“I am the sucker,” Quint said, not entirely understanding why Gaglio made the insult.
“You should have declined this post. It’s your right to do so. As a Level 3, you have lots of privileges. We’ll talk while we are in the field. Pozella talked to you about threads, weaves, and strings. I’ll make you more aware of your surroundings.”
Perhaps Quint had been too subservient, but then who was Gaglio to tell him of his faults? He had fallen as far as Quint had risen, it seemed. But then, perhaps Pozella was right, and Gaglio’s experience might help. The only reason his strategic operations duties improved was through a chance meeting with the commander, not because of something Quint did intentionally.
Gaglio turned right into a narrow lane of tents and entered one of them.
“We will share this palace for a few weeks,” Gaglio said. “I talked the sergeant into having you stay with me. Your other option was to share an eight-person tent with the rest of the Wizard Corps supply company.”
“Specialists have the same rights as a Level 3?”
“No. They have the same rights as a corporal, Corporal Tirolo,” Gaglio said, grinning.
There were two cots in the tent, enough room for two chests at the ends of the beds, and a table with a couple of mismatched hard chairs.
“Thrilling, isn’t it?” Gaglio said with a smirk.
He put Quint’s bag by one of the chests and laid on the opposite cot. “I do get tired more quickly than the others,” Gaglio said. “Wake me when you’ve finished putting your things away. The sergeant likes tidy subordinates.”
“You don’t seem put off bunking with a hubite,” Quint said.
Gaglio lifted an eyelid on one eye, keeping the other one closed. “I grew up in the southeast. Probably not far from where you grew up. Being a willot among the hubites made our situations closer to the same than they were different until I was sold to the wizard corps.”
“Just like me.”
“Just like you,” Gaglio said. “I wasn’t treated well growing up until I went through training, and suddenly, the shoe was on the other foot. Being a stupid nineteen-year-old, I threw my weight around until it hit me that willots and hubites aren’t that different, and most of the perceived differences aren’t there once you strip away outward appearances.”
Quint pursed his lips. “It doesn’t stop those who think hubites are animals from giving me a bad time.”
“That doesn’t, but you won’t get hassled by me, young man. Enjoy it while you can. Wake me when you’re done.” Gaglio turned over and was soon snoring.
Quint took his time and decided to rest for a few minutes, too.
A bugle woke him up. Gaglio had already left the tent, but he stuck his head inside.
“That’s the call you need to heed more than anything else. It’s time to eat!” Gaglio opened the tent for him and ran his hand along the edges with one hand while he generated strings with his other.
“No one will steal our things through the tent door. They will have to slice open the tent elsewhere,” Gaglio said.
Quint would have to ask Gaglio how to cast the string. It wasn’t the same one he would have used.
They walked to a massive tent in the middle of the camp, jostled by soldiers moving faster than them.
If Quint had any worries about not getting a place to eat, they would be erased by all the empty seats.
“Half the camp eats at the same time. There are almost enough seats for the entire camp inside, so there are always places to sit. If we set up a field camp elsewhere, this tent stays up for when we return,” Gaglio said.
Quint looked across the tent. He counted six feeding stations. Gaglio led him to the other side, where the lines were shorter. “When the other group eats, the short lines are on our side.” He shrugged as he took a beat-up metal tray and a fork.
“No knives?”
Gaglio shook his head. “Everything is cooked bite-sized. It cuts down on the cost. You can use a thread to cut something when you are in the wizard corps.”
“One I don’t know,” Quint said.
“But you are a Level 3.”
Quint laughed. “I know how to create strings, but I’m not practiced in their use.” Another string to learn, Quint thought.
“Perhaps Pozella didn’t have the time to show you how useful they were. We will have weeks,” Gaglio said.
After dinner, the camp erupted into different activities.
“We aren’t on the march, so we have choices about our evening activities after dinner. I generally read, but with you sharing the tent, perhaps that can be the time we teach each other a few things.”
Quint raised his eyebrows. “What can I teach you?”
“I’m sure I’ll learn some lessons during our time together, Gaglio said. “Let’s go for a walk.”
They left the camp and strayed into a meadow. There were burn marks on the short grass, so it had been used by wizards before.
“Show me some useless strings,” Gaglio said.
“This one sharpens a pencil.” Quint took the stub of a pencil from his pocket and laid it on a dead log before creating the string that put a sharp point on the writing implement.
Gaglio grinned. “Try it on my knife.” He dulled the edge of a metal nail someone had embedded on the log and ran his finger along the edge. “Dull.”
Quint shrugged. He’d only been taught to sharpen pencils. He thought momentarily to get an image of a knife edge instead of imagining a point on a pencil and used the same string.
