Doncia and Piri delayed on the steps to Doncia’s tenement. Evening chill came creeping as the sun went behind the buildings. Doncia hugged herself. It was just the cold.

‘They say he is good,’ Piri said.

‘Do they?’

‘They say he helps those who have the sight, those who are touched.’

Does he take them away? Doncia wondered. Is that what happened to Father?

‘But we’re not touched,’ she said, searching Piri’s eyes.

They sparked. ‘No!’

The beautiful boy’s eyes had been dark—they still smouldered in Doncia’s memory like coals.

Mother came round the corner with a folded clothes rack balanced on one shoulder and a sack of clothes hung on the other. She trudged up the stairs behind them. She looked weary, like her feet were heavy.

‘What’ve you girls been up to?’

‘Nothing.’ Doncia said—the easy instant answer. Mostly nothing. Piri was nodding her head in earnest agreement.

‘I heard about the school, about Mr Langwish. I’m sorry.’ She put down the sack of clothes and fumbled in her satchel for the building key.

‘Should go,’ said Piri, hopping from foot to foot.

‘Actually, Piri,’ Doncia’s mother said, ‘would you come in a moment?’

‘Uh-huh,’ said Piri.

They traipsed up the staircase to level three, and Mother fished for her keys again. She unlocked their apartment and pushed the door open with the ironing.

Doncia mixed them drinks of lemon juice, water, and sugar.

‘With the school closed the children are supposed to work,’ Mother said, leaning on the timber table. ‘For the war effort.’

Doncia studied the walls. Reddish.

‘Most will be sent to the factories.’

‘No!’ said Doncia.

‘But,’ said Mother, holding up her hand. ‘I can get you work in the graf’s castle. You also, Piri, if you want, if your parents agree.’

‘In the castle?’ Piri’s eyes went wide, and she grinned.

‘The work will be hard, mind. Probably harder than the factories, but it won’t be so boring.’

‘What work?’ Doncia asked.

‘Domestic work—cooking, cleaning, whatever.’

Work like Mother did. Hard work for other people.

‘All right,’ said Doncia. Better than factories.

‘Yes, please Mrs Beltran,’ Piri said, with her brightest smile. ‘If it’s all right, if it won’t get you into trouble.’

Mother laughed. ‘No trouble. If your parents agree be waiting in your foyer in the morning at five.’

‘Yes’m, thank you.’ Piri said, and grabbed her bag.

Doncia saw her out.

‘Don’t forget,’ Doncia said at the tenement entrance.

‘They say there’s demons beneath the castle,’ Piri teased, and ran off.

‘You don’t believe in demons,’ Doncia called after her.

Later Mother ironed while Doncia prepared potato pie with cheese.

‘It’s not fair,’ Doncia said. ‘I want to study and become a technologician like Father.’ She wanted to provide properly for them, so Mother didn’t have to slave into the night ironing.

‘I know, I know,’ said Mother, ‘but hold tight, Doncia. At least it is not the factories, making bits and pieces of machines for the war. It won’t be forever.’

‘You don’t know that,’ said Doncia.

‘No, I don’t, but there’ll be opportunities, just keep an open mind.’

Doncia checked the walls. Pinkish in places.

🔸⏱️🔸

Doncia and Piri followed Doncia’s mother up to the castle. Mother was wheeling the rack of ironed clothes, struggling each time the metal wheels caught in cracks in the pavement or cobbles. As they walked the stars and galaxies hid themselves behind the new dawn light. A crowd of sandstone mansions shied back from the stone wall and the giant ornate arch, leaving a rare open lawn around the top of the Mount.

‘Morning Nola!’

It was a guard calling down from an open window in the archway. Mother waved.

‘Morning girls,’ the man continued, sounding amused. Doncia and Piri waved too.

‘Captain Anton is a strange little man,’ Mother whispered. ‘He’s short for a soldier because the ceilings inside are low.’

They continued under the arch and along the footpath between the cobbled road and the long reflecting pool. Already the castle loomed both high above and deep below in the reflection. It was angular, many-turreted, and rambling, but she couldn’t get a proper sense of the size because it was impossible to tell what was around the corners, and that only made it seem bigger, and her smaller.

The castle had stone lacework around every window and stone serpents for handrails. Gargoyles like screaming eagles tried to launch from the rooftops.

Doncia heard the put-put-put of an automobile coming up the drive behind them. It was a long, streamlined limousine with ornate vines and flowers etched into bodywork. Doncia and Piri stopped to stare as it passed. The windows were dark in the back part of the cabin.

The road curved around a grand entrance, and the limousine eased to a halt before the wide steps. A waiting page opened the door with a flourish, and a rotund man in a brown suit and top hat stepped out.

‘It’s Mr Delgarde,’ Mother whispered.

Doncia stared. Mr Delgarde owned most of the factories. ‘What is he doing here?’

‘None of our business,’ Mother said, ‘and we don’t go in that way.’

She led them around to the left, away from the entrance and between a Cathalite chapel and a long colonnade. They turned into a courtyard where a bronze mermaid swam in a fountain. The fishy spray tickled her nose.

Mother pushed the clothes rack up a ramp and through a doorway. Doncia hesitated at the entrance. The pocketwatch was ticking in her pocket, and her hand started toward it, but Piri marched straight in, and Doncia felt silly left behind.

‘Stand to the side and wait,’ Mother said. ‘Ma’am knows you’re coming.’

Doncia was terrified. Everything was tinged yellow.

‘Don’t worry, you’ll be fine,’ Mother said. ‘Nobody bites.’ Doncia imagined people with big teeth, biting, but her eyes adjusted to the light, and she saw them then, in a kind of parade, and none of their teeth seemed particularly large.

Mother went to stand in line. There were women in neat grey dresses like Mother, some with aprons of various designs—striped, checked, and a few with flowers. There was a woman with chessboard-checked clothes and a chef’s hat. There were men with overalls and boots, men with laboratory coats and spectacles, and men with long-tailed black suits and crisp white shirts.

A short woman strode in, wearing a formal gown and her hair in a lace net. Her head moved slightly back and forward as she stepped.

‘Anybody missing?’ she squawked.

‘No Ma’am,’ said the tallest of the suited gents, bowing. Though he towered nearly twice her height it was clear who was in charge.

‘Just as well. Delgarde is here and the graf will be in a temper. Watch yourselves. Dismissed.’

Doncia tensed as the bird-woman’s eyes beamed around toward Piri and her.

‘What’re you doing here?’ she said, pointing at them. Doncia swallowed.

‘We’re...’ Doncia began.

‘Well?’

‘Here to work,’ Doncia managed. She saw Piri nodding furiously.

‘Here to work, Ma’am,’ said the woman. ‘You’re Professor Javer’s whelp, aren’t you?’

‘Yes—Ma’am,’ she said.

‘You’ll forget that if you want to last, and muck in. Hear me?’

Doncia nodded.

‘I can’t be seen to be giving you any special privilege, so it’s bottom rung. Work your way up, if you can. Report to Isolde. Tell her you’re the new cleaner.’

Doncia looked to Piri, realising they were to be separated.

‘Now!’

‘Yes, Ma’am. Thank you, Ma’am,’ Doncia said and took a step. ‘Which way Ma’am?’

Ma’am rolled her eyes, mumbling ‘Cathal protect me.’ She pulled a rope attached to a contraption on the wall. A tiny bell tinkled in the distance, and a young woman hurried in. She was one of the few who wore flowery aprons. If not for the birthmark which blotched her forehead and left cheek she might have been beautiful.

‘Take Doncia here to Isolde, please Moni,’ Ma’am said.

‘Yes’m,’ said the young woman, dipping her head. She inspected Doncia with dark eyes. ‘Come on,’ she said, and dashed away.

Doncia waved to Piri and chased after, eventually catching up as Moni disappeared down a corridor to the left, which quickly turned right again. Doncia looked around in awe; the ceiling was three floors high, but each floor was twice as high as the ceiling in Doncia’s tenement. Determined not to get lost, Doncia counted the halls and doorways. At the fifth they entered a tower staircase that spiralled both up and down. They went down past two doors, and Doncia realised they must be underground. They exited at a third door. Gaslights hung on the rough stone walls only at irregular intervals, and sometimes it was quite dark.

‘Where are we going?’ she asked.

‘Isolde is in the robot store.’

‘Robots?’

‘Cleaners. You’ll see. Not far now.’

The passage had doors on both sides, all with identical green paint. A little way along one door was wedged open.

‘Go in,’ Moni said abruptly, as if she was afraid to do so herself, then sped away.

Doncia watched her disappear, then rubbed her fingers over the engravings on her pocketwatch to work up some courage, and stepped inside. The cavernous room was lit by hissing gaslights, but it was filled with so much clutter it was hard to see where to walk.

She went along what must have been the main path between the rows of shelves. Labelled cardboard boxes of different sizes were stacked treacherously. It smelled like the Clee City Library.

‘Hello?’ Doncia called softly. ‘Madam Isolde?’

Something clattered and there was a loud curse.

A shiny robot sped toward Doncia on many springy legs, like a huge brass spider. It bounced off the boxes and crates. It was only about as high as her knees. She jumped out of the way and it continued out the door.

‘Well, now it’s working,’ said a throaty voice.

A woman came into view around a tower of wooden crates. She was middle aged and thin. The cords of her muscles were like taut wires, and thick branching veins crossed them. The skin of her face was so tight Doncia could see the shape of her skull underneath.

‘Who’s there?’

‘Doncia, Madam Isolde. I’m the new cleaner.’

‘Are you now?’ Sharp blue eyes measured her. ‘We can always use more hands, especially little nimble ones. Show me yours.’

Doncia let go of her pocketwatch and held her hands out hesitantly, remembering a time she’d got herself into trouble and Mr Langwish had caned them.

Isolde grabbed and squeezed.

‘Bit soft. Never done a day’s work, have you?’

‘Been at school, Ma’am, but the graf closed it.’

‘Don’t call me Ma’am, we reserve that for her. Call me Isolde, because it’s my name and I don’t have no airs or graces, Doncia Beltran.’

Doncia wondered if everyone knew who she was, knew her as her father’s daughter, and had unknown expectations.

‘You knew my father?’

‘Yes, and I liked Professor Javer, mind, but he didn’t go out of his way to make friends, and there are many here as didn’t like him, so have a care girl.’

Doncia looked down. ‘Yes, Isolde.’

‘Now, let us see. Brooms or bots?’

After a moment Doncia realised it was a question, and she looked up again at Isolde, who clearly expected an answer.

‘Robots, definitely....’

‘Perhaps later—brooms first,’ Isolde said with a gaslight sparkle in her eyes. ‘Mops, actually. Come along.’