“You inherited it.”
“No, they can’t be inherited as other goods can be. It’s not allowed. It was supposed to be buried with my grandfather when he passed. I’d been so fascinated by it, and he’d often show it to me to amuse me.”
“So you acquired it before he was buried.”
The professor paused. Then said, “After.”
“You . . . ?”
“You could call it my first archeological excavation.”
Karigan exchanged glances with Cade. She could not tell how he felt about that particular detail. Undoubtedly he’d known.
“Funny,” the professor murmured, “but I despise grave robbers and don’t hide the fact. Yet, it’s how I began. Stealing from the grave of my own grandfather.” He cleared his throat. “We’ve ten minutes—less now—to make it to the roof. Let us hurry.”
“What’s going on?” Cade asked.
The professor laughed. “The opposition is making its move.”
There was no time to ask questions. The professor sprinted off across the mill floor, and if she wanted answers, she had to follow. Cade looked just as perplexed as she felt.
They hurried after him, Karigan glad of the distraction the professor presented, a reprieve from dwelling on the . . . on the kiss. Just thinking of it warmed her cheeks. At the stairwell they each grabbed a taper and ran up the stairs, their feet clattering on the steps like a platoon of soldiers. They passed the landing that led to the artifact room, continued up past another landing with the door yawning open to who-knew-what. She had never explored beyond the third floor and was curious, but the professor’s pace did not waver. When they reached the fifth floor, the professor dove through the doorway, and Karigan found herself pursuing his shadow.
They emerged into another expansive mill floor, largely empty but for a few chests and crates piled in the center of the room. The professor walked over to a rope that dangled from the ceiling. He waited for Karigan and Cade to join him.
“We need to extinguish all but one of the tapers,” he said, “and the one will stay here on the floor at dimmest glow.”
When this was done, he said, “I don’t believe I need to remind you to remain silent, but I will anyway. Most likely we’d not be heard, but sound can carry in odd ways, and I’d rather not take a chance.”
He pulled down on the rope hanging from the ceiling and a ladder descended, unfolding to full length as it came. It must have been well-oiled for it did not make a single creak or groan. It seemed to Karigan another clever innovation of this time.
At the top of the ladder there was a trap door. The professor climbed, worked a mechanism in the door and carefully pushed it open. Again, it moved silently. Damp, cool air curled down through the opening. The professor beckoned Karigan and Cade to follow.
Karigan left behind the dim amber light pooling on the floor beneath her and climbed more by feel than sight. When she reached the opening and poked her head out, she saw the dirty skies had cleared enough to permit moonlight to guide her. She crawled onto the roof, rusted metal hard and rough on her hands and knees.
Rising to her feet, she patted dust off her trousers. Despite the professor’s urgency, all was quiet. What was supposed to happen at two hour? Karigan was distracted by the unusual vantage point the roof presented. She observed first not the sea of stars overhead, but the rivers of misty street lamps below, their glow spread and warped by the fog that snaked along at ground level. She was drawn toward the edge of the roof. At first she’d thought it flat, but it had a subtle slant, perhaps to shed rainfall and snowmelt into the canal below.
The reflection of street lamps glimmered in the canals. Other lights spread far out into the night and there was beauty in it. Beauty in a city where she’d found so little. The inventions of these people—her descendents—were almost like magic, able to do marvelous things, like the city streets lit up at night, or the mechanical man in the professor’s chronosphere. Some of it was magic. Harnessed etherea, as in the chronosphere. Somehow the empire had learned to meld magic and machine.
A dog bayed in the distance and Cade came up beside her. He took her arm and drew her away from the edge.
“Someone might see your silhouette against the stars,” he whispered, his lips almost brushing her ear. She trembled.
He released her. She steadied herself with a deep breath, and silently berated herself for her carelessness. She should know better, but the city seemed, for all its light, asleep, abandoned. Who would be up so late to chance sighting her?
Inspectors, she answered herself, and the view of those hundreds of street lamps burning away the dark of night became much less enchanting than they had been just a moment ago.
The professor gazed off in the direction of what she guessed to be the Old City. There were few lights in that direction, only tiny dots of illumination that gleamed across the river, but mostly it was dark. She discerned the mount as a hulk rising against the starscape of the sky.
What was the professor waiting for? What did he expect to happen?
The clanging of bells made her jump. From the many towers of the mill complexes, the hour pealed out. Two tollings for two hour. Karigan yawned as the bells reminded her she was up well past bedtime.
Even after the resonance of the bells lingered on the air and then faded out, the professor waited, head cocked, but nothing changed. Eventually he shrugged and indicated they should climb back down into the mill. No one spoke until the professor, last on the ladder, closed the trap door after him and descended to the mill floor.
“What did you expect to see?” Cade asked, brightening each taper.
“I wasn’t sure I expected to see anything or hear anything. Actually, I hoped to hear nothing, because it was supposed to happen at two, right on the bell.”
“What was supposed to happen at two?” Cade asked, an edge to his voice.
Karigan thought it interesting the professor kept things even from Cade.
“Oh, we’ve done a little something—or at least I hope we have—to slow down Silk’s drill project. If we have succeeded, I am sure it will be the talk of town tomorrow. You’ll hear the rumors.”
“You know that whatever you’ve done, Silk will retaliate,” Cade said.
“I do know.”
“He’ll punish innocent people, unless your men were careless enough to get caught. What if they are and they give away secrets?”
“Sacrifice for the cause is necessary.” The professor’s voice had grown very quiet. The light accentuated the crags and lines on his face. “All involved know the dangers they face. They will not betray us in the unlikely circumstance they are captured.”
“And the innocents Silk will punish in their stead?”
“This is war, Cade. In every war there is collateral damage.”
A chill caught hold of Karigan. Every time she thought she knew the professor, some new facet of him surfaced. Every time she was lulled by his kindness and humor, she saw another side. This one was cold, dispassionate. One had to be willing to sacrifice for one’s ideals, but cold-bloodedly and willingly give up the lives of innocents? She averted her gaze, wondering how that made him any different from Silk or the emperor.
“If Silk or his cohorts should ever learn our secrets,” the professor continued, deadly calm, “you know what to do.”
“I do,” Cade said.
Hide and protect Arhys, Karigan thought. As a Weapon, that would be his primary objective. She studied his face. His expression was both determined and . . . disturbed. Was he as disturbed as she by the professor’s willingness to accept the deaths of innocents?
As if the world were once again daylit and sunny, the professor’s whole posture and demeanor changed, and he strode off before they could ask more questions. “Come, you two,” he called over his shoulder. “We must have a look at Cade’s social calendar.”<
br />
• • •
Back down in the library section of the second floor, the professor explained, his chair tilted back and his feet propped on his desk.
“Silk has scored a point against us,” he said. “He has skillfully found a way to cut me from attending his dinner party as Miss Goodgrave’s escort and chaperone.”
“What did he do?” Cade asked.
The professor tapped an ornate letter opener against his knee that looked like it could do much damage to more than just a letter. “He ensured a mandatory meeting with the board was called at the university, to review my projects and ensure they are worth funding. No funding and the opposition, I’m afraid to say, loses its front.” At Karigan’s quizzical expression, he explained, “The shield behind which the opposition hides much of its activities.”
Karigan thought she understood. The university gave the professor contacts through a range of societal levels, allowed him to keep watch on Dr. Silk and dabble in research and excavations, secretly, of course, that were outside the parameters of his official projects. Adding to his collection on the third floor, for instance.
“Dr. Silk will take Raven away if we don’t go,” Karigan said.
“I know, my dear, but that’s only if you don’t go. You are the important one. It’s you he wishes to see, not me. He thinks if he parts us, you are unprotected and vulnerable to his designs. That is why I’m sending Cade in my stead. You must prepare your best suit, Old Button.”
Cade gawped from his chair. “Me? B-but—!”
“You did not seem to object to being in Miss Goodgrave’s presence before.”
Cade’s cheeks flooded with red. Karigan felt herself warm again.
“Besides,” the professor said, “it’s about time you started delving into the social intrigues and not just your books and weapons, eh?”
Cade cast about himself as if looking for some excuse to present itself. “But I am nothing to those people—they will just look down on me.”
“Exactly!” The professor pointed the letter opener at him. “They will underestimate you. Yes, they will know you are my protégé, but because of your lower status, they will dismiss you at the same time. You will use that to listen and observe in a way that I cannot. They will treat you like a servant, forget that you’ve eyes and ears, and you will bring your observations back to me. You will also keep a sharp eye on Miss Goodgrave here and ensure she isn’t beguiled into any missteps by Silk’s charm.”
Cade did not protest. He said nothing at all, his gaze projected straight ahead. Karigan did not think he’d make a very good spy—he was much too transparent in his thoughts, but she believed the professor had it right about the upper class guests regarding him as no more than a servant. They’d ignore him.
“I haven’t got a good enough suit,” Cade said finally. “No evening wear.”
“All the better,” the professor replied. “It will just reinforce your low status.”
Now Cade stared at the ceiling as if trying to suppress further argument.
“I haven’t got the full list of guests,” the professor said, “but I know the city master and his wife are invited, along with some of the elite of this city and the Capital.”
“The Capital?” Cade’s voice was tight.
“Yes, my boy. They’ll be even less informed about the lower class, since they are not exposed to it in the same way they would be if they lived in Mill City. They’ll find you quaint. Perhaps mildly exotic.”
Cade swallowed, said nothing. Karigan almost laughed at the idea of him as mildly exotic. And she had kissed him!
It was not the distant clamor of the bells that roused Lhean from the deep meditations that left him adrift in memories of verdant Eletia. No, many bells had come and gone without his notice, but this time there was something underlying the metallic clamor, like thunder in the earth. The minutest tremor reverberated through his body, so subtle that, besides himself, perhaps only burrowing creatures could feel it. Fine dust stirred in the air. A thread of unrest rattled through the rubble of the old castle.
Lhean sharpened his awareness, and when the second tolling came, he heard beneath it the subdued thunder, three separate blasts of it, that broke apart earth and rock, a power like the great magicks of old, which he was too young to have witnessed.
But etherea was gone from here. He climbed out of his crevice and in the night saw nothing amiss, but on the air drifted a hint of burning powder like that which he’d smelled after the firing of the shooting devices. In time, the scent became more pronounced.
He must not slip into his dream-memories again. They’d sustained him for now, but something new was afoot, and he must keep watch.
SILK
“I don’t care if we have to empty all the mills of slaves to find enough labor,” Silk told the construction boss. “I will have the road repaired by this afternoon, at three hour at the latest.”
“B-but—”
“If you cannot see that it is done,” Silk said, leaning down from his saddle and pointing his riding crop at the man, “I shall appoint someone else, and you can join the slave gang in their work.”
“Yes, sir. Three hour.”
Silk nodded, and after a swift bow, the man ran off to make his arrangements. Silk sat erect once again in his saddle. Even now his household slaves were raising a canopy for his comfort while he waited.
Down the slope of the Old City’s mount, the morning light shone on his caravan where it waited at a standstill on the winding road. It consisted of Moody and his assistants from the machine shop, guards, laborers, and a long, specially constructed wagon hauled by a team of mules. It was laden with his precious drill, all covered in canvas. Even so, a steely glow permeated the cloth. Silk wondered if others saw it or if it was just an effect of his own peculiar sight.
He wrenched his stallion around and gazed up the road where a swarm of slaves were already at work repairing the first crater that had been blasted by the opposition. It had been a nasty surprise to find the first one, and even nastier to learn there’d been five others. He’d posted guards up at the drillhouse on the summit, but he hadn’t thought to cover the road. After all, the drillhouse and steam engine would be the more obvious targets, wouldn’t they? But they hadn’t been touched.
The guards had been killed stealthily, with knives driven into their backs. Silk tapped his crop on the toe of his boot. Why hadn’t the insurgents blasted the steam engine or the drillhouse? If they’d really wanted to slow him down, that’s what they should have done. Perhaps they feared his reaction?
It was true that if the steam engine were harmed, he would have butchered every inhabitant of this sorry city if he had to in order to find the culprits. So the opposition had moderated its crime hoping to escape the worst of his wrath. Spineless. A wasted opportunity on their part.
Still, there was some logic in their choice, if their desire was to preserve lives. Yes, undoubtedly some would die as a result of his inquiry into the blasting of his road, but there would be no bloodbath. Not today, anyway. He’d immediately tasked the chief of the Inspector force here in the city with the investigation. Clearly, the perpetrators knew how to use black powder and had some access to it. That gave the Inspectors a starting point.
In contrast, Silk reflected, the emperor would have commanded his troops to haul people out of their houses and stores and slaughter them, heedless of their guilt or innocence, to send a message to his enemies. In theory, it would turn the populace against the opposition for giving the emperor cause to shed the blood of so many. Sometimes such demonstrations worked to bring the insurgents out of hiding, to sacrifice themselves to prevent further killing, but more often than not, Silk thought, it just caused them to go to ground. And for all the emperor’s demonstrations over the decades, there was still an opposition that refused to learn his lessons.
They struck in s
uch a way to expect a more moderate response, Silk thought. So fine, I will give them that. I will take a more surgical route. They will drop their guard, and if we can catch even just one of the scoundrels, we can extract useful information from him. Maybe get him to give up his fellows. Then we exterminate the opposition once and for all.
He absently watched the dim shapes of slaves moving rocks and debris. His horse stamped its hoof as a fly tried to settle on its wither.
If, Silk thought, his approach proved successful and led to the fall of the opposition, it could only bring him closer to the emperor’s inner circle, and immortality.
• • •
An hour later found Silk properly situated in a comfortable reclining armchair beneath a canopy, his feet propped on a cushioned footstool. Even with his dark specs, the light made his head ache. One of his servants refilled his crystal glass with lemonade. Another wielded a large fan to keep him cool and prevent insects from alighting on him. Farther up the slope, slaves toiled to repair the road, their numbers supplemented by workers pulled from one of the Churlyn Mills. He’d no doubt Churlyn himself was furious, but he was barely of Preferred status and had no recourse against the likes of Silk. Churlyn would not make his day’s production quota. Silk shrugged, unconcerned, and sipped his drink.
The fringe of the canopy flapped listlessly in the breeze. There was the clatter of slaves pounding on rocks, the shouts of overseers, and the snorts and neighs of beasts.
Every thirty minutes, one of the Inspectors offered an update on their investigation. Little, of course, had been achieved in so short a time, but the Inspectors were diligently rounding up men in the city known to work with black powder or who otherwise dealt in it, for questioning. As Adherent Minister of the Interior, Silk’s father was in charge of the Inspector force, so it was only natural that the members of the force would defer to the powerful minister’s son. As the current thirty minutes lapsed, an Inspector came forward with a filthy man whose wrists were manacled and attached with chains to an Enforcer. The Enforcer dragged him along until he stumbled to a stop in front of Silk.
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