Ticker

by Lisa Mantchev

  “Our readers want to hear about your encounter with Calvin Warwick! What happened?”

  “Is it true he proposed to you, Miss Farthing?”

  “That he threatened to blow up the entire city?”

  “What about the Spiders?”

  There was the brilliant light of a camera flash, and I flinched at the whoosh! of burning potassium permanganate and aluminum. “It all happened terribly fast. The Ferrum Viriae arrived and bundled us away.”

  The reporters weren’t satisfied with such a bland answer and pressed closer, pencils poised above their notebooks, RiPAs at the ready.

  “What about the doctor?”

  “Is he in custody?”

  I didn’t want to say as much, but Marcus had dealt with Warwick himself. Under the influence of the golden Spiders, he’d been docile, silent. Guilty, doubly so, and destined for the gallows, he’d been escorted back to Gannet Penitentiary.

  But will the surgeons be able to remove the Spiders? Or will Warwick be trapped within his own mind as well as the prison?

  Those were thoughts for another day, and nothing I was going to share with the newspapers. “I think we’ve answered enough questions for now.”

  The most insistent of the reporters wagged his pencil under my nose. “What do you have to say about the city of Bazalgate lauding you and your friends as heroes?”

  “No comment,” I said firmly.

  “But surely you have an opinion!”

  “There are no heroes in a situation like this,” Nic said. “There are only the dead and the survivors.”

  Closing my eyes, I wished all these horrible people would go away and leave us alone. Like a genie granting my request, Dreadnaught appeared in the doorway. “You have other callers, Miss Farthing.”

  The reporters paled when Marcus and Sebastian entered the parlor. Both of them had found clean clothes in the interim, but it was Marcus’s demeanor as much as his uniform that brought everyone to attention.

  “Am I interrupting something?” the Legatus calmly inquired.

  Our unwelcome guests bowed their heads and filed past him with much stumbling over furniture and hastily packed photography equipment.

  “A most welcome interruption.” I rose from the chaise but made no move toward them.

  Sebastian took the first step. “I need to apologize for my behavior and make amends. Instead of flowers or chocolates, I’ve rung my barristers. The factory and courthouse will be rebuilt, and a hundred thousand aureii will go into a trust, to be divided between the families of the victims. My insurance doesn’t cover acts of terrorism and valiant stupidity, so this will be coming out of my own pocket.”

  It was one thing for Sebastian to admit to wrongdoing and quite another for him to part with such a sizable chunk of his wealth. And yet . . . “It wasn’t your fault. Not really.”

  “That’s not altogether true, is it?” Like a child, he smiled and scuffed a toe against the carpet. “Warwick explained it to me, my dear Penny. I remember, though it’s all a bit hazy now. He couldn’t have suggested I do things that weren’t in my nature. If I wasn’t a greedy bastard, he wouldn’t have been able to manipulate me.” Hitching up his shoulders, he stuffed both hands deep in his pockets. Those bluer-than-blue eyes were darker than I ever remembered seeing them before.

  I pressed my hands to his face, forcing him to meet my gaze. “You will make amends, Sebastian. And you have the love and support and forgiveness of your friends to see you through it. You were a victim, too, and I’ll not hear a single word spoken against you. None of us will.”

  He flushed then, and I could see the struggle to retrieve the pieces of his lackadaisical dignity. “Well then, if you’re not going to cast me out on my ear . . .”

  “I’m not.”

  “Maybe I could sit down? It’s been a long dashed week.”

  I shifted to one side to permit his entry into the study. A second later, Cora peeped out from behind Marcus’s jacket, her shy smile widening with each passing second.

  “Hallo!” She scampered across the room and enfolded me in a mighty hug.

  I crouched to better look at her. “That is a very pretty dress.”

  Hopping back, she twirled to show off the flare of her charcoal skirts. “Not a dress. A uniform!” She held up her wrists to display matching silver bangle bracelets.

  “So you’ve joined the army, have you?” I hazarded a glance at Marcus. “Young for a recruit, don’t you think? You could have waited until she was done with primary school.”

  He was careful to wink at me when Cora looked away. “She apparently insisted sometime between the roast chicken and the cake. According to Captain Hunter, she also explored every inch of the Fortress and redecorated one of the guest barracks to suit her.”

  “I like it there,” Cora chimed in. “And Mama said it was all right for me to stay near Philomena and the great big talking machine.”

  I stiffened, as did Marcus, and both of us said, “Talking machine?” as one voice.

  Cora admired herself in the hall mirror, turning this way and that to take in the sight of her iron-gray skirts. “The one past the ice room. I can hear her plain as day in there.”

  Marcus hunkered down next to her. “You can hear your mother when you’re near the Grand Design?”

  Cora leaned forward until the tip of her nose was touching his. “Yes, Legatus.”

  I could tell there was more he wanted to ask, but I shook my head and beckoned to Nic. “Cora, this is my brother, Copernicus Emery Farthing.”

  She peered up at him, tilting her head as though listening to something only she could hear. “The clockwork soldier.”

  I broke out in gooseflesh, but Nic only nodded and took care not to scare her with his newly Augmented hand. “It might look that way, but really I’m an inventor. I make things.”

  “Windup toys?” Evidently deciding to trust him, Cora drew him over to the cart and pointed to the cream slices just out of her reach. “Can we have tea and cakes?”

  Seizing the opportunity to speak to Marcus alone, I joined him in the doorway. “Do you think she’s actually clairvoyant?”

  “It could simply be her active imagination, but I’ll speak with Philomena about it.” In case Cora should glance over at us, he kept his expression placid. “Either way, what’s the harm if it gives her solace?”

  “What about her family?”

  “None we can locate yet.” Marcus glanced at the child coercing the largest cream slice out of my brother. “We tried to pull her cards from the Bibliothèca, but she hasn’t a birth certificate we can find.”

  “Sloppy record keeping isn’t one of the Eidolachometer trademarks.” It was all I could do to remain smiling, though the charade gave me something of a headache. “You’ll keep trying, though?”

  “Certainly,” Marcus said. “In the meantime, she’ll live at the Flying Fortress as my ward. It will be quite the feat not to spoil her. She already has every member of the Ferrum Viriae wrapped about her finger.”

  “Including the great Mister Kingsley, I should imagine.”

  “She does, though it undermines my authority to admit it. And you’ll visit regularly, of course.” Marcus glanced across the study at Nic and back to me. “We have matters to discuss, Tesseraria.”

  “Don’t mistake him for a soldier,” I warned. “He won’t ever walk that path.”

  “Not just that,” Marcus admitted. “We’ve tried several levels and varieties of energy on Warwick. Nothing has proved effective yet on the Spiders he used on himself.”

  “His were gold,” I said, remembering the look of them upon the surgeon’s hand, before they disappeared into his ears. “Sebastian’s were brass and easily deactivated. Nic’s were silver and took a third pulse. But the ones at the courthouse and in the Carry-Away Boxes were black, and Warwick’s were gold. Perhaps he designed his own so they can’t ever be removed.”

  Sebastian called to us, “I’m for a drink. Does anyone want anything?�
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  I felt the dust settling around us and wondered if I could trust the floor not to open up again underfoot. I’d had quite enough excitement to last me two lifetimes.

  Realizing the press had gone, Violet hustled in from the back parlor. “Legatus,” she murmured in passing.

  “Miss Nesselrode.” Marcus inclined his head.

  Dreadnaught entered, studying a small but startlingly vivid bouquet. “These just arrived for you.”

  “Whoever are they from?” I said, accepting the floral tribute of roses in every possible shade: Dark pink for gratitude, light pink for joy of life, yellow for friendship, and red. Quite a lot of red. No mistaking the meaning in that. “There’s no card.”

  “No need for one,” Marcus said with a cough. “They’re from me, though I meant them to be delivered later this evening.”

  “Don’t we merit tributes as well?” the irrepressible Mister Stirling asked as he poured himself a measure of Gentian Amaros.

  “Indeed you do.” Marcus distributed paper-wrapped parcels to Sebastian, Nic, and Violet. Opened, they contained matching sets of iron bracelets. “Honorary, of course, but they’ll provide access to the Flying Fortress whenever you might require it.”

  As the others put on their new jewelry, Marcus returned to my side, looking down at me with that steady gray gaze I’d come to know so well. “I hope I conveyed the right message. With the flowers, I mean.”

  “You did indeed, sir . . .” At that moment, a lumbering gray-green mass appeared at the edge of the settee. Nic caught sight of Brimborion and started with surprise. Thinking that Marcus would hardly approve of taking tea with a turtle, I raised my voice to draw his attention. “You have my thanks.”

  “Only your thanks?” he asked. Before I could answer, he touched two fingers to his hat. “If you don’t mind watching Cora for the rest of the afternoon, I fear I must take my leave for now.”

  I abandoned the bouquet and followed him into the hall. “Must you go already?”

  “There’s still a lot to be done about the city, even if the primary threat has been removed.” He paused at the door and turned back to me. When he held out a hand, I took it. “Get some rest, and tell Dreadnaught there’s a turtle behind the chaise lounge. It probably could use a bit of carrot peeling or some nice lettuce.”

  I flushed up to the roots of my hair. A look over my shoulder confirmed that Cora was attempting to ride Brimborion about the study. “I haven’t the slightest notion what you are talking about, Mister Kingsley.”

  “I think you do.” Marcus drew me closer than necessary to add, “You are the keeper of vital information, are you not?”

  I experienced an elevated pulse that couldn’t be blamed upon my new Ticker. We might never acknowledge it aloud, but we had Warwick to thank for both my new heart and my ability to offer it to someone. “I am.”

  “Then allow me to share with you the intelligence, Tesseraria, that I wish to be your escort to the theater next weekend.” He claimed my other hand, which still wore his diamanté ring. “You haven’t taken this off.”

  “No. Would you like it back?” My breath caught just a little at the idea of returning it to him.

  Marcus thought it over for a moment before saying solemnly, “Perhaps you should keep it, Penny. See if you think it suits you.”

  “It suits me just fine.” Standing on tiptoe, I added, “You suit me just fine.”

  “Thank the Bells,” he said, inhaling softly, breathing me in.

  Then there was only him. Only us. Two heartbeats synced, his flesh-and-blood heart keeping time with my clockwork one. I closed my eyes, etched this moment in my memory, made space for it between all that had happened and all that was yet to come.

  When I finally pulled back, I glanced at the others. They were crowded about Brimborion, studiously avoiding the interlude in the hallway.

  All save Cora, who clapped her hands and crowed, “Kiss him again!”

  The world spun around me as Marcus caught me about the waist and dipped me low. “Shall we oblige her—”

  Before he could finish asking, I silenced his mouth with my own, because no one knows better how to seize a moment than a girl with a clockwork heart.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  As always, I would like to convey my love and appreciation, this time distributed in SugarWerks Carry-Away Boxes and accompanied by gifts of cake.

  To the fans of the theater books who kept asking when I would have another novel out. Thank you for asking for an encore performance and for the roses you’ve thrown onto the stage.

  To my husband and children, who understand that my corporeal body might be present but my mind occupies several alternate dimensions simultaneously. And to my mother and sister, who know why I don’t always pick up the phone and yet they continue to call, to make offers of childcare, and to deliver hugs and dessert.

  To my literary agent, Laura Rennert, for her enthusiasm and fellow feeling. Thank you for loving Penny’s story and finding it a home.

  To the Skyscape team: Miriam Juskowicz, for giving Penny a place to park her Vitesse; my editor, Robin Benjamin, for her meticulous notes and eyes so keen, I suspect they might have been Augmented; and my copyeditor, Rebecca Friedman, who put the final coat of polish on this massive brass contraption.

  To the steampunk community, including artisans like Richard “Doc” Nagy (sadly lost to us) and musicians like Professor Elemental, Steam Powered Giraffe, Vagabond Opera, and Abney Park. You are an endless source of joy and inspiration, there from the very beginning of Penny’s journey, planting seeds in a garden that is just now blooming.

  To my first readers, second readers, third, fourth, and fifth readers, who saw so many different drafts of Penny’s story that they will have to read the final published version to see what made it to the page: Lori Hunt, Jennifer Ford, Sunil Sebastian, Glenn Dallas, Noël Furniss, Stephanie Burgis, Tiffany Trent, Shannon Messenger, Melissa Bleir, Rafe Brox, Kari Armstrong, Heather Clawson, Lianne Marie Mease, Amanda Mitchell, and Derek Silver.

  Last but certainly not least, credit for the word “crimstone” goes to Nancy Jeanne Hedge, with my gratitude.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Photo © Angel Mantchev

  Lisa Mantchev is the author of the acclaimed Théâtre Illuminata series, which includes Eyes Like Stars, a nominee for the Mythopoeic and Andre Norton awards. She has also published numerous short stories in venues such as Strange Horizons, Clarkesworld, Weird Tales, and Fantasy. She lives on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington with her husband, children, and horde of hairy animals. Visit her online at: www.lisamantchev.com.