and eyed the bottle of red wine clutched in Molly’s hand. ‘Now there’s a friend on a cold night like this. Not many of those left downstairs, nor any more likely to come our way. The ingenuity of those that owned the vineyards crushed like their own grapes in the monstrous killing machines the revolution has raised in Quatérshift.’
Molly watched Coppertracks extend the tubing of his telescope to its maximum length, a clockwork-driven engine doing the heavy lifting. ‘I thought with the new observatory in the Free State at your service, you’d be using your telescope less now?’
‘So I had planned,’ said Coppertracks. ‘But last night I experienced a disturbing dream, a visitation from the Steamo Loas, urging me to seek the pattern of the stars in the toss of the Gear-gi-ju cogs.’
‘Say you did not,’ said the commodore. ‘Throwing your blessed cogs like dice and shedding oil you can ill afford at your age, murmuring like a gypsy seer.’
‘My people ignore the advice of the Steamo Loas at our peril, dear mammal,’ said Coppertracks. ‘Of course I performed the ritual of Gear-gi-ju at the Loas’ urging.’
Molly had an uneasy feeling about this. After her own communion with the Hexmachina a couple of days ago, a fruitless search for any sign of where her old ally in high adventure, Oliver Brooks, might be now had turned up nothing more than a trail of tall stories in the penny dreadfuls and almost-as-fictional accounts from the lurid crime pages of the capital’s news sheets. The warning from the Hexmachina seemed like a dream. At least, Molly deeply hoped it had all been a bad dream.
‘And what did the pattern of your mortal tossed cogs reveal?’ asked the commodore.
‘The Eye of Eridgius,’ said Coppertracks. ‘The ancient astronomers’ name for Ashby’s Comet.’
‘Is that all? And we are well shot of that, then. Off past the sun, you said. A fare-thee-well until the comet returns in a thousand years’ time.’
Coppertracks’ telescope swept along the sky, fixing on the position where the comet should be, the steamman’s mu-bodies setting up a table to take notes of their master’s observations. Coppertracks raised an iron finger to tap his transparent skull in perplexity. ‘This is most irregular.’
Molly moved out of the way of one of his scuttling drones. ‘What is it, old steamer?’
‘Ashby’s Comet has disappeared!’
‘Maybe that wicked flying star has finally burnt itself out?’ said the commodore.
‘That’s not how the mechanics of a comet work,’ chided Coppertracks. He returned to the telescope, placing his vision plate on the rim of the device, swivelling the assembly’s axis across different portions of the heavens. ‘It is not one of your night’s fireworks. Where have you gone to, now, you erratic little—’ Coppertracks emitted a startled fizz of static from his voicebox. ‘This cannot – this is impossible!’
Coppertracks abandoned the telescope, his diminutive drones already rolling out large tracts of paper on the table behind their master, pencils in their hands, scrawling at a frantic pace – filling the cream vellum emptiness with calculations and equations. Molly pressed her right eye to the telescope. Against the inky canvas sat a tiny crimson dot so small it might as well have been a fleck of brick dust blown off Tock House’s walls.
‘You’ve located it again, then?’ said Molly. ‘The comet looks so small now.’
‘It should be far smaller,’ said Coppertracks from the table, the fire under his skull-top pulsing with the energies of his vast intellect. ‘And more to the point, the comet should be in a totally different quadrant of the sky.’
‘Those calculations you received from King Steam’s new observatory must have been off by a margin, then,’ said the commodore. ‘Sure and it’s happened to me often enough, plotting a course underwater with only the stars and the maths on an old transaction engine to see
Molly watched Coppertracks extend the tubing of his telescope to its maximum length, a clockwork-driven engine doing the heavy lifting. ‘I thought with the new observatory in the Free State at your service, you’d be using your telescope less now?’
‘So I had planned,’ said Coppertracks. ‘But last night I experienced a disturbing dream, a visitation from the Steamo Loas, urging me to seek the pattern of the stars in the toss of the Gear-gi-ju cogs.’
‘Say you did not,’ said the commodore. ‘Throwing your blessed cogs like dice and shedding oil you can ill afford at your age, murmuring like a gypsy seer.’
‘My people ignore the advice of the Steamo Loas at our peril, dear mammal,’ said Coppertracks. ‘Of course I performed the ritual of Gear-gi-ju at the Loas’ urging.’
Molly had an uneasy feeling about this. After her own communion with the Hexmachina a couple of days ago, a fruitless search for any sign of where her old ally in high adventure, Oliver Brooks, might be now had turned up nothing more than a trail of tall stories in the penny dreadfuls and almost-as-fictional accounts from the lurid crime pages of the capital’s news sheets. The warning from the Hexmachina seemed like a dream. At least, Molly deeply hoped it had all been a bad dream.
‘And what did the pattern of your mortal tossed cogs reveal?’ asked the commodore.
‘The Eye of Eridgius,’ said Coppertracks. ‘The ancient astronomers’ name for Ashby’s Comet.’
‘Is that all? And we are well shot of that, then. Off past the sun, you said. A fare-thee-well until the comet returns in a thousand years’ time.’
Coppertracks’ telescope swept along the sky, fixing on the position where the comet should be, the steamman’s mu-bodies setting up a table to take notes of their master’s observations. Coppertracks raised an iron finger to tap his transparent skull in perplexity. ‘This is most irregular.’
Molly moved out of the way of one of his scuttling drones. ‘What is it, old steamer?’
‘Ashby’s Comet has disappeared!’
‘Maybe that wicked flying star has finally burnt itself out?’ said the commodore.
‘That’s not how the mechanics of a comet work,’ chided Coppertracks. He returned to the telescope, placing his vision plate on the rim of the device, swivelling the assembly’s axis across different portions of the heavens. ‘It is not one of your night’s fireworks. Where have you gone to, now, you erratic little—’ Coppertracks emitted a startled fizz of static from his voicebox. ‘This cannot – this is impossible!’
Coppertracks abandoned the telescope, his diminutive drones already rolling out large tracts of paper on the table behind their master, pencils in their hands, scrawling at a frantic pace – filling the cream vellum emptiness with calculations and equations. Molly pressed her right eye to the telescope. Against the inky canvas sat a tiny crimson dot so small it might as well have been a fleck of brick dust blown off Tock House’s walls.
‘You’ve located it again, then?’ said Molly. ‘The comet looks so small now.’
‘It should be far smaller,’ said Coppertracks from the table, the fire under his skull-top pulsing with the energies of his vast intellect. ‘And more to the point, the comet should be in a totally different quadrant of the sky.’
‘Those calculations you received from King Steam’s new observatory must have been off by a margin, then,’ said the commodore. ‘Sure and it’s happened to me often enough, plotting a course underwater with only the stars and the maths on an old transaction engine to see
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