Jack Campbell: The Hidden Masters of Marandur

She paused, thinking through possible causes for the CAD to be totally nonfunctioning. Most of the possibilities involved major problems and a lot of work. Where to begin? Just finding the problem might take most of the day.

Then she recalled a test that Professor S’san had put them through at the Academy, one that had baffled every student before S’san pointed out the simple cause of the problem. It can’t hurt to check that first.

Mari knelt by the back of the machine, where the power wire ran into a metal fitting over the wall junction with the single electrical power line within the city hall. That power line originated at the Mechanics Guild Hall, fed by the hydroelectric generators there. As far as commons were concerned, it might as well all be magic.

She unscrewed the cover and peered at the connection. Her brief sense of satisfaction faded rapidly as Mari studied what had been hidden. “Abad, take a look at this.”

He went to one knee beside her, eyes intent. “One of the wires is completely loose. How did that happen?”

Mari pointed to the screw which should have held the wire securely. “It’s been unscrewed.”

Abad’s breath caught. “Unscrewed? Who could have done that?”

She didn’t answer, even though Mari had a suspicion. Commons weren’t supposed to have such tools, weren’t supposed to know how to use Mechanic tools, weren’t supposed to know how to do anything with Mechanic devices, but she had encountered some who did, the ones she called Dark Mechanics. The ones she had been ordered by her Guild superiors never to mention. “We’ll have to report this,” Mari said as she quickly reconnected the power and set the screw firmly in place. Maybe now the Guild would finally listen to her instead of trying to muzzle her.

On the heels of that thought came another realization. Someone had sabotaged the CAD in a very simple way that might have tied her up for hours. That someone must have known that Mari would be the one sent to investigate a problem with a CAD.

Someone had wanted her here. Which meant she had better leave here as fast as possible.

But as she straightened to see the lights on the CAD blinking through its startup routine, Abad turned to the city leaders. “We need to ask some questions. Close the door,” he ordered.

Exchanging worried looks, the city leaders gestured to one of their assistants, who turned to the door and began swinging it closed. Even though nothing could be seen in the doorway, the door abruptly stuck on something when only halfway closed, then as the baffled assistant tried again it swung closed without a problem.

Mari’s hand went to her pistol again, closing tightly about the grip this time, her heart pounding in her ears. The group of commons was between her and the door. Mari rammed forward into a couple of them, shoving the two city leaders toward the door, but both staggered against something unseen, going down in a heap that abruptly included not only the two commons but also a Mage.

Everyone froze for an instant. Then the female Mage on the floor raised her eyes and met Mari’s gaze. She was short, strands of stringy dark hair escaping from the cowl of her hood. Her face held no expression at all as she looked at Mari, even her eyes betraying no emotion, but in one hand she held a long knife ready for use.

Mari didn’t remember having drawn her weapon, but she suddenly realized that she had the pistol out and pointed directly at the Mage’s face.

Abad glared down at the Mage as the wide-eyed commons in the room cautiously moved away from both Mage and Mechanics. “Kill her,” Abad suggested.

“No,” Mari said. “Guild policy,” she added, to avoid admitting that she didn’t want to harm anyone unless absolutely necessary to save herself or someone else. “Unless they’re actually attacking us, we’re supposed to ignore Mages. This one might have been after one of the commons.” She didn’t believe that. This Mage was looking right at her, not at any of the city leaders. “There might be more around. Let’s go.”

Mechanic Abad hesitated a moment, but obedience was drilled into Mechanics from the time they first became apprentices, and Mari did have Master Mechanic rank. Abad nodded and followed as Mari walked sideways to the door, keeping her eyes on the Mage and her weapon aimed straight between the Mage’s eyes. Abad yanked the door open, followed Mari out, then slammed the door shut behind them as he and Mari quickly headed out of the building.

She didn’t slow down until they were again on the steps leading out of the city hall, her eyes scanning the plaza in front of the building for any sign of other Mages.

“How did you know?” Abad asked. “I didn’t see her until—until those commons tripped over her.”

“There’s a Mage trick, a trap,” Mari explained, choosing her words with care. The unwritten but firm rule of the Guild was that no Mechanic ever saw a Mage do anything that the Mechanics Guild couldn’t explain. “You can tell they’re setting it if the door to a room sticks when there’s nothing visible blocking it. I found out about it in Dorcastle.” It wasn’t a lie, just a partial truth. The trick had been Mage work all right, but the door had actually hung up on that Mage bending light around herself to be effectively invisible. Alain had told Mari that a Mage needed to maintain concentration to keep something like that working, so Mari had shoved the commons at the Mage in hopes of not just knocking the Mage off-balance but also breaking her focus.

“A trap?” Abad nodded slowly, his expression uncertain. Just like Mari, he had seen that Mage appear from out of nowhere. But to admit that would mean admitting that Mages could do things Mechanics thought impossible, and no Mechanic was allowed to do that. “Yeah. Someone deliberately unfastened that power connection to get us in there, and she must have hiding, waiting for us. Maybe she didn’t actually unscrew that wire, but just pulled on it and somehow pulled the screw out that way.”

“It would be awfully hard to do it that way,” Mari said. Abad must know he was trying to rationalize what had happened, but he couldn’t admit the truth without admitting that the Mechanics Guild was lying about Mages and maybe other things as well. Somebody used a screwdriver to loosen that screw. Only Dark Mechanics could have done it…or could my own Guild have set me up? But how could Mages have also been involved? Alain told me, and I saw in Dorcastle, that Dark Mechanics get along with Mages no better than regular Mechanics do. How could they be working together here? Or was the apparently joint move mere coincidence?

She hated lying to Abad, and wished she could have discussed her thoughts with him, but the truth about Dark Mechanics, as with Mages, would have imperiled Abad with their own Guild even if he had believed it. As far as the Mechanics Guild was concerned, people who could do the work of Mechanics but were not Mechanics did not exist. She had been told that, ordered to believe it, and warned never to tell anyone else that any other truth might exist. Even though Mari had no intention of abiding by those commands forever, she had no evidence with which to convince any other Mechanics. The hard evidence she had given her Guild superiors in the past had simply disappeared once in their custody. But perhaps this incident would help break the logjam of denial. “We need to get back to the Guild Hall and report this as soon as possible,” Mari said.

Abad nodded quickly and firmly this time. When he had first been paired with her for contract work, Abad had eyed Mari will ill-concealed suspicion and subtly questioned her every move, but that had been fading as they worked together. Now, after this latest incident, Abad no longer hesitated to follow her lead.