The Wooden Prince (13 page)

Punch called out to the automa who was painting her face. “Columbine, wouldst thou assist…um…” He looked at Pinocchio. “I beseech thee, what is thy name?”

“Pinocchio.”

Punch waved to Columbine. “Locate a costume for fair Pinocchio.”

She applied a final touch of red to her wooden puckered lips, then put down her paintbrush to head toward the racks of clothes.

Punch walked away, calling over his shoulder, “Prepare thyself, Pinocchio, for tomorrow we entertain all the good folk of Siena.”

With a flourishing sweep, Harlequin cracked his bat against Pinocchio's head one last time.

C
olumbine chose for Pinocchio a black cloak tipped in vibrant blue and white feathers, as well as a black helmet with a long beak. Apparently, he was supposed to be some sort of bird. A magpie, she explained. When she handed him a pair of black slippers, he remembered with a start. He couldn't let the others see how his feet had become that strange fleshy material.

“May I keep on my boots?” Pinocchio asked. “I think they look more…uh, dramatic.”

“If you wish.” Columbine batted her eyes with automa indifference. “You'll play the part of one of the half-beasts, led by Scaramouch. Just follow what the others do. Fight off Harlequin's troupe, playing humans. Harlequin always wins, so you'll have to be defeated in the end. Just don't let them hack you up too soon. The audience is here to watch us battle.”

“Hack me up?” Pinocchio said. “We won't really damage each other, will we?”

Columbine handed him a curved scimitar. He was relieved to see that it was bronze, so it wouldn't disrupt his gearworks. But when Pinocchio touched the edge of the blade, it nicked a small chip of wood from his finger.

“It's sharp!” he said.

Columbine pulled up her sleeve. Her arm was crisscrossed by cracks and cuts, as if her arm had been severed many times. “The gnome is skilled. He will glue you back together afterward.”

A valve in Pinocchio's innards gave an anxious whine.

While the others went about their preparations, Pinocchio decided he had to escape. The gnome's hammering had been silent for hours, so hopefully it was late in the night by now. The other automa weren't watching him, so he tried the door. To his surprise, it opened. Didn't Al Mi'raj lock them in? Was he so used to automa just doing as they were ordered that he never expected any of them to try to escape? Pinocchio didn't much care.

With a rush of excitement, he dashed upstairs and down a hallway and found he had no idea how to get out. This place was a maze! If he could only find the end of the hallway without accidentally barging into Al Mi'raj's bedroom.

He finally came to an end and tugged at the handle, but this door was locked. So the fire eater did lock them in. Pinocchio peered back down the hallway, listening, hoping everyone was sleeping soundly.

He was strong. A swift kick with his seven-league boots should take the door off its hinges. Pinocchio got a running start. He sprang out horizontal, throwing his full weight into the leap, but when his feet met the door, his knees buckled, and the seven-league boots fired him back at an odd angle with a crash.

The nearest door opened. He froze, wondering what terrible thing Al Mi'raj was going to turn him into. But it wasn't the djinni who appeared. It was Wiq.

“What are you doing out here?”

Pinocchio scrambled to his feet. “Nothing. Just…uh, looking around.”

Wiq rubbed his eyes. “You woke me. Were you trying to escape?”

Pinocchio touched his nose and was relieved to find it hadn't grown. Fortunately, Al Mi'raj hadn't told him explicitly not to try to escape.

Wiq gave him a funny look. “You were, weren't you? Well, you can't get out. We're all prisoners here, of the lord mayor of Siena, and of the empire. Even Al Mi'raj. These doors are reinforced with lead. The mayor has me lock them every night—”

“You've got the keys!” Pinocchio said. “Well, why don't you leave?”

Wiq scowled and touched the metal collar around his neck. “It's sort of like the fealty charm that keeps you from disobeying. If I tried to escape, it would tighten. I'd strangle.”

“Could you unlock the door for me?”

Wiq shook his head. “I can only open it to let visitors in.” He narrowed his eyes at Pinocchio. “You're a strange automa, you know that?”

Pinocchio shrugged.

“I've never seen one of your kind try to escape.”

“My master—my real master, Geppetto—is looking for me,” Pinocchio said. “I want to go back to him.”

“But why?” Wiq asked, his long ears swishing. “Why do you care about him?”

“Because,” Pinocchio said, “he's good. He's kind. He wants me to be his—” But he stopped, realizing he probably shouldn't say any more.

Wiq brushed him away. “Go back to the others before you wake Al Mi'raj and get us both in trouble. I don't know what's malfunctioning with you, but if you know what's best, you'll forget your old master and obey Al Mi'raj.”

Pinocchio's shoulders sagged, and he slumped back down to the cellar. For the rest of the night, he sat in a corner while the others prepared for the coming show.

He'd never forget Master Geppetto! He wanted so badly to be with Geppetto again. He longed to hear Maestro's songs and to hear more of Geppetto's stories and to have his master just talk to him in that way no person had ever talked to Pinocchio before—the way he imagined a father would talk to a son. A father and son…Would he ever get to really be Geppetto's son?

His insides burned. Something seemed to want to come out from the corners of his eyes, but there was no way for the pressure or steam or whatever it was to escape from the sealed sockets.

As he brought his hands to his eyes, he saw something strange happening to his fingertips. The fine lines of wood were disappearing, replaced by something smoother, softer. Out of his fingers, oval-shaped fingernails of shiny pink had formed.

Flesh!

He held his hands out, gasping in alarm. Had any of the other automa seen? No, they were too busy. The skin extended down his fingers, crossing his knuckles and palms. Once it got to his wrist hinges, it stopped. First his feet, and now his hands! He ran over to the trunks of costumes and began furiously rummaging through them.

“Can I help you find something?” Columbine asked.

Pinocchio hid his hands beneath the piles of scarves and shirts. “Gloves,” he said. “Just looking for gloves.”

“Over in that cabinet,” she said, barely glancing at Pinocchio.

Pinocchio slammed the trunk shut but didn't pull one of his hands out fast enough. He stifled a yelp. His thumb got pinched. A trickle of reddish liquid formed. He had seen this substance before, when Master Geppetto had been injured at the mechanipillar. This greasy, thin liquid wasn't as bright, but Pinocchio knew what it was.

Blood.

Pinocchio tucked his hands under his shirt and made sure the other automa weren't watching before he opened the cabinet, found a pair of black leather gloves, and pulled them on.

As if he needed another reason to worry about getting his hands or feet hacked off in tomorrow's performance. What would Al Mi'raj do if he saw his automa bleed?

“Prithee!” Punch called out the following afternoon. “'Tis time for the performance, majestic marionettes. Gather your props. The show is at hand.”

Pinocchio reluctantly followed the other actors down the hall. Scaramouch's troupe of fifteen or so were dressed as half-beasts. They wore an assortment of masks—wolves, baboons, mice, lizards—and carried all manner of bronze weapons. Scaramouch, in his jaguar mask, made a lazy windmill twirl with his poleax.

Harlequin stood beside Columbine and about a dozen other automa without masks, who were playing humans. Each carried a bronze sword. Not nearly as menacing as the arsenal Scaramouch's side had, but if these swordsmen and women fought the way Harlequin did, Pinocchio wondered if being turned into a chamber pot would really be so bad.

When they reached the shadowed courtyard, Pinocchio heard the noise of the crowd outside. Al Mi'raj was standing beside a grumpy-looking Wiq.

“Pulcinella, if you're ready,” Al Mi'raj said.

“Down to my fantom, Your Worship,” Punch replied before strolling out into the piazza.

Trumpets blared and the crowd cheered as Punch waved to them. Pinocchio pushed his way through the other automa to get a better look at what lay outside. He found himself next to Wiq, who ignored him.

Punch climbed a tall podium that rose from the middle of the wide piazza. The whole arena was illuminated by large pixie bulbs hovering about twenty feet above the brickwork.

“Lord Mayor! Most esteemed dons and donnas,” Punch's voice echoed, magnified, Pinocchio guessed, by the gnome's handiwork. “If music be the food of love, I beg you take your leave. But if high comedy and exhilarating combat be your nourishment—hark!—you will be fulfilled.”

The crowd roared. Stands had been erected around the outside of the seashell-shaped piazza. Above the stands, finely dressed groups of people watched from balconies. And to one side rose the biggest building, a crenellated hall with a tall clock tower.

“That's the Palazzo Pubblico,” Wiq whispered, “where the lord mayor and his council watch.”

Pinocchio looked at the boy, surprised that he was speaking to him.

Wiq continued, “Make sure the lord mayor can see you when you get hacked apart. Al Mi'raj doesn't like getting complaints that the mayor's guests couldn't see the show properly.”

Pinocchio wilted.

From the podium, Punch boomed, “On this eve, we introduce you to a ferocious band of half-beast rebels.”

Scaramouch marched into the piazza with his chest puffed out, followed by his half-beast band. The audience booed and hissed. Wiq had to give Pinocchio a shove. “Get out there!”

Pinocchio scampered to catch up, trying to be as inconspicuous as possible. Peering through the eye holes of his mask, he spied the lord mayor and his council laughing raucously. Pinocchio could only guess why. Automa butchering one another seemed to pass for high comedy in Siena.

“Defending the empire against yond beasts be your champions.” Punch waved a dramatic arm. “Harlequin and his spellbinding swashbucklers!”

Harlequin bounded across the piazza in a series of somersaults that made Pinocchio dizzy. Harlequin's troupe raced after him and drew their swords in unison, the metallic chime echoing around the arena.

“Let the performance begin!” Punch cried. The cheers of the audience swelled into a deafening roar. Pinocchio's knees threatened to quit.

The two sides charged each other, leaving Pinocchio momentarily behind. He raised his scimitar feebly and ran after the others. Maybe he could just stick to the back.

At first it seemed an all-out barrage of automa doing their fiercest to hack one another to pieces. But as Pinocchio scuttled around behind Scaramouch's masked troops, he noticed little performances occurring among the battle.

The lovely Columbine was surrounded by a trio of automa wearing jackal, lizard, and parrot masks. Pinocchio thought she was about to be chopped to pieces. She cried for help, and Harlequin burst onto the scene like a slashing tornado. In a series of motions too fast to see, Harlequin scattered all three of Columbine's attackers to the cobblestones in mock deaths and severed pieces. Harlequin gathered Columbine in his arms, and she planted a kiss on his cheek. The top of his head popped open, and a little whistle of steam erupted.

The audience roared with delight. Pinocchio found it bizarre.

He found himself so caught up in watching, he nearly forgot where he was. Until he noticed automa charging at him. Lots of them.

As one of Harlequin's swashbucklers reared back with his sword, Pinocchio panicked and leaped straight up. The seven-league boots propelled him above the automa's swing, all the way up into one of the pixie bulbs hovering over the piazza. It shattered and glass tinkled down. The tiny incandescent creatures inside scattered like stardust into the sky.

When Pinocchio landed, he saw one of Harlequin's swordsmen rushing at him. Before Pinocchio could leap for safety, the automa swung his sword directly for Pinocchio's chest.

Something happened.

Pinocchio wasn't sure where it came from. It was like the uncontrollable instinct that caused him to grab a person's hand if it came too near his chest. Lightning fast, Pinocchio twirled his scimitar to defend himself against the blow. He stared in surprise as his blade blocked the automa's sword.

The shock only lasted a moment.

Pinocchio found himself parrying and blocking with unbelievable precision. This was amazing! With an acrobatic spring, he jumped to avoid the next blow. As he landed, his scimitar chopped clean through the arms of an automa. Pinocchio winced.

A chant was rising from the crowd: “Magpie! Magpie!”