Ticker (10 page)

“Legatus, you have half the city convened at the courthouse and face the possibility of rioting in the streets when the verdict is announced, yet you thought it important to answer a call about a break-in?” Though I sounded amused, my palms had started to sweat.

“I think you ought to let me ask the questions, Miss Farthing.” He set my tea before me with a thump.

“You can ask.” I stripped off my gloves and selected a cheese bun from the platter. If I were to spar with him, it wouldn’t be on an empty stomach. “That doesn’t mean I will answer.”

He circled the desk with his own cup and unnerved me by taking the chair adjacent mine. “All right, then. Your mother is working as an independent contractor for the Ferrum Viriae, and she’s in possession of some important schematics. When the break-in occurred, I wanted to make certain she was safe and then secure the blueprints.”

I gaped at him. “My mother is working for you? How long has this been going on?”

“Approximately six months.”

“What’s the project?”

“I can’t answer that question.” Marcus spoke slowly, measuring out the precise amount of information he was willing to share with
me and not another word more. “There are people who want the Augmentation technology Warwick developed. Dangerous people. We intercepted dozens of underground communications over the last few months, and that number spiked this week.”

“Is that why the city officials raised the alert level?” I asked. “You think something might happen when the verdict is read?”

“That was my suspicion, yes. Now I think it was just a distraction. As was the explosion at the factory.” Marcus gave me another searching look as he added, “It was a bomb.”

“A bomb?!” I sloshed tea over the lip of my cup and into the saucer. “Are you certain?”

“The preliminary tests came back positive for accelerant. That’s the quick and dirty way of confirming it.” Far from looking discomfited, there was a warrior’s readiness about the way he sat next to me. “What else can you tell me about the break-in at Glasshouse? Perhaps something valuable was taken?” The fire had time to hiss and pop before he spoke again. “Information is my best weapon, Miss Farthing. The more informed I am, the better prepared I can be.”

His honesty did ungodly things to me, and I found myself wanting to tell him. Dear Cogs! There was something so earnest about his face, about the way the words now poured out of him, but still I hesitated. “You have to understand . . . I’ve no reason to trust anyone right now.”

Marcus leaned forward a bit more, starting to reach for me. At the last moment, he reconsidered and retreated. “I am the proprietor and leader of the largest, most powerful private military in Industria. I have a network of informants larger than the number of workers at your factory—”

“None of whom can tell you what happened at Glasshouse, it would seem,” I countered softly. “So here’s the arrangement
I am willing to make: if I disclose what I know, you will tell me exactly what machine my mother was working on. You’ll also give me access to your intelligence files and the messages you’ve intercepted.”

Now it was his turn to pause. “You’re not cleared for that information.”

I willed myself not to flush or stutter. “I guess that’s where it will come in handy, what with these being
your
files and
your
decision as to who should be able to view them. Now, do we have an agreement? My information for yours?”

Several seconds passed. Then, instead of answering, he went behind the desk and rummaged in a drawer. Withdrawing two circular bands, he approached me, went down on one knee, and took my hand in his. His skin was work roughened, marked by combat, and the Ticker gave a curious flutter.

“Marcus . . .” My voice trailed off when he kept his hands on mine. If there was anything to this—

And by
this
I meant
us
—

And the thudding of my clockwork ventriculator told me
this
was indeed
something
—

Then we’d gone about it all wrong. So many things should have happened before bare skin met bare skin.

The moment ended when he snapped an iron bracelet around my left wrist. Before I had a chance to process what he was doing, I wore a matching metal circlet on my other arm.

“I hereby swear you into unenlisted service in the Ferrum Viriae,” he pronounced, the words as solemn as his gray eyes. “And I assign you the rank of Tesseraria.”

I was startled by his use of the title; it was an old one given to the person responsible for safeguarding watchwords and delivering
them to the commander on duty. A keeper and protector of classified information.

Marcus rose, brushing nonexistent dust from the knee of his pants as he addressed me. “Now, Tesseraria Farthing, we have an agreement. And more importantly, you have clearance.”

I looked down at my new jewelry, momentarily distracted by the way the embedded diamanté refracted the lamplight. Minutely etched white lines formed a three-dimensional image within the stone: the Ferrum Viriae crest surrounded by laurel leaves. “This has been, in all possible ways, a most curious day.” Looking up at Marcus, I felt compelled to add, “Don’t think I’m going to address you as sir.”

“Tesseraria,” he said, lifting his cup of tea to his mouth and frowning when he found it cold, “I dared not even dream of such things.”

SIX

In Which Various Events Shake Our Heroine to the Foundation (Not Garments)

Reconsidering his beverage, Marcus put down his tea and reached for the brandy. He held the cut-glass decanter up to the firelight, sending dancing flames through liquid amber. “I think I need some of this. You?”

“Strong spirits and my implant aren’t ever a good combination, but I’ll take a lemon and Fizz if you can manage it.” Anything to calm my racing pulse, which felt like the galloping of horses through my veins. “And I’ll continue to partake of the food, if you don’t mind.”

I’d eaten another currant bun by the time he handed me a tall glass filled with lemon concentrate and Effervescence. He followed that up with a substantial stack of papers.

“Here are the intelligence files on your family.”

It was a most disconcerting feeling, opening the thick uppermost folder to see my name typed alongside a copy of my passport
photograph. I splayed my fingers over my own face and winced. “This is truly a terrible picture.”

“Hardly my top concern when gathering intelligence.” Brandy snifter in hand, Marcus watched me keenly, making no pretense of his interest in my reaction.

Under my picture, stamped out in black on white, was everything anyone might want to know about me, from the names of my private tutors to the sums of money the family owed assorted creditors. Oddly enough, the Ferrum Viriae’s reconnaissance also included a list of young men who escorted me to last season’s social functions, cross-referenced by age and income, with notations of gifts that included “box of cream caramels, imported” and “bouquet of lilies of the valley tied with a pink ribbon.” An entry about my mechanical Butterfly collection was underlined, and I wondered why Marcus had thought it important. When I glanced up at him, I found him intently studying a selection of cakes. With great nonchalance, he settled on a cream slice studded with fruit before handing me the plate.

“Take one. They’re from SugarWerks, flown in daily.”

Fruit and cream were all well and good, but under these circumstances, only chocolate would do. I finished the first tart in two bites and selected a second before asking, “What sort of machine was my mother building for you?”

The RiPA on his wrist fired to life. Watching his frown deepen, I swallowed just in time for him to meet my gaze.

“The verdict is in,” he said.

“And?” I couldn’t have swallowed again if I tried.

“Guilty,” Marcus said with uncharacteristic gentleness. “Warwick is to hang on the morrow.”

Every siren in the building wailed. Dropping the dessert tray, I clapped my hands over my ears.

“What’s happening?” I shouted at him over the tidal wave of noise.

“Get to the archway!” Marcus didn’t wait for me to move, instead catching me by the hand and towing me into an alcove.

Crowding me into the half-circle under a monogrammed medallion, Marcus lifted one of his bracelets and waved it under a Geodesic Spectrophotometer. Pressed up against one another, we stood there for what seemed an eternity until the device recognized and acknowledged his clearance. There was a flash of bright light, a sound like a gong, and then the floor twisted underfoot one hundred and eighty degrees. Beyond a screen of copper latticework, silk-blindfold darkness blanketed the view.

“Hold tight,” Marcus advised. He braced me with his own body a second before the platform plummeted like a lift with its cables cut.

My scream chased us all the way to the bottom. Twisting my fingers in Marcus’s sleeves, I could feel my skirts billowing around my knees and my hair whipping me wildly in the face. A few seconds later, our descent decelerated until our arrival was as dainty as a well-born lady alighting from a carriage. Somewhere overhead, a bell pinged like an oven timer.

“The cakes are done,” I said, noting the internal lurch and resettling of the Ticker’s balance wheels. Trying to keep a bellyful of sandwiches and chocolate where they belonged, I extracted myself from his grip and gasped, “Where are we going?”

“The Communications Center.” Marcus folded back the gate.

“Do you know what’s happening?” I asked. Golden emergency lighting revealed other soldiers arriving via similar transport, the parade of well-muscled bodies only slightly less intimidating than the architecture of the barrel-vaulted hallway.

“So many messages are coming in my RiPA that I can’t make heads or tails of it,” Marcus said, using his bracelet again to unlock the door at the far end of the hall. “Whatever occurred, it exceeded my preparations for the verdict. Damage control is going to be necessary.”

Displeasure was evident in his tone, his expression, and his agitated gait as we entered the next chamber. With pops and flares, lights flickered on at intervals, allowing the vast space to unfold around us. Every possible means of delivering information lined the walls, including a few engineering marvels as yet unfamiliar to a civilian like myself.

“Confirm incoming bulletins!” Marcus demanded. “Someone tell me what is happening down there!”

One of the officers standing by the Aethergraph Station jerked on a set of headphones. “There’s been an explosion at the courthouse!”

Still numb from the news of the verdict, I thought for a moment that I’d misheard him. Trained soldiers gasped and swore. Horrified murmurs raced around the room. I didn’t join in, too caught up in my own thoughts to give them voice. Gripping the railing and skipping every other stair in his haste to ascend, Marcus climbed to a circular platform in the center of the room.

I gave chase as best I could. “Where are Nic and the others? They were supposed to be right behind us in the second SkyDart!”

“They’re on the landing platform.” He spared me only half a glance before barking out, “Get me the city plans!”

Detailed maps hung on the walls: the port city of Meridia, Industria and her surrounding coastlines, the empire in its entirety. Etched upon thin sheets of metal, deliberate green oxidation marked the land masses and a delicate blue-gray patina the rivers, lakes, and oceans. The map of Bazalgate slid forward on
a set of rails. As new messages arrived, miniature incandescent lights activated all over the city.

“The Third, Fourth, and Eighth boroughs have checked in!” someone relayed.

Marcus lowered a brass trumpet that projected his orders to the farthest reaches of the room. Though the others couldn’t see it, his knuckles were white from gripping the mouthpiece. “Get the rest of the districts on the wires.”

“Yes, sir!” a soldier responded.

“Numbers coming in from the scene, Legatus!” another shouted.

“A dozen injured and one death reported so far.”

“Get me a list of everyone taken to Currey Hospital, and I want the names of the dead as they are located.” Marcus pivoted on his heel. “What’s the damage to the courthouse?”

The thrumming of the communications machines filled the long pause before someone answered, “The soldiers clearing the site found undetonated explosives in the rubble, and Calvin Warwick has gone missing in the chaos, sir.”

Suddenly, there wasn’t enough air in the room.

“All the media outlets in the city have received a statement!” shouted the officer presiding over the PaperTape machines. “We have an incoming message.”

“Pull it up on the Solaris.” Marcus turned to face the massive display, which was larger than the SugarWerks menu board and far more technologically advanced. Where Violet still chalked the day’s specials onto slate tiles and slid them into brass grooves, the Solaris was an advanced magnetomechanical device that could receive and display Aethergraph messages up to one hundred and forty-four characters long.

Painted flaps whirred, revealing one letter at a time.

AN OPEN MESSAGE TO ALL CITIZENS OF INDUSTRIA: