Finally seen for what he truly is Alonzo must ask himself the most difficult question of all.

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Who He Was

Alonzo

 

A great fog rolled in from the sea. It covered the city in a blanket of white-cold, sapping the strength from the air and going straight to the bone. Men bent almost double as they scurried from doorway to doorway, lured into those nooks by the false promise of shelter. Regardless of coats or mittens the winter reached deep into the breast of every living thing in the Sheer, turning its hand in a vise-like grip as though it could steal their very hearts.

Only the nutcracker men marched tall, undisturbed by the cold. They collected the frozen corpses of match-sellers and beggars alike, dragging them out from archways and lees. Even those who lived above the Teeth were not immune, and the nutcrackers found plenty of work hefting the bodies of choir boys, outcast lovers, governesses, and one lordling who had inexplicably removed every stitch of silk and cotton before laying down stark naked in the snow.

There was little to do but wait. Spring would come, but the people who said so did not seem to believe it, and so Alonzo did not listen.

He sat on a new bench, directly beside the window. Behind him, in the workshop, the stove and kiln roared away, making the big room cozy and warm. Though he had no heat of his own Alonzo pressed his arms in tight to his chest, as Jacques was doing, in imitation.

The toymaker had moved his primary workbench directly alongside the kiln, and he tried to work both facing it and facing away, which did not seem to be working very well. Nevertheless, he smiled and hummed as he worked, producing a tune that sounded familiar yet out of reach.

Alonzo, for his part, turned back to the window. The slate Jacques had bought him lay on the bench, scattered with broken chalk. No matter how hard he tried he could not clasp the pieces gently enough to use them. Instead he traced a finger through the thick frost on the glass, pressing harder when the cold ivory failed to produce the desired effect.

“Patience, Alonzo,” Jacques said without looking up. “I am almost finished.”

Alonzo rolled his eyes. He had had enough of patience.

Though Jacques was certainly in a better mood than usual he had spent all his time ordering parts for the Lady Trimaris and sketching designs of her inner workings. Sheafs of paper littered the nearby tables, some in orderly stacks, others strewn about. Every single page was covered with notes, notes scrawled in tiny, nearly-unreadable handwriting.

Bolts of silk, boning for stays, an unstyled black wig with its tresses hanging down, boxes of cams and gears and metal rods, canvas for lungs, kidskin–even the brass skeleton of a dancer, her mechanisms pulled apart and studied–waited for Jacques to put them together. At the toymaker’s words Alonzo threw the whole, disordered pile of it a contemptuous, jealous glance and went back to scratching patterns in the frost.

He could not reach any of the books from his current perch, could not expand his knowledge any further. And how desperately he longed to read them, too! How much he wanted to carefully–so carefully–turn the pages and uncover their secrets.

Once, Jacques had brought down a collection of fashion plates, their clothes hand-painted after the book had been bound. What an awakening that had been! Alonzo remembered seeing with delight that there were other people like himself, other men and women done up in makeup and curling hair, their rich silks and jacquards practically jumping off the paper. One tiny rip, however, as he’d struggled to grasp the knife-thin edge of the page, had ended that venture. Now the books waited, just across the room, on the highest shelf, where they could be seen but certainly not touched.

That was not the only thing Alonzo ached to get his hands on, either. Quite close to Jacques, but almost out of sight behind the doll cabinet, stood a dress mannequin–and it was wearing Alonzo’s coat.

Perhaps Jacques thought Alonzo could not see it from his new place by the window, but he could, if only one pearly sleeve and the frothy suggestion of lace. It must be meant as a surprise, for Alonzo could not recall Jacques making it. The garment had simply appeared one day, tucked away as though it were not meant to be seen.

From time to time Alonzo stole a glance over his shoulder, trying to be nonchalant. When Jacques looked up Alonzo turned back quickly, feigning disinterest.

“At last,” the toymaker breathed. He warmed his hands by the fire, front and back, and then rose, clutching Alonzo’s final piece.

The ivory foot gleamed in the firelight. It folded forward to point the toes and flexed to splay them. Each piece interlocked with a golden ball joint, just like his fingers.

Jacques manipulated it fully, running his thumb over and over again along the arch. He sighed. “Whatever I make after you, my dear, you can be certain you are my greatest work. Nothing can rival you, no doll, no creature of clockwork. Even the machinations of Marquette–grand though they may be–cannot hold a candle to you.” Coming forward he knelt in the cold air in front of Alonzo’s bench, grabbed his tools, and set quickly to work attaching foot to ankle. “I don’t know what I was thinking,” he murmured, “trying to make an automaton that could be mistaken for a man. To quiet the dreaming, perhaps. But no matter, you are here now and you are whole, and the work is done. There. Let us see if you can stand.”

Even though it was not made of flesh Alonzo felt his heart thrum–turning faster and faster–as he made ready to move under his own power for the first time.

Jacques took one hand and Alonzo steadied himself on the bench with the other. He shifted his weight, a sensation that was not entirely new, and reached down with one toe outstretched.

He felt the resistance as the ivory met the floor. It was not like having skin–not at all–but the stone seemed almost to push back against him and so he knew that his foot could go no farther.

The body Jacques had built was more than a marvel. It moved as Alonzo wished it to, as quick as thought. He did not fully understand it, but the blue jewel of his heart and the serapin cores through the ivory limbs served to carry his intentions out, as naturally as if he had been a man.

He found his center of balance with little difficulty and stood. Slowly he removed his hand from the bench and waited, breathless.

Jacques backed away, leaving Alonzo to steady himself on his own. “One foot in front of the other, now. Come to me.”

This was different. Alonzo frowned as he tried to lift one foot without falling over. Jacques started to speak but Alonzo shook his head, thinking hard.

Twice more he tested, listening harder to his body than he ever had before. He couldn’t feel the way Jacques could, but he had spent the past few months leaning and reaching, so there must be some trick to it.

Alonzo’s eyes missed nothing. He watched as Jacques moved, suddenly aware of how the other man’s body shifted slightly from side to side. Alonzo imitated him, swaying as if in a breeze. Resting his fingertips on the tables to either side, Alonzo leaned left ever so slightly and raised his right foot. He set it down a pace farther out. Then the other foot came after. Lean, lift. Lean, lift.

A grin he could not contain spread across his face, infectious and young. Instead of going right to Jacques Alonzo attempted the same trick backwards. It was more difficult, but not impossible. He twisted his body and it took him several tries to attempt a sideways motion, for it was vastly different than everything else.

First a shuffle, then a walk. Alonzo raised himself up on his toes, as he had seen the silver ballet dolls do in their display case.

“Goddess.”

He turned to see Jacques, unmoved from his spot several tables away, standing with a hand to his mouth. “Alive,” the toymaker murmured, “there is no other word for it. Not simply thinking, not simply questioning. I thought…I hoped, but…”

Alonzo went to him, taking Jacques’ fingers and kissing the back of them as a gentleman might. He smiled, trying to distract Jacques from the strange mood that seemed to be gripping him.

“Stone and ivory, gold and resin, word and thought; together making, what, a child? A man? Certainly no automaton–clockwork given life–Goddess,” Jacques said again. “Not even Baron Marquette could boast such a thing. It is one matter to see your work in pieces, awaiting construction. You cannot see the whole of it.

“I knew you were more, of course, I always knew. But to see you move is…it is like nothing else. What have I made?” he asked, almost whispering as he took Alonzo’s face in his hands. “And how much of it was me…and how much was you?”

Alonzo didn’t know what to say. Jacques, he mouthed, and immediately had a fright.

Jacques grasped Alonzo’s shoulders, his eyes wide. “By the muses–Yes! ‘She will live’, that’s what the seer said to me. If I can replicate…without the stone, but I must. Oh my dear, this is what she meant; life, real life. Seeing you like this simply proves it can be done.”

“I won’t fail the Baron, Trimaris will–”

Before he could continue the door to the shop, which neither of them had heard open, slammed shut. The familiar voice of Thomasine preceded her by mere moments as she stepped through the curtain and into the workshop. “Master Augusti, you must come quick! There’s a firecat that’s just had kittens in Medtown and–”

Her patchwork skirt, puffed out by the many layers underneath, swirled around her feet. Woolen mittens capped her hands into delicate ovals and a many-colored scarf draped itself artfully over her shoulders. Though she brought a gust of frigid air in with her, her pale cheeks were pinched pink by the wind. She had a wide, generous mouth, calm yet earnest eyes, and a cascade of golden hair. And she was the most beautiful person Alonzo had ever seen.

In fact, she was the only person he had seen other than Jacques. Alonzo stepped forward, almost involuntarily.

Thomasine stopped, her gaze meeting Alonzo’s like some amberic current. She saw at once what it had taken Jacques until just now to discover, her intelligence recognizing his. Alonzo could practically see the words changing inside her; not ‘clockwork’ but person.

“Hello,” she began, half-smiling, but did not get to finish.

Jacques stepped between them. “Get out,” he said, and his voice was low and hard.

“But–”

Jacques–

Alonzo clung desperately to the toymaker’s arm, begging. But his balance was not entirely true yet and as Jacques shook him off Alonzo flailed and had to grab for a chair to keep from falling.

The older man advanced on Thomasine, his whole body rigid with anger. “You dare to barge in here, after I made my intentions clear? You think to spy on my work–”

“No, Master Augusti, I only wanted–”

“To what?” he snapped. “To discover my secrets, my techniques, without having to work for them yourself?”

Beautiful Thomasine, her whole body wincing as if stung, spoke over him, racing to get her words out. “–what you’ve made here, he’s lovely, why hide him away? Is it clockwork that powers him or something else, perhaps? The mechanics for the mouth–Ah! Those eyes!–the fingers are so delicate, yet so articulate! Master Augusti, how on earth did you manage it? Or did he come to you that way?” Her eyes were alight with artificer’s passion and she took a step toward Alonzo, hands outstretched.

“Don’t touch him!” He shuffled Alonzo behind a curtain at the back of the shop, closing the fabric with a swift tug. “Some things are not for you to see, Sa Thomasine.”

Alonzo balked. He tried to grip the curtain but Jacques was holding it tight. Oh, how could the toymaker be so cruel–and for seemingly no reason?

Thomasine was equal to Jacques, however. She spoke clearly, neither shouting not whispering, and her voice trembled only a little. “For someone so passionate about his craft, for someone who can see the beauty in iron, who can turn brass into gold and silver statues into life-like creatures, for a man with the talent to repair the nutcrackers, you certainly are a miser when it comes to knowledge. You’re not going to live forever, Sar Augusti, and when you die someone should benefit from all that you know.”

Before he could speak again she stopped him, though Alonzo did not see how. “No, don’t bother. You’ve made it clear we’re nothing but inconvenient nuisances. Take your ivory lover and your solitude, and much good may they do you.”

Alonzo heard her draw away, towards the door. He poked his head out from the curtain, now that Jacques was no longer standing by. Thomasine met his eyes just once, and he thought that it was a sad look, though there was anger there as well.

She turned away and left, without saying goodbye. Through the glass of the shop window, what little was not obscured by the forward curtain, Alonzo saw Thomasine press a hand to her face and then vanish down the close.

“Peace at last,” Jacques said, swiping the cloth across the opening. “Don’t pay her any mind, my dear.”

Alonzo clenched and unclenched his fists, the ivory clicking as he did so. He didn’t understand why Jacques was acting this way. Thomasine seemed kind and beautiful, and from all the conversations he had overheard, he knew at once that he would have been able to talk with her for hours. He didn’t feel angry, simply confused.

Unbidden his thoughts pinged out, a mental barrage asking why over and over.

“Because,” Jacques said, sitting Alonzo down so he could inspect the feet. “Not everyone in the Sheer is what they appear to be. There are thieves and cutthroats–some who look like ruffians and some who do not–who would not think twice of spiriting you away and taking you apart, yes, my dear, even that,” he murmured when Alonzo gasped in fear, “to take the gold from your hands, the gears from your chest, even your precious heart, which I am certain they would have no trouble selling to the highest bidder.”

“You see, Alonzo? Even if Thomasine and Tadeo and Savoy do not mean to harm you they have too much of the city in them. They can think only of themselves and their own advancement. Their minds are like machines; seeking every opportunity to improve, every margin by which they might profit. And if they thought that disassembling you would further that goal I have no doubt they would do it.”

Alonzo did not agree and said so, leaning on Jacques with his mind that while he was not as certain about Tadeo and Savoy, he could not believe sweet Thomasine would ever do something so wicked.

“Perhaps not her, then,” Jacques conceded, “but she would no doubt talk of you. And sooner or later that talk would get back to someone who would steal you away.” His brown hands caressed Alonzo’s cheek briefly before returning to their finite adjustments. “One day I will show you the city, and all the waltzes of life therein, but not today. Be assured, however, that all I do I do to protect you. To keep you safe.”

Alonzo met his eyes. He watched as a lock of ebony hair fell across Jacques’ forehead and was brushed away. Still, their gaze did not waver. He saw into Jacques as he was once able to see the thoughts of the other sleeping stones, saw the toymaker’s passion and intensity, and yes, his skill.

For a long moment Alonzo felt himself at the center of a stage, the spotlight on him hot yet welcome. Was this…love? The kind of love only spoken about in opera; tragic and beautiful, big enough to shake the world. Like a solo Alonzo felt his heart singing and he reached out to Jacques, searching for confirmation and, perhaps, the refrain of a duet.

Yet the subtleties of romance eluded him. Jacques turned away, closing himself off as he usually did with a frown and the brusque dismissal of Alonzo’s thoughts. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves. A gentleman learns one thing at a time, and your education is far from finished. Come, Alonzo, there is much to teach you yet; you have not begun to dance.”

As he rose to follow Jacques to the dress mannequin Alonzo felt a tightening in his breast, running underneath the current of excitement. For the first time, but not the last, he silently asked himself, But what am I for?