Chaska shifted her brass lens two inches to the right, following the thick braided wire that ran from the top of the derrick to a wedged iron pin on the western buttress.
“We can’t just cut the main stays from up here,” she said, lowering the glass and rubbing her watering left eye. “If the whole frame tips south, those four pine pilings will smash straight through the crust of the middle pools. Everything living in those lower basins would be crushed or boiled when the hot pipe underneath cracks.”
“Which struts are carrying the dead weight over the dry shelf?” Ashaun asked.
“Can’t tell from this angle,” Chaska said. “They’ve hung canvas tarpaulins around the lower collar to keep the sulfur spray off the grease-gears. Somebody has to look under the deck or read the engineer’s rigging plan.”
Down in the camp, a brass horn sounded from the sentry post by the mule track: two short, level notes, a pause, and a flat lower third. Immediately the two guards outside the cliffside stone shed grounded their spears, stretched their shoulders, and waited for the relief pair coming down from the mess tent.
Kiv sat back on his heels beside Siv. “Still running fourth-watch field rotation,” he said. “Two short and a flat third means the outer picket reports in before the stew kettle comes off the fire. If a scout handler walks down the upper switchback in the next twenty minutes, the gate corporal won’t even ask for a…
