Mechanized Masterpieces: A Steampunk Anthology (2 page)

We lingered, just we two, in the
Andromeda
cockpit. Yvette sat in the captain’s chair, fiddling with the knobs arrayed on the consoles before her. I knelt beside her, drinking in her lovely, grief-stricken face.

“I dread your departure, Edward,” she murmured softly. “I fear you will plunge into darkness and never escape. I cannot . . . It must not be so.”

“I told Father one year, Yvette. I go to make my fortune—
our
future. All of this is a means to an end—a bridge to my heart’s one desire. Tell me you—”

Her fingers on my lips silenced my tongue. Her looks forbade my speech. She held my gaze, her eyes swimming in tears.

She took my hand and held it. She turned the ring upon my finger. She had woven it of her own silken tresses. It shone like pure gold. “Promise me you will never remove this ring. No matter what else happens. Give me your sacred honor.”

I searched her features, unsettled by the desperation which laced her tone. “Never. I promise.”

“And yet, it is not enough,” she murmured. A look of firm resolve added complexity to the sadness and loss upon her face. Then, warm stone and cold metal settled into my hand. I raised into the air Yvette’s prize crystal hanging from a silver chain. The sunlight refracted through the stone and projected upon the bulkhead an image of the
Andromeda
herself, ablaze in rainbow colors.

 “I had it done. A crystal from your workshop could serve, but this stone . . . you need it for protection.”

More than a mere line etching, a master craftsman had carved a relief of our airship onto the stone in minute detail. Deep in the recesses of my mind whispered the certainty that Yvette had employed forces I would never understand to accomplish what, I dared not speculate.

Yvette loosened my collar, clasped the chain about my neck, then tucked the crystal beneath my shirt. Her hand rested upon my bare chest as she whispered her instructions. “It must rest here, next to your heart, touching your skin.”

I riveted my eyes on her, willing her to meet my gaze. She busied herself in setting my attire to rights, yet would not look into my face. Her lips whispered some silent invocation I could not hear. Then, she gave her final instructions. “Use this to remember me. A token of my . . . friendship. To keep you afloat. To light your way home.”

I took up her hand and held it to my cheek. “I shall never remove it.”

Tears again welled in her eyes. “See that you don’t.”

“Edward! What the devil are you about?” Herr Rottstieger’s intrusion brought me to my feet, and one glance at the lady’s ducked head caused him to hesitate.

He harrumphed to clear his throat. “Well, then,
mein junge
. We must weigh anchor tout suite.”

Yvette rose and stepped to the hatch. I moved to follow her. “Just as soon as I see Miss Fairfax home.”

Yvette wheeled on me. “No, Edward. No. I have Rowland.”

“Yvette—”

“Please, Edward,” she breathed. “Let us part here as we are, the best of friends.”

My whole being revolted at the notion of such a cold parting. I would take her in my arms and bespeak my heart. I would profess my undying devotion, secure her to me. But I knew she meant to avoid such a scene. I could not discomfit her.

“The best of friends,” I repeated, forcing a smile. She extended to me her hand, but I leaned and kissed her cheek.

“Remember your promise,” she whispered, and then was gone.

At Spanish Town, Rochester coin opened the doors of the colony’s finest families. Naturally taciturn and unsocial, I found answering the demands of society a most onerous duty, but I got on by degrees. I dare say, I became good at it . . . at least, I gained confidence. I became, so it was said, the most popular young blade on the island.

 Every now and again, Miss Bertha Mason—for such was the beauty on the balcony—would flit across the social stage, but remained otherwise elusive. I scarcely knew her.

Even so, she wormed her way into my consciousness. She battled with Yvette for my dreams. In them, the breeze which caressed the nymph’s soft skin with silken tresses, which flirted with her robe and offered teasing, tantalizing glimpses of a round of breast, a length of thigh, also wafted jasmine around me. It encircled and enfolded me until I awoke in a sweat, the scent still palpable in the air.

But then, the crystal would again cool my skin, and the fever which fought to control me receded at its touch. The clouds lifted, my mind cleared, and dreams of Yvette, fresh and clean and pure, would fill my mind. It felt a brisk early morning after a suffocating, sticky, and stultifying tropical night.

My father’s plans progressed apace. Within three months, I shared ownership with him and fully managed West End, a cane plantation at Negil, on the westernmost extent of the island. Within six, I had completed the initial phase of our planned rum distillery. Within nine, I had established myself as a member of the West Indies elite. Investors lined up to underwrite our airship manufactory. The sunlight dynamo in both distillery and sugar mill proved an unqualified success.

I wrote to my father and begged Yvette’s hand.

At the end of a year, I had done with waiting. My father’s silence on the subject and Yvette’s failure to write caused me no small amount of concern. I would attend Herr Professor on a three-month publicity tour of the East Coast of the United States, and from there, we would go to London. I would return with my bride.

Twenty hours and counting. I itched to be gone, but last-minute business at the governor’s mansion detained me. There, an acid etching illustrating a newspaper article on the notice board caught my attention.

I burst into the offices high in Hangar One and slapped the yellowed clipping onto the desk in front of Herr Rottstieger. “Look at it! Just look at it! Tacked up with the notices in the lobby like some tawdry bit of gossip!”

Lately, All Souls Church, Langham Place, London: Mister Rowland Fairfax Rochester, son of Rupert R. and the late Camilla Fairfax Rochester of Thornfield Hall, —shire, wed to heiress and society beacon, Miss Yvette Fairfax, daughter of the late Colonel and Mrs. Harrison Fairfax, last of Hyderabad, India. Couple to honeymoon on the Grande Tour before returning to their home on Wimpole Street.

My friend eyed me warily, without a single glance at the paper. I stepped back, undone by the truths I read so plainly on his face.

“You knew.” The words stuck in my throat. Herr Professor winced. His eyes fled mine. “By the devil! You knew and you hid it from me!”

He flinched as my palm hit the desk, a tiny jerk of the head as he stared at the floor. I pushed my hands through my hair with both fists to press back the whorl of disjointed thoughts that assaulted me. Tears rushed my eyes. A leaden weight sat on my chest. I could draw no air.

I stepped away from the violence bursting to free itself. My back to the man, I leaned against the windowsill, my outstretched arms pushing hard against it, as if somehow I could hold back the cataclysm. I stared blankly through the glass, wrestling with a gale of sensibilities, resolves, reckless, insane schemes to make her mine, struggling to cease my trembling and stifle a wail of despair-laden rage. A knock at the door at last shattered the silence. Herr Professor rebuffed it. Footsteps scurried down the wooden stairs.

“I didn’t hide it,
junge
.” He spoke softly, feeling his way. “You never read the papers.”

“You just neglected to tell me, is that it?” I turned to him. He no longer sat, but propped himself against a file cabinet situated against the wall. “How long ago was ‘lately.’ There is no date here.”

“Six months.”

I felt kicked in the chest by a mule. Herr Professor surely read my outrage. “I have not known for six months, Edward—only three months, perhaps. It has been six since the day.”

Realization of the truth settled over me like an arctic blast. “My father told you . . . That blasted bounder wrote and told you when, exactly.” Rottstieger again winced. “And all this time—all this time you have pretended to be my friend—pretended to encourage me,
to share my joy
! You played me for a fool!”

“No, Edward. When you wrote and asked Yvette to be your wife, I knew nothing of the matter. The letter from your father came after you told me what you had done.”

“And so for three months, every time you delayed our departure—all of it was a lie to put me off!”

“I delayed because Rochester told me he would write—
they
would write. They would tell you themselves in their own time. In their own way. I kept waiting for that letter, Edward—for Rowland to do the honorable thing. I had resolved to tell you . . .”

“When? When, exactly, were you planning to extend me that courtesy?”

“Before we got to England.”

“But after we left Boston,” I spat. “It would not do to spoil your precious tour.”

Herr Professor closed his eyes in capitulation. “No. It would not.” His pulse throbbed at his throat and he swallowed hard. “I never wanted this to happen, Edward. I never expected it to end like this.”

I peered at him. “What are you not telling me?” He heaved a sigh and I felt the last piece of the puzzle drop into place. “You have been in on it all along,” I whispered. “You took his part.”

“No, Edward. I never took his part. Anything I did, I did for you.”

“For
you
, you mean to say!”

“No,
junge
. For you.”

“How much? How much did he pay you to get me away from Yvette so Rowland could marry her? How much to properly merge the Fairfax and Rochester fortunes?” He hesitated, tongue-tied, and I slammed my fist on desk. “How much, Heinrich?!”

“The matching funds. If I could get you to Jamaica, he would match whatever other investors gave you—gave the corporation.”

“
The matching funds
? His
club dues
are more than his precious matching funds! You should have asked me, Heinrich. I could have got you better.”

“You have no idea what it meant to have Rupert Rochester invest in us. He is respected, known for his perspicacity. His endorsement gave us
gravitas
. That he would not invest in his own son’s inventions—it damaged our cause more than you can imagine. But what harm could a trip to Jamaica do, eh? How much good would come of it . . . at least, so it seemed to me.”

I snorted, then flopped to a chair and dropped my head into my hands. A storm raged within. I gripped my hair fiercely, clinging to something—anything—to keep from going under.

My friend sat beside me and placed his hand upon my shoulder. “
Mein sohn
,” he ventured after a long moment, “no one could see you together and not know she loved you. That day—the day we left—when you were together in the cockpit, with the door locked and Rowland so frantic to get inside . . . I thought you had secured her promise. By my life, I thought you were secretly engaged.”