by S. E. Grove
Shadrack shook his head. “This is madness.”
“Is it?” Blanca asked softly. “You are a scientist—you know that time passes and the earth’s surface changes. All the Ages pass away. Do you not wish for the arrival of an Age in which there is knowledge, and ease of life, and peace? You are simply afraid of losing the world that is familiar to you.”
“Your arrogance is astounding,” Shadrack said with disgust. “I have never seen such blind faith.”
Blanca shook her veiled head. “It is you who are arrogant,” she replied quietly. “Think of the cost of preserving the primitive Ages you cling to. To satisfy such sentiment, you are willing to put up with petty tyrants, never-ending wars, widespread ignorance. You, who value scholarship so highly, should welcome an end to these dark Ages, where every piece of hoarded knowledge is false.”
“Without our ‘false knowledge’ and our ‘mistakes,’ your Age would never have come about,” Shadrack said sharply. “Every future Age owes a debt to its past Ages.”
“But the consequences of those falsehoods,” Blanca said. “Your blindness is more destructive than you realize.”
“Surely you overestimate me. In your vision, I am only an irritating speck of sand from the past.”
“That may be true. But you, in particular, are a speck of sand that matters.”
He laughed bitterly. “If this is meant to win me to your cause, it isn’t working.”
Blanca looked at the map. Then she took a handful of white sand from the nearby pile and carefully poured it out, covering every landmass. All that remained was ice and ocean. “These dark Ages will not survive, regardless. The Southern Snows are moving northward, Shadrack. We can dispute everything else, but not this.”
Shadrack looked hard at the veil, his heart pounding. He abhorred her entire vision, and in part he still did not believe her. But in at least one respect, he could not risk disbelieving her. If an Ice Age was truly descending on the Baldlands, and rapidly, he had to find Sophia before it reached her. He felt a momentary flash of fury at himself for sending her to Nochtland. Then he composed himself. “What do you plan to do?”
For a moment, she was silent. “I am in a difficult position. I do not know the location of the carta mayor, and you will not tell me.”
“Because I do not know it,” Shadrack said curtly.
“Nor will you tell me where Sophia is going with the Tracing Glass.” When Shadrack did not answer, she shrugged. “I might make a globe of your memories to find out.” She paused, waiting for him to protest. Shadrack looked down at the ground, disciplining his face into stillness. “But then I would be without your skills as a mapmaker.” She moved closer to Shadrack and took one of his hands between her two gloved ones. “I need more than your memories to revise the carta mayor. I need your hands. When you agree to help me, I can tell you more.” Shadrack stood silently. “Consider,” Blanca said earnestly, pressing his hand and then releasing it, “that the Ice Age is already advancing. It has begun here, and here, and here,” she said, indenting with her fingertip the sand spread across Late Patagonia. “It is no longer a matter of weeks—more likely days—before the border reaches Nochtland.” She touched the capital of the Baldlands, leaving a shallow depression. “Come,” she said encouragingly. “Tell me where you have sent the Tracing Glass.”
Shadrack wheeled away from her, struggling to control his frustration. There were few times in his life when he had been so entrapped by his circumstances, and he did not like the feeling. Blanca seemed to know Sophia was heading south, and she would pursue the Tracing Glass whether he assisted her or not. If he assisted Blanca, the glass would almost certainly fall into her hands, and Sophia’s safety would be all but irrelevant.
There was only one course he could follow. He had to escape as they traveled south and find Sophia himself. It was the only way to keep both her and the glass safe. He turned back to Blanca. “I will do everything I can to prevent you from ever seeing or touching it.”
For a moment, she did not speak. “Ah. Well, I have learned one thing. You believe the carta mayor exists. Otherwise, you would not go to such lengths.” Shadrack clenched his jaw, his eyes hard. “You should reconsider. It is only a matter of days before we find your niece.”
“I will take my chances,” Shadrack said hoarsely.
“If you agree to help me, I will be sure she is treated kindly when she’s found. I have fifty men at the stops along the railway route she travels. She cannot get off or on a train without my knowing.” She lifted one shoulder. “That is the advantage of owning the second largest rail company in New Occident.” Shadrack blinked. “Oh, the private train and rail line leading here weren’t evidence enough for you? Yes. You may appreciate the irony of it: I took the first step toward making my fortune on the gaming tables of New York, playing with parliament time. From there it was a simple matter to buy my first tobacco plantation—tobacco is such a vice in New Occident.” She shook her veiled head. “One plantation easily becomes ten. Ten plantations are enough to finance any amount of speculative investment. Steel, for example. And of course steel manufacturing is so useful for building rails. White Smoke Tobacco, White Anvil Steel, and the Whiteline Railroad Company. A neat symmetry, don’t you think?” Her tone was triumphant.
Shadrack pressed his lips together tightly.
Blanca gave a small sigh and turned toward the Sandmen, who stood waiting. “We leave in an hour. Put all of the items from Boston in a trunk—or more than one, if need be. Don’t let him near any scissors,” she added.
15
Safe Harbor
1891, June 24: 8-Hour 00
Roundhill Station: This station was built in 1864 by the Whiteline Railroad Company, only half a mile to the north of See-Saw, where the final Battle of See-Saw took place in 1809.
Station sign
THE GLASS MAP was unharmed, and Sophia still had her pack, containing the atlas, all the folded maps for their route, her sketchbook, and an assortment of drawing instruments. Just as vitally, the leather purse had remained attached to her belt; without funds, her lifewatch, or her identity papers, they would not have gotten far. The compartments on the train were sold out, so she bought two bench-car tickets for New Orleans and then she and Theo sat at the edge of the platform to wait a whole slow hour for the next train heading west.
All of the nervous energy that had carried her through the evening and early morning had dissipated like air leaking from a balloon. Her chin and knees were bruised; her ribs and back ached from landing on the roof of the railcar, and all she wanted was to sleep. Surely, she thought, we don’t have to worry about the Sandmen appearing here. She slipped her hands into the pockets of her skirt for the two talismans that gave her comfort: the smooth disc of the pocket watch and the spool of silver thread. Time was securely in hand, and the Fates were watching over her.
The humid morning air settled over her like a damp rag as the hour slowly dragged on. More people began appearing on the platform, their dusty boots rattling the floorboards in a wearying procession of shuffles and taps. Sophia leaned back against a trunk that someone had left unattended as Theo placidly looked out over the tracks. She closed her eyes, and it seemed to her they’d been closed only a moment when a shout jolted her awake.
Sophia looked up to see the most extraordinary woman striding toward them. Everyone standing on the platform stepped aside as they saw her coming. She was tall and extravagantly dressed in a billowing charcoal-gray silk gown trimmed with lace and a black plumed hat that covered most of her face. Strapped to her narrow waist was a leather belt with a holster and a silver revolver. Her white-gloved hands planted on her hips, she stopped before them; the scent of orange blossoms wafted toward Sophia. “Thought you could take it from under my nose, did you?” she asked with a look of hard-edged amusement. Her smile was not friendly.
Sophia looked up at the woman’s face. She was beautiful; her long, dark hair hung to her waist, and her black eyes glittered.
Sophia felt a moment of panic—Mortify is on a train speeding west, so Montaigne sent someone else! She sprang to her feet and Theo joined her. Compared to this commanding woman, she felt very much a child. Her knees and palms were raw from having skidded across the roof of the train, and her skirt—plain striped cotton, even on the best of days—was ripped in more places than one. Her clean clothes, of course, were lost somewhere on a trunk heading west. She balled her fists and tried to wear, at the very least, a dignified expression. “It’s not yours,” she said, in a voice that sounded far less grand than she intended.
The woman laughed. “Is that going to be your defense? Because I don’t see how you hope to explain its contents.”
Sophia contemplated running, and then she looked at the revolver and thought of Shadrack. She swallowed hard and her voice trembled. “Where is my uncle?”
The beautiful woman’s expression abruptly changed, turning pensive. “You’ve misunderstood. I’m not that kind of pirate. And the trunk would make poor ransom,” she said.
“The trunk?” Sophia asked, confused.
The woman gave her a good long look, and then she laughed until her hat shook. When she was through, she gave Theo and Sophia a broad smile. “I believe I’ve misunderstood as well,” she said. “I’m referring to that trunk by your feet. And unless I’m mistaken, you’re referring to something else entirely.”
“You can have the trunk,” Theo told her.
“We just found it here,” Sophia said at the same time.
“Well, sweetheart, my apologies. But I confess to being intrigued. Has your uncle been taken by pirates?” She seemed genuinely curious, and her voice was full of warmth.
“No,” Sophia replied, before Theo could say anything.
The woman raised her eyebrows. “Secret, is it? Well, don’t worry about me; I know all about secrets. I’m Calixta,” she added.
“I’m Sophia. And this is Theo.”
“A great pleasure to meet you. I apologize that you had to see my vicious side first, and so entirely without provocation. Let me make it up to you properly,” Calixta continued, looking at something far in the distance, past Sophia. “Share my compartment, won’t you?”
Sophia followed Calixta’s gaze and saw a moving speck on the horizon; the train was approaching. “Oh, thank you. But we have tickets for benches in the main car.”
Calixta waved a gloved hand. “Bother the main car. I have the largest compartment at the front of the train, and it has far too much room for tiny me. Porter!” she called. A moment later, two men emerged hurriedly from the station house. “Decidedly not real porters,” she said in a lofty aside. “Who leaves a trunk by itself on a platform? But we’ll pretend. And such a pitiful little station, in the middle of nowhere,” she added. “Please bring my other trunks,” she told the men, who jumped to obey.
The moment the train stopped, the doors flew open and the ticket collectors emerged. Calixta walked directly to the front, followed by the porters, and boarded the first car.
“Should we really sit with her?” Sophia asked in a low voice.
Theo shrugged. “Why not?”
“She’s a pirate!”
“She’s harmless. Just a little extravagant.”
“I don’t know,” Sophia said, as they handed their tickets to the ticket collector.
The main car was packed. A woman with five children, three of whom were wailing at the tops of their lungs, was attempting to wrestle her brood onto a single bench. By the window, a heavyset man had rudely commandeered two benches by sitting on one and dropping the muddy boots he’d removed on another. The pungent smell of his socks was already drawing expressions of consternation from the passengers around him. Sleeping here would be impossible.
“Okay,” Sophia said to Theo. “Let’s find her. Don’t tell her anything about the map or Shadrack, though.” They walked through the noisy car and then two others before reaching the front of the train. The left-hand compartment was open, and Calixta was inside, supervising the placement of her trunks.
“There you are! Thank you very much,” she said to the two porters, handing them each a coin from her purse. “Ugh!” she sighed, sitting down abruptly. Her gown ballooned around her. “I can’t wait to escape this miserable swamp and get back to my ship. The air smells like dirt, everything is covered with dust, and the people! Is it me or do they never bathe?” She patted the seat beside her. “Sophia?”
Sophia closed the compartment door and sat down stiffly next to Calixta. Theo, across from them, seemed tongue-tied. “You’re sailing out of New Orleans?” he managed to ask.
“Yes, finally. The Swan will be at the dock—my brother will have it waiting—and then we head out from there.” She began unpinning her hat. “Give me a hand, won’t you?” Sophia succeeded in removing the last pin, and Calixta set her hat on the shelf above the trunks. She smoothed her hair into place as she sat back down. “What a day! And it’s only beginning.” She started pulling off her gloves. “Aren’t you hungry?” She continued removing them as she got up again. “Hello?” she called into the corridor, stepping out of the compartment for a moment. The whistle blew, and the train began rolling forward.
Sophia and Theo exchanged glances. Calixta abruptly reentered, closing the door behind her. “That’s settled, then—breakfast for three. Now,” she said, as the train picked up speed and the breeze whirled in through the open window, “I won’t ask yet about your fascinating uncle or what you insisted wasn’t mine, but perhaps I can ask where you are going?”
“Yes.” Sophia hesitated. “Theo has to get back to the Baldlands, and I’m going to Nochtland.”
“You’re also sailing out of New Orleans, then?”
“We were thinking of riding down to Nochtland from the border,” Theo put in.
“Oh, you don’t want to do that. Takes ages, and you get your horses stolen every other day. You should sail down out of New Orleans to Veracruz. Only a suggestion, of course, but if I were you, I wouldn’t want to stay on land a moment longer.” Calixta rolled her eyes.
“Why were you here?” Sophia asked, with what she hoped sounded like polite interest.
“Oh, I only came to negotiate a new contract with a merchant. Last chance, with the borders closing and all that. I tried to send my brother Burr, seeing as I am the captain, after all, and he is only quartermaster, but he says that I negotiate better. And, well,” she sighed, “my brother is a darling, but it is also true that he rarely seems to land the lucrative contracts I do.” She trilled with laughter. “Nor does he land the proposals! Had I known my trip would result in three highly ridiculous marriage propositions, I would have refused, contracts be damned. One was a banker who insisted on agreeing vehemently with everything I said. Charming, but not so much with his mouth full of food.” She wrinkled her nose delicately. “Under the mistaken impression that he would benefit financially from marrying me, no doubt. Then a lawyer who has quietly married and buried no fewer than three wives already; rather suspicious, no? And, lastly, the merchant’s son, who almost certainly proposed only to enrage his father. How well he succeeded! Men may irritate women entirely by accident, but I believe they infuriate one another wholly by design.” Calixta laughed merrily, fanning herself with her gloves. “Truly,” she said, with a hint of pride, “I am always far more trouble than I’m worth.”
Sophia couldn’t help it; she found herself smiling. “I wouldn’t say that. We really appreciate your inviting us to sit with you.” She knew it sounded very stiff and serious.
Calixta smiled at her. “Not at all, sweetheart. My pleasure.”
A knock at the door interrupted their conversation, and Calixta called, “Come in.”
A waiter from the dining car rolled a cart into the compartment. “Three plates of eggs, ma’am.”
“And they actually smell like eggs. Thank you,” Calixta said, reaching into her purse for a coin.
After the waiter had left, they ate breakfast, and soon Sophia reali
zed that the warm food and the dull hum of the train were making her drowsy. “Why don’t you sleep in the bunk?” Calixta suggested.
“I should stay awake,” Sophia murmured.
“Nonsense. You need to sleep. Theo and I will keep watch.”
Sophia nodded, not bothering to ask what they would keep watch for. She climbed up to the bunk, put her pack next to her pillow, and put her head down, falling into dreamless sleep.
—12-hour 05—
THE TRIP FROM the town near the Georgia border to New Orleans took several hours, and Sophia slept most of the way. She woke gradually to Calixta’s low laughter, the sound helping to dispel her lingering sense of worry. Truly, Sophia thought, the Fates have been kind to place such a good-humored benefactress in our path.
The pirate’s mood was infectious. Usually it was Theo who charmed people, but in Calixta he had clearly met his match. He had dropped the cocky self-assurance and was readily answering her questions. “I grew up with a bunch of kids. No parents around. The bigger kids took care of me, and then I took care of the smaller ones. We all raised each other, you know?”
“How sweet,” Calixta said. “Regular band of pirates.”
Theo laughed. “Pretty much.”
Sophia rolled over onto her back and quietly checked her watch. It was twelve and five—well past midday. If she had read the schedule correctly, they would be arriving in New Orleans soon.
