The Fourth Year (The Dividing River Book 3) by Arthur Stone

Author:Arthur Stone [Stone, Arthur]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2025-01-07T00:00:00+00:00

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When Atahualpa awoke, he did not immediately realize what it was that disturbed his sleep. A nightmare? He glanced at the window covered with plastic film: flickers of reflected red light were dancing on the tremulous surface. The last vestiges of his drowsiness instantly vanished. Pulling up his pants and jumping into his heavy boots, he rushed outside.

Thank God, the fire was not in the village, it was somewhere way beyond the city wall and quite far from the Crystalline—which meant it wasn’t the mill burning either. Then the sound of a large explosion boomed in the air, and bright orange flames shot up into the night sky, clearly visible above the wall. Only then did Atahualpa realize the explosion was not the first. The original distant boom was precisely what woke him up.

“Icksy! Damn you, man! You finally blew your shop up!”

People all around him were already streaming out of their homes, some bringing buckets and poles and heading towards the fire. The watchman on the tower finally decided to sound the alarm, banging on their now famous gong brought from the island. The gate began to creak open, and like a good mayor that he was, Atahualpa was the first to slip through the gap and race towards the burning ruins of the “Department of Chemistry and Munitions”.

At the bank of the creek, Icksy was busily slapping and punching Blazer who offered no resistance.

“You idiot! Why did you dump sawdust into it? It triggered the crystallization, do you understand?! And once it started, it was a done deal!”

“Sorry, man, I just mixed those two things up! They are the same color!”

“You imbecile! When you are high, it all looks the same to you!

“Come on, I didn’t do it on purpose!”

“Like it matters! Thank your lucky stars, if I noticed it a few seconds later, the damn shed would have blown up with us inside!”

“Enough!” Atahualpa grabbed him by the hand. “What happened here?”

Blazer, wiping away bloody snot, laughed hysterically.

“Mr. Atahualpa, our shed kind of burned down a little.”

“I noticed that much. Chemists, my butt… It’s a good thing you’re both alive. Was there anything of value in there?”

“A bag of ditch weed,” Blazer muttered.

“Come again?!”

“Nothing,” Icksy said. “This idiot’s mixed up the jars. There was a torpedo warhead in there, but thankfully, it wasn’t primed to detonate yet, or it would’ve blown the roofs off in the entire village. A couple of bags of saltpeter too… See how the flames roar?”

Something crackled in the flames, not unlike toasting rounds of ammunition. Atahualpa instinctively ducked, then righted himself and shook his head.

“We’ll build you a new shed—much further away from the walls this time. Something is telling me this isn’t the last mistake you will make.”

“I don’t make such idiotic mistakes,” Icksy snorted. “But I can’t vouch for anyone else, this here yahoo included.”

“Hey, folks!” Atahualpa bellowed. “Don’t bother trying to put the fire out! Let it burn, there’s nothing left there to save, anyway!”

“Shit!” Icksy swore.

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