that graded back from the wall’s rear. ‘You’re a pretty one,’ he heard the old fellow coo, and he didn’t have to wonder what the man was addressing. ‘Very nice, very nice.’ Stumbling along with him, their spears clattering, Stall and Evessa shared a glance and rolled their eyes.
    Hiam wondered if he was stalking a parrot.
    Eventually, circling round a tall boulder, he found the man hunched down on all fours like a pale spider investigating a crevice for food. ‘Master Engineer …’ Hiam began.
    The man jumped, and glared about myopically beneath bushy white brows. ‘Who’s that? Who?’
    ‘It’s Hiam, Stimins.’
    ‘Oh, young Hiam. What in the Lady’s name are you doing down here?’
    ‘Looking for you,’ Hiam observed tartly.
    ‘Ah! Well, whatever for?’
    Hiam crooked his head to motion away his escort. Bowing, they moved off to lean back amongst the tumbled boulders, arms crossed over the hafts of their spears. ‘Your report.’
    The engineer was fiddling with small rocks in the palm of one hand, turning them round and round. ‘Report? What report?’
    The Lord Protector slapped a hand to the hot gritty side of a boulder. Dried bird guano streaked the stone white and patches of lichen grew green and orange. ‘Your report on the state of the wall!’
    ‘Ah. That report. Well, it’s not conclusive yet. I need to study things further.’
    ‘That’s what you said last year, and the year before that.’
    The snowy brows rose over pale, watery blue eyes. ‘I did? Well, there you go.’
    ‘With all due respect, Master Engineer. We no longer have the time for the luxury of conclusiveness … Your current assessment will have to do.’
    Stimins sniffed his disapproval. ‘That’s the trouble with you younger generations – no patience to do the job right. Things are off to the Abyss in a broken wagon, they are.’
    Hiam crossed his arms, and his cloak fell open to reveal the broad scarred forearms, the dire gouges and deep scrapes in the bronze and leather vambraces. The Master Engineer extended his bony hand, clenched, knuckles knotted in joint-ache. Hiam held his own out, open. Two small stones fell into his palm.
    ‘My report,’ Stimins said.
    Mystified, Hiam studied the two stones. Taking one in each hand he found that they fitted together exactly: two halves of the same piece. ‘What’s this? A broken rock?’
    ‘Shattered cleanly in half, Lord Protector. By the corroding cold itself.’
    Now Hiam regarded his Master Engineer. ‘The cold? How could it do such a thing?’
    Stimins raised his hands for patience. ‘Let me correct myself. By frost. By moisture, freezing suddenly. Explosively.’
    Hiam thought of casks of water left out during the worst of the assaults, how some exploded at the touch of the Riders’ sorceries. ‘I see … I