Iron Seas 03 - Riveted

from the upper peninsula.”
    Annika’s heart thumped, her pulse pounding in her ears.
    “She was protecting them, I realized.”
    Then Annika didn’t need to confirm it.
    “Do you know the lengths she will go to protect them? I didn’t either, but I wondered. So I found out.”
    Horror crawled in Annika’s stomach. What had he done? Every horrible story she’d ever heard about the ways that men could hurt women flooded her memory. But, no. He hadn’t threatened her yesterday because he already knew what David’s response would be.
    Knowing she played into his hands by responding, not caring, she asked, “How?”
    “I gave her a choice between Heimaey and your village. She chose Heimaey.”
    By the gods’ tears. Lorenzo couldn’t be a man. He couldn’t be a human. Only a monster could do such a thing. “To kill one village or another? That’s no choice.”
    “Oh, it was. She could have refused to choose between them and leave the burden all on my shoulders. She didn’t. She took theburden of responsibility in exchange for certainty. It’s admirable, I suppose. Self-sacrificing. All that mattered to me was that the suit worked. The rest was just interesting.”
    And Källa should have broken her promise and killed him there.
    No, Annika realized. Källa would have broken her promise and killed him there. Her sister knew that Lorenzo had something wrong in him, and probably suspected worse. But if he’d threatened Hannasvik that directly, she wouldn’t have hesitated.
    “What choice did you really give her?”
    “No choice. I asked her what she would kill, if she could. She told me that she’d kill the dogs.”
    Yes. That was Källa.
    “Now you think, ‘He is deranged. He is inhuman.’ Will it make killing me easier?”
    Annika actually thought it would. But David had said he called himself an observationist. Perhaps that was all that Lorenzo wanted—to see what reaction he could prod from her.
    “Do you actually believe anything you said about David?”
    “No.” There was a smile in his voice. “I have not quite figured you out. Who killed the watchman, I wonder? You or Kentewess?”
    Would he retaliate? They’d killed one of his men. “I did,” she said.
    “See? Now you lie, probably to protect him. I know it was Kentewess. His neck was broken. If you had killed him, you’d have used something to do it with. Källa used to say that you are the rabbit, that you’re only brave inside a machine. I think you’re braver than she said. I don’t think she was all wrong, however. You’ll use a tool, but only because you recognize that you’re weak.”
    Källa wasn’t wrong—and as she traveled through the tunnel, Annika gave serious thought to killing him with the troll at the first opportunity.
    The end of the tunnel appeared, lanterns flooding the tunnel with light. Men with pickaxes chipped away at the wall. Others carried blocks and wheelbarrows full of ice to a train of carts that stood on sled runners rather than wheels.
    If Lorenzo left the troll, she would smash him in front of these laborers and face whatever came next.
    He must have realized it. After she set the machine down and the men began filing out of the chest hatch, he told her to come out of the seat.
    “You must stoke the engine, of course,” he said. “Also, once a day, you will drag the carts out of the tunnel to dump them. You will be responsible for securing the train to the walker. I don’t trust them to do it properly.”
    In truth, Annika didn’t either. The men appeared exhausted. In their place, Annika didn’t know that she could properly secure anything. Her mind never worked well when she was tired.
    Why would he push them this far? Was this just cruelty of the same sort as in the Lusitanian mines, or was he hoping to see what they would do?
    “A pitiful sight, aren’t they?” Lorenzo stood beside her, looking over them. “They are interesting, too. Some men whom we’ve brought from Castile to Iceland thirst for blood. Some just want to work, take pleasure in earning their wages, in being strong. If you kick them down, they get up and keep going. Very few ever kick back…though some are beginning to.”
    Good. She hoped they eventually kicked him down, too. “And that is the reason you have so many guards.”
    “You see well.” He glanced at her, then back at the men. “But I don’t need guards for these men. If you knock them down, they stay down until you tell them to get up again.