Engn II

II

IIThree years after the destruction of Engn…

Booming explosions shook Finn awake. For a moment, he lay unmoving in bed, slick with sweat, not sure what was real and what was dream. He'd been back inside Engn as the towers and wheels collapsed and bloomed into flame. He'd been in the dormitory as Graves or Croft or Bellow tipped his bed over and began their machine-like kicking. He'd been falling, falling down clanging metal chutes leading to the mines.

But no. He was back home and Engn was long gone. He'd lived in the valley for three years since the destruction. He was safe. Everyone in his family was safe. And yet his bed was lurching as if being shaken by some furious giant. He was fully awake, but the shaking hadn't stopped. This wasn't another nightmare; it was real.

On the shelf opposite, the small wind-up clock his parents had given them as a house-warming gift shuddered into life. It marched its way sideways, twisting around before toppling off and smashing to the floor. Badger, lying curled up on the end of the bed, whined in alarm. Her features blurred as Finn looked at her, as if something was wrong with his eyes.

“What's going on? What's happening?”

Diane's voice beside him was shaky, as if the two of them were rattling along the lane at high speed in a cart rather than lying in bed. Scraps of plaster and dust rained down from the ceiling above them, scratching into his eyes.

“Come on,” he said. “We have to get outside!”

Helping each other, staggering across the swaying room, they blundered their way to the stairs. Badger led the way, more stable on her four legs despite her age, clattering down the steps before them. Finn and Diane followed. Downstairs, their little kitchen had come alive. Pots and cups and cutlery rattled and tinkled as if possessed. Finn stood for a moment watching it all, trying to understand. Diane, still in her thin nightshift, grabbed him by the arm and hauled him through the door.

They ran from the cottage they shared, Mrs. Hampton's old place, and stood looking back from the garden, both panting, holding each other's hand. Badger cowered behind them. It was barely light, the low winter sun just peeping over the line of the hills. Frost gilded every surface. The grass of their little lawn sparkled, but it was sharply cold on Finn's bare feet.

He'd thought, somehow, it would only be their house being shaken to pieces. But, no. The whole world was moving. The ground was suddenly no longer solid; it flowed and bucked beneath them like the sea in a storm. The trees all up the valley sides danced, scattering the last of their leaves as if being blown by a strong wind.

Then, in an instant, it all ceased. A huge silence rolled through the valley, as if every living thing was standing in stunned disbelief. Finn shivered, his clenched jaw muscles hurting sharply. He didn't move, waiting for something to happen, waiting for the world to start making sense again. Diane put her arm around his waist. Her body was warm against his. Relief and shock played across her face as she stared around.

“Finn!”

His father came careering down the lane, still clad in his own nightgown, sandals on his feet he kept slipping out of. In other circumstances, the sight would have been comical.

“Finn! Diane! Are the two of you okay?”

“Yes, yes,” said Diane, her teeth clenched against the cold.

“What's happening?” asked Finn again. “What's going on?”

His father bear-hugged the two of them. His chest was heaving heavily from his sprint down the lane. He replied only when he'd released the two of them. “An earthquake.”

“An earthquake?” said Finn.

He knew what it meant, of course. Still, it was hard to relate such a little word to the power of the real thing. The whole world had shaken. It was like the day Engn fell. The ground had cracked and broken then, too. But there'd been a reason for that – it hadn't just happened. It made sense. “But we don't get earthquakes,” he said.

“No,” said his father. “Not these days.”

There was worry in his father's voice. For some reason, hearing that was worse than the shaking of the solid ground.

“Is mother all right?” he asked. “The house?”

“She's fine. A few plates smashed. These old houses were built to survive a little shaking.”

“Have you heard from Shireen?”

“Your mother's gone up there to see if they're all right.”

“Why didn't you use the line-of-sight?” asked Diane.

His father shook his head. “No good. Everything goes out of alignment when something like this happens. It'll take days to get it all running again. The quake probably heaved up a few roads and power lines, too. Flane is going to be busy getting everything straight. We all are.”

Finn studied his father. What did he mean, something like this? Something like this never happened.

“Is it safe to go back inside?” asked Diane. She was trembling visibly in the freezing morning air. Her hair was long now, flowing and golden. When she'd been on the run, she'd kept it hacked short, so it didn't get in the way. It smelled good as Finn held her close. It was contact with a world that made sense.

“No,” said his father. “There can be aftershocks. Sometimes they last a day or two. It's best not to go in.”

“But we'll need warm clothes and blankets to sleep outside this time of year,” said Diane. “I mean, we can manage, but not the older ones.”

His father nodded. “In the old days folk used to gather together in the Moot Hall. It has deep foundations to withstand the tremors. The wooden walls sway rather than falling over. We'll gather there until we're sure there are no more quakes.”

“I need to find out about my village,” said Diane. “It may have struck there, too.”

“It's a long way off,” said his father. “Perhaps they'll be safe. We can leave a message at the Switch House as we go past. Rory will tell us as soon as we get word from down the valley.”

Now Finn put his arm around Diane, offering her his warmth. The ice on the road sparkled in front of them. Everything was so peaceful, so right. It was too hard to believe what had happened. They started walking, but then Finn remembered something.

“Wait. I have to go back inside, just for a moment.”

“Why?” asked Diane. The suspicion in her voice was clear. She knew very well what he was going in for.

“Connor's image spindle.”

“Finn, no,” said his father. “I told you, it's not safe. Especially not for that. It doesn't matter.”

Finn caught the look passing between Diane and his father. They'd discussed this before. Discussed him and his obsession with the silvery shaft of metal Connor had given him just before they'd destroyed Engn. He knew they didn't understand.

“But it might get damaged if the house does fall down,” said Finn. “The spindle is delicate. Then there's the reader; it barely works as it is. It's taken me months to get it to show any images at all and now it could be smashed to pieces.”

“Then it won't get any more smashed,” said his father.

“I…” But before Finn could reply fully, another deep boom tolled through the air, heavy and solid in the still morning air, the sound rebounding off the stone sides of the mountains. For a moment, none of them spoke, looking around as if for an explanation.

“What was that?” said Diane. “Another earthquake?”

“Nothing shook,” said Finn. “The ground didn't move.”

“It sounded like an explosion,” said his father. “A big explosion, far away.”

They looked at each other, each thinking the same thought, none of them saying it. They'd all heard sounds like it before, although not for three years. But how was that possible? Engn had been destroyed. He had seen it destroyed. They all had.

There'd been rumours, of course. But people liked rumours, liked to make up stories to fill what they didn't actually know. Travelers passed through the valley with wild tales of being pursued by ironclads and the stories grew from there.

Besides, even if the concussion had boomed across the great grass plain, it didn't prove anything. Perhaps some surviving fragment of the machinery had finally corroded or collapsed. Shaken loose by the earthquake, maybe. Or some buried tank of oil had been ignited by a chance flame. That was all it was.

Still, the look of anxiety of the faces of his father and Diane was clear.

“Okay, look,” said Diane. “I can see you're not going to come without the spindle. You go inside the house and grab it. I'll get the reader from the workshop. Then we can get to the Moot House.”

“No,” said Finn. “I don't want you risking yourself.”

“And I don't want you risking yourself,” said Diane, “but you're going to whatever I say, aren't you?”

She was right, of course. She thought he was obsessed with the object Connor had given them. Her meaning was clear. Risking himself meant risking her, too. Risking them. Just as it had before, back in Engn. Risking her was the price he would have to pay.

“Okay,” said Finn. “Just … be careful.”

His father looked troubled, but he didn't say anything. He would have, once. Now, since their return to the valley, he treated both Finn and Diane as grownups. Sometimes, Finn actually wished he wouldn't. Sometimes he wanted to be told what was best, what to do, what everything meant.

“You be quick, both of you,” said his father. “If there's any sign of another quake, come straight out, you hear?”

Finn nodded. “I'll grab some more clothes, too.”

His father held Badger while Finn and Diane ran back to the cottage and the little stone outhouse they used as a combined workshop and wood store.

At the door, Finn slipped on the outdoor shoes he'd left there the evening before, then stepped inside. He trod carefully, as if the slightest footstep could bring the whole house crashing down around his ears. He crossed their kitchen, shards of shattered pottery and glass crunching beneath his feet. On the mantelpiece, over the smoky old iron stove they cooked on, was the stone pot he kept the spindle in, as if it were their most treasured possession. Thankfully the pot was undamaged.

He lifted the slim metal spindle out, holding it carefully by its tip to examine it in the morning sunlight. It looked intact. The tiny etched lines spiralling around it were unblemished. He exhaled with relief. All the answers he sought; they were still there. Still, literally, in his grasp. If only he could read them.

For months after their return to the valley, he hadn't even understood what the spindle was. Connor had given it to him just before he died. It will come in useful. Remember what it was all for. Finn had assumed it was some key or token he hadn't, in the end, needed. Then one of the tinkers passing through the valley, selling broken fragments of Engn machinery to anyone who would buy, had told him what it really was. A memory spindle. Used to record the images from the seeing orbs.

Finn recalled drawers full of the tinkling metal sticks. And Connor had gone to the trouble of giving him this one in the control room. Clearly it was important. Vital. He had only to construct a reader and all his questions about Connor and Engn would be answered. Soon, soon, he would uncover the truth.

Spindle grasped in one hand, he threw warm coats over his arm and picked up shoes for Diane, then crossed back to the doorway. The rising sun dazzled his eyes as he stepped outside, blinding him for a moment. His father was nothing more than a shape, Badger beside him, whining and scrabbling. Then Diane was there, standing in front of him.

“Finn, I'm sorry,” she said. “There was nothing I could do.”

Finn shielded his eyes and squinted to see what she meant. In her arms, she carried the smashed fragments of the memory spindle reader.

It was shattered beyond repair.