Ticker (9 page)

Except to administer a right good slap.

I climbed in and tucked my hands firmly at my sides.

Marcus’s features shifted from searching to stern as he followed. “Please do me the favor of fastening your safety belt, Miss
Farthing. It’s a long way to the ground.” He propped one foot against the door and made a great show of fastening his own lap belt. “Although every air transport must, by law, be outfitted with as many parachutes as there are seats, I wouldn’t care to test such devices unless it was a dire necessity.”

Reaching for the heavy safety belt, I fastened the connectors. “I would quite enjoy parachuting.”

“Have you ever parachuted?”

“I’ve read the manuals.”

“Theory and experience are two different things.”

“The last time I read a manual, I immediately climbed aboard a Vitesse and drove it all the way around the Heart of the Star.” I didn’t mention that shortly thereafter I’d taken a header over the handlebars and landed without ceremony in a hay cart.

Marcus handed me a pair of ornate aviator goggles. “This will be a bit farther to fall than off your cycle.”

The moment his hands returned to the controls, the flyer rocketed into the sky. I admit that I made an undignified noise that might have been a half-swallowed squeak. Torn free from its combs, my hair whipped about my face and shoulders, and I pulled on the goggles both to protect my eyes and relieve my squint. Soon, Bazalgate was no more than a collection of miniature rooftops and streets. The fog crept off the River Aire, and gas lamps the size of wax tapers burned bright.

Whatever I might have thought about Marcus as a conversational partner or a soldier, he was damned good behind the controls. His shoulders even relaxed a small measure while dealing with instrument panels and levers.

As opposed to people.

“This is marvelous!” I shouted over the mighty cacophony of the rushing wind and the engine. Remembering too late to whom
I was speaking, I hastily downgraded my enthusiasm by adding, “If ostentatious. Hardly inconspicuous, either. Certainly not made for stealth.”

“The fog helps.” Marcus’s mouth quirked, though with irritation or amusement I couldn’t be certain. “When people can’t see the hand waving before their face, they don’t look to the sky.”

“Aren’t you afraid of crashing into the Carillon Bell Tower?” Dedicated to the city’s founders, it was Bazalgate’s tallest landmark and the most impressive.

“There are a thousand and one instruments in here, at least half of them navigational.”

“Naturally.” I would have traded my eyeteeth for just five minutes at the controls.

Though I couldn’t have leaned forward more than an inch, Marcus noticed. “Perhaps another time, when I’m quite certain my insurance premiums are up to date.”

Any rejoinder I might have made evaporated with the clouds as the Flying Fortress came into view. Sunlight glinted off white columns and sleek glass architecture. Smaller satellite buildings clustered around a singularly imposing main structure, like chicks to a mother hen. Under it all, turbines produced the necessary amount of thrust to keep everything aloft. I hadn’t any idea what the power source might be, nor could I fathom how Marcus’s engineers achieved a nearly clean burn, but the utter lack of emissions meant that the air around the Fortress was cold water sipped from a crystal goblet, a far cry from Bazalgate’s soot-smudged tankard. I adjusted my goggles and leaned as far out of the SkyDart as my lap belt allowed.

“Miss Farthing, please sit back so I might land without distraction,” Marcus requested as we cruised nearer to the landing platform. Blinking red lanterns lit the circle’s perimeter, though
the sun subdued their brilliance. At night or in inclement weather, however, they’d be a veritable beacon of hope.

Marcus landed us with a gentle bump, no more than the basket of a hot-air balloon touching down in a grassy field. I remembered with a jolt that this was no mere pleasure jaunt, and all the fears I’d been holding at bay rushed back to weigh me down. Fumbling with the sack of cards, I released my belt and was halfway out of my seat before Marcus cut the engine.

“You have an Eidolachometer machine here, so we can read these?” I asked.

“I’ve sent for one.” Determined to maintain some semblance of authority, Marcus tossed his goggles onto a seat, opened the door of the speeder, and leapt down. “Allow me.”

Before he could unfold the filigree stairs, I gathered my skirts in one hand, vaulted over the railing, and landed next to him. Reaching back inside, I extracted the bag of cards and hoisted them over my shoulder. “Lead the way.”

“Patience is a virtue, Miss Farthing.” He turned on his heel and headed for a waiting elevator.

There was no way of asking him to hurry without explaining why, so, for once, I remained silent. The interior of the elevator was a capsule of elegance, with brass rails, etched mirrors, and thick Bhaskarian carpeting. Marcus operated the various levers with the same quiet assurance that he’d demonstrated in the SkyDart. A pulley system activated, and we glided downward. There was no floor indicator; it was only by counting off the seconds that I knew we’d descended at least three stories below the landing platform by the time the doors slid open.

The hall beyond was decorated with potted palm trees, jewel-toned rugs, and an extensive collection of curios alongside tattered leather-bound books, rolled maps, and globes of polished
stone. Overhead, a system of bands and wheels rotated dozens of woven-straw fans. Formally dressed soldiers saluted as we passed. Plainly clad servitors carried silver trays set with message cylinders, ledgers, and other missives of importance. When the foot traffic cleared, a young woman sat in a chair opposite the elevator.

“There you are, Legatus.” Though the unfamiliar woman wore the drab gray of the Ferrum Viriae, it was cut in the newest of fashions and embroidered collar to hem with metallic silver stars. Dangling green esmeraude earrings grazed her shoulders. Waist-length black braids cascaded down her back, and a Logodædaly Multilinguistic Translator dangled from her belt.

Marcus drew up short. “What have you done to your uniform?”

The newcomer looked down at her clothes with the air of one surprised to be wearing any. “This? A few minor alterations only.” A dozen bangles jangled on her arms alongside her iron bracelets when she turned her gaze upon me. “And you have the famous Miss Farthing with you, just as I knew you would.”

I returned her keen look and raised an eyebrow. “I’m sorry, have we been introduced?”

“Not in this lifetime,” was her cryptic response.

Marcus located his tongue and his manners. “Penelope Farthing, I am pleased to introduce to you Philomena de Mesmer, recently appointed psychic consultant to the Ferrum Viriae.”

A professional medium in Marcus’s employ? I’d have been less shocked by a monkey hanging from the rafters. “I beg your pardon?”

Philomena cut in before he could respond. “I sent you a message, Miss Farthing. I hope you received it in time.”

“I . . . did receive it, in fact.”

Mind the third step from the bottom. It’s a bit tricky.

And then I’d fallen on that precise stair at the Bibliothèca.

Coincidence, surely . . .

“I hope the information proved useful to you.” Her forehead puckered in the tiniest of frowns. “Messages from the Great Beyond are often subject to interpretation.”

Now it was Marcus’s turn to be confused. “You sent Miss Farthing a note?”

“Little more than an hour ago,” Philomena confirmed. “A personal correspondence, so perhaps I shouldn’t have used official stationery. My apologies, Legatus.” She set off down the hallway at a brisk clip. “I was headed to your office to deliver my report, then realized I could meet you at the elevator.”

“Another premonition?” The words slipped out before I could stop them.

“That, and the announcement over the loudspeakers.” Philomena tossed the words over her shoulder as she walked, leaving us to catch them and catch up.

I glanced at Marcus. “The Ferrum Viriae subscribe to a belief in the occult?”

He kept his gaze fixed forward. “We’re conducting research in all branches of science and technology.”

“Science and technology? You can’t mean to tell me you’re counterweighing some of the greatest advances of this century with a belief in such jiggery-pokery. Parlor tricks? Smoke and mirrors?”

A muscle in his jaw jumped at the accusation. “I’ve seen enough things in my lifetime to contemplate the possibilities of the next, Miss Farthing.”

“As have I, and yet I refrain from such nonsense. As both an engineer and a person of science, I am absolutely appalled.” I had more to say on the subject, but Philomena whirled about to face us.

“Come on then, we haven’t all day.” She strode backward with the confidence of one unconcerned with crashing into a large potted fern.

I suppose psychic energy is good for more than just forecasting and fortune-telling. She wouldn’t need Starshine goggles to make her way through a dark room.

“Received a portent of doom, have you?”

“Oh, I receive all sorts of correspondence.” Philomena paused outside a carved door bearing Marcus’s name and rank etched in silver. “As I said in my note, your sister delivered another message to me this morning. Dimitria has been trying to reach you for some time.”

“Don’t.” I sucked in a breath and struggled to calm myself. “Don’t you dare drag my sister’s name into your crystal-gazing hocus-pocus.”

“Ordinarily I’d let you believe what you like, Miss Farthing, but your sister has been clogging up my communications with the Great Beyond to the point where I haven’t been able to meet with my other contacts at all.” The more Philomena explained, the more irritated she grew, until she prickled all over like a disgruntled porcupine. “I’ve important work to do here, and I don’t appreciate the distraction, to be honest.”

I leveled a freezing stare at the woman, the sort that Grandmother Pendleton would use on an impertinent lady’s maid. “Miss de Mesmer, my mother visited every clairvoyant in the city limits and most in Meridia. They bilked her out of quite a sum, promising her they could contact my sister, and I can see that you are in the same sort of business. Good day to you.” I turned to Marcus, who looked like he was struggling to decide which of us to admonish first. “I’ll be inside, Legatus. If you wish to speak with me at all, you will do so alone.”

Sweeping into his office, I dropped the bag of Eidolachometer cards in an empty chair. Curling in my fingers, I dug my nails into my palms and fought the tears that threatened.

Dimitria.

Thoughts of her were wrapped in fine linen, ribbon decorations, hushed whispers, Mama’s tears. Striving to put the here and now before the memories, I concentrated on my surroundings: the Ferrum Viriae shield hanging over the mantelpiece, the fireplace surround carved with images of the Twelve Engineers, the elaborate machines whirring away on marble pedestals. On the wall hung several pictures, a set of framed medals under glass, and an article from
The Examiner
, dated six months past.

FUNERAL CONDUCTED FOR HEIR TO INDUSTRIA’S LARGEST PRIVATE ARMY

By Orville Accardo

A memorial service was held Saturday for Viktor Augustus Kingsley. Heir to the Ferrum Viriae empire, the twenty-two-year-old was killed during a training exercise gone badly wrong. Mister Kingsley was commanding a twelve-squadron live-fire exercise when an interruption in service to the secure RiPA lines put the young man in the wrong field position. Formal inquiries found no wrongdoing by any of the instructors nor the other soldiers involved.

Like everyone else in the country, I’d read this in the broadsheets, but I’d forgotten until this moment that I wasn’t the only one suffering a loss.

A noise sent me scurrying back to my chair, then Marcus entered alone. Standing just inside the door, he studied my face like it was an illuminated manuscript, with all the answers he needed written upon my features. Certain I had smudges of dirt upon my nose, I did my best not to squirm under his gaze. There was no way to guess what his heart was doing, but the Ticker’s pace had accelerated enough to flush my neck and warm my cheeks. And I didn’t need a crystal ball to guess what he was thinking: we each needed information in the other’s possession.

With deliberate steps, he moved behind the marble-topped behemoth of a desk and reached for the intercom. Turning the side crank produced a series of hisses and clicks, then there was a muffled, “Yes, sir?”

“Tea and brandy, please.” Marcus put a hand over the mouthpiece to inquire, “Are you hungry?”

Luncheon seemed a distant memory after the excitement in the alleyway—not good for my blood sugar or the Ticker. As much as I would have liked to answer, “No, thank you, you may stuff your sandwiches somewhere most inconvenient,” I was forced to nod.

“And a light repast,” he added into the brass bell speaker. Clicking off the device, he pulled out several files and placed them on the desk. “Do you know what these are?”

“Lists of my many perceived shortcomings, alphabetized and arranged in descending order?” I volunteered.

“No, Miss Farthing, they’re intelligence files. On you, your brother, your parents, and Calvin Warwick.”

“How lovely.” The thought that someone followed me about the city and snooped in our rubbish bins should have disturbed me, but in comparison to the other revelations of the day, this was merely irritating. “I suppose, then, you know what sort of tooth powder I use and how Nic likes his trousers tailored.” The tirade
was cut short by a knock at the door, indicating the swift arrival of food and drinks.

Then Marcus had a different query for me. “Cream or sugar?”

“Both, please. Two lumps.” Seeing an opening, I used his courtesy as an opportunity to put him on the defense. “So are you going to share the real reason you turned up at Glasshouse this morning?”

Marcus stilled, silver tongs hovering over my cup. “I beg your pardon?”