the marshes between here and there, and if their wagons are like the one
they've left down there, they'll need roads." The thick arms folded into
a pose appropriate for an apprentice to his master. "Come and see
yourself, if you'd care to."
The steam wagon was wider than a cart, its bed made of hard, oiled wood
at the front, and sheeted with copper at the back. A coal furnace twice
the size of a firekeeper's kiln stood around a steel boiling tank. Saya
pointed out how the force of the steam drove the wheels, and how it
might be controlled to turn slowly and with great force or else more
swiftly. Otah remembered a model he'd seen as a boy in Saraykeht. An
army of teapots, the Khai Saraykeht had called them. The world had
always told them how it would be, how things would fall apart. They had
all been deaf.
"It's heavy, though," Saya said. "And there's housings there at the
front where you could yoke a team of oxen, but I wouldn't want to pull
it through soft land."
"Why would they ever pull it?" Nayiit asked. "Why put all this into
making it go on fire and then use oxen?"
"They might run out of coal," Otah said.
"They might," Saya agreed. "But more likely, they don't want to rattle
it badly. All this was a rounded chamber like an egg. Built to hold the
pressure in. You can see how they leaved the seams. Something cracked
that egg, and that's why this is all scrap now. Anyone who was nearby
when it happened ... well. Anything strong enough to make a wagon this
heavy move in the first place, and then load it with men or supplies,
and then keep it going fast enough to be worth doing ... it'd be a lot
to let loose at once."
"How?" Otah said. "How did they break it?"
Saya shrugged.
"Lucky shot with a hard crossbow, maybe. Or the heat came too high. I
don't know how gentle these things are. Looking at this one, though, I'd
like a nice smooth meadow or a well-made road. Nothing too rutted."
"I can't believe they'd put men on this," Nayiit said. "A wagon that
could kill everyone on it if it hits a had hump? Why would anyone ever
do that?"
"Because the gain is worth the price," Otah said. "They think the men
they lose from it are a good sacrifice for the power they get."
Otah touched the twisted metal. The egg chamber had burst open like a
flower bud blooming. The petals were bright and sharp and too thick for
Otah to bend hare-handed. His mind felt perfectly awake, and his head
felt full. It was as if he were thinking without yet knowing what he was
thinking of. He squatted and looked at the wide, blackened door of the
coal furnace.
"This is made of iron," Otah said.
"Yes, Most High," Saya agreed.
"But it doesn't melt. So however hot this runs, it can't be hotter than
an ironworking forge, ne? How do they measure that, would you guess?"
Saya shrugged again.
"They're likely using soft coal, Most High. Use coal out of a Galt mine,