Huge Ajax's Arc

Chapter 130 of 619

Ajax followed Marco up the passage into the front room. Chalam waited by the inner door with his staff across his knees. Cody stood outside with three men behind him and a fourth off to one side. The fourth man kept his hands in view and his eyes on the ground. That alone told Ajax something. "Bring him in," Ajax said. "Just him. The others wait at the gate." Cody nodded and stepped back. The fourth man came through the door alone. He was thin, wind-burned, a canvas coat too big at the shoulders. He stopped where Marco pointed and did not sit. "Name," Ajax said. "Bran. Walked up from the coast road. Heard you were paying for stone work." Marco stood two paces to the side. He tilted his head a fraction. He did not touch the man. He did not speak. Ajax watched Marco's face. He knew the look by now. Marco listened the way another man watched a horse's ears. "Take off your shirt. We check for tribal markings," Ajax said. Bran took off his shirt and stood in front of them. Nothing but old rope burns on his wrists. Marco pulled Ajax aside and whispered to him. "He's thinking about his sister. She's sick. He came for the coin." A short pause. "Nothing else in there. No spiral. No name from the list. He doesn't know what we are." "You sure." "Sure." Ajax studied Bran a moment longer. "You lift stone?" "Since I was ten." "Two silver a day. You sleep in the shed by the wall. You do not walk the shelf without Cody. You ask no questions about the vault." "Understood." "Go tell Cody you're hired. Wait at the gate." Bran went out. The door swung shut behind him. Marco let a breath go. "He's clean. Just tired." "Good." Ajax said. "Same read on the other three?" "Cody's men. Marco heard their thoughts on the way in. Two masons thinking about wages. One laborer thinking about a woman in the port." "Dry work," Marco said, dry himself. "Nothing worth carrying back to the Keeper." Ajax stepped to the door and looked out at the yard. Cody had the four men lined at the gate. Bran took a place at the end. The two masons were already pointing at the cliff face, measuring with their eyes. One picked up a chisel from Cody's pack and thumbed the edge. "Put them on the north wall first," Ajax said. "I want a course laid before dusk." Cody raised a hand and moved them through. The men went to the stone at a walk that turned to a working pace before they reached it. Hammers came out. A laborer set a barrow. The first chisel bit rang off the cliff. Ajax watched a moment. His walls had hands on them again. He turned back inside. "Marco. Stay by the gate today. Anyone new comes up that road, you read them before they see me." "I'll be there."