Read Online Star's Reach by John Michael Greer - Free Book Online Page A

and down the way he
always did, waved me to a chair, and said, “You decided?”
    He meant the letter or the finder’s rights to
Star’s Reach: one a big chunk of easy money but nothing more, the
other nothing more than a hope, maybe, but a hope of finding the
thing every ruinman dreams of finding. I sat down on the chair,
looked at him, and said, “I keep on telling myself that I ought to
have some brains.”
    For once, Garman laughed. It was as dry as an
old granny’s whatnot and as short as a dumb ruinman’s life, but it
was still a laugh. If he’d suddenly sprouted feathers I don’t think
I’d have been more surprised. “If I was twenty years younger,” he
said, “I’d be telling myself that.” Then: “Berry says you picked
him.”
    “That’s right.”
    Garman nodded once. “Good choice. He’ll be of
use.” Berry lit up like a lamp; Garman didn’t say that sort of
thing lightly. “The original’s going to Shanuga today for auction,”
Garman went on, “but a copy needs to go to Melumi right quick; Mam
Kelsey’s talked with them by radio and they want it. You headed
that way?”
    I hadn’t even begun to make plans yet, but it
suddenly seemed like the best possible idea, not least because I
guessed what Garman had in mind. “I was thinking that,” I lied.
    “Good.” He pulled two copies of the letter
off a table next to his chair, handed them to me. “One for you and
one for the scholars. And here—” He tossed me a leather bag that
landed in my hand with a clink. “Ought to be about a fifth of what
they’ll pay. That’ll keep the two of you in food on the way.”
    A fifth of the price was courier’s wages, but
from the hard plump shape of the bag, he’d rounded up a good bit. I
pretended not to notice, and thanked him.
    “Don’t mention it.” He leaned forward, then,
and gave me one of his looks. “Now listen. You two go fast, keep
mum, and stay off the main roads. Some people might kill to get
this before the Versty does.” He handed me another sheet of paper.
“This might help.”
    I read the paper. It was a letter from him to
some mister in the Cago ruins, up north on the lakes, saying the
Shanuga ruins didn’t have room for a new mister and asking the Cago
ruinmen to find a place for me. “If anyone asks, that’s why we’re
traveling.”
    “That’s right.” Then: “And it’s close enough
to true, anyway.”
    I knew what he was talking about, of course.
The Shanuga ruins still had a lot of metal in them, but raw metal
doesn’t pay a ruinman much, and the good finds—old machines and
rare metals and documents—had been getting scarcer since before I
was born. I’d already heard of towns where they’d closed the guild;
they only allowed a certain number of misters, and a prentice
couldn’t make mister unless somebody had just died or he was ready
to go somewhere else. It hadn’t yet occurred to me that there might
not always be somewhere else to go. That came to mind later, after
I’d traveled a bit and learned just how close the ruinmen’s guilds
had gotten to digging themselves out of business.
    After that we had some papers to sign for
Berry, so the laws would treat him as my prentice and not Garman’s.
Garman put his name on the lines and I put mine, and then Berry
surprised the stuffing out of me by reading the papers and signing
his own name nice and neat in the right place. Then we said our
goodbyes and Garman cuffed me on the shoulder, one mister to
another, and Berry and I left the tent and went to get some food
before we started.
    The camp was mostly awake by then. Off in the
middle distance I could hear Mister Calwel’s voice, high and sharp,
yelling at his prentices. Chickens clucked and scratched in the
grass, and one of their wild cousins crowed off in the forest
somewhere. I was about to get in line at the cook’s tent when Berry
cleared his throat and gave me a look that he must have learnt from
Garman, reminding me that I was a mister now and