The Exiled Duke's Lottery system

On the second afternoon, Vale caught up with Belhorn. The old caravan master led the train no matter the road—dry, flooded, muddy, or buried under winter sludge. A lead wagon rolled ahead of him, thirty trailed behind, and enough people moved between them that someone was always shouting for his attention.

Still, he walked. Vale sat beside him, matching his steady rhythm, and waited nearly a mile before speaking. "May I ask you something, master?"

Belhorn didn’t look at him. "You may ask but i may not answer."

"I’m going north for work."

"So is every man here who isn’t hauling my goods."

"They told me at the yard that Elarion takes anyone who can hold a tool," Vale said, eyes on the muddy ruts. "I want to know if that’s true, or just tavern talk passed from one man to another."

Belhorn walked a few paces more, his stick’s ferrule clicking on stone, then shifted it to his left hand. "It’s true." Vale waited. "And I know because I’ve lost eleven hands to it in three years." Vale glanced at him, keeping his expression controlled. "Eleven?"

"Two had worked for me over a decade," Belhorn said, mouth twisting sourly. "They went north on my wagons and never came back."

"What happen did they vanish?"

"No." The old man snorted. "One of them wrote to me."

"What did he say?"

"That he was sorry and that he was earning double." Belhorn tapped his stick against his boot. "Double pay. A roof over his head. Regular food. A doctor when he’s sick and if he doesn’t have a proper trade, they teach him one."

He shook his head, staring at the mules ahead. "I cannot compete with that."

"You tried?"

"For a year."

"And?"

"I nearly went broke."

A faint flicker of amusement touched Vale’s eyes, though his face remained still. Belhorn noticed anyway.

"Every time I go north, I lose hands," Belhorn grunted.

"Then why keep carrying people there?"

"Because Elarion pays me to."

That ended that line of questioning.

"What is it like?" Vale asked after a long pause.

Belhorn glanced sideways. "You’re asking the wrong question."

"What should I ask?"

"Ask me what I have seen."

Vale considered it, adjusting the strap of his pack. "All right. What have you seen?"

Belhorn was quiet for a moment, listening to the heavy creak of wagon wheels behind them.

"Iron roads."

Vale turned his head slightly. "Roads?"

"Two rails. Solid metal. Laid straight across the dukedom from one town to another." He pointed ahead with his stick. "Like this road, except narrower and harder."

"And?"

"Machines run on them."

Vale remained silent, absorbing the detail.

"Metal machines. Bigger than a house," Belhorn said flatly. "They carry more than my entire train. They go faster than a horse in full gallop. They run all day."

"What pulls them?"

"Nothing."

Vale looked at him. "There is no draft team?"

"No team." Belhorn shrugged. "A man sits at the front, turns a valve, and the thing moves."

"How?"

"I asked that question the first year." Belhorn paused. "A man in a gray uniform explained it to me but well it went above my ears."

Vale’s mouth twitched. "So you stopped asking?"

"I stopped asking people who wanted to explain things." He pointed his stick toward the horizon. "Started watching instead."

"What else?"

"Machines. Everywhere." Belhorn’s answer came without hesitation. "In yards. In sheds. Beside the rail lines. At loading stations." He shook his head slowly. "There is a thing at Iron Junction. It takes an entire wagon-load from a bed."

Vale frowned slightly. "With what?"

Belhorn gave him an even look. "If I knew that, I would own one. It picks up an entire loaded box. Moves it onto a rail car. A man stands beside it and works two levers."

"How long does it take?"

"A minute."

Vale fell silent.

"I watched it for an hour," Belhorn added quietly. "I have unloaded wagons for most of my life. I watched that machine do in a minute what would take my men half an hour, and I went back to my own wagons feeling like a man who had brought candies to sell in a house which produces them."

The weight of those words hung between them for a dozen paces.

"And the things in the air?" Vale asked quietly.

Belhorn stopped his steady tread and looked at him—properly looked at him—for the first time since they had begun speaking.

"So somebody told you about those."

"Somebody in a taproom said something."

"And you didn’t believe them."

"No."

"Then start to." Belhorn faced the road again, resuming his pace. "I have seen two kinds."

Vale waited, his breathing calm and deliberate.

"One is long," Belhorn held his hand out, palm flat. "Fat. Too large to be anything sensible."

"It floats?"

"In the air. Like a bladder on water."

"And moves?"

"Slowly." Belhorn nodded. "I could see men standing in a basket underneath it."

Vale looked upward instinctively at the gray cloud cover.

Belhorn noticed. "Don’t bother. You won’t see them this far south."

Vale brought his attention back to the muddy track. "What about the other?"

The old man went quiet for several seconds.

"The other one goes fast."

"How fast?"

"Faster than anything has any business going ." Belhorn’s stick tapped harder against the earth. "It came over the road while I was standing beside my lead wagon."

His tone lacked any grand flourish—it was purely the cadence of a man describing an uncomfortable truth.

"It crossed over us," Belhorn said.

"And?"

"It was gone before the sound reached me."

Vale’s footing didn’t falter, but his focus locked onto the old man. "The sound came afterward?"

"Yes."

"And?"

"It knocked the hat off a man standing three paces behind me."

Vale stared at the old man’s profile. "That seems difficult to believe."

"I said exactly that," Belhorn spat into the ditch. "Out loud."

"What happened?"

"One of their carters looked at me." The old man shook his head. "Like I was a child who had just discovered rain."

A soft, genuine chuckle escaped Vale despite his caution.

"Nobody up there thinks it is remarkable," Belhorn continued, his voice dropping. "That is the part you should remember."

Vale looked toward the grey expanse to the north. "It isn’t the machines that matter?"

"No." Belhorn tapped his stick against his leg. "It is that the people who live there have stopped finding them interesting."

They walked nearly a quarter mile without speaking, the rhythmic plodding of the mules filling the silence.

"Is it worth it?" Vale asked finally.

"The journey?"

"The work."

Belhorn considered that carefully. "It depends on what you are."

"Say it plainly."

"If you can work, yes. If you can work well, twice over." Belhorn pointed his stick at Vale’s chest. "And if you have a trade, they’ll find you before you’ve finished asking whether they’re hiring."

"And if I don’t?"

"Then you’ll probably find work anyway."

Vale nodded once. "What if someone goes north for another reason?"

Belhorn gave him a sharp, sideways glance. "What reason?"

"To see the place."

"To be clever?"

Vale said nothing.

"To become somebody?"

Still nothing.

"To look at the machines?" Belhorn snorted. "Then no."

"Why?"

"Because they’re picky about who gets in."

Vale kept his face unreadable. "What do you mean?"

"I only go as far as the freight yards at the junction."

"And then?"

"I unload," Belhorn said with a shrug. "Then I head back."

"Your wagons never go into the city itself?"

"Never."

"Didnt try to?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Never been asked."

Vale considered that, processing the operational security implications. "You don’t find it strange?"

Belhorn shook his head. "I find it convenient." The stick tapped against his boot. "Money changes hands. Cargo comes off. Cargo goes on." He shrugged again. "I have been doing this for years."

"And you never asked?"

Belhorn looked mildly offended. "I’m a caravan master."

"Yes so."

"Not an idiot."

A faint smile touched Vale’s lips.

"I am paid on time," the old man added, as if that settled the entire philosophy of his existence.

The road curved ahead, cutting through a low ridge of bare granite. Beyond the bend lay nothing but open field, brown scrub, and a vast wall of grey sky.

Then Belhorn spoke again, his tone conversational and flat.

"You won’t mind me mentioning something."

Vale kept his step steady. "Go on."

"The city watch was turning over half the east quarter the day before I loaded."

Vale said nothing, his face a smooth, unreadable mask.

"Two of my teamsters were stopped on their way to the yard," Belhorn continued walking. "Asked their names. Their business. Where they’d spent the night."

Vale didn’t blink.

"A man I buy rope from had four guards in his shop for nearly an hour."

"What were they looking for?"

"That is exactly what I asked."

"And?"

"My rope man doesn’t know." Belhorn tapped his stick against his boot. "He also isn’t discreet."

Vale waited.

"The watch didn’t tell him." Belhorn paused, letting the implication land. "Somebody said they were looking for a group."

Vale maintained his quiet, easy pace.

"People who had come into the city," Belhorn continued. "From somewhere."

Still Vale offered nothing.

"And then disappeared before anybody could get a proper look at them."

The wheels creaked behind them. Belhorn tapped the stick once against the dirt.

"You wouldn’t happen to know anything about that do you?"

"Nope, i am a law abiding commoner."

"OHH." Belhorn nodded slowly, keeping his eyes on the road. "That is what I thought too."

Vale glanced at him sideways. "And what do you think now?"

"That I have thirty-one wagons." The old man shifted his stick to his other shoulder. "A schedule." Another step. "And absolutely no reason to involve myself in somebody else’s business."

Vale waited.

Belhorn stopped walking. He turned around slowly, resting both hands on his stick, and looked back down the long line of the caravan.

Eight strangers were scattered along the train.

Aldis near the front. Durn farther back beside the third axle. Ghara and Thorne near the heavy teams. Vale, Renna, and Elenwe by the ninth wagon. Pib hidden somewhere under a frame.

Belhorn looked back at Vale.

"There are four of you toward the front."

Vale’s face remained impassive.

"Four more scattered behind."

"And none of you look at each other." The old man turned and resumed walking. "That is difficult to do properly for two days straight."

Vale matched his stride once more.

"Whoever taught you that knew what they were doing," Belhorn said. "Whoever told you never to speak to one another didn’t."

Vale glanced at him. "Why?"

"Because eight people who never speak stand out far more than eight people who nod."

Vale considered that. The old teamster was right—over-correction was its own form of exposure.

"I am not asking questions," the old man said firmly.

"I believe you."

"You shouldn’t."

Vale almost smiled.

"I have a load to deliver," Belhorn continued, pointing his stick back toward the train. "I need hands to get it there and every one of you has worked hard for two days." A pause. "None of you have been drunk." Another pause. "That already makes you better than most people I hire."

Vale nodded once. "What do you want us to do?"

"Act like normal people." Belhorn’s answer was immediate. "Nod at each other. Talk at the fire tonight. Argue about the food. Complain about the road. Borrow a tool." He motioned with his stick. "Eight people who travel on the same road eventually acknowledge that the other seven exist."

Vale looked back along the line of wagons. "Fair enough."

"And when we reach Iron Junction?"

"Get off my train." Belhorn looked at him. "Go wherever you’re going."

"Master Belhorn—"

"And do not tell me about it."

Vale fell silent. The old man was offering them a clean break and sensible cover—not out of sentiment, but out of professional self-preservation.

"Thank you."

Belhorn waved his stick dismissively. "The weather," he said loudly, "has been unusually dry for the season."

Vale looked at him, catching the pivot instantly.

"And if it holds," Belhorn continued at full volume, "we will reach the second water stop by dark."

Vale nodded in agreement. "Good weather for it."

"Terrible weather," Belhorn immediately corrected him, scowling at the sky. "Too dry. Dust gets into the axle grease."

Vale glanced sideways with a faint grin. "Thought you said it was good."

"I was being polite."

And for the next mile, as the wind picked up from the north, they discussed nothing more dangerous than wheel grease and dust.