The Hod King

by Josiah Bancroft

  Senlin was careful to keep off the dance floor, which consumed much of the court. The few couples who braved the floor were either very old or very young. Both seemed to enjoy the opportunity to dance without an audience. Observing an elderly couple sway in each other’s arms, Senlin felt a pang of loss so sharp his thoughts fled it without further investigation.

  It was only when he reached the opposite end of the court beyond the pyramid, where the stout central column of the ringdom met the floor that he noticed the two tunnels blistering up from the ground, and the curious train track that ran between them, and the small railcars that sat idle upon the track. The railcars were no bigger than a country buggy and were brightly painted. The track was separated from the general admission area by brass stanchions and velvet ropes, which were attended by a couple of jolly-looking old men in blue coats and gold kepis. Senlin nodded to them. They nodded back. He decided this was not the time to go in search of new mysteries.

  As he walked, his hand was drawn again and again to his jacket pocket and the tobacco-wrapped messenger concealed there. He recognized the irony of skirting the Sphinx’s gaze while carrying one of her spies around with him. But that moth was more than a courier; it was also a tether to his friends. At the very least, it could carry his final words to them should the evening go horribly awry.

  He found a high table from which he could watch for the duke and Marya’s arrival. After months of thinking of what he might say to Marya, it was finally time to decide what he would say to her. And yet faced with that question, his thoughts dove after every opportunity for distraction. Suddenly, everything was fascinating: a sweat ring on the table, the constellation overhead of a lion that looked markedly dog-faced, the congested laughter of a passing lord, a pair of young ladies dancing with their skirts held out like the wings of a bird.

  For months, he had fought to be here, and now he wished to be anywhere else. Because the closer he came to the moment of their reunion, the more certain he felt that it would mark the end: the end of their marriage, the end of their shared history, and the end of a pursuit that had sustained him for many months, giving him purpose and strength.

  Then he heard a voice that transported him as readily as a bookmark to another place and time. He was standing in the Market again with sand in his eyes and the sun on his neck, and that same sweet voice filling his ears, saying, “We’ll meet again at the top of the Tower!”

  He turned around, following the sound of her voice.

  Marya held Wilhelm’s arm as the two of them passed through a hidden door in the hedge. She thanked the doorman and laughed with relief at having skirted the mob at the gates.

  At first sight, Senlin did not notice her auburn hair, twisted up like a conch shell and held in place by diamond-tipped pins, nor her fiery gown, which faded from smoke gray at the collar to flame orange at the hem, nor her bare white shoulders that he’d only seen behind closed doors before, nor the pearls around her neck. He saw nothing but her familiar face and her foreign gaze that flitted over him—a stranger in a frightful mask—and passed on.

  But the glance was enough to stoke his determination. It was cowardly to pretend he had any right to reject himself. It was cowardly to fall before the blow landed. He could not beat himself for her, nor blame himself enough to steal her right to blame him if she wished. He had to face her, be truthful, and accept her choice.

  He approached the handsome couple, bowed, and said, “Good evening, Sir Wil!” The duke looked at him with guarded perplexity, obviously not recognizing the man under the mask. “I’m so sorry. My name is Cyril Pinfield. We met earlier this after—”

  The duke slapped Senlin affably on the chest, laughing as he did so. “Cyril! I didn’t forget you, you idiot. You’re wearing a mask!”

  “Oh, of course! I am, aren’t I. What do you think? Do you like it?”

  “No, it’s awful! Where did you get it? Those were popular, what—six months ago?”

  “Really? The man at the shop said it was very popular. That’s why he only had one left. Though, now that I think of it, it was rather dusty. Should I take it off?”

  “No, no, no. Keep it on. It suits you. And who knows, perhaps you’ll reinvigorate the fashion!” Struggling to contain his laughter, the duke said to Marya, “Darling, this is the gentleman I was telling you about. Now, don’t let his looks fool you; he’s really quite sensible.”

  “How do you do,” Marya said, presenting her hand. It was difficult for Senlin to see the subtleties of her expression through the mask’s warping and colored lenses, but the tone of her voice was discernably cool. He wondered if Wil had already told her about his proposal, wondered what she must think of a man who wished to sell her off in parcels.

  When Senlin touched her hand, he could feel the quiver of her pulse, or perhaps it was only the shaking of his own hand. He bowed. “It’s a pleasure to meet you, madam.”

  She withdrew her hand quickly, and before Senlin had straightened, she’d already gripped the duke’s arm again. He couldn’t help but feel rebuked by their intimacy.

  The duke insisted they have drinks before the first word of business was uttered. Wil declared his intention to get Cyril “well and truly drunk,” a campaign that began with a glass of champagne in one hand and a gin and tonic in the other. Feeling nervous and exposed, Senlin had little trouble maintaining the Boskop’s awkward character. The mask made it difficult to drink anything, requiring him to turn his head to one side and pour the drinks into the corner of his mouth. Wilhelm found Senlin’s frequent dribbling and sputtering highly amusing, and so proposed a toast whenever a new arrival joined their circle.

  Senlin spoke little, though no one seemed to mind it. The court continued to fill, and as it did, more nobles were drawn to the duke and duchess. The famous couple managed the attention with practiced grace. They knew each earl and baron by name. Wil joked with the lords about their expanding middles, their graying temples, or their dwindling fortunes. He turned what might’ve been an insult in the mouth of a lesser man into a gibe so affectionate it seemed a compliment. Marya, meanwhile, listened to the ladies, each of whom were eager to impress her with the victories they’d won over a lazy maid, or a gossiping shopkeeper, or a spendthrift husband. Senlin observed the banalities from the margins, all but forgotten except when the duke raised a toast.

  In an effort to keep himself from gawking at Marya, Senlin devised a sort of internal timer: He recited a ballad in his head, one that she had been quite fond of, which took about a minute to get through, and then he would permit himself a slow, passing glance. It seemed entirely likely that she wouldn’t be able to see his eyes through the lenses of his mask, but it wasn’t the fear of being obvious that made him ration his gazes. When he looked at her, he had a sudden urge to rip the mask from his face and declare himself, to be seen by her, to share in this awkward thrilling reunion, even if that meant his immediate execution. He was feeling impulsive, reckless. The dousing of alcohol wasn’t helping matters. How foolish he had been to assume that an opportunity for a private moment with the Mermaid would present itself! He felt like a man who wakes in the dead of night to jot down some epiphany in the dark, only to rise the next morning to discover he’d written an unintelligible scrawl. He had no plan! There would be no revelation! He would go back to his hotel room having only tormented himself with the duke and duchess’s apparent wedded bliss.

  “Cyril, I heard you had a spot of trouble recently.”

  “What?” Senlin said, stirring from his thoughts. He looked about to see who had spoken and found Wil was smiling at him. “Trouble? You mean the hole in my socks?”

  Wil’s laughter was like a rallying cry that brought the encircling nobles to join him. “No, the hod in the alley, and those two idiots—what were their names?”

  “Brown and … the lanky one. Uh, Cavendish,” an earl with a red beard and corn-yellow teeth said.

  “Yes, those two idiots. Killed by a hod. And apparently a little one. I
’m glad I don’t have to give that eulogy.” The circle of men snorted their agreement. Senlin took from the duke’s tone that the murdered men had not been members of the Coterie. When he looked around, he saw most of the nobles in orbit about the duke and duchess were wearing the club emblem. “Eigengrau said they were already down when you dashed in and scared the mudder off.”

  “Yes,” Senlin said, though without much conviction. He wondered why Eigengrau had changed the details of his story. To ease the course of the investigation? As a personal favor? Now did not seem the time to delve into it. “I heard they caught the man.”

  “Yes, well, we can’t have mad hods running around killing people, can we?” The duke sipped his champagne, and Marya, who’d been nodding along to a conversation with the red-bearded earl’s wife a moment before, now pulled the duke’s arm and said something only he could hear. The duke frowned as he listened, perhaps annoyed by the interruption, but as she spoke, his expression brightened and finally broke into a grin, which he directed at Senlin. “Oh, that is an idea! Cyril, are you prone to motion sickness?”

  “No,” he said, then sensing the duke’s disappointment, he quickly added, “Well, except for on airships. I spent my trip down hanging over the rail. And on horses—I always get sick on horses. And I don’t care for rocking chairs. Chairs should not have a sense of wanderlust. We don’t have rocking tables. Why have rocking chairs? It’s obscene! Otherwise, my constitution is hardy.”

  “Yes, you sound like quite a rock, Cyril. To the rock!” the duke said, raising another toast. Senlin gamely knocked his glass against his plaster nose and spilled champagne on his jacket. “I asked because my wife had a thought. She’d like to hear more about your notion of a Tower-wide tour but would also like to show you one of our more novel diversions. We call it the Merry Loop. It’s sort of like a sleigh ride, but it goes all through the underground. You can tell her all about your grand vision and—”

  “And all this madness about cutting up my name and selling off the letters,” Marya interjected. “Oh, here’s an M for you and an A for you and an R for you—” she said, miming the act of handing out the letters to the noble ladies of the group. “And here’s your Y, Mr. Pinfield.” She made as if to throw it at him. He flinched, and the ladies sniggered. But he had not flinched at the pantomimed throw; he had cringed because of the passionate, almost trembling disdain with which she glared at him. “What in the world makes you think I’d trust a stranger with my name? You seem to have done a very good job of stuffing my husband’s head full of imaginary riches, but I promise you: I’m not so easily stuffed. So”—she tugged her gloves off as she spoke—“I’ll give you one go-round on the Merry Loop to convince me that you’re not a scoundrel. And if you bring your dinner up in the process, then the deal’s off.”

  The duke laughed. “I did warn you, Cyril: She is a spirited woman!”

  Senlin let himself be pulled along by the party toward the short, roped-off train track. The duke’s merry troop bypassed the line of nobles who waited outside the ropes, though Wil shook hands with half the gentlemen waiting in line, exchanging salutations, compliments, and promises as if the queue were his own reception line. The two elder porters in blue greeted the duke with salutes and quickly unclipped the rope so his party could approach the tracks where a single cart waited to be filled. Wil tipped them both handsomely.

  One of the noblemen grabbed Senlin’s shoulders and shook him, though Senlin didn’t know whether it was meant to stir his nerves or spark some enthusiasm in him. Someone took his wineglass. The porter asked him if he had his candle, and he mumbled that he did. The party cheered, and someone pushed him onto the hard bench of the cart. Ahead, just inside the mouth of the mineshaft, the track dove into darkness. He felt someone take the seat beside him. A metal bar was lowered over their laps. He watched her hands grip the front lip of the cart. He marked the gold glint of her wedding band.

  Then the cart lurched toward the darkness. A mechanical rumble traveled through the seat and up his spine, and the cheers of the party turned to howls of laughter, which he knew was for him: the terror-stiffened Boskop, off to lose his supper on some twisting ride. And when the floor seemed to fall out from under them, and the cart plunged into the dark, Senlin yelled, not out of horror, but anguish.

  The track leveled out a moment later, and the darkness was subdued by the appearance of soft electric lights along the roof of the tunnel, which ran nearly within arm’s reach. The stone around them was so roughly cut it seemed almost natural, like the eroded tunnels of a subterranean stream. The music and the chatter were replaced by the dreamy regularity of the clacking wheels.

  “You can take that ridiculous thing off now,” Marya said. “What are you doing here, Tom?”

  Chapter Eleven

  Eventually, the certainty of a noose is preferable to the agony of an appeal.

  —Oren Robinson of the Daily Reverie

  The Sphinx’s mask sat in his lap. It seemed to gaze up at him with keen, catlike eyes.

  They stared straight ahead, breathed hard, and said nothing.

  The walls of the tunnel changed. It was a moment before he understood what he was seeing—a re-creation of the Tower’s construction in miniature. It began with square-edged blocks jutting from the rough-hewn rock as if from a mountainside. The blocks were surrounded and climbed upon by hundreds of figurines, none larger than a thimble, wielding hammers, pulleys, and ropes. The workers were frozen in the act of cutting the stones and pulling them free of the mountain.

  The tunnel opened around them, and the scene that had begun in the walls now continued on a passing ledge, sculpted to resemble a desert floor. The ceiling was painted sky blue, blotched with white clouds. Teams of miniature men hauled blocks over a path of logs down to a model train. A black locomotive pulled a line of flat-bedded cars, each loaded with a single block.

  Ahead of their jangling cart, the tunnel contracted about an archway. The passage beyond was unlit, presenting a yawning inky black. The scene on the tunnel ledge ran up and around the archway, crowding about the unlit hole as if gravity had turned a corner. The figures worked bucket cranes, as if excavating the dark. Senlin felt a little thrill of revelation when he realized what the scene was meant to re-create: the digging of the well beneath the Tower. For a second, he had the queasy feeling that they were falling into that well as their cart passed into darkness.

  And the sensation was made much worse when the cart plummeted sharply down.

  The mask flew up from his lap and into the gloom. It seemed to chase after his stomach. The sense of free-falling into nothing blew away the awkward silence that had gripped them a moment before. Marya threw her arms around his neck even as he embraced her. Her full cheek pressed into the hollow of his neck as snuggly as a dovetail joint. Amid his terror, Senlin felt a great pitch of emotion at the contact. The cart around them rattled so violently he was sure it would fly from the rails. In the deathly dark, he turned his lips to hers, and they kissed as if it were the end of everything.

  Then the track leveled out and the wrenching sense of doom faded.

  As the weight of gravity returned to their limbs, their embrace weakened. A glow appeared before them and lit them well enough to see each other again. They came apart as if stunned by what they’d done. The railcar slowed to a stop. Ahead of them, the track angled upward, supported by a trestle that made the rails seem to hang free in the air. The track proceeded upward about a central column, spiraling out of sight.

  The column held a frieze that depicted the building of the Tower, level by level: the fitting of blocks, the laying of foundations, the carving of the edifice. The air was lit by pale electric lights that tinted everything orange. The base of their cart caught on some unseen gears in the tracks, which began to carry them up the curling spire at a crawling pace.

  She stared at him. He couldn’t interpret her gaze, and she didn’t give him long to consider it. That vulnerable, uncertain expression was as shor
t-lived as a wink. Quickly, her lips straightened and thinned into a formal line. The kiss they’d shared suddenly seemed long ago. “I thought you’d gone home,” she said.

  He twisted to face her in the cart, one arm on the rail before her, one on the back of the seat. The spread of his arms was open and pleading. “No, I couldn’t. Of course I couldn’t. I’ve spent the past year looking for you.”

  She studied his face, perhaps searching for honesty at first, but then he watched as she discovered each new crease, the scar like pink yarn that cut his chin, the dappling damage of the sun. Powder and tint flattered the contours of her face, though the effort seemed entirely unnecessary: her beauty radiated through the paint.

  “You look very … well. How are you?” he asked. His heart urged him to say more, but he was afraid compliments would only chip away at her happiness. If she was happy.

  “I am well. I’ve been very busy. I’ve been … preparing for the new concert season.”

  She had never spoken to him so formally before, not even in the classroom. The tone made him pull in his arms and look away. The column their cart coiled about was inlaid with glowing rods placed at regular intervals.

  “Why are you here, Tom?” she asked. “Why come now, after all this time?”

  The fact that she asked the question seemed all the answer he needed. Yet, he had come this far, and he had to speak his heart. “I’ve come to rescue you. That is, if you need rescuing.”

  Her laughter seemed to surprise her. She stifled her mouth with a cupped hand and shook her head apologetically. When she spoke, she was a little more her former self. “Where have you been? How did you survive? How are you here, dressed like that, convincing everyone you’re a Boskop? You’re going to parties and wearing a tuxedo, and that ridiculous mask!”