by Trish Telep
My stomach clenches icy cold. I am sixteen. I should have at least a couple of years before figuring out how to dodge this issue. Maybe I should have let my father ship me to the continent for finishing school after all. Or perhaps I could still claim to be passionately in love with Richard.
Franklin has continued on, unaware of my internal panic. "... advantageous to both parties, and with my newly secured position and your father's permission I would like to begin calling on you formally."
"I ... I ..." How could a day that started out with such promise turn into this? My mind fires thought after thought, none connected, none offering a solution to this monstrous new development. "I ... I'm afraid I do feel faint, Mr. Greenwood. The air, and the, the heat, and the ..."
He pats my hand. "I understand you are quite overcome with emotion, as am I."His tone is even and utterly lacking any feeling whatsoever. His fine features are untouched by anything resembling love or affection. I wonder if anything has ever excited passion in him, if he has ever cared for anything other than securing a position among Lords. "I'll get your nurse."
Watching him walk away, I hate him. I would sooner leave my entire life behind than face one with him at my side.
I touch my lips in memory; maybe I can do just that. Tonight, I meet with a real man.
* * *
I am a bundle of nerves as I wait in my dark alley. I'm in costume as usual, but instead of it hiding me I feel exposed. He knows I am a girl--he knows more about me than I do about him. I wish I had my cables and pulleys reset, but there hasn't been time to do it myself or contact one of Richard's boys. The day's anticipation has turned into nervous fear. Comfort comes with the knowledge of the knife in my boot, the iron filings in my pocket. I can take care of myself. I just hope I won't have to.
A soft glow at the entry to the alley draws me out of my musings and steals away my breath. He carries his silver-topped cane and walks with far less urgency than at our last meeting.
"Evening," he says, his voice low and hinting at a smile I cannot make out in the dim light.
"Evenin'," I answer, glad that the darkness also hides my smile and burning cheeks.
He leans forward, closing much of the distance between us. "I trust there were no supply problems this time?"
"So long as you have the payment."
He reaches forward and takes my hand in his, lingering far longer than necessary before dropping a small, heavy purse in it. After I purchase supplies, the rest goes immediately to three families with small children, a private salary I pay to keep at least a few kids out of the factories.
I tuck it into my coat pocket and pull out the handkerchief-wrapped package. "Use it in the next three days. Wind it twice, then you have about sixty seconds to get away."
He takes it out of my hand and slips the watch inside his coat. "Aren't you curious what I want it for?"
"S'long as it causes problems for the men who run the factories, I approve." The last one put an end to a very important meeting of local magistrates. Others disrupted factory shipments or stopped trains carrying in scabs; then, of course, the one that showed up on my doorstep.
I expect him to move now that he has the package, but he leans in even closer. I can see the dark outlines of his beard and mustache, the black intensity of his eyes barely lit by the glowing salamander held between us. "I still have questions." His voice is low, and I don't think I've ever been addressed as intimately.
"I don't doubt it." I tilt my face up to his.
"Questions can wait, though." He puts a finger under my chin and leans in, kissing me again, less quickly than before but I still taste the smile on his lips. I should know his name, I should question who he is, but I care about nothing so long as his mouth talks to mine. Then his hands are on my hips, pulling me closer; my arms are around his neck, wanting more, more, more of him against me.
A harsh scream breaks through the night, and we pull apart. I gasp for breath, my lips tingling and numb. "What--"
The scream sounds again, followed by the same woman's voice shouting ... something indecipherable. My mysterious buyer runs in the direction of the noise, and I follow, almost as fast on my feet. A couple of turns and we're in the labyrinthine passages of the Rookeries.
He slows and I do, too. Then, to the right--"Stop! Gerroff me! I said no!" Her shrill shout is suddenly muffled.
We race around the corner to find a portly gentleman pinning a woman against the wall, his arm against her throat. His other hand is doing things my mind refuses to register.
My buyer does not hesitate. Raising his cane, he brings it hard against the man's back. With a shout the rapist turns to face my buyer, and the woman falls to the ground, scrambling on her hands and knees before getting up and running.
"How dare you!" the fat man growls, and with a shock I realize I know the voice. Collins. Collins here, in the Rookeries, attacking a young woman.
"How dare you." My buyer's voice is low with menace as he swings again with the cane. But Collins surprises me with his reflexes, ducking out of the way and knocking the cane to the ground as he pulls something out of his belt. A knife. Collins has a knife. And someone who would do that to a girl would certainly have no problem shivving my buyer.
I dart in closer and reach into my pocket, grabbing a handful of iron shavings. "Oy, Collins!" He looks over at me, surprise widening his eyes just as I fling the shavings into his face.
He screams, clawing his eyes. The more he blinks the more it will hurt, the more it will scratch at his delicate corneas. I am surprised by my cold, unfeeling calculations as I watch him. He will probably be blinded.
I cannot summon the pity to care.
"How do you know him?" There's a strange tone to my buyer's voice.
A shout from a nearby alley interrupts us. "Time to go," my buyer says, running in the opposite direction of the voice. I reach down, pick up his cane, and spare one last look at the loathsome Collins before taking a different path into the freedom of the night.
* * *
"Yes, but there isn't any point in our waiting for Father, is there?" I am irritable and hot, my fine lace parasol doing nothing to lessen the baking heat radiating up from the stones of the main square.
Nurse folds her arms over her ample bosom, heaving a sigh. I will get nowhere with this argument. If Lord Ashbury requests tea with his beloved daughter after the trial, then his beloved daughter will obediently wait outside for him as long as it takes.
I hate his beloved daughter.
A man bumps into me as he walks by and mumbles an apology under Nurse's glare. I look around, suddenly aware the square outside the courts is far more crowded than is normal for this time of day. There are no definable groups, but there does seem to be an unusual amount of people milling about and talking with vendors. Curious. I would worry, but even my trained eye cannot pick out any weapons beneath the men's open-necked shirts.
"Mr. Greenwood!" Nurse calls out, her face brightening. I curse inwardly; I think the old bat fancies him. That, or she hates me. Likely both.
He turns, interrupted in his purposeful walk toward the courthouse. A brief flicker of something--annoyance?--passes over his face before he sets it into his usual blank, bland smile and walks over to us.
"Good afternoon." He tips his hat to Nurse and takes my hand to--blast him--bring it against his dry, passionless lips. It is all I can do not to rip it away when I notice that, in his other hand, he clutches a pocket watch.
A churched pocket watch.
A churched pocket watch that was, until two short nights ago, in my possession.
I look up, horrified, into his face and picture him with a short, false beard--picture his eyes in the dark, animated with passion. I imagine his flat voice infused with urgency and harsh with determination.
And his lips. How could I have not recognized those lips?
"Miss Catherine?" His eyes, that I now see hide just as much as mine, consider me. "Are you well? You seem to have gone qui
te pale."
I pull in a breath that leaves my corset straining against my breast. Biting my lip against a smile, I nod. "Quite well." He smiles and turns to go.
"Oh, and Franklin?"
He turns, raising a single eyebrow at my informality.
"Do give my regards to poor Mister Collins. Such a tragedy. But perhaps you could call on Richard Cartwright and myself later this afternoon? I believe I have something of yours. A certain cane with a silver top." I bat my eyes at him and admire his ability to betray only the slightest hint of shock through widened eyes. "Are you well? You seem to have gone quite pale."
He recovers more quickly than I would have expected, a secret smile pulling up the corner of his lips. I have tasted that secret smile, and I intend to again. "Quite well. This afternoon, then."
I wave demurely as he strides off into the crowd, turning and glancing back at me at least three times. As for me, my world has shifted on its axis. And so it is that, two minutes later, when they bring out the union leader Wilcox, I am utterly unsurprised by the cracking, echoing bang that sounds, or the choking billows of foul green smoke. I step politely out of the way as the masses shift and congregate to add to the confusion, and conveniently use my parasol to trip several soldiers as they run toward the courthouse.
I've no doubt, as Nurse rushes me away, that Wilcox will have mysteriously escaped custody before being put on that boat to Australia. And I've no doubt that my buyer will become a regular customer. And much more ...
Franklin Greenwood. My Franklin Greenwood.
Well and good, indeed.
Acknowledgments
"Rude Mechanicals" (c) 2011 by Lesley Livingston. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"The Cannibal Fiend of Rotherhithe" (c) 2011 by Frewin Jones. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"Wild Magic" (c) 2011 by Ann Aguirre. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"Deadwood" (c) 2011 by Michael Scott. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"Code of Blood" (c) 2011 by Dru Pagliassotti. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"The Clockwork Corset" (c) 2011 by Adrienne Kress. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"The Airship Gemini" (c) 2011 by Jaclyn Dolamore. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"Under Amber Skies" (c) 2011 by Maria V. Snyder. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"King of the Greenlight City" (c) 2011 by Tessa Gratton. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"The Emperor's Man" (c) 2011 by Tiffany Trent. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"Chickie Hill's Badass Ride" (c) 2011 by Dia Reeves. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"The Vast Machinery of Dreams" (c) 2011 by Caitlin Kittredge. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
"Tick, Tick, Boom" (c) 2011 by Kiersten White. First publication, original to this anthology. Printed by permission of the author.
Author Biographies
Ann Aguirre is the national bestselling author of urban fantasy, romantic science fiction, apocalyptic paranormal romance (as Ellen Connor, writing with Carrie Lofty), paranormal romantic suspense (as Ava Gray), and dystopian young adult fiction. Before she began writing full-time, she was a clown, a clerk, a voice actress, and a saviour of stray kittens, not necessarily in that order. She grew up in a yellow house across from a cornfield, but now she lives in sunny Mexico with her husband, children, two cats, and one very lazy dog.
www.annaguirre.com
Jaclyn Dolamore has a passion for history, thrift stores, vintage dresses, drawing, and food, only some of which appear in her novels. Her debut, Magic Under Glass, was a Junior Library Guild selection and received a starred review from Booklist. She is hard at work on the sequel, or so she tells herself, and in the meantime her next book, Between the Sea and Sky, will be published. She lives in Orlando, Florida, with her partner, Dade, and two naughty cats, Tacy and Oskar.
www.jaclyndolamore.com
Tessa Gratton has wanted to be a palaeontologist or a wizard since she was seven. After traveling the world with her military family, she acquired a B.A. (and the important parts of an M.A.) in Gender Studies, then settled down in Kansas with her partner, her cats, and her mutant dog. She now spends her days staring at the sky and telling lots of stories about magic and monsters. Her debut novel is Blood Magic, which is followed by its companion, Crow Magic.
www.tessagratton.com
Frewin Jones is the author of the fantasy series The Faerie Path, in which a sixteen-year-old girl finds that she is in fact the seventh daughter of King Oberon and Queen Titania of the ancient and Immortal Realm of Faerie. To date, there are five published books in the series, with more to come. Frewin is also the author of the Warrior Princess series, set in seventh-century Wales, which chronicles the adventures of Branwen, a fifteen-year-old girl who becomes entangled with the Shining Ones--a quartet of Old Gods from back in the mists of time. After publishing his first book in 1987, Frewin became a full-time writer in 1992. He lives in South London with his wife, Claudia, and their elderly and very pampered cat, Siouxsie Sioux.
www.allanfrewinjones.com
Caitlin Kittredge is the author of the Iron Codex trilogy, a Lovecraftian steampunk adventure. The first volume is The Iron Thorn. Caitlin is also the author of two bestselling adult urban fantasy series. She lives in Massachusetts with three cats named after comic book superheroes, and does pinup modeling and photography in her spare time.
www.caitlinkittredge.com
Adrienne Kress is a Toronto-born actor and author. Her middle-grade children's novels are Alex and the Ironic Gentleman and Timothy and the Dragon's Gate. She is a theatre graduate of the University of Toronto and the London Academy of Music and Dramatic Arts in the UK. Published around the world, Alex was featured in the New York Post as a "Post Potter Pick," as well as on the CBS Early Show. It won the Heart of Hawick Children's Book Award in the UK and was nominated for the Red Cedar in Canada. The sequel, Timothy, was nominated for the Audie Award in the U.S. and the Manitoba Young Readers Choice Award in Canada, and has also been optioned for film. Her debut YA is The Friday Society.
www.adriennekress.com
Lesley Livingston is the award-winning author of Wondrous Strange (winner of the CLA YA Book of the Year Award) and Darklight (shortlisted for the Indigo Teen Read Awards). A writer and actress living in Toronto, Canada, she has a Master's degree in English from the University of Toronto, where she specialized in Arthurian literature and Shakespeare. Captivated at a young age by stories of folklore, past civilizations, and legendary heroes, Lesley is a Celtic mythology geek--especially when it comes to stories of the Otherworld, Faeries, and King Arthur--and an unrepentant egghead (a character trait that somehow doesn't interfere with a love of shoes and shiny things). The concluding volume of the trilogy is Tempestuous.
www.lesleylivingston.com
Dru Pagliassotti is the author of the debut Clockwork Heart, which was one of the first published books in the rising new genre of steampunk romance, winning Romantic Times' Best Small Press Contemporary Futuristic Novel, and named by Library Journal as one of the five steampunk novels to read in 2009. Her second novel, An Agreement with Hell, features one night of horror that briefly puts angels and demons on the same side against a threat from beyond. She is a Professor of Communication at California Lutheran University, and has raised two iguanas named Hemlock and Belladonna.
www.drupagliassotti.com
Dia Reeves is the debut author of the critically acclaimed young adu
lt novel Bleeding Violet, a nominee for YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults. She lives in a suburb of Dallas, but her family grew up in East Texas, a mysterious area that has inspired many of her stories. She is a librarian with a wild imagination, and in order to make her life less boring, she enjoys writing stories of monsters and doorways to absolutely anywhere else but here.
www.diareeves.com
Michael Scott is the Irish-born New York Times bestselling author of the six-part epic fantasy series, The Secrets of the Immortal Nicholas Flamel. He began writing more than twenty-five years ago, and is one of Ireland's most successful and prolific authors, with over one hundred titles to his credit, spanning a variety of genres, including fantasy, science fiction, and folklore. The fifth book in the series is The Warlock.
www.dillonscott.com
Maria V. Snyder is The New York Times bestselling author of the Study series (Poison Study, Magic Study, and Fire Study) about a young woman forced to become a poison taster. Born and raised in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, Maria dreamed of chasing tornados, but lacked the skills to forecast their location. Writing, however, let Maria control the weather, which she happily does via a Stormdancer in her book Storm Glass. Her first young adult fantasy is Inside Out.
www.mariavsnyder.com
Tiffany Trent is the author of the acclaimed young adult dark fantasy series Hallowmere, which was an IndieBound Children's Pick and a New York Public Library Book of the Teen Age. A former instructor at Virginia Tech, Tiffany has three Master's degrees, in English, Creative Writing, and Environmental Studies. She currently lives in the Outer Banks of North Carolina. Her new YA steampunk novel is The Unnaturalists.
