The Crimson Skew

by S. E. Grove

  For some time, no one said anything.

  “Flowers and rotting meat. What is this blasted fog?” Miles finally demanded, pounding a fist on the kitchen table. The empty plates with their spoons and the dish of peach cobbler rattled in alarm.

  Shadrack straightened. “I have no idea, Miles. I’ve never heard anything like it. But I reported it to Broadgirdle.”

  “To Broadgirdle?” Miles cried. “Why tell that villain?”

  “Think, Miles—all of those soldiers heading into the Territories.” At the other man’s frown, Shadrack continued. “Whether you like my decision or not, it does not matter. Broadgirdle already knew of it. He might be a villain, but he is not wholly incompetent.”

  “We wish he were,” Miles growled. “And what does he mean to do about it?”

  “He is sending the troops protective clothing.”

  “Fat lot of good that will do.”

  Mrs. Clay had been brought to tears by the account of the children locked in the pantry. She looked down at her half-full teacup and uneaten cobbler. “May the Fates help us,” she said now. “Perhaps it is some kind of ill wind—like the weirwinds that are so much more common in the Baldlands than here.” Her voice grew agitated. “Perhaps they are moving east!”

  “It sounds manmade to me,” Miles countered. “Too convenient that it has struck in four towns and all of them towns in the Indian Territories.”

  “What if there is a new Age,” Mrs. Clay said, even more agitated, “like the Glacine Age to the south, and this fog is what emerges from it? Recall that the soil in the Glacine Age is poisonous. Why not an Age with poisonous air?”

  “Nonsense. Then why does it always strike at dawn and in localized areas?”

  Mrs. Clay pondered for a moment. “Oh!” she exclaimed. “It could be a creature from a different Age—a monster of some kind that breathes these poisonous fumes.”

  Winnie waved his chewed pencil for attention. “What are we going to do about Theo?” he asked, interrupting the debate.

  “Exactly,” Nettie said, shooting Winnie a glance. “We have to warn him somehow.”

  “We have only a few days,” Shadrack replied, “before Theo enters the Indian Territories. I presume from what Broadgirdle has said that most troops will have the protective clothing before crossing the border.”

  “That’s not enough,” said Nettie.

  “I don’t trust anything Broadsy sends,” Winnie said at the same time.

  “We need to do more,” Shadrack agreed. “I can warn him in a letter, but without knowing who or what causes this fog, I cannot advise him how to prevent its effects. But I have an idea for how to minimize the likelihood of an encounter for Theo’s company.” He unrolled a paper map that showed a detailed portion of western Pennsylvania and lower New York. “All of the attacks that I have heard of have taken place in towns—usually midsized towns. I might be wrong, but perhaps more isolated places are safer. This is a copy of the map I sent today to Theo’s company, plotting their movements west. You can see here”—he pointed to a clump of trees—“that I described the easiest path as one cutting through this sparse forest. What this map fails to show,” Shadrack continued with a smile, “is that this route will lead into a deep ravine, which it could take days to emerge from.”

  “So getting Theo stuck in a ravine is the solution?” Winnie asked skeptically.

  Shadrack looked deflated. “It keeps him away from the nearby towns where the crimson fog might appear.”

  “I think it’s a good idea,” Nettie reassured him.

  “It’s only a short-term solution,” Shadrack admitted, sitting down heavily. “The long-term solution is to bring Theo home. And to find the source of this fog. And to end the war.” He put his head in his hands.

  “We need to get a closer look at the fog,” Miles said. He pushed back his chair and stood. “And we need a scientist capable of studying it.”

  Shadrack lifted his head and looked wearily at Miles. “A scientist? What are you suggesting?”

  “I think you should send the best explorer you know and the best natural scientists you know to discover what is afoot. In other words,” he said, grinning fiercely, “I go west. And you write to Veressa and Martin Metl.”

  “Oh, yes!” Mrs. Clay exclaimed, her eyes lighting up at the mention of the famed Nochtland cartologer and her botanist father. “They will certainly help us.”

  Shadrack considered in silence, his eyes lighting with faint hope. It had not occurred to him to ask for the Metls’ expertise. “Martin and Veressa. Why did I not think of them?”

  “Because you are overworking your brain, which is already of limited capacity, and you forget too easily about your friends. As I well know,” Miles added, looking more pleased than offended.

  Shadrack’s shoulders lifted. “It might work, if you are willing—”

  “Of course it will work. I know everyone who has written to you, and I know where to find them. Martin knows more than anyone about strange substances. And Veressa knows how to keep her father from going overboard with dangerous experiments.”

  Shadrack smiled wryly. “She does not, however, know how to prevent you from going overboard.”

  Miles beamed, delighted with his plan. “All the better. I can be ready to leave in an hour. Tell them to meet me near the town of Pear Tree.”

  5

  Maxine’s Dovecote

  —1892, August 6: 12-Hour 09—

  The Mark of Iron and Mark of the Vine are rarely seen in New Occident, but in the Baldlands they are common. Nevertheless, even in the Baldlands they are not entirely understood. Where do they come from? What do they mean? What can they do? To these, we should add the question of how widely the Marks are found. For example, we have not fully explored how the Marks manifest in animal species. How many animals have the Marks? Why do some animals have them and not others? Can learning about animals with the Marks help us understand their purpose?

  —From Sophia Tims’s Reflections on a Journey to the Eerie Sea

  SOPHIA AND CALIXTA arrived at Maxine Bisset’s door only minutes after Burr, Goldenrod, and Errol. “I knew you would come at once,” she said. “Get in off the street.”

  “I must ride to the harbor and warn the crew,” Calixta said.

  Maxine shook her head. “Too late. My rider has just returned. The Swan was spotted and had to pull anchor or risk being torn to pieces. It is long gone.”

  Calixta stared at her, aghast.

  “Come in, child!” Maxine insisted. “This is no place to discuss these things.”

  Silent for once, Calixta paid the coachman and followed Sophia through the doorway. “You must be Sophia,” Maxine said warmly, taking her hand and pressing it.

  “Sophia Tims. Nice to meet you.”

  “And you.” The fortune-teller smiled. “Don’t let the circumstances alarm you. I hope you will feel at home here—I am delighted you’ve come.” She was a woman of some fifty years, her springy brown hair streaked with gray, threaded with beads, and piled into a soft and ornate mound atop her round face. Her complexion was like Sophia’s; her smile appeared easily and often; her hands had the sturdiness that comes from long years at a stove or a washboard. Her eyes twinkled with kindness, intelligence, and something else—perhaps a nostalgia she had tried to mask with cheerfulness, or a curiosity about the dark corners of the human soul.

  Sophia liked her instantly. “Thank you. What is this all about?”

  “We will discuss it in due time,” Maxine reassured her, leading her down the corridor and glancing back at Calixta, who followed them. “The long and short of it is this: someone has spread a nasty rumor about the Morrises. The lie is intended to provoke them, and it is difficult to ignore.”

  It was, Sophia reflected, a well-calculated lie—sure to tarnish their name, but impossible for them to address whi
le in hiding. “A man named Finn O’Malley just attacked Calixta in a shop.” The pirate did not say a word.

  “I’m not surprised. They are in grave danger,” Maxine said soberly. “You are safe here, but we must plan very carefully.” The open corridor they walked along bordered a patio lush with plants. Brightly colored birds perched at the edge of a stone fountain. Dark rooms with shuttered windows led off the corridor, the air coming from them cool and damp. “We are gathered in the dining room,” Maxine explained, “because it has the largest table. And,” she added, “because Burr has a terrible weakness for my cook’s pastries.” She gave Sophia a broad wink. “You will soon discover why.”

  Burr, Wren, Errol, and Goldenrod were assembled in the dining room. Half a dozen tiered plates filled with tiny cakes and pastries were arranged on the long dining table. Above it, a massive chandelier hung ponderously, its pendants winking in the occasional sunlight from the patio. The room was both luxurious and worn, as if some things about it had been used so much they had become too dear to part with. A set of dining chairs in perfect condition lined one wall, but many of the seats at the table were faded armchairs with mismatched upholstery. Maxine settled into one of these comfortably and gestured for her guests to do the same. “Please, my friends. Don’t offend Celia. Start with the pastries. Tea and coffee will be here at any moment.”

  “Are you all right?” Burr asked Calixta, his voice serious.

  Calixta put her arms around him. “I’m perfectly fine, thank you. But I’m worried about the Swan.”

  “They have orders to return to Hispaniola should anything like this occur,” her brother reminded her. “They will be fine.”

  “And you will be perfectly fine, too.” Maxine passed Sophia a small plate with a pink piece of cake.

  “This is not what we had planned,” Calixta said, taking a seat beside Maxine.

  “And what, exactly, was it that you had planned? What brings you all here? I have divined some of it, but not all.”

  Calixta glanced at Sophia. “They are all here to help me,” Sophia said ruefully, “and I am so sorry for the incredible complications it has caused for everyone.”

  “Nonsense,” Burr said, sounding more like himself. “Wren you cannot pity, for his entire existence is a complication. And you know quite well how Calixta and I enjoy complications. Enjoy? No—such a pallid word. Love. Adore. They fill us with delight. What are complications but unsolicited fun? Errol and Goldenrod . . .” He reached to fill his plate with pastries, and at the same time he gave the pair a skeptical look. “Well, you can see that they do not know the meaning of fun. Complications or no, it is all the same to them.”

  Sophia smiled despite herself as she ate the pink pastry. Errol and Goldenrod, well accustomed to Burr’s sense of humor by now, blithely ignored the comment. “No complication is too great, miting,” Errol said, “as you well know.”

  “And I am grateful for it,” Sophia replied. “As you see,” she continued to Maxine, “fun-loving or otherwise, they are all here to help me. I am looking for my parents, who went missing eleven years ago. Wren met them as they were sailing to Seville, and then they disappeared. We’ve learned now that while in the Papal States”—she paused, looking down at her lap—“they were transformed.”

  Maxine eyed her keenly, that other quality beyond the intelligence and kindness bubbling to the surface. “What do you mean, transformed?”

  “They became Lachrima.” Avoiding Maxine’s eyes, Sophia reached into her skirt pocket and drew out a roll of paper. “In the Papal States, we traveled to a place known as Ausentinia—a place that gives travelers maps to anything and everything they have lost.” Maxine’s gaze sharpened even more. “Along with a purse full of garnets, I was given a map to find my parents. And they”—she indicated Errol and Goldenrod, Wren, Calixta and Burr—“have all been helping me follow it.”

  “Is that the map?” Maxine asked, pointing to the roll of paper.

  “Yes.”

  “Can I see it?”

  Sophia handed it across. Her eyes wide with excitement, Maxine read the map aloud.

  “Missing but not lost, absent but not gone, unseen but not unheard. Find us while we still draw breath.

  “Leave my last words in the Castle of Verity; they will reach you by another route. When you return to the City of Privation, the man who keeps time by two clocks and follows a third will wait for you. Take the offered sail, and do not regret those you leave behind, for the falconer and the hand that blooms will go with you. Though the route may be long, they will lead you to the ones who weather time. A pair of pistols and a sword will prove fair company.

  “Set your sights on the frozen sea. In the City of Stolen Senses, you will lose your companions. Remember that though in your brief life you have met Grief, confronting it alone, you have not yet met Fear. It dwells in the west, a companion on every path, a presence in every doorway.

  “You will meet the wanderer who is sweet and bitter, and you will travel together, your fates bound on each step of the journey. Trust this companion, though the trust would seem misplaced. You will travel to the Forest of Truces, where the silent bell rings and the dormant seed grows. From then on, the map you follow must be your own. Find it in the lines you have drawn, the paths made by your past. The old one remembers more than anyone.”

  Maxine turned it over and brushed her fingers over the illustrated map—the nebulous lines that led from the City of Privation to the Frozen Sea, the City of Stolen Senses, and the Forest of Truces. “Beautiful,” she sighed.

  “Beautiful perhaps, but damned difficult to follow,” Burr said pleasantly. He followed the statement with four pastries, eaten in quick succession.

  “This is a divining map,” Maxine declared, ignoring him.

  “We have found,” Goldenrod put in, “that the map is difficult to interpret but invariably accurate. Most of what is described in the first two paragraphs has already taken place. I am the hand that blooms; Errol is the falconer. Calixta and Burr are the sword and the pair of pistols, naturally. And we have taken our direction from its line about the frozen sea, which we understand to be the Eerie Sea.”

  “Oh!” Calixta exclaimed. She reached out for Sophia’s hand. “Now I see why you wouldn’t leave me at Victor’s. I’m sorry—I’d forgotten.”

  “In the City of Stolen Senses, you will lose your companions,” Sophia repeated. “Yes,” she said, her brow furrowed with worry. “It is bound to happen. But if there were some way to anticipate it, we might, well . . . not avoid it, but make the same meaning less awful. Where is the City of Stolen Senses? Could we figure out where it is? If we could, would we be able to do something so that losing is just ‘losing track’ and not—not something worse?”

  Maxine considered this. “So you believe it is possible to fulfill the meaning of the map in various ways, and that you can choose how to fulfill the meaning.”

  “Exactly,” Sophia said, grateful that Maxine—unlike her travel companions, whom she had been trying to persuade for weeks—understood this so quickly.

  “It is an astounding piece of divination,” the woman said, returning the map to Sophia. “And my own view on such things is like yours—prophecies are loose, not rigid. They can be remarkably protean, so that a single prediction may fit many circumstances. Perhaps Calixta and Burr have told you that I am something of a diviner myself?”

  Calixta’s face was a picture of politeness as she put her teacup down. “We did, Maxine dear, but really we are here for the pigeons.” She hurried on: “Sophia’s uncle is Shadrack Elli, the cartologer. He has had no news of her since she sailed for the Papal States. We wish to send him word that Sophia is safe, in our care, and that she is heading north.”

  Maxine nodded. “Of course, I see. So we must send a pigeon to Boston.”

  “And ideally, we would ask him to send a reply to a location farther no
rth. How far in that direction does your network extend?”

  Maxine waved her hand dismissively. “As far as you like. My pigeons fly to the Eerie Sea, to the western coast, and to the new border of the Glacine Age to the south.”

  “Perhaps,” Goldenrod ventured, “I might suggest we aim for Salt Lick.”

  “One of my depots is in Salt Lick,” Maxine replied, “so that would work quite well. Would you like to see the pigeons?” she asked Sophia.

  Sophia pushed her empty plate to one side. “Very much. I had heard pigeons could carry messages, but I have never seen any who do.”

  “You may be disappointed,” Maxine said with a smile. “They look just like ordinary pigeons. But their feats of stamina are quite extraordinary. And they are remarkable in another way, too. These are iron pigeons.”

  “Pigeons made of iron? How do they fly?” Sophia wondered.

  Maxine rose from the table. “Pigeons with the Mark of Iron.”

  “Oh!” Sophia exclaimed.

  “Come with me to the dovecote, and we’ll dispatch your message to Shadrack right away.”

  “Could I come as well?” Goldenrod asked.

  Seneca shifted on Errol’s shoulder, dancing from one clawed foot to the other. “Oh, no, my friend,” Errol said to him firmly. “You and I are staying here.”

  Maxine led them toward the kitchen—a long room with several worktables and multiple ovens, where the cook and two assistants were toiling in the aftermath of the afternoon pastry production—and then out into a second garden patio. Beneath the heavy yellow clouds, insects buzzed in slow circles while a hummingbird dipped and darted. Herbs grew in dense clusters at the edges of the garden: lavender and thyme, sage and mint.

  A stone walkway wove through the herbs to an ornate iron stair. The narrow grillwork steps led to a low-ceilinged room, musty and close with the murmuring of pigeons. A long window with no glass or screen looked out onto the patio and, beyond it, the city of New Orleans. The pigeons were free to fly in and out. Nestled in narrow wooden shelves lined with straw, they fluttered and shifted, eyeing Maxine and the visitors dispassionately.