WD4.0

To get to the quarry, Kug had to descend four ladders, crawl across two ladders, and climb up six ladders. It was a jagged bowl of dry grey steam. Some men and a strong woman worked with a dragony, scaled ox to push some of the rocks out of a hole in the quarry wall. The rocks rolled down a hill to the river, where rafts were waiting. The water and the rafts looked furry grey. On the opposite wall ladders disappeared into the dust cloud. Skinny men carried rocks in shaggy woven cones which were near to their own heights and strapped to their backs. They moved up and down the ladders like timid palm weevils. Someone had fallen, and a shiv priest was administering the scorpion from behind a heavy dust veil.

Women and children and old men sat indian-style everywhere in the silt, vaguely pink and black. They rocked back and forth bringing medium rocks down onto small rocks to make gravel.