“I’m afraid he’s in Firenze for the week. Business with the Order.”
“In that case, may I present Signorina Elsunani di Jumi da Veldana. Elsa, this is Signora Gioconda Pisano, headmistress of Casa della Pazzia.” Elsa gave her a nod, and de Vries added, “I do wish Filippo were in town. I’m afraid it’s a matter of some concern for the Order.”
Signora Pisano folded her hands together. “Yes, I had supposed so, on account of your sudden arrival. Shall we go to my office?”
“One moment.” De Vries turned to Elsa, switching back to Dutch. “How are you doing with the Italian?”
“Listening is easy. I imagine it will feel strange on my tongue for a while, though.” She watched Signora Pisano’s face, registering the incomprehension there. Good—they could speak privately then. “I have an odd feeling about this place. Are you certain we can trust these people?”
“I would trust them with my life,” he said gravely.
“Well, that’s good,” Elsa sniped. “Since that’s precisely what you’re expecting me to do.”
De Vries gave her a look of mild reproof. “Patience, my dear. I promise—”
“Watch out!” someone shouted in Italian from above, startling everyone, including Signora Pisano. Elsa looked up to see a young man with a rapier in his hand leaning over the balcony railing. “It’s coming this way!”
He vaulted over the railing and Elsa sucked in a breath, thinking he was falling to his death, but he landed light as a cat on his feet. The boy looked up, and for a second their gazes locked. He was a study in brass—tawny eyes and olive skin, blond hair grown long enough he had to shake it away to see her clearly. Elsa felt heat rise in her cheeks.
“Leo, really!” Signora Pisano scolded in a tone that implied shock at his manners more than fear for his safety.
He broke eye contact with Elsa and turned his head to respond, but a loud buzzing noise began to emanate from the wall beneath the balcony, and a cloud of plaster dust started billowing into the foyer. Leo spun around, lifting his rapier to a ready position. Elsa found herself yet again covering her nose and mouth with her sleeve. A large section of wall detached from the rest and collapsed into the foyer with a crash, and through the cloud of plaster dust a two-meter-tall shadow was visible.
The imposing shape stepped forward—No, Elsa thought, squinting through the dust, not step so much as roll. Though Leo held his rapier as if waiting for an opponent to advance, the thing he faced was machine, not man, and it had treads instead of feet.
Leo stepped forward to meet the metal monster, and as the plaster dust began to settle, Elsa’s view of it improved. A round saw blade whirred at the end of one of its six limbs, and two more brandished rapiers. The other arms terminated with a flamethrower, a mallet, and an enormous crablike pincer.
“Terribly sorry,” said Leo, though his ear-to-ear grin did not give Elsa the impression of remorse. He whipped his rapier through the air, parrying and lunging. “I’m afraid I’ve improved the training bot rather too much.”
Elsa didn’t know much about swordplay, but the fact that the boy was still in one piece seemed a fair indication of his competence. Even so, flamethrowers and saws hardly made for a fair fight. Elsa drew the revolver from its holster and cocked back the hammer.
The bot had a head, but without a closer look it was impossible to know if anything important was located there besides the optics. Instead, she aimed for an exposed tube underneath one arm and fired. The tube burst open, spilling thick red-brown fluid down the side of the bot. The bot’s movements became slow and jerky, and after a few seconds its limbs sagged and went still.
“You shredded the hydraulics!” Leo said. “That’ll take hours to replace.” He gave her an annoyed look, which did nothing to lessen the perfect angles of his features.
Instead of answering, Elsa busied herself with tucking the gun away in its holster. The whole situation was so strange, she was unsure whether she would actually be expected to apologize for stopping the rampaging machine. She leaned closer to de Vries and muttered in Dutch, “Yes, I feel very safe here already.”
Signora Pisano was pinching the bridge of her nose between thumb and forefinger. “Why, pray tell, would you add a radial saw to a training bot?”
Leo shrugged and sheathed the rapier, then slipped his hand out of the intricate metalwork of the guard. “It seemed like the thing to do at the time.”
Signora Pisano took a closer look at the training bot. “How many times do I have to tell you, Leo? No flamethrowers in the house!”
“It’s only a small one,” he protested.
“You,” she said, pointing a finger close to his nose, “I will deal with later.” Then she looked away from Leo. “Casa?”
A disembodied voice echoed through the foyer, making Elsa jump. “Yes, signora?” The voice was deep and resonant, but with a somewhat feminine softness around the edges.
“We’re ready for repairs here.”
“Very well, signora.”
A small army of clockwork bots hurried in, ambling single file like ducklings. Elsa stood still, frozen by amazement. Some of them were tall and narrow with long brass limbs, some were barely knee-height, with a dozen different tools sticking out in all directions. One squat little bot cleaned the floor with round, rotating scrub brushes as it moved along. Elsa felt a sudden longing to grab it and take it apart to find out how it worked—her fingers itched for the feel of its delicate gears.
“Elsa … Elsa!” De Vries had his hand on her shoulder.
She shook her head to clear it and blinked up at him. “Yes?”
“There will be time to examine the bots later.”
“Right … of course,” she answered slowly.
“Come along,” said Signora Pisano, “let’s find somewhere we won’t be disturbed again.” At this she cast a scalding look at Leo, then led Elsa and de Vries out of the ruined foyer.
Signora Pisano’s office was comfortably small compared to the grandiose vastness of the foyer, with wall-mounted gaslamps bringing out the warm tones of the wood paneling. Her shelves displayed mechanical baubles and trinkets instead of books. Signora Pisano sat behind her polished-wood desk while Elsa and de Vries took up the comfortable armchairs placed in front of it for guests.
When de Vries finished relating all that had happened, Signora Pisano leaned back in her chair and said, “That’s quite a story. You’re right, Alek, the Order will need to hear of this at once.”
“Naturally,” said de Vries. “I felt it was essential to secure protection for Elsa first, though.”
“Yes, yes.” Signora Pisano nodded thoughtfully. “I must say, Elsa, given your parentage, I would have thought scriptology would be your calling, not mechanics.”
“Well, I do scribe, of course,” said Elsa politely. “My mother taught me when I was little. We’re not exactly living in the steam age in Veldana, though, so I’m afraid I don’t know much about mechanics.”