Written on the Wind (The Blackstone Legacy #2)(90)
A squirrel darted across the loading area. The creek of the rickety wheel and the slosh of water dumping from the buckets was constant. The thump and grind of the millstones continued. All around him the world was proceeding as normal, but during the sixty seconds it took to read this letter, everything had changed.
Mirosa suddenly felt lonelier and more isolated. Sadder.
It took a few minutes for a change in the sound of the waterwheel to penetrate his fog of dejection. The scraping noise near the axle sounded bad. He moved closer for a better look, but a wooden plate covered most of the rotating mechanism. A blacksmith had replaced the metal gears less than ten years ago, so it probably wasn’t a problem with the gears. The scrape sounded like wood against wood. This waterwheel had reliably turned for almost a hundred years, but it was now tired and old.
He sighed. Why was he getting so morose over a mill needing repair? He was rich. He could afford anything. If he wanted, he could tear this old waterwheel down and build a modern one powered by electricity.
The prospect made him cringe. He liked the age and heritage of this mill. The massive oak trees felled to make this cider mill came from right here in the valley. They would have been alive when Peter the Great hunted stag in these forests. Tradition was important, and he would save this old waterwheel no matter what the cost.
That meant he needed to stop its rotation lest more damage be done. He trudged up the steps that had been cut into the hillside to reach the sluice gate and jimmied the wooden board to shut the flume. The wheel would stop rotating as soon as the water in the sluice came to a trickle.
Ilya Komarov was the best carpenter in the valley, and Dimitri summoned him to diagnose the problem with the waterwheel. Perhaps a healthy commission would soften Ilya’s curt demeanor.
It didn’t work. Ilya arrived a few hours later and resented being called away from the fence he had been building. He even demanded payment before looking at the wheel. Dimitri paid, and Ilya took a cursory look.
“The wheel shaft is out of balance,” Ilya said, but Pavel disagreed.
“It sounds like a loose bearing to me. It’s not making proper contact with the iron band on the axle.”
Ilya’s face twisted in scorn. “Of course it’s not making proper contact, because it’s out of balance. You haven’t been maintaining it properly.”
Dimitri didn’t want to listen to these two men squabble like cats in a knapsack. He was inclined to agree with Ilya but wanted to understand how to maintain the waterwheel so this wouldn’t happen again.
“How do we get it properly balanced?” he asked.
“You’re not going to like it,” Ilya warned. “The western sun has been hitting this wheel for decades, causing it to warp. The best thing would be to take it apart, flip it around, maybe remove a few of the boards to help redistribute the water, and hope for the best.”
“That’s it?” Pavel scoffed.
The idea sounded far-fetched, but Dimitri needed a better idea of what taking the wheel apart would entail. Wearing waist-high waders, he climbed over the stone wall and into the flume. The water slowed his stride as he trudged toward the wheel. It had been motionless ever since he closed the sluice gate this morning, so he was able to get close enough to examine the axle and metal bearings in the center of the wheel. Ilya hunkered down on the wall beside him.
“You see how those boards are warped? That’s your problem. Let’s get this thing rotating again so you can see the problem in action.”
Dimitri stepped back a few paces, and Pavel opened the sluice gate. Water poured down the flume, and the wheel groaned as it went back into motion. The internal thump seemed even louder. Dimitri stepped farther back, but his foot slid on the algae, shooting out from beneath him. He crashed into the water. A weight clamped down on his ankle, dragging him forward. The wheel! He yelled, but icy water flooded his mouth and throat, sucking into his lungs. He thrashed, craning upward for a breath of air, but couldn’t reach the surface.
His ankle exploded in pain as the wheel dragged him deeper beneath its weight. Blue sky rippled above the surface of the water. So close, but he couldn’t get to the air. Icy water seized his muscles, but he had to keep fighting. Pain was everywhere. Was this it? Why hadn’t he known that dying would hurt this badly?
A hulking shadow blotted out the sunlight. Someone was over him, a weight on his hips holding him down, hands around his ankle pulling. His ankle felt torn apart, but finally it slipped free.
Hands beneath his shoulders hauled him upright. He broke through the surface and gasped for air but coughed up water. Ilya was in the flume with him, hoisting him to the stone wall.
Behind them, the waterwheel slipped back into rotation, the familiar sound causing him to shudder in horror. Another minute, and he would have been dead.
He was freezing. Pavel helped him out of the sluice, and both Dimitri and Ilya collapsed on the ground. Dimitri puked up water and sputtered for air. There was no way he’d be able to stand. His ankle was surely broken.
Ilya looked shaken too. He’d risked his life by reaching under that wheel to pry Dimitri’s foot free. A bloody scrape marred Ilya’s face, and he shivered in his sopping clothes.
Pavel sounded panicked. “I’ll send for a doctor,” he said and raced toward the house, leaving the two of them alone in the dirt, shaking with cold. Pain radiated from Dimitri’s broken ankle, but he got up onto an elbow to look Ilya in the eye.