The Alchemy of Stone

Chapter 16




Mattie startled when someone tapped her on the shoulder, and jumped to her feet, her fists balling.

Loharri smiled. “Easy there,” she said. His eyes watched the homunculus with keen interest. “What is this, Mattie? Did you make that?”

“Yes,” she said.

“What does it do?”

“I’m trying to make it obey me,” Mattie said. “I made it from the stone of the gargoyles, and now I want to compel it to release them . . . but I want to find something else to attach them to, first.”

“Fascinating,” Loharri said, and looked away from the homunculus. His long eyes seemed cold now, and Mattie felt another wave of creeping terror. Had he guessed that she made one for Iolanda? Did he suspect that Mattie had the power to bind him? She thought back to the very first time she had met Ogdela, and saw Loharri afraid; how she envied that power then! And yet now she wished he didn’t know what she was capable of, that he wouldn’t look at her like that—as if sizing up the enemy. “You’re not safe here,” he said. “They’ve taken the northern district, everything there. The enforcers are holding them off, but they are advancing on the east. Best you come with me. Bring that thing along.”

“But . . . ”

“I’m not asking,” he said. “I’m telling you. You are coming with me. Bring it with you.”

Numb, Mattie obeyed. It was just like before, and no matter what had happened to her since, no matter how powerful or emancipated, she still did as she was told—because she could not do otherwise, because he was the one that made her. Just like the gargoyles obeyed the stone—or was it the other way around? she could not remember—she obeyed Loharri, and mutely gathered the homunculus into the cradling hammock of her skirt. It wobbled and hissed and stained the dark brown fabric a darker red; Mattie did not complain and followed Loharri out of the house, past the boarded-up entrance of the apothecary downstairs.

He did not say a word, and Mattie felt a dark foreboding. The city matched her mood—the traffic was sparse, and there seemed to be fewer people in the streets. She heard occasional musket shots coming from the east and smelled the smoke and gunpowder in the air. But that did not preoccupy Mattie—at least, not as much as Loharri did. His brisk, angry steps, his tight-lipped demeanor of disappointment all indicated the inevitable punishment. He can’t take my eyes away, Mattie thought. He can’t do this. And yet, when she asked herself who would prevent him, there was no answer. The enforcers were too busy fighting, and even if they weren’t, would they ever interfere with a high-station mechanic taking apart his creation?

She wished she could cry. Her freedom was just an illusion—she was emancipated because Loharri let her, and therefore she had no power at all. Everything she had was either given or allowed by him. Mattie wondered if it were possible to hate anyone more than she hated Loharri that moment, to be more afraid.

And where was Iolanda? Probably busy with other things, probably safe away and underground, with Niobe at her side, both of them real women who shared a bond Mattie neither understood nor could ever hope to partake in. Iolanda would defend her, of course—if she were here to defend, and if it didn’t interfere with her plans. Protecting Mattie, helping her get her key back was not a high priority, and she bided her time before she would attempt to control Loharri—bided it until it was needed. It was not about love, Mattie realized; it was about gaining access to the mechanics’ secrets. When her co-conspirators would take the city, then she would use her influence to build an alliance with the mechanics, to tame them.

“Bokker is a good alchemist,” Loharri said without looking at her.

Eager to maintain whatever illusion of amicability she could get from him, Mattie nodded. “He is. Why, were you working with him on the city defenses?”

“No,” Loharri said. “He finished the project I needed finished—the one you were working on before you started with the gargoyles. Remember? You asked my permission to take a break, but I didn’t expect you to abandon it completely.”

“I’m sorry,” Mattie said. Despite her better judgment, a feeling of relief filled her—if it was just about that silly project, then he would forgive her soon enough. How important was it, now? Just a game, a curiosity. “I remember—you wanted a chemical that would capture images for you. Too cheap to pay the painters.”

He smiled at that. “Indeed. But Bokker, he did well—thanks to your list. And I worked out how to record not just pictures but also sounds; I can watch people as they move, as they talk, without ever being there. Very entertaining.”

“I thought you were preoccupied with the Calculator.”

“So I was; but you’ve had your distractions too, haven’t you?”

Mattie nodded and hung her head pensively. “I’m sorry.”

“We do what we must,” he said with a shrug.

They remained silent until they reached the western district and his house. He stopped in front of it, patting his pockets for his keys. He unlocked the door and Mattie followed him meekly inside.

“I have a new face for you,” Loharri said, and locked the door behind him. “Come to the workshop, and I’ll fit it on.”

“I like this one,” Mattie said.

“I don’t.” He took Mattie’s elbow and dragged her to the workshop. The homunculus, sleeping peacefully until then in the folds of her skirt, woke up and hissed.

“And shut that thing up,” Loharri said, and shrugged off his overcoat, letting it drop to the floor. “I’m really not in the mood for this, Mattie. Tell it that if it doesn’t become quiet, I’ll smear it on the walls.”

The homunculus apparently did not need intermediaries, and fell silent at once.

“Put it down and sit,” Loharri said as soon as they entered the dark cluttered space of the workshop.

Mattie obeyed, and the homunculus stood on its liquid legs but did not leave Mattie’s side, holding onto her skirts as if afraid to let go. Loharri did not look overly bothered by its presence—he merely made a peevish face and made a show of circumventing the creature in a wide arc. He dug around in the pile of junk.

Mattie watched him extract another face—an exact replica of her previous one—and wanted to be able to cry. No other response seemed fitting as she realized that she was about to be forced back into the mold she was working so hard to escape. “You are not going to take my eyes, are you?”

“Of course not.” He dug under her jaw and popped off her face. Instead of putting the new one immediately on, he tinkered with something in Mattie’s head. She heard the faint click of a tumbler, and lost sensation in her limbs. She tried to move, but her arms hung by her sides, limp, and her legs, heavy now, straightened against her will in front of her. “What did you do?” she whispered.

“It’s only a temporary disabling switch,” he said. “You won’t feel any pain—in fact, you shouldn’t feel anything at all. And you won’t be tempted to run.”

He dug again, and Mattie cringed as she felt the contents of her head, the delicate gears, beveled and plain, grate against each other as Loharri’s fingers moved around. “Don’t let it bother you,” he said, and turned her chair to face the wall—a plain white wall with nothing interesting painted on it. He shifted more tumblers, and Mattie’s eyes emitted two light beams that met on the wall, creating two partially overlapping spotlights. She whined in fear.

“It’s all right,” he said. “It’s nifty, really—Bokker’s chemical captures images onto a rotating copper roll, and the same roll records the sound. And everything you see is written on it—it’s like your memory, but now I can see it, too.”

“How long has it been there?” Mattie whispered.

“Since you were last . . . broken,” he answered. “I’m not a fool, Mattie, and I notice things. I notice it when you lie, when Iolanda lies—she thinks she is so clever not to hide her feelings but make them sound like jokes. But now we will see what really happened.”

The light coming from her eyes blinded Mattie, but still she could see through the haze the vague shapes moving, the cobbles of the city streets jumping up and down in rhythm with her steps. Iolanda’s frizzed hair, her pitying look as she leaned closer, her face taking up most of Mattie’s vision. Niobe standing by the window, watching them, her arms crossed.

Sebastian’s face appeared, by turns kind and mocking—Mattie was surprised to see it so clearly now. His face leaning closer, his lips smiling . . . Then the image became dark, and Mattie recalled with embarrassment that her eyes were retracted then, blind, the rest of her oblivious to everything but the pleasure of Sebastian’s hands on her chest.

Loharri made a small sound, of surprise or annoyance, Mattie could not tell. He touched something in Mattie’s head, and the image blurred. Loharri swore through his teeth but fell silent when the pale face of the Soul-Smoker took up the entire wall and the shouts and whispers of the dead poured from his lips. And then there was darkness of the tunnels, the faces of the courtiers . . . Mattie’s voice asking about Iolanda.

“Interesting,” Loharri said. His face remained composed, but she could see the vein swelling on his mangled cheek. “I knew you were hiding something, but this, Mattie, this . . . I have to go now and talk to Bergen. You stay here and we will talk when I get back.”

He picked up his overcoat and put it on, his movements slow and measured. Mattie wanted to plead with him, to remind him that he loved her. But the ice in his eyes told her that he was beyond pleading and entreaties, that she was beyond forgiveness—perhaps, even beyond the consideration that one gives to the most insignificant creatures. She could even hope to live through this, because now she was even beyond vengeful dismantling.

He turned to leave, but stopped abruptly. “Oh, I almost forgot: I’ll need these to show to my peers.” His fingers, cold and accurate, prized her left eye out of her head, then her right. She cried out, but her only answer was the sound of the slamming door, the turn of a key, and a quick rattle of footfalls on the steps outside.

Mattie did not know how much time had passed. She had counted her heartbeats at first, but given up after two thousand. She wished she could see the sun, and if she tried hard enough she could imagine how it would look out of Loharri’s workshop window—large and molten, with a tang of copper, enclosed in the delicate cage of black rose branches, still like cast iron.

It was always so peaceful here, so quiet—Loharri had often said that he enjoyed the stillness of the air, the absence of sound, which made it easy to imagine that this house was the only place that existed, surrounded by an infinite bubble of luminous and empty space. And now Mattie realized that even if she screamed for help, her cries would be muffled by the dense hedge, and in any case, people were used to screams by now and hid and ran rather than rushed to help.

Something touched her lips—a wet, cold, and unpleasant touch tasting of blood and sulfur—and Mattie started. The familiar hissing reassured her; the homunculus clambered up her senseless form and now whispered in her ear, its voice indistinct and blurred by the gargling quality of its speech. “I can help,” it said. “Help?”

“Do you know which switch he has turned?” Mattie asked, her disgust for the creature tempered somewhat by hope.

“Yessss,” it hissed. “I see everything.”

“Can you turn it?”

The slurping sounds indicated the homunculus’s progress; there was a shifting of metal, and a sudden jolt shot through her arms and legs. She doubled over in pain, sending the homunculus splashing to the floor. “Are you all right?” she asked. “I’m sorry.”

“Yessss,” it said and burbled. “Would you like me to find you new eyes?”

“Yes please,” Mattie said. “You are a clever little fellow.”

“Of course,” it answered. “I am earth. I am stone.”

The homunculus slurped across the workshop floor, and even though Mattie could not see it she imagined the black blood trail it was leaving on its wake. She heard the sounds of rummaging, slow and laborious, and she thought that it took such a little thing an enormous effort to shift the pile of parts and rejected machines; the limitations of its size posed an almost comical contradiction to its grandiose claims, but Mattie was disinclined to find humor in anything just now. It was earth, or at the very least its essence. She wondered if the gnomi, the earth elementals, looked just like the homunculus; she wondered if it was somehow one of them, a creature that could move through solid stone with the same ease as she moved through the air. She discarded the thought as unlikely, and carefully stretched her arms and legs, awakening to life with tingling and electric jolts.

She felt around with her fingers; the layout of the workshop was familiar to her and after a few minutes investigating her immediate surroundings, she remembered how she used to navigate these rooms by touch. Often even touch was superfluous—after a day of darkness she developed new senses, which allowed her to feel when the walls were too close, and to circumvent the obstacles.

Mattie felt her way to the pile of parts and rooted through it, the shape of her eyes familiar to her—long cool cylinders with latches in the end that locked into her eye stalks. Her fingers felt gears, faces, metal plates, bits of armor, coils, valves, engine parts, and flywheels. She recognized them all and was momentarily delighted before discarding yet another disappointment.

The homunculus labored by her side, its quiet boiling and hissing always present. She imagined the mess they were making—strewn-about parts, some smeared with pungent sheep’s blood, and she felt a small pang of dark satisfaction. Let him clean up after her, for once. When he gets back, she would be gone, hidden, on her way to find Iolanda and to beg her to speed up Loharri’s binding. And to warn Sebastian, of course.

“Is this it?” the homunculus whispered and put something in her hands. She was used enough to him to not recoil at the touch of his hands, wet like a kiss.

She wrapped her fingers around a small heavy cylinder. “Yes, this is it. Thank you. Is there another one?”

“No,” the homunculus answered.

Mattie fitted the cylinder into its socket. It was an old eye, discarded years ago, and Mattie tried to accept the dullness of her vision, the gray shroud of dust that seemed to cling to everything. “No matter,” she said. “One is fine for now, but we better get moving.”

She gathered the creature into her skirt and smoothed the white petticoat underneath—she wanted to look at least somewhat presentable, not as a crazed one-eyed automaton smeared in sheep’s blood with her skirts bundled about her waist, exposing her long, metal legs.

“Go easssst,” the homunculus said, and nestled deeper into the hammock of Mattie’s skirt. “He won’t look for you there.”

“No,” Mattie said. “North. We have to see the Soul-Smoker and warn Sebastian.”

The homunculus gave no other advice and asked no more questions, and seemed to have fallen asleep, lulled by the sound of her steps.

We walk in small numbers; we can count ourselves now with what fingers a creature has on two hands and two feet. We don’t bother, unwilling (afraid) to dwell on our diminishment. Instead, we watch the city crumble. There is fighting, and it feels like it has been going on forever—or at least long enough for us to forget what the city used to look like, before the smoke and fire, before the growing ruins and gutted buildings, before the Grackle Pond was cluttered with scorched, mutilated metal and bits of steam engines and the gears of an automaton brain large enough to make decisions but too small to predict their consequences. We forget so quickly now, our memory so dependent on our numbers; the more of us do the remembering the better the memories are.

The lizards do not drag carts behind them anymore; a few of them have broken loose and stomp the streets in blind panic. Automatons are few and far in between, most of them smashed to pieces or sent away to the farms. The paper factory, as well as all other ones, has stopped, soon after the caravans of coal stopped coming through the city gates. The air has a different quality to it—woodsmoke and clay and stone instead of metal and burning coal; we are trying to decide whether it is an improvement.

We watch the enforcers, their buggies abandoned, their armor nowhere to be seen (too heavy to walk in) head toward the city gates. They cannot possibly hope to retake the farms or the mines; they lead a prisoner among them, and we realize that they want the Soul-Smoker—one always brings a decoy, a sacrifice on such outings. Or perhaps they want to bargain with the rebels and the man walking with his head low, his clothes soaked with the rain, is their bargaining chip. We cannot be sure, but we worry about the blind boy, all alone in his cabin.

The telegraphs all over the city chatter and thrash and spew forth endless ribbons of paper covered in messages no one reads—no one has to anymore. Soon they will run out of paper, and we imagine them straining and chittering, and punching the empty air with their beaks that will have run out of ink too. We wonder how long the water will keep flowing.

The markets are quiet now, and there is little left to buy besides last year’s corn and turnips. We see hollow-eyed women cowering—how fast they learned to move in quick dashes between the buildings!—and keeping close to the corners and houses. The merchants leave the centers of the markets free too, their stands leaning sparsely against the protective walls.

The children are gone, as if they had all disappeared overnight—we know it is not true, we know that some are locked inside and others were taken by their parents out of the city; yet others were sent away to relatives in other cities, where they could be children and carefree, while the adults wait out the awfulness that befell them. But it feels to us that they ran away, abandoning the city that disappointed them, and we try and imagine what it would be like, to run away forever, turning our ridged, winged backs on this city. We imagine the sounds of the sea and the smell of red, kind earth, the smells of different spices and the taste of unfamiliar rocks, made of limestone born by the sea and not the cruel hot compressions of the earth underneath. We contemplate joining the circus, like we imagine everyone does—idly, not seriously, but wistfully. There is such temptation, such forbidden joy in abandonment.

And then the rain starts falling, black rain tainted with soot; it weeps from the ledges and mourns in the gutters, it roars as it runs through the streets, like organ pipes, like a song. We look into each other’s faces and wipe away the black rain that weeps from our hardened eyes, leaving black tracks down our cheeks. And we are suddenly not sure whether it is the sky or us who is crying.

We look around us, and we mourn ourselves, we mourn the fact that even after the city and we are gone, the rock will remain. We mourn the ruined city, the unfinished construction, the demolished palace, the gutted houses. Even if it is right for it to be ruined, we can still feel sadness at its passing, can’t we? Can’t we? And the rain falls.

We watch a lone figure stagger through the streets, holding a parcel to its chest. We recognize our metal girl, our friend, and we creep closer. She does not look good with her one eye and her blood homunculus, which she cradles to her chest, protecting it from rain. The homunculus wails as if water hurts it. The girl lurches onward, determined and half-blind, but heading steadily north. We imagine her walking like that, broken but unbreakable, forever, the homunculus at her chest crying in its gurgling incessant whine.

We eye it with suspicion—we are not of blood and bone, we are not of plant magic, and yet we feel a strange kinship to the pathetic creature, so soft it is almost liquid. And yet somehow it smells of stone, of the gray-limned stone that bore us—when we close our eyes, we see its layers and hair-thin ridges, the minuscule inclusions of black granite and crystal-bright quartz. Somehow, the creature is related to us, and we don’t know if it is good or bad, but we try to like it, as one would an obnoxious relative.

And the girl herself is not well—we can see it in her staggering, lurching step, in the dull green (where is the iridescent blue of a dragonfly’s wings?) glow of her single eye that reflects only the rain back at us.

She sees us only when descend into the street and stand like a wall in front of her, a wall of sour gray bodies streaked with black.

“I know how to help you,” she whispers.

“Shhh,” we answer. “It can wait.” (It cannot.) “Let us take care of you first. Where are you going?”

“The Soul-Smoker,” she answers.

We tell her about the soldiers.

Her fingers tighten on the soaked fabric of her skirt, and she cradles the bundle with the homunculus—a monstrous child—closer to her metal bosom. “We have to hurry then. Do you know a quick way there?”

We nod, and we pick her and her bundle up, we gather her into a protective embrace and cradle her close. She falls silent, so tired now.

And then we fly.