Steelhands

by Danielle Bennett

  Sir Tovere, it read, and I felt a pang of tenderness and pity, Thank ya for yer writing. The gloves are nice of ya. I will be wearing them. If only ma son should wear some himself. May be he will buy some. I know ya asked for his health, but he ent heer. He has schooling now in Versity. May ya be well. Jetta.

  “You wrote to Gaeth’s family,” Laure whispered.

  “I wrote to his mother, yes,” I replied. I had a strange, chill feeling creeping through my chest, and I glanced at Laure to see if she felt the same way. “I had gloves that belonged to her—I thought I should send them back …”

  “You thought you’d meddle, is what you thought,” Laure snapped.

  “And it’s a good thing I did, isn’t it?” I asked. “Since now we know Gaeth never did go home.”

  “Fat lot of good it does us,” Laure said miserably. “We still don’t know anything. This just makes it worse.”

  “Now, be sensible,” I began, but Ducante cleared his throat, signaling a start to the lecture—and an end to all idle chatting.

  Needless to say, I was incapable of paying attention to what he had to say. I managed somehow to copy down word for word what he was dictating, but without properly listening to the sound of his voice. It all passed from my ear straight to my pen, without once passing through my brain. That part of me was full of dark and nervous thoughts.

  If Gaeth had not gone home, yet those in charge of our dormitory believed he had, then he truly was missing. And with no one aware of it save Laure and me, the chance that he was in danger somewhere seemed greater than ever.

  This was too large a matter for the two of us to take care of on our own—and yet I had no one in the city I felt I was able to confide in. If I took this quaint letter to the authorities—I supposed the Provost would be the most likely candidate—I knew without question I would only be laughed at. What evidence did I have? Who was Gaeth to them? Could I explain that the boy had been hearing voices before he disappeared—and back up that evidence with Laure’s situation? I most certainly could not.

  The more I went over my suspicions in my head, the more dangerous they seemed to me, yet the sillier I knew they’d seem to someone else. And still, I felt the keen sense of responsibility driving me to find some solution—for Gaeth’s sake.

  Where in Regina’s name was he?

  I was tangled up in my thoughts when I heard the bell chime. My hand was cramping with how quickly I’d been taking notes, and I managed to ease my grip on my pen just as Hal took over speaking for Ducante.

  “… if there’s anything you need help with,” he said in his kind, easy voice, “don’t hesitate to ask. Even if it’s not about the research or the studying—I’m here to talk, if need be.”

  I felt as though a lamp had been lit suddenly over my head. In all the time I’d spent watching him—and with how carefully I had conducted my study of his behavior and his habits—I knew he would not be the sort of person to laugh at someone when they felt their companion was in need. If I took my concerns to him, perhaps he might know—from official class roster—whether or not Gaeth had withdrawn or made some excuse to the professor regarding his prolonged absence.

  I rose at once from my seat, ignoring Laure’s questions as I pushed past the crowd of students desperate to escape the lecture hall.

  This, I realized just before I arrived at Hal’s desk, would mark the very first occasion I had actually convinced myself to speak with him. It seemed easier somehow to do it because it was not on my own behalf but someone else’s.

  He was in the middle of stacking a few heavy books, and his back was facing me; I could have cleared my throat to let him know I was there, but suddenly I was seized with uncertainty and panic, and by the time I managed to wrestle control of myself, he had already turned around.

  “Hello there,” he said, offering me a quizzical smile. I stared back at him, aware my mouth was hanging open. “Is there something I can do for you?”

  Gaeth had saved me, I recalled, on that fateful day when I’d had my heart irreversibly crushed by the impossibility of ever getting to know Hal as I’d once wished. Now it seemed it was my duty to do something for Gaeth in return.

  “I …” I managed, quite sure I felt Laure’s eyes boring holes into me. She was no longer in the room, but knowing her as well as I did, I was certain she was lurking just outside the door and watching me like a hawk. “That is, I heard what you said just now. About if anyone needed to talk.”

  “Oh, really?” Hal asked, brightening. Once, that expression might have had my knees buckling, but today I was all business. “Don’t tell anyone, but you’re actually the first person who’s ever actually taken me up on that offer. There’s another class coming in about fifteen minutes from now that I’d wanted to sit in on, but I’m sure we could use the professor’s office in the meantime. Would that be all right?”

  “That would be more than adequate,” I said, clutching my books stiffly to my chest as though shielding myself from a dragon. “Thank you.”

  “It’s no trouble at all. Really,” Hal added, leading me out the door with a smile.

  I was nearly certain I saw the top of a fiery red head disappearing behind the doorframe just as we passed through. Dear Laure never had been all that gifted with matters of subtlety, and I wondered if she intended to follow us all the way to the office, too.

  Because of my own pragmatism—it made little sense to fall in love with someone whose affections lay elsewhere—my heart no longer jumped each time he spoke, and I could appreciate the slight bits of humor in my current situation. It was slightly jarring to come to such a realization when faced so immediately with the former object of my affections, but there it was: simply another thing Gaeth had gone and ruined for me. Hal had the same complete lack of guile that Laure did, which caused him to sound almost excited by the prospect of someone else’s problems. Since I was doing this for Gaeth’s sake as well as to satisfy my own curiosity, I did my best not to say anything at all until I’d been spirited away to the upstairs offices, at which point Hal’s attentions could be fully focused.

  Ducante’s rooms were blessedly clean, if slightly cluttered by scrolls of dusty parchment, and there was a large plant in the corner that badly wanted watering. I restrained myself from wiping down one of the bookshelves as I passed, even though I was certain Hal wouldn’t have noticed and everyone would have breathed a little better because of it.

  He didn’t sit behind the desk but rather leaned back against it. I expected he was probably anxious to show me that we were peers, and that I could feel comfortable sharing all my deepest anxieties with him not as though he were a professor but a fellow student. It was a sweet gesture, yet due to the bizarre nature of my request, it was suddenly very tempting to clam up entirely or to invent something out of thin air.

  Somehow—reminding myself of Gaeth in order to maintain my focus—I forced myself to sit down, lowering myself slowly into the leather chair so that it wouldn’t creak embarrassingly.

  “So, are you worried about the exams?” Hal asked, bracing his arms back against the desk. “I know there’ve been a lot of students in about that lately. And it doesn’t help that some professors have been drawing up practice exams with all sorts of trick questions on them. They think it’ll help if the first-years overprepare, which I suppose is one strategy … But I’m sorry, I’m getting ahead of myself here. You’re … Toverre, aren’t you?”

  “How did you know that?” I asked, instantly suspicious, the color rising high in my cheeks and no doubt making me look as though I had the pox. Had he known I was following him all along?

  “I’m sorry,” Hal said, tucking a piece of hair behind his ear. He gestured toward the neat stack of notes and textbooks in my lap. “I didn’t mean to unsettle you. It’s just that you have very distinctive handwriting. I have to read your essays out loud to Professor Ducante; he claims it’s going to drive him blind.”

  I couldn’t hide my papers now without feeling self-consc
ious, but I rather desperately wished to. Also, I was going to have to be more careful when I answered Laure’s homework for her, in the future. It was a lucky thing I knew her handwriting so well.

  “I hope his eyes don’t fail him before the end of semester,” I said, realizing it was my turn to speak again. I wished I had thought to grab Laure when we’d passed her by—these things were always so much easier with her along to make a joke and break the ice. Also, whenever she was in the room, no one so much as looked twice at me. Hal’s gaze—with his cloudy gray eyes—was unwavering, and I found it difficult to sit still without staring back at him.

  “They’re very good essays,” Hal added, to soften the blow. “I suppose I shouldn’t have told you that, about the handwriting.”

  I felt even more uncomfortable with the unexpected praise and cleared my throat quickly to distract him. “It’s not exams I wanted to talk to you about; I have organized a very precise system of studying, and I’m feeling extremely confident. No worries at all there. This is more of a personal problem.”

  “I see,” Hal said, nodding once to show he was listening. He hesitated, then spoke again. “Is it that girl I always see you with? Not to pry, of course.”

  “Laure?” I said, momentarily horrified out of my deep concentration.

  “I guess I was wrong,” Hal said, looking as though he was trying to keep from laughing. “My intuition’s all off today. Didn’t sleep very well last night. Perhaps you’d better just tell me, before I embarrass myself any further.”

  He was not the one who needed to be embarrassed, I thought, but I took his suggestion gratefully.

  “It’s about a … friend of mine,” I began, staring at an empty space on the desk just next to Hal’s wrist. I had to say it all at once, or else my doubts would get the better of me and keep me from speaking entirely. “By the name of Gaeth. He’s gone missing. Actually, he’s been missing for some time now, long enough that I’m sure it’s not just my imagination running wild. The redhead you always see me with—Laure—and I came here together with him, and so we became friends. We’d have lunch with him at the beginning of the semester, even dinner sometimes. And then, one day, he stopped coming to classes, to the dining hall … No one else he knew could tell us where he’d gone. I will admit right away that we did something inadvisable—we were even caught in the act, so I believe it isn’t too incriminating to tell you now that Laure and I ended up breaking into his room just to see if he was there. Which he wasn’t, much to our dismay. We’d been told he went home, you see, only all his things were still in his room. There was even a half-eaten sandwich, though if I speak about it too long I’ll be ill. The point is, everyone here seems to be under the impression that he’s gone back home to Borland. We even spoke to the dormitory authorities, and that’s what they told us. Only then I wrote his mother, inquiring after his health, and she as much as told me to ask him myself since she believes him to still to be here!”

  The whole thing had become quite the tale when I finally paused to catch my breath. It was the most I’d said to anyone other than Laure since Gaeth had gone missing, and I was nearly trembling by the time I’d come to the end. I wanted to add that a gentle, hopelessly simple creature such as Gaeth could get into all sorts of trouble without someone cleverer there to get him out of it again, and that I should have realized it sooner and kept a better eye on him to begin with. But none of that concerned Hal, and I held my tongue.

  Hal drew in a breath, crossing his arms. I could tell I’d upset him from the sudden tension in his face. The poor man had clearly been expecting something about a tender youth’s love life, or perhaps the typical sob story from a student waking from their stupor to realize exams were coming up.

  To be fair, that was all the trouble I had expected from the city when I’d first arrived. The dreams I’d harbored were of first love and proving myself capable of every challenge the ’Versity saw fit to throw at me. All the rest had come quite out of nowhere—first Gaeth, then Laure’s own strange behavior. And as committed as I was to my own independence, I couldn’t solve it all by myself.

  I was sorry to have to share my disillusionment with Hal, but there was no one else with whom I’d be able to talk.

  “The reason I am so concerned,” I added, as Hal continued to think with knitted brow, “is that he was exhibiting some signs of the fever when last we spoke with him. I worry for his health, not only his whereabouts.”

  “Well,” Hal said at last, letting out his breath, “I can’t say that was what I was expecting at all. Do you think it’s something to bring to the Provost’s attention?”

  “I wasn’t sure,” I admitted, clasping my hands tightly together. “Perhaps I should have filed some official report, but I didn’t wish to do anything so drastic until we knew for certain he hadn’t gone back home. I only just heard from his mother today.”

  “The post does tend to get stuck up around Borland,” Hal agreed, plucking at the elbow of his sleeve. “I lived around there—just across the river, actually, in Nevers. We used to say it was because of all the mud, with the postmen getting stuck in it.”

  “I wouldn’t be at all surprised,” I said, attempting to feel light-hearted and failing spectacularly. My skin felt hot and itchy, and I dug my nails into the soft skin on my palm. “I really do apologize if this is inappropriate. I understand that none of this is your jurisdiction. It’s just difficult to … to find …”

  “It’s difficult to find someone to talk to in the city, sometimes,” Hal said, leaning forward just slightly. It was easy to forget he’d been from the country, just like Laure and I were—at least it had been for me. The difference between him and the people I’d known back home stretched wide as Locque Nevers itself. “I felt that way, too, when I first came. If it wasn’t for … well, I understand what it’s like, anyway. I’ve adapted, but it took a while, and lots of feeling uncomfortable at parties in the meantime.”

  I smiled, and it wasn’t even the fake smile Laure had forced me to master so I wouldn’t frighten all her school friends away with what she called my “grimacing.” “I am doing my best,” I told him, just so that he wouldn’t worry.

  “As for the matter of your friend,” Hal said, sitting back again, “I really don’t know what to say. You’re right that it isn’t my jurisdiction—not at all—but I’m glad you came to me about it. You said you spoke to someone, and they told you he’d gone home?”

  “Yes,” I said, the smile slipping off my face as easily as it’d appeared. “That is the part I don’t understand. I was wondering if you’d have any more information about it, or if Professor Ducante had some official note?”

  “Nothing that I’ve heard of,” Hal admitted. “There have been a few because of this fever, but … Gaeth, you said?”

  “Yes,” I replied. “From Borland. I don’t know his surname.”

  “Doesn’t ring a bell,” Hal said, “but I suppose I could do some asking around. See if the dean knows anything.” He tapped his chin while he thought; the dreamy countenance he usually wore in class had been stripped away, replaced by an expression of sharper intelligence. It was easier now to see him as the hero who’d saved Thremedon in its hour of need, and I quickly looked away in order to avoid more vulgar staring. “I’ve been living in the Crescents while doing my own studies, so my knowledge of the dorms isn’t that extensive. I could find some things out for you, though. At the very least, what someone would have to do to withdraw in the middle of the semester. I’m betting there’s all kinds of paperwork to fill out, at the very least. Not to mention some kind of room inspection—which is strange, considering what you told me about the state you found his quarters in. Best to have all the information before we go to the Provost, or else they’ll waste time doing it themselves, and I’m afraid with the time it takes them to get that kind of business looked after, you won’t get your answers very fast.”

  “If there’s paperwork, I don’t think he could have filled it out by himself,
” I said, trying not to feel as though I was betraying Gaeth’s confidence by admitting his failings to someone as smart as Hal. “Perhaps Ducante might have had something to say about his essays.”

  “Like I said, I don’t remember the name,” Hal said apologetically. “It’s possible he never turned in anything at all.”

  “I wouldn’t be surprised to hear that,” I said.

  “No? I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” Hal said, sliding off the desk to get a bottle of ink, a pen, and some paper. “How do you spell his name?”

  I dictated the letters for him, ashamed at the relief I felt washing over me now that I’d unloaded my difficulties on someone else. But not only had I survived the conversation, it seemed that something good might even come of it, as well. Surely, someone who’d once saved the lives of countless magicians would be an enormous aid to Laure and me in saving one rather large citizen of Borland.

  “I’ll let you know if anything comes of this,” Hal said, waiting for the ink to dry. “And I’m glad you came to me, Toverre.”

  He reached out to give me some comfort—his hand upon my shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze—and I felt a combination of feelings, including elation and despair. He was smiling at me again, for encouragement, which clearly revealed the blue flecks in his eyes.

  “So am I,” I mumbled, and I stood quickly from the chair, bolting out the door without further word.

  BALFOUR

  The fever broke early in the morning on the fourth day. I knew the exact time, because I woke with a start, feeling as though someone had been calling my name. But the apartment was ghostly still, not even the pounding of boots overhead or the faint sound of carriage wheels upon cobblestones from outside to indicate I was anything but alone in the world.

  Then the clock on my bedside table chimed dully. It was five in the morning exactly, just before dawn, and I was so drenched in my own sweat that I was in dire need of a bath.

  I could tell the fever was gone because I felt lucid—and completely in control of myself—for the first time in four days. The first emotion I experienced was acute embarrassment. Then, overwhelmed by my gratitude at being well again, I ignored those pettier feelings.