Ekaterina Sedia - The Alchemy of Stone

Mattie looked at him askance. He seemed so alien—always coming and going at odd hours, seemingly untouchable by either the enforcers or mechanics. He was like a gargoyle, hidden, having the gift of making himself invisible—a natural gift, Mattie thought. “Your name was on the list,” she said.

“What list?” He seemed momentarily disoriented by the change of topic but smiled. “What are you talking about, Mattie?”

“Your mechanic medallion was reported missing,” Mattie said. “I saw the list.”

“So? I’m sure there were plenty of others.”

“Yes.” Mattie paused. “Don’t you want to know why we had the list?”

He forced a smile. “Why, Mattie?”

“Because only the mechanics can legally order explosives from the alchemists,” she said. “We suspect that maybe there was a stolen medallion involved.”

Sebastian shrugged. “I wouldn’t know anything about it, Mattie. Ask the gargoyles—they saw me every day; they know I wasn’t involved in anything, no matter who the mechanics want to blame.”

“The gargoyles complain that their feeders are empty.”

“I’m sure the monks will find someone,” Sebastian said, his face coloring with a dark blush. “If they haven’t already.”

“Maybe.” Mattie studied him—she did not suspect him, not really. But there were questions that gnawed at the edges of her thoughts, leaving a latticed pattern of doubt and confusion. And she could not forget that he was a mechanic who knew something of alchemy—and who could say how much he picked up from his mother? Maybe the mechanics kept perfecting their art, making more and more complex things every day, but explosives had been made the same way for centuries. The alchemists enjoyed tradition and camaraderie more than efficiency; Niobe was right about that.

“So what, you gonna start suspecting me now?” Sebastian said. His years spent at playing simpleton with a bucketful of gravel had left their mark in his speech—she noticed it more when he got defensive, retreating into a pretense of simple-mindedness when questioned or confronted.

Mattie shook her head. “I would never suspect you, Sebastian.”

He smiled, still uncertainly. “And why is that?”

She saw no point in pretending—her mask was a part of her, her real face, her clean boyish features. “Niobe thinks I love you,” she said.

Sebastian stopped smiling and looked away. She made him awkward, Mattie realized—everyone felt awkward when they had to say no to someone who’d been kind to them. And occasionally, just out of gratitude, they said yes. “I’m flattered,” he said. “But even people could be mistaken about such things—why, you barely know me.”

“Barely.”

He coughed and got off the chair with an air of determination. There was nowhere to go so he just paced the length of the kitchen—three steps to the door, three back. “Have you seen the new contraption the mechanics are building?” he asked after a bit of frantic pacing.

“No,” Mattie said.

“They’re building it by the pond, not too far from the park. You really should see it—it is fascinating. They call it the Calculator.”

“Oh,” Mattie said. “Loharri mentioned it before—it’s the machine that is supposed to figure out the answers and find those responsible for the bombings, and help us figure out how to run and defend this city.”

“Yes,” Sebastian said. “My, you know a lot of things before they become public knowledge, don’t you?”

Mattie nodded. “Loharri doesn’t keep secrets from me. And the mechanics always talk freely when I’m about—I don’t think they take me seriously at all.”

“It’s their loss,” Sebastian said. “Trust me on this. Will you go see it?”

“Why do you want me to?”

“I thought you would like to meet another very smart machine,” he said.

Mattie shook her head. “It is not smart. It just analyzes— anyone could do that.”

“Why don’t they?”

“Because they don’t know all of the parameters,” Mattie said. “And the same is true for this machine—it doesn’t know everything, and it is unable to decide what’s important.”

She went to see the Calculator anyway. She saw it from afar—its smokestack rose over the trees of the park, gray and white, occasionally colored with the yellows of sulfurous fumes. The machine itself disappointed her—Mattie never dared to think it in such words but she expected an intelligent automaton that looked like her. Instead, it was a gigantic contraption, clanging with metal pistons and spewing steam from multiple pipes and openings covered with grating. It was like an angry house that was hissing and spitting at Mattie, and she did not know why it was so upset.

There were several engineers tinkering with one of the many square modules at the Calculator’s side. Loharri was among them, and Mattie’s instinct was to turn away and run home before he noticed her. She turned and hurried toward the safety of the street, where she would be hidden from his eyes by the buildings and the brightly colored but still-subdued crowd. The absence of dark faces was noticeable to Mattie, and she moved uneasily through the crowd, so homogeneous that Mattie stood out like a red roof in the gargoyles’ district.

“Mattie!”

She turned with ready moan of exasperation, to see Loharri running after her.

“Wait!” He slowed to a somewhat more dignified walk and weaved through the crowd, long and sinuous like an eel. “You don’t have to run every time you see me and make me chase you through the streets. It doesn’t look proper.”

Mattie shrugged. “I wasn’t running. I just didn’t like your Calculator.”

He grinned, briefly flashing his very white teeth. “Please don’t tell me you’re jealous.”

“Of course I’m not.” Mattie shifted on her feet, uncomfortable, all the while studying his face for any subtle change induced by Niobe’s alchemy. “I just think it is loud and dirty.”

He laughed, and bowed with an exaggerated flourish. “You, of course, are much prettier.”

Mattie huffed. “Has it occurred to you that being pretty might not be the height of my ambition?”

“Yes.” He smiled still. “It worries me quite a bit, actually. You were made to be pleasing to the eye and interesting to converse with, not to run off and take up a trade which frankly isn’t that different from the nonsense the Stone Monks ply.”

“Why do you hate them so much?”

He shrugged. “They are not rational, my dear girl.” That was his standard explanation for any dislike of others he had ever exhibited. “So all right, the gargoyles grew the city. It was awfully nice of them, but I don’t see why we’re supposed to worship them.”

“Not worship,” Mattie said. “Feed them and help them when they need it. And maybe listen to what they have to say.

“Sure. This is why we have the monks in the first place, for feeding and helping. And now, apparently, you’ve joined the ranks of the helpers and listeners. Why would they need the rest of us?”

Neither of them mentioned the trade in children, the horrible deformed creatures, colloquially known as spiders for their short, round bodies and long, thin limbs, the pitiful terrors that emerged from the mine shafts every night. Honestly, Mattie was glad she did not have to see them—the stories were enough.

Mattie watched the traffic, now mostly caterpillars and just a few lizards, flow by with its usual hissing and groaning and metal clanking against stone. This is what this city is about, she thought. The metal against stone, the constant struggle, and the mechanics against the alchemists. Only now there was no doubt as to who had won—the mechanics had the upper hand; it was their city now.