Of Steel and Steam

by Pauline Creeden et al.

  She had a good idea what the thing was. She had never seen anything exactly like it, but the wrongness was familiar. At the least, she knew how it had been made, and any hope died that her friend might still be whole.

  “Let go,” she told it softly. She chose Polish, the Count’s language, but the thing did not respond except to tug at her arm insistently. She tried again in Latin, then Greek, but it only tugged harder.

  “I don’t wish to harm you,” she said, slipping again into the language of the land. “But I know what you are made of, and I will kill you if you don’t let go.”

  The little lights in the sockets of its skull flickered, as though it had glanced away for a moment, and it let its hand drop.

  “You do understand, then. Where is Magnus?”

  It did look away, turning its head, and in the silent moment, she heard a faint, clockwork ticking.

  “Inside? He is still in the castle?”

  A nod.

  “He…” Words suddenly became difficult, and she coughed to dislodge them. “He is alive?”

  Another nod.

  Alive was not good enough, but it was something. She let out a breath. “And you? Who are you?”

  The shining face grew wary, the eye-lights dim, and it hesitated. Then its expression cleared as it reached a decision.

  It extended a hand, palm-up, and it was the traveler’s turn to hesitate. Did it want her to surrender her weapon? She had no intention of that. Gripping the shotel even tighter, she placed her own hand into the cold metal digits.

  It turned her hand so her palm faced upward and traced into her palm with a fingertip: “BOY.”

  She blinked. It had not been fashioned to look like a boy. Whatever the creature actually was, someone had intended it to look like a man. But there was one reason she knew that a man might be called a boy.

  “Boy. That… Is that your name?”

  That hesitation, again. Nerves. It was a cunningly crafted automaton that could feel anxiety.

  It nodded.

  She nearly asked what it called itself. Not Boy. The question was on her lips. But something in her questioning had raised its defenses, and she still had to get inside.

  “Take me to Magnus.”

  The entire metal body tensed and straightened in unmistakable refusal.

  “You will not? You have been instructed not to?”

  Nod.

  “By whom?” Was Magnus being held prisoner? The letter felt as though it might burn her fingertips as she withdrew it from her pocket. “By him? I have this. I am invited. Tell him that Aurelia has answered his letter.”

  It looked over the seal skeptically, took the letter and glanced at the signature inside, angling the paper to the light of the moon. Then it handed the letter back and shook its head, pointing back to the pony in a clear gesture. Go.

  There was something odd in its stance, a reluctance, almost desperation. She did not think it refused her entry because it had orders, but because it did not want her to pass through those doors. Her gaze strayed to the marks of fire and axes, of anger and violence.

  “I am not here to harm him. Something is wrong, isn’t it? I came to help.”

  Something caught her eye, and she glanced up into a window above, where a light flared and died, then grew again. Someone had lit an oil lamp.

  The creature noticed, too, and it caught her arm as she took a step toward the doors, throwing her back toward the pony.

  She caught herself and brought her shotel up to slash, knowing now how to reach the creature’s weak spot, but it opened its mouth, and with a voice that shattered the night like the screech of metal on metal exclaimed:

  “Get out of here!”

  That concern was not for Magnus. It was for her.

  Before she could respond, the window creaked open, and a voice carried down.

  “Is there trouble, boy?”

  Aurelia’s heart froze. She knew that voice. She had known that voice, back when there was laughter in it, back when it joked and questioned and pursued knowledge with passion she had seldom seen. But it had gone cold and hollow, with less life than the artificial being in front of her. It rang down like the toll of a funeral bell, and as though in answer, distant thunder rolled in from beyond the mountains at the other slope of the valley.

  The creature stood transfixed, its empty eyes wide, the lights within blazing with panic so bright she actually put a moment’s thought into untying the pony and disappearing back among the trees.

  But she owed a debt to the man in the castle.

  She took a breath.

  “Magnus?” she called.

  After a moment, a head was thrust out of the window. It was angled downward, away from the moonlight, obscuring the face, but it could only be him.

  “Who is that? Why have you come?”

  “Aurelia. I received your letter.”

  What if he didn’t even remember the letter? The messenger had been at least three years dead when she returned home, and her home was far away. When had the letter been sent?

  For a long, terrible moment, there was silence on the mountainside.

  Then the thunder rumbled again.

  “Which? I sent fifteen.”

  There was no bitterness in that statement, no veiled irony. There was nothing at all but a question.

  “I… You… You said that… You said your wife was dying.”

  “Ah. Well, there’s nothing can be done for that, now. I’m sorry for your wasted journey.”

  The head began to disappear, pulling the window after it.

  Anger welled up, and she let her voice snap as she had when, as a student, he had made some careless remark or dismissed the grave dangers of the art she had taught.

  “I have walked four months, discipule, because you summoned me.”

  He paused, and after a moment, the window began again to close. But just before it clicked shut, he called out. “Bring her inside, boy.”

  The automaton stood rigid beneath the moon, his hands curled into fists.

  “Bring me inside, then,” Aurelia told him gently. “I am not afraid for myself, and you should not be afraid for me. He was my friend, once, and I am still his.”

  He did not appear reassured, but he forced himself into motion and led her away from the charred great doors, around the castle to a smaller door recessed in the rock and almost entirely hidden by wild, thorny bushes. She used the flat of her blade to push them aside, but they still clung and snagged at her clothing.

  “My horse,” she said, as he shut the door. “There is somewhere safe he can stay?” She had not brought him so far only to let him be eaten.

  The automaton nodded and bolted the door. That wasn’t much of an answer.

  “You’ll see to it?”

  He nodded again, and Aurelia supposed she would have to be satisfied with that.

  He led her down a dark corridor cut through the stone, clean and dry but terribly cold. It opened into another hall, the flesh of the mountain transforming seamlessly into the castle. She had trod every inch of the place, those years ago, but this was unfamiliar in the flickering light of a single candle. The automaton picked up the light and handed it to her, leading on.

  They came to an antechamber she knew a little better, beyond which she thought lay the grand dining hall. But the empty doorway at the far end of the room was black as pitch, and the small space had been redecorated. A grudging fire burned unenthusiastically in the fireplace, casting a red glow on a table, one chair, and an unlit iron candelabrum.

  And Magnus.

  He stood behind the chair with one hand resting on its back. His eyes were dark in a waxen face, engraved with years of strife. He had never been handsome, but he’d had an air of strength, a solidity in his square jaw, broad, crooked nose, and heavy brow. Now those same features seemed brutal. His skin had thinned with age and illness, clinging to the flesh beneath, and the left eye drooped in a severe ectropion, showing the red inside the lower lid.
/>   “I am glad to see you again, magistrix.”

  Nothing in his face or voice showed those words true, and he stood still and silent as she came forward with a hand extended, which he refused to take. But his own hands were gloved, she noticed, the fingers rigid beneath the white cotton.

  Aurelia stopped in front of him. “I should have come sooner. I’m sorry I was not in time.” The single chair at the table was enough proof of that.

  He lifted one shoulder and stepped away from her, toward the fire. “I’ve instructed my girl to bring food and prepare a room. How long will you stay?”

  Still, nothing in his voice, nothing in his face.

  “Until I’ve rested, I suppose. Or as long as you would like me to.”

  He nodded—still nothing—and gestured her to the chair. As she took it, she noticed that the automaton had vanished silently.

  “Magnus, what’s happened since I left you?”

  “Only the past, magistrix. Let us not bring it into the present.”

  “You swore to give up the art after last time. You vowed never to touch it again, and yet I come here and find a golem… Where did you get the materials? Are they not still watching you?”

  “A golem? It’s scarcely even alive. It runs mostly on clockwork. You give me too much credit.”

  Scarcely alive, and frightened of the man who built him.

  Aurelia shook her head. “Your wife…”

  “Precisely,” he interrupted. “If I had resumed my studies, don’t you think I could have preserved her?”

  There was an element of truth to that objection, but Aurelia knew and Magnus knew that their science was no more infallible than the medicine of the universities.

  “Your hands…”

  He whirled on her, sending the candelabrum crashing to the floor with a reverberating clang. Chips of white candle wax flew, speckling his sleeve and settling in his thinning hair. “Have you come to accuse me? I was burned, Aurelia. Burned by accusers like you. If you are here to drag me through old pains, you can leave!”

  Echoes rang back from the darkness beyond the chamber.

  And a small cry of alarm. A young woman crept into the room. She carried a single plate covered by a cloche, adjusting it as though she had nearly dropped it. Never making eye contact, she set it in front of Aurelia and began to withdraw.

  Aurelia rose, and the scrape of the chair stopped the woman. “I’m extremely tired,” she said. “Thank you, but if you’ll show me where I’m to sleep, I would prefer to eat there.”

  The woman glanced at Magnus for approval, then bowed her head. “Yes, Pani. Follow me.”

  “I came,” Aurelia said again, “because you summoned me. Old friend.”

  “Of course,” he replied, hollow once more. “Sleep… deeply. Old friend.”

  Chapter 3

  Aurelia followed the silent servant through the dark halls, her single candle revealing nothing but the floor directly ahead. There had been light there, once. There had been warmth. It had been a home. Now it felt like a mausoleum.

  The young woman led her upward, through galleries and up sweeping staircases, until suddenly, something seemed familiar. The third door from the end of the corridor on the left side. It was where Aurelia had stayed the last time she was in that place. So many years.

  The servant unlocked the door and pushed through, leaving the key in the lock. Inside, a fire had been laid, but the room was still cold, and the furniture was still covered by ghost-like sheets. The white masses seemed to shift and tremble in the firelight.

  “I’m sorry, Pani,” the young woman said. “I hadn’t even begun to prepare the room, except to warm it a little.”

  “That’s fine,” Aurelia replied. “You hadn’t expected me to come up so soon. Let me eat, and then I’ll help you.”

  The woman looked at her, truly looked, for the first time. She went still. Then she blinked. “I… No, Pani. Thank you. I’ll manage.” She swept the cover from a table and used the edge of the cloth to clean away a little dust that had filtered through, then set down the plate and removed the cloche. Late apples, soft, white cheese, crusty bread and a dollop of golden butter. “I’ll bring wine, Pani.”

  “Tonight, I would prefer water. And I would prefer that you call me Aurelia. What may I call you?”

  The woman was in the process of folding the dust cover, frowning at her hands as she tried to line up the corners. She paused and looked up. “I could not, Pani. It wouldn’t be appropriate for a servant—”

  “It is the purpose and calling of all humankind to serve, so I am a servant, also. Please, do not call me Lady.” She picked up the opposite edge of the dust cover and brought the corners together, folding it between them.

  One of the young woman’s eyebrows twitched skeptically, though Aurelia could not be sure what part of that statement she doubted. That she truly believed what she had said? That a guest in a castle could understand what it meant to serve? Or that Aurelia was human? All of it, perhaps.

  “Aurelia, then,” she said at last. “But you’ll sit and eat and let me be a hostess, one servant to another. And you will call me Helena.” She set down the folded dust cover and began work on another, revealing the carved trunk that had been concealed beneath.

  Aurelia sat with a smile and picked up a slice of apple. “Thank you, Helena. Now we understand one another. How long have you been here, in the castle? Do you live here?”

  Helena glanced at her from between the curtains of the enormous bed. “Some years. There was an illness, shortly before his wife died. It nearly took my family, but he worked night and day and saved them and much of the village. After, when he began to have difficulties, my mother sent me up here to help around the household. But then all the others left, and now I’m the only one.”

  That raised so many more questions than it answered. “Why did the others leave?”

  Helena threw open the window. Thunder rumbled again, much nearer now. And there was another sound, too, the eerie wail of wolves.

  “My master can be difficult.”

  Well, Aurelia had always known that, but now…

  She chewed contemplatively and moved her chair closer to the fire. The night air freshened the dusty, musty room, but it was cold. “And you’ve stayed. You must see something the others didn’t. Tell me, is he… Is Magnus all right?”

  Helena stopped by the window, her eyes narrowed. “You want to know if he’s lost his mind.”

  “I want to know if he’s all right.” Though the thought had occurred to her, if only briefly. “Who attacked this place?”

  In answer, Helena’s eyes traveled to the window. The fog had dispersed, somewhat, and Aurelia could see where a couple of lights marked windows in the village below.

  “Why? Why would they turn on the one who treated their illness?”

  Helena shook her head. “Fear,” she said simply. Then she marched to the door with an armful of folded dust covers. “I’ll fetch you some water. Did you bring any luggage? I’ll bring that up, too.” And without waiting for an answer, she slipped out and shut the door behind her.

  Aurelia stared after her for a long minute, then stared at her half-eaten plate. She tried to analyze, but it was difficult through the exhaustion and distress. The villagers tried to burn the castle out of fear. They had tried to burn Magnus. Magnus, her student, her disciple. Her responsibility. Magnus, who had built a mechanical golem that also feared him, who showed signs that he had resumed the studies he vowed to abandon. Fear.

  But Helena remained in that place. She had lived there for years and must have seen all there was to see of the man. She did not seem afraid. Wary, perhaps. She stepped with caution. But she also jumped to the man’s defense. And she did not leave.

  Aurelia picked at the remains of her meal but found she could eat no more. She rose to stoke the fire and watched the crimson sparks climb the chimney.

  He wanted her to leave. She’d come too late, much too late, and he blamed her for th
at. She understood. But something was badly wrong, and she could not leave in good conscience until she had found the root of it. And fixed it. He was her responsibility, after all.

  The wolves cried again beyond the window, and she moved closer to see if she could spot one in the moonlight. The storm was rolling closer still, and soon, there would be no moonlight at all. Lightning flashed and lit the treetops, followed by a peal of thunder after less than a heartbeat. She’d have liked to be out in it. The lightning did something to the air that tingled beneath her skin. The weather had every right to be uncertain and chaotic, because that was its nature, but chaos had no place indoors, where humankind ought to have everything under control. A few fat drops of rain splashed on the stone around the window, and a wind sprang up. Somewhere, it struck some crevice in the stone or one of the broken windows and made a terrible, throaty moan that rose slowly to a shriek. She shut the window before too much of the damp could come inside.

  “What are you doing, old friend? What happened?”

  But she knew he wouldn’t answer if she simply asked. Would Helena? The young woman was reticent, perhaps understandably. Who knew what she’d been asked just before they came to set the place alight?

  So all that remained was to stay. To help.

  If she intended to help, she would have to understand, and if no one would tell her what had happened, she could only find out on her own. Cautiously. Secretly. Just as she had practiced her art for years.

  When Helena returned, she brought water and fresh linens and two glass-chimneyed lamps. The golem followed with Aurelia’s luggage. All of it, the bags of clean clothes and the oiled leather satchels of books and cases of equipment, the lot of it heavier than most men could lift. Helena did not spare the creature a backward glance and gave no sign that she considered him anything out of the ordinary. She must have seen some strange things since coming to live in the castle. As strange as metal men with empty eyes. As strange as Aurelia, herself, perhaps?