Coldmaker(91)

I swallowed hard, shutting the lid of the chest so I could think for a moment. I felt I was back on the banks of the Kiln holding Abb’s empty bucket, Sister Gale racing across the river to caress my face. The Frost had awoken something in me. Suddenly my hands itched to tinker more than they’d ever done before. I felt frantic, as if I’d woken up from a long sleep and was supposed to be somewhere an hour ago.

Shilah crept closer to the crate, putting her hand on the wood. She flinched away at first, not expecting the freezing cold temperature of it either, but she breathed in, and set her hand down again.

‘Maybe you did talk to the Crier,’ Shilah said, her voice an awed whisper.

I took another deep breath, Shilah and I exchanging a look and then lifting the lid back off together.

The Frost was almost too much to look at. This Cold was truly holy.

I thought about all the Jadans and all the barracks that this could keep alive, and I knew it had come to me for a reason. That those nights sweating on the rooftops and sifting through rubbish had been worth the risk. That every lash I’d endured meant something, and that every piece of pain I’d suffered was valuable. That every little thing I’d created in the past had been in preparation for this very moment.

All so a Frost might end up in the hands of a Jadan Inventor.

I’d have my answers.

Half a night later and the wave of excitement I’d been riding had faded to nothing. I hovered over my tinkering table, materials and tools spread across the entire surface. My knuckles creaked as I rested my weight on the wood, my eyelids heavy and my frustration rampant.

Shilah was curled up in a chair beside me, fast asleep, her hair unbraided and blanketing the top half of her face. I stopped myself from reaching over to tuck it behind her ear.

The fatigue was winning, however. As the night progressed, my experiments shifted from thoughtful to downright weird. I’d been scared to touch it at first, but now the Frost lay suspended in a makeshift hammock I’d strung across an upside-down stool, and my current test involved sprinkling Rose of Gilead petals over the Cold to see if there was a reaction. There was none. I’d discovered early in the night that the Frost was impenetrable, unlike other types of Cold. Not crushable, not breakable, not anything. I thought maybe I could extract a small chunk to add to Leroi’s solution in the marked clay pot, but found my efforts rebuffed. Scraping a blade across its surface was useless, and if anything, the sheen seemed to grow stronger under the drag of the knife, lighting up, as if the Frost was laughing at my feeble attempts. I tried wetting a boilweed swab and rubbing it gently on the surface, as a droplet of water would melt away a tiny section of any other Cold, but the Frost refused to yield.

I’d even done some nonsense experiments that I was glad Shilah was too asleep to witness. I burned some incense. I took the Bellows and blew long ineffective puffs across its surface. I tickled its belly with a silk handkerchief. Held magnets on either side. Quietly sang the Jadan’s Anthem to it. Traced the Opened Eye symbol on it with melted candlewax. Dusted it with prayer sand from Marlea. In a final desperate sleep-deprived attempt, I’d even offered it a fig.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, I was getting nowhere.

Whatever I tried, nothing happened, but I couldn’t shake the feeling that I was missing something.

But for now, my neck was aching, my arms were weak, and I was starting to see things moving in the shadows.

I decided a little rest wouldn’t hurt, so I sat down and closed my eyes.

‘Nice work putting the “ink” in tinkering, Little Builder,’ Abb said with a laugh, standing on top of the Khat’s Pyramid, waving his arms to keep balance.

I looked down, seeing only stone and sand and darkness stretching as far as the eye could see. ‘Looks like you’ve put the father in … the dad in the—’

‘Stick with what you’re good at,’ Abb replied with a wink. ‘Anyway, I’m going to need to go back to the barracks soon, there’s only so many excuses Gramble will believe these days. How about one last story?’

I felt my chest squeeze. ‘Only one?’

‘You want more?’ He stepped closer with a wink. ‘I never thought the son of a Healer would be so greedy.’

I laughed, shaking my head. ‘One is fine.’

Abb put a hand on my shoulder, and pointed over to the thousands of pieces of Cold falling to the Patches in the distance. Thick streaks fell occasionally, and I knew instinctively they were Frosts. We began walking towards the distant stars. I had missed his smell, his presence, and I leaned into him as we moved.

‘Have I told you the story of Alex the Painter before?’

‘I don’t think so.’

He put an arm around me and hugged me tightly against his chest. ‘Well, I’m glad I saved it for last then.’

He slowed our pace, ambling towards the falling stars in the distance. I thought I saw words traced in their wake, reminding me of the prayer he’d sung to me on my birthday.

Abb paused, taking a deep breath. ‘Once there was a young painter named Alex who lived in the small town of Yelish. Alex had a natural gift, but he decided he didn’t want to settle for being good, he wanted to be great. So he travelled the entire World Cried, discovering all the colours and textures and sights he could find. While he was on the road, if a family gave him food and shelter for the night, Alex would paint their walls with beautiful designs in thanks. If he found a sad traveller on the road, he would take out his tools and brush colour on their clothes in exchange for directions. He learned and he grew, and half a lifetime later he did indeed become great. And when Alex returned home to Yelish he painted masterpieces, on canvas and walls and streets, and for years the Jadans there rejoiced. One day Sun decided he was tired of all the beauty that Alex had at his fingertips, so he fell to the land and disguised himself as the Jadan king, showing up at Alex’s door with a deal.