The Iron Duke by Meljean Brook Page B

through the Blacksmith’s shop who didn’t feel as if they still owed him, even if they’d paid their debt in full or completed the task he’d asked of them.
    And for those who didn’t feel loyalty, and those who weren’t indebted, there were always those who feared him.
    From behind her, she heard Newberry’s step falter when the Blacksmith emerged from a laboratory into the corridor. Mina had tried to prepare the constable by describing the Blacksmith’s appearance, but she supposed preparation was impossible—just as most people who’d been told about her mother’s eyes still reacted with shock when they saw her.
    The Blacksmith had the same silver eyes, but the modification hadn’t stopped there. Every inch of skin not covered by his shirtsleeves and brown trousers was the pale gray of mechanical flesh, shaped to mimic human features. The effect, Mina had to admit, was uncanny. With steel prosthetics, the difference between the human parts and the machine was obvious. Even prosthetics made of mechanical flesh, sculpted to match the person’s natural limbs in everything but color, didn’t generate a shiver of unease on the first glance. But when it was the face—the whole face—something beyond the hairless gray skin seemed wrong, even if Mina couldn’t have pointed to a feature that didn’t look and move as it should. Perhaps it was simply not knowing whether the face that the Blacksmith owned was his. Had he modeled the broad forehead and high cheekbones on his natural features, or did they serve a different function?
    That unsettling effect was compounded by his appearance denying any attempt to place him—and Mina thought that most disturbed anyone first meeting him. He could have been an American native or the Horde, or from the islands in the South Seas. He could have had Liberé blood, descended from the Africans who’d managed to flee the Horde on French ships, mixed with European or the few Russians who’d escaped to the New World, instead of running north to the Scandinavian countries.
    But although the Blacksmith’s lineage was impossible to guess, his origins weren’t. Mina had once met a man from Australia—the Japanese districts in the north, rather than the southern territories that teemed with smugglers—and she thought the Blacksmith’s accent resembled his.
    To her surprise, he and the duke clasped forearms in greeting, as if no formality existed between them. That impression was strengthened when the Blacksmith simply said, “Trahaearn.”
    “Blacksmith,” the duke replied, dashing Mina’s hope that she might learn his real name.
    Maybe he didn’t have one, however. Many children raised in the Horde’s crèches weren’t given family names. Most named themselves, as Trahaearn probably had, or made their occupation a surname. Perhaps “blacksmith” was his only identity.
    “Inspector.” The Blacksmith looked to Mina before his mirrored gaze settled on Newberry. “You share the same nanoagents.”
    “My father’s,” Mina said. “He infected us both.”
    “Yes, I recognize them. He assisted me during your mother’s operation. He’s a skilled physician.”
    Mina would make a point to repeat that to her father later. “Yes.”
    The Blacksmith nodded and approached Newberry, taking the heavy ice box from him. The bugs made everyone strong; even Mina could have carried it braced against her chest. The Blacksmith tucked it under his arm like a pillow.
    To Mina’s disappointment, he led them into an office, not a laboratory. Still, she had plenty to look at while he set the chest on a desk. A tall armored suit stood in the corner, less clunky than the Royal Marines’ steelcoats, too small for the Blacksmith to wear—and probably far too heavy for anyone to walk in without a boiler to operate the limbs. A curious device sat on a shelf: a smooth, foot-long spike atop a solid cube. It didn’t seem to have any moveable parts, but it might have been a puzzle bank, which