“We have to,” the husky man said with calm resolve. “It’s only a short distance.”
The other cursed again. “It’s not my job, Ishaq, and you know it. I’ll not do it!”
Then Ishaq threw up his hands in a helpless gesture as his headstrong partner went to the front of the wagon and urged the team on, managing to drag the wagon to the side of the road and out of the way of the other wagons that were beginning to back up down the street. Once he had the wagon to the side, he started unhitching the team.
The man at the back of the wagon turned and peered around at the people watching.
“I need some help,” Ishaq called to the sparse crowd.
“Doing what?” a nearby man asked.
“I’ve got to get this load of iron to the warehouse.” He stretched his thick neck and pointed. “Just there—in the brick building with the faded red paint on the side.”
“How much will you pay?” the bystander asked.
Ishaq was getting frustrated as he glanced over his shoulder and saw his partner leading the horses away. “I’m not authorized to pay anything, not without approval, but I’m sure that if you came round tomorrow—”
The people watching laughed with knowing disgust and went on their way. The man stood in the downpour, ankle deep in mud, alone. He sighed and turned to his wagon, pulling back the tarp to reveal iron bar stock.
Richard stepped out into the street. Nicci wanted to check some more rooms on the list before it got dark. She snatched at his sleeve, but he only gave her a scolding look. She huffed her displeasure but followed anyway as he made his way through the mud to the man struggling to pull a long bar from the wagon bed.
“Ishaq, is it?” Richard asked.
The man turned and gave Richard a nod. “That’s right.”
“If I help you, Ishaq,” Richard asked, “will I really get paid tomorrow? The truth, now.”
Ishaq, a stocky fellow with a curious red hat with a narrow brim all around, finally shook his head in resignation.
“Well,” Richard said, “if I help you get this load into your warehouse, then would you allow me and my wife to sleep in there where we could get out of the rain for the night?”
The man scratched his neck. “I’m not allowed to let anyone in there. What if something happened? What if things came up missing? I’d be out of work”—he snapped his fingers—“quick as that.”
“Just until tomorrow. I only want to get her out of the rain before she comes down sick. I have no use for iron. Besides, I don’t rob people.”
The man scratched his neck again as he gazed back at the wagon over his shoulder. He glanced at Nicci. She was shivering and it was not an act. He peered at Richard.
“Sleeping in the warehouse for one night is not a fair price for lugging all this in there. It will take hours.”
“If you agree to it, and I agree to it,” Richard said over the sound of the rain, “then it’s a fair price. I asked for no more, and I’m willing to do it for that price.”
The man stared at Richard as if he might be crazy. He pulled off his red hat and scratched his head of dark hair. He swept his wet hair back and replaced the hat.
“You would have to clear out when I come first thing in the morning with a new wagon. I could get in trouble—”
“I’ll not let you get in trouble over me. If I should get caught, I’ll say I broke in.”
The man thought about it for a moment, looking surprised at the last term Richard had thrown in an effort to close the deal. The man took another look over his shoulder at the load, then nodded his consent.
Ishaq hoisted a long bar of steel and put his shoulder under it. Richard lifted two and extended his arm forward to steady it, resting the heavy steel on the bunched muscles of his shoulder.
“Come on,” he said to Nicci. “Let’s get you inside where you can start to dry out and get warm.”
She tried to lift a steel bar to help, but it was beyond her strength. There were times when Nicci missed her power. She could at least feel it through the link to the Mother Confessor. It took more effort, but even at this great of a distance she was still able to maintain the link. She walked beside Richard as they followed the man to the dry room Richard had just won for her.
The next day dawned clear. Rainwater still dripped from the eaves, though. The night before, as Richard helped Ishaq lug the load into the warehouse, Nicci had used a light rope Richard had in his pack, stringing it between racks so she could hang up their wet things. By morning, most of their clothes were reasonably dry.
They’d slept on wooden pallets, the only other choice being the dirt. Everything smelled of iron dust, and was covered with a fine black film. There was nothing in the warehouse to keep them warm, other than a single lantern Ishaq had left them, over which Nicci could at least warm her hands. They slept as best they could in their wet clothes. By morning, those, too, were reasonably dry.
Much of the night, Nicci hadn’t slept, but, by the light of that lantern warming her hands, had watched Richard sleep as she thought about his gray eyes. It had been a shock to see those eyes in her father’s business. It brought back a flood of memories.
Richard opened the warehouse door just enough to squeeze through and carried their things out into the breaking dawn. The sky over the city looked as if it were rusting. He left her to watch their things while he went back in to lock the door from inside. She could hear him climbing the racks in the warehou
se to get up to a window. He had to jump to the ground.
When Ishaq finally came up the street with the fresh wagon, Richard and Nicci were sitting on a short wall on the entrance road to the warehouse doors. When the wagon rolled past them into the yard outside the building and came to a halt before the double doors, Nicci saw that the driver who had abandoned Ishaq the night before was at the reins.
The lanky driver set the brake as he eyed them suspiciously.
“What’s this?” he asked Richard.
“I’m sorry to bother you,” Richard said, “but I just wanted to get here before you opened up so I could inquire if there might be any work available.”
Ishaq glanced at Nicci, seeing that she was dried out. He eyed the locked door and realized Richard had kept his word, and kept him from the possibility of getting in trouble for letting someone sleep in the warehouse.
“We can’t hire people,” the driver said. “You have to go to the office and put your name on the list.”
Richard sighed. “I see. Well, thank you, gentlemen. I’ll give it a try. A good day to you both.”
Nicci had learned to recognize in Richard’s voice when he was up to something. He gazed up the street, and then down the street, as if he were lost. He was up to something, now. He seemed to be giving Ishaq an opportunity to offer more than he had paid for the help. Ishaq had let Richard carry twice as much of the load the night before. Richard had done so without a word of protest.
Ishaq cleared his throat. “Hold on there.” He climbed down from the wagon to unlock the door, but paused before Richard. “I’m the load master. We need another man. You look to have a strong back.” Using the toe of his boot, he drew a little map in the mud. “You go to the office”—he lifted his thumb over his shoulder—“down this street, here, to the third turn, then right, past six more streets.” He made an X in the mud. “There’s the office. You get your name on the list.”