Read Online Strange Devices of the Sun and Moon by Lisa Goldstein - Free Book Online Page B

backed away into the street and closed the door.
    Another scream came from the room, and then silence. After what seemed like a long time the door opened and Anthony came out, blood streaming from his arm.
    â€œHas it gone?” George asked. “Are you badly hurt?”
    â€œTake it,” Anthony said. “Quickly.” He held out a small earthenware jar in his unwounded hand.
    â€œI—What do I—”
    â€œQuickly!”
    George took the jar and backed away. The other man’s eyes shone with a strange light, like a Bedlamite’s. Something fell with a loud noise in the house behind him. George turned and ran down the street.
    After a few minutes he felt something soft squelch under his feet. He shuddered and slowed to a walk. Where was he? How was he to get back home?
    He looked around him, seeking a familiar landmark. Clouds covered the sun, making it look like a dark watchful eye. Something moved in the shadows and he jumped, but it was only a scrap of cloth blown by the wind. The same wind drove the clouds before it and the sun flared out for a brief instant. He saw a broad street in the distance and went toward it cautiously. As he came closer he saw movement and heard the creaking of cart wheels. Hurrying now, he followed the sights and sounds and found himself on Cheapside. He walked quickly toward the crowds of people ahead of him, not wanting to travel alone.
    Anthony had deliberately confused him, then, so that he would not remember the way back. But why? Did it have something to do with the mechanical monster in Anthony’s house? George had only gotten a quick glimpse of it, but he thought he recognized an alchemist’s alembic from a book he’d seen in the churchyard. Did Anthony know the secret of changing base minerals into gold? But surely he would not live in such squalor if he had money.
    He made his way slowly down the street. Now that he had leisure to think his mind filled with a tangle of questions. What was the creature? It had seemed bound to Anthony in some way. Had he conjured it and was now unable to rid himself of it?
    And what was in the jar Anthony had given him? Did it come from the same place as the creature, and would it bind Alice to the same kind of necromancy? What if the other man had given him the wrong jar? He had had only a short time to find what he wanted, after all. If what he had given George harmed Alice in any way, George thought, the other man would have to face something worse than the green creature.
    As he prepared for bed that night the memory of his strange journey began to fade. But he dreamed that the creature, in falling on Anthony, had brushed against him. It felt dank, repulsive, and George’s gasp of horror woke him up. He lay still, his heart pounding. He tried not to look at the dark corners of the room where, he was certain, something crouched, waiting for him.
    Afternoon light fell through the windows when Alice woke. She rolled over in bed and covered her eyes with her arm. What a night, she thought.
    But what, exactly, had happened? Had she truly gone dancing in the fields with the faerie folk? Were all the stories from her childhood true?
    Every muscle ached as she tried to sit up. If only John were here, she thought. What a tale she would have to tell him. Brownies and winged creatures and Robin Goodfellow, and at the end of it all the brightness of the queen herself.
    But she couldn’t lie here dreaming. There was work to be done, her stall in the churchyard to tend to. Nay, the young man who sometimes worked for her came in today, God be thanked. Today would have been the day she went to the printshop. But it was still early afternoon; she could go by the shop and then, if there was time, she could pay a visit to Margery.
    Margery. Had she truly seen her sitting in the field as if she belonged there, talking to Queen Oriana? Alice knew Margery was wise in the knowledge of herbs and flowers and stones, but how