The Wooden Prince

by John Claude Bemis

  “Come, Master,” Pinocchio urged, eager to get to Montalcino.

  He scampered onto the narrow rim of the aqueduct. As he traversed, he looked back to see Geppetto warily starting to follow. He was standing sideways with his arms out like a bird, inching his feet side to side.

  “What’s the matter, Master? Why are you walking like that?”

  Geppetto grumbled, and Maestro said, “He’s not as foolhardy as you! If you fell, you might damage a few parts, but going over the side could kill him. And if he falls in the trough, he’ll be swept away by the water and—”

  “Can you please be quiet, Maestro?” Geppetto snarled, slowly facing forward and taking measured steps, one foot in front of the other.

  This was yet another strange thing about humans, Pinocchio decided. Geppetto had been so brave when they were sneaking past the airmen in San Baldovino, but here his master was frightened by the simple act of walking on a bridge.

  Pinocchio watched until Geppetto had nearly caught up to him. “Keep going,” Geppetto said, waving a hand.

  “But I’m worried for you, Master. I don’t want you to fall.”

  “Then please quit distracting me.”

  Pinocchio felt the tug of the orders threatening to lengthen his nose, so he took a few more steps before reaching back a hand. “Let me help you, Master. That’s why I was sent to you. Prester John wanted me to help you. Please take my hand. I don’t want to lose you.”

  Geppetto froze. His face went white. “What did you say?”

  Maestro buzzed down to land on the aqueduct. “What’s wrong, Geppetto?”

  Geppetto knelt to keep his balance, his eyes fixed on Pinocchio. “It’s just…when I left Abaton, when Prester John sent me back with the three gifts for the doge…Your words reminded me of something he said. ‘Don’t be angry with the doge for asking you to steal my Ancientmost Pearl. There is nothing that grieves a parent more than losing his child.’”

  Pinocchio tilted his head curiously. “Is he right, Master?”

  “Of course he’s right,” Geppetto said. “And Prester John must have heard what happened to my family. How his gifts provoked the doge’s anger against me…against them.”

  Maestro wiggled his antennae. “I’m not understanding what you’re saying, Geppetto.”

  “The boy.” Geppetto nodded to Pinocchio. “Prester John sent him to me.”

  “Yes, we know,” Maestro said.

  “To be my son.”

  “What?” Maestro and Pinocchio said together.

  “When Prester John heard what happened to my son, he sent his own gift to ease my grief. He sent me Pinocchio, an automa who is becoming a boy.”

  “I’m meant to be your son?” Pinocchio murmured. Something warm and strange and wonderful was welling in his gearworks.

  A gentle smile gathered on Geppetto’s face. “I believe you are. And I—”

  Over the tree-topped hill behind them, a figure rose in the air, long wings stretching from his back, red armor glittering in the sunlight. The happiness drained from Pinocchio.

  “Airman!” he gasped.

  Geppetto nearly lost his balance. “Go, Pinocchio!” he shouted. “Get to the other side.”

  The airman hovered high in the air, his gaze locking on the aqueduct. With a dive, he came for them. Geppetto began walking faster, a dance of steps with his arms outstretched and flailing.

  Pinocchio didn’t want to leave his master, but Geppetto had given him an order. He reluctantly headed for the other side. The airman swept across the aqueduct, a shot booming from his musket. A chunk of rock exploded near Pinocchio’s feet.

  He froze. The airman was coming around in a tight arc, his mechanical wings beating the air.

  “Hurry, Master!” Pinocchio shouted.

  Geppetto was hurrying as best he could, but the airman landed on the aqueduct between them. He aimed his weapon at Pinocchio. “Stay where you are!”

  This was not an order Pinocchio had to follow. The airman was not his master. But Pinocchio wasn’t going to leave Geppetto to be captured.

  “Signore Polendina,” the airman barked.

  Pinocchio realized with a jolt who this was. Captain Toro.

  “Or are you, in fact, Geppetto Gazza, traitor to the empire?” Captain Toro said. “We’ll soon find out. Order your automa to stay where it is while I secure you.”

  Geppetto narrowed his eyes. “Pinocchio,” he said. “Continue to the other side. Get away.”

  Captain Toro reloaded his musket and trained it on Pinocchio. “I can shoot it. An automa is not so easily repaired after having its chest splintered by a musket ball.”

  “You won’t,” Geppetto said. “The doge wouldn’t want you to do that.”

  Captain Toro turned the musket on Geppetto. “You seem the brave sort, signore. Let’s test it. Order the automa to stay where it is or I’ll shoot you instead.”

  “You won’t do that, either,” Geppetto said.

  Captain Toro leveled his musket. Pinocchio hesitated, not sure enough about how people worked to know the difference between a threat and a warning.

  “Go!” Geppetto shouted at Pinocchio.

  At once, the musket blasted in a cloud of smoke.

  “NO!” Pinocchio shouted, running for Captain Toro. The seven-league boots gave him a surprising burst of speed, and he tackled Captain Toro, rocketing the two of them out over the river. As he did, Pinocchio realized that Captain Toro’s shot had been aimed high. Geppetto was still standing on the aqueduct, unharmed.

  But it was too late. He and Captain Toro were falling.

  One of Captain Toro’s wings opened, but Pinocchio had the other one pinned. They sailed around in a spiral, Captain Toro sputtering and trying to pry loose Pinocchio’s powerful hold.

  Pinocchio’s nose grew as they fell. Geppetto had ordered him to go, and he had defied his master. What else was he supposed to have done? But it was too late to worry about that now.

  They splashed into the river. The swift current immediately swept them away. Pinocchio held tight to Captain Toro, fearing that if he let go, the airman would fly back up and capture Geppetto. They sank to the bottom, the current dragging them by Captain Toro’s lone wing.

  Captain Toro fought and struggled. His musket was lost. With one hand he beat at Pinocchio. With the other he clawed at the river bottom. Pinocchio clung to his back in the racing current. Captain Toro’s fight began to fade, and soon he was no longer moving. Reluctantly, Pinocchio loosened his hold. The captain drifted limply in the water.

  Pinocchio turned him over. Captain Toro’s eyes were wide, but he didn’t see Pinocchio. Pinocchio tapped at the captain’s cheek. He didn’t respond.

  He gave the captain a shove. Wake up!

  But the captain wasn’t sleeping. He had stopped functioning. And when humans stopped functioning…

  “No!” Pinocchio roared, his voice dulled by the water.

  He had to get Captain Toro out of the river. Maybe then he would come alive again. He grabbed the captain’s arm and pulled, fighting the current to walk toward the bank. As he brought the captain onto the shore, Pinocchio broke off the mechanical wings so he could lay the airman on his back.

  He patted Captain Toro’s face. “Just function again,” he murmured. “Please don’t be dead. I forgot you could die. I didn’t mean to do it. Just start working again.”

  There was a terrible burning in Pinocchio’s gears, beginning from his feet and working its way up to his chest. Was this what Geppetto felt every time he thought about his wife and son? Pinocchio rested his hands on Captain Toro’s stomach, feeling shame and despair at what he had done. Something burning hot flooded down his arms into his fingertips.

  Captain Toro sputtered, and Pinocchio shot to his feet. Then, with another sputter, a fountain of water spewed from Toro’s mouth. The captain coughed brutally, rolling onto his side.

  Pinocchio fell back, drained. His head felt as if it were filling with thick mist. “Captain?” he
whispered. “Are you alive?”

  Captain Toro opened his dark-rimmed eyes. His helmet was gone, and strings of wet hair were plastered to his face. “You drowned me,” he gasped.

  “I didn’t mean to,” Pinocchio said.

  “But…” He breathed heavily. “You…saved me.”

  “I suppose I did mean to do that.”

  “Why?” Captain Toro said weakly.

  Pinocchio’s thoughts weren’t so clear anymore. The mist that seemed to fill his head was making it hard to think. “My master told me human life is valuable,” he said. “You will live, then?”

  The captain nodded.

  “Good.” Pinocchio ran into the trees, scrambling up the embankment to get away. His thoughts were so muddled by whatever he’d just done to Captain Toro, he forgot why he was even out here in this forest. His automa impulses, however, were working better than ever. He was an automa who had lost his master. He simply had to find him again.

  After he had run some distance, he noticed something in his field of view. He touched the long nose sticking from his face. He couldn’t remember now why his nose had grown long. What had he done? It didn’t matter. He just had to find his master. Master could fix it.

  “Master!” he shouted.

  But where was his master? He vaguely remembered his master had been on a sort of bridge that carried water. Yes, an aqueduct.

  He continued up the gorge, running into the base of a cliff, where he simply kept going by pulling himself hand over hand up the sheer face. When he reached the top, he scanned the ravine. No aqueduct.

  “Which way is it?” he said to himself.

  A voice answered behind him. “Which way is what?”

  Pinocchio turned to see five swords pointed at his chest. Five swords floating in the air.

  Even this didn’t surprise Pinocchio. He stared blankly until he realized that the swords were being held by five nearly invisible figures. They wore cloaks covered in leaves and bark that perfectly camouflaged them.

  “Look what we’ve got here, Rampino,” one called.

  A bush rustled, becoming a sixth cloaked figure. Rampino chuckled and drew a sword. “You lost, automa?”

  “Yes,” Pinocchio said. “I am lost and looking for my master.”

  “Are you now?” Rampino smiled, showing crooked yellow teeth. “Looking for your master, or run off from him?”

  Pinocchio tried to understand why the men were holding swords on him. “I assure you, I am no danger to you. You can put away your swords.”

  A round of laughter burst from the men.

  “Hear that, boys?” Rampino chuckled. “We can put away our swords.”

  For some reason none of the men put away their swords.

  Pinocchio’s fealty lock was buzzing at him to get back to his master as soon as possible. He was a good automa. A loyal automa. He should not be wandering around the woods on his own.

  “Can you help me find my master? He was—”

  “That’s what we’re here for, automa,” Rampino interrupted. “We’re going to help you find your master.”

  “That is good,” Pinocchio said.

  “A new master, that is,” Rampino clarified. “Get him in the cart.”

  New master? He did not want a new master. He had to get back to his.

  A man came forward, and as he reached for Pinocchio, his hand came too close to Pinocchio’s chest. With a flash of movement, Pinocchio grabbed the man’s wrist. He yowled in pain.

  “Let go of him, you blasted puppet!” Rampino growled, swinging his sword.

  Pinocchio held up an arm to block the blow. The sword gave a thunk as it stuck in his forearm. The effects of the sword’s iron were instantaneous. His knees buckled, and he collapsed, motionless, to the ground.

  “Get him in the cage, boys,” Rampino said.

  The men had an automa donkey cart hidden over behind some trees. Like the mechanipillar, it walked on metal legs, but it had only four, one at each corner of the wagon. The wooden donkey’s head, sprouting from the wagon front, peered around to look placidly at Pinocchio. Fixed atop the donkey cart’s wagon was a large metal cage.

  Pinocchio was hoisted inside. He struggled to sit up before the barred door was locked, but he was too slow. “Signori, you do not understand. I must return to my master. He is nearby. He will be looking for me.”

  “Hear that?” Rampino called. “Better hurry.”

  The donkey brayed like a warped piston. The wagon jerked forward and began to sway as it walked over roots and stones through the forest. The men marched beside the donkey cart.

  Rampino sheathed his sword with a laugh. “A fine catch! Did you see that fight in him? He’ll earn us a nice bag of gold. Just you see.”

  The one man was whimpering, clutching his arm tight to his chest, but the others smiled at their leader, hardly a mouthful of teeth between them.

  “And I know just who’ll pay nicely for an automa like this,” Rampino said.

  “Al Mi’raj?” another replied.

  Rampino chuckled. “That’s just the fire-eating djinni I was thinking of.”

  Lazuli was hiding in a tree. She’d been hiding a lot lately, and, as a princess of Abaton, this was not something she was used to. It seemed that ever since she’d arrived in this cursed Venetian Empire, it had been one near escape after another. And now…

  A musket blast echoed up from the ravine.

  It had to be imperial airmen. She’d seen her share of them, although fortunately, so far, from a safe distance.

  Something was happening over in the ravine, but from her hiding spot up in the tree, she hadn’t been able to tell what was going on. Clearly the airmen were pursuing someone. Maybe it was some poor enslaved chimera—or “half-beast,” as they were called here in the empire. She’d heard that the slaves who ran away from their human masters were hunted down. Who knew what horrible things they did to them? These Venetians really were savages.

  While the calls of airmen seemed to remain down in the ravine, someone was coming her way. Hurried footsteps were crunching on leaves on the forest floor below. Lazuli came out a little farther on the branch to see who it was.

  It was a human, and given his attire, not an imperial soldier. He bent over, his hands on his knees, catching his breath. Lazuli guessed he was the one the airmen were looking for. So they hunted their own kind as well. Did their savagery have no end?

  “Are we safe?”

  The voice was so chirping and light, Lazuli couldn’t imagine that it belonged to the man. But there didn’t seem to be anyone else with him.

  “Not in the slightest,” the man said. “Give me a moment and we’ll keep going.”

  “But where?” the chirping voice asked. “We don’t know where Pinocchio’s gone.”

  “The lad can’t drown. And automa are too heavy to float. He could be stuck on the river bottom. Ten to one he’s already managed to drag himself ashore. But where’s he hiding?”

  The man stood and gave a great stretch of his arms. Lazuli glimpsed his face now. That pointy mustache, that mane of silver-black hair. She knew this man! He was the only human she’d ever seen, at least before she’d arrived here with her father in this vile humanland empire.

  He was Geppetto, the high alchemist of Venice. Or least he had been the high alchemist. Her father’s spies had said that Geppetto had barely escaped with his life from the doge’s fortress after returning from his visit to Abaton.

  And now she could see that a cricket was clinging to his shoulder. Could that be Maestro?

  Lazuli cupped a hand to her mouth and called lightly, “Are you Master Geppetto?”

  Geppetto spun this way and that, peering around at the forest but not looking up. “Who’s there?” he hissed.

  “I don’t like this,” Maestro chirped anxiously.

  “I’m up here,” Lazuli said.

  Geppetto looked up and gave a start when he spied her. “Great Vesuvius, girl! How did you get stuck in that tree?”r />
  “I’m not stuck,” Lazuli said, stepping easily along the branch back to the trunk.

  Geppetto waved his hands in alarm. “Stop!” he cried. “You’re going to fall!”

  Lazuli walked down the trunk, her feet flat against the bark and her body perfectly horizontal to the earth. When she landed without a sound on the forest floor, she pulled back her hood to reveal her bright blue hair.

  “You’re a sylph,” Geppetto gasped.

  “That’s not just any sylph!” Maestro piped. “That’s Princess Lazuli, Prester John’s daughter!”

  “And you, Master Cricket, are Maestro, the renowned musician of the Moonlit Court,” Lazuli said, flourishing a hand.

  “Why…yes, Your Highness,” Maestro said, bowing his antennae repeatedly. “I’m…I’m honored you remember me.”

  Geppetto frowned. “But what are you doing here?”

  “Searching for my father,” Lazuli said. “He’s been captured.”

  “Yes, I know,” Geppetto said. “But you shouldn’t be here, child. You’re in terrible danger!”

  “I’m no child, Master Geppetto.” Lazuli cocked a hand to her hip. She resented being seen as a little girl. She might have been the youngest of her father’s children—and the only one still living—but she would be old enough to marry in a few years, although that was a dreadful thought.

  “I accompanied my father on his voyage to Venice,” Lazuli said. “We had just reached the lagoon near the city when our ship was attacked….” Her throat went tight at the memory of that terrible night, of the fiery missiles that rained down from the doge’s floating warships, of her father hurling her from the side of their ship just before the explosion, of having to run across the surface of the water to get away.

  Tears of bitter shame threatened to form. She had run away and left her father to be captured. But what else was there to do? She’d only have been caught as well, or worse.

  Geppetto’s expression softened. “You don’t have to—”