Mechanica (13 page)

My foot slipped, and I dropped five feet or more before I managed to grab a windowsill. My ribs hit one of the beams on my way down, and my chest clicked painfully when I breathed in. Still, I wasn’t on the ground, and I didn’t think I was too badly injured.

I made myself look down. To my relief, I was halfway there. With about ten feet to go, I took my hands off the beam and fell back.

I rolled on impact and the soft, fresh snow cushioned my landing. I stood up and dusted the powder from my coat.
That was almost fun,
I thought.

The dark figure came closer, and I recognized Caro’s short, round body even before the moonlight revealed her face.

“I meant come down by the stairs, you idiot,” she said. “You could have killed yourself!”

“Mmm, but I didn’t, did I?” I grinned at her. I didn’t think I’d ever been so happy to see someone.

Caro crushed me in her arms, and even though she was more than a head shorter than me, I felt comforted and protected in her embrace.

“How’d you find me?” I asked.

She cleared her throat and let me go. “I may . . . or may not . . . have followed you home.” She squinted up at me, embarrassed. “You just seemed so broken down and henpecked, Nick. I thought you might need some looking after. And then I saw you get pulled inside like that, and I knew for sure you needed help. I figured I’d come back when it was dark and things had quieted down.” She scowled. “Those aren’t your sisters, are they? I mean, no one should treat you that way—but especially not your family.”

I laughed roughly. I thought Caro must have dozens of siblings and cousins, all as golden and smiling as she, all caring for each other and never arguing.

“They’re my sisters all right,” I said. “My stepsisters, to be specific.”

Caro shook her head. “Well, never mind that.” She turned and started toward the forest, beckoning. “Follow me.”

I trotted along behind her, trying to step in her boot prints. Her feet were much smaller than mine, though, and her stride shorter, so I often missed.

Once we were thoroughly inside the tree line, she stopped. “I’d like to help you,” she said, louder now that we were away from the house, “but I won’t give you help you don’t want. I know how you feel about charity.”

We both grinned.

“Now, I’m guessing you aren’t one for running away, or you would have run long ago. Am I right?”

I shrugged. “For a long time I didn’t think it was possible. But I don’t want to leave my parents’ house until I know there’s a better life for me somewhere else. This was their home, and it’s still mine.”

Caro nodded. “And what would be better?”

I closed my eyes, imagining. “A home of my own, a big workshop, actually eating the food I make instead of just the scraps . . . and someday saving up enough to buy this place back from the Steps . . .”

I found myself spilling my whole life story, unsure what it was about Caro that let me speak so freely.

She just listened, barely even moving except to smile or nod sympathetically, even though I knew her feet must be as numb as mine in the snow.

“That’s why I came to Market today,” I said, finally. “I want to build something really grand for the Exposition, so that maybe I can get enough commissions to open my own shop. Then I could leave the Steps forever, and I wouldn’t have to rely on anyone but myself ever again.” I laughed grimly. “Of course, now that they’ve caught me, I won’t be able to go to Market, and I won’t save any money, the whole workshop is gone, and the Exposition might as well be in Faerie for all I’ll be able to get there.” I laughed. “Not that I’d mind seeing Faerie.”

Caro said nothing, even when I finally managed to stop talking. The wind hissed around us. An owl hooted overhead.

Finally she nodded. “Well,” she said briskly, rubbing her mittened hands together, “I can’t give you a new place to live, Nick, and I can’t help you cope with the Steps. But I think I know how to get you to the Exposition.”

“Really?” As much as Caro felt like a friend, my memories of the last seven years told me I couldn’t rely on anyone, let alone a girl I’d only met that morning. Besides, how could someone as young and poor as I was help me?

“Yes,” she said, all too patiently. “Since it’s likely unwise for you to come to Market without the Steps’ leave”—I raised my eyebrows and scoffed, but had to agree with her—“I can meet you here, whenever I’m free, and take your beads and machines and things, whatever you can still make, to Market for you. You can tell me what you need for your inventions, and I’ll buy your supplies with the money from your wares.”

I thought I’d spent all my tears, but my eyes pricked and burned at her kindness. “Thank you,” I said, managing to keep my voice steady. “I think . . . I think that might work, if I can find time to get away.” I brushed my face with the rough sleeve of my coat. “Why are you bothering with me, Caro?”

A branch cracked behind us. I stiffened, hearing snow crunch under boots as someone approached. I was certain the Steps had found me, and I spun to face them.

It was Fin. His arms were crossed, his face hidden in a tree’s shadow. “Caro’s not in it for nothing,” he said.

“Lord, Fin,” Caro exclaimed, “must you skulk so?”

Fin made a noise that might have been a laugh—or perhaps a growl. He stepped out of the shadow. His face looked serious enough, but the good-humored crinkles around his eyes told me not to worry. “If Caro’s going to help you,” he said, “she’ll need something in return.”

Caro’s cheeks darkened, their blush so high I could see it even in the moonlight. “I—I thought . . .” She tugged on a curl that had come loose from her red woolen hat. “Maybe I could—perhaps—keep a small portion of the bead money, for my trouble.” Her blush heightened still further. “My mum is sick . . . and the . . . the doctors—”

“Of course,” I said, cutting her off before her face turned purple. “I wouldn’t think of letting you do this otherwise.” I smiled at her, and she tentatively smiled back.

“Good,” said Fin. “Mrs. Hart really needs a better doctor, but the only good ones are kept for the royals, doing nothing, and the medicine—”

“Oh, shut it, Fin,” said Caro. “It’s all turning out just fine, see?” Her voice was strained, though, and I wondered how serious her mother’s illness really was. I thought of Mother, dying of Fey’s croup, and the illegal lovesbane Father wouldn’t buy to help her.

“Well, I can’t thank you enough, both of you,” I said, hoping to turn the subject away from sick parents and palace greed. “The only problem is, I think the Steps will be watching me very closely from now on. I won’t be able to tell you ahead of time which days I can get here.”

“Not to worry,” said Caro. “Fin and I can get there, can’t we?”

Fin nodded. “It’ll take some work on your part,” he said, “but then, it’s for your benefit. We could hardly let you just sit around and be rescued.” I could hear the teasing in his voice.

“It would be boring,” said Caro, nodding her agreement.

“What does this brilliant plan involve, exactly?” I asked.

Caro beckoned and turned away, walking deeper into the forest. Fin took my hand, and we followed her together. His hand around mine comforted and frightened me all at once, just as Caro’s touch had done at Market: simple and kind, foreign in the way it didn’t ask anything of me.

The owl screamed again, and its call made me feel immensely far from civilization, even though Lampton Manor was, at most, a mile behind us.

“How do you know where we are?” I asked. In spite of the warm assurance of Fin’s hand, doubts were trickling through my mind.

“We grew up nearby,” said Fin. “We used to come play in this forest all the ti—”

Caro coughed, cutting him off. Part of Woodshire Forest was Lampton Manor’s private property, and the rest belonged to the crown. As far as I could tell, we were walking just along the property line. No one was allowed in without a royal hunting license—or a royal pedigree.

“Er,” said Fin, “as long as we’re quiet about it, we should be fine.”

I shook my head. “I don’t care if we’re allowed here or not.”

Fin squeezed my hand. I squeezed back, but that suddenly felt too bold, and I hoped the moonlight wouldn’t show my blush.

Caro stopped after a few more steps—too few—and Fin let go. “We’re here,” they said, almost in unison.

I looked around, confused. There was nothing “here” that was different from any other part of the forest: tree trunks, snow, and the blank bluish moonlight that cast Fin’s brown skin with a deep indigo. My own skin looked bluish-gray, while Caro’s had turned into translucent ice. The moonlight suited him better than either of us.

“I don’t see anything,” I said, feeling singularly dense and a little suspicious.

“Up there,” Fin whispered, his breath gentle on my ear.

I looked up.

There were dark shapes in the trees above us, blotting the stars, covered with snow. Some were simple platforms, some boxes with slanted roofs like small tree-hung cottages. Caro stepped forward and brushed aside the branches of a thicket, and I saw a large shed on the ground there, almost completely hidden by the snow-covered bushes around it.

It took a moment, but suddenly I recognized what the shapes meant. They were ruins, and this was the site of the Forest Queen’s abandoned village.

My story-loving heart thrilled at the idea, and I felt as if I’d stepped into one of the books I’d read in childhood. I stood still, taking in the moldering platforms around me, filled with a happiness that was almost like worship.

“You can bring your beads and everything here,” said Caro. “Hide them in the shed, and we’ll come pick them up, you see, and leave the money up there”—she pointed to a nearby treehouse—“once we’ve been to Market.”

I almost asked them how to get up there: there were no stairs, no ladders, not even a knotted rope to climb.

Then I blinked and admonished myself for being so dense. It was a tree, wasn’t it?

As if to confirm my thoughts, Fin loped away, grabbed a branch, and nimbly swung himself upward. Caro and I watched him climb. He reached the doorway and stepped in, snow falling through the slats where he walked.

He called to us from inside. “See? Simple.” I could hear the smile in his voice.

I ran to the tree. I found I could more easily match my steps to his boot prints than to Caro’s.

I jumped for the first branch and just barely caught it. I kicked my legs up toward the trunk, and my boots scudded over the rough bark before finding a hold. Putting most of my weight into my arms, I sideways-hoisted myself up until I could take the next branch. I was in the treehouse in seconds.

“You’re right,” I said, glad my years of chores had made me so strong. “It is simple.”

Fin’s laughter blended with mine. We looked out the window and waved, and Caro laughed too, below us in the snow.

We parted in the forest, since Esting City lay to the west and Lampton Manor to the east, each about two miles away. Fin hugged me this time, and he whispered “Good luck,” his lips close to my cheek. I shivered.

He turned to leave, but then looked back at me, frowning. “Do those Steps of yours give you any food when they lock you up?” he asked.

I had to laugh. “Hardly,” I said, “but I’ll manage.”

“Hmm.” He dug into one of the pockets in his black woolen coat and pulled out a neat twist of brown paper a little smaller than his hand. “Take this,” he said. “It’s not much, but it’s good.”

I looked down at the parcel, then up at Fin again. I could sneak in and out of the pantry at home easily enough . . . but there was some code we were all writing there, in the forest that night, and I didn’t want to break it. “Thank you,” I said. And then, remembering Caro’s concern about taking charity: “I’ll pay you back after Market day.”

Fin’s dark eyes flashed. He didn’t say anything, but I knew I’d taken the wrong tack. My heart sped up and I tried to think of a way to apologize, but while I was still fumbling with my words, he turned to go again. He and Caro kept a small distance between them as they walked away.

The snow squeaked under my boots, packing farther into the footprints I retraced. I noted odd-looking trees and rocks on my way, hoping they’d help me remember how to get back. I recalled the warmth of Fin’s hand on mine, and I smiled as I walked.

I’d made it almost halfway back before I realized the immense flaw in our plan. With my workshop destroyed, I had no place to make beads or to finish that morning’s knitting machine orders.

How had I forgotten for so long? I had always considered myself a fairly practical person—how could I not have realized?

I knew the answer already: I’d been caught up at once in Caro and Fin’s excitement. I’d caught their hope like a contagion. Perhaps I wasn’t so practical after all. . . .

Had Market been only that morning? So much had changed there, and so much had changed afterward, that it seemed ages away.

I covered my face with my hands and groaned. What would I tell Caro and Fin? And what could I do now, with my equipment gone? My new friends had offered me hope, but it had lasted only as long as Jules’s reincarnation in my dream.

I couldn’t give up, though, I lectured myself. Not yet. I couldn’t disappoint my new friends so quickly . . . and what was more, I couldn’t disappoint myself.

When I got back to the house, I encountered another problem. I’d barely managed to get down from my third-story window and couldn’t possibly climb back up. I didn’t dare go through the front door—I was almost sure the Steps were asleep by now, but
almost
hadn’t been good enough lately.

At the back wall, facing the forest, the workshop’s small ground-level window was buried under the new snow. I didn’t want to see my shop in its ruined state, but the cellar was my only safe entry into the house.

I had to break the glass to get in, after I’d dug through about a foot of snow. My mittens were caked with it, so I just closed my eyes and made a fist, praying the blow wouldn’t lodge any shards in my knuckles—and that the breaking glass wouldn’t wake the Steps. The sound wasn’t as loud as I’d thought it would be, thankfully, and it was further muffled by snow.