Corroded

by Karina Cooper

  I rather had myself worried. “I am quite fine,” I said firmly. “Tip-top shape. Where am I?”

  “My room,” she said, as if it were obvious.

  Like the last I’d seen her, she wore a sturdy woolen skirt and a simple man’s shirt, though now, the sleeves were rolled high and the heavy leather gloves I’d seen at her belt were protecting her hands. A set of goggles, brass-rimmed and with tinted glass in the frames, was shoved high on her forehead.

  She looked quite the working man, were it not for the skirt and the ample roundness of her figure. A bit of dirt smeared her cheeks, or perhaps a kind of grease or oil. The smile she gave me was wide, and more relieved than I had a right to.

  Guilt plucked again.

  “I rescued your clothes,” she was saying a she set the items beside me. “Or, really, Zylphia did, and I repaired some of the holes.”

  “Thank you,” I said, because such things were ingrained. I reached for the items, frowning at the precise stitches I found in the sleeve of the cotton shirt I’d worn. “Maddie Ruth, what do you do here?”

  “I fix things. Can you hear the noise?”

  “Naturally.”

  “That’s the blow-off from the fans.” She turned her back, as if concerned with my modesty. “There’s four sets below the grounds, which keeps the fog at bay.”

  Ah ha. One question, at long last answered.

  “Why have I never felt a draft?” I asked, quickly dressing while I had the opportunity. Bless Maddie Ruth for her quick thinking. The belt holding all my various gear was still with the rest of my clothing, and my goggles rolled up within. “The engines should cause a wind.”

  “They’re precisely designed,” the girl said, studying the scars in her gloves. “What drafts they create are offset by the layout in which they’re placed. If you’re paying right close attention, you can feel a bit of it at certain places, but it’s mild. Most won’t even know.”

  I certainly hadn’t. So much for the Veil’s so-called magic. Not at all to my surprise, the mystery turned out to be machine. I found myself grinning, a bit of smug satisfaction. “What fuels the machines?”

  “Aether, like the ones in sky ships but different. We’ve got to keep the fires stoked in order to fuel the extraction devices, but then that powers the connectors. The ratio is much lower than full steam needs. Would you like to see?” Maddie Ruth turned as I finished lacing the corset. I tied it off behind me with the skill of long practice. I’d designed it to be easy to tie by one’s self, easy to lace, and not nearly as tight as a true corset should be.

  I fastened the collared throat at the nape of my neck, pulling my hair over my shoulder to do so. The length of it had not done well in the interim. Frizzy without the care usually afforded it, I imagined the appearance of it might have sent Fanny into a fit of the vapors.

  My smile faded as I thought once more of my family.

  How much I missed the life I thought I had hated so much. How things could have been different.

  I could have maintained my Wednesday debates with Teddy, truly the best friend a girl could ever wish for. How I missed matching wits and intellect with a man who had not seen me as a dowry or a simpering female, but a peer of scientific thought and entertaining discussion.

  How I missed the way Booth would walk down my halls, every step interspersed with the thunk of his silver prosthetic.

  If only my chosen husband—a man whose crooked smile had been so difficult to produce, but now I thought of as so dear—had survived our wedding day.

  Had I remained, there was no promise of happiness. The marchioness, my mother-in-law of only some days, had sworn to imprison me in my own home, strip me of my loving staff, afford me no freedoms—for a widow could claim none, and all that I owned belonged now to my Lord Compton’s father. Perhaps I deserved such punishment.

  No. Such thoughts were useless. I married a good man for the reason of security and care of my family, chose to leave the world below the drift behind, and still the sweet tooth took him away in blood and malice.

  Had I stayed above, mourned as I should have, I would have regretted the inability to achieve that which I had all but forgotten this past day.

  Revenge.

  Guilt transformed to a savage anger so sharp, I hunched my shoulders around it. I pressed one hand against my breastbone, where the ache was all the more acute.

  “Miss?”

  I looked up, the dull strands of my hair tumbling over my shoulder, to find Maddie Ruth watching me expectantly. Worried, I think.

  I forced myself to stand straight. What had she asked me? “Ah,” I said, as if waking from a dream. “The machines. I would like to see them, but not this moment.” I took a steadying breath. “Maddie Ruth, I require help.”

  Her eyes brightened. “Help?”

  “Two important matters,” I told her. I busied my fingers with my hair, ignoring the gray smudges it left behind as I plaited the length of it. It was thick, unruly, and took great effort to tame as I spoke. “The Veil’s servants have a cameo that belongs to me. It is roughly palm-sized, and bears—”

  “Your face?” Maddie Ruth backed out of the curtains. “Or someone that looks right enough like you that it could be an easy mistake, right?” The curtain was still dancing on its cord when she returned, her smile ear to ear. Gold winked at me as she proffered the all-too-familiar disc.

  I stared, my fingers still and cramping in the midst of the weave I made of the tangle. “I... What? How?”

  “Zylphia brought it,” she said.

  Oh, no. No, that foolish girl. Why would she steal from the Veil for me?

  Unless she understood that such a thing might lead to the Veil’s demands being met? I had spoken of that cameo, but not whose face was upon it. Did she see the resemblance and guess the rest?

  No. I shook my head, clearing the uncertainties. It was long past time I ceased to worry about the others around me. There was work to be done—and perhaps it was the remnants of the tar speaking, but I was eager to see my collection over with.

  The sweet tooth had been allowed to wander free for far too long.

  “Maddie Ruth!” called the rough masculine voice. “The fires are high and set to last another hour or so.”

  “Good,” the girl called back. I waited in silence. “Go for a smoke, if you like.”

  “Aye,” he grunted, and then there was nothing but the dull rush of sound; that machinery that was similar to the noise an aether engine made, but larger. Fuller.

  These must be some machines.

  “Be careful with that cameo,” I advised, finishing my plait with more speed than care. “Do you see a small hinge upon it?”

  She squinted, yet I saw no recognition on her face. “I need a glass,” she said after a moment, and once more left the nook.

  This time, I followed.

  I would never have imagined that such a place would exist beneath the ground of the Menagerie. It was a large enough room, but full half was taken by heavy, overlarge brass and steel fittings whose giant tubes vanished into the wall they rested against. That thrum filled the air, almost a palpable vibration I felt more in my teeth and bones than against my skin.

  The rest was brick and mortar, windowless and lit by hanging lamps whose oil gleamed golden through glass bulbs. An overlarge work desk took up one space, while shelves lined the far wall and tools of various origin had been left where they had been laid down.

  I saw bits of cast off metal, all sorts from tarnished brass to copper coated with verdigris stains and bits of iron salvaged from what I could only assume were other machines. Strung from the girders in the ceiling, a colorful kite swung gently in a faint breeze.

  It was a working man’s paradise.

  Or, I realized as I followed Maddie Ruth to the large table, a working woman’s.

  My respect for the girl rose markedly.

  She hunched over the cameo, turning it beneath a magnifying glass while I marveled at her space. “Ah!” An excl
amation of success. “I see it. There’s tiny cogs here. It opens, then?”

  “A part opens,” I corrected, forcing my attention fully to the matter at hand. There would be time enough to ask of the various implements I saw around us later. “Watch, but lean very much away.”

  She did as I suggested, leaving the cameo upon her gloved palm and angling far as she could from it. I reached around her, found the small indent I searched for, and depressed it. The mechanism engaged, those minute cogs spinning slowly and with terrible purpose. All at once, a bit opened at the top, and there was a faint hiss almost lost beneath the machines.

  My insides seized, my lungs frozen in remembered apprehension.

  To my relief, nothing came from the opening. No shimmering pink cloud, as had been ejected the last time I’d come face to miniature face with the wretched device.

  I breathed easier, but still with some care. “That,” I said, gesturing, “once held an alchemical serum with opium at its root.” All I knew of the stuff, really. “I must learn exactly what it was.”

  “You’ll need an alchemist for that. I know of one, but you won’t like it.”

  “It won’t be easy, but I know one or two who might—” Her words caught up with me. I blinked. “You what?”

  Maddie Ruth turned the cameo over, tapping it against her palm in unadulterated curiosity. Though nothing came out, she nodded as if she understood something I’d missed. “Someone in the Veil knows alchemy.”

  “Who? Who is it?”

  “Well, I don’t rightly know,” she said thoughtfully. Her brow furrowed. “No one knows who’s in the Karakash Veil, right? But I know they—” She paused so suddenly, it was as a warning had slapped her in the face. The look she shot me was filled with guilt. “I’m not to say.”

  “Maddie Ruth.”

  The name was a benediction, and she flinched under the intensity of the demand. “I mean, I know someone knows it, that’s how the lanterns stay lit. It’s all alchemical light inside.”

  The revelation stunned me. How had I not noticed that it was no candle but something approximating it inside the paper lanterns strung along the Menagerie grounds?

  Then again, if I had noticed, would I have considered alchemy the answer?

  Alchemy was not a science to which I ascribed much respect. Often the last resort of intelligent men gone daft with age and the looming promise of death, alchemy had led to many a man’s ruin—and certainly no small amount of insanity.

  My own father’s dabbling in the mess had proven just that. As had Miss Hortense Hensworth, who had turned to alchemy to right a wrong and lost her life to its maddening effects.

  Uncertainty and reticence warred with the guilt and grief I could not put to rest within me.

  I needed to know what was in the bloody serum if I was to learn how to fool the Veil. Though the concoction was certainly not the magical mixture the Veil—the spokesman I dealt with, anyhow—was convinced it to be, it was heady stuff regardless. Heaven only knew what the Veil would do with it, were I to hand it over.

  If I could figure out the formula, perhaps I could substitute a counterfeit.

  I had no choice. I would be forced to reach out to Lady Rutledge, who had become a sort of mentor in Society as well as a lady of science. She would know where to direct my inquiries.

  I had of late become a creature of scientific theory, as opposed to practice. What little I knew was not enough to tide me over here. “Right,” I said firmly, as if my concerns had no bearing. “I will not go to the Veil for this.” It would utterly defeat my intent. “I’ll have to locate another alchemist of some repute. Can you draw a diagram of the mechanism used?”

  Maddie Ruth peered into the tiny black hole in the cameo’s side. Then, with a faint smile, she set it atop the desk. “No.”

  Bloody bells. “What do you want?” I asked, no preamble at all. I was no neophyte when it came to the negotiations of the rabble below the drift. Maddie Ruth, for all her surprising know-how, was still one of them.

  She stripped off her gloves, tucking them into her thick leather belt. “I want to be a collector.”

  Bloody bells and twice the devilry. My heart pounded in a surge of fear I could not control. I half turned away. “Maddie Ruth, do not ask me to teach you what I cannot.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I have watched too many die,” I said sharply, scrubbing the back of my hand across my too-dry eyes. “There is a man out there who will stop at nothing to take away all those I love and admire. You would be easy pickings. I will not give him you too.”

  Maddie Ruth could have argued. I expected her to do so; to tell me that she would not be so foolish, that she would not die, that she was too smart, too agile, too something. All excuses that would only prove my concerns valid.

  Instead, she said thoughtfully, “This man. You’re hunting him, aye? The sweet tooth, they call him.”

  This gave me pause. I frowned at her, but found her quite serious. “I am.”

  “And if he’s collected, what then?”

  I saw where this was going. Carefully, I said, “Then it may be time to revisit the matter.” It was no promise. It was no guarantee.

  “What if I asked you to let me help you, then?”

  “What are you suggesting?”

  “I can help with things,” she replied, less than explanatory. “Things like this.” A gesture with a grease-smeared palm at the cameo. “Or perhaps if you need a body out in the street with you. Or just a device,” she added hastily, reading my immediate protest with startling ease.

  I thought quickly. I had not promised to change my mind, and she did not demand it. “Is that your offer, then?”

  “It is.”

  Well, it was a sight more reasonable than I could expect. I nodded. “Fine. But ’tis your duty to be sure what I ask of you and what the Veil demands are never in contest, do you hear me?”

  She nodded.

  “And if Hawke ever asks you, you know nothing,” I added.

  Her eyebrows rose in unconcealed amusement. “Him? Talk to the likes of me? Only if I’ve done something worth a haranguing. And then it’d come mostly by them other whips.”

  That was what I was afraid of. “Be serious,” I told her.

  “I’ll be very careful,” she said on a great big sigh, as if I wrenched the commitment from her. “But you’ve no worry. I work hard and get the run of my way down here. Mostly.”

  “Fair enough.” It was the best I could hope for. “Then ’tis done.”

  “Shake on it.” Maddie Ruth spit in her palm, offered it for shaking.

  Ah, lovely. Lower-class honor. I mimicked her gesture, spitting in my palm the same as her, and clasped my hand to hers. The press of damp flesh was enough to have me cringing in amused distaste.

  I’d put my hand in worse, really. A bit of saliva never hurt a body.

  She pumped my hand once, as hard as a man might, and promised, “I’ll start work on this.”

  “Do you require equipment?” I hadn’t seen anything I might ordinarily ascribe to a laboratory.

  “Nah.” A tossed off shrug. “Just something to see the fine bits. I’ve a microscope Flip found left behind an old druggist’s shop after the owner kicked off, and he gets me what I need when I need it.”

  A good lad to have about, that Flip. “Thank you,” I told her. Now, I needed to begin the next step in what was not quite a plan so much as a budding theory. In Ishmael’s turn of phrase, there was a hang-in-chains to locate.

  I had a small idea of where to begin.

  Chapter Eleven

  This time, I made my way to the collector’s station with no interruptions. Part of this small victory may have come from the lateness of the hour. Most out would be intent on achieving whatever entertainments they chose for the evening than on idling about.

  The rest, them what made it their business to watch for easy prey in the dark and fog, would take note of my collector’s appearance. Those of us who ma
de our living by the wall had a certain inimitability quite difficult to ignore.

  If the manner with which we strode through the streets of London low did not give the less intelligent pause, the appearance of the fog-preventatives and hand-tooled respirator covering much of my face would. Even low pads tended to err on the side of caution when a body wore such items in plain view.

  Only the terminally unwise assaulted a collector in less than a group, and good fortune to any who attempted to locate a group of men willing to try.

  I used this to my advantage on those nights when I would much rather focus on the task at hand than wander through the stews making contacts from the residents and working girls there.

  I felt rather calm, which surprised me—though I quickly came to believe this a remnant of the opium I had been given. That it came from Hawke’s own fingers was an undeniable fact I was trying very hard not to dwell on.

  Delivering medicinal tar was not as intimate a task as my imagination was determined to paint it.

  It did allow me, however, a measure of peace that I struggled to maintain without. I walked fearlessly through the fog-stifled streets until I arrived at my destination and did not allow myself to wander across mental landscapes I swore I’d have no truck with.

  Hawke’s efforts, Zylphia’s punishments, these were among those thoughts I stifled.

  These concerns, these aimless worries, would only detract from the greater goal. I entered the abandoned train station that had become the collectors’ base of operations, strode through the fog leaking through the long-since shattered windows to pool across the empty floor. The lanterns affixed on either end of the open space offered just enough light to indicate that I was alone in the vacant station. It was a rare enough thing to cross the paths of other collectors, but not unheard of.

  I did not even know how many of us there were, though I was assuredly the only woman among them. My presence continued to be the fodder of gossip and rumor; a fact I had long grown to enjoy, as my identity remained a thing of mystery.

  The faintest current of air pushed the fog along, curling it into wisps and fingers of lamplit gray as it clung to my knees. It did not reach high enough to dampen the papers on the old brick facing at the far end, but some nearer the bottom did tend to show a bit of rot around the edges.