The Clockwork Nightingale's Song by Amy Rae Durreson

Author:Amy Rae Durreson
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: steampunk, london, inventor, class divide, nightingale
Publisher: Amy Rae Durreson

He was expecting it to be awkward when he arrived back at Marchmont’s workshop, but Marchmont merely greeted him with, “Weatherproofing?”

“Could we add caulking and a protective coating without changing the weight distribution?” Shem asked, coming over to the bench. The workshop already looked messier than it had when he left the day before.

They fell back into yesterday’s rhythm easily enough, though there were a few moments when Shem looked up to find Marchmont staring at him with a faint frown, as if trying to work out a puzzle. Neither of them mentioned the previous evening, and Shem knew he should have been relieved that Marchmont dropped it easily. He just felt sad, though, and a little more conscious of how easy it was to be alone in this world. It didn’t help when their hands bumped over their work and sent another pang through him.

An hour didn’t seem like very long, and Marchmont was clearly irritated when he left. It was no surprise when Marchmont appeared in the Gardens again, bringing the nightingale home to sing out its heart. He wasn’t as tired tonight, or maybe just more guarded, but Shem walked him back to the gate anyway, neither of them saying much.

There was no easy solution to the challenge posed by the nightingale: it had never been designed to fly. Marchmont continued to work on it with an intensity Shem didn’t quite understand. He knew there were other projects waiting for the inventor’s attention, but this one seemed to have become an obsession.

By the end of the week, they had a routine, and something that, if it wasn’t for the class divide, Shem might have termed a friendship. He learned his way around Marchmont’s workshop and ventured the odd comment about his own life in response to Marchmont’s babble. He managed to make Marchmont fall quiet and think a few times too, by challenging the little sneering comments Marchmont made about people less brilliant or educated than him. Shem was fairly certain there was no real unkindness in the man; he had simply never bothered to think about society in the same way he did about his designs. It must be nice to have that freedom.

The summer turned sweltering. At least the air above the permanent veil of smog was cooler, and Shem was always awed by the nights when lightning crackled across the skies and caught at the tips of the firework towers, even though it was bad for profits. His work settled back into its usual pattern, and he gradually entrusted the boy with more independent work.

Marchmont appeared in the nightingale’s grove before every dawn. Sometimes he stalked straight off home again, but often he stayed for breakfast, addressing most of his conversation at Shem, but learning the names and skills of some of the other mechanics too. They all regarded him with a wary interest that slowly changed to a careful tolerance. The rich were odd, everyone knew, and geniuses even more so, and if his lordship wanted to eat with them, that was just another eccentricity.

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