Clockwork Heart

by Dru Pagliassotti

  “This is Isobel Vidoc and Emelie Wilkes,” Lars said, introducing the two women. “They’re on the team, too.” He turned to Isobel. “Where’s Kyle?”

  She shrugged.

  “I stopped at his flat and he wasn’t there.”

  “Em?”

  “I haven’t seen him.” The smaller woman frowned, shifting from foot to foot. “What’s going to happen now? Are we under arrest?”

  “Vic? Any sign of Kyle?”

  “I haven’t seen him, either.” Victor scratched his beard. “That makes him suspect number one, doesn’t it?”

  Lars recoiled. “Kyle’s not a thief!”

  “I know that. But the stripes don’t. And until he shows up…”

  The programmers looked at each other, crestfallen.

  “You’re all suspects,” Cristof informed them as he and Taya reached the top of the stairs. “Lieutenant, why not have them accompany us, too? They know the area and the engine. They might spot something we’d miss.”

  “You will all walk behind me,” the lictor directed.

  Lictors were stationed at the top of the stairs down to the AE labs, and a warning chain had been strung across the head of the stairs with a lictor’s seal dangling from it. Students crowded the hall, watching as the chain was unhooked and the small procession headed down to the basement. Taya heard them gossiping about Alister. None of them seemed to know about the missing engine yet.

  “It seems strange that the University is still in session,” she murmured to take her mind off the annoyance of negotiating stairs while on crutches. “I feel like the whole city should be in an uproar.”

  “The Council may be shaken, but Ondinium remains untouched,” Amcathra replied. “It is the strength of the city. And the weakness.”

  “Why do you think it’s a weakness?”

  “There is nobody in Ondinium who cannot be replaced. We are like the gears in one of Exalted Forlore’s clocks. That is a strength because the clock will keep running even if every gear has been replaced. But it is a weakness because it is impossible to respect a man who is nothing more than a replaceable part. ‘We must have a dedicate here. Go, send a lictor there.’ A man’s name and spirit become unimportant.”

  “You’re a philosopher, Lieutenant.” Taya reached the bottom of the stairs and rubbed her aching shoulders. “But a grim one.”

  “I do not understand how a philosopher in this city could be anything but grim.” Amcathra paused in the gas-lit hallway until the rest of the group joined them.

  “‘The hawk sees the meadows and streams that lie beyond this dark forest,’” Taya quoted, in Demican.

  “‘Let the sun shine upon the mountains; their peaks remain encased in ice, and my heart, also,’” Amcathra countered in the same language.

  “Good one,” Taya said with appreciation, reverting to Ondinan. “You win. I haven’t read enough Demican poetry to compete. I just liked that line about the hawk.”

  “Perhaps an icarus, whose eyes are fixed upon the horizon, cannot be other than optimistic. Those of us whose view is obscured by machinery are not as fortunate.” Lieutenant Amcathra saw that the rest of the group had gathered. He turned and began pacing down the hall, his blue eyes moving over the walls and floor like one of his hunter kin.

  The programmers murmured as Lars pointed out the marks on the walls outside the prototype engine room. After scrutinizing the door and frame, the lieutenant entered, pulling matches from his coat pocket to light the gas lamps.

  Taya’s first impression was of a large, empty chamber. Then she noticed the marks on the walls and the snips of wire and small screws on the floor. Thick cables ran into the room through a hole in the wall and ended in a cascade of wire and tubes.

  Amcathra took his time circling the room, crouching often to inspect the floor before taking another step. Cristof waited in the doorway, and Taya leaned on her crutches behind him. The rest of the programmers crammed close, trying to look over their shoulders.

  “If you left anything in the room or took anything with you, the lieutenant will want to know,” Cristof warned Lars.

  “I don’t think I even went inside. Maybe one or two steps, because I was surprised. But that’s all.”

  “They packed the engine in straw-filled crates,” Amcathra said. “I see nails, splinters of wood, and wisps of straw. Is straw safe for an engine?”

  “If they wrapped the parts in oiled rags before packing them,” Lars replied.

  “Could a good hound track the scent of the oil?” Cristof asked.

  “They would have put the crates into a wagon outside,” Victor said. “A dog would lose the scent, eventually.”

  “We will try,” Amcathra said. Suddenly he stopped and crouched.

  Taya watched, fascinated, as he lay on his stomach, studying the ground. If you took Janos Amcathra out of his lictor’s uniform, wiped away his black stripe, and dressed him in a Demican hunter’s furs and leathers, his behavior would seem absolutely in character. She wondered what kind of family he’d come from. He’d preserved many Demican habits.

  “What color is Mr. Deuse’s hair?”

  “Brown,” Lars said. “Brown hair, blue eyes. About average height and weight.”

  Taya realized they were talking about Kyle.

  “He had a key to this room?”

  “Yes.”

  “Lots of people have brown hair,” Isobel protested, even though she, like Amcathra, was Demican blond. “Just because you find some brown hair doesn’t mean Kyle stole the engine.”

  “Where was Mr. Deuse last night?”

  “He left the station with the rest of us.”

  “Did any of you go home with him?”

  A chorus of ‘no’s.

  Amcathra stood and searched the room again. At last he walked back, turned off the gas lights, and waved everyone away from the door. He closed and locked it.

  “I will take your keys to this room, please,” he said, holding out his hand. One by one, the programmers slid their keys from rings and cords and laid them on his palm. He dropped them all into his pocket with a metallic jingle.

  “Exalted, Icarus, please stay. The rest of you may leave. You will remain here in the capital where we can contact you if we must.”

  “What did you find?” Lars asked.

  “Clues.”

  “Look, Taya, we’ll be at the PT,” the big man said, stymied. “You’ll tell us if you learn anything, won’t you?”

  Taya leaned on her crutch and patted his arm, feeling like a doll next to him. “I’ll try, I really will.”

  After the team members had left, throwing worried looks over their shoulders, Cristof turned to Amcathra.

  “Kyle helped us figure out what Alister’s program was doing. He seemed like an honest man.”

  “I think Mr. Deuse may have been coerced,” Amcathra said. “I saw blood and brown hair on the floor, as might come from a head wound.”

  Taya drew in an apprehensive breath. “Do you think he’s alive?”

  “If they had killed him, I think they would have left his corpse behind.”

  “Besides, Lars said Kyle knew how to reconstruct the engine,” Cristof added, his eyes narrowed behind their lenses. “And he’s the head of the programming team, now that Alister’s in jail. He’d be a nice catch for the Alzanans.”

  “It does not need to be Alzanans, Exalted.”

  “Who else would do something like this?” Cristof pulled off his glasses and began polishing them fiercely. “They waylaid Kyle and forced him to unlock the door; maybe even made him dismantle the engine.”

  “The amount of blood was significant. It is possible he protested at some point.”

  Taya felt sick, imagining the pleasant young programmer sprawled in a pool of hi
s own blood.

  “Then they packed up the crates and carried them up the stairs and out. What was Victor saying about wagons?” Cristof looked at her.

  “He said the thieves would have to hand-carry the crates across campus to the gate or pull a wagon around on some kind of road… something-course…”

  “Froshcourse. Right. It runs along the campus perimeter for deliveries.” Cristof turned to the lieutenant. “It’s a long route, and it passes in front of the dormitories. One of the students may have heard if a wagon went by late at night.”

  “I will have lictors speak to them.” Amcathra stood. “Let us examine the foot path to the gates.”

  Outside, Taya sat on an iron bench and watched the two men work. Her leg was throbbing again, warning her that the painkillers were wearing off, and her arms ached from the crutches. Sitting was a relief.

  This time Amcathra permitted Cristof to search with him. Both men bent over the path, Cristof constantly pushing his glasses back up as they slipped down his sharp nose. Taya grinned, trying to imagine him in a Demican hunter’s furs. He wouldn’t be very convincing. He still looked like a crow, bobbing along the path searching for something to eat.

  Her grin faded. Kyle had seemed like a nice man, intelligent and responsible. He was the one Clockwork Heart had chosen as Lars’s match. And although Lars might have been irritated by the program’s decision, he was worried about his friend. He wouldn’t be happy to find out that Kyle might have been kidnapped. But how could the thieves have taken Kyle out with them? And what would they have done with the wagon?

  “They must be storing the crates someplace until they can get them out of the city,” she said, out loud. “And if they aren’t hiding them on Secundus, they would have had to take them through one of the sector gates last night. The crates and Kyle, both.”

  “The sector gates are locked after midnight,” Amcathra replied at once. “The theft could have occurred before then, but I think it would have been carried out later, when nobody would be walking around the campus.”

  “So if they transported the crates to another sector, they either lied to a lictor about an emergency or waited and went through this morning,” Taya finished.

  “It’s unlikely they’d call attention to themselves by trying to get through after lockdown. If I were a thief, I’d leave the sector the next day, probably a few hours after the gates had opened,” Cristof said.

  Amcathra gave a decisive nod. “Go to the station. I want a tracking hound brought to the engine room and lictors questioning the students in the dormitories. I will inquire at the cart gates, starting at the nearest and proceeding west. Rejoin me when your messages have been delivered.”

  Cristof gave the lictor a sour smile. “So, I’m trustworthy enough to run your errands but not investigate your crimes?”

  The lictor pulled a narrow black wallet out of his coat pocket and handed it to him. Cristof flipped it open, startled.

  “I thought you were going to wait for the captain’s approval.”

  “This is a field decision. I will clear it with him later.” Amcathra was as stone-faced as ever. “I recommend you do not speak to your brother without another lictor present, and if you do speak to him, do not promise him anything you cannot deliver.”

  “I understand.” Cristof slid the wallet away. “Thank you, Janos.”

  “Why are you still here?”

  Taya grinned at Cristof as they headed out the University gate. “Are those papers what I think they are?”

  “My credentials. I’m back on the job.” He sounded pleased, although he was clearly trying to hide it.

  “He was going to give them back to you all along, wasn’t he? How long have you been friends?”

  “He’s my supervisor, Taya. Not my friend.”

  “Men.” Taya laughed. “So, what are we going to do now?”

  He stopped outside the University gates and looked askance at her crutches.

  “I need to deliver the lieutenant’s messages and start investigating these leads. I’m going to be running all over the city. How do you feel?”

  “Tired,” she admitted. “And my leg’s starting to hurt, but I’m not supposed to take any medicine for another half an hour.”

  “I’m sorry.” He frowned. “Maybe you should rest for a few hours. It’s not that I don’t want your company, but you might hurt yourself trying to keep up with me.”

  “I’m not going to go stuff mail bags.”

  “They’ll give you the day off, won’t they?”

  “I don’t want to sit around the eyrie all day, either.” Taya let her gaze climb up the side of the mountain, over stacks of houses and shops to the mansions of Primus. The stubborn part of her wanted to stay with Cristof, but the practical part knew that she’d only slow him down. “Do you think Viera’s ready for visitors yet?”

  “I’m sure she’d like to see you. Should I look for you there?”

  “I don’t think I’ll stay long. I might go to that bar Lars mentioned, the Pickled something. Is there any reason I can’t tell the team about Kyle?”

  “You’d better not. We don’t have any proof that he’s involved. That hair and blood could have come from a janitor or one of the engineering team. It’s too early to tell.”

  “But—”

  “Please, Taya. There’s no sense alarming his friends if he’s visiting his mother or spending the day with his girlfriend, is there?”

  Taya wasn’t so sure Kyle had a girlfriend, but she let it pass. “Okay, but if you haven’t found anything by this evening…”

  “I’ll find you, and we’ll talk about it.”

  “Promise?”

  “I promise.”

  “Good.” Taya leaned on her crutch and touched his face. “No matter how late.”

  He nodded, looking preoccupied. “Take a hack and charge it to me if you have to.”

  Taya sighed and dropped her hand. Whatever romantic stirrings Cristof had felt earlier that day had vanished in the excitement of the new case.

  “What’s wrong?” He blinked, focusing on her again.

  “Nothing,” she said, ruefully. “I’ll see you later.”

  Viera Octavus welcomed Taya with relief. As Cristof had warned, she was still furious with Alister.

  “My family took him in when his parents died,” Viera raged. “I looked up to him as though he were my own brother. And when I got married, I welcomed him into my house, fed him at my table — and he betrayed me!”

  Taya nodded, watching the exalted pace back and forth across the parlor. She’d seen Viera take a dose of something medicinal, but it hadn’t done much to calm her down.

  “I don’t blame you for being angry,” she said. “He betrayed a lot of people.”

  At last Viera dropped back onto her sofa, wiping her eyes with a handkerchief.

  “I wish he’d died with Caster,” she said at last. “It would have been easier if they’d both been victims. Finding out he killed my husband… it’s like losing him all over again.”

  Taya didn’t ask which ‘him’ she meant. Instead, she pushed out of her chair and limped over to sit next to Viera.

  “I wish I could help. I’m sorry I’ve brought so much pain to you.”

  Viera shook her head.

  “It’s not your fault. I’m glad Alister was caught. I hate it, but I’m glad for it.”

  Taya nodded, understanding.

  “You can’t stay away,” Viera added. “I’ve already lost too many people.”

  “As long as you want me to keep visiting, I will,” Taya promised.

  She left two hours later, sobered and depressed. What would have happened if she’d agreed to Alister’s ruse and pretended he’d survived the explosion? Viera and Cristof both would be happier, and Alister
wouldn’t be under a sentence of death. She thrust the thought away. No. One way or the other, the lie would have come out and destroyed them. It wouldn’t have been possible to keep the secret forever, and it would have made her an accomplice to his crimes.

  “Taya!”

  She looked up and saw Cassi sitting on top of a hack, her ondium wings bright in the afternoon sun. Taya limped across the street and saw that her friend had found Gregor and Bolt.

  Cassi hopped down and gave her a quick hug, careful not to jab her with the armature’s ondium keel.

  “I got your note,” she said. “Took me a while to find you, though. I ran into your exalted and he told me you were either up here or at some punch-jockey bar. He asked me to make sure you were staying off your leg, so I rounded up your favorite coach.”

  “Thanks.” Taya turned to Gregor. “Can I put you on retainer for a day or two?”

  “Of course.” The coachman smiled.

  “I appreciate it. If I don’t have enough money with me—”

  “We’ll settle up later, then.” Gregor slid from his seat and opened the hack’s doors, letting the folding steps clatter down to the cobblestones.

  “I found Exalted Forlore down at one of the gates, and he bought me a cup of tea. I thought he was just going to thank me for yesterday, but as soon as we sat down, he started asking questions.” Cassi grinned. “He looked like he was in a hurry, but I think he couldn’t resist the chance to investigate you.”

  “Me?”

  “Uh-huh. He grilled me for ten minutes, fidgeting constantly, and then he shot out the door without even saying goodbye. Do you like him?”

  “What do you mean, he grilled you? What did he want to know?”

  “Oh, the usual. What kind of flowers do you like, how many boyfriends have you had, what’s your favorite color, how many boyfriends have you had, what kind of jewelry do you like, how many boyfriends have you had…”

  Taya groaned, covering her face with her hands.

  “I think he’s a prude,” Cassi concluded, sounding cheerful. “He looks like a prude.”

  “He’s not a prude! Well, maybe he is. What did you tell him?”

  “That you like irises, you look good in blue, and you hardly wear any jewelry at all.”