Steamscape Read online

  The artist had even drawn in each warrior’s individual symbol at the points of the shape. It had been common –was still common – for the last thirty years to make the mark of the Hex.

  Theo’s mother had often charmed all the clan’s kids with tales of the Hex’s heroics in the border rebellions. But she also chided the youths that the Hex would come and steal them away if the kids didn’t learn to pick pockets better. He had grown up with those stories just like everyone else, in total awe of invisible, fearsome soldiers.

  People drew the Hexagon for protection, to ward off intruders, and even as a charm against evil spirits or as a curse on someone. The Hex. Elite warriors trained by Steampower for Codic’s pleasures. Theo wondered which side they’d fight for now.

  His eyes traced the symbols surrounding the shape. The Death Spinner – a soundless assassin, marked by a silhouette of a spider. Flame – Theo squeezed his eyes closed at his fiery stamp. Parrot – who was said to be anyone he chose to be, represented by a winking bird. Ghost – as close to a crypter as one could be – whose symbol was only a white circle. Silvermark – the leader, with his silver shooting star. And the Steam Slayer – the warrior depicted by claws.

  The young man breathed in the coal-laced air and reopened his eyes. “Ghost, if you’re out there, lend me your ability today.” He had grown up believing that Ghost could just talk to the machines and make them fail. Of course he knew better now, and felt instantly stupid.

  Talking to the ghosts in the steam. Ridiculous. The crypters claimed that they could send messages without a telegraph or radio, and even scry distant lands through the steam.

  Theo scowled and re-secured his footing. He climbed a few more feet between the pillar and the tower wall. Glancing overhead, he saw he was running out of the old castle’s wall to the place where the boiler continued up on its own. He hoped he was high enough.

  He dug out a device from his pocket. He’d spent three months building this contraption to do two minutes of work. It was a heavy cylinder with a large, hollow screw in the center. He jammed it up against the boiler tower and waited for the coating of heat-sensitive glue to melt it into place.

  Then again, this thing was hot enough it just might melt the glue entirely. Theo lifted his other hand to the handle rising out of the other side of the tool. He gripped it, squeezing his fingers as tightly as he could.

  But he could not turn it.

  Theo’s breath came in gasps and he ground his teeth against it. The tool wavered in his vision and fires rose up in front of his eyes.

  His boots splashed up the mud as he sprinted through the downpour. They knew by the look on his face. His mother had buried his face in her stomach and held him tightly. It had been the first embrace from her that he could remember.

  She hustled him into the smuggling compartment of the wagon with several other children. He’d curled up toward the front, his hair sticking to the top of the false floorboards.

  It was raining, but that hadn’t stopped the fires.

  Flame…

  Theo gasped as he slipped down the wall. He scrambled to stop himself from falling. He felt one drop of sweat slide down his cheek, linger for a moment, and then fall toward the catwalk below.

  He cursed himself. This was not fire. This was only steam.

  But it could still burn, a traitorous thought flared.

  His hand cranked the handle with all the force of his internal anger. The auger chewed through the deep wall of the boiler. It wasn’t a large hole, but it didn’t have to be.

  The young man reached toward the base of the tool and pushed the valve closed. No steam seemed to be escaping. He unscrewed the handle from the tool and replaced it with a plunger. He dug back down into his pocket and pulled out a handful of small capsules.

  Each capsule was comprised of thick, hard gelatin which would melt soon after exposure to moisture and heat. He shook one of the pills, listening to the waxy blocks rattle inside.

  White phosphorous. It was so expensive during this war that he’d had to break into a mansion and steal someone’s collection of sapphires.

  The powder was incredibly flammable, and even better yet, pyrophoric. It would ignite upon contact with air once the thick gelatin melted far enough down the steampipes – and then it would also turn into phosphoric acid, causing even further damage.

  Even more sweat ran down his cheeks. It was already so hot here, and the sweat made it dangerously slick. He glanced down at the capsules in his gloved hand.

  He froze. Two more men passed below. These carried wrenches and their shoulders slouched forward as they walked. They weren’t soldiers.

  Theo mouthed, “Get out of here!”

  His hand started to punch down the plunger, but then he paused. He wondered who he would really be hurting – Codic or those conscripted workers?

  He shook his head and steeled his eyes. His inner, dark voice said, the only thing you owe is your anger. Besides, if the machines stopped turning, the slaves wouldn’t have to work.

  “They say the ghosts in the steam love fire. Well, here ya go, boys.”

  He tipped the capsules into the tube and closed it up with the plunger. Then he breathed deeply, opened the valve and slammed the plunger down, hurling the capsules into the steam-stream. He pumped the second dose into the tower.

  He almost breathed out when he heard from below. “Hey, up there!”

  ***

  Solindra lifted her skirt to step over a puddle of what she could only hope was muddy water topped with rainbow sheens of oil. She wrinkled her nose – it smelled like the privy.

  Valhasse stank. She’d always dreamed of visiting a city, but now she was dreaming that she could just go home and return to pretending what a city should be. It wasn’t supposed to be noisome, clogged with ash, or so downright dreary.

  She’d always pictured people laughing in front of flower shops. There was supposed to be color and light! Instead there was fog, coal-smelling air and herds of people like animals.

  Jing, limping along behind her, tapped her shoulder. “Remember, your name is Marissa Clifton and you’re from Codic.”

  Solindra bunched her skirts. “I’ve seen how those women dress, and I don’t look like them.”

  “Smart. Okay, you’re from Chimney Rock. It’s a frontier town.”

  She gasped indignantly. “The border?”

  Jing frowned and started walking again.

  “Okay, okay.” She pointed at a large, tall structure with pipes coming in and out of it at all angles. “Jing, what’s that?” It looked like it had been constructed out of a rotted castle’s core.

  He blew out a sigh. “Boiler tower. Helps propel steam around the city.”

  They kept walking through the down-facing droves of people.

  “Where’s Drina?” she asked.

  “Behind you.”

  Solindra whirled. There was Drina, standing there with a bag of bread and cheese in her hands.

  “You always do that!” The girl’s face glowed red.

  Jing chuckled while Drina tore off a piece of bread and held it out. But the mechanic’s expression quickly darkened. “Dinghy can’t carry enough coal for a long journey.”

  Drina shrugged. “Sell it for a couple of horses then.”

  He shifted his weight onto his metal leg. “I don’t like horses. But I suppose I’m game if it gets us out of the country.”

  “Remember why Mark didn’t do that seventeen years ago?”

  “The borders can’t possibly be as well guarded now with the war on. Besides, nobody’s looking for teenagers.”

  “What does that mean–” Solindra started.

  A steam whistle blasted four short notes and a long from the nearby train yard. The ground underneath their feet shook at the weight of the rolling cars. Solindra’s expert ears picked up that this was a fully loaded passenger train slowing to a stop.

  “Four and a long?” she asked. “Haven’t heard that combination before.” She smile
d. “Why don’t we catch a train?”

  “Not that one,” Jing said darkly. “I read John’s– Calvin’s reports. We’re not going into that yard.”

  The girl finished chewing on the bread. “Then why not a stagecoach? I’ve always wanted to ride in one. Even one of those that are pulled by horses.”

  The mechanic mused, “Buying a cheap farm cart might do it. Couple of draft horses. We’d be just another family of refugees.”

  Drina shrugged. “We’ll probably have to bribe our way out of the city if we leave by road.”

  Jing sighed. “And neither one of us were the best at that.”

  The cook curled a hooked smile. “There’s always my way.”

  “As if that wouldn’t raise the alarm?”

  “Not at all.” Drina smoothed her short skirt. “They’d just blame it on Steampower, and us with the vessel–”

  “What is a vessel?” Solindra pulled out the red sancta from a skirt pocket.

  “It’s nothing,” Drina and Jing replied in unison.

  The girl frowned. “This may be my first time off that blasted mountain, but it’s not nothing.”

  Drina smiled sadly and folded the sancta down lower in Solindra’s hands, out of view. “A vessel, is, ah, a rare person who both Steampower and Codic used to be after.”

  “Why?”

  “Different reasons. They tried to ma– bree– train infants to be crypters. Real ones.”

  Solindra jerked the sancta free and jumped back. “I am not one of those freaks! How could the capital or Steampower give credit to those crazy ideas?”

  Drina frowned. “So says the girl in the closet trying to find her father in the steam.”

  “It didn’t work now, did it?” the young woman snapped. She gasped and lifted up the device. “This sancta-thing is a cipher medallion, isn’t it? No. No! My dad was not one of those occultists!”

  “No, he wasn’t.” Jing shook his head. “He was unfortunate enough to know the truth.”

  Solindra crossed her arms. “Which was?”

  “He never said, Cyl. He wanted you to live a good life.”

  She tossed the device up in her hand and caught it again. “I say let’s destroy the damn thing. Ain’t worth nothing to me.”

  Drina caught it on the next toss. “Not right now. Mark thought you would need it if events came to pass, like the puzzle box. And since it probably is a cipher medallion, I’d suggest keeping it out of sight, young lady.”

  Solindra grumbled, but tucked the sancta back into her pocket. She jumped at the four-short-extra-long whistle combination again, blasting off right behind her. She turned and gazed through the tall, barbed fence between them and the train yard.

  And then she saw a thousand or so people crammed into cattle cars. Only dullness splashed across their faces as they stared at the ground through the slats in the cars. Soldiers surrounded the train, sometimes even pointing their rifles directly at the people, who didn’t seem to react to the threat.

  Drina rubbed the girl’s shoulder and Jing limped to stand between them and the fence. Solindra started heaving for air. “What is that?”

  “It’s called the Killing Train,” Drina said. The woman paused; she and Jing exchanged a glance. “Some guilty, but most probably just happened to live on the wrong side of the new border dividing the country. Codic’s clawing its territory back, you see? Steampower’s got the better weapons, but Codic’s got the men.”

  Solindra continued to gasp. “Killing Train? But those are people. They’re people.”

  “They’re just numbers to Steampower and to the capital.”

  “They’re people.” Her face had faded to a shade of old porcelain, and she started to sway like wheat in the wind.

  Drina steered her ward away from the fence by her shoulders. “Nothing we can do, Cylinder. I’m so sorry.”

  “But they’re people!”

  “We can’t help them.” Jing stepped in way of her view. “I’m sorry.”

  A couple of patrolling soldiers drifted past on the other side of the fence. Solindra flinched at them, blinking back tears in her gray eyes.

  Drina rubbed her shoulders, pushing the girl away from the train yard. Jing followed, his metal leg thumping against the brick street.

  The mechanic stopped, raising his nose into the air. “Do you smell burnt garlic?” His expression changed to wide-eyed comprehension just as the first explosion rattled the street. Metal squealed briefly as the blast shredded the roof of a nearby factory. Its steampipes ripped open in a blossom of flame.

  Fire consumed the nearest boiler tower from inside. A second, smaller explosion erupted from the top of the dome. The ancient masonry of the castle started to crumble away like a snake shedding its skin to reveal the body of the burning boiler. People streamed out of the collapsing building, not even yelling and instead saving all their concentration for escaping.

  Solindra crashed down onto her knees, her cries lost in the sudden roar and stampede of the crowd. More explosions tore apart the steampipes leading from the nearest boiler in buildings on either side of them.

  Drina wrapped her arms around the young woman and forced them to squat. Jing leaned over and shielded both of them. They backed up to the train yard’s fence, having no avenue of escape.

  Jing wiped the sweat from his forehead. “Chalk that one up to Steampower saboteurs.”

  “We’re being attacked?” Solindra covered her ears with her palms.

  “Eh, not so much,” Drina replied, a treacherous grin on her face. “Maybe it’s just an accident.”

  The mechanic groaned underneath his breath. “Either way, we’d better get out of here fast.”

  Drina eased her grip on Solindra. The girl gripped the fence, shaking so hard that she could hardly stand up on her own. Scents of burnt garlic and oil rolled over them, adding to the falling ash from the sky.

  “Garlic?” Solindra frowned.

  “Strange. Phosphorus, likely.” Jing nodded almost approvingly. “Started fires in half a dozen warehouses I bet, and look at the boiler. It’ll be so hot it will melt its own metal. They can’t put that out any time soon. Not bad.”

  Solindra pulled herself up on the fence to stand, still shaking visibly. “I want to go home.”

  Shouts and shots arose from around a corner. A young man was sprinting ahead of several soldiers. A guard leveled his rifle and fired, but the runner had already weaved before the rifleman had squeezed the trigger.

  The shot pinged off the fence above Solindra’s skull.

  She crouched down and tried to yelp, but the scream froze in her throat. She’d never been on the wrong side of a bullet at Pitchstone!

  And now the world was filled with soldiers guarding the Killing Train and a city that didn’t seem to have the heart to care. Its men were shooting on a crowded street!

  Another shot rang on the fence further down from them.

  “Just breathe, Cyl,” Drina said, watching the runner and soldiers with eagle eyes. “This moment will pass.”

  Solindra wanted to scream at the older woman’s calm voice. How could anyone be so unruffled right now? A third shot ricocheted off the brick street and back toward them, narrowly missing her thumb. She heard the bullet clink against the fence.

  The young woman kept her hands pressed to her ears and watched as the fleeing boy, near enough to her own age, gazed at her for just a moment, before speeding back up.

  She looked back between the herd of people bound for the Killing Train and this young man. She stood. “We have to help him!” She jumped forward and nearly careened into the fugitive. Terror lent her enough strength to almost catch up.

  “Cyl! No!” Jing leapt after her, but his metal leg weighed him down. Steam hissed out of its joints at the sudden movement.

  “Cylinder!” Drina spun around to face the oncoming soldiers instead of giving chase.

  A soldier slammed the lever on his rifle home, reloading the chamber, and leveled at the runners. He started
to exhale and his finger slowly increased pressure on the trigger. He never saw the piece of brick flying through the air aimed for his ear.

  ***

  “What are you…?” Theo couldn’t finish, he had to breathe instead. He stared in amazement at this flame-haired girl.

  That hateful part of him prompted him to think, why don’t you trip her up? They’ll stop chasing you.

  “Shut up! Shut up!”

  “What?” Solindra glanced behind them. “I’m here to help you. We need to hide.”

  “Help me?” He blinked in confusion.

  She sprinted ahead, her gaze buried deep into the back of an alley. “There!”

  They charged ahead into the darkness. Their footsteps suddenly surrounded them, echoing off the high walls.

  Another backstreet corkscrewed away in the middle of this alley. Theo grabbed the girl’s shoulder and tugged. She burped a yelp of panic.

  “Don’t! I guess I’m saving you instead.” He stuck his finger in her face. She went cross-eyed, and he felt himself tipping forward into the silver, steam-colored orbs. He had never seen eyes like that before. For just an instant, their grayness brightened and he saw all the colors of the prism, just like the aether bands in the sky.

  He shook himself free and yanked her down the curving, ever narrowing alley. “Just don’t.” After two corners they came to a thick, iron gate. He crouched down. Unlike most things that had been made before the war, this one wasn’t all curving patterns and stained glass. It was a simple gate, meant to bar unsolicited passage.

  She knelt beside him, shivering like a beggar in a blizzard.

  The thundering of boots echoed around the curving corners. The girl flinched. Theo did too, and immediately started brushing off his soot-stained sleeves to hide the action. The footsteps didn’t grow any louder.

  After a moment, he exhaled. He cocked a seamless salesman’s smile at her. “What crime did you commit?”

  She just shook her head and replaced her hands over her ears.

  He held up his hands and widened his smile. “I won’t squeal, I promise.”

  “Home,” the girl muttered. “I was trying to do the right thing, but I want to go home. But Dad’s no there, so it hasn’t been home in awhile.”