A Clockwork Fairytale (10 page)

Metal grated on the other side of the door as the bolts were drawn back. With a creak of hinges, the door cracked open and a dirty face with a bent nose and two missing teeth appeared in the gap. Vittorio winced and prayed to the Great Earth Jinn that this was
not
the princess he intended to marry. He threw his weight against the door and barged into the unlit room. The ragamuffin cried out and stumbled back to huddle with two others in a doorway. One of them had to be Princess Melbaline.

Vittorio grabbed the nearest by the scruff and went to the adjoining storeroom where a lone candle burned on a small scarred table among stacks of boxes and heaps of sacks. He thrust the tyke’s face close to the glow, only to release him the moment he noticed his dark hair. The princess had been blonde like her mother. He lunged and grabbed the other two, lifting them off the ground, one in each hand. They were so light he could have shaken them and broken their necks as a terrier kills rats. The one who’d answered the door was also dark haired so he shoved him away and concentrated on dragging the third close to the candle. This boy had more spirit, kicking and cursing him. From the voice, Vittorio was nearly certain he held a boy, and a quick scan of the tyke’s face confirmed this wasn’t the princess either.

“Where’s the other one?” Vittorio demanded, slipping his dagger from his wrist sheath and brandishing it to encourage honesty. He knew she’d survived childhood because he’d had his spies watching her.

“Mel’s gone,” the feisty boy shouted. Then he called Maddox. Vittorio let him shout for his master. If Melbaline wasn’t here, the old baker had some questions to answer.

Vittorio strode back to the main shop. When the boys tried to follow, he shoved them in the storeroom and jammed a metal spoon through the door handle to lock them in. If he had to release the Foul Jinn to torment Maddox, there was no point in frightening the people in the third circle by killing the boys as well. The lads had seen his face, but he’d used a glamour so they would not recognize him again. He rested a hip against the bakery counter and braced a hand on the wooden surface, waiting for the wheezing old man to stumble down the steps at the back of the shop. Squinting, Maddox appeared and raised a flickering oil lamp.

“Good evening to you, baker. Do you remember me?” Vittorio asked.

“Great Earth Jinn, save me!” Maddox’s eyes widened and he recoiled, bumping a flour barrel and raising a cloud of dust.

“I’ve come for the girl.”

“She ain’t here no more. She ain’t here. You must go.”

Vittorio’s anger spiked. She’d been here the last time his spies had checked two months ago. Why did she have to disappear just when he needed her? The king would soon return to the Earth and Vittorio must be ready to claim his inheritance. “Where is she?”

“Don’t rightly know, sir.” The oil lamp in the old man’s hand trembled, sending shadows jumping around the walls. “I packed her off with a message one night and she ain’t never come back.”

Vittorio didn’t believe a word of it. He stalked up beside Maddox and pressed the dagger above the man’s jumping Adam’s apple. “Have you forgotten my threat, old man? I have a Foul Jinn in my pocket, or maybe you’d prefer to taste my blade.”

Maddox cringed like a woman. Vittorio snatched the lamp from his hand and set it down to keep him from dropping it and incinerating the bakery and half the third circle. “Speak up, man, or I’ll make you talk.”

“She ain’t here,” Maddox whimpered.

“I’m in full possession of my senses, baker. Do not state the obvious. Where is she?”

“I can’t tell you, sir. I can’t tell you.”

Vittorio couldn’t believe his ears. He had a blade pressed against Maddox’s throat and the blighter refused to answer. There was only one explanation: someone else had put the frighteners on him. “Defy me, Maddox, and I will hurt you more grievously than the other man who’s threatened you. Now answer my question.”

“He’ll know, sir. He made me pledge to him.”

Fear and anger sparked along Vittorio’s nerves. Had someone else identified Princess Melbaline and decided to marry her to gain the throne? Vittorio bundled the baker into a straight-backed chair, ripped the stained neck cloth from the man’s throat, and used it to tie his hands behind his back.

He kicked the chair leg and the old man cried out. “Tell me who has the girl,” Vittorio demanded.

Maddox screwed his eyes closed and his wrinkled face collapsed in on itself like a crumpled glove. “He’s a spymaster, sir.”

“A spymaster! Does this blaggard have a name?”

Maddox squirmed and groaned as though he were in pain. “Master Turk, sir.”

“Turk!” Vittorio paced, flexing his fingers on the handle of his dagger. Master Turk had sprung from nowhere a few years ago. Nowadays his name was on everyone’s lips. Spymaster Turk had risen to prominence quickly. He must be ambitious. Until now, Vittorio had not had a reason to cross swords with Master Turk. That had just changed.

He crouched in front of Maddox and stared up into his terrified face. “What does Turk want with the girl?”

Maddox stared at his lap. “Don’t rightly know, sir.”

Vittorio flipped his dagger and jabbed the tip into the old man’s thigh.

“Aww, please, sir. As the Great Earth Jinn is me witness, ’tis honest I’m being.”

Pulling back his dagger, Vittorio sprang to his feet. The old man didn’t know anything or he’d have blabbed.

“Where’s the pledge Master Turk gave you?”

“In me left trouser pocket, sir.”

Vittorio eyed the man’s stained breeches with disgust, hesitating for a heartbeat before he plunged his hand in the pocket and pulled out a smooth round stone. He held it up to the lamp. Tiny points of light danced across the stone’s surface while a hint of color shimmered through the crystalline layers. He hadn’t seen a starlight stone since his days with the Shining Brotherhood.

He pressed the stone to the skin between his eyebrows and sensed its spirit had been activated to form a tiny Jinn. Whoever Master Turk was, he must have magical power. Had the spymaster already sensed Maddox’s distress through the pledge stone? Was he on his way here?

“What does Master Turk look like?” he demanded.

Maddox screwed up his face in concentration. “Tall and dark haired.”

“That describes half the population of the Island, man,” Vittorio retorted.

“I can’t remember,” Maddox whined.

Master Turk must have used a glamour to disguise himself from Maddox. It was time to draw this spymaster out and make him reveal himself.

Vittorio fished out a small box from his pocket. He took out the metal beetle containing the Foul Jinn and chipped the ice off it with his thumbnail. There was a slim chance the old man had seen through his glamour and could identify him, especially as his face would soon be on every coin of the realm. And what better way to catch a magical spymaster than to bait the trap with a Foul Jinn.

Maddox’s eyes fixed on the smoky emanations coming from the mechanical beetle and his face set rigid with terror. “No, sir, please, sir. I never gave the girl up. Master Turk took her.”

“I warned you what would happen if you didn’t take care of her, baker.”

“I did me best,” he choked out. “Honest I did.”

Vittorio placed the beetle on the flagstones at his feet and with his mind activated the Foul Jinn it contained. He didn’t bother to instruct it where to go; he simply let it find its own way to its victim. The tortured Jinn set off running around in circles, the clicking of its tiny metal feet loud in the nighttime silence. Like the numbskull he was, Maddox screamed, attracting the Jinn with his fear. The beetle homed in on the baker, climbed onto his unlaced boot, and ran up his trouser leg. Maddox shook his leg to dislodge it but the mechanoid’s rough feet were designed to climb and it scuttled on up the old man’s shirt front.

“No, sir, please, sir. Get it off me. I won’t talk to no one. I promise.” Maddox babbled with fear. As the beetle reached his neck and crept across his cheek, Maddox clamped his mouth shut and closed his eyes, but the beetle burrowed between his lips into his mouth. Maddox coughed and choked as it went down his throat.

Maddox’s eyes rolled back in his head and he slumped forward in his chair, his muscles twitching as the Foul Jinn spread from the beetle to invade his body. Maddox wouldn’t remember his own name soon, let alone Vittorio’s face.

With a smile, Vittorio scraped the edge of his knife against Maddox’s cheek to gather some of the wispy noxious emanations from the Jinn and spread them over the metal box in which he’d carried the beetle. He set the box down on the counter beside the oil lamp. If Master Turk came himself and was careless enough to make contact with the Jinn’s residue, it would make him sick and weaken his power.

Vittorio dug inside his coat and checked his pocket watch. He would like to wait for Master Turk himself, but he could not risk being seen anywhere near the place now that he’d released the Foul Jinn. He would post men to watch the bakery and to follow Master Turk home. Once he discovered where the spymaster lived, the princess would be his.

Chapter Seven

A man cannot use both his heart and his brain at the same time
.

—Gregorio, Primate of the Shining Brotherhood

Turk kneeled before the Primate of the Shining Brotherhood to have his memory read. His master had forgiven him for arriving late at his chamber, but Turk could not relax. He was worried Gregorio would reprimand him for fastening Melba’s dress. Gregorio’s cool fingers grazed Turk’s temples and the familiar dreamy daze clouded his mind.

“Great Earth Jinn!” Gregorio’s sudden exclamation jolted Turk out of his pleasant haze. He opened his eyes in time to see his master’s hand draw back. Gregorio struck him across the face with a resounding smack, snapping his head aside with the force of the blow. Turk overbalanced, catching himself with a hand on the hearth. Ears ringing and cheek burning, he turned shocked eyes back to his master.

“I trusted you!” Gregorio shouted. “I told you not to let the girl bend you to her will.”

Turk’s chest constricted with mortification. In the fourteen years he’d been pledged, this was the first time Gregorio had hit him.

“I did not break my vows, Master. I will never break my vows.” Turk thought of Gregorio more as a father than a master. He would not betray the man’s trust no matter what the provocation.

Gregorio’s blue gaze sharpened with accusation. “I’ve read your memories, boy. I know what happened. You promised me you would not touch the girl.”

“I didn’t touch her improperly. I only fastened her dress and engaged in a few moments of frivolity.”

“Frivolity is the thin end of the wedge that a woman drives between a man and his good sense. Females appear harmless but they have the power to rouse the base instincts and tempt you into wrongdoing. It only takes a few minutes for a good man to fall, and the consequences can be out of all proportion to the crime. I’ll find a woman to finish teaching Princess Melbaline the finer points of gentle behavior. You stay away from her, boy, lest you jeopardize our plans.”

“Yes, Master.” Turk hung his head, his heart aching to have disappointed his master so badly.

“Now get out of my sight,” Gregorio snapped.

Turk scrambled to his feet and grabbed his boots from the hearth before stumbling out the door. He walked to the end of the covered balcony and pressed his back to the wall. Now he had time to think, angry confusion burned in his chest. His face still stung from the slap he’d received—and for what. He’d been foolish to fasten Melba’s dress, but he hadn’t broken any vows or even come close to breaking them. He deserved a few words of reprimand, but surely not a slap. He had performed his duty to the best of his ability, and he had expected his master to be pleased with Melba’s progress. Why had Gregorio been so angry?

Turk hauled in a catchy breath, wishing he could see inside his master’s head to understand his reasoning. Now he would have to distance himself from Melba so he did not upset Gregorio again.

Gathering his wits, Turk leaped onto the adjoining roof and made his way back toward the inner circle, his spirits low.

The fetid stink of burning wood mixed with rotten fish drifted to him. He stopped and glanced around. It was years since he’d smelled that odor during his lessons at the seminary, but he would recognize the stink of a Foul Jinn anywhere. It took him a few seconds to realize he was sensing the smell inside his head rather than with his nose. For him to sense it so strongly, it must be attacking someone who held one of his pledge stones. His thoughts jumped to Melba, but she would be safe because Waterberry House was warded against Foul Jinns.

The most likely target was Maddox. The bluejacket who’d delivered Melba to the baker had threatened the man with a Foul Jinn. Was it possible the sailor had returned for the princess to find her gone?

All thought of Gregorio left his mind. Turk sprinted to the bunkhouse in the second circle where his pledged boys lived. He needed another set of eyes and fists, and the most able he knew belonged to his head lad. Steptoe was the only other member of the Shining Brotherhood to work as a spy. He had been Turk’s best friend since his first day in the seminary and was pledged to Brother Carlos, Gregorio’s personal secretary.