advantage automatons have is that they don’t talk back or complain. Very few tasks need an actively engaged mind.”
“And the mechanics and the alchemists have it covered,” Niobe said. “I understand.”
The market had become larger too, and Mattie regretted not visiting it more often. There were quite a few booths that sold herbs and minerals and bits of rare wildlife. She couldn’t help but stop every few steps, craning her neck at a lovely display of boars’ hooves or bottles with golden oil of uncertain origin.
Niobe followed her, asking occasional questions about the use of plants. She seemed curiously ignorant of their properties, and Mattie quite enjoyed explaining that two piles of small dried blue flowers were, in fact, quite different—one was lavender, the other veronica, and each had its own properties.
Niobe sniffed at the flowers and laughed, and told Mattie that where she came from, all plants were subdivided into blood plants and water plants, plants with yellow sap, and plants that cured nausea. She scoffed at dried salamanders and insisted that only live ones were suitable for harnessing elemental powers, she lingered over large shapeless chunks of rock, her long fingers tracing the silvery veins of precious metals and her soft voice reciting their affinities to sulfur or volcanic fire. Mattie could not remember the last time she had been able to lose herself in conversation so completely.
She lost track of time as well, and the sun was starting to tilt west when they finally emerged from the battleground of the markets, both loaded with precious ingredients and professing mutual surprise at how little they managed to spend in the face of overwhelming temptation.
They entered one of the side streets, and Mattie recognized the jewelry store—the only one in the city that carried lapis lazuli, mother-of-pearl, and large chunks of amber. Mattie used to come there with Loharri—he picked through the precious stones for his projects, while she browsed through the piles of amber, looking for pieces with entrapped insects or bubbles of air from long ago.
As if answering her thoughts, Loharri emerged from the doorway of the jewelry shop. His sharp eyes slid over Mattie to her companion and lingered a bit, before meeting Mattie’s gaze. “Slumming?” he said. “Don’t worry, I am too. Who’s your friend?”
“I’m Niobe,” Niobe said. “Forgive me for not shaking your hand.” She shrugged apologetically at her many parcels.
“Forgiven,” Loharri said. “What’s in the jar?”
“Sheep’s blood,” Niobe said. “What’s your name?”
Loharri frowned a bit. “Loharri’s my name. I am a member of the order of Mechanics. Surely you’ve heard of us?”
Niobe nodded. If she felt out of place or intimidated, she didn’t show it, and Mattie marveled at the difference in her demeanor compared to the latest alchemists’ meeting. “I’ve heard of you. You’re the ones who build all those factories that make it impossible to take a stroll by the river.”
Mattie cringed—Loharri didn’t like being challenged, or addressed in such a familiar manner.
Loharri produced the coldest smile in his repertoire. “Everything has its price. Yet, we managed to do some good—I’m the maker of your friend,” he said, pointing at Mattie. “I’m sure she mentioned me.”
“In passing,” Mattie said. She found it easier being rude to him while Niobe was nearby. “Niobe’s an alchemist, too.”
“I noticed.” Loharri gave a cursory nod of his head. “You will excuse me, but I have a business meeting to attend. I’ll see you tomorrow, Mattie.”
Niobe turned and watched him disappear behind the corner. She then smiled at Mattie. “Quite a character.”
“Yes,” Mattie said, undecided on whether she should feel proud of Loharri or embarrassed by him.
“What happened to his face?”
“I don’t know,” Mattie said. “He rarely tells me anything about himself.”
Niobe sighed and started up the stairs. “They never do,” she remarked in a low voice, apparently addressing herself more than Mattie.
Niobe’s craft proved to be as difficult as it was fascinating. In her cramped laboratory, smaller than Mattie’s and twice as cluttered, Mattie learned to burn blood and refine it through a long, sinuous alembic; Niobe showed her how to mix the blood essence—black powder that smelled of burned horn and rust, and crumbled in Mattie’s fingers—with the viscous resin of rare trees, how to shape the resulting sticky mass into tiny figure and imbue the lifeless homunculus with powers curative or destructive—it didn’t seem to matter to the homunculus, who absorbed poison or antidote with equal ease.
Niobe spoke at length about the properties of blood—its affinity with metals and earth, its ability to