CHAPTER FOURTEEN

BRIAN AND I both let out shocked squeaks, awakening Morty. He threw his head back with a “What? What?” to glare at us.

“It . . . it . . .” I pointed at the Needle. “It ate Brian’s cane!” I scrubbed my sore palm carefully, trying to get the sting out.

“It what? What it?”

“There was a bronze crab, a sculpture, where the obelisk came to rest on its base.” Brian explained to Morty without taking his eyes off the crevice where the giant beast and his perdition rod had gone from sight. “It tore the cane out of her hold and vanished.” Ominous scraping sounds came from inside the shadowy nook.

“I’ll find out why she was holding it instead of you later. Is it altogether gone or just hiding inside the stone?”

And could the frail, hollow-seeming cane survive anything that bronze crab might do to it? Like crunching it to bits? Raking noises continued. “The racket suggests it’s still there.” I swung on Morty, after hopping down the stone steps. “Get it back.”

“Don’t know if I can.”

“This is your element, right?”

“Indeed, however . . .”

“However what?”

“Tessa, there is magic and then there is elemental magic. I can’t do what the professor could do, not by a long shot. If I could, they would never have taken my Goldie.”

I wanted to heed the sorrow in his eyes, but didn’t. “But can’t you make it spit the cane out?”

“Maybe.” Morty put his hands on his knees and stood. “It might destroy the work altogether.” He eyed it. “It spent hundreds of years in the dry Egyptian climate, and a hundred or so here, with rain and cold, wind and snow, eating at it. It was made to survive one but not necessarily the other. They’ve cleaned it up and tried to seal it against the pollution, but their efforts are not altogether successful. Stone is native to the earth where it is quarried.”

“Oh.”

Brian said, “Boost me up.”

We both faced him.

He made a thumbs-up sign. “Boost me up, I’m getting my cane back.”

“If it’s not fallen into pixie dust by now. Or splinters. Or whatever old crabby has done to it.”

“Just do it!”

I hopped out of Morty’s way and let the big guy hoist Brian up onto his shoulder, after he first climbed the narrow steps and positioned himself. The gymnastics put Brian chest high at the crack where the crab sculpture had been, with Morty braced as the base of the human pyramid.

Stretching both arms out, Brian called for his cane. At least, I think that’s what he did. As usual, I didn’t know the language but I could feel the emotion behind it, and it had to have been the professor speaking. Let it go. Give me what is mine, as I respect and need it, and it needs me. The words died away, like a forgotten echo, and we all waited in silence. Faraway, the whoosh of traffic on streets could be heard, along with the occasional blaring horn. Closer, voices and footfalls as people walked, jogged, and pushed prams along the inner pathways. Even closer, the squawk of a bird or two and the answer of an outraged squirrel.

And then I heard it, the faintest of clicks, a whisper of stone on stone, as if the sculpture had suddenly become a shy creature and moved to peek out at us cautiously. If crustaceans could peek. Who knew? I didn’t think they ate wooden canes either, and look what happened. I held my breath so that I could listen better.

Another furtive series of noises.

Brian repeated what he’d said before and put his right hand out authoritatively. The gold ring found at the Washington Monument glimmered at the base of his right thumb. I bit my lip, seeing in my mind’s eyes the crab seizing his hand and making off with it, attached or not, sending an ewww of a thought.

I was at risk of turning purple from lack of air when the sculpture bolted out of the crevice and thrust the cane into Brian’s hand before returning to its original position and freezing back into carved immortality. Brian hopped down from Morty’s shoulder, and we all jumped the railings and tried to look innocent while I took several long breaths.

I watched as Brian turned the cane about in his hands. He handled it as though some weight had come back to it, and the burnished wood gleamed as it used to. It appeared to have gone through a rejuvenation of its own. He looked the length up and down, running his hands over the carved shaft, missing entirely what had happened to the curved handle.

I pointed. “What’s that?”

“That?” He looked where I pointed. “Oh . . . ahhhhh.” And a big smile spread across his face. “That is a gazing stone. Small but extremely powerful.” He moved the cane upright and cradled the handle, rubbing his thumb over the crystal marble. “Once mine and now returned.”

More than marble-sized, but far smaller than a traditional crystal ball, it winked in the bright sunlight, and Morty made a noise of satisfaction deep in his throat.

“Now that,” he told us, “is a quality piece.”

It looked as if it had always been embedded in the handle, but we all knew better, or at least I knew it hadn’t been there the last week or so. Brian rubbed it again, and a glint of starry fire seemed to rise from it. A faint, chiming hum sounded, rather like the noise from a crystal wineglass.

“This,” he said, “should make a great deal of difference.”

“Well now. Ain’t that just a bit of all right.” A dapper figure unfolded himself from under a nearby crabapple tree, dusted off, and came to join us. “Progress. Soon the old chap will be himself again, instead of here an’ there.”

Steptoe shaded me.

“Speaking of which, how did you get here?”

Steptoe picked a bit of twig off his sleeve, ignoring Morty’s belligerence. “Same way as you lot did. Sam drove me up last night and dropped me off to wait because it didn’t seem as I’d get a proper invite, otherwise. Sam’s a good man, ’e is, although I doubt ’e has many years left for chauffeuring after dark.”

No wonder Sam’s eyes had gone so baggy. He’d spent most of the night driving. I told myself he’d done it for the money, but I wouldn’t have put it by Steptoe to have possibly threatened a bit. Or maybe the pay was honey enough to leave the family at home and drive all night, grab a few hours of sleep and do it all over again. I understood what it was to have a pile of bills on the kitchen table and not enough to pay them all off. I wouldn’t blame Sam at all.

I edged over a bit, just in case someone thought of charging at someone else and causing harm in one way or another. I really didn’t know what to expect from anyone anymore, but caution seemed to be the word of the day.

Steptoe eyed the cane. “Well done. Did you know it was there?”

“No.”

Steptoe paused just a moment in case Brian wished to add anything, and then flashed a grin at me as it became obvious that Brian would not. “Did the pebbles help any, ducks?”

“Tremendously, thank you.”

“Good. I’ve prepared a few more, but we’d have to arrange a trade.”

I looked into his smiling face. “We’re not giving you the cane or the crystal or the cane with the crystal.”

“Course not! Wouldn’t think of asking for it. There might be a little bit of something, help or whatnot, I could ask for though.”

He had already helped us by finding a decent shuttle vehicle and Sam, although I could almost point out that it was in his self-interest too, but I could sense a debt there. I started to ask what he wanted when Morty thrust his arm across the front of me. I stopped talking in surprise.

“Make no deals.”

“I wasn’t. I just wanted to know what he had in mind.”

“Bad bargains have come from few words. Our folk are tricksy, and sometimes have less than honorable intentions.” Morty took a step closer and I, for one, couldn’t miss it as his right hand curled into a fist.

Steptoe put his hand over his heart. “I ’ave been nothing but helpful. Haven’t I? Like we was proper mates.” He turned to me.

“When dealing one on one with me, yes, but I’ve overheard conversations with you and your minions that weren’t so nice.”

His hand over his heart doubled up as if reflecting an inner pain. “Now that ’urts, it does. I thought I explained all that.”

“You never explained why the three of you thought you had to break in on the professor in the first place.”

“Ah. That.” He fell silent for a long moment, closing his eyes. Thinking, was he? When he opened them, however, he merely said, “Saw my minions, did you?”

“I did. I even saw your shit fit when you disintegrated one of them.”

“Now, love, that wasn’t a disintegration. Unpleasant yes, but the man deserved to be tweaked, didn’t he, for not following orders and for being so damnably stupid about things. I sent him to limbo for a little rest.” Steptoe interrupted himself with a shiver. “Much less unpleasant and permanent than punishments doled out by others. Definitely not permanent.”

“Nice pivot. I still need an answer as to why you broke in on the professor.”

“Needed his ’elp, didn’t we? He wouldn’t give it, and I thought that might be the case, so I sent my lads in with an order to be a bit forceful about getting what we needed. The professor panicked, unfortunately, and that’s when my last order, to get his ’ead if he went up in smoke, should have been followed. I know I told you ’bout that, that someone could revive ’im all nice and proper even if all we ’ad was his head. But we didn’t get it, and he panicked. It wasn’t taken, so now we’re all ’ere in this little dust-up.”

“Self-protection!” Brian burst out, before clenching his jaw shut.

“Aye, it was, you thought, but need not ’ave been if you’d just listened to my lads before assuming the worst of their intentions. Now you have t’start all over again and construct your old rites, and nothing I can do but watch.” Steptoe dropped his hand from his heart. “I know I ain’t always been on the right side of matters, but we went in with the best of hopes, but ’e wouldn’t listen. Prejudged and all that. I am on your side. Truly.”

Morty snorted. I stood, pondering what someone it was who could have revived the professor from just his head and if we’d have to resort to finding them, after all, when Steptoe interrupted my thoughts.

“Now see? That’s what I mean. Prejudged.”

Our Iron Dwarf stomped a foot. “Judged based on past actions, and rightfully so.”

“It’s not wrong t’ say we’ve been opposites before and likely will be again, but not now. Now we’re all in the boat together, it’s full of leaks and we’re all likely to sink lessen we help one another.”

“So we can just trust you now? And in what way would we have to be knowing that?” Morty ended with a harrumph of dissatisfaction.

“Because I’m ’ere, in broad daylight, and not skulkin’ about in the shadows.” Steptoe straightened his coat jacket. “I have my values, you know.”

“Crooked though they might be.” Brian straightened his shoulders. “I remember an alliance or two as well as a betrayal and more.”

“Oh, now your brain is wakin’ up,” Steptoe said dryly.

“You should be pleased. If I were more awake, you’d probably be even less trusted. I tend to agree with my companion Mortimer, for he has been by my side through hard and lean times, and that I do remember.”

“Something you cannot claim.” Mortimer looked down his nose at his target, difficult to do at his height, but he managed. “You cannot bandy loyalty about.”

“Oh?” Steptoe raised an eyebrow at him, before adding smoothly, “I might have an idea where your wife is and who took her and why, but no one wants to ask me.”

“Don’t you be dragging Goldie into this!”

Brian glided swiftly in between them, and Morty shouted over his shoulder.

I waited for the fuss to die down a bit before asking, “Do you really?”

“I said I might. I’d ’ave to ask around about, ’ere and there, but it’s not beyond the realm of imagination. I could find out.”

“That’s a favor I won’t be making a bargain with you for!”

Steptoe shrugged at Mortimer. “Suit yourself. Not like he’s going to be any help for a while,” and nodded to Brian. “Not that I want to be dragged into this, but did you ever think she might have gone over, that she was never taken at all?”

Morty exploded, and I don’t know how Brian held him back as the two of them scuffled but Brian did, or maybe the new crystal in the cane had an effect because it blazed white-hot when Brian threw his arms up to stop Morty in his tracks. Steptoe danced a quick two paces back.

Whatever it was, it worked, a little, although Morty’s shoulders went tense and stayed that way. He made noises like an old train’s steam engine while his ears blazed red, and I made a note to myself to stay out of his way if he ever got this angry again.

“Don’t. Ever. Mention. My. Wife. Again.”

Steptoe put his hands up in the air. “I’m not givin’ away any secrets here, Master Broadstone. She comes from a tribe born on the dark side of the street, more oft than not, and ’er family, the sisters in particular, were none of them too ’appy when she took up with the likes of marrying you. That’s to her credit, of course, choosing to follow a lighter side, but who knows? She might have regretted that decision later, and now that I’ve said my piece on that, I’ll keep my tongue as you wish,” he ended up, even as Morty shrugged one last mighty time against whatever hold Brian had on him.

“Now I sense that whatever ’elp I might have asked from any of you ’as up and gone. My fault, I know, but some words just need to be said.”

“I’m still listening.” Three heads turned to look at me. “Well, I am. I don’t seem to have the same kind of baggage you guys have.” I shrugged. Just a missing, presumed-dead father with gambling problems, not magic and alliances gone awry. Not that it wasn’t fascinating trying to listen and try to read all that seemed to be going on between the lines, but if I had thought my reality was freaky, all I had to do was step into theirs. “I still don’t know what it was you wanted from the professor in the first place.”

“The library,” said Steptoe. “I need a book from the professor’s precious library.” He wouldn’t meet my eyes, so I wondered if there had been something more.

“Which you got burned. The entire house went up in flames,” I reminded him.

He shook his head. “Not that room. Warded, it was, and inspectors have it taped off, but it stands, a little bit worse for smoke and some water, but the library stands. I can’t get into it though, with the inspectors poking around and the professor not about to give permission.”

“Does it stand? Really?” Brian’s voice broke. I remembered vaguely that Carter had told me that. Events had chased it from my thoughts.

“It does, and all I’m askin’ is a bit of wisdom from one o’ the professor’s valuable books. Not the whole book, mind you. Just a look-see at its precious pages. Won’t touch the book, won’t keep it, just a read.”

That almost sounded innocent unless I remembered that his cohorts were willing to beat the permission out of Brandard in the first place. Still, it seemed doable, depending on the book and if the professor, once restored, would allow it. I traded looks with Brian. He gave a diffident twitch of his head.

“All right,” I told him. “I’ll do my best to get you an entrance into the library and a look at a specific book, if I get permission from the professor and authorities to do so.”

“Best deal I’ve ’eard all day. Done.” And Steptoe put his hand out for a shake.

We touched and I could feel a tingle across my palm, a little shocking and definitely surprising, and from the quick expression on Steptoe’s swarthy face, he had been caught unaware, too. We dropped hands quickly.

“Now.” He fished out ten or so of those explosive pebbles and dropped them into my palm. “Just a tad more powerful than the last batch, seeing as you might need them.”

“Th—”

“Don’t ever,” Morty cut me off and stated, “thank one of us.”

“Why ever not?”

“It leads to more complications.”

“Ooohkay. That’s very kind of you,” I substituted.

“Better.” Morty tugged his vest and shirt back into place, like a cat smoothing down his fur after a troubling patch, plaid coat wrinkling over massive shoulders, and motioned toward the street beyond. “We’d better head back.”

“You’re all done here?”

Brian hung back in doubt. “You think we’re not?”

Steptoe drew his lips together and made a little face. “I grant that little bauble does light up the day, but . . .”

“It’s not nearly all that’s needed.” Brian let out a sigh. “Keep a watch,” and before any of us could say, “Don’t do it!” he was back over the railing and up the steps to the block on top of it and this time, without a boost from Morty, he hitched himself up until he was nose to nose with the bronze crab again. Holding on by one elbow, he tossed the cane to me and then swept the crevice about the sculpture with his free hand. The only thing that came scuttling to life this time was an impressive orange and red autumn leaf, which had evidently been imprisoned between the stones since last fall. It had held onto its temporary glory, keeping its colors and suppleness despite the fact that its many peers had browned and gone to dust long ago. He let it drop and it wafted to the ground near my shoes, so I picked it up and pocketed it, Steptoe watching every movement. He smiled as I finished and began walking off to the street.

He called to Brian, “Wot now, professor?”

Brian jumped down and cast a look to the sky in thought. Then a slow smile came across his face. “I feel like a smoke.”

“What?”

He dipped his head to the rest of us. “Quite. A bit of fine tobacco while we’re in the city, and I know just the place, on Broadway, not far from Columbia. A little cigar boutique. It may have lost some of its cachet now that we can trade with Cuba again, but it should still be doing business.”

“Smoking?”

“Indeed.”

It seemed to me like a little bit of power had gone to Brian’s head, but he had a point. While we were in the city, now would be the time to visit a tobacconist. We headed toward the edge of the park, the ribbon of the street coming into view when they hit us, out of the sky, like a tornado.

Because I was in the front, I caught the brunt of the ambush, feeling a whoosh of foul-smelling air before a heavy object crashed into me, knocking me off my feet and into the brush, as a screeching tore the calm out of the afternoon and set my ears to bleeding. Senses reeling, it was the only thing I realized as I clapped my hands to my head and brought them away dribbling with blood.