“Just how old are you anyway?” Koyl asked from behind me, causing me to sigh. I was standing in the office of the Steelheart Company answering various questions which were “required” for some reason if I wanted to work for them. It had taken Koyl and Dawpvaol nearly five minutes to hash out the details of how they were supposed to spell my name. It's not even my name, really, I wanted to say, but stayed silent for the purpose of getting on with the process. My lack of a family name was a point of contention, but Koyl convinced Dawpvaol to drop it. I also learned that I was thirteen znaal tall, apparently. The average was eleven to twelve.

“Old enough,” I replied curtly, “how many more questions are there?”

“I guess you're not a kid or anything,” Dawpvaol muttered, marking something down on the sheet of paper in front of her with a fountain pen. I was never a kid, I thought, subjectively though, I have no idea how long it took me to go from my primitive state to what I am today. “Okay, do you have any specializations? Skills you tend to use for work?”

“My ope-” I started, then paused. The response to the question she had asked was so automatic that I had almost rattled off my typical skill-set announcement in Uwrish. “Does it matter?” I asked. “Is there some advantage to giving you that information?” Dawpvaol eyed me up suspiciously.

“If you're just laboring, no,” she said. “However, if you're looking for work that pays better we need to know what you're good at so that we can judge if a job is appropriate for you.”

“Can I answer later?” I asked. Dawpvaol sighed in exasperation.

“Yes, but you will be tested on certain skills if you claim to have them,” she replied while scribbling something else down on the paper. “Nation of origin?”

“Uwriy,” I lied. I got another suspicious look from Dawpvaol for my reply.

“Try again,” she demanded.

“Come on Dawp,” Koyl protested. “Who cares where he's from, he speaks the language and it's just labor.”

“He could be a spy from Ahlahtiyah or Owfehn,” Dawpvaol snapped.

“Really?” Koyl laughed. “Looking like that?” In a strangely out-of-place expression of emotion, Dawpvaol appeared to pout for an instant before narrowing her eyes at Koyl. “He's obviously Gwahlaob, at least in descent,” Koyl continued, “we're not hostile with the Sihz or the Yahn, so don't worry about it.”

“He's twice as tall as-” Dawpvaol began to shout.

“It's as Koyl says,” I interjected. I had no idea what he was talking about, but it seemed like agreeing with him would get the process over with quicker. Dawpvaol looked at me for a third time with extreme suspicion, but wrote down something on the page regardless. I looked back and met Koyl's curious gaze. He's trying to decide if I was telling the truth, I read from his face.

“Okay, now the final question,” Dawpvaol sighed. “Do you swear on your honor that you have not been an enemy of our company in the past, that you have no intention of becoming one in the future, and will do all in your power to maintain friendly relations with us and our members?”

“Of course,” I lied. For once Dawpvaol was satisfied with my answer. She brought out a strange wooden device from under the desk and placed it in front of me. The raised surface of it was about two centimeters squared, and it had a sharp spike sticking upward out of the middle by a few millimeters.

“Prick your thumb, press it here,” Dawpvaol instructed, sliding the paper in front of me and pointing to the bottom. I did as she instructed, leaving a smear of blood with my right thumbprint on the page. “Okay, now since you two showed up very late there aren't many labor jobs left,” she explained.

“To be clear, I am registered?” I asked.

“Yes,” Dawpvaol confirmed, “so anyway, you don't have your pick as you would have had if you had showed up at dawn. Really, all I've got left today are...” she trailed off, pulling out some more paper from under the desk and sliding three pages in front of me. Koyl was suddenly to my right, peering at the pages.

“Agh, are you kidding me Dawp?” he complained.

“First, field work to the south-west,” Dawpvaol continued. “Mainly plowing a few fields where the farmers have lost some beasts to predation lately. Second, ore processing. You would be hammering chunks into gravel and loading it up into carts for our forges to use. Lastly, firewood processing. Much like ore processing, but instead you would be cutting up logs into firewood for the forges instead.”

“So we're going to be busting our asses either way,” Koyl muttered.

“Lunch will be provided regardless of which job you take,” Dawpvaol informed us. “However, I have to warn you that the second and third jobs are supposed to be done by groups of-”

“I know how to cut up firewood,” I announced.

“As I was saying,” Dawpvaol snapped, “that job is meant for a group of five people. If you cannot complete the assigned labor you will only receive partial pay. Normally you wouldn't even be allowed to do it but since nobody took the job today we'll take what we can get.”

“We'll take the firewood,” Koyl said, slapping his hand down on the rightmost paper.

We had to walk all the way back through the slums to get to the storage warehouse where we were assigned to be working. Koyl was practically running the entire way there, at a pace that I found hard to keep up with because my bulk kept me from slipping through the passerby in the streets as easily as he could. When we arrived, I found out that the “warehouse” was actually just a stable of some kind with a number of wagons strewn about outside of it, placed on a small green lot at the edge of town. Koyl went up to the door and knocked on it, calling out to whoever was inside, and seconds later the door opened up. The person who emerged was a rough-looking man with brown hair and a brown beard, though still pale skin. Dozens of logs were visible behind him inside the barn. Each had a diameter between twenty-five and thirty-five centimeters.

After a brief discussion with the man Koyl and I learned that the contract was to process twenty trees, which meant cutting them up with a saw into three-znaal lengths then splitting them up and placing the wood into the wagons. Looking at the sky, I could tell that it was past mid-morning, with just an hour left before noon. Koyl began to try to negotiate with the man, but the man held firm and simply told us to get working or leave. Reluctantly, we both accepted some tools from him and got to work.

One of the first things I had to do was take off my armor and disarm myself. I hadn't noticed it much before, but my body did generate a large amount of heat when it was exerting itself. After helping Koyl lift the first log out of the barn and place it on the ground my body was screaming at me to cool off somehow, shedding water as sweat in a desperate attempt to reduce its internal heat. After removing my clothing and putting it beside the barn I examined my scars, seeing that they had faded tremendously from the last time I had taken notice of them. I caught both Koyl and the man staring at them as well, and felt a small rush of positive signals from my body.

I lifted out another log with Koyl, set it down, and then we both got to work. The hand-saw that was given to me was a simple curved tool with a toothed edge, but was more than enough to chew through the soft dry wood we were working with. I opted to cut the entire log into lengths before starting to split the wood, estimating three znaal as around twenty-two centimeters. By the time I was splitting my first section with the heavy axe that had been provided, Koyl was barely through the process of cutting his first section off of his log.

“Alright, lunch!” the man called out. “Take a break!” I managed to process one and a half logs by the time the sun had reached its zenith, while Koyl wasn't even through his first one yet. The man overseeing us had helped me take the second log down so that I could avoid disturbing Koyl's work.

“Thank the gods,” Koyl gasped. He was also shirtless, not that it mattered much since his shirt was so torn, revealing a skinny and underfed physique. He didn't bother standing, instead letting himself fall backwards into a sitting position as he desperately tried to stop sweating. The man came out of the barn with two wooden buckets of water, set them in front of us, then went back in for the food. I opted to sit down as well, taking a long drink to rehydrate myself.

“Finish these up quick,” the man instructed as he came back with two loaves of bread. He handed one to me and the other to Koyl, then pointed to the barn. “I'll be back out in a little while, and if you're not working by then you're taking too long.” Without further comment, he walked back inside the barn and vanished from view.

“How can you work so hard?” Koyl asked, breathing heavily in between sips of water and bites of bread. I didn't respond immediately because my own mouth was full of food. The bread itself had a nice flavor to it, and appeared to have some kind of nuts mixed in.

“Talking will slow down your eating,” I replied with my mouth half full, then I took another bite. My heads-up display showed multiple green bars filling up, though a few near the top which I was used to seeing increase when I ate stayed still. Not as nutritious, I thought, I'll need to eat something else later.

When the sun was finally down the job was over, and I could safely say that I was exhausted. The man in the barn, who I learned was called Tahroyl, congratulated Koyl and me on a good job and offered us two tubs of water to clean off in before going back to town. One bath later I put on my gear, then Koyl and I went back into the Steelheart Company office in silence. I didn't speak because I had nothing to say, but Koyl was probably silent due to fatigue. Dawpvaol scoffed at the sight of us when we entered, and we had to wait until she was done talking to another poor-looking man before she would speak to us.

“So?” she asked. Koyl and I both slid papers onto the counter. Dawpvaol looked and Koyl's paper and snorted, then looked at mine and her eyebrows raised. She looked at me, still surprised, then back at the paper. “You didn't try to change this?” she asked.

“He can't read,” Koyl groaned, “he couldn't even if he wanted to. I can tell you it's accurate.”

“Sixteen logs?” she read from the paper. “On his own?”

“He's a freak, I told you,” Koyl muttered, “now give us the damned money please.” Dawpvaol nodded and reached under the desk, pulling out a rough cloth bag of coins and placing it on the table. Koyl, now instantly alert, snatched it up and held it close to himself.

“Yuwniht, don't let this... person take advantage of you,” Dawpvaol said sternly, looking directly into my eyes. Koyl hissed and turned around, leaving the office without saying another word. I followed behind him and met him out in the street.

“Okay, here's half,” Koyl said, placing four ngoywngeyt coins into my hand along with another three four-ngeyt coins. He showed me the remainder in the bag and I confirmed that it was half, assuming he hadn't done some kind of trickery. It's good enough, and I gained valuable information, I thought, no need to start a fight.

“Okay,” I echoed, “goodbye.” I turned to leave, reasoning that there must have been a rooftop nearby that I could rest on for the night and still be near enough to the office that I could work the next day. I was stopped by a hand on my right shoulder, and turned to see it was Koyl, looking confused.

“You're fine with half?” he asked in disbelief. This person really is stupid, I thought.

“On second thought, you owe me four-fifths,” I replied. I didn't really intend to take that amount of money from him, but I figured the suggestion would scare him away. Instead, he laughed at me.

“What inn are you staying at?” Koyl asked. “Do you even know where to find one?”

“I was just going to stay outside again,” I told him.

“You nutcase,” Koyl criticized, “do you realize how lucky you were that nobody tried to rob you last night? You're way more tired now, I can see it, you won't even wake up tonight if someone pinches your purse.” I initially had no doubts about my ability to awaken quickly, but then I remembered the Rehv worshiper in the forest who somehow managed to sneak up on me. He has a point, I admitted. “Come on,” Koyl said, beckoning me with his hand, “I know a cheap place.”

“Just for tonight then,” I said quietly.

“It's even cheaper if you pay for more days at once,” Koyl grinned, “and the innkeeper has a pair on her like you wouldn't believe.” I didn't know what he meant at the time, so I just followed along.