Steven Harper - The Havoc Machine

“What about anyone from a nearby village? Is anyone else missing a child?”

More murmuring. “No, my lord,” said Vilma.

“Then we should go look for his parents,” Thad declared. “Ada. Farewell!”

And, ignoring their pleas to stay, he spurred Blackie ahead. Sofiya was left with no choice but to follow.

“I wonder how long it will take for this to evolve into a fairy tale,” Sofiya mused once they had cleared the village. “A variation of Hansel and Gretel, perhaps.”

“Or the Pied Piper,” Thad said.

“What?”

But Thad didn’t answer. Sofiya rode beside him, Dante gripped his shoulder, and the boy clung to his waist behind him. It felt strange to be surrounded by so many people after spending so many years alone. Even in the circus he held himself apart from the other performers. The sun had fully risen now, and he caught a hint of salt on the crisp air, though the Baltic Sea was many miles to the northwest. Now that he wasn’t actually in danger, the long night and his aches were catching up with him, and he fervently wished there were some way around the long ride back to Vilnius.

“Your horse is amazing, lady,” said the boy after a while. “He’s very pretty and I like the way his mane stands up. Like a warrior. What is his name?”

“It has none,” Sofiya said. “It is a machine.”

“Everyone has to have a name,” the boy said. He sounded upset. “Even a machine.”

“Perhaps you could give him a name.”

“Kalvis.”

“The blacksmith god of the Lithuanians,” Sofiya said. “Fitting.”

“Because he was made by a blacksmith,” the boy finished. “What’s your horse’s name, sir?”

“Uh…Blackie.”

“That’s dumb.”

“Now look-” Thad began.

“I’m hungry,” said the boy.

Feeling guilty, Thad pulled the loaf of rye bread from his coat. He should have realized. “Here.”

But the boy pushed it away. “Na, na. I can’t eat that. You have to give me something else.”

“There isn’t anything else,” Thad said, annoyed again. He pulled the vodka jug from his pocket. It sloshed. “Except this. But you’re bit young for-”

The boy snatched the jug from Thad’s startled hand, raised it to his mouth, and pulled his scarf down. Over his shoulder, Thad caught a glimpse of metal as the boy drank. Thad was off the horse so fast, Dante nearly lost his balance.

“Applesauce,” he squawked with indignation.

“What the hell?” Thad demanded.

The boy clutched the empty jug to his chest. The scarf that covered his face and hair slipped, revealing brass. Thad reached up and yanked the cloth away.

The boy was an automaton. The lower part of his face was metallic, with a square jaw that fitted neatly against a brass upper lip. A brass hinge was fitted neatly under a rubbery ear. The boy’s nose was a smooth bump complete with nostrils, though it was made of copper and didn’t match the rest of him. The upper half of his face was made of some flexible material. Rubber, perhaps. Eyelids blinked with quiet clicking sounds, and they even had tiny eyelashes. His eyes were wide and brown, but not glassy. Were they rubber as well? The boy’s forehead and the area around his eyes moved with easy fluidity and realism. In fact, the boy’s entire body moved with none of the stiffness Thad associated with other automatons, and his voice sounded pure and human, without the usual mechanical monotony or odd echo. His short brown hair even had a silky sheen. It probably was silk. Thad stared in shock.

“Dear God,” he said.

“Bless my-” Dante’s words were cut off when Thad grabbed his beak.

“This explains much,” Sofiya said. “The boy remembers nothing because he no memories. He uses alcohol as fuel. Havoc experimented on living adults but this was his first-”

“Shut it,” Thad snapped. “Just shut it!”

“Why?” Sofiya’s voice was deceptively mild. “Did someone give you the right to hand me orders? Are you my good Polish husband now?”

Thad wanted to round on her, snarl at her, but kept himself under control. Sofiya was a woman, and telling her to shut up was already a serious breach of etiquette, something his father would have bent him over one knee for when he was a child. And why was he worried about that now? He didn’t care what Sofiya thought. He made himself look up at Blackie and the thing in the saddle.

A child. This automaton had fooled Thad into thinking it was a real child. He felt like he’d been kicked in the head and his stomach oozed nausea. His skin crawled. The boy was the product of a clockworker, and who knew what it might do? It had been riding behind him for miles now.

“Thank you for taking me out of there.”

But he was just a little boy. And he sounded like-

“No,” Thad whispered.

“This boy is a masterpiece,” Sofiya went on. “So lifelike. I am impressed. Havoc was much better than I imagined.”

“Get off my horse,” Thad said to the boy. “Now.”

The boy shrank down inside the rags. “Are you going to hurt me?” he-it-asked in a tiny voice.

Thad was shaking. This…thing was the product of a murderous lunatic, the same sort of lunatic who had tortured his son to death. Thad didn’t rescue such monstrosities; he destroyed them. This abomination should be melted down.

But when he looked at those eyes and at the way he- it, Thad reminded himself fiercely-the way it huddled on the horse, frightened and alone…

It’s not frightened, Thad snarled inwardly. It’s only mimicking fright because its memory wheels are pulling wires and pushing pistons.

A sword threatened to divide Thad down the middle and he didn’t dare move in case it cut him.

I love you, Daddy.

“What are you going to do?” Sofiya asked. “Are you going to hurt him?”

Hurt him.

The sword shifted imperceptibly, changing his balance like the weight of the vodka bottle pulling him back from the pit.

“I’ll have to decide later,” Thad said in a stony voice. “Get off my horse. You can ride with Miss Ekk back to Vilnius.”

“Ha!” said Sofiya with a snort. “You rescued him. He rides with you.” And she turned her brass horse toward the road to make it clear there was no arguing.

Thad set his jaw, then mounted Blackie ahead of the boy, who still cringed away. “Put your scarf back on, boy.”

Blackie was tired, and the ride back went slower. No one spoke. Sofiya’s face remained pale. The boy held onto the back of the saddle instead of Thad’s waist, and Thad tried to pretend he wasn’t there. When they reached the outskirts of Vilnius, Thad started to turn toward the circus, but Sofiya pulled up short.

“No,” she said. “We must see our employer and explain to him what happened, though I am sure he already knows.”

“He does?” Thad raised an eyebrow. “Then perhaps we should take a nice stroll by the river together first.”

“Sounds wonderful.”

“Or get some breakfast.”

“Equally appealing.”

“But we won’t.”

“No.”

“Because?”

“We are dancing, Mr. Sharpe. He is waiting for us to come and tell him, even though he knows the truth, because he is waiting to see how much truth we tell him. And we must pretend he doesn’t know, and he will act as if he is unaware we are pretending he doesn’t know. Steps within steps, dances within dances, Mr. Sharpe. He likes it that way. In any case, I see no reason for me alone to bring him the bad news when it was your fault.”

“My fault?” Thad shot back. “I didn’t set off the explosive device that destroyed the castle.”