The Toymaker's Apprentice (6 page)

Stefan knew what that was like. He didn't want to spend his own life making toy soldiers and wooden swords. He had big ideas, too. But Christian didn't look triumphant.

“It was to be my masterpiece. My greatest creation.” A ghost of a smile crossed his lips and vanished.

“It was Christmastime, and the king had demanded a grand amusement for his little girl. I strove to give it to him. An Advent calendar on the scale of nothing that had ever been done before. You say you like automatons, Stefan? This would have held a city of them. Twenty-five tremendous caverns, which already existed in the bedrock beneath the kingdom. I would have carved them out, shaped them, and filled them with such wonders, more amazing than anything Boldavia or Nuremberg had ever seen.”

His face fell. “I dug too deep, with no regard for the kingdom below. There had been a balance between mice and men; the rock was their truce. Until I broke it. With chisels and hammers, I destroyed their homes. And the inconceivable happened. The mice had been digging from the other side, seeking to expand their territory. When I cracked the rock, I set them free. They rose from the depths, their numbers more than triple those of the people living on the island. The Queen of Mice demanded counsel with King Pirliwig. A kingdom for a kingdom, she said. A fair share in ruling the country, above and below.”

“But mice are dumb animals,” Stefan said. The thought of mouse royalty was ridiculous. “How could the king blame you? That's like being blamed for a thunderstorm.”

“Spoken like a true apprentice,” Christian said. The words stung, but it was Christian who winced. “A master clockmaker should have known better. I'd studied the animal kingdoms the way you've read up on automatons. I knew of mice and their ambition. But reading and understanding are two different things. I chose to do what I wanted, rather than consider the consequences.”

He gave Stefan a look and shrugged. Stefan knew he'd done the same thing by planning to run away without speaking to his father.

“And now you're a criminal in the eyes of Boldavia?” Stefan's stomach sank.

“If only it had ended there,” Christian said. “Of course King Pirliwig refused her. He was the sovereign ruler of the realm and would remain so until the end of his days, at which point Pirlipat and her future husband would take his place.

“But the Queen of Mice would not have it. If he wouldn't share his kingdom, then she'd take it from him. Her own heirs would rule. So she attacked the young princess, who was by now a pert young lady of six, and bit her on the leg.

“If she had been a regular run-of-the-mill pest, we might have treated the wound with a good wash and a bit of honey to keep it from festering. But royalty is different. Like the queen bee who may sting again and again and not die, the bite of a royal mouse is designed not to deter, but to destroy. Part wound, part curse—it taints the blood with vile intent. The venom in that
bite took terrible effect. It deformed the princess, poisoning her into a shrunken little manikin seeming for all the world to be carved out of rough wood.”

Stefan's stomach turned. It was a horrible death.

“I was arrested and set to be executed. And
that
is why I am the most dangerous criminal in Boldavia,” Christian said with a sad smile. In the corner, Samir grunted, as if satisfied with this honest confession.

“Because you killed their princess,” Stefan breathed.

“What? Oh, no. She lives . . . well, lives with difficulty, but she does draw breath and is alive.”

“Mein Gott
!
” Stefan's father exclaimed. “A living doll?”

“And an ugly one at that,” Christian confirmed. “As you can imagine, the king and queen were beside themselves with terror. Pirlipat remains in good health despite the affliction but, so cursed, she can never hope to marry, rule with dignity, or provide an heir of her own. A monarch's wealth is in his or her children. You must have a successor to succeed.”

“Not only in monarchies,” Stefan's father said. Stefan cringed.
Drosselmeyer and Son
was a sign that could have hung over their shop for generations, if only he had chosen to stay at home.

“Samir and the Royal Physicians were assigned the duty of finding a cure. Fortunately for me, Samir discovered what the others could not. The cure is the meat of a nut called a
krakatook
. It has curious properties, is exceedingly rare and, according to the stars, I am destined to find it. At first, the king refused to let me go. Instead, he sent his men out in search of the nut. Every young man in Boldavia followed suit. But, when the
krakatook
was not readily found, the king commuted my sentence on one condition—I must find the nut. And then I'll be set free. Samir was assigned to be both my jailer and astrological guide. We have searched for seven years, but have yet to find a single nut.

“In the meantime, the mice have not stopped watching us. If we find the cure, the king will no longer fear the Queen of Mice, and he will surely hunt and destroy her. Until then, he cowers in his castle while the mice run roughshod all over Boldavia.”

It all sounded like a fairy tale. Talking mice, human kings, and animal queens. Stefan wouldn't have believed it had he not heard the words of the mouse spy.

“What can we do to help?” Stefan's father asked. This was the father he loved—sensible and brave.

“Thank you, Zacharias,” Christian said with feeling. “We've searched the world for the nut—France, England, Asia, Russia, the Ottoman Empire, Arabia. Why not Nuremberg?”

“We'll begin immediately,” Zacharias announced, half-rising from his seat.

“Actually,” Christian said slowly, “I've recently taken on a journeyman. I think this would be a wonderful opportunity for him to show his worth.”

Stefan almost choked on his elderflower cordial.

“Truly, Christian?” his father asked. “Who is the lucky fellow?”

“I believe you know him. It's your son.”

Zacharias's eyebrows flew into his hairline. He turned to Stefan, who had the decency to blush six shades of red.

“Father,” he began.

“My boy?” Tears dimmed his eyes for a moment and he
touched the wedding ring on his finger. The sight stabbed Stefan to the core. The ring's twin lay with his mother in her grave. Guilt crushed his chest. He could not breathe.

And then, his father smiled.

“Well done, Stefan
!
” he bellowed, pulling him into a bear hug. “You could do far worse than your cousin Christian. And you'll discover far more than I could ever hope to show you as a wood-carver.”

“You're a wonderful toymaker,” Stefan said hoarsely. He hugged his father tight. When last they had been so close, his mother had been part of the embrace. “
You
are wonderful.” He cleared his throat of tears and looked up. “Do I really have your blessing?”

His father looked down at him, and Stefan suddenly felt very small.
Say no,
he silently wished. He'd stay if his father needed him, and it would be all right. He'd make it so.

“You have it,” his father said. Stefan's cheeks were wet, but he grinned. They turned to Christian, who seemed very pleased with himself.

“It's settled, then. For now, we all need sleep. And in the morning,
you
, my dear boy, will begin your work as a journeyman.”

SNITTER WAITED.
That was the bulk of his job, waiting. Yes, there was intrigue and travel, and there had been more than a few battles in his day. But mostly—in the antechambers of the Queen, or the bow of a ship, or the back alleys of some cold, damp city—he stood on his hind paws and waited.

Blackspaw was late. The moon's pale face was turning gray with the coming dawn. Nuremberg was far, even by the underground riverways. Perhaps the messengers had been waylaid by weasels or an impatient snake. It was a rough business, transporting intel. Another half hour and he would have to leave without his lieutenant.

There was a rustle of paper and leaves. Snitter angled his ears to better catch the sound. Scurrying. The clittering of nails on cobblestone—he would have to tell the young mouse to trim them. Long claws might be useful in battle, or fashionable in court, but in the world of spies, they were simply an alarm.

Snitter resisted the urge to call out to the lad. Softer paws were afoot. The rat at the inn had already had one run-in with a cat, they didn't need another.

A small piebald rounded the corner out of breath, shaking with exhaustion. The camouflaging gray dust had washed off in the gutters, exposing his mottled white fur and black paws. On seeing his superior, the bedraggled young mouse snapped to attention and saluted.

Snitter waved the salute away and uncorked a small flask. “Steady, son. Refresh yourself and report.”

Blackspaw shook his head, out of breath, and wiped the sweat from his brow, his dark paw like a smudge of dirt on his creamy forehead. The young mouse bowed and Snitter could tell by the tip of his whiskers and the droop of his tail that something had gone amiss.

“Flicker was seen?”

Blackspaw thrust a sooty note into his captain's paw. Snitter cursed under his breath. Flicker had been chosen for his size and speed. His very name came from his ability to appear as no more than a flicker in the corner of the eye.

Blackspaw's shoulders drooped. “Caught and questioned, sir. But he escaped
!
” he added quickly. “He told them nothing
!
”

Blackspaw and Flicker were littermates. Of course he would defend his brother. But they were also zealots—members of the Queen's guard because they believed in her mad ideas, the dominion of Mouse over Man. Snitter doubted the boy would have kept his mouth shut. No, he would have spouted venom and contempt like prophecy.

Snitter sighed and took a swig from the flask. That was the trouble with mice these days—rushing headlong into trouble, announcing themselves at every turn. Blackspaw was no different from their Queen. Snitter was born of a quieter breed. The sort of mouse associated with churches and timidity.
That
was a position of power: being ignored. Then a mouse could do anything he fancied. “There is a reason why mice squeak and the wind roars,” Snitter's grandmother used to say. “Who are we to replace the wind?”

He remembered the day the thunder came and split open the roof of their world. There was no fate worse for a mouse than exposure.

But the Queen had other ideas. Seven years ago, almost to the day, she laid the Boldavian princess low, striding across the throne room floor slowly, deliberately. It had seemed like an age passed as she climbed the stairs to the royal crib. The king and queen stood by, their furless faces stricken dumb at the boldness of this tiny rodent. The Queen of Mice had smiled at them, a cat's smile of wicked teeth and venom, and slithered into the blankets where the princess slept. They'd moved to save her, but too late, too slow. Sharp teeth and a tender limb. A scream that shook the air.

Snitter had thought his heart would stop, he who was meant to guard the Queen. But she emerged from the sheets unscathed. Dabbing at her snout with a lace handkerchief, she smiled again, this time a mouse's smile, no teeth, just sweetness.

She pointed at the stricken princess. The girl had already begun to shrivel and petrify. “One bite, and this,” she'd said in the difficult language of Men. “Two bites, and dead.”

Queen Imebella sobbed, the king gasped.

At that moment, the royal clockmaker entered the room with a net.

“Do not
!
” the Mouse Queen cried. “Or two bites
!
See?” She bared those teeth again.

The king nodded. He would not risk what life his child had left. The man called Drosselmeyer dropped his net and the Queen of Mice grinned.

“Boldavia. Is. Mine.” The first human words she'd ever
learned. The servants said she had been practicing them since the day the earth broke open. She was an old breed. The languages of Men did not come easy to her. But she'd taken the time to learn the speech of a conqueror.

She'd leapt from the crib and whisked out of the throne room, ushering in a new age for mice. Where generations of mousekin had lived quietly under the flagstones of Boldavia—wintering beneath the castle, summering in the fields—the new Queen would have sun and summer all year round.

And, for a short time, she did.

But then came the reprisals. Traps and cats and a slaughter like mousekind had never seen. All because of that blasted clockmaker, Drosselmeyer.

The rat's song shivered across Snitter's memory. Seven years had passed since those dark days, but there was no song for Boldavia. The Queen had yet to finish the verse. She would take the world of Men and squeeze the juice from it like a blackberry.

A pretty idea, Snitter admitted, but an impossible one. Fields need to be sown to reap wheat. Mice were not farmers any more than cats were men. Chase them away and who would sow the fields? Who would make the cheese? When the castles and cottages were all in ruins, only then would the Queen see the folly of her ways.

Until then, Snitter would remain her faithful servant. She would not be the first monarch he'd seen brought to ruin, nor the last. And if, by some mad twist of luck, she succeeded? Well then, he'd have earned his endless summer, after all.

“Back to Boldavia with you,” he said to Blackspaw now. “Tell the Queen I've found her tutor. Ernst Listz. You travel together
at first light. I'll arrange to babysit the clockmaker as long as he's in Nuremberg.”

Seven years they had carried this duty, watching the clockmaker, reporting his movements. The eighth year would be no different, nor the ninth, should Snitter live that long. The nut the clockmaker sought was a fable. It did not exist, or he would have found it by now. The Queen could have her babes in peace. The tutor would train them to be heroes and, fate willing she had boys, a King would be named. The battle for Boldavia's castle would continue under the banner of the son.

“I shall find him at once,” Blackspaw said, seemingly recovered from both his bad news and the journey. Snitter twitched his tail in annoyance. The boy was too stupid to be tired.

“You'll find him at the Golden Note Hotel by the opera,” he told the lad. The young mouse's eyes widened. It was an extravagant choice for a rat who, only hours before, had been singing for his supper. “I'm counting on you to deliver him safely to the Queen.”

“Never fear, sir.” With a swish of his tail, Blackspaw disappeared into the night.

Snitter sighed and made his own way into the darkness. One thing life had taught him—fear was the first step on the road to wisdom. A lesson some mice never lived long enough to learn.