"How long have you been up, if you've chopped down half the forest?" Jess asked as Thomas swung the furnace door closed with a heavy clang and spun the wheel to dog it shut. He was already sweating in the cool air, and the light shirt he wore clung to him; he wiped his forehead and gave Jess a full, unhindered smile.
"Long enough to tell you hardly had enough sleep at all," he said. "Here. Your father had a gift for us. Look."
In the place where the horses, in older days, would have been stabled, the area had been cleared to a large open space, and along one wall a long trestle table held a row of wooden crates. Jess grabbed a pry bar and opened the first one, uncovering a supply of small, finely made gears. The next box held larger ones, and the next still larger. Another box held bars of lead, for casting movable letters. Jess checked off each one against the list in his memory. There was nothing lacking. His father had given them everything they needed, even strong oak boards to build the frame. How he'd done it in the space of less than a day was something Jess didn't care to think about.
He watched Thomas pick up gears, fit them together, run admiring hands over the fine craftsmanship like a miser who'd found a cache of gold. "Perfect," Thomas murmured. "Well. To start, anyway. Nothing is ever quite perfect once you start to build, yes? And we'll need a good watch. As small a one as you can find. Can you get one?"
"A clock? Why?"
"Because I have something to repair," Thomas said. "Go find one. Two watches would be even better. And ask Captain Santi for as many extra power capsules as he can spare from his weapons."
"You want me to run errands."
"Well. Someone has to. And I can be at work, constructing-" Thomas suddenly fell silent, looking past Jess. When he spoke again, his voice had changed. Gone quiet. "Scholar Wolfe."
"Schreiber," Wolfe said. He stood in the doorway of the workshop, looking at them in a distant kind of way that Jess found unsettling. The Scholar had left off his robe today and wore plain clothes, suitable for work, just as Thomas and Jess wore. "I was thinking that I might help you."
"I-" Thomas glanced at Jess. "Of course, sir. If you wish."
Wolfe nodded and moved to look over the boxes. The gears. Ran his fingers over a board, testing its straightness. "I need something to do," he said. "You understand. Rooms grow small. Silence gets heavy."
Thomas nodded slowly. "I know. And you are welcome here. You created this, too."
"My version was crude. You improved on it," Wolfe said. "But I'm not unskilled. Between us, I think we might do very well."
"Yes," Thomas said. "I would be glad of your assistance and knowledge."
"Don't butter me, Schreiber; I'm not a piece of bread. You're a rare kind of genius. I'm not your equal and never will be in this particular area. Tell me what to do. Show me plans. I'll do the rest, without complaint."
It was a new idea, thinking of Wolfe as someone who wasn't in charge. But as Jess watched him pick up a thick leather apron and put it on, he found himself smiling. It didn't altogether lift the heavy cold inside him, but for a moment, for this moment, he saw the delight in Thomas's expression, the answering spark in Wolfe's eyes, and warmed just a fraction.
"Then, here," Thomas said, and unrolled a huge drawing over the trestle table, while Jess and Wolfe shifted boxes to make room. "Get started. And you." He leveled a finger as Jess put his heavy box on the floor. "Go and find me those parts."
Jess saluted crisply. "Yes, sir."
He'd already been forgotten by the time he reached the door, and when he looked back, Wolfe and Schreiber were bent together, pointing and talking and already starting to make notes on the paper.
Scholars, doing what Scholars did.
Jess wasn't a Scholar and realized that he'd accepted somewhere along the line that it wasn't what he really was suited to, after all. So he went to do what thieves did.
He went to acquire what was needed-and not necessarily ask permission.
When he arrived back with two clocks and a couple of pocket watches he knew wouldn't be missed, Thomas and Wolfe had already constructed the frame of the machine. Wolfe was working with a grinder that spat huge red sparks across a stone wall, and he didn't stop for Jess's arrival.
"Watch your step," Thomas called out to Jess without looking up from his work. "No, no, little Frauke, friend Jess is allowed. You may let him be."
Jess almost dropped the loot when he realized that one of the shadows behind Thomas was moving. It was nearly invisible where it crouched, but as he watched, he saw the outlines of it. "Thomas," he said. "You built an automaton? When?"