The Toymaker's Apprentice

by Sherri L. Smith

  Abruptly, the singing stopped. The midwife, a brown mouse with surprisingly large feet, stepped through the doorway and pulled two pieces of cotton out of her ears. This must be Old Marmade. If the old girl was disturbed by the delivery, she didn’t show it. Likely the little nursemaid had merely been overwrought. New to the birthing chamber, perhaps. It could certainly be startling to witness a birth—that alarming shade of fuchsia, the sheer number of babes—but it could hardly be called unnatural.

  “She’ll see you now,” the midwife said. “Mind she don’t start singing with you standing there. If she does”—she held up the cotton—“there’s more by the bedside. Or better yet, bow your excuses and go.”

  Ernst thanked her, although what backwater superstition the mouse was referring to, he had no idea. The Queen had summoned him shortly after the hysterical nursemaid had collapsed in his arms. There had been little time to wonder at her puzzling pronouncement. Now he would see the princes for himself.

  He stepped into the chamber and bowed deeply. “Your Majesty,” he intoned with all the dignity he could manage.

  He did not look up until the Queen spoke. She sounded tired, as one would expect, but somehow even more so. As if her voice was starting to wear thin.

  “Come, Herr Tutor. Meet your princes.”

  Ernst straightened from his bow, swept his tail behind him, and regarded the room. He was in a sizable parlor, comfortably outfitted with chairs and a fireplace. Beyond this first room, a set of double doors stood open to the Queen’s sleeping chambers. It was from this room that she had spoken.

  Her bed was a large, round, sumptuous-looking thing that made her look small. Beside the bed stood a bassinet draped in a matching deep purple velvet counterpane and creamy white linens. Gauzy purple fabric draped the bassinet in a canopy. The floor had been strewn with herbs in an attempt to freshen the stifling air. Sage and lavender tickled Ernst’s nose, but did little to quell the meaty scent of blood.

  He reached the foot of the bed, and bowed once more to the Queen. She nodded with a self-satisfied air.

  Ernst pulled back the filmy drapes and looked into the bassinet.

  A sound escaped his throat. He cleared it quickly. The nursemaid had been correct.

  Tucked into the soft sheets, pink as scalded moles, the seven princes mewled blindly, as did every other mouse litter Ernst had ever witnessed.

  Only, this was not a litter. This was . . .

  A monstrosity. Seven heads perched on one small body, squashed from birth. Seven noses sluggishly pushed against the air, seeking their mother. Seven heads. Four paws. One tail. It would be a mercy to kill it now.

  Ernst’s tail lashed violently, betraying his horror. He blinked and sought something to say to the Queen.

  Surely they would not live. Defects such as this . . . nature wouldn’t allow it.

  “Majesties,” he managed to whisper at last, and dropped to one knee in a bow that showed humility to the Queen and her children, but also allowed him to hide his face until he had recovered.

  “My Queen, you must rest. You have clearly labored long and hard. I . . . await the day, madam, when I can . . . serve your young.”

  He was going to be sick. The scents of lavender, copper, salt, and sage were stifling, the room too warm, the walls too close. He stood swiftly and backed out of the chamber with his head down before the Queen could say anything more. If she asked him to stay, he would not do it. If she asked him to stay, he would slay the beastly thing—things?—in its crib.

  But she did not stop him.

  Ernst reached the door and turned on his heel, escaping into the foyer. It seemed wide as a meadow compared to the chamber of horrors at his back. He paused only to close the door.

  His last glimpse of the Queen showed her smiling fondly as she pulled the bassinet closer to her bed and, once again, began to sing.

  THE CREAKING OF WOOD and the sound of lapping water woke him, along with a faint, persistent scratching. Zacharias Drosselmeyer stretched and yawned. He’d been having such a pleasant dream. He was being rocked like a baby in a cradle, as that little princess, what was her name? Pirlipat. Funny name. Christian had told such a curious story about the little girl. Something about mice—

  He came awake, as if a bucket of cold water had splashed him in the face. “Stefan!” he shouted, but the name came out as a croak.

  “You’re awake! That fool shouldn’t have given you a second cup,” a small voice said. A child’s voice would have had more resonance than the one that addressed him now—but this was clearly an adult male. And not the man in scarlet.

  “Where is my son?” Zacharias demanded. He tried to sit up, only to find that he was tied down to planks like a real-life Gulliver.

  The voice came closer. “Safe in Nuremberg. For now. As long as you cooperate.” There was that scratching again. The voice passed back and forth along his right ear. If it weren’t pitch-black, Zacharias would have sworn the speaker was pacing close to the floor.

  “Cooperate? This is preposterous. I’m your prisoner!”

  “Regrettable,” the little voice said. It had a strange accent he could not place. “But there is a remedy. You will answer a few questions.”

  “Where am I?” Zacharias demanded. His anger was the only thing keeping despair at bay. He clung to it like a shield.

  “Far away from home. Where you are needed most.”

  For a wild moment, Zacharias imagined himself in the satchel of Krampus, the Christmas demon that took away bad boys and girls. Or, perhaps he was being delivered to Father Christmas, forced into service in his toy workshop . . .

  Zacharias groaned. Whatever he’d consumed in those two thimblefuls of liquid, it was affecting his mind. He was in a boat, that much he was sure of. He could smell the river and hear the slap of water against the hull.

  He slumped back against the ropes holding him to the floor. He would cooperate. He’d do anything to keep his son safe. “Tell me, what is it you want?”

  A door opened. The scarlet man, now dressed in black, appeared and untied him. Zacharias stumbled on weak legs as the deck pitched gently beneath him. He was in a windowless ship’s cabin, crowded with a large writing desk and stool. Sheaves of clean paper lay stacked beside an inkwell. The scarlet man hung a lantern above the desk without saying a word, then left, locking the door behind him.

  Zacharias sat at the desk, unsure of what to do next.

  From nowhere and everywhere, the small voice spoke to him. “Describe the following apparatus. Blueprints, please,” it said.

  Zacharias waited, listened to the description, pen poised over the page. The words made no sense at first, and he asked the voice to repeat them.

  “But what is this—”

  “No questions!” the voice snapped. “Consider it an exercise.”

  “An exercise?” Zacharias muttered, flexing his fingers around the pen. With a sigh, he put nib to paper and began to draw.

  THE WHEELS OF THE WAGON drummed against the cobblestones as the weatherworn carriage made its way out of the black forests and into the riverside streets of Regensberg. Stefan huddled in the corner of the backseat, using his coat as a blanket. He dozed in and out of sleep. His whole body was numb. He told himself it was from the jouncing of the coach, but that was a lie. His parents were gone. Better to be numb than afraid.

  Their plan was simple. Samir and Christian had explained it to him as they hurried to meet the last coach of the night.

  “If the mice have him, they will bring him to Boldavia,” Christian said. “Under the castle . . . in the dark.” A haunted look had crossed his face.

  “But Herr Grüel said every toymaker that’s disappeared has turned up a few days later. We should wait here,” Stefan had insisted. Christian and Samir had not agreed.

  “Believe me, Stefan, if I thought waiting was the best course of
action, we would stay. But Zacharias is family—a Drosselmeyer. Whatever it is they wanted a toymaker for, they now have someone far more valuable. The Queen of Mice will want him brought to her.”

  “Is it a trap?” Stefan had asked. Was his father merely bait to lure Christian back to Boldavia? “Don’t they know you’d return anyway, with the—”

  Christian pressed a finger to his lips to stop him from speaking. “Please,” he said in a hushed voice. “We are far from safe here. Seven years is a very long time to a mouse. The queen is ready for this to be over, as am I. It’s time to pay the piper, as they say.” He tapped his eye patch, beneath which lay the krakatook. “At least now we have the fee. When we cure the princess, the king will owe us a boon. What’s more, he’ll do anything to stop the mice from hurting his family again. With his soldiers beside us, we will sweep Boldavia clean. Your father will be found, Stefan, and the mice will be routed at last.”

  And so they had stolen to the edge of town by cover of darkness, and boarded the carriage to Regensberg.

  “End of the line!” the coachman bellowed, and he jumped down from his perch, rocking the carriage. Stefan startled awake. They had come to a stop in front of an old, bedraggled alehouse.

  “Quickly now,” Christian urged. He rose, stretching like a cat beneath his coat, and ushered them toward the alehouse. “We can find a boat here. Most of the sailors take their leave inside.”

  Stefan shivered in anticipation. He had never been this far from home before. Now, he hoped every step away brought him closer to his father.

  The river winds had weathered the alehouse to a sad brownish gray. Above the door was a sign showing a lady with a blue river for hair. Die Donau, the sign read. The Danube.

  “I’ll do the talking,” Christian told them.

  Inside, Die Donau was everything Stefan had imagined a wharfside tavern to be—dark, smoky, full of disreputable, rough men and harried barmaids. Their entrance brought a few stares—though far fewer than Stefan would have expected, for an Arab, a boy, and a one-eyed man. Stefan followed Samir to a table near the fireplace while Christian sauntered up to the bar, nodding a few hellos to people as he passed.

  Stefan blinked in surprise. “He knows these people?”

  Samir returned a wave from the barmaid. “Of course. We were here but a few days ago. And we have crossed paths with many sailors in our long years abroad. Perhaps you thought we’d only find cutthroats and thieves?”

  “These are the wharves!” Stefan exclaimed. “They’re notoriously dangerous, day or night.”

  “Yes,” Samir agreed. “For some people. Look around you, Stefan. Look with both eyes, and tell me what you see.”

  Stefan scanned the room, trying not to make eye contact. “I see rough men with thick hands and scars.” Stranglers and knife-wielding murderers, he imagined.

  “Sailors,” Samir said simply. “Their hands are rough from work, and the scars are from battling the rapids of the Danube, not tavern brawls. Well, not many.”

  Stefan took a third look. The man at the table closest to them was practicing knots. At another table, a man was making fishing lures.

  The barmaid whisked by with a wink, depositing three large mugs of steaming broth on their table. “Take your order in a minute, Herr Samir,” she said breezily.

  Stefan sighed. “I’m sorry. I guess I’m seeing menace everywhere now.”

  “It’s understandable,” Samir said. “And at least you were being honest. But trust me, there are far worse places than Die Donau.”

  Stefan wrapped his cold hands gratefully around the mug, inhaling the scent of mutton and onions. He was starving.

  “Little sips, it’s hot,” Christian said, coming over to them. He patted Stefan on the shoulder and sat down. “Georg knows of two barges headed south in the morning. One stops in Budapest, the other goes all the way to Silistra. With any luck, we can catch the Silistra-bound boat the rest of the way to Bulgaria.”

  “Not until morning?” Stefan asked. Worry fluttered in his belly.

  “It’s better than going by land,” Samir replied, stretching his arms against the table. “No matter how smooth the horse or sturdy the boot.”

  “Provided we avoid the pirates,” Christian agreed.

  “Pirates?” Stefan said. “You’re joking.”

  “I’m afraid not. Of course, there are bandits on horseback, too, and wandering soldiers, the war, et cetera. So one path’s just as good as another.”

  Stefan almost dropped his mug. “You think mice can navigate my father safely through all of that?”

  Christian frowned. “Not mice, Stefan. Men. You’ve taken commissions in your shop based solely on a letter, haven’t you? More than one highwayman or pirate has done the dirty work for the kingdoms of Man and Animal alike.”

  Stefan had lost his appetite. He excused himself quickly from the table and strode out to the alehouse yard.

  Outside, the air was fresh and damp. He bent over, resting his hands on his knees, and watched a speckled flock of hens scratch in the dirt. At his feet, a small purple flower struggled in the worn wagon treads and boot marks of passersby. Its delicate petals trembled in the wind. He was moved by a sudden urge to protect the little blossom, even if it meant plucking it. His mother would press it into a book, the way she had placed her wedding nosegay in the family Bible.

  Stefan pulled a handkerchief from his pocket to wipe away the sudden tears that overcame him. The cloth scraped his cheek and he laughed involuntarily. It was Clara’s handkerchief, complete with the crooked “S.” Brown-eyed Clara, the embroiderer in the gardens. She was right; the linen was not so delicate after all.

  Stefan rose. This was no time to daydream about clever girls with wry smiles and extra handkerchiefs. He was on a mission. Two missions, really, if you counted his father and the princess (a real princess!). He should force himself to eat something and get to bed. They’d be sailing with the dawn.

  He returned the handkerchief to his breast pocket. He would wash it tonight and dry it by the fire. Maybe when all of this was over, he could return it to her, along with tales of all the places it had been. Regensburg was only the first.

  THE QUEEN OF MICE was out of bed. She had recovered rather quickly, given the circumstances, Ernst noted. Childbirth had not been kind to her. Delivered of her burden, she was still ponderous and swollen. Her fur had taken on a coarser, wintry tint. It occurred to him she was much older than he had originally guessed. Regardless, here she was, holding court with much pomp and circumstance to present her true heir and only sons.

  Ernst hung back at the farthest end of the throne room, unwilling to come closer to the royal bassinet. Around him, the mice of Boldavia were dressed in their finest clothes. They crowded forward, each wanting to be first in line to give their respects. Or to confirm the rumors.

  The nursemaid hadn’t stopped with Ernst, it turned out. From the the size of the crowd, it seemed she had run the entire length of the country crowing about the disfigured prince. Ernst pressed his back to the wall, allowing a pale mouse in a gown the color of autumn leaves to pass in front of him. She still managed to step on his left foot. The crush of mice would have been suffocating if Ernst was any shorter. But he was tall enough to see over everyone in the room, even the piebalds that guarded each entrance and ringed the back of the dais where the Queen and her bassinet stood on view. Blackspaw was there, along with Snitter, the old spy who’d recruited him in Vienna.

  Snitter gave a nod of acknowledgment, which Ernst respectfully returned. He wondered what the old piebald thought of the new princes. Would the Queen’s subjects remain loyal once they saw what they were kneeling to? Ernst supposed they might. Loyalty ran deep in Boldavia.

  Three trumpeters in purple livery stepped forward, playing an impressive fanfare. A mouse in a ridiculous powdered wig and long, gold-trimmed coat strode up to the dais wi
th a scroll in both paws. He unrolled it with great care, revealing the heavily calligraphed birth announcement.

  “Her Royal Highness, the Queen of Boldavia presents to you the new royal highnesses, your sovereign princes—Arthur, Hannibal, Charlemagne, Alexander, Genghis, Roland, and Julius. Heirs to the thrones of Boldavia, above and below.”

  The crowd cheered. Interesting, Ernst thought. Not only had the beast, er, beasts survived, but the Queen had named them after royal conquerors from the world of Men. If they lived, he would do well to learn their names—and hide his own distaste. Seven or seven-in-one, they were his charges now.

  The page droned on in his pronouncements and Ernst allowed his mind to wander, down into the depths of the castle, to the chamber where that terrible mechanical cat was kept. Perhaps it would take a monster to fight such monsters, he surmised.

  And then the Queen was rising from her throne. As one, the mice in the throne room dropped to one knee. Ernst snapped his attention back to the present and quickly followed suit.

  He had to admire the old cow’s strength of will. She stood beside the royal bassinet, cooing over her creation. Dreamy-eyed and looking strangely tender, she hunched over the crib, the purple draperies blending in with her gown. Her royal crown perched daintily upon her head.

  The Queen looked down at her subjects and smiled. “Thou may rise and see Our sons.”

  She reached into the bassinet and pulled out a wriggling bundle of linen and lace.

  The audience rose. Whiskers quivered, noses quested, eyes strained to see the new brood.

  The Queen raised her children into her arms. With a twitch, the linen and lace dropped away.

  Seven heads turned to blink at their royal subjects, bleary-eyed and unfocused. Seven ruddy pink heads, seven quavering noses. Fourteen black eyes, lids sliding open and closed in unison. One pink, tiny tail twitching in the sudden chill. The otherwise perfect body trembled slightly, held aloft in its mother’s arms.