Thunderstruck

by Shannon Delany

  Evie coughed. “Let us say we do have the Stormbringer.”

  The Wandering Wallace laughed. “You doubt the accuracy of my assessment?”

  She lifted and dropped one shoulder, far too cynical to blindly accept some prophesied savior. “If King Arthur didn’t return when the golems tore London apart stone by stone and brick by brick, and Christ didn’t return when the Old World’s churchyards vomited up their corpses and made war on the shrines, I feel relatively certain no barefoot teenaged girl in a worn blue and gold dress is set to bring an end to a war that’s raged between humans and Wildkin for generations. I believe you believe we have the Stormbringer.”

  Marion’s gaze flicked to her, and Bran shifted in his seat.

  “And I am committed to the cause of abolition whether we have the Stormbringer or not—whether there is a Stormbringer or not. But I’d rather go into revolution armed to the teeth with men of matching intentions at my back and sides. At this moment, from what I know of Philadelphia, we are simply and brutally unmatched.”

  “Oh, ye of little faith! Regardless of the fact we have the Stormbringer, just word that we do—that the Stormbringer exists and is on this vessel—will be enough to gather every starry-eyed or desperate soul with a hunger for change. We will have our army—the entire Below will join us when they hear who rides with us. When they see the storms we’ve seen.” The cards in his hands disappeared. “My magick will seem like paltry parlor tricks when the Below and servants on the Hill hear who we have.”

  “There is nothing more powerful and rallying,” Marion whispered, “than a sign a promise has been fulfilled—that a prophecy has come to be. The Wandering Wallace is correct. People will flock to our cause—people who were not brave enough to stand alone will be empowered standing alongside the Stormbringer. Standing beneath the shelter of her power. The Council will quake at her name,” Marion promised. “This coup may yet be bloodless.”

  The Wandering Wallace pushed back from the table, grating his chair’s legs across the deck. “I certainly cannot guarantee that—”

  “You may not guarantee it, but hope for it and perhaps it, too, will come.”

  Now the Wandering Wallace tapped his fingers on the tabletop. “Your faith is remarkable, Marion. I shall set my course by its bright and leading light.” He stood, stretching and peering at the people all around him.

  With a jaunty step he made his way to where the girls played. “And what, dear dolls, are you all doing?”

  Maude smiled up at him, and Meggie held up a black paper figurine. The Wandering Wallace carefully took the figure in his hands, nodding his great beaked head and looking at Meggie with approval. “A shadow puppet. A carefully cut, well-jointed shadow puppet,” he added. “Who is she?” he asked, noting the ruffled skirt and loose hair.

  “Who do you think?” Meggie teased.

  He held it up to the sky, framing it in a twisting mass of clouds. “I might deduce—from the dress”—he looked toward Jordan—”and the hair—” He winked. “Well, not the hair exactly.”

  “I like her hair more now than before,” Meggie confessed, “but Mama is not as impressed.”

  The Wandering Wallace gave a sly wink. “So it is our Conductor, Jordan!”

  “Yes! Oh!” She reached behind her and picked up the upper body of another figure. “Who is this?”

  “Hmm. Strong brow, firm jawline, and broad chest … Is it Rowen?”

  Meggie clapped her hands together in answer.

  “These are quite accurate.”

  “It is Mama’s handiwork,” Meggie beamed.

  “Lovely. Lovely indeed!” he congratulated. “Maude, you have hidden talents.”

  “It is nothing, truly,” Maude said. “Merely a traditional papercraft. Though there is a fascinating story of the very first of the shadow puppets—a tale from the Far East.”

  Evie was prepared to drop her glare from where she hoped it burned into the Wandering Wallace when his demeanor suddenly changed, the raven’s head raising, his gaze skimming over Maude and landing on Miyakitsu.

  Odd.

  Miyakitsu was twitching. Her head snapped from side to side, fingers flicking in her hair, her eyes darting. Something about her was distinctly disturbed.

  The Wandering Wallace reached out, petting Meggie’s head. “They are lovely.” The words were strained. “Perhaps your mama will tell the story of the first shadow puppets and you will put on a show for us?”

  “Yes, certainly,” Meggie said, bouncing beneath the palm of his hand.

  “Good, good,” the Wandering Wallace said, his voice falling into a whisper, his eyes still stuck on Miyakitsu.

  “My love,” he said, stepping around Meggie and Maude to be closer to Miyakitsu. “Dearest,” he coaxed. He crouched there and Evie did the thing she ofttimes avoided doing—she used Witchery to pull his whispered words to her on a wisp of wind. “You do not seem quite well….” He reached down, grabbed Miyakitsu by her shoulders and pulled her up and to him, clutching her face to his chest.

  The Wandering Wallace turned to address the group of them. “I am sorry, dear friends, but it seems I must take my lady to our rooms to rest. She is not quite herself,” he said. Then, before they could ask him any questions or offer any help, he hurried Miyakitsu to the elevator and, sinking into the belly of the Artemesia, he sealed them away from view.

  ***

  Aboard the Artemesia

  The Wandering Wallace held Miyakitsu, not too tight and not too loose, feeling how her form slipped and changed within the circle of his embrace, her skin loose around her true self. She was slipping away, sliding, unbidden, into the fox. “My love,” he whispered, “stay with me. Remember who you are—remember who I am,” he begged.

  The elevator bounced to a stop at their floor.

  Too late.

  Where once he held his beautiful wild woman, now the Wandering Wallace struggled with a frightened and snapping fox the color of midnight. He kept the kimono closed around her, wrapping her in fine silk as he rushed to their room, wrestled his way inside and dumped the crying beast on the bed.

  He slammed the door shut, bolted it, and stared at Miyakitsu. “Please, my love. Not yet. Not so soon. I cannot do this … I cannot do anything without you,” he whispered, tugging off his mask and rubbing at his treacherously leaking eyes. “You are too young to give over to the magick,” he whispered. “I was supposed to have more time. I was promised more time!” he shouted, hurling the mask to the floor.

  The fox retreated on the bed, snarling.

  “What do I do … What do I … ?” He paced before the distrusting fox, pulling at his short hair. “Set the stage, Wallace, set the stage. She might return any moment …” He rushed to the trunk that was always among their belongings. With a few careful touches the lock released, buzzing and popping apart, pieces rotating out of position to allow the lid to open.

  Inside, Mitakitsu’s accidental doppelgänger, Tsu, slept, bound into the box and not to wake unless absolutely necessary. He had broken the promise to himself in the past—the promise to keep Tsu asleep while Miyakitsu was human and whole, but he had always managed to keep the girls from seeing each other. Tsu might see the fox, and Miyakitsu might see the closed trunk, but that was as close as they ever came to being face-to-face. And since Miyakitsu remembered nothing—nothing—after she slept or phased into her fox state—it didn’t matter if Miyakitsu the fox saw Tsu the doppelgänger.

  The Wandering Wallace raced around the room, setting the stage as he did every night, moments after Miyakitsu had fallen asleep and moments before he joined her in bed. Carefully, he placed the daguerreotypes and the masks, each in its particular place. He picked up the hand mirror and suspended it by Miyakitsu’s side of the bed.

  He looked at the fox. It still stood atop the bed, watching him with narrow and frightened eyes. It had not begun to sniff or circle, so it had certainly not begun to settle.

  He had a decision to make and make quickly. If he
left the fox in the room unchaperoned, it might do serious damage. If he went Topside without Miyakitsu and mentioned she was unwell, it would raise questions at least, and might invite unwelcome interest and visitors later. But if he stayed, some Good Samaritan might stop by and check on them. Most of them knew he traveled with a black fox, but if that black fox suddenly phased into a beautiful nude woman they supped with every night …

  He would be seen as a Wildkin collaborator. The trust he had built to help launch a revolution would be gone.

  He returned to the open trunk, staring into it at Tsu. To anyone else she appeared to merely be sleeping. And she would remain that way until he dressed her up in the strands of soul stone crystals that kicked her body back into a semblance of life.

  There were days he regretted his reaction to the panic that caused him to craft Tsu, but today was not one of them.

  He scrubbed a hand roughly across his scarred brow and reached into the trunk, opening a smaller box within it. Inside was a set of compartments and inside each was a small stoppered bottle. There was one in the shape of a fish that held bitters, one in the shape of a cone that held liquefied ginger, and one like a pyramid that held molasses. A few bristled with strange protrusions.

  He ticked them off, knowing each by touch: Absinthe, laudanum, heroin, opium, vodka, and … His fingers paused on the last one.

  Chloroform.

  He’d never needed to use it. Not on Miyakitsu or Tsu, at least. He pulled out a handkerchief and withdrew the bottle, unstopping it and dumping some of it into the cloth in his hands—just enough to moisten it. He closed the bottle again, set it back in its compartment, and straightened, eyeing the fox.

  It whined, a singsong sound, and flattened its body to the mattress, baring tiny, sharp teeth.

  He pounced on it, covering the panicking beast’s snout with the dosed cloth and holding it—holding her—he tried to force himself to remember—her—until the scrabbling of her paws slowed, her eyes closed, and her fighting stopped.

  He laid her limp body down on the bed, adjusting her position so she looked as if she had fallen asleep naturally, tucking her thick tail around her and propping her chin on her front paws.

  He stepped back, staring at her, his heart racing. Sweat dotted his forehead even though the room was cool. He leaned over, kissed her forehead gently, and rocked back on his heels, thinking.

  Like a man who had suddenly aged years in mere moments, he rose and stepped back over to the trunk. He looked from Tsu to the fox and back again. Then he crouched by the accidental doppelgänger and pulled out a strand of stormcell crystals. He swept her hair back from the nape of her narrow neck and attached the necklace. Then he moved on to the matching bracelets, the anklets, and earrings. He set each in its proper place and undid the belts holding her in the painted trunk.

  There was one last thing to do, a strange thing straight out of myth and legend.

  But magick was strange and so old it transcended memory and fell to instinct. So the Wandering Wallace, a man forced to make his way by selling illusion and sleight of hand in a land that outlawed any magick it couldn’t control, let the tickle of power wiggle up from his heart to tingle on his lips, and, leaning into the trunk, he brushed his lips against his wife’s mirror image.

  And she woke.

  The stormcell crystals around her throat glittered; a glow racing through them like lightning circled her neck. Her eyelids quivered and she blinked rapidly, eyelashes fluttering. She coughed—once, and softly, and then turned her face to where he always waited, watching.

  This was magick. As magickal as a woman who was sometimes a fox, and as magickal as people who could pull clouds and wind and weather together to send ships and passengers flying. He reached into the box, holding a hand out to her. “Hello, my love,” he whispered, “did you sleep well?”

  She was always blessedly foggy in the first few minutes after waking, enough that, as long as he got her out of the trunk and lying or sitting on the bed, she had no recollection of regaining consciousness in a box where she was often stored like some forgotten doll. It was always a bit of a race then, to get her out of the trunk and to a spot she could truly wake and not be horrified at the reality of how he kept her.

  “Here, sweetness,” he whispered, helping her step free of the box. She stumbled, falling against him, her hair coming free of its loose knot and flowing around them both, the black of deep water. He breathed deep, pulling her strange scent down—a scent much different from the wild and sensual musk of Miyakitsu. Tsu’s scent was cedar and spice, the scent of the trunk she slept in and its contents.

  She seemed to have no scent of her own—no distinguishing musk, nothing that distinguished her as simply Tsu. Perhaps doppelgängers of briefly dead girls never truly separated themselves from the person they mirrored. He moved her across the floor to the bed, swept the fox gently aside, and laid Tsu down there, moving his hand slowly across her half-opened eyes and counting under his breath to ten before pulling his hand away again.

  “Hello, my beauty,” he said, bending down to kiss her lips in greeting.

  She stretched, a long and languid move nearly precisely the same as Miyakitsu’s. “Hello, my handsome love,” she whispered. She yawned. “Why, when I wake, am I always so hungry?”

  “Hungry?”

  “Yes,” she whispered. “Hungry. For the sight and touch of you.” Stretching a hand up, she stroked his cheek.

  His eyes drifted to the drugged and sleeping fox and he grabbed Tsu’s hand. This was the trouble with magick—other than not knowing how magick truly happened, where it originated from—not knowing what rules were being reinforced and which were broken at any one moment.

  Tsu was and was not, at any one moment and at none at all, his wife, his love, his hope, his fear, and his true love’s simpler self. Tsu was as simple as shadow and as complicated as a cat. She was made from his wife, but had no idea there was any other woman in his life but her—and he was desperate to keep things that way.

  When Miyakitsu had suddenly—he swallowed hard at the thought and pressed Tsu’s hand tighter to his cheek, pinning it there—died, he tried to revive her, to save her.

  But magick intervened.

  Miyakitsu died that day on his Reanimating table, but he refused to give in so easily. He tried again. He used every stormcell in his collection then—used every bit of metal and wire, and he pulled the magick he’d learned from the Night Market people and those in the darkest of Philadelphia’s alleys—places Marketers dared not go—and pulled every stitch of power Miyakitsu herself had taught him to manipulate and there, in his workshop, with only candlelight because he had no stormcells to spare, he leaned over Miyakitsu’s chilling form and did everything to bring her back.

  He had been a man possessed.

  His heart hammered at the thought. That was what scared him most—how desperate he had been.

  And the words he said—the promise he made in a moment of desperation. Words one part prayer, one part spell. And he had committed fully to something that drifted loose at the fringes of all magickal workings in the New World, something wild and ancient.

  Something hungry.

  He dropped to his knees at Tsu’s bedside, still holding her hand to his cheek.

  “What,” she whispered, dark eyebrows sweeping together in worry. “What bothers you so, my love—what—” Her eyes searched his face. “What haunts you?”

  He dared not tell her the truth, that a night three years ago haunted him. That she haunted him.

  Because three years ago in the corner of his workshop something had flickered into existence, at first so faint he thought it was the lateness of the night and the emotional strain of losing his only love playing tricks on his vision.

  But the stormcells glowed and pulsed, burning like each held the heart of a star in their faceted depths. A form in the room’s corner slowly solidified, its edges firming to hold in whatever swirled within its boundaries—like a housemaid qu
ickly stitching shut a bag she’d caught a snake in to keep it from biting.

  The room and all its contents seemed black and white that night, all glare and shadow, nothing soft and in between, all color leached out by the stormcells and the thing that grew and stretched and found a familiar form in the dimmest corner of the Reanimator’s workshop.

  “Miyakitsu,” he had whispered, his eyes burning, stretched so wide and unblinking. He had stumbled toward her, disbelieving at the same time hope grew hot in him.

  He left rationality on his table with the corpse of his foreign bride and reached out to the form before him.

  Long, loose black hair obscured her face.

  He shivered now as he had shivered then, not at first sure what was behind the long locks. His hand shaking and his heart full of hope, he had reached out to the shadow, sweeping the hair back from her face to reveal Miyakitsu. Solid, safe, warm and soft beneath his trembling touch.

  She was an impossibility.

  A living, breathing impossibility.

  She pushed past him, weaving toward the table, and he shouted as she stumbled, her hand reaching to steady herself—at least he thought so then—but she snared the tangle of stormcells and wires, pulling them down on her as she lost her balance.

  There was a sickening sound as her head struck the edge of the table. She collapsed, wrapped in a sparkling web that flared one last time.

  And went out.

  The only lights left in the cluttered space were the flickering flames of a half-dozen candle stubs.

  He raced to where she laid, her eyes closed. He prayed one more time—to have her back and then lose her …

  He, a man who never cried, had sobbed then.

  Until he’d heard her breathe.

  “Oh, God,” he whispered. “Thank you … Thank you!” He pulled the webbing away from her.

  He heard a cough and his name whispered. “Wallace?” came the frightened voice, and he snapped straight up.