by S. C. Green
Isambard sucked in his breath. Holman, even though he couldn’t see the beast, sensed something was wrong, for he grabbed Nicholas’ arm, his fingers digging deep.
The head came up, and the dragon sniffed. Nicholas’ breath caught in his throat. He could smell himself and his companions as the dragon smelt them — four men, cornered and frightened. He smelt dessert.
Suddenly, another hand squeezed his. It was Aaron. Nicholas couldn’t hear his thoughts, but he could feel the dragon slipping, confused. It wanted to ignore the intruders, but it didn’t know why. The dragon’s thoughts receded, and his own mind slipped back into his head. Nicholas gathered his senses and concentrated on pushing out one thought, giving it to the dragon. Ignore the people. They’re no threat.
Holman, not able to see what was happening, but smelling the blood and the stench of the kill, whimpered.
Ignore them. They’re nothing.
The dragon’s head whipped around, and her yellow eyes bore into Nicholas. He pushed harder, knowing the dragon could leap at any moment, knowing this was the only way he could save his friends.
Ignore the people. Ignore the people.
The dragon snorted, dipped its head, and returned to feeding.
Aaron glanced at Nicholas, and they pushed Isambard and a terrified Holman around the corner of the building and circled on to the main street. They huddled under a streetlamp and caught their breath.
“That was … that was …” Holman could only stutter. His fingers around his cane were white as bone.
“Two dragons in as many weeks,” Aaron teased. “You must smell mighty tempting, James.”
Shaken, they pressed on toward Engine Ward, the towering funnel of black smoke growing larger with their every step. As Nicholas walked alongside Aaron, the air between them seemed to sizzle with energy, like lightning bolts flicking between their fingers. Nicholas knew it had been mostly Aaron who had stopped the dragon, but he wondered what they might be able to do, the two of them together, if they could again direct their minds to the same purpose.
The Ward gates stood open, and the usual gaggle of priests and intellectuals passed to and fro, some going to the midnight masses held in the vaulted cathedrals, others leaving to take their pleasures in the bawdy houses and bagnios. Here, progress was slow, for men kept stopping Brunel to congratulate him on his appointment. He chatted with each of them, not scolding them for interrupting, paying as much attention to the ill-mannered rakes as to the sycophantic priests. Nicholas caught the sounds of music and revelry on the breeze, and as they neared the Chimney and the Stoker quarter, he could see Stokers dancing around great bonfires, already celebrating Brunel’s appointment.
Brunel didn’t go to them straight away, but stood on the steps of the Chimney, his gaze sweeping over the scene. Nicholas and Aaron watched him, and James faced the fire, each man lost in his own thoughts.
Finally, Isambard said. “I cannot get the image of that dragon out of my head. All we have built here — this great city of brick and stone and iron — cannot control, cannot protect those who dwell within her.”
Nicholas thought back to that horrific day, ten years ago, when Henry had been crushed in the beam engine and Isambard had regarded the incident with this same rapt curiosity. He shuddered.
“When you finish your Wall,” said Holman, “they will no longer be a problem.”
“They will always be a problem, as long as we fear them and don’t try to understand them,” said Isambard. “The Stokers understood them, back before I was born, when they lived in the swamps. Unfortunately, we understood them so much we used their own tactics against them — we hunted them practically to extinction. It seems only fair they should come to this city to kill us.”
“Is that why they’re in London, do you think?” Aaron asked. The idea seemed to intrigue him.
“I couldn’t say. Something is drawing them into the city. Why could it not be revenge? Do we so readily assume vengeance is the sole dominion of man?”
“I wonder why the Royal Society has never sent someone to investigate the dragons,” said James. “Surely someone like Buckland could study them in the swamps to ascertain the reason for their exodus.”
“Yes,” said Isambard. “I don’t understand this myself. But now that I’m a Presbyter, perhaps I can begin to unravel this mystery.”
“Let’s get this wall of yours built first,” said Nicholas.
Across the street from the Chimney, a man emerged from one of the warehouses. He bent down, a briefcase bursting with papers clutched tightly to his chest, and fumbled with the lock. Nicholas didn’t recognise him, but the moonlight caught the man’s face, and he thought his expression almost impossibly sad.
“Would you excuse me for a moment,” said Isambard. “There’s a matter I need to attend to.” Before Nicholas and Aaron could say another word, he broke away and slipped into the street below.
***
With a strangled sigh, Charles Babbage dipped his quill into the inkwell and scrawled his signature on the last of Clement’s many cheques. He folded the stack inside a crisp envelope, added his seal to the front, and dropped it into his satchel.
He would deliver the cheques tonight, after he closed up the office, and then he would go home and drink all the brandy in the cupboard. And then maybe he’d start on that bottle of port Francesca had bought him on their wedding anniversary. He would drink until he forgot all the trouble he was in, and if he drank so much he didn’t wake up in the morning … well, so much the better. He would drink ’till he forgot Clement, and the Royal Society, and the ridiculous blasphemy charges, and that could take a very, very long time.
Clement, the self-made precision engineer whose detailed drawings had brought Babbage’s dream of a Difference Engine to life. Clement, who could fashion a tool for any purpose and create minute parts so similar one could not tell them apart even under a microscope. Clement, the bastard son of a whore and a cheat, who’d been deliberately delaying completion of parts of the Difference Engine to extort more money from their open-ended contract. Clement, the rotten blagger, who’d robbed Babbage of every penny he had, cost him his Royal patronage and turned his congregation and the whole of the Royal Society against him.
Babbage locked the door to his office and stalked down the hall of the old shipping warehouse, now home to several small-scale engineers and their tiny, floundering churches. Some would go on to become great names in the sects of Great Conductor or Morpheus or Aristotle; others had been great once, but their fortunes had waned as new and greater inventions took hold of the people’s fickle interests. And some, like Babbage, had never really invented anything at all.
He closed his eyes as he passed by his workshops; dark now, and deserted. He couldn’t bear to see his beautiful engine, the racks of numbered wheels lined up against the shelves, ready to be assembled onto the great steel frame. And now they would never turn, would never execute the complex calculations for which he had designed them.
He jammed his hands into his jacket pockets. It wasn’t bloody fair. He had devised one of the most singularly useful machines in existence — a calculating engine. No longer would engineers, mathematicians, and astronomers be forced to rely on the erroneous ledgers of equations calculated by the computing men. They could instead crank a handle and receive an accurate answer calculated by the machine.
When he’d first approached the Royal Society with his idea, they had immediately seen the benefit, and offered him a stipend of £1,500 to complete the first prototype. Then Joseph Banks had suggested he hire Clement — the most accomplished precision engineer in the Sect of the Grandfather Clock, and a Society favourite. And that was where everything had gone bloody wrong.
Outside the window, an organ grinder passed by, the high, tinny notes of “Down in the Sally Gardens” sealing his doom. Babbage ground his teeth together. The only thing he hated more than Clement was organ grinders. They knew it, of course, and worked together in teams to follow hi
m all about the city, taunting him with their repeating, off-key tunes.
He turned away, hunching as he pulled the door shut behind him, locked it for the last time, and shoved the key back into his pocket. He turned, and his stomach dropped to his knees as a dark shadow emerged from the buttress of the Metic Church and floated towards him. He fumbled for his pocket knife, but barely had time to draw breath before the figure was upon him.
“Isambard, you startled me!”
“I’m sure many have said the same thing to you in past weeks,” Brunel smiled. “You were missed at tonight’s meeting, Charles.”
“I’m in no mood for mockery, Isambard.”
“It’s the truth. You’re not the only one who thinks the Society should focus more on constructive reasoning and less on robe-kissing. Davy’s calculations were wrong — it seemed a simple matter to me.”
“Hardly. This simple matter has had me excommunicated. Banks informed me yesterday I shouldn’t bother to defend myself.” Babbage started walking, briskly, across the courtyard in front of the church, hoping Brunel would take the hint and leave him be. But the Stoker met his stride with ease, his casual demeanour only increasing Babbage’s unease.
“A move I’m certain you anticipated with great joy. After all, now you are unbound from their rules and scrutiny. Now you’re free to push the limits of your science.”
“The limits of my bank balance, more like,” Charles sniffed, cutting across the pavilion at the rear of the Church of Grandfather Clock. “This blasted engine is not even a quarter complete, and Clement has taken all his drawings, all my money, and all the precision tools he created to fashion the mechanisms. And without the Royal Society’s stipend, I cannot hope to afford the price of another engineer. No, sir, the Difference Engine is doomed for the scrap heap.”
“If that’s the case, then what I’ve come to offer will brighten your day.”
“What do you want?”
“I want you to renounce your god, assemble what sections and plans remain, and join me in the Chimney.”
Charles snorted. “Join the upstart Stoker who plays at engineering? That would do wonders for my reputation.”
“That’s upstart Presbyter to you.”
Babbage stopped. “You didn’t—”
“Can’t you hear them praising my name?” He gestured behind him at the revellers. “I’ve been awarded the prize in the engineering competition, and I want you to work for me. It’s not as abhorrent as you make out, my friend. Think about it — you have a Difference Engine lying in pieces all over your workshop, an engineer who’s run off with your only means to fashion the precision parts, dwindling finances, and a church that’s about to desert you for someone less risky. I have a need of your analytical mind and work to occupy you, and what’s more I now have the funds and tools to help you complete your masterpiece.”
For a second, just a second, Babbage was tempted to accept. But then he looked up, into Brunel’s eyes — the eyes of London’s newest religious fool — and what he saw stopped him short. Flickering behind the clear surface was that same fanatical gaze he saw in Clement, in Banks, in everyone at the Society. No, Babbage decided. This Industrian nonsense will go to Brunel’s head, just like it does to every other learned man, and I’ll have no more of it.
He shook his head. “I’m doing just fine on my own, thank you, Isambard.”
“As you wish,” Brunel tipped his hat. “I must say, I am disappointed. I greatly admire you, Charles, as a man of brilliant intellect who’s caught the short end of the Council’s stick. You would find plenty of worthwhile endeavours to occupy yourself in my employ.”
“I have enough endeavours of my own to employ my intellect for the rest of eternity.”
“Very well.” Brunel took a thin metal plate from his pocket and threw it at Babbage, who fumbled and dropped it in a puddle. Scrambling to pick it up, he heard the Presbyter say as he departed: “If you change your mind, bring that plate to the Chimney. The offer will still be open to you.”
***
The walls of the state chambers of Windsor Castle echoed with the sounds of shattering crockery, as King George III of England proceeded to break every bowl in the china cabinet over the head of Alison Cooper, the newest maid.
Brigitte Black hid behind the door and listened, her heart beating hard against her chest. With every shout and scream and smash, silent sobs escaped her, the salty tears blurring her vision. After a while, Alison ceased to scream, but still the tirade raged on.
Finally, the King ran out of plates. But he did not leave Alison. Brigitte pressed herself against the door, struggling to hear what was going on. She could just make out a light sound, like a sucking or … lapping of liquid, before the King let out one final bellow and stormed off to his chambers. Brigitte waved to Cassandra, who tiptoed down the hall to check the way was clear. When Cassandra waved back that the King had gone, Brigitte nudged open the heavy door, and bit back a scream.
Alison lay facedown in a pool of her own blood, her pressed white uniform now stained bright pink. Her arms were spread at either side, the bare skin crisscrossed with weeping gashes, as though she had reached out to embrace the King while he thrust the crockery into her. Ceramic shards stuck out at odd angles from her skin and her matted, tangled hair. Beside her head, a teacup — the only piece of china in the room still intact — sat upright on its saucer, holding a few drops of her blood.
Cassandra let out a great sob, clamping her hands over her mouth as though she might be sick. Brigitte reached out with trembling fingers to touch the girl’s shoulder.
“Don’t—” Cassandra sobbed. Brigitte didn’t blame her. She didn’t want to see, either.
As Brigitte’s fingers brushed the raw skin beneath the torn dress, Alison groaned. Perhaps she’s still alive. Perhaps we’re not too late, after all.
“Alison?” she said, trying to keep her voice even.
Alison groaned again, fainter this time. Brigitte clasped her hand around Alison’s shoulder and pulled her back, trying to get her to turn onto her side. Alison’s head lolled back, causing some of the shards to fall out and fresh blood to pool from the wounds. Blood dribbled over Brigitte’s apron.
But Brigitte barely registered the stain, transfixed as she was by the girl’s face. Alison’s eyes were half-closed, glassy, and unseeing. The skin on her cheeks hung in torn strips, slivers of Staffordshire sticking out like porcupine quills. Long gashes crisscrossed her neck, as though he’d tried to behead her with the dinnerware. Blood dribbled from cracks in her lips.
Brigitte recoiled in horror. She dropped Alison’s shoulder, and fled to Cassandra’s arms. The two girls met each other’s eyes. “Miss Julie,” they said in unison.
Brigitte gestured for Cassandra to grab Alison’s legs, and she dug her hands under the girl’s shoulders. Shards tinkled on the marble floor. Together, they heaved her off the ground and hobbled into the hall. Between Brigitte’s legs, Alison’s head flailed back and forth, spraying blood all over the French carpets. Luckily, the maids’ staircase was only down the adjacent hall.
Brigitte held the door open with her back while they manoeuvred Alison’s limp body inside. Cassandra bent down to wipe the blood dribbling down her stockings. “This is horrible!” she sobbed.
“He is horrible.” Brigitte grunted as she lifted Alison again and started backing down the staircase. “The sickness is making him positively cruel.”
“I hoped this time Banks had cured him for good.” Cassandra lifted Alison’s legs over the corner balustrade. “Do you remember this time last year, when they had to chain him to his chair? Or when he babbled incoherently in the drawing room for fifty-two hours straight? I’d give anything to go back to the babbling. Just last week I overheard two ministers in the drawing room discussing his deplorable behaviour at the Royal Society. Apparently, he sent three Whigs to the Tower for pronouncing the God Morpheus’ name wrong. They fear he won’t recover his sanity again.”
“As right they should,” Brigitte winced as Alison’s head knocked against the wall. “At least now maybe they’ll talk about a regency, even if the princesses aren’t yet old enough. May we all survive long enough to see the end of him.”
“May we all.” Cassandra looked down at Alison. “Quickly now. Miss Julie will know what to do.”
Brigitte kicked open the door at the foot of the stairs, and they dragged Alison’s body into the kitchen. A plump, sour-faced woman looked up from the kneading to scold them, but then she saw the blood.
“Out of my way!” She flung the rolling pin over her shoulder, scooped up the unfortunate Alison in one beefy arm, grabbed a wool blanket in the other, and dashed into the sleeping quarters. Brigitte and Cassandra sprinted after her.
Miss Julie flung the blanket over Alison’s bed, laid the bleeding girl out upon it, and began picking out the ceramic shards. “Bring me water, a cloth, and the vinegar!” she barked. Cassandra raced off. Brigitte stayed in the doorway, unable to move, her teeth biting down on her fingernails while she watched Miss Julie work.
Cassandra returned with a tub of water, a stack of rags and the bottle of vinegar. Miss Julie soaked one of the rags in the water, rubbed a little vinegar on it, and started mopping up the blood. Alison’s eyes fluttered open, and she moaned a little before disappearing again. “It’s all right, child,” Miss Julie said. “We’ll have that pretty face of yours back in no time.”
To Brigitte she said, “most of the cuts are quite shallow, but on her face and neck — these are serious. Tear those rags into bandages.”
Her hands numb and shaking, Brigitte picked up one of the rags in the pile and tore jagged, clumsy strips, which Miss Julie soaked in the water and vinegar and wrapped around Alison’s head. Alison moaned, lolling her head from side to side. Brigitte knelt beside her, stroked her hand, and whispered her name, but Alison didn’t seem to be aware of her presence.
When Miss Julie had finished, she stood up and wiped her hands on her apron. “I’ve done all I can, the rest is up to the Gods. Now, what happened?”
