Maddock pushed the handcart and its stinking contents with an angry abandon, and its wheels bumped and jumped along the dry track that led from the Enclosures to the lower slopes of the gardens. Two ruts had been worn deep into the track by the relentless passage of the dung carts. With the constant turns of the path, as it wound through the contours of the fortress hill, there was always the possibility of the cart's wheels snagging if the person pushing it was not paying attention.

Maddock was not and they did.

The cart jerked sideways and the top layer of madriel dung slumped over the side.

"Ruteia balls!"

Maddock dropped the handles of the cart angrily which, as the cart was caught at an angle up the slope of the track, had the effect of causing it to tilt the other way and tip more dung out of its other side. Maddock sighed and sat down beside the path, breathing heavily as the sweat poured from his brow after his furious race up the hill. He knew he should not be so angry, but he could not help it. That boy, with his stupid fists and his stupid attitude, typified everything he hated about the Order.

His anger began to subside, but then he realised that he had left his shovel leaning against the trunk of the cherossa tree after his fight with the squire. He swore again and then looked mournfully at the dung that covered the track. It was nothing like the stuff he was used to shovelling back at the farm. The dung of masdon and ghat, though it stank, was at least only the result of a diet of good plains grass and a laborious digestive system. The dung of madriel, however, who lived on a diet of nothing but rich karabok meat, stunk worse than anything Maddock had previously been able to imagine.

"Not sitting down on the job are we, Field-hand?"

Maddock's head flicked around and then up to meet the amused eyes of Master Dramut, who was sitting astride his own pale beast of a madriel. They had somehow approached silently behind him and now stood at the top of the bank beside the track. If the Madriel-master noticed the new bruise on Maddock's face, he did not show it.

"Oh, I was just..." began Maddock.

"I can see what you were doing, Field-hand. So eager were you to complete your duties that, hurrying as you were along the twisting paths to the pits, you have inadvertently upended your load and now you are taking the time to sensibly assess the situation. You have doubtless already come to the conclusion that there is a real possibility you will have to clean up your mistake with your own hands, because you have carelessly left your shovel leaning against a cherossa tree back at the training arenas. Am I right?"

Maddock simply sat and stared up at him.

Master Dramut's steed lowered its head as close to the path as its horns would allow and snorted at Maddock as though his scent had irritated its nostrils.

Master Dramut smiled, unslung something from behind his back, and threw it down onto the sunken track at Maddock's feet. It was his shovel.

"You should count yourself lucky that it was me who found it, and not High Madriel-master Sprak. You would doubtless not like the associated punishment for the loss of a shovel. I, myself, am prepared to be lenient this time, but will not be quite so understanding if you repeat the transgression."

Maddock frowned at the shovel, then stood and picked it up.

"How long am I going to be shovelling dung for?" he asked, not trying to hide his belligerence.

"You will be shovelling dung for as long as I deem it necessary. Now get to it before my patience wears thin."

Maddock looked down at the dung, then began to shovel it back into the cart.

"And don't leave any behind on the path to dry. There is nothing worse in the mouth than dung dust."

Maddock made sure that his shovelling was meticulous. Although he had his back turned to him as he worked, he knew Master Dramut was still sitting silently behind him.

"Master Dramut?"

"Yes, Field-hand Maddock."

"Can I ask you a question?"

"As long as you don't stop shovelling, you can ask me anything you like."

"Why am I here?"

"A deep question for this hour of the day."

"No, I mean why am I here shovelling dung when I failed the tests?"

"Failed!" said Master Dramut. "What on the plains makes you think that you failed the tests?"

Maddock dropped a shovelful of dung into the cart and then straightened up.

"But I... I don't understand. I know I failed. I could not get your beast to stand when you told me to."

"Of course you could not. Dracius is a full trained steed of a Madriel-master, and I would not expect a boy, fresh from a farm's field, to be able to get him to do his bidding. Even some of the most experienced Madriel-masters of Klinberg would be hard pressed to get my beast to stand once I have commended him to lie down and remain so."

"So why..?"

"Don't stop shovelling."

Maddock bent back to his work.

"The key to training all madriel is to have a voice that they will obey. It must display confidence and conviction, and a little of something indefinable. I know my steed well and can read every response in his body when an untried boy stands before him. I will not crowd your brain with the details just now. All you need to know is that you passed the test."

Maddock finished shovelling and started inspecting the grass on both sides of the path for any signs of missed dung.

"You'll tell me I passed the second test next," he said.

"You did."

"How!" said Maddock, straightening up again. "I didn't stand on the last circle, like you told me to."

"Tell me, Maddock, were you scared when you faced my steed in the arena?"

"Yes," replied Maddock, quite truthfully. He looked up at Master Dramut's steed, which had its head up and was staring out over the Enclosures, its nostrils slitting and opening as it scented the air.

"And yet you still stepped up to the second circle, as instructed."

"Yes."

"Which displayed a certain amount of courage, and courage is a quality we seek in all our prospective Field-hands. Stupidity, on the other hand, is not."

"So I wasn't meant to go to the last circle?"

"Of course not! To step so close to a beast of the Pride before they are familiar with your scent would have been extremely foolish, and so it is fortunate that you displayed the appropriate good sense."

Maddock lowered his head and studied the path at his feet.

"Is something bothering you, Field-hand?"

"I was too scared," he said. "That's why I couldn't stand on the last ring, Madriel-master. It was nothing to do with cleverness."

Master Dramut shrugged.

"Sometimes fear is simply the sensible part of your brain telling you when something you are about to undertake is stupidly dangerous. Many people who claim to be fearless are, in fact, merely fools."

Maddock didn't feel any more convinced that his success had been his own.

"It is we, the Madriel-masters, who decide who passes and who fails the tests. We are a little more qualified than yourself to make such judgments, Field-hand."

Maddock sighed.

"So if I passed, like you say, why is it that all you have me doing is shovelling madriel dung?"

"You may have impressed me in the tests, boy, but you are still only a Field-hand in training, and as such, you must start, let us say, at the bottom." Master Dramut smiled and scratched his bony cheek. "And, in that regard, as I can see you have finished clearing up your mess, it is time for you to be on your way to the Pit-master."

Maddock scraped the shovel's blade on the edge of the cart and carefully slung it by its strap onto his back.

"Is there really a Master of the Composting pits?"

"There is a Grower that has sole responsibility over the pits, but you would be wise not to call it Pit-master unless you want to end up composting beneath its tower," said Master Dramut as he turned his steed. "Now on your way, and don't lose your shovel again."

With no further word, Master Dramut's steed broke into a loping run back down the slope. Maddock watched them go until they disappeared behind the white bulk of the Infirmary, standing in its linked grove of cherossa trees at the edge of the Enclosures. With a sigh, he picked up the handles of his cart and began the long climb up the hill towards the gardens.

'Right!' he thought as he pushed. 'If this is what it takes to get anywhere in this place, I'm going to show them a thing or two about shovelling shit!'

With a grim smile, he continued up the path, taking a little more care, as he did, when going round the corners.