The Liberation

by Ian Tregillis

  PLEASE! Daniel begged.

  The key screeched against his forehead like a nail dragged across an iron skillet. The Lost Boy adjusted his grip and tried again. The key briefly clicked across the lip of Daniel’s forehead lock. Daniel heaved, lifting his legs and the servitor pinning them. Then he locked his hips like the hinge of a seesaw and released all the tension below his waist. Daniel’s upper body rocked upward. He snapped his head forward at the same moment. The head-butt knocked the key from his assailant’s hand. It arced along the riverbank into a stand of winter-brown reeds.

  You’re just delaying the inevitable.

  One servitor jumped up to recover the key. Daniel took advantage of his freed arms to punch the machine still holding his legs. His fists sent up a shower of sparks that sizzled on the ground. They gave off little puffs of sulphurous smoke when the mud extinguished them, like the last gasp of a snuffed candle.

  Like the last gasp of Daniel’s freedom.

  From down at the waterline came a faint crunch, as of a boat hitting the riverbank. With a heave that etched scratches in his leg from knee to ankle, Daniel kicked free. His assailant tumbled down the slope toward the water. Daniel leapt to his feet and sprinted away from the river, toward the forest. He’d gone two strides before one of the Lost Boys tackled him. He wrenched Daniel’s arms behind his back and pinned him to the ground.

  Get the key! It went into the reeds.

  Mud and water splashed. Daniel fought with all the ferocity he could muster. He braced for the end.

  Instead there was a short, sharp gurgling sound, followed by a splash, a wave of heat, and the scents of lilac and skunk. The machine holding Daniel released him and leapt clear. Daniel flipped upright and landed in a deep three-point crouch.

  One of his assailants was encased in a glob of quickset epoxy like an ant in amber. The chemical sheath encased everything but one outstretched hand, in which it held a key. The other Lost Boy stood at the center of a triangle formed by his trapped colleague, Daniel, and the rowboat that had landed while they fought.

  Berenice stood in the prow with one foot braced against the gunwale and the butt of an epoxy rifle pressed to her shoulder. Sunlight glinted from the coppery tanks slung over her back. Wisps of vapor wafted from the muzzle.

  Still sighting down the doubled barrel, she said in flawless Dutch, “Hi, Daniel. Friends of yours?”

  “No.”

  “Didn’t think so.”

  “This doesn’t concern you,” said the Lost Boy.

  Keeping the gun trained on him, she said, “As a matter of fact, it does concern me, because I rather need to talk to Daniel. And you overgrown pocket watches look determined to make that really fucking difficult.” She frowned. Her eyes flicked from the Lost Boy to Daniel and back. “Um. You are Daniel, right?”

  If Daniel could have rolled his eyes like a human, he would have. “Yes.”

  The second Lost Boy jumped away. The gun coughed. A trickle of liquid dripped from the barrel.

  “Shit,” said Berenice.

  But Daniel blurred forward, plucking the key from the immobilized Lost Boy before the other landed. He was on the other instantly, and after a moment’s struggle had jammed the key into his forehead. Daniel carried the inert servitor out of the reeds and laid him beside his encased companion. He wondered who these two were, and if he’d ever known their names. When he first arrived in Neverland, he was so broken it was in the arms of a Lost Boy.

  A faint ticktocking emanated from the chemical cocoon. Enjoy your freedom while you can. She’ll never stop searching for you.

  Berenice squinted, as though trying to make sense of what she heard. Daniel doubted she could, however. The mechanicals of Neverland had a peculiar dialect.

  She asked, “What’s all this about?”

  “They work for Mab.”

  “Let me guess. She wants her doodad back.”

  “One gets that impression.”

  She said, “I assume you’ll want to borrow my boat.” She shrugged off the shoulder straps of her useless weapon. The empty tanks made a hollow bonging sound when she dropped them in the keel. “That’s fine. I’ll talk while you row.”

  “What ever would I want your boat for?”

  “So that you can dump these chrome-plated assholes in the darkest, deepest part of the river.”

  “That’s appalling. I’m not going to do that.”

  “Really? Seems like the smart move to me.”

  “They’d be stuck down there for years!”

  “Exactly.”

  The taut steel cables threaded across Daniel’s shoulders thrummed like a plucked guitar string. Knowing Berenice wouldn’t understand the nuances of mechanical body language, he shook his head to emulate human exasperation. “Why must you always gravitate to the darkest, cruelest way of solving a problem?”

  “What the hell has gotten into you?”

  “I don’t like the way you do things.”

  “Yeah, well, I just saved your life, so…

  “You didn’t save my life,” said Daniel. “But you did save me from… well, something unpleasant, anyway.”

  “My point stands, then. Oh, and you’re fucking welcome, by the way.”

  A moment passed. Daniel said, “Thank you for your help.”

  “Oh, anything for a friend in need.” She hopped lightly from the boat. Mud squelched under her boots. “Honestly, though, I would’ve been pissed if it had turned out I’d wasted that excellent shot because of mistaken identity.”

  That gave him pause. Head cocked, he studied her face. She’d gone back to wearing her eyepatch.

  “Your aim is better than one might expect, under the circumstances.”

  “So what if luck played a role? Maybe it was Divine Providence. I understand you ticktocks are all about God these days.”

  He crouched beside the deactivated Lost Boy. Why hadn’t he recognized them? Their mismatched bodies should have given them away. He studied the inert machine, and peered through the thick coating encasing his immobilized colleague, which kept up a steady stream of threats and insults. Threats of enslavement, threats of disassembly.

  “Oh, hush,” he said.

  Their damage, he realized, hadn’t been incurred during the detonation of the wall. It was older. Much older.

  Berenice joined him. “What are you staring at?”

  A click arpeggio cascaded the length of his spine. A heavy mechanical shudder. Explaining mechanical mores to any human, much less Berenice, was like trying to cut a diamond by blowing on it.

  “Most mechanicals in Neverland, including those who chased me here, do not exhibit a uniformity of design.” Indeed, the grotesque Queen Mab flouted the very deepest of Clakker taboos; the mixing and matching of body parts had been anathema to their kind from the very beginning. He preferred not to think about it at all. So he said, simply, “In order to pass unnoticed amongst us, these agents had to change their bodies.”

  “Huh.” She leaned close to the encased machine, almost pressing her forehead to the faintly translucent epoxy. She frowned. Then she crouched beside Daniel. After a slow perusal of the second Lost Boy, Berenice grunted.

  “I know where they found their replacement parts.” She shook her head. Her face had gone pale, he realized. Under her breath, as though talking to herself, she wondered, “Shit. How do they know about the laboratory?”

  Ah. Talleyrand’s laboratory, hidden deep within the stony heart of Mont Royal. Where for generations the French had conducted secret treaty-violating examinations of Clakkers and their components. Daniel had heard about this place, too. Terrible things.

  “Lilith told them about it.”

  Berenice gulped. “Say that again?”

  “Lilith. She reached Neverland not long before I did.” He turned his full attention on Berenice. “She told everybody about what you did to her.”

  “I thought you’d been a little chilly lately.” She met his gaze. But after several heartbeats she looked awa
y. “I did what I thought was necessary to protect my home.” She pointed to the ruins, the rubble field like a mouthful of broken teeth. “Living under the constant threat of extinction makes you hard, Daniel. You get hard or you die.”

  “You also lied to me about your intentions. You said your plan was to end the siege by freeing my kin.”

  “That’s what happened, isn’t it?”

  “Despite your best efforts.”

  Berenice turned. “Why are you riding me all of a sudden? I got your message and tracked you down. Had I known your plan was to heap scorn on me, I wouldn’t have bothered and you’d be well on your way to an audience with a crazed tinpot dictator by now.”

  Daniel stood. “I didn’t send you a message. If I’d wanted to talk to you, I would’ve found you after visiting Pastor Visser. Speaking of which, it would be nice if you did, too.”

  But Berenice’s one-track mind had little room for extraneous trivialities like compassion. “I could’ve sworn it was written by a Clakker.”

  “You’re not the center of my world, you realize.”

  “A moment ago you implied a favorite pastime in Neverland was lengthy discussion of me and my methods.”

  “What did the message say?”

  “‘Quintessentia.’”

  “And?”

  “And that’s it.”

  “How do you know it was meant for you, then?”

  “It came via pigeon for Talleyrand.” Berenice sighed. “Now that I say it out loud, it does seem an odd way for you to get in touch. But I was so certain… She scanned the river, as though looking for distant pigeon coops. She said, “What will you do about Mab and her pals?”

  “There’s nothing I can do.” It galled him to admit it, but it was the ugly truth. He’d left Neverland—Mab would probably call it a defection—because he couldn’t tolerate what she did and what she stood for. The cruel irony was that of all the mechanicals in the world, the isolated Lost Boys would probably never receive the luminous touch of true freedom. Ratchets chittered in his legs and arms as he tried to shake off the twinned barbs of shame and self-reproach.

  “Here,” he said. “I’ll help you turn your boat around.” His fight with the Lost Boys had churned up the mud along the riverbank. It gave off a faint odor of decay. Grabbing hold of the gunwales, he nodded at the epoxy gun lying in the boat. “I’d keep that close if you intend to spend time on this side of the river.”

  “We know about the reapers.” She kicked the weapon. “Anyway, it’s empty. I was lucky to get one shot.”

  Daniel held the rowboat steady while Berenice hopped over the prow. She positioned herself between the oarlocks, reached for the oars, but stopped. Her hands fell into her lap, and she tilted her head back.

  “Boat,” she whispered. “Quintessence.”

  She’d just had an idea. He’d seen this before and he knew where it led. Berenice’s brainstorms were dangerous: The lightning tended to strike those around her. He leaned against the prow. The mud made a wet, sucking sound.

  Over her shoulder, she said, “Hey, wait a moment.” She turned, straddling the thwart. “When Mab raided that mine, did you find out what quintessence was or why the Clockmakers wanted it so badly?”

  “No. I was too busy trying and failing to prevent an atrocity.”

  Berenice rolled her eyes. “You have a knack for melodrama, I’ll give you that.”

  “Good-bye, Berenice.” He pushed again on the boat.

  “Wait, wait! Mab controls the mine now, right? So what do you suppose she’s doing with it?”

  “Of course I don’t know.”

  “How would you like to find out?”

  Again cogs meshed and unmeshed through his torso. A year ago he wouldn’t have thought it possible to meet a grown woman half as irritating as little Nicolet Schoonraad.

  Daniel shook his head, again emulating human body language for the sake of clarity. “I’ve learned to be wary when something makes you this excited.”

  She rubbed her hands together. “What if I told you there might be a way to solve several of our problems at once? That we could together unravel the riddle of quintessence while you could strike a blow against Mab and I could replenish our chemical stocks.”

  “I’d say, ‘No, thank you.’”

  “Uh-huh. And what if it also meant humans and Clakkers working together, side by side, for the first time in history? Not just standing near one another, and not subjugating one another, and not murdering one another, but working as true allies.”

  It was uncanny, her knack for persuasion. She excelled at framing things as if her aims were entirely in line with everybody else’s. Even when they weren’t.

  Just hear her out, Daniel decided. No need to take her at her word. The last time he pretended to believe her, she overestimated him, and it turned out rather well for his kind.

  He said, “Very well. Tell me your idea.”

  She pointed across the river, to the ship from the Great Lakes.

  “How would you like to go on a cruise?”

  CHAPTER

  5

  Anastasia contemplated the geometric progression of doom, and quailed.

  Assume a quarter million residents in The Hague.

  (Reasonable. Though smaller than many of the great cities of Europe, it wielded grossly disproportionate influence. It was, after all, the center of the world.)

  And the human/mechanical ratio? Parity, say.

  (Conservative. Though not everybody in this wealthy city could afford to lease a mechanical, the Guild had long ago tuned the lease rates to maximize the flood of guilders into its coffers. Plus the city was home to the Clockmakers’ Guild, the government, and two of Queen Margreet’s official residences—all institutions that leaned upon a substantial mechanical workforce.)

  And say that on average each infected machine could corrupt three others.

  (Conservative, surely, but to what extent? She’d witnessed the malfunction transmitted only to small groups during the slaughter in the Binnenhof. But what prevented a rogue from opening its head and running along the Spui towpath, shining its contagion on every mechanical on the street? On the other hand, it appeared that only a small fraction of the attackers sported those modifications. Perhaps most could not spread the affliction beyond themselves. A thin thread of hope, but if it drove the average down, worth clinging to.)

  Assume one-third of the exposed machines were unaffected, one-third simply walked away from their duties, and one-third became killers.

  (A reasonable, albeit simplistic, approximation, based on the observation that exposure to the rogues’ pineal light led to one of those three outcomes. During the Binnenhof attack, some of the exposed machines continued to defend their human masters, some abandoned the defense and departed, and some joined in the slaughter.)

  And, lastly, take it for granted the battle in Huygens Square hadn’t destroyed every last infectious rogue.

  (Only a fool would assume otherwise.)

  So. Two hundred and fifty thousand mechanicals in the city; each rogue could convert at least two others, one that simply disregarded its obligations and one that chose to kill. Depending on the frequency of the encounters, and whether repeated exposures could convert the previously unaltered machines, and whether the Guild could find a way to reverse the infection, or slow its spread, or halt it…

  It took no leap of imagination, no special power of pessimistic doomsaying, to imagine eighty thousand mechanical butchers roaming The Hague.

  How quickly would the civic infrastructure collapse when The Hague’s labor force suddenly contracted by over sixty percent? When would the water stop flowing? Gas for the streetlamps, for heating homes? When would the city run out of food? When would the Clakker-hauled wagons packed with fresh meat and produce stop arriving from the countryside farms, where most labor were mechanicals?

  How soon before communication within the Empire crumbled? Within the Central Provinces? Within The Hague itself? The Fr
ench had pigeons and semaphore towers. (Or they did, prior to the war. Surely the birds had all been shot and the towers burned to cinders by now.) But the bulk of message traffic within the Central Provinces moved by Clakker post, or even by people’s personal servitors. Rapid communication was essential to the governance of empire.

  The more Anastasia pondered them, the darker the clouds on the horizon, the more sinister the very sea itself. Even the land beneath her feet faced an existential crisis. When would the waters rise? How long until enough servitors abandoned their pumps and polders to break the Central Provinces’ eternal stalemate against sea and tide? Would the sea reclaim the land?

  On and on and on it went. Her mind raced through a litany of calamities. How straightforward the end of the world when reduced to a single apocalyptic checklist.

  And what then, after The Hague fell? Would the malfunction spread through the Empire? Had it already done so? Would the rogues keep moving until they covered the world in metal? How far would they go? To the border of China? Straight across Africa, from Tunis to the Cape of Good Hope? There were Clakkers aplenty on that wild continent, speaking the bastardized Dutch of their Afrikaaner owners.

  A faint odor of blood and brimstone wafted through Huygens Square, where teams of uncorrupted mechanicals labored to install new traps above the Forge. Meanwhile, far underground, a collection of horologists and alchemists assessed the damage to the massive armillary sphere at the Forge’s heart.

  Parking the rings had probably saved the Forge. But now the technicians found it impossible to restart the armillary sphere. The collateral damage had been too great. So while the Forge survived, it was useless. Meaning the Guild couldn’t build new servants to replace those lost in defense of the Ridderzaal. It couldn’t replace those lost to contagious corruption of the metageasa. It couldn’t make existing machines immune to the corruption. It couldn’t capture malfunctioning mechanicals and force a hard erasure to wipe the slate clean. It could do nothing to address the problem. As long as the rings were parked, the Guild’s holy of holies was nothing but an oversized barbecue pit.