Kneeling by the stream, Kadav splashed water onto his face and chest, trying to cleanse away the sweat and grime of another long day. If only the cool water could calm the raging whirlwind in his head. With every passing hour it was becoming more obvious; having barely even begun, the project was already in dire jeopardy.
The problem was time. Hours collected in his gut like sand in the bell of an hourglass. One day this person wouldn't appear; the following day it was someone else. They would turn up eventually, looking haggard and misused. Even then, their hearts weren't in the work. Kadav lectured, shouted, cajoled and promised. He reminded them of their oaths and the fiery inferno that awaited oathbreakers. In response, they gave vague excuses and swore they were upholding their end of the bargain. Most baffling of all, they seemed to be telling the truth. He saw no signs of intentional sabotage. Yet the result was much the same. With the labor-force in constant flux, the work progressed in fits and starts when it progressed at all. At this pace, they would be lucky to complete the apparatus before the leaves began to fall. The heaviness in Kadav's gut told him they didn't have that long. Either the dragon would return by then, or knights and adventurers would start arriving in numbers.
He dried his face, rubbing at his bloodshot eyes until he saw spots. As his vision cleared, an apparition of the priest appeared in the pleated waters of the stream. He froze, startled, before recognizing his own reflection. The thinning hair plastered wetly against his pate and the shirt draped stole-like around his neck had created a momentary illusion. He chuckled uneasily to himself. The stress was starting to take a toll on his sanity.
Suspicion gnawed at him as he dressed. What could be undermining the resolve of his workforce? The more he mulled it over, the more obvious the answer became: the priest. The holy man must have found a way to negate the workers' oaths. Kadav wasn't sure how he had managed it, but when he found out, he would shove that holy scroll up his pontifical arse.
His ire stoked, he arrived back at the worksite just in time to see Hrago scaling the scaffolding ladder. It was the first he had seen of the cabbage farmer all morning.
"Hrago!" he shouted from across the clearing. "So nice of you to join us this fine day!"
Without returning his greeting, Hrago climbed to the topmost platform where several men were already hewing out a vertical channel in the face of the god tree.
Kadav stormed over in high dudgeon. He was still the mayor of this town, fire-breathing dragon or no, and he wasn't about to be ignored, even by a longstanding ally. "Hrago!" he called up.
"What can I do for you, mayor?" came the cabbage farmer's reply.
"I said, it's nice of you to join us this fine afternoon!"
"I heard you the first time," Hrago replied stiffly. "A nice day to you too, mayor."
"So that's it, is it? Gone for half a day and not even a hello-how-you-do?"
By way of answer, a new chok-ing sound added itself to the percussive chorus, this one deeper and louder than the rest.
Kadav rattled the ladder. "I'm speaking to you, Hrago! Don't you ignore me! You've bloody well got some explaining to do!"
The other choppers took leave of their work to peer nervously over the edge. Chok! Chok! came the sound of a single ax being swung with great force into the ancient tree. "I'm a bit busy at the moment," came Hrago's voice. "Perhaps you could drop by later."
Livid now, Kadav went to scale the ladder but was forced to give way as an exodus of workers came shimmying down from above. No one wanted to get caught on the rickety scaffold if the argument came to blows. When the way was finally clear, Kadav clambered his way to the top. He started to swing a leg onto the platform, but without anyone to steady the ladder or give him a hand up, he felt his center of gravity shift precariously. On second thought, he decided to stay put. The ladder extended a couple feet above the edge, giving him a midget eye view of the farmer's broad back.
"Look at me, damn you!" Kadav accosted him.
Hrago whirled around and slammed the axe into one of the rig's mainstays where it stuck. The blow shook the platform, causing the ladder to buck in Kadav's hands. A look of embarrassment passed over the cabbage farmer's face as if his own outburst had taken him by surprise. "I see you there, mayor," he said through clenched jaws. "I'm guessing you didn't climb all this way up for no good reason. You want something?"
"An explanation," Kadav said, "of where in the seven hells you've been all morning."
"Some things needed seeing to on the farm."
"Is that so? If I didn't know better, I'd say there were some things around here needed seeing to."
"Maybe so." Hrago wrung his hands together. "But my farm ain't got no one else to look after it."
"Let me guess. Are the little bunnies nibbling at the cabbages again?"
Hrago flushed. "As a matter of fact. But that ain't the least of it. The weeds are running amok and the dogs are ranging wild. My watermelon patch is all but ruint. One heifer's dried up and the others are like to on account of 'em not getting pulled regular."
"Is that what this is all about?" Kadav suppressed a sneeze. The shaking had stirred up a cloud of wood dust. "There's a fire-breathing dragon on the loose and you're—sneeze—worried about bloody cabbages and heifers?!"
"Come winter and we'll all be worried about cabbages and heifers."
"Come winter and we'll all be—sneeze—rich as kings. No one's going to give a tarnished coppy about your cabbages then."
"Can't eat gold."
"Then we'll eat dragonflesh for Rhojë's sake! And if the rabbits eat up your farm, you can buy another. Why, you could buy ten farms with all those riches!"
"What I gonna do with ten farms? I ain't got enough oxen to plow me that many and there ain't enough of me to do all that picking. I gots to sleep sometime."
Kadav wiped his nose with the back of his hand as he considered what to say next. "Tell me, how did he get to you?" he cut to the chase.
Hrago made a show of looking puzzled. "Can't say I know what you mean, mayor."
"The priest, what did he say to you?"
"Priest? I ain't talked to no dang priest."
"But a priest has been talking to you, hasn't he? What did he promise you in exchange for sabotage? Absolution from your many sins? That piece of land your pa always had his eye on? Prayers to ease the suffering of your dearly departed sister?"
"You ain't got no right bringing my pa or Eris Lee into this!" Hrago stomped, kicking up more wood dust.
"And you've got no right to go breaking your oath!" Sneeze!
"What oath you speaking of, mayor? Cuz I ain't sweared none."
Too late Kadav realized his mistake. He had not extracted an oath from Hrago as he had the others, thinking it unnecessary. Not that it mattered; a betrayal was a betrayal after all. "Let me tell you how it is, friend," Kadav said. "I'm the mayor of this here town—sneeze. What you do for me, you do for the good folks of this town. What you don't do for me, you don't do for the entire town. Now this town has a long memory, and it don't—sneeze—go so well for them that use their neighbors' manure to fertilize their own fields. You do your part and I'll see to it that you receive your share of the profits. But if you shirk your load..." Kadav shook his head as if it didn't bear thinking about. "Speaking as one friend to another, I wouldn't want to see anything happen to that fine farm of yours."
Kadav had never dared take such a tone with Hrago before. As two men that never expected much from each other, they had forged an accord that was as close to friendship as any he had known over the years. But Kadav had not arrived at his position of power by letting bonds of affection interfere in doing what had to be done. There was a time to forge alliances and a time to break them. He needed to send a clear message to the men gathered at the worksite. It was a shame Hrago had to be made an example of, but that was just the way of it.
"Are you threatening me?" Hrago's hands went ominously still.
"I'm just telling you the way it is," Kadav said, trying to sound authoritarian in spite of the running eyes and sniffly nose. Damn this wood-dust!
Hrago strode over and seized the ladder by both posts, holding it out from the platform until it was almost vertical. Kadav hooked an elbow over a rung as his feet struggled to stay on their perch. It was over twenty feet to the ground, far enough to break bones. His knees shook so badly they knocked together. He had never felt so utterly helpless.
"Let me tell you the way it is, mayor," Hrago said. "When you done killed this dragon of your'n, you can keep your gold and buy your ten farms with it. As for me, you can pay me for the days I done labored for you. That'll do in place of the thanks you been witholdin'. Now I'm going back to my farm while there's still a chance of having a harvest this year. Speaking as one friend to another, I suggest you don't come anywheres close. I don't want to think what might happen to your face the next time I sees it."
Hrago released the ladder which, after a moment's hesitation, rocked back against the platform. As for the cabbage farmer, he had his own means of getting down. He wrapped his arms around one of the rig's mainstays then swung his body to the outside and shimmied down it like a bear. Once on the ground, he quickly disappeared into the woods.