A Student's Dream (Twisted Cogs Book 1)

by Hemmings, Malcolm

  “Aren’t you supposed to be interviewing Elena, not her mother?” Ele said from behind Elena’s chair. The marble boy didn’t answer, which didn’t surprise Elena. If Arta had been right, only Stormtouched could see or hear Ele, and Pietro was the creation of a Stormtouched, not touched himself.

  “My daughter is one of the finest Fabera that Italoza has ever seen,” Joanna gave Elena a look much like the owner of a prize dog, and Elena squirmed in her chair.

  “Hmmm...” Pietro paused, brushing the end of the feather against stone lips, “your letter mentions nothing about Elena being a Fabera.”

  “I mentioned that she was Stormtouched, I thought that was enough to convey how much she can bring to your studio.”

  “You seem disappointed,” Elena ventured. It was always a struggle for her to speak up when her mother was around, but the worry was threatening to override her better instincts.

  “Not disappointed, per se,” Pietro said, “but it’s up to me to make your case to Master De Luca, and that information makes my job much more difficult. My master tends to look for skills that are a little more," he paused, looking for the right way to put it, “in line with Studio De Luca. He has taken on Faberi in the past, of course, but very rarely, and usually only when there is a lack of supplicants. This year, we have already had far too many supplicants...it’s harder for me to make the argument to him to take on the less valuable.”

  Elena winced at the characterization, but her mother was already berating the boy.

  “‘Less valuable’? When you come to know our family better, little sculpture, you’ll find that a Lucciano has more value than a hundred other supplicants. I find the very idea insulting, and what’s more, I’m surprised that a studio of your reputation can’t find a way to test a Stormtouched’s true value.”

  Pietro let her finish, carefully holding the quill above the inkwell so as not to drip on the parchment.

  “I very much wish I could know the Lucciano name better, Madam,” he said respectfully, “but just as I’m sure you wouldn’t wish your servants letting rabble into your home, so too is Master De Luca quite particular about the students who are permitted to enter his studio.” Joanna seemed a little mollified, perhaps due to the assumption that the Luccianos had servants, and he continued smoothly. “For some Stormtouched it is simple to test and rank them, but that is not true of all of them. I must say I wish they all were; it would certainly make my job easier,” Pietro smiled with perfect white teeth, and Joanna returned a thin smile of her own, as if against her will.

  “Well then, what makes Elena any harder to test than any other supplicant? She’ll take whatever tests you set to her.”

  “That would be wonderful, but the tests vary from case to case. If Elena were a Saggitara, I could point her towards a set of targets and watch her with her weapon. If she were an Artifex, she might’ve brought one of her paintings, if a Caelator, one of her sculptures.”

  “It seems to me that you could test a Fabera or a Machinator by looking at her creations as well, couldn’t you?” Joanna interrupted, too hastily, too eager. Pietro was shaking his head even before she stopped talking.

  “It’s not quite so simple. A Machinator’s creations are easy to rank, yes; there’s no mistaking a device that humanity hasn’t seen before. Faberi, on the other hand?” he spread his hands helplessly. “What’s the difference between a Faberi-made table and a table made by a master craftsman?”

  “A Faberi’s work is perfect, that’s the difference.”

  “I certainly can’t tell the difference between a perfect table and a well-made table, can you, Madam?”

  “And so what? Surely Master De Luca could use a master craftswoman?” Joanna’s voice was rising in pitch now, and Elena prayed she wouldn’t fly into a rage.

  “Master De Luca can afford to hire a host of craftsmen if he wants them, Madam Lucciano,” Pietro’s tone never changed, though his white marble eyes were locked on Joanna’s, “he hardly needs to go to the trouble of feeding, housing, and training a garzona to get a source of beautiful tables.”

  “You’re singling Elena out in this discrimination! You’re unjust in your selection, and I must say-”

  “It is the magic of the Storm that is unjust in its selection,” Pietro raised his voice for the first time to interrupt her smoothly, and used that momentum to barrel over her objections. “To rank a Saggitari we give them a bow. To rate a Artifex we give them a brush. To the Caelator we give a chisel, and to the Machinator we give our most heartfelt and abject pleas that they deign to deal with us. I am always quite sorry when a Faberi or Lanisti or Rhetor tries to supplicate, but that is the luck of the draw, the flip of the coin. We need no Lanisti when we can hire a swordsman, we need no Faberi when hiring a builder will do, and a Rhetor who doesn’t keep their mouth shut is a Rhetor who must be put down, worthless either way.”

  The marble child shouldn’t have been so imposing, but standing on his chair, leaning over his desk, he was somehow keeping Joanna’s steely gaze. “Some Stormtouched are just more useful, Madam Lucciano, and that is all there is to say of it.”

  “Elena, please leave the room. I must speak to Mister Pietro in private.” Joanna was trembling, and Elena wasn’t quite sure whether the marble boy would be safe if she left. When he gave her a terse nod, however, there was nothing she could do but step outside of the office and shut the door behind her.

  She didn’t want to deal with talking to Arta, Isadora, Arturo or the sleeping boy just now, so instead of making her way back to the antechamber Elena leaned her back against the door. The heavy door was well-crafted enough that it muffled the words of the conversation, though she could hear her mother was speaking angrily.

  “They didn’t have to kick us out like naughty children,” Ele complained, leaning against the wall opposite from her. Elena didn’t answer, and she was surprised to realize that she was almost as angry as her mother had been. How could he just dismiss her, on the basis of a single fact? The entire meeting couldn’t have taken more than five minutes, her prospects moving from certainty to dejection in less time than it took to bathe. “Elena?” Ele tried again, “it’s alright you know, your mother will pull her family strings like she always does-”

  “It’s useless,” Elena cut him off. “Master De Luca has actual political power, mother’s posturing won’t even impress Pietro.”

  “And so you’ll just give up?”

  “I’m not giving up,” Elena lifted her chin stubbornly. “There are other studios in Milia, other Masters. Some of them will take me. If not I’ll...I’ll find someone else to become an apprentice to. Or I’ll figure out how to open a shop here on my own. If I can’t get there as an artist, I’ll work my way into the courts as a craftswoman or a merchant.”

  “This morning you were an artist, now you’re a merchant?” Ele asked quietly. “It makes me nervous when you make such sweeping changes of plan.”

  “I’m not changing the plan!” Elena said. “The plan is to get to court. One way or another.” Ele meant the best, but she didn’t particularly care for his criticism at the moment. She glanced up and down the hallway, looking for a change of subject. On one side was the door to the antechamber, the room where her mother no doubt expected her to wait. At the other end of the hallway was a closed door, fitted with a prominent lock.

  “What do you think is behind there?” Even in the empty hallway, Elena dropped her voice to a whisper. Ele gave the door a glance, then gave Elena a warning look.

  “Stop. Now is not the place for your curiosity.”

  “What’s wrong with being curious? I was just wondering what’s behind there and what kind of lock that is.”

  “We need to stay here. There’s no point in offending the studio.”

  “What will they do, reject us twice? Wait, do you really not know what kind of lock it is? Have I finally found one that has you stumped?”

  “Of course I know what kind it is, you can tell from the shape of the
keyhole that it’s a lever-pin. Probably a three-pin...no, he’s rich, make that a four-pin.”

  “So you could get past it?” Elena bit her lip to keep from smiling. It was far too easy to push Ele’s buttons.

  “I know what you’re doing, Elena,” Ele said, giving her a weary look, “and I don’t approve. We should be waiting out here, coming up with a plan for the future.”

  “I already have my plan, but you’re welcome to come up with another,” Elena shrugged. “It’s probably for the best, anyway. We don’t have anything to work with, nothing useable.”

  Ele gave her a hard look, and for a moment Elena thought she might have gone a bit too far.

  “Stop trying to get a rise out of me. It doesn’t work.”

  Elena’s gaze dropped to her feet, and she stuck her lower lip out ever-so-slightly. After a few moments Ele sighed and pointed to the corner a little ways down the hallway, where the wall and the floor met.

  “There’s a loose nail in the corner down there, and you have a splinter of wood stuck in the hem of your dress from when you fixed the cart’s wheel. That would, in theory, be enough to make a lockpick.”

  Elena grinned as she knelt down to retrieve the nail and pull the wooden splinter, about the size of her little finger, from where it had lodged. Ele walked briskly to the end of the hallway to examine the lock as she worked. Using the sharp end of the nail, Elena scraped slivers away from the piece of wood, shaping it into a rough key form.

  “I was right. Four-pin.” Ele peered at the lock, and Elena used the stone wall by the door to hammer the nail into the wood so that her makeshift key had a metal core. “Give it four teeth, but you won’t be able to gauge the size until you try it a few times.”

  “I’ll bet you I get lucky though,” Elena bit down on the wood, making a face at the taste of dirt and grit, but her sharp teeth pressed grooves along the edge.

  “You’re going to muck your teeth up one of these days, doing that,” Ele shook his head as Elena tried the wooden lockpick on the lock. When it stuck, she jiggled it gently, chewing her tongue as she payed close attention to the feel of how it pressed, how the pins inside stuck. The buzzing in her temples felt almost soothing as her Storm assisted her, tingling along her fingertips while she worked. She withdrew and carefully bit again.

  The edge of the wood tasted of steel. It might have been that the taste of metal really was stronger on some of the pick’s ridges, showing her where to bite and where to leave it, or that might just be her Storm helping her along. Either way all that mattered was the result. The key slid almost all the way into the lock on the second attempt, and Elena drew it out to nibble at the wood again.

  “What exactly is your goal in this?” Ele asked with an air of long-suffering. “What do you hope to accomplish?”

  “Maybe we’ll find some books, or see some technique, something that helps us!” Elena said around the key. “Do we have to have a reason for everything? Isn’t it enough that we’ll get to see the inside of Master Bernardo De Luca’s studio if we do it, and if we don’t, we won’t? Where’s your sense of curiosity?”

  “You’re the curious one. You always have been,” Ele grumbled as Elena slipped the key back into the lock. It fit perfectly, all four pins clicking into place. The wood of the key splintered and jammed into the inner workings of the lock when she turned it, but Elena grinned as the heavy door swung open. She extended an arm in invitation, and Ele rolled his eyes as he entered first. “Yet somehow I always get caught up in your escapades,” he grumbled, “funny how that works.”

  Chapter V

  The Soul of the Studio

  Elena wasn’t quite sure what she expected to be on the other side of the heavy door, but when it swung open she wasn’t disappointed. A courtyard of white stone greeted her, enclosed by the walls of the studio on all sides but open to the sky above. Sunlight streamed through some sort of netting at the top, casting a dappled shadow across the ground, letting the light in but providing enough shade to be comfortable. In the center of the courtyard stood a statue of a woman whose pitcher somehow poured a constant stream of water into the stone pool that surrounded her.

  “A Machinator fountain,” Ele murmured.

  A breeze caught Elena’s hair and played with a strand as she stood in the doorway, open-mouthed and entranced. The courtyard hummed with lazy activity, and it seemed like a scene out of a painting. In one corner, a pretty brunette girl made marks with chalk on a block of wood as big as her arm, while a boy who could be her brother looked on with interest. On the other side of the fountain, a young man and a pale girl with sharp eyes were discussing a half-painted tile that sat on the easel between them. Both pairs were so absorbed in their work that they didn’t seem to notice Elena’s entrance into the courtyard.

  “This is what the studio of a master looks like,” Elena breathed to Ele. “This is what we’ll have, someday.”

  “I thought you were going to be a merchant now,” Ele said sourly. Elena ignored him.

  “I don’t care what happens when we’re caught, this was worth it.”

  As if on cue, a polite cough made Elena turn around. Standing directly to the left of the door they had entered through was a tall, thin woman with grey hair wrapped in a tight bun on her head.

  “I don’t believe I recognize you,” the woman said simply, although it was clear from her voice and tone that she expected an explanation.

  “Pietro said we were to meet him here,” the lie flew to Elena’s lips as soon as she’d thought of it. She didn’t expect to get away with the deception, but even a few more minutes in the lovely courtyard would be worth it.

  “Ah, I didn’t realize that Pietro was already sending the year’s supplicants on.” The severe look on the woman’s face softened a bit. “Have you been shown around?” When Elena shook her head, the woman gestured to the door on the far left of the courtyard. “I have a few moments to give you a quick tour; we’ll start with the kitchens. My name is Bea, by the way. I keep the studio running, with Pietro’s help, while Master De Luca is locked up in his study.”

  Elena couldn’t believe her luck. It wasn’t anywhere near as good as becoming Master De Luca’s garzona for real, but she would at least be allowed a glimpse into the life at the studio before she was cast back out into the real world. She glanced at Ele to see if he was as excited as she was. He was facing her with a sour frown, but not even his judgmental look could cloud her glee.

  “The other doors lead to different areas of the studio, of course, but going this way will let us see the entire studio without having to step out into the heat again,” Miss Bea gestured to the kitchen door, “come now, in here, the both of you.”

  So she can see Ele too, Elena noted as she followed, which means she’s a Stormtouched. I should’ve expected that; Master De Luca doesn’t take on Mortalis as apprentices, it wouldn’t make sense for him to leave his household in the control of one. She still wasn’t used to Ele being seen and heard by other people, but at least he hadn’t made the same mistake and ruined things by saying something snarky that gave her away.

  “What the hell are we doing, Elena?” Ele lowered his voice and murmured in her ear as they followed Bea through the door, “do you think you’re going to trick your way into becoming a garzona?”

  Elena made a dismissive gesture as if she was swatting away a fly, turning in circles to take in the kitchen. It was sweltering hot, a heavy heat that went beyond the heat of the day, but she was too intrigued to even feel it. Bea was standing by the door, but Elena moved slowly, taking in the brick ovens, the huge pantry, and the two cooks preparing a meal with practiced ease, one fat and bald, one old and thin, each in crisp white clothes.

  “You is lost, little girl?” one of them asked, stirring a large bowl with one hand and adding cream to it with the other.

  “No, I’m just looking,” Elena said.

  “You seem entranced,” Bea noted from the doorway. “If you have any questions, I’d be happy to
answer them.”

  “You shouldn’t have said that,” Ele grinned, “Elena always has questions.” Bea’s smile was sudden and warm, completely at odds with her otherwise severe expression.

  “Ask away then,” she said, “this might be your only opportunity for me to answer them.”

  If only you knew how true that was, Elena thought. Since this was her one opportunity, she tried to think of what questions she would need to know when she was running her own studio. It would be quite some time, but there was no harm in preparing for it now when she had the chance. Her Storm buzzed helpfully, highlighting things to ask questions about.

  “Why is there so much food being prepared? I thought Master De Luca only had four garzoni?”

  “Four garzoni, four want-to-be garzoni, two cook, one Master...we need much food for this many mouth,” the older cook answered.

  “Everyone gets the same meals here, so the food you see being prepared is for everyone, although of course the cooks will be eating later,” Bea said. Elena nodded, already formulating the next question in her mind.

  “Why do they all wear uniforms?” Elena skipped out of the way of one of the cooks carrying a large pot that steamed, and was rewarded with a weak nod as he passed.

  “The Master is a very orderly man, and he has a reputation to uphold. As such, he enforces a certain style of dress as a bare minimum for everyone in the studio. You too will be receiving a set of clothes to wear, though what set usually depends on how the Storm touched you and what function in the studio you served...” Bea trailed off, her eyebrows raised in a question. Elena realized that the woman was asking what sort of Stormtouched she was, and she hastily moved on to her next question.

  “Are the Master’s ice chests made by craftsmen? Or did one of his Faberi garzoni make them?”