twitch. I could hear a metal clicking from within the neck as it tried and failed to straighten its head.
“I think we missed a piece,” I said.
“Do you know who you are?” Lena asked it.
The automaton rolled onto its side and slowly pushed itself upright. The hole in its chest was gone, replaced with young, bright wood, naked and unprotected. How many spells lay scattered on the ground, broken and useless?
Even as I asked the question, something crawled over my foot, making me jump. The metal keys were moving through the grass, climbing up the automaton’s body like silver insects. The automaton didn’t move.
On impulse, I stepped forward and touched the metal skin. I could feel the individual spells crackling with magic, but the metal nearest the chest was cold and dead.
“Isaac, what are you doing?”
More letters clicked into place, and I felt another line of magic surge to life. The sensation reminded me of steam rushing through a pipe, all of that energy waiting to be tapped and directed. “He transferred the essence of a living person into another body. Can you imagine what else we could do? You could build prosthetic limbs that respond like living flesh, or entire bodies for people dying of injury or disease.”
“Or living weapons,” Lena said, watching the automaton.
The automaton stared at us in return. Its jaw hung open, giving it a vaguely shocked and dimwitted expression. We hadn’t fixed all of the chains and cables inside. Would those repair themselves with time as well?
“Johann Fust.” I waited, but there was no sign of recognition or awareness. After so many centuries, it might not remember who it was. Gutenberg was the only one who knew the automatons’ identities, and I couldn’t imagine him ever addressing them by name.
“Isaac… are you sure we should be doing this?”
“Fixing a wood-and-metal golem that could crush us both? Not at all.”
“No. Trying to save Gutenberg. He enslaved his enemies in these things. He manipulated the minds and memories of people like Charles Hubert. He runs the Porters like his own little dictatorship. Does anyone know what other secrets he might be hiding?”
“De Leon might,” I said.
“What do you think Ponce de Leon was really banished for?”
I had asked myself the same question. All I knew was that de Leon had been a Porter for centuries. He had been one of the original twelve, and he had left the organization at some point during the twentieth century.
Maybe he had been right to do so.
The last of the metal blocks slid into place. The automaton limped forward. The jaw wasn’t the only damaged component, but overall, it appeared functional. Protecting Gutenberg would have been one of its core spells, and now those spells had been rebuilt.
Whatever crimes Gutenberg might have committed, we had to find him. We had to stop Charles Hubert, or whatever he had become. “Where is Johannes Gutenberg?”
The clicking in the neck grew louder as the automaton turned to look at me.
“Gutenberg is in danger.” It didn’t move. Maybe it couldn’t hear or understand me, or maybe it wasn’t programmed to obey anyone but its creator. I tried again. “Wo ist Johannes Gutenberg? Er ist in Gefahr.”
It was modern-day German, but hopefully whatever was left of Fust might recognize it. The automaton went perfectly still, and I sensed its magic building like a capacitor preparing to discharge. I backed away, gesturing for Lena to do the same.
It brightened like a miniature sun, and then it was gone. I checked my tracking device. The screen was blank. Panic tightened my throat. If we had blown up our only link to Gutenberg-
The red dot reappeared, and the map zoomed outward, recalibrating as it picked up the signal. I saved the location. “We’ve got him.”
Chapter 19
I gripped the wheel with both hands as the Triumph lumbered up the gulley-strewn road. Gravel sprayed from the back tires as we accelerated.
“Are you going to share the plan with me this time?” Lena asked.
“The plan… is to call the Porters for help.”
“Suddenly you and the Porters are friends again? How long was I in that tree?”
I could feel her staring at me. “I thought that automaton was going to kill you,” I said softly.
“It was going to kill both of us,” she said. “It didn’t.”
“But Hubert has others. Not to mention the vampire slaves he’s collected.” The Triumph’s traction spells kicked in like a powerful static charge as we rounded a curve. “They’d crush us both.”
“They’d crush you,” Lena said quietly. “Not me. You said the Silver Cross lets Hubert control more than just vampires, remember?”
“Right. I get crushed, you join Hubert’s army of ass-kicking slaves.” Smudge, too, if Hubert decided a fire- spider was worth the effort. “Two years ago, Pallas pulled me out of the field for a reason. I rush in alone, and I almost get myself killed. I’m not risking it this time. I’m not risking you.”
“You’re not alone.”
My cell phone buzzed like an angry wasp before I could answer. I slowed long enough to grab it and check the screen, which showed a missed text message and a voice mail.
“Watch the road.” Lena tugged the phone away from me. “The voice mail is from Nicola.” She switched the phone to speaker so we could both hear.
“Isaac, this is Nicola Pallas. What the hell did you do?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever heard her swear,” I commented.
“That’s because you’ve never started a war before,” said Pallas’ voice.
I glanced at Lena, who shrugged. “It says she left this message almost forty minutes ago.”
“Can you hear us?” I asked.
“Don’t be absurd. I just split a part of my consciousness and transferred it into your voice mail so it could talk to you and report back to me once you tell it what you’ve done.”
“Sweet,” I whispered. “You have got to teach me that trick.”
Lena cleared her throat and gave the phone a meaningful look.
“Sorry. Charles Hubert is possessed by Gutenberg. He sent an automaton to kill us, but Lena destroyed it. We’ve got Gutenberg’s location. It looks like he’s near the town of Mecosta. I’ll send you the coordinates, and-”
“Send them, but don’t expect help any time soon,” Pallas interrupted. “We’ve pulled every field agent in the Midwest into Detroit. I’ll try to send someone to assist you, but I can’t make any promises.”
Lena tensed and jerked the phone closer. “What happened?”
“At six twenty-one tonight, four automatons smashed their way into the Detroit nest. Twelve city blocks have lost power, and Dolingen Daycare is nothing but a crater.”
My gut turned to ice. “What happened to the kids?”
“Most had gone home. One of the vampires hauled the rest away. The automatons weren’t interested in humans. They’re killing every vampire they can find. Most of the vampires are trapped underground. The rest have fled.”
“Meaning we have angry, frightened vampires running through the city,” Lena said.
“We did this,” I said. The timing couldn’t be an accident. “When we found Hubert’s cabin and destroyed his automaton. He panicked. We pushed him into launching this attack.”
“How long will it take you to reach Gutenberg?” asked Pallas.
I bit my lip, visualizing the highways and calculating speed. “Twenty minutes if I go all out.”
“Do it.”
“Hubert isn’t stupid,” I said. “He’ll have kept at least one automaton back to protect him. Maybe more.” Four
