by Gwynn White
She lay the necklace beside her on the bed. “Lock?”
The chain appeared to retract into the medallion, then morphed into the familiar metal dragon she knew so well.
“Oh wow. You really do have other forms.” She hadn’t imaged what she saw in that alley.
He gave her a little whirr of agreement, then sprang up to her shoulder. With something like a purr, he rubbed his cheek against hers.
She reached up to brush a finger beneath his chin. “I just don’t know what to make of you. Or him.”
Lock purred, then hopped down onto the bed. With a flap of his silver wings, he leapt across the short distance separating them from the table.
Finding no answers, Briar got to her feet and walked to the curtained nook that held her bunk. There was nothing to do but follow her own instructions and get to bed. She shrugged off her waistcoat and the shirt followed. She hesitated before pulling on her nightgown, noting with unease the bruises the soulless had left on her when he clutched her heart. What would have happened if Grayson hadn’t found her? Had he once suffered a similar experience?
Her mind flashed back to the scar she’d seen on his chest—before he’d climbed from the bathtub as bare as the day he was born.
Her cheeks heated again with the memory.
“Dear God,” she complained, pulling on the nightgown. What was with all the blushing? It wasn’t like he was the first naked man she’d ever seen. He was just the first one she didn’t mind looking at.
She groaned and dropped onto her bunk. “It’s the bourbon,” she told herself, though she had only one glass. “And the stress.” It had been a very stressful day—well, couple of days.
With a click of tiny claws, Lock slipped beneath the curtain and hopped up on the bed with her. Scampering across the sheets, he climbed onto her pillow and gazed up at her.
“Yes, you’re right,” she told him. “I just need some sleep.”
She lay down, and Lock crawled over to curl against her shoulder. Did an automaton need to sleep? She’d have to ask Grayson—if he would tell her.
“So many unanswered questions,” she muttered, letting sleep overtake her.
She was buttoning her waistcoat when a knock on the hatch door drew her out of her room.
“Captain?”
She instantly recognized Grayson’s voice. “What is it?” she called out, unease tightening her stomach. Did he have some indication that Solon had found them?
“The crew has informed me that I am now cook—until one can be hired. The equipment I need to do my job is in your chambers.”
She climbed up the ladder and pushed open the hatch. “Cabin,” she corrected, climbing out.
He held the hatch for her, smiling at the correction.
“Well, go ahead.” She waved a hand at the open hatch.
“You would allow me to visit your…cabin? Alone?”
“Yes. This is a canal boat. Any semblance of private space is merely a courtesy from your fellow boatmen, not an actual physical space. Besides,” she lowered her voice as she continued, “you are already aware of the one thing I consider private. He’s curled up on my pillow.”
Grayson’s smile grew. “He sleeps with you?”
“Don’t be perverse, sir.” She hesitated. “Unless there’s a reason he shouldn’t.”
“No, and I wasn’t being perverse. Merely surprised.”
She lifted a brow, but he didn’t comment further.
“Well, go on,” she said. “I assume you know where everything is.” After all, he had cooked dinner yesterday.
“Yes, ma’am.”
“Then get to it, and I’ll get this boat underway.”
A final grin, and Grayson disappeared down the ladder.
She turned away, smiling to herself, and discovered Eli at the tiller deck, frowning at her.
“What?” she demanded. “He’s making breakfast.”
Eli wordlessly turned back to the rope he was coiling. She hated being at odds with him, but she had to trust her instincts. And her instincts kept telling her that Grayson wasn’t the bad guy.
9
Captain?” Eli called to her from the tiller deck.
Briar looked up from her mopping. “What is it?”
“We’re coming up on lock thirty-four.”
She dropped her mop in the bucket and turned. He was right. The land flattened out considerably once north of Chillicothe, and she could easily see the lock in the distance.
“Looks like we won’t be doubling up,” Eli added.
Shielding her eyes against the bright morning sun, Briar squinted. Eli was right. The miter gates were closed on their side, indicating that the water within the lock would need to be lowered to their level.
“Looks like we’ll need to fit the lock.” She remembered how Uncle Charlie used to complain about that, but he remembered the days when the Ohio & Erie used to employ lock tenders. There were still men who held the title, but their job was to maintain the upkeep of the locks, waste ways, and sluices. They didn’t open and close the locks for the passing boats.
“Where’s Jimmy?” she asked.
“Below deck, with Mr. Grayson. Apparently, he offered to fix Jimmy’s watch.” Eli frowned. “I hope he doesn’t break it beyond repair. That watch belonged to Jimmy’s father.”
“Mr. Grayson can fix watches?”
“So he claims.”
This she had to see. Walking to the hatch, she called down to Jimmy. “We’re about to lock through.”
“Coming, Captain,” Jimmy’s voice echoed up from below. A moment later, he climbed through the hatch.
“How are the repairs going?” she asked.
“He just took it all apart.” Jimmy’s brow wrinkled in concern.
“I’ll go check on his progress if you don’t mind taking care of things up here?”
“Thank you, Captain.” Jimmy looked relieved already. “I never expected that old watch to ever work again, but I’d like to keep it in one piece, all the same.”
Not sure how Jimmy expected her to remedy the situation, Briar shook her head. Being captain wasn’t just about navigating the boat or keeping the books. Sometimes, she was just expected to make things right—even if she was the youngest person on this boat, save Benji. Still amused, she climbed down the ladder into her cabin.
Mr. Grayson sat at the table hunched over a towel that held an assortment of tiny gears and other pieces.
He glanced up, then turned back to what he was doing. “Turn the sausages for me?” He paused long enough to gesture at the stove, but kept his focus on the watch.
All right, not everyone aboard her boat saw her as captain.
“At least you phrased it as a question.” She walked to the stove, inhaling the wonderful scent of freshly cooked sausage.
“I didn’t figure you wanted me to burn your breakfast,” Grayson answered.
She picked up a fork and carefully turned each sausage in the heavy cast iron pan. Finished, she walked over to the table to see what he was doing. It appeared that he was reassembling all the tiny pieces and was perhaps, nearing completion of the task. She must have misunderstood when Jimmy said he’d just disassembled the watch.
“I hope you know what you’re doing.” She stared at all those parts crammed in such a tiny space. How had he remembered what went where? “That watch is important to Jimmy.”
“It didn’t work and hasn’t for some time.” He picked up a gear with a small set of tweezers. The black tool bag he’d used to repair the rudder was open on the table beside him.
“It belonged to his father,” she explained. “He drowned when Jimmy was seventeen.”
“The watch was submerged?”
“I…guess.”
“There was some corrosion,” Grayson continued, seeming untroubled by the morbidity of his conclusion. “The inner workings were cheaply made. Fortunately, I had some replacement parts.”
Now that he’d drawn her attention to it, she noticed t
hat the watch’s inner workings were bright and shiny, unlike the dull metal of the case. “You mean, Mr. Martel had some spares.”
“Yes.” He picked up one of the gears and carefully aligned it with the one he had just mounted. “It’ll run forever when I’m done, submerged or not.”
She lifted a brow, though he didn’t look up to see it.
He picked up a tiny screwdriver and leaned closer.
She watched him work for a few minutes. “That’s amazing.”
“Thank you.”
A laugh escaped her. “Not you. I meant that all those intricate little parts can fit together and keep time.”
He glanced up then back down once more. “Though complicated, it’s a simple mechanical principle.”
“Show me?”
“If you like, but pull the sausages out of the pan for me?”
“Oh.” She had forgotten all about them. She hurried back to the pan and was relieved that none had burned. Transferring them to a plate, she set it on the back of the stove to stay warm before returning to the table.
“Here, look at this.” Grayson absently scooted over, making room for her on the bench.
She sat down, not so certain she cared for this closeness. She considered moving to the seat across from him when he leaned over to show her what he was doing. She realized she wouldn’t be able to see the tiny mechanism from over there.
“The basic principle is the storage of power in a wound spring, the mainspring”—he tapped a circular housing with his tweezers—“and releasing that power in a controlled way.” He launched into a surprisingly technical explanation about the movement of the balance wheel and the alignment of a host of gears and pinions that transferred the stored power in the spring to the calibrated movement of the hands.
Briar soon forgot about his closeness, leaning in to better see and asking questions. She’d always been interested in the inner workings of mechanical things. Uncle Charlie had taken her to task more than once when she’d disassembled something just to see how it worked. But she’d never had the nerve to tear into a timepiece.
Grayson, on the other hand, had clearly done this before. His movements as he worked were confident and precise, and his knowledge of the topic made it obvious that he had some training, or at least, a lot of experience.
He tightened the final screw and set aside his screwdriver.
“And that’s it?” she asked.
“Yes. It will keep perfect time now.” He pulled his own watch from his pocket and passed it to her. “Allow me to reattach the hands, then you can compare them.”
She pressed the button to open the cover and display the watch face. “So you’re going to validate your claim with your own pocket watch?”
“That watch was a gift, crafted by a master watchmaker. You’ll find none finer.”
She studied the smooth motion of the second hand. “Are you telling me it’s ferromancer made?”
He lifted his gaze from Jimmy’s watch. “It’s those sorts of comments that have cost many a talented craftsman his life.” A muscle ticked in his jaw with his restrained anger.
His anger surprised her. “I’m sorry. You work for one, and I encountered another’s minion yesterday. I have ferromancy on my mind.”
He released a breath. “You’re right. I apologize for the outburst.” He returned to his work.
“I’d hardly call it an outburst.” She watched him for a moment. “So, who was he?”
“Who was who?”
“This watchmaker who died. The one who gave you this watch.”
Grayson glanced up. “I never told you that.”
“I put two and two together.” She held his gaze. “Will you tell me? Is he the one who taught you how to fix watches?”
Grayson sighed. “His name was Fabrice Martel—no relation, before you ask.”
She smiled at that.
“He had immigrated from Paris and ran a little shop on the outskirts of London. He took me in as an apprentice when I was eight.”
She lifted a brow. “That sounds young.”
“I had—have an aptitude for mechanical things.”
“I’m beginning to see that.”
“No ferromancy involved,” he hurried to add.
She smiled. “I wasn’t going to ask. I might be hard-headed, but I’m not stupid.”
“I’m beginning to see that,” he threw her words back at her, a glint of humor in his gaze.
She resisted the urge to roll her eyes. “How long did you work for this man?”
“Three years. Aside from the convent, it’s the longest I’ve lived anywhere.”
“You’re an orphan?”
“More or less.”
She frowned, not sure what to make of his answer. Perhaps he still had parents, but they had given him up for some reason. She wasn’t going to ask for details, but his answers only created more questions.
“I’m surprised that a pocket watch still impresses you after being around ferromancers and creations like Lock,” she said.
“Fabrice couldn’t mold the gears with his mind or feel the imperfections in a hairspring, yet he produced watch after watch of meticulous perfection.” Grayson spoke the words with passion and a clear admiration for the man and his talent. “You met the soulless. That’s what ferromancers create.”
“Not all.”
Grayson glanced over, a frown now on his face.
She reached up and pulled off the necklace. “Whatever your relation and feelings toward him, you must admit that Mr. Martel is different.” She laid the medallion on the table. “Lock?”
Like the night before, the chain retracted into the medallion and an instant later, Lock sat in the center of the table, blinking at them with his gem-like eyes.
She held out her hand. and with a whirr of what might be happiness, he rubbed his cheek against her finger.
“I find pocket watches—or any mechanical design—fascinating,” she admitted. “But I don’t see how you can compare that to this.”
“You’re enamored with the construct because it can move on its own.”
She ignored his blatant effort to avoid using a male pronoun. “That aspect is incredible, but if I understand you right, his animation has nothing to do with his design.” She brushed a finger along Lock’s neck beside the raised scales that ran down his spine and along his back. “Look at this intricacy. Each individual scale is a work of art. There’s the life-like motion of his limbs and the design of his joints. Then there are the wings…”
Lock spread one wing as she ran a finger over the upper edge.
“Add to that the fact that he can morph into other shapes.” She looked up and found Grayson watching her, not Lock. “Can other ferromancers do this?”
“All have the ability to create constructs.”
“Of this beauty?”
A slight smile curled his lips at her word choice. “Yours is unique among constructs.”
“I knew it.” She trailed a finger along Lock’s tail. “This is probably incredibly stupid, but I want to meet your Mr. Martel. I’ve studied his plans, and though I can’t make sense of them, it’s clear the man is an artist.”
“An artist?”
“Yes. I snuck into the shed that housed his locomotive in Portsmouth. I had intended to vandalize it, but it was so beautiful, I couldn’t bring myself to do it.” She laughed at herself. “I might have a crush on your boss—vile ferromancer and all.”
When Grayson didn’t reply, she looked up. He still watched her, but she couldn’t read his expression. There was a hint of amusement, but also, something more.
“What?” she asked, suddenly self-conscious about all she had shared. “I’m kidding. You know that, right?”
“Of course.” He returned his attention to Jimmy’s watch, replacing the face.
A knock sounded on the hatch, and Briar sprang to her feet.
Lock let out a soft cry and dropped to the table, morphing in mid fall, but he didn’t become
the lock or the necklace. A beautiful silver pocket watch now lay beside Jimmy’s.
“Captain?” Jimmy opened the hatch. “We’ve locked through. How’s breakfast coming?”
She was stunned that she’d been down here so long—and that she’d forgotten breakfast.
“Breakfast is ready,” she answered. “Tell the crew?”
“Yes, Captain.” Jimmy didn’t immediately close the hatch. Instead, he descended the ladder, stopping a little over halfway down. His gaze shifted to Grayson. “I was wondering how you made out with my old watch.”
“Quite well,” Grayson answered. He picked up Jimmy’s watch, the steel watch chain dangling from his fingers, and carried it over to him.
Jimmy left the ladder to accept the timepiece. “It works?” Jimmy eyed the exterior of his watch, no doubt wondering if any pieces were missing.
“See for yourself.” Grayson caught her eye, a slight smile on his mouth.
Jimmy opened the cover and stared at the watch face. He took so long in responding that Briar moved to his side to verify that the watch hands were still moving.
“It really works,” Jimmy whispered.
“You’ll find it keeps perfect time,” Grayson answered.
Jimmy stared at the watch for a complete revolution of the second hand. “I never thought…” He cleared his throat. “My granddad bought this watch with the money he made digging the canal. He always credited it with helping him land my grandma—her seeing that he was a man of means and all with his fancy watch.” Jimmy chuckled.
“It’s a fine piece,” Grayson said. “It just needed a good cleaning and a little adjustment.”
Briar looked up, but Grayson kept his attention on Jimmy. From what he’d told her, it sounded like he’d had to replace a lot of the cheaply made components.
Jimmy snapped the watch closed and offered Grayson a hand. “Thank you, sir. What do I owe you for your trouble?”
“It was no trouble.” Grayson shook his hand. “I enjoy fixing things.”
“So we’ve seen.” Jimmy chuckled. He returned the watch to his waistcoat pocket and carefully reattached the chain. Briar didn’t realize how incomplete Jimmy had looked without that familiar chain dangling from his pocket.