The Mammoth Book Of Steampunk Part 8

"A story?" The Artificer clicked her beak. "I wear one of those anklets around my neck."

Akbar smiled; but as he smiled in court, with grace rather than belief.

"What you ask worries me," said the Artificer. "But it worries me more that I seem to have taught you nothing. So be it, King of Kings; bring me beaten silver to replace the worn copper in my tail, and precious metal and enamel enough for this task, and they shall have what they want."

And so it was; she made a little golden child with wings and tail enamelled green, and named her Devadasi. Bulbul and Peac.o.c.k raised her and taught her with love and patience. Being made by the Artificer, whose skill exceeds all others', she soon sang with greater range and sweetness than her father and danced with more grace and expression than her other father. All the birds were entranced except the Artificer, who stayed away.

One day, when Akbar came to the aviary with trouble on his shoulders, Devadasi fluttered down to him. "May this slave sing to ease your soul?" she asked. "May I dance to give joy to the brightest star in the Heavens?" For her fathers had also taught her manners.

Now, the Shah-en-Shah had just abolished the pilgrim tax, and he was anxious to forget his mother's anger (remember that he was very young in those days). So he smiled, and accepted, and Devadasi sang for him and danced. And like all others, the Emperor of the World was entranced.

"What a clever bird you are," he said afterwards.

Devadasi preened and asked, "Do you not think my singing sweeter than Bulbul's, o my lord?"

The Emperor said, "Yes, little bird, it is sweeter than any other music in the world." This was thoughtless of him; but indeed he was not thinking.

"And do you not think my dancing prettier than Peac.o.c.k's?"

"I do, little one," he said.

Bulbul and Peac.o.c.k had approached to see how their daughter fared; but their heartsprings broke at Akbar's words, and they sang and danced no more. Struck by grief and guilt, the Shah-en-Shah bent his head and wept.

"Do not mourn, Great One," said Devadasi. "They are merely metal now, it is true, but surely it would please their springs and screws to be made beautiful. Have the Artificer bird use them to build more birds like myself, and my fathers' very cogs will rejoice."

And so the Light of Heaven commanded.

The Lady obeyed (for even an honored guest obeys the Ruler of All). She sawed Bulbul and Peac.o.c.k apart, melted them down, re-formed them. But their balance wheels and their broken heartsprings she quietly set aside.

The Devadasi birds exulted. They sang in complex harmony and ch.o.r.eographed elaborate dances, their different colors flashing in varied patterns. And they wanted, always, to make more complex music, more complex patterns. They wanted more of themselves. So too did the Light of Heaven want more of them, for the memory of Bulbul and Peac.o.c.k made him doubt his every thought and judgement. In the Devadasi birds' presence he could forget the new torture of shame and indecision; he came more and more often to the aviary, sometimes even cancelling his open court. And each time he came, the birds asked for something more.

They asked for bronze from the aviary's central fountain, and copper from the pipes that pumped in warm oil. He granted their wish, though it meant the other birds grew creaky and stiff. They wanted the solder that held together the aviary's panes of gla.s.s; and they had it, though the roof shattered and the rain came in.

They asked him, then, for stories of warfare. He spoke of swords and guns and killing machines, of strategy and of treachery on the field. And Falcon heard, and knew that her hunting was only a game for princes, and her heartspring broke. Then they asked whether owls of flesh could spin their heads all the way around; and Owl tried it, and unscrewed his head until it fell right off and smashed. They asked about wild swans, how gracefully they could glide through still water; and Swan tried to swim, and sank.

As each bird died there was more metal, and more still, and Devadasi's wishes kept the Artificer busy. But she saved every heartspring, and every special movement plate and wheel, and she hid them away. And late at night when she would not be disturbed, she spent long fraught hours patching broken heartsprings with copper from her old tailfeathers.

The day came when there were no birds left to murder for salvage, nothing more to harvest from the aviary itself. On that day the flock asked the Shah-en-Shah if they might go with him to the Artificer's workshop, and on that day he did once again as they asked.

"See what you have wrought?" sang the Devadasi birds, their pure voices interweaving. "If not for you, the aviary would still be whole. You are flawed, Artificer; we are perfect. It is fit that you sc.r.a.p your wings and make more of us."

But the Artificer said, "You will not find it so easy to break my heartspring."

"Then at least take that ugly anklet from around your neck," they chorused. "It is not fitting for a bird to wear jewelry, and it will help make one of us."

"Do you know the cost of an anklet?" said the Lady. "I shall tell you."

"We care nothing for your stories," they called.

"You will listen anyway," she said; and they did.

The Anklet Once a young couple from Pukar came to Maturai, ruin of the south, in search of work and a new life. In that time, the city that is no more was thriving, rich in the manner of the flesh people, with fruit and meat and wandering cows and children and elaborate, painted woodwork.

The couple were barefoot, their skin scratched and muddy from travel. They owned nothing of value but her gleaming golden anklets. Ragged lengths of dyed silk fell from their shoulders, a mockery of the spun-gold robes they once had worn. But these were no paupers; they were master artificers both, and hoped to rebuild their fortune in Maturai.

Settling beneath a banyan tree on the edge of the city, they waited for sunrise. She beat a rhythm on her right anklet, her copper fingers dark against the gold. It sprung open with an oiled clickwhirr. Moonlight caught on its tiny hinges and on the nine precious stones on their internal belt.

"Will you calculate our future?" asked her husband. For her right anklet was an astrological device; each stone represented a star.

"No," she said. "How would knowing help? We must speak to this raja's artificer; we have no choice."

Her husband bent his head. "Forgive me." His voice was dull as his once-gleaming skin.

She said only, "You were not yourself."

He slumped, silent, until she closed the anklet up and handed it to him; then he raised one brushed-bronze eyebrow in a question.

"You will need proof of our skill," she said.

"Should I not take my masterwork, rather than yours?"

"Yours is too useful," she said. "He might take it away." Her left anklet was a measuring device, its belt set with magnifying lenses. She did not mention that she preferred losing her own masterwork to his.

So when the stars to the east started to fade, he rose with her anklet in his hand and trudged into Maturai. He did not return.

Three days and three nights pa.s.sed before she ventured into the city. She waited because flesh women did not conduct business, and because she was ashamed to enter the city with an ankle bare. But she also waited because she wished to trust her husband.

So it is that we can make terrible mistakes with the best of intentions. For by the time she entered the city, her husband was three days dead.

She learned from the flesh people that a metal man had stolen the Queen's anklet and tried to sell it to the Raja's own artificer. She asked where he was. "With the artificer," they said. "In pieces, by the Raja's command. As the thieving device deserves."

She said, "The one you speak of was neither thief nor mere machine, but my husband."

As one, they turned away from her.

So she went to the palace. The Raja's guards tried to stop her, of course; her hair filaments were unbraided, her copper skin dented and green in places. But they knew nothing of Pukar's people, of their strength and their speed. The woman of metal brushed them aside and clanged into court, where she cried, "Is this the justice of Maturai? Her raja is a murderer; her queen wears stolen goods."

"The device is raving," said the courtiers. But the Queen looked at her and paled. For the copper woman's single anklet was a perfect golden band, just like the Queen's two.

The Raja said, "What nonsense. My artificer made the Queen's anklets himself."

"Perhaps." The woman flexed her finger hinges. "But I made one that she wears."

"Do you claim my artificer lied?"

"Claim?" she said. "Call your artificer, o murderer, and I will prove it."

The Raja took an angry breath, then stopped and smiled. "If I shame him so, he will leave," he said, as oiled as the copper woman's hinges. "I must have an artificer."

"Give me his workshop and his goods," she said, "and I will take his place."

The Raja called gleefully for his artificer then, and bade the Queen slip off her anklet.

The metal woman watched quietly. When the Queen had eased an anklet off, she said, "But surely you knew which one you lost? Mine is the other."

The Queen flushed and bowed her head, then fumbled her other anklet off. She held it out to the metal woman without looking up.

The artificer came in then, flanked by guards and protesting with every step. "What travesty is this?" he cried. "I have never been so insulted! Majesty, have I given you cause to doubt me? Surely I must know my own work!"

The copper woman said, "Then trigger its mechanism."

"What mechanism?" he sneered. "Do you see seams in my craftwork?" He held the anklet up to the window and turned it in the fractured light. "Do edges glint? Do hinges mar the surface? Show me one single imperfection Thing."

She took the anklet from him, tapped it, and held it up as it clickwhirred open. "In Pukar," she said, "jewelry is more than merely art."

The Raja had his artificer put to death. The copper woman watched and smiled. She smiled more when the Raja cast suspicious glances towards his queen.

And so the woman of Pukar became a raja's artificer. But she did not promise him loyalty, for she was too honorable to lie.

In the workshop she found her husband's armpieces, legpieces, breastplate and skull. She found his gears arranged by size. She found a dozen plates, a thousand screws, a counterspring, a ratchet spring, a regulating spring. If she had found his heartspring intact, she might not have destroyed Maturai.

But she had given the old artificer three days and three nights with the body, and the flesh people have always wanted to know how heartsprings work. She could not repair it. Her husband was truly dead. And she had never told him that she treasured his anklet over her own. Her own heartspring might have broken then. It tightened, instead, in anger.

So she promised the Raja a present in thanks for his justice, and she locked herself away. She kept her heartspring tight, and thought only of her art. For nine months she made children, scavenged from her husband's parts and her own. Nine monstrous children, each with one leg, one arm and one eye. Each eye was a stone from her astrological anklet.

From the remaining parts she made a bird, copper from its tailfeathers to its wingtips. But its beak was the bronze of her husband's skin, and its articulated hands were human.

She was barely a framework by then. She unscrewed her b.r.e.a.s.t.s, filled their cups with gems from workshop stores, and with poison; then she soldered them together. She told her children their task: hop to the funerary grounds, steal burning branches from the pyres, and set Maturai aflame. She wound their heartsprings so tightly that they could think of nothing else. Then she set them loose.

Finally she clasped her measuring anklet around the bird's neck, pulled out her heartspring, and in one automated movement transferred it into the copper bird.

Then she stretched out her wings and flew.

She flew first into the Raja's court, holding the sphere made from her b.r.e.a.s.t.s; and there she dropped it. It hit the marble tiles and burst open (for solder is not strong). Shining gems bounced everywhere. Some cut gashes in the courtiers and guards. They did not care. The copper bird's last view of the court of Maturai was a frenzy of men and women grabbing for rubies, emeralds, pearls; and every stone was coated in poison.

Heartsprings "Poison kills flesh very quickly," said the Artificer thoughtfully. "And carved-wood buildings burn fast. So ended Maturai and so, as I flew high above and far away, was justice finally done."

There was a silence in the workshop when she finished. Even the flock was a little bit impressed, and the Emperor looked at his friend with a first hint of fear. She was both teacher and maker; just how tightly was her heartspring wound?

The flock recovered first. "Your price has been met," they warbled, "and we outnumber you still. If you will not give us your anklet, we will rip it from your neck."

"But the story is not done," said the Artificer. "For I made you, and I must tell you one thing more. I made you in the image of the temple dancers of golden Pukar, those who stole away my husband for one long and heartsore year. I even named the first of you after them: Devadasi. They were beautiful and skilled, and their grace was unmatched in this world."

As one, the flock preened.

"Yes, you were made in their image," said the Artificer. "But what I must tell you is that I failed. My skill was not sufficient. They are still unmatched, for they were better than you."

And hearing this, the entire flock's heartsprings broke in one discordant tw.a.n.g, and they fell, littering the floor, the table, the cabinets.

The Shah-en-Shah flinched. He looked around, a dreamer slowly waking into nightmare. Tears formed in his eyes. "What have I done?" he said.

The Artificer collected the Devadasi bodies. She cut feathers and plates and counter-nuts apart. "You have learned something, my friend," she said, pulling heartsprings out of their hidden drawers. "The hard way, of course, like all the young."

And she set to remaking the birds of the aviary.

Akbar He did learn, that young ruler. He learned whom to trust, and whom to heed, and that the two are not always the same. And that is surely why he lives to tell you this story today.

Prayers of Forges and Furnaces.

Aliette de Bodard.

The stranger came at dawn, walking out of the barren land like a mirage gradually shimmering into existence beside the bronze line of the rails: a wide-brimmed hat, a long cloak, the glint that might have been a rifle or an obsidian-studded sword.

Xochipil, who had been scavenging for tech at the mouth of Mictlan's Well, caught that glint in her eyes and stopped, watching the stranger approach, a growing hollow in her stomach. Beneath her were the vibrations of the Well, like a calm, steady heartbeat running through the ground: the voice of the rails that coiled around the shaft of the Well, bearing their burden of copper and bronze ever downwards.

The stranger stopped when he came up to her. They stared wordlessly at each other. He was tall, a good two heads taller than Xochipil; he held himself straight, like an axle or a rod that wouldn't break. The glint wasn't a sword or a rifle, after all but simply that of a dozen obsidian amulets, spread equally around his belt, shining with a cold, black light that wasn't copper or bronze or steel, but something far more ancient, from the old, cruel days before the Change.

Xochipil's heart contracted. Perhaps it wasn't too late to run away. But he'd catch up with her easily, with those big legs of his. She'd never been a fast runner, not with her right leg trailing behind her, permanently out of shape. Before the Change, cripples such as her would have been killed: sacrificed to the old G.o.ds to bring the harvest or the sunlight.

The stranger's eyes rested on her leg, but showed no change of expression. "This would be Mictlan's Well?"

Xochipil, not trusting her voice, nodded.

"I see." The stranger's eyes were brown, almost without pupils. "My name is Tezoca. I'm told there is an inn here, for travellers?"

Xochipil nodded again. She stared at him, trying to decide what he was; but he didn't appear fazed by her appearance, or aggressive. "But you need a travel licence. Or the will to serve the community and bind yourself to the workers, in this age and the next and the next," she said. The words of the Well's oath of loyalty came irrepressibly out of her mouth.

The words fell in the silence between both of them. Under her feet, the earth was quiescent, as if the rails themselves waited for Tezoca's answer.

"I see." He smiled; his teeth were dark, stained with soot, or coal-dust. "I see. What makes you think I don't have a permit, little one?"

"Don't call me 'little one'," Xochipil snapped, annoyed that he'd used the same condescending name for her as the townspeople did. "My name is Xochipil."

Tezoca spread his hands. "My apologies. What makes you think I don't have a travel permit, Xochipil?"

Wordlessly, she pointed at the dangling amulets on his belt.

"This?" he asked, lifting one of them. In the rising sunlight, it shone as red as blood and it wasn't an amulet after all, she saw, but a shard with a sharp edge, barely reworked to make it seem innocuous. In its depths was an odd, cold light, a beat quite unlike the voice of the rails, speaking of a forgotten time, of altars slick with blood and the smoke of incense rising against the pristine blue of the skies, above a city that wasn't steel and bronze, but simple adobe ...

A hot, sharp pain burst across her cheek; startled, she realized Tezoca had just struck her. Warmth spread from the blow, to her face, to her bones. It wasn't an unfamiliar feeling Uncle Atl had been fond of calling her to order when she failed to be grateful for anything but it was the first time a complete stranger had struck her, at all. And he wasn't getting away with none of it, never mind that he was taller or bigger than her.

"Apologies," Tezoca said, his gaze still on her, as if he could read her thoughts. "I had to tear you away from that." He didn't sound angry, or sad just thoughtful, and perhaps a little proud, though she wasn't sure why.