A Clockwork Fairytale (21 page)

“I don’t really know what to do,” she said nervously. “I like this room and all the nice stuff, but I can’t just sit up here all the time doing nothing.” She needed to keep her mind occupied so she didn’t pine for Turk.

She glanced up at the Royal Victualler, half expecting him to laugh at her, but he gave her a reassuring smile. “That, ma’am, is exactly what most young ladies love to do. Nothing. But if you wish to be active, I shall find diversions to entertain you. I’ll show you around the Palace, introduce you to the staff, and answer all your questions.”

The tension along Melba’s spine eased and she smiled. As long as she kept her wits about her, the Royal Victualler could be a useful ally and friend.

“Will you call me Melba, please? I don’t like ma’am. It makes me sound ancient.”

He laughed at her joke and she relaxed a little more. “You definitely don’t look ancient, Melba. You are a very beautiful young lady.”

Heat ran up her neck into her cheeks. “Thank you,” she said, wondering if he really thought that or if he was flattering her to make her like him.

“If I’m going to call you Melba, I think you should call me Vittorio, or Vitto if you like.”

“Vitto.” Her gaze darted up to him and then back to her hands.

“I gather you were found living in a bakery in the third circle, Melba.”

She nodded. Even though she’d spent the previous night huddled in the bakery storeroom, that part of her life seemed like a long time ago now.

“Do you remember anything about your life
before
you arrived in the bakery?” he asked gently.

“No. I were only three when I went there.”

“Sometimes we are able to remember a long way back,” Vittorio said. “I was only four when my mother abandoned me at the monastery of the Shining Brotherhood, but I still remember her face.”

“Ain’t you seen your ma since then?”

Vittorio leaned back and his gaze drifted into the distance. “She went to the mainland. She has never returned.”

Melba stared at him, seeing him for the first time as a person who had a ma and pa and hopes and worries, rather than just the beautiful man who wanted to use her to get the throne. “Why did your ma leave you with the Shining Brotherhood when you was so small?”

He shrugged. “A misguided opinion of what was in my best interests, I imagine.”

“I heard you was a monk,” she said.

He laughed as if the joke was on him. “Not anymore, thank the Great Earth Jinn.”

“Why did you leave?”

He leveled a serious gaze on her and she wondered if she’d asked too personal a question. “The Primate of the Shining Brotherhood is both dishonest and dishonorable. I still perform my devotions to the Great Earth Jinn, but I have no time for an organization led by such an unscrupulous man.”

Melba remembered what Gwinnie had said about Gregorio the Primate. He should have been king but he’d walked out and left all the work to her father. “Old Master Maddox, who I was pledged to in the bakery, said the Shining Brotherhood weren’t to be trusted.”

“Well, your Master Maddox had it about right, Melba. They are
not
to be trusted.”

Although she knew he was buttering her up, she liked the way he agreed with her. “Master Maddox said it’s unnatural the way they stay away from women.”

Vittorio burst out laughing, his eyes glowing with mirth. “I couldn’t agree with him more. The Great Earth Jinn created men and women to need each other. The bluejackets have a saying that a young monk is like a kettle without a spout. Eventually the steam blows off his lid.” A frown flitted across his face as Melba giggled. “Forgive me. That was an improper thing for me to say to you.”

“I heard worse than that, Vitto.” Melba laughed harder, leaning back to kick up her feet so she could see her new shoes. Then she remembered she was supposed to be behaving like a princess. But Vittorio grinned at her with no hint of disapproval.

“So what did Master Turk have to say about the Shining Brotherhood when you criticized them?” He asked. The sound of Turk’s name on this man’s lips sobered her and her laughter died. She didn’t want to discuss Turk with anybody. Her thoughts and feelings about him were private.

Melba’s hand went to the front of her dress where Turk’s Earth Blessing hung around her neck and she blinked back tears. She’d managed not to think about him while she talked with her father and most of the time while she bathed. But after she dressed, sneaky painful longings overwhelmed her and she’d cried. “Turk didn’t say much about them,” she said absently.

“I’m surprised he didn’t defend his Brothers,” Vittorio said.

Melba squinted at him. “They ain’t his Brothers.”

“Master Turk is a monk, Melba. Didn’t he tell you?”

An icy chill washed over Melba’s skin as though she’d been dunked in the harbor. “He ain’t a monk!” But even as the denial burst from her lips, the evidence flashed back through her mind: the monk collecting a message from the cubbyhole behind Turk’s palace, the habit hanging in his wardrobe, the sacred tubular bells in his simple bedroom, the Earth Blessings he wore. How had she missed all those clues? But she wouldn’t believe it. “He’s a spymaster,” she said.

“My guess is he spies for the Shining Brotherhood. I told you the Primate was unscrupulous.”

She remembered Turk asking her father to have the reward delivered to the Shining Brotherhood. Everything inside Melba clenched tight as a fist. She hunched forward against the pain. Like Gwinnie, Turk must have known she was the princess as soon as he saw her feet. Had he been planning to turn her in for the reward the whole time she’d been with him? Turk had disapproved of Master Maddox because he’d only looked after her for coin, but he was worse. He’d turned her into a girl and betrayed her trust for coin.

“I’m sorry. Have I upset you?” Vittorio asked softly. “I assumed you must know.”

“Please go,” she whispered. She just wanted to be alone. How could Turk have done this to her? A sob shook her but she hung on to her control until she heard the door close behind Vittorio. She wished she had never met Turk. She pushed her hand inside her bodice, yanked out his gold Earth Blessing, and hurled it across the room. It hit the wall with a dull clink and dropped to the ground. Tears burning, she dashed to her bedroom and threw herself down on her bed.

Chapter Sixteen

A boy is guided onto the path of devotion by his master, but a man stays on the path by mastering himself
. —Brother Carlos

Turk flung a star blade at the target on the monastery garden wall. The razor-sharp six-pointed star hissed through the air and bit into the wood. His right hand was a mass of bloody nicks from repeatedly handling the lethal blades, while his feet ached from hours spent kicking the punch bag in the gymnasium. But he had to stay active to stop his mind brooding on Melba.

Ever since he’d left her at the Royal Palace a week ago, he had worried about her. So far, he’d sent her two notes asking how she was settling in and not received a reply to either. He feared someone in the Palace was intercepting his messages.

Frustration burned through him. His spies could not access the Royal apartments to speak with her, and he wasn’t able to leave the monastery grounds to try to reach her himself. Vittorio had posted bluejackets at both gateways to the monastery and, according to Steptoe, there were still guards on Waterberry House.

Luckily, the sacred monastery grounds were out of bounds to Vittorio’s men. As long as Turk stayed within the walls, he would be safe. Worried for his safety, Gregorio had even forbidden him from taking nighttime excursions on the skyways.

Although Turk had always enjoyed reading and studying, he couldn’t concentrate. The quiet life of contemplation and devotion he used to enjoy before he became a spymaster now seemed boring and claustrophobic. He wanted to know what was happening outside the monastery walls.

He hurled his other five star blades in quick succession, creating an evenly spaced row in the target. Turk had bought the unusual weapons from a southern merchant shortly after he became a spymaster. He liked the idea that they were a traditional weapon of his mysterious southern homeland.

“Hey, mate!”

He looked around at the sound of Steptoe’s shout. His friend ambled along the path between overhanging shrubs. Turk raised his fist and they bumped knuckles in greeting. “What are you doing hiding in the far corner of the garden?” Steptoe asked.

“Hoping not to be disturbed.”

Steptoe laughed. “I don’t think anyone will disturb you, mate. The old gardener Fulvio told me you were tossing around stars of death. Remember, some of the old monks haven’t stepped outside the monastery walls for more than sixty years. I think they’re frightened of you now you have a reputation in the big wide world.”

Turk didn’t even want to imagine being trapped inside the cloistered community for the rest of his life.

Leaning a shoulder against the wall, Steptoe batted a wasp away from his face. “So, how you doing now you’re back in the compound?”

Turk stared up at the blue sky wondering whether to be honest or not. Since Gregorio’s unexpectedly harsh reaction to his thoughts, he’d become wary of revealing his feelings. But Steptoe was his friend, not his master. “I’m not settling in well,” he said.

Steptoe squinted up at the sun thoughtfully. “Can’t say as I would either. I still keep up me devotions, but truth is, I don’t think I can ever come back inside.”

Turk combed his fingers through his sweaty hair and his hand unconsciously paused on the longer hair curling against his neck. Secret curls, Melba had called them. Every time he thought of her, the pit of his stomach felt empty as if he’d forgotten to eat and would be forever hungry.

“What news?” Turk asked quickly.

“Vittorio still has a guard on Waterberry House, but the men on the monastery gate have gone.”

“Thank the Great Earth Jinn. I hope that means Vittorio will leave me alone now. He has no legitimate reason to come after me, anyway.” Now he could try to reach Melba to make sure she was happy.

“Have you discussed your restlessness with Gregorio?” Steptoe asked.

Turk rubbed sweat from his eyes. He had delivered a verbal report of his meeting with the king to the three most senior Brothers, but he’d put off seeing Gregorio alone. His master would be furious when he read Turk’s mind and saw his mixed-up feelings about Melba. “I dare not let him see my thoughts until I have them under control.”

With a frown, Steptoe said, “He doesn’t still read your mind, does he?”

Turk’s attention snapped to his friend. “Of course. Why?”

“Carlos hasn’t read my mind since I were fourteen. He said a boy is guided onto the path of devotion by his master, but a man stays on the path by mastering himself. If I have worries I can always discuss them with him.”

Turk’s unsettled feelings focused into a hot pulse of anger. Why didn’t Gregorio trust
him
to make his own judgments? Turk did not want to share his private thoughts about Melba with anyone. The time had come to tell Gregorio to stay out of his mind and let him make his own choices.

He pushed away from the wall. “I’ll be back soon,” he said to Steptoe. He ran through the garden to the wing of the monastery that housed the private quarters of the senior Brothers. Taking the steps two at a time, he cursed the long habit dragging at his legs. Habits were made for old men who walked everywhere at snail’s pace in clumpy wooden sandals. When Melba had wanted to wear trousers, he had dismissed her plea without giving it a second thought. Now he understood exactly why she didn’t like wearing a dress.

He yanked off his boots, strode along the balcony, and knocked on Gregorio’s door. At a word from inside, he entered and shut the door behind him. Anger pulsed in his veins as he recalled the unfair slap Gregorio had given him when his master shouldn’t even have been reading his mind.

Gregorio sat working at his desk in front of a window overlooking the second circle. His brows drew together as he turned to Turk. “Is something wrong, boy?”

Turk knew he should be diplomatic and he struggled to moderate his words. “Steptoe tells me Carlos stopped reading his mind when he was fourteen.”

“Ah.” Gregorio put down his pen.

Turk waited for his master to continue but he just stared out the window. “Why don’t you trust me to make my own decisions?”

Gregorio unfolded from his chair and stood slowly and stiffly, wincing as if he were in pain. “I seek only to protect you from yourself, Turk. It is too easy for a young man to be led astray, especially outside in the city where every temptation lies at your fingertips.”

“So you check up on me as though I’m an initiate incapable of being trusted.” Turk stepped forward, his fists clenched at his sides. “I understand my duty. I
am
an honorable man. You should have trusted me.”

Approaching him, Gregorio gripped his shoulder. “In truth, Turk, you are a stronger man than I am. I
should
have trusted you, but I know firsthand that the temptations of the flesh can be irresistible.”

Shocked, Turk pulled away from him. “Irresistible? What do you mean?”

Gregorio hung his head and stared at the ground. “I’m ashamed to admit that I broke my vows. My life is plagued by guilt. I only wanted to protect you from the same thing.”