The Margrave did request green eyes; I figure I can concede that small detail to his whims. I love green.
Laszlo straightens up, weighing my words. “Glass? Well, of course,” he says, as if I have suggested the most obvious thing in the world. “Much more refined and elegant. Where do you propose we get them?”
“Well, that’s the unfortunate part,” I say with sigh. “I fear we shan’t have any way to get them, though the finest glassblower in all of Tavia happens to be a friend. With the threat of impending skirmish in Brylov and you raising taxes, I imagine his shop must be closed now and his furnace left to grow cold. It takes a day or so to even get it firing hot enough to blow the glass. I suppose I shall just have to carve her eyes by hand and paint them green. I’m sure it will make no difference when she awakens—”
“No! She must see perfectly. I want only the best for her!” he says emphatically. “Give me the name of that glassblower. I will have him brought in.”
“Of course, my lord. Let me write up the requisition for you, so that he might have proper measurements to make for a perfect fit. He will need to be paid, of course, to secure the best materials.”
After I dictate Fonso’s information to Laszlo and hastily write an order, he rushes from the room to send a messenger after my redheaded giant of a glass smith. A small part of my heart untangles itself, finally able to breathe. I feel triumphant. Even if I only spared Fonso from a week’s worth of hunger or lessened his chances of being sent to Brylov to fight, it’s worth it.
While I sit smoothing the forehead of Tavia’s presumed future Margravina, a plan unfolds itself quietly in front of the two of us.
Why didn’t I think of it sooner? Can I help them all and still manage to build a marionette beyond the Margrave’s wildest dreams?
I cast a glance at the saboteur. Remembering when she pressed her own hand to mine in the wood, that moment I felt her strength push back against my own, a smile lifts the corners of my mouth.
The old tree woman foretold that the heart of the maker would determine the course of the marionette. I pick up my small planer with renewed vigor and shave more curls from the princess’s rough scalp. If I can build into the very fiber of this princess the various strengths of the Maker’s Guild—and if she really does wake under the blue moon—she will be a force to be reckoned with. A force the new Margrave will never expect.
I didn’t realize what I was doing back then, building the saboteur. I couldn’t have fathomed then what kind of powerful being might be wrought from wood, couldn’t have imagined how someone might use her for their own desires. And she isn’t even alive!
Though I come from the same place as these two grand figures I’ve labored over, I never considered that I might possess powers of my own. Yet here I stand, an assassin created by my own hand within arm’s length and a princess in bloom on my worktable. The saboteur was built with fevered glee, using the wildest stretches of my imagination. To build this marionette, I must tame that wildness and turn it inward—into cunning.
Laszlo may intend to provoke our neighbors to war and force me to do his bidding, but I will wage war in this gallery of my own accord. I come to this battleground armed with the weapons I know best: a rebellious piece of wood and the tools of my trade. I cannot say yet if I believe Prima can be awakened, but if she can, she should be the best of all of us. Exactly the match this Margrave deserves.
CHAPTER 22
FONSO ARRIVES AT WOLFSPIRE HALL FIVE DAYS LATER, just as I am carving Prima’s ears. I sense his presence in the hallway before I even hear him enter the locked gallery. With a rush of happiness, I run to him despite the guard hovering at his back. He is wearing a wide smile, clutching a velvet pouch I desperately hope contains the princess’s new eyes. Either that, or a slow-acting poison I might slip undetected into the Margrave’s tea. After enduring a two-hour soliloquy today from Laszlo on the superiority of navigating sea journeys using constellations—from one who has never stepped a single well-shod foot on a ship—I would be grateful to receive either.
It’s all I can do to keep from flinging myself into Fonso’s massive arms. Seeing his dear, coppery head again makes me feel connected to home, to all the makers. But with the guard watching, I know it won’t do to seem over-familiar with the glassblower. For Laszlo and his guards, Fonso’s presence here must be all about the work. They mustn’t suspect my plan.
“Fonso Donati, glassblower, here to deliver and set a pair of glass eyes. Have I arrived at the right place?” he says, trying to keep a laugh from his voice, though I see his eyes are pinched at the corners.
“Indeed,” I say, pointing with a flourish to where the princess lies in bits and bobs all over the worktable at the center of the gallery. “I am ready to place the eyes, if you’ll be so kind as to follow me.”
I am bold with the guard, wanting him gone. “We will need complete silence and no distractions to make sure these are installed properly. Please wait in the hall.”
“The Margrave ordered me to—”
I summon up an icy stare; my best impression of Laszlo. “Well the Margrave ordered me to build him a perfect marionette. If I don’t set her eyes properly and she turns out to be a cross-eyed hag, I will know exactly who to point him to for that, now
