The Unraveling, Volume One of The Luminated Threads: A Steampunk Fantasy Romance (6 page)

It looked like the Midlands. But since when did mountains surround the Midlands?

The knots in her stomach tightened. This must be one of those craters the scientists swore wasn’t a volcano because the rocks were all wrong. The formation of such a crater might be a mystery, but more mysterious still was why she’d never heard of one’s presence in the Peak District.

Behind her, a door banged shut. Annmar whirled. Strutting from a cottage came a man in a worn tweed suit and a matching waistcoat over a pale blue shirt. He looked dressed for church, except for the railroad cap covering his gray hair. His beard stuck out in long wispy strands reaching to his watch chain. He moved quickly for a man of his age and stepped right up to her.

“You Miss Masterson?” His accent was pure Peaks, the ends of his words clipped off.

She nodded.

“Mr. Fetcher said to expect you. I’m Mr. Yates.”

“Pleased to meet you,” she said. Then, with another daring look over the crater valley, she asked, “Where am I?”

“You’re headed to Wellspring?” He barely waited for her nod. “It’s there.” He pointed to the nearest town, one hosting three spires. A line of tracks cut straight to it. “West of Chapel Hollow, not far from Breakthrough Gap, as I’m sure Mr. Fetcher promised.”

Her head was spinning. “Breakthrough Gap?”

“What it’s called from the Blighted Basin side.” He gestured to the crater again and gave her a studied look.

Annmar hastily swallowed before Blighted Basin? tumbled out. She straightened, trying to keep an unruffled demeanor. What a horrible name. Blighted didn’t fit this lush countryside at all. Not to mention, how could this huge valley be within the Peaks? Farms, villages and a town settling it? Serviced by a modern steam engine?

“Strong artistic Knack, Mr. Fetcher said. Not surprised you worked the Proof if that’s the case. You traversed the Gateway easily?”

The Gateway Proof. That’s what Mr. Fetcher called the blue seal. Her gaze dropped briefly to the paper packet she still clenched. She hadn’t seen a gate. Only the dark, cramped gorge… Mr. Yates gestured behind her with his chin, and she turned to look back.

There was no narrowing gorge, no dark, confining trap of rock. No howl, just the twitter of birds. The rocky cliffs left an adequate gap, wide enough even the tiny tollbooth station was visible. The steam loader chugged around the building, her trunk perched on the top. The ash trees swayed in the breeze, and when their arching branches waved together, the lines of trees, rock and rails connected in a huge ring. For a second, the center of the circle shimmered blue. The trees shifted again, and the image snapped away like all her other imaginings.

Annmar sucked a breath. As if in one of Polly’s stories, apparently she’d passed through a Gateway because she had the Proof, given to her by a man who liked her art and thought she was Mother, who probably would have had a better idea than her daughter what exactly was happening here.

Nerves.

To cover her confusion, Annmar said, “Yes,” because that’s what Mr. Yates expected. Tell the customer what he wants to hear, Mrs. Rennet always said. Though in Mr. Shearing’s case, that had proved a mistake.

She should go back to Derby before this baffling trip landed her in some even more dreadful situation. Annmar clenched one hand around her satchel strap, the other into Mother’s shawl and forced her thoughts into order. This couldn’t possibly be as awful a situation as the one Mr. Shearing had proposed. Her fingers found her hidden half sovereigns. No employer paid gold for a farce. This Mistress Gere and Wellspring Collective offered real employment. Employment it would be a shame not to test.

She would do this.

Annmar took a breath and evenly asked, “When does the train leave?”

“As soon as it’s ready. Might take them a bit with the loading.”

“Oh.” She looked around. The steam loader drew up to a waiting rack railway. “I could purchase my ticket while I wait.”

“You could.”

Did he think she couldn’t pay? “How much is it?”

“Not much. Surely less than they took from you on the Outside to get this far.”

“Uh, all right.” She stepped toward the building, but he didn’t move.

“I need to know it’s you, you understand.”

“But you said Mr. Fetcher told you I’d be coming.” And she’d gotten through this Gateway of his, whatever it was.

“He did. Brown curls, city clothes.”

Derby was only a borough, but that certainly described her. Annmar tried to think of what to say to maintain a polite nature and not give away her ignorance.

“Draws, Mr. Fetcher said.” He eyed her. “You draw?”

Her hand slipped over the satchel. He already said he knew she had a knack for art. She glanced to the valley of Blighted Basin again. Few visitors must go to a place so remote. To them, it must seem she hailed from a city. She would be a source of gossip for the rural people. “Yes, I draw.”

“That’s what we heard.” Mr. Yates looked around to the workers unloading the crates.

Several now watched. This time she knew she had to wait for whatever test it took to garner the approval of this man—the ruler of the station.

“The wife.” He lifted his chin toward the cottage he’d emerged from. “She has a cat. Fond of that cat, she is. See it yonder?”

Annmar followed his gaze. In the side garden, a lady sat rocking with a thin cat on her lap.

“I see her cat. Pretty orange tabby.”

“Pretty, yes, but old, that cat is, near twenty. Isn’t long for this world.”

Suddenly, this drawn-out conversation made sense. It wasn’t a test, exactly. Just the awkward request of a stranger. “Oh, your wife is going to miss her cat.”

The man nodded. “Something fierce.”

“Mr. Yates, would you like me to make a drawing of the cat, for your wife?”

He nodded again. “That would be good. Thought maybe you could sit on that bench, have one of the wife’s muffins and look like you was drawing the scenery. She’d think nothing of what the expected artist does while she waits. But if you could draw Mr. O—we call him that, short for Mr. Orange—I could surprise her with the picture. Her birthday is next week.”

“I can do that. But should I buy my ticket first?”

“You don’t need to worry about your ticket. I’ll take care of it and seeing that the rack train waits for you to finish.”

Annmar smiled. “And you needn’t worry about that. I can finish before the train is loaded.”

Mr. Yates broke into a broad grin. With a tip of his hat, the stationmaster offered his arm and escorted her to the bench.

Chapter seven

Wellspring Collective, Blighted Basin

Annmar arrived at
Wellspring Collective to find it deserted. A farmyard of chickens wasn’t what she expected from Mr. Fetcher’s description of a growing agrarian business. However, the owner’s absence delayed her masquerade of impersonating her mother.

By the third knock on the huge farmhouse’s door, Annmar’s muscles had tightened again. “Where is everyone?” she asked the livery driver.

He shrugged. “Workin’, you know.” He dropped her trunk with a bang on the paving flags beneath the covered entry at the rear of the stone farmhouse. That should have brought someone running, but nobody appeared, even after the young man set her valise beside it, accepted his tip and left.

Shifting from foot to foot, she stared after the wagon and then beyond the farmyard. In the crop fields between here and the western mountains, a mechanized engine steamed its way over rolling hills. She spotted the movement of wagons, but they were far off. She dug into her satchel for Mr. Fetcher’s instructions. But, just as Annmar recalled, they ended with Mr. Yates. The grateful stationmaster had dispelled her nervousness, and during the short ride to Chapel Hollow, the valley residents had looked and acted normal, as if it was a usual country shire. She’d just assumed Mistress Gere would meet her at the farm. No doubt she’d been delayed.

Annmar folded the paper over the Proof, put it away and took out her sketchbook. She refused to allow her mind to create the melodrama of a penny dreadful. Nor would she snoop. Besides, Wellspring was too intriguing. Everywhere Annmar looked, something popped into her mind. Things she was sure most business clients wouldn’t appreciate in an illustration.

Her drawing of the three-story stone house started out normal enough, but the structure altered under her pencil into an open-air pavilion with inviting cushioned wicker furniture. The surrounding old rowan trees reshaped into many-armed sentinels awaiting unwary intruders, their troops formed from the adjacent orchard trees. Beyond the farmyard’s spreading walnut tree, the long whitewashed outbuilding with its odd dormers changed into a parapeted fortification. The windmill and water tank transformed into clouds with cascades flowing into rivers between the fields.

What would the fields look like at night? At dawn? Seeing the sun rise over the fields with rows of crops planted in their complicated cross-work patterns? Oh, it would be a glorious race to catch the colors in the sky and the play of shadows over the textures of different plants. The thought made her pencil twitch even faster, and the lines on the page coalesced into an expansive view of field after field rolling over the hills, with something connecting them.

The pencil hung suspended above the page while she stared. Her focus blurred a moment, and part of her struggled to name what the other part drew—a fine network of lines, spider web-like, but underground, in the soil. They weren’t really lines, but tunnels. No, tubes…or, rather, roots.

Annmar nodded to herself. The delicate lines had to be roots. They crossed her page in a lacy pattern, weaving the countryside together into an orderly system that spoke of life, fertile and vibrant. The sense of it hadn’t occurred to her while sketching, but now, looking at the entire drawing, a shiver of excitement ran up her spine.

She drew a breath and glanced around the still-deserted yard. The farm smelled so good, too. A light flicked on in the fortifica—uh, the outbuilding.

“Aha. Someone has arrived.” Annmar slapped her book closed and jumped up, but her steps across the gravel drive slowed as every stone made itself known through her worn soles. By the time she picked her way to the building, dust clung to the uppers. Annmar sighed and stopped at the open double doors to brush the tops of her shoes clean. There. First impressions had to be good impressions.

She peered inside the building. To one side, workbenches holding tumbles of metal parts and hanging mechanic’s tools identified the area as a repair shop. Opposite, rolls of fencing, metal rods and bundles of wire surrounded the bottom of an old cast-iron spiral stair to the upper floor. From the layer of dirt and cobwebs, the stair wasn’t in use.

Deeper into the building lay more messy storage. This place was nothing like her sketched images of various chambers befitting the castle’s inhabitants. She shook her head. Why had that bit of whimsy struck? Like her nerves at Gapton, that nonsense wouldn’t serve her well in her new position. The cadence of voices rose and fell beyond the door. Mess or not, she’d announce herself to these people.

A few steps inside, movement caught her eye, small and dark like an airborne rock coming at her. Annmar ducked and stumbled. Blurs—birds—dove from the rafters, shrieking in a growing swirl at her head. With a cry, she threw up her hands to fend them off and dodged for the doorway.

The tumult of birds flew from the workshop and disappeared into the trees. Annmar panted in time to their quick wing movements. Had they meant to scare her, or had she scared them? She shook her head at the thought. “Wild animals. A rough farm. Why did I think this was a good idea?”

Nothing held her here, yet everything kept her from returning home. Her hand crept to her bodice and felt for the coins. Still there. Those in her waistband, too. She reached out to steady herself and knocked something that gave way.

A pile of wooden crates tipped in slow motion.

Thunk
. Creak.
Thunk
. Creak.
Bam
.

Annmar jumped just as the crates landed, shooting up a cloud of fine powder. She covered her mouth and nose, but choked on air so thick its particles tickled her skin. A fit of coughing overcame her, making a few tears leak from the corners of her eyes. She dashed outside.

Leaning on the sun-baked wall, she gulped in clean air. A final cough cleared her throat, but a shake of her traveling skirt released more billowing dirt. She skittered aside.

Oh, for heaven’s sake. She couldn’t get this filthy in a week in Derby. Her carefully contrived first impression was lost, dreams of an independent shop drifting away with the dust she brushed from her shoulders and sleeves.

“Hello there,” called a woman behind her.

Annmar turned, her hand rising to swipe back her escaped curls. A woman strode along an avenue created by rows of fruit trees. She was tall, her lean figure dressed in the style Mrs. Rennet wore, a ruffled blouse topped by a suit vest styled for a lady. But unlike Mrs. Rennet, this lady had on a split skirt, the kind worn by women who rode horseback. She would most certainly be holding a sword when she rode—

“Would you be Anna Mary Masterson?”

Annmar dismissed the images springing up in her mind and bobbed the half-curtsy expected of Rennet’s Renditions’ workers. Then she caught sight of her filthy gloves. She tucked her sketchbook under her arm and removed them. So much for appearances.

“I’ve just arrived. Well, not just. I saw a light and heard...” She nodded back to the white building. “I was looking for someone because no one was at the main house.” Oh, Lord, she was talking too much. Annmar stopped and forced a smile. “Would you be so kind as to direct me to Mistress Gere?”

“You have found her. I am Constance Gere.” The sword-bearer—lady—offered her hand, also gloveless.

Annmar said a silent thanks her impropriety would be overlooked in this country setting and shook the work-roughened hand.

The woman glanced her over from head to foot. “I’m sorry not to have been here to meet you. Not the best introduction for a young lady, stumbling around what must have appeared to be the storage. I hope you aren’t too put off…” She peered down at Annmar with intense gray eyes and slowly said, “Yes, young lady.”

Caught. Annmar met the formidable woman’s gaze. “My mother, Anna Mary, passed away last year. I am Ann Marie Masterson, also an artist with a very similar style to my mother, who instructed me.”

Mistress Gere inclined her head slightly and wiped a hand over her mouth. When she dropped it, Annmar was relieved to see she was smiling.

“Mr. Fetcher, the vain peacock, did not wear his spectacles when he met you, did he?”

Annmar couldn’t help smiling. She shook her head. “Only when he looked at this.” She extended her sketchbook. It fell open where the pencil still marked the last drawings.

Mistress Gere stared at the page, the one with the lacy roots, suddenly silent.

Oh, Lord, no. Not those whimsical sketches. Annmar’s neck and face heated. “In the front, there are better—”

Mistress Gere raised a hand, one finger up. She drew a breath before lifting her gaze to meet Annmar’s. “This page will do. You have a talent not seen in Blighted Basin since your mother left nearly twenty years ago.”