Steampunk Hearts

by Jordan Reece

  “I won’t be hoodwinked, Master Maraudi,” Arden said. The back of his hand still burned where Volos’s lips had pressed down; it had warmed him all night in the very cold cave. His dreams had yet again been indecent, and he’d relished them.

  “Good,” Master Maraudi said in approval. “Let him plead his case with the king when we get back to Lighmoon. It isn’t our concern.”

  “Do you think the king will release him? This is not so . . . seemly, is it? Seeing as he’s a man and not a beast?”

  “The king must weigh the royal needs against the tracker’s wants. And if our good Ri Ques runs again before she can be married and packed off to Isle Zayre? If she runs off once she’s there? He cannot be summoned from the Cascades speedily to rectify this problem. What if some madman kidnaps a royal grandchild, as happened in Loria, oh, twenty or twenty-five years ago? They never found a trace of that poor little prince. If the tracker were willing to stay and supply this skill of his, the king could make him a special guard, an investigator of the Crown. A home and pay and honor. But . . .” Master Maraudi’s eyes went back to the cage. “He will make this much harder for himself than it needs to be, and end up in the perindens as an animal.”

  “His life will not be good in there.”

  “His life will be as he chooses it. The king has quite a temper, yet he is not an unreasonable man, nor does he approve of Isle Zayre ways of lifetime bondage. But the tracker may leave him no choice, may push him into exploding and lashing out. You could encourage the tracker a little: help him to see reason when it is time for that. A cage or a home, a trough or a plate, air or coin in his pockets. I know what I would choose.”

  The roads had been transformed into a muddy mess, and the horses’ hooves squelched in the most troublesome spots. The wheels of the cage collected muck. When they were stuck overlong in one place as a fallen tree was chopped to pieces and removed from the road, the cage sunk several inches into the mud. Once the tree was gone and Keth kicked her horse to move on, the cage didn’t budge. Everyone dismounted and gathered up branches and stones as Dieter cleared by hand some of the mud from around the wheels. Then the wood and rocks were laid down in its place. They provided enough traction for Keth’s horse to drag out the cage.

  They rode on, time slipping away from Arden. It was just another town or city, another wooded area or pasture, another beggar shaking a rattle-cup or muddy road to slog down. Volos gestured when necessary to guide them along and otherwise said and did very little.

  He would make it hard once in Lighmoon, and Master Maraudi had made it sound like the king was quite likely to deny Volos’s request to go home. He was going to end up in a cage in the perindens to keep him from running, and his life would be spent in bitter waiting for the next time someone went missing. Arden would bring him food twice a day while they both grew old and gray.

  He thought about the untended minute, which he was tempted to give once they had the princess in hand. But how angry would the king be with Arden at the loss of his tracker? It seemed a foolish matter to expend much temper on his penchant when he would have his daughter back, and the reputation of Odri saved from international shame. The tracker had served his purpose; all of the ones he could serve were purely hypothetical.

  So the king had not lost much in the end, although he might not see it that way. It would be Arden’s fault that the king was denied his most unusual prize, and Arden’s fault again if the princess ran off a second time and could not be tracked. Tolaman’s sniping over the incompetence of his second lead would be nothing compared to a king in fury. It was not a crime worthy of execution, of which there were few in Odri and reserved for far greater crimes, but he could express his displeasure in other ways. Arden could find himself sent to the Routies, or off to the horse breeder to replace the sickly penchant woman. Clapped on a ship upon the roiling sea to use his penchant as a lure for whales . . . deep in a hot Isle Zayre jungle and bound to a rich master to capture monkeys if the king was truly feeling spiteful . . . or perhaps the king would shrug it off and leave Arden to the perindens. There was no way to know. It was frightening to be at his whim, a man that Arden had only ever seen at a distance, and never shared a single word.

  “Are you sure?” Keth was saying, and Arden turned his attention back to the problem of the princess. They had paused at an extremely muddy split in the road, one that led upward on a hill and the other that wended away into the green straight ahead.

  “I’m sure,” Volos replied.

  “But this is the road to Minkakel!”

  “Her scent does not go that way. It continues straight.”

  “Minkakel was only ever a guess, Keth,” Master Maraudi said.

  “It was a clever and logical choice for her to make, however,” Keth protested. “Who does she know beyond this place? What is there but small towns and no-name villages, people so below her station that their paths would never have crossed? If her destination is to hide in the Great City, why take this roundabout route?”

  “All of these answers will be revealed in time. You want to take a moment and double check your scents, tracker?”

  “No. You disliking the answer doesn’t change it. Her scent goes that way.” Volos pointed to the green. “Not there.” His finger moved to the hill.

  “Is it strong? Are we gaining on her?”

  Volos breathed contemplatively. “We are about the same distance as we ever were.”

  The blood was draining from Keth’s solemn face. She turned to Master Maraudi and said in agitation, “To travel to Loria by common routes risked her capture. But if she went this way, planning to evade us by leaving Odri for the wildlands and taking a boat from there down to Loria . . . it will be a swift trip once upon the water and she will disembark at Port Shaze!”

  “That a problem then?” Dieter asked nervously.

  “Shaze is scant miles from where her sister lives and less than that from multiple convents!”

  “Why would a jewel thief go to a convent?” Volos asked mildly.

  Even ridden with anxiety, Keth kept up the fiction without hesitation. “For a woman to claim sanctuary in a Lorial convent makes her untouchable, regardless of her crime. Bounty hunters lurk years outside waiting for the worst of them to come out, but as long as they stay in, no reclamation will ever be had. She can have her companion sell those jewels and send her money to live in ease within those walls.”

  Master Maraudi had at first looked dismissive at this postulation, but now grave concern was overtaking his craggy face. “Clever. Clever by half and then some. We must go faster and beat her to that boat. Go!” They kicked their horses, but only three moved forward. The cage had sunk into the mud again.

  Volos laughed as they struggled to get it out. “Quick! Put all your muscle to it! Oh, won’t you hurry? She’s getting away!”

  “If the road-” Keth grunted and shoved a branch under the tire, “-if the road continues in this fashion, we will not be able to pull the cage.”

  “Then we’ll buy him a horse and shackle him to it,” Master Maraudi said. The wheels were prized free and they were off at a much quicker pace than before. The state of the road worked against them and they did not maintain it for long.

  The rain had been heavier north of Minkakel. Strands of grass poked up above pools of standing water in the fields, and the horses were pushing at times through heavy mud. Keth steered the cage around fathomless puddles and lost control of it altogether when the saturated ground simply gave way under the wheels. Her horse screamed and staggered at the sudden shift of weight pulling it off-course. The cage turned over, Volos shouting and clinging to the bars as it went down into a pool with a splash. Then it began to sink. In terror, he scrabbled to hold onto the highest part of the cage.

  “Unhitch it!” Master Maraudi demanded. Dieter released the horse and Keth coaxed it onto firmer ground as Arden splashed into a shallower part of the pool. There was firm rock beneath him, and then it changed to mud just inches away from
where the cage had gone in. He wrapped his hands around the bars and pulled. The weight of it was too great for one man or even three, and all he could do was stop it from sinking. The cage had fallen lock side down, so releasing Volos could not be done.

  “Do not let me drown in here!” Volos whispered.

  “I shall not,” Arden grunted. Sweat rolled down his face and his muscles strained from the effort of keeping the cage from going down. The others worked together in the frantic construction of a buckle-and-rope tether to be hitched to the bars and horses.

  The mud wanted this cage. Arden steadied his breathing and held on, drop after drop falling from his forehead to splash on the bars and in the muck. “Please speak to me.” He needed to think of something other than what would happen when his strength failed.

  “I like a man with muscles,” Volos said in a light tone, but his eyes were filled with fear. “Are these from lugging dragons about?”

  “Dragons and unicorns, mermaids and bears,” Arden said.

  “And which of these creatures is your favorite? I have only seen mermaids in storybooks. They were lovely.”

  “They care about exactly two things: fish and brushing their hair,” Arden said. “But yes, they are lovely.”

  “And just how lovely do you find them?”

  “Not that lovely. They have little more to say than the sheep you chase after, and I’m sure you don’t favor them in that way.”

  “Ah, well, when it has been too long . . .” Volos smiled, a genuine smile, and it was as beautiful as his eyes. Etto had no charms in comparison. “I jest. Now tell me of unicorns. I have also only ever seen those in storybooks. What are they like?”

  “Like any horse, but with a horn that has to be dusted regularly. Other kinds of penchants use the powder for healing spells and things. I know nothing of those, for a penchant of animals performs no spells. They also use dragon droppings burned in fire.”

  “There are many disgusting facts in your head, Arden of the zoo. I should like to hear all of them, but over a mug of ale at a pub, not here.” His eyes grew wide with terror when the cage shifted. “All of you! Hurry up or your jewel thief makes it to Loria!”

  The tether was attached, and the cage was pulled out of the mud and turned upright. Volos took off his caked shirt with a silent plea and Arden dipped it in a cleaner puddle on the side of the road. Then Volos wrung it out and wrapped the sleeves around the bars so that the shirt could hang and dry.

  Mud sloughed off the cage as it was hitched again to the horse. At long last, they were on the move. By then the day was coming to its close, and Master Maraudi said angrily over their dinner that he was going to offer money to the first person with a horse to pass by. These delays could not be borne.

  His temper was mitigated in the morning when the dirt road turned to gravel and eased their travels tremendously. But his eyes still slid to the horses of fellow travelers, gauging them for suitability in case the road soured again. He made no offers, nor would Arden in his place. The villages near the road were poor and falling apart, and the horses were no grander than their surroundings. Old and tattered, one was blind and being led along by a farm boy encouraging it gently. A laden cart of crops drew along behind it. Another was lame.

  They came to an inn where the princess and her mysterious man had waited out a night. Master Maraudi dished out another handful of coins for information, his foot tapping impatiently as a slow-speaking innkeeper tried to remember their particulars. The princess had given the name of Bollie here, and the man was Grenden. Common names, just like Adan and Ducilla, and the man’s fancy sword hadn’t caught the eye of the innkeeper. Here they had pretended to be a lord’s personal couriers on their way to the Great City.

  That had been the only part to really catch the innkeeper’s attention. “I told them to backtrack and take King Silver. It’s a faster way to get there than coming through here to reach the lavender road. The lavender is getting too rough for people in fancy clothes nowadays.”

  “And what did they say?” Master Maraudi asked.

  “They thanked me but went on to the lavender. You can’t convince people who already have the answers, can you? No, you can’t, not young, gold-in-their-pocket lord’s couriers too good to listen to a man who might know the area.”

  As they turned to go, he said off-handedly, “Funny thing. The woman now, I told her that she looked a little like the youngest princess. Thought she’d be happy to hear that. What woman wouldn’t? But she turned pale as a ghost and turned away. Maybe she doesn’t think that one is too comely.”

  “Princess Briala was here?” asked a patron over a glass of ale at the bar.

  “Of course she wasn’t here!” the innkeeper scoffed. “When last did royalty come through here? Better roads than this. We had a woman the other day with hair just like Princess Briala’s, lovely tumbles of black. But the face was different. The princesses all got the queen’s high cheekbones and this girl was pudding-cheeked.”

  As the search party returned to their horses and began down the road, Keth said, “The holographie crystal is losing its power. She’ll be back to herself soon.”

  “Maybe we’ll pass it in the road,” Dieter said. “Or two of them, if the man’s is wearing off, too. What do they look like?” He fingered his pocket where he had slipped his dragon scales, clearly debating if two discarded holographie crystals would add to his wealth.

  “I doubt she’ll dump them,” Keth said. “The spell within those crystals will regenerate in time. They just aren’t meant to be used day after day. She’s more likely to put them in her pack and let the spell build up again.”

  “Her scent has stopped,” Volos announced.

  “What do you mean?” Arden asked, aghast. “She hasn’t . . . died?”

  “No, that doesn’t make a scent stop. It just changes to something far more unpleasant. She’s holding steady somewhere. Her scent hasn’t moved for hours.”

  “Perhaps poor weather has caught her up as it did us,” Master Maraudi said.

  “Or she is at the wildlands port waiting for a boat to Loria,” Keth said, and they rode on fast.

  ****

  Riding from first light to last, they were waylaid at times by the odd course the princess had traveled. The holographie crystal had to have given up the ghost not long after the inn; she had abandoned the roads entirely when they passed by inhabited land, and never once did her scent trail off to a doorstep for a bed or meal. The horses picked carefully through fields and woods, and at times moved so far away from the road that it was lost to view entirely. For the princess to move so confidently through an area that she had not once visited in her life was strange. It was the man who had to know the region and was guiding her on. The two had camped in a little grove of trees one night, the nearest farm only revealed by a column of smoke rising from its chimney. As the search party passed it, Volos said quietly, “He’s young.”

  “The man?” Arden asked, riding beside the cage.

  “I couldn’t ferret out his scent earlier with so many people around. But he was the only one here with her, and they are the only ones to have been in this place for quite some time. I can’t say an exact age, but this isn’t the smell of an old man. He is young and . . .” Arden waited as Volos breathed. “This isn’t the scent of a street-scuff. He smells of the sweat of travels, but his clothing does not reek . . . This is a royal man who daubs himself with cologne. A royal man would help a jewel thief? For a cut of the pay? Why would a royal need it?”

  Arden looked at him, unable to state the true identity of their quarry, but Volos picked up on the significance of his expression and nodded. It did seem curious to Arden that an Odri lord or, more likely from the age, an Odri lord-ling would assist a princess betrothed to a prince of Isle Zayre to reach Loria, but Arden was not privy to court tempests in the perindens, and they did not seek him out there. It was also curious that the lord-ling would be so skilled in his navigation. This was not a place where the ri
ch lived. The map that Keth had acquired displayed more and more empty space the closer one got to the wildlands, showing occasional villages of no size or importance, and no cities or towns whatsoever.

  “This is a man she loves,” Volos mumbled. “Did you love the man who fled you?”

  “I did,” Arden said. “He was handsome and quick-witted, and when his eyes were on me, I felt like the only man in the world. I thought he loved me in return. I was a fool. He finds toys in hearts and this I did not see about him until after he’d played so carelessly with mine.” The memories made him feel brittle. Arden had been so naïve and stupid, so willing to see what wasn’t there. “But a Cascades man would never be like that, is that true? Because they have seen loveliness.”

  “Do not turn those words against me sarcastically. There are cold-hearted people within the pearls. Yes, and yes, we have them here and there. Once there was a boy who delighted me, and I believed I delighted him in turn. He had such soft eyes, wide and honest and warm as a summer morning. I brought him to meet my family at a Sevenday dinner and they talked so pleasantly that I delighted in him even more. But afterwards I asked my brother Cusano if he liked him, and he let silence be his answer. This angered me and I demanded why. He said that my family had loved me since I was nothing but a red-faced, squalling infant that scratched their faces. When I became a tracker, they did not love me more. He wished for me a boy who did not favor me for what I became, rather than who I was.”

  He spoke with his voice down. They both were to keep Keth from overhearing. The wheels of the platform crackling on dead leaves helped with that. “I was still angry, but after that Sevenday, I saw this boy differently. How important it was to him, when we met with people from other pearls, to mention that I was the tracker. It did not need to be said over a card game and ale, and yet he could not refrain. He was Oloni and this man here, this man of his was the tracker! When he wanted to buy something in a shop, he would say that he was my man, and often it would be given to him for free. I watched in secret as he did this time and time again. He loved me only because I was the tracker, not because I was Volos. I went back to Cusano in shame and thanked him for opening my eyes.”