The Brass Giant

by Brooke Johnson

  Petra smiled in return. Just one moment with him, a brief embrace, a tiny exchange of words—­she yearned to be near him, if for only a second. She wished to trace the dimple in his cheek, twist his long hair through her fingers, bury her face in his warm chest and hear him say that everything would be all right.

  The heavy footfalls of his father’s steps nearing the foyer interrupted the gaze between them. Happiness left Emmerich’s face and his eyes turned stern. Though he did not speak, she received the message.

  She stepped onto the landing and Kristiane shut the door quickly behind her.

  The rain had stopped. Warm sunshine replaced the torrent, heating the puddles of stagnant water into muggy vapors. Petra shed the heavy coat. It smelled of wet, mildewed canvas, a trace of cigar smoke on the cuffs. She folded the coat over her arm and descended the stairs. The sunlight teased her. Only luck would keep her hidden as she made the cross-­city trek back to the Holland house.

  Chroniker City was rarely a quiet place, always an endless flow of hustle and bustle through the streets—­rickshaws and bundles of tourists clogging the thoroughfares, shoppers dawdling at shop doors and windows, and vagrants sitting on curbs, shaking tins of loose change. Not even the damp air and water-­slicked streets quelled the surge of pedestrians. The rain kept ladies and gentlemen huddled beneath awnings and umbrellas, but the moment the clouds parted and the sun peeped out, ­people once again swarmed the streets.

  She arrived at the edge of the University square hot, wet, and with blistered feet. The ebb and flow of foot traffic was lighter in the center of the city, most ­people’s business being in the first and second quadrants, but here, she could no longer hide in their throngs. She was out in the open now.

  Several groups of students and Guild members milled in front of the University, deep in conversation with their peers or buried in books and papers. Petra kept her head down, pulling the brim of her sodden hat over her eyes. Every person enrolled at the University or in the employ of the Guild likely knew who she was now. Nearly everyone had seen her the day she and Emmerich tried to escape the University. They would know her face, know she had been arrested, tried, and sentenced. If someone recognized her—­

  Petra knocked into a middle-­aged man mumbling about valve gears and equidistant curves. Keeping her eyes averted, she quickly sidestepped the man and circled around him while he muttered a mathematical formula to himself.

  Her heart racing, she turned toward the fourth quadrant, but a firm hand gripped her by the shoulder. She spun around, expecting the engineer or a policeman, but instead she faced Tolly Monfore, his eyebrows drawn and mouth pressed into a frown.

  “What the bloody hell are you doing?”

  Petra wrenched her arm free. “It’s not your business, Tolly.”

  “You think I don’t know what’s going on?” He lowered his voice to a whisper. “You were arrested, Pet—­for treason. And I don’t expect they let you out by choice.” He grabbed her by the sleeve and dragged her through the square toward Medlock.

  Petra dropped Norris’s coat and tried prying Tolly’s fingers from her sleeve, his knuckles white from the grip. “Tolly, let go.” Exasperated, she brought her fist down on his elbow, buckling his arm and breaking his grasp. Released from his grip, she staggered backward into a lamppost, and her hat fell from her head, her unruly tresses coming loose from her bun and tumbling down over her shoulders.

  “I’m trying to help you,” he hissed, drawing close. “Petra, what if you’re caught? Come with me. I can keep you safe.”

  “Stay away from me,” she said, shoving him away. She leaned over to fetch her hat and stiffened, her heartbeat quickening as she realized a handful of students stood nearby, staring at her. Her hair. She snatched the hat off the ground and wound her hair into a twist, hiding it away beneath the hat, but it was too late. They had recognized her.

  “It’s you,” said the nearest one, stepping forward. “You’re that girl.”

  “The spy,” said another.

  Petra backed away, her breath caught in her throat. She felt her hands tremble.

  “Find the constable,” said the student. “I’ll hold her until you get back.”

  “The hell you will,” said Tolly, rolling up his sleeves as he stepped in their way.

  One of the students shouted for help, and Tolly jumped him. But by then, a Guild copper—­wearing the stark black suit of the militia—­spotted them wrestling across the square and started toward them, drawing his baton.

  Someone grabbed Petra’s arm and yanked her forward, waving to the copper. “Oi! Here’s the one you want. It’s her—­the spy.”

  Tolly tumbled free of the fistfight and landed a punch on the one holding her, breaking his grip on her arm. “Run,” he said, shoving Petra toward the square. “Go!”

  With one last look at Tolly, she turned and ran.

  She heard the shouts of the students behind her, the sound of the Guild copper calling for help, and she felt the eyes of everyone in the square upon her. Blood rushed in her ears, her pulse hammering like a hundred pistons. She slipped past the brink of the square and delved into the fourth quadrant. Sprinting through the alleys, she kept off Medlock, hoping to lose anyone who followed in the narrow, dead-­end streets. She made it halfway down Tilling Street when the thought struck her to lead the coppers and bobbies off before going back to Norris’s house. But before she could make a decision, someone grabbed her, clamping a coarse hand over her mouth before she could yell out.

  Her captor pulled her into the shadows of an alley and into a dark room. A door closed, blocking out the late afternoon light, and she struggled against whoever held her, breathing hard. But her captor was much larger than she was, and resilient. He held her close, hardly allowing her to breathe, much less make a sound.

  “Quiet,” he hissed, his breath thick with the smell of tobacco. “Or they’ll hear you.”

  Petra stilled. She recognized that voice—­hoarse and weary—­a voice she had heard most recently from the prison cell, when Solomon came to her with the screwdriver. She steadied her breathing and waited.

  Footsteps echoed in the alley, and voices.

  “I think she went this way.”

  “Blast it! I thought they had her in the city prison.”

  “No, we got the word an hour ago. She got out somehow.”

  There was a disgruntled groan. “Why did no one fire up the alarms?”

  Then they were gone, their footsteps trailing away into silence.

  Finally, Petra’s captor released her. She whirled away and faced him, trying to see his face in the darkness of the room, but the shadows were deep, obscuring his features. She could just make out his familiar tattered clothing and scruffy beard—­this was the man who had been following her. “Who are you?” she whispered. “Why have you been watching me? Why are you helping me?”

  The man raised his hands in surrender. “I only do as I’m told, miss.”

  Petra narrowed her eyes. He had helped Solomon with her escape, and now he had helped her evade the Guild coppers. But all those weeks of watching her, of lurking in the shadows outside the pawnshop . . . “Who are you working for?”

  “Someone with a mind to keep you safe,” he said, his voice low. “Now, you need to get back to Mr. Holland. The coppers know you’re out.” He glared at her then. “You shouldn’t have left to begin with. Now, come on. Let’s get you back.”

  Chapter 15

  PETRA WOKE TO someone hammering on a door. It was late, hours past midnight according to the clock above the wardrobe. She could only guess who would arrive at Norris’s house at such a late hour.

  “All right. All right,” said Norris from the living room. The couch creaked, and Petra heard him shuffle across the floor. He slid the dead bolt back and opened the door. “Who the bloody hell are you, then?”

  “Where is sh
e?”

  Petra’s heart nearly jumped out of her chest as she recognized the voice. Emmerich. She hastily flattened her hair and crawled out of bed, pulling one of Norris’s robes over her nightshift as she headed toward the bedroom door.

  “I don’t know who you’re talking about mate,” said Norris. “No one here but me.”

  “I’m not your mate,” said Emmerich.

  “Aye, you’re not.”

  “Are you Norris Holland?”

  “I am.”

  “Well, she left me a message, said to send word here. Now tell me where she is.”

  “As I keep telling you, mate, I don’t know who you’re going on about.”

  Petra curled her fingers around the door handle and pushed through into the living room. The hinges creaked, but neither of them noticed. Norris stood in front of the door with his arms crossed over his chest, barring Emmerich from entering the house, while Emmerich glared at him from the doorway.

  “Emmerich,” she called, wrapping the robe tightly around her chest. “I’m here.”

  “Petra,” he breathed. He shoved past Norris and strode toward her, gathering her up into his arms. He nuzzled her hair. “You’re safe.”

  “Thanks to you.” She pressed her face into his chest and basked in the feel of his arms around her, holding her close, his breath warm against her skin.

  “I wish I could have told you what was going on, but there wasn’t time,” he said, hugging her more tightly. “I know how angry you must have been, after what I said.”

  “I thought you betrayed me,” she said quietly. “I thought—­”

  “I would never do that,” he said, breaking their embrace. “You mean everything to me.” He lifted his hands to her face and kissed her, drawing her into him with a slow gentleness that pulled the very breath from her lungs. Her heartbeat quickened and she reveled in the touch of his lips against hers, an ache filling her bones as she stood in his grasp, all the feelings she felt for him welling up inside her, yearning to burst free.

  “Well, this is bloody perfect,” said Norris. “This isn’t a brothel, you know.”

  Petra drew away from Emmerich with a frown. “You seem to use it like one,” she snapped, feeling a flush creep into her cheeks. She’d forgotten he was even there.

  “Well, if you’d like your privacy, I’ll be in my bedroom.” He disappeared through the door and shut it behind him, leaving the two of them in the living area.

  An awkward silence followed, seeming to amplify the distance between them, though they stood only inches apart. Her joy at seeing Emmerich again, of having his arms around her, dissipated as the events of the trial came to the forefront of her mind—­the accusations, the lies, the imprisonment, and the danger she was now in because of him. With a tired sigh, she sat down in the overstuffed chair near the fireplace and kneaded her forehead.

  Emmerich joined her on the armrest.

  “You should have sent Kristiane,” she said wearily, looking up into his blazing eyes, wanting nothing more than to fold herself into his arms and kiss him again, to forget all that had happened since the moment of their first kiss. “You could have been followed. The Guild knows I escaped. They could be watching you.”

  “No one followed me, Petra.” He stroked her cheek, speaking softly. “Don’t worry. Everything is going to be fine. I’ll figure this out and—­”

  “Fine?” she scoffed and gently pushed him away. She needed room to breathe, to think. “Emmerich, you accused me of treason and then busted me out of prison. We are as far from fine as we could possibly be.”

  He cupped her face in his hands, his expression serious. “Petra, I need you to trust me.”

  She wanted to. Looking into those eyes, she wanted to trust him, to believe that he could figure things out and make everything right. “Then tell me what’s going on. Why did you lie to the Guild council? Why did you let them believe I was a traitor and a spy?”

  A frown weighed on his brow, and he stepped away, running his hand through his hair as he stared at nothing for a moment, a grim expression on his lips, his eyes hard. Inhaling a deep breath, he sat down in the armchair opposite Petra, rubbing his forehead with his fingers. When he finally spoke, his voice was soft. “After you were captured—­after we were both captured—­I was taken before Vice-­Chancellor Lyndon and my father. My father insisted that you were a spy, that you had been trading Guild secrets to the anti-­imperialists and that I had been a fool to trust you. But I knew you were no spy.”

  “Then why blame me? If you knew it wasn’t me—­”

  “If I refused to give you up, then my loyalty to the Guild would have been in question, and I might have been imprisoned as well. Instead, Vice-­Chancellor Lyndon proposed a deal: if I testified against you at the tribunal, they would let me go unpunished by the law.”

  “So you sold me out.”

  “I agreed to the terms, yes. It was a measured decision, Petra. I said those things so that we might both come out alive. What good would I have been to you if they imprisoned me as well? It was the only option I had, the only way I could be sure of your safety. Lyndon assured me that you would be under Guild protection until an investigation proved your guilt—­or innocence—­and I knew it would buy me time to prove that you were not who they claimed, but there wasn’t enough time before the trial to gather the evidence I needed to clear your name.” He clenched his jaw, his eyes darkening. “In truth, I found the opposite.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Petra, there is evidence against you, hard proof of your involvement with anti-­imperialists, of selling documents to enemies of the crown.”

  “But—­” She felt her heart seize in her chest. “That’s a lie.”

  “I know that, but true or not, it is there. To the council’s eyes, you are guilty beyond question.”

  “That’s why you helped me escape.”

  He nodded. “After the trial, I feared that the council would turn you over to British authority, and I couldn’t—­” His voice broke and he cleared his throat. “I knew that because of what I said, because of what Lyndon told me to say, you would hang, regardless of your innocence, and I couldn’t let that happen.”

  Petra stared at the ashes in the fireplace, trying to make sense of what Emmerich was saying. “I don’t understand. Why go to the trouble of fabricating an anti-­imperialist plot?”

  Emmerich clenched his jaw, his eyes smoldering beneath his drawn brows. “It’s not a fabrication.”

  “What?”

  “The anti-­imperialist plot is real. There is a spy within the Guild. We don’t know who, but there is evidence of someone selling schematics and build-­plans to anti-­imperialists across Europe, including designs for the automaton, which very few ­people beyond the council had access to.”

  “You think the spy is someone on the council?”

  “It is a possibility. The extent of the cover-­up suggests someone of a high position within the Guild, someone with knowledge of secret projects such as the automaton and the ability to falsify evidence.” He narrowed his eyes, resting his hand on his chin. “If I were to guess, I would say it was either my father or Lyndon—­or someone working directly for them.”

  “The vice-­chancellor? Your own father?”

  “My father was most insistent about your involvement with the anti-­imperialists, and both he and Lyndon pushed for my testimony against you.”

  “But why would they betray the Guild—­the crown?”

  He pressed his lips together and sighed. “Petra . . . there’s more.”

  “More?”

  “I know the reason the automaton was converted into a war machine. The completion of the automaton was only the beginning. We destroyed it, but too late. The Guild has the designs, the instructions for its assembly—­everything. They know it works; they’ve seen what it can
do. Petra, they’re going to build an army.”

  “For what purpose?”

  “War.”

  Petra blinked. “But we aren’t at war.”

  “We will be. When we destroyed the automaton, it raised suspicion of enemies within the Guild, especially in light of the recent Luddite attack. My testimony against you was a final catalyst, something to drive the rest of the council to action. Most of the council is loyal to the British Empire, and if there was a threat of war, a threat of attack from the anti-­imperialists, they would not hesitate to stand to arms and defend the Empire, if not outright retaliate against British enemies. By asking me to accuse you of being an anti-­imperialist spy, both Lyndon and my father have driven the council to thoughts of retribution, born out of fear and mistrust for those who could dismantle everything they stake their lives upon. If the British Empire mobilizes, the other countries will react. They will have cause to attack.”

  The grandfather clock next to the fireplace struck three o’clock in the morning, a deep gong ringing through the silence following Emmerich’s words.

  “Petra, we have to stop them.”

  She looked up at him, a determined blaze in his copper eyes. “How?”

  “We already wrecked the automaton. If we destroy all traces of the design, halt manufacture at the source, perhaps we can delay production of the automaton army, buy ourselves time to discover the true traitor within the Guild, expose this conspiracy to start a war, and not least of all, clear your name. If we can reveal the truth, perhaps we can stop it.”

  Petra stared at him, her heart rising up her throat. “Emmerich, what you’re suggesting . . . We can’t go up against the Guild council, against the orders of Parliament and the crown. We’re only two ­people. How could we begin to hope to succeed?”

  “We cannot sit by and do nothing.” Emmerich stood and faced her. “Petra, this automaton is our responsibility. We created it. We must be the ones to make certain that the world never knows its menace.”