David Weber - How firm a foundation

“Good!” Ainsail said, nodding enthusiastically, and rolled his eyes. “If I have one more irritated Guardsman wander by to ask me ‘How much longer do you think you’ll be?’ I think I’ll just go ahead and cut my throat right here.”

“Seems a mite drastic to me,” the wheelwright told him with a grin. “Still and all, you’re close enough to the Cathedral you could probably get in line with the Archangels pretty quick.”

He laughed, and Ainsail made himself laugh back, although there wasn’t anything funny about the blasphemous reference as far as he was concerned. And he noticed the heretic didn’t sign himself with the scepter when he mentioned the Archangels, either. Well, it was hardly a surprise.

He stepped back and watched the wheelwright and his assistant get to work. They were good, he admitted, as Charisian workmen tended to be, but they were in for a surprise. Well, two surprises, if he was going to be accurate, although they probably wouldn’t have time to appreciate the second one. But that spare wheel of theirs wasn’t going to fit. Ainsail had taken some pains to make sure no standard Charisian wheel hub was going to fit that axle, just as he’d very carefully arranged for the wheel to break precisely where-and when-it had. Fortunately no one had noticed the sharp rap with the hand sledge which had been required to knock out the wedge he’d fitted to keep the wheel rim properly tensioned against the steel tire until he reached exactly the right spot. Hopefully, the wheelwright wasn’t going to notice that the “break” was suspiciously straight edged and clean, either. Ainsail was a little worried about that, but only a little.

God wouldn’t have let him come this far only to fail at this point.

“You worry too much, Rayjhis,” Bishop Hainryk Waignair said teasingly. “If it weren’t the Gulf of Jahras, it would just be something else. Admit it! You’re a fussbudget! ”

The white-haired, clean-shaven Bishop of Tellesberg leaned forward to tap an index finger on Earl Gray Harbor’s chest, brown eyes gleaming with amused challenge. He and Gray Harbor had known one another almost as long as Gray Harbor had known Maikel Staynair, and Waignair, as the second-ranking prelate of the Church of Charis, often sat in for the archbishop on meetings of the Imperial Council when Staynair-as today-was otherwise occupied with the responsibilities of his own ecclesiastic office.

“I am not a ‘fussbudget,’” Gray Harbor said with immense dignity as the carriage moved steadily along the street. “I’m simply a conscientious, thoughtful, insightful-don’t forget insightful! – servant of the Crown. It’s my job to worry about things, just like it’s your job to reassure me that God is on our side.”

“ ‘ Insightful!’ ” Waignair snorted. “Is that what you call it?”

“When I don’t feel an even stronger term is appropriate, yes,” Gray Harbor said judiciously, and the bishop laughed.

“I guess there might be a little something to that,” he said, holding up the thumb and forefinger of his right hand perhaps a quarter of an inch apart. “A little something!” His eyes glinted at his old friend. “Still, with Domynyk in command and Seijin Merlin’s visions assuring us everything went well, can’t you find something better to worry about than the Gulf of Jahras?”

Gray Harbor considered for a moment, then shrugged.

“Of course I can. In fact, I think probably one reason I’m worrying about the Gulf is that we do know it worked out well.” Waignair looked perplexed, and Gray Harbor chuckled. “What I mean is that ‘worrying’ about something I know worked pretty much the way we had in mind distracts me from worrying about the other somethings out there that we don’t know are going to work out the way we have in mind. If you take my meaning.”

“You know, the frightening thing is that I do understand you,” Waignair said. “Probably says something unhealthy about my own mind.”

Gray Harbor chuckled again, louder, and the bishop shook his head at him. The truth was, of course, that both of them knew about the good news Gray Harbor was going to be able to announce in the next five-day or so. Waignair, as a member of the inner circle, had actually watched the battle through Owl’s remotes for several hours. He’d spent most of that time praying for the thousands of men who were being killed or maimed in that cauldron of smoke and fire and exploding ships, and he knew exactly what price Domynyk Staynair’s fleet had paid to purchase that victory. Gray Harbor hadn’t been able to watch personally, but the first councilor was an experienced naval officer, with firsthand experience of what that sort of carnage was like. And he’d long since grown accustomed to taking Merlin’s “visions” as demonstrated fact. He’d been planning how best to use the destruction of the Desnairian Navy ever since the battle had been fought, and he was looking forward to putting those plans into motion as soon as the news officially reached Tellesberg.

“The problem’s not with your mind, Hainryk,” Gray Harbor told him now. “The problem’s with-”

Ainsail stood on the narrow, constricted space of open sidewalk beside his wagon, between it and the building he’d managed to park alongside, and watched the traffic flow past while the wheelwright and his apprentice swore with feeling and inventiveness. They’d just discovered the non-standard dimensions of the wagon axle, and as soon as the two of them got done expressing their feelings, Ainsail was sure they’d get around to working out ways to deal with the problem.

Or they would have if they’d had time, he thought as he finally spotted the vehicle he’d been waiting for. It was a good thing he had made sure the repairs were going to be more time-consuming than the wheelwright had originally thought, since the carriage making its way slowly along the crowded street was substantially behind its regular schedule. And, as it drew closer, Ainsail felt his mouth tighten in disappointment. It was unaccompanied by the guardsmen in the orange-and-white livery of the archbishop who normally escorted it.

Why today? he demanded silently. Today, of all days! Would it have been too much to ask for the bastard to keep to his own-?

He cut that thought off quickly. The fact that God and Langhorne had seen fit to bring him this far, grant him the degree of success he’d achieved, was more than any man had a right to demand. He had no business complaining or berating God just because he hadn’t been given still more!

Forgive me, he prayed humbly as he opened the small, carefully concealed panel he’d built into the side of the wagon bed. It’s not my place to set my wisdom above Yours. I’m sure it’s all part of Your plan. Thank You for the opportunity to be part of Your work.

He reached into the hidden compartment and cocked the flintlock. Then his hand settled around the pistol grip and he stood, shoulders relaxed, watching with a calm tranquility he was a little surprised to realize was completely genuine, as the carriage rolled steadily closer.

“We’re going to have to go back to the shop, Master Gahztahn,” the wheelwright was saying. “It looks like we’ll need to-”

He went on talking, but Ainsail tuned him out. He nodded, pretending he was listening, but his attention was on another voice. His mother’s voice, reciting the catechism with a much younger Ainsail as he sat on her lap in her kitchen. And then there was Archbishop Wyllym’s voice, and other voices, all with him at this moment, bearing him up on their strength. He listened to them, embraced them, and as the carriage drew even with the wagon, Ainsail Dahnvahr smiled joyously and squeezed the trigger. . III.