“And more importantly: What the devil do you intend to do with a reanimated mechanical boy?”
“The tree said it would bring peace. To the Wood.”
The possum exchanged a glance with the attaché. “Oh, did it? It’ll erase the infighting? The strife among the lower classes? The ruined harvest? It’ll refill the empty coffers of the Mansion?”
“The tree didn’t really go into detail,” said Prue.
“I suppose trees rarely do,” added the attaché snidely.
“It’s madness,” said Ambrose. “But I’ve got too much on my plate to run interference for an Outsider on an inane quest. One thing: When you decided to announce your intentions to that bloodthirsty rabble, did you take a moment to consider that these were the very people who exiled the old Governess to begin with—for the precise thing that you’re trying to reenact?”
“I had, I mean I did. I just didn’t think . . .”
The possum shook his head. “That’s the trouble with you Outsiders. So impetuous. Well, you’ve cooked yourself up a real stew, haven’t you, Bicycle Maiden?”
“What do I do?”
“Oh, they’ll calm down,” said the attaché. “Riots are a weekly occasion. Surprising, this happening on a Wednesday. Typically, they only riot on Thursdays and occasionally Monday afternoons. Extenuating circumstances, I suppose.” He had picked up a stack of papers from the desk and was busy thumbing through it. “Svikists, Spokes, Caliphs. It’s the new world here. This is what revolution looks like.”
“Can you send in guards?” asked Prue. “To, you know, get things under control?”
“We tried that,” said the attaché. “Only gets them more riled up. They start getting oppressed when you do that.”
“So how do you keep order?”
“We wait for them to move on, after they’ve done whatever damage they plan on doing.” This was Ambrose, who’d moved to the office’s window and was carefully pushing the curtain away to see the outside. “These days, the Synod has been nice enough to handle the crowd control.” He paused. “See? They’re already starting to disperse.”
Prue crawled her way to the window, a captive wary of a sniper shot, and peeked her head above the sill. Sure enough, the crowd was scattering away from the Mansion across the deep-green pitch of the grounds. Several figures, wearing long gray hooded robes, seemed to be guiding the figures away.
“Who needs to pay for security when you’ve got a religious sect keeping things organized?” Ambrose said. “Certainly makes things easier for us.”
“So that’s the Synod? The Caliphs?” asked Prue, watching as the robed figures seemed to wordlessly corral the agitated crowd away from the Mansion. They wore masks over their faces, shiny human masks that caught and reflected the sun when they turned their covered heads. A few of them swung pendulum-like things on chains that puffed smoke with every swing.
“Basically, these are the Mystics of the South Wood, just like the North Wood has theirs,” explained Ambrose. “They’d been outlawed by the old regimes. Decades ago it was a crime to have any kind of Caliphate iconography around. Once the sect had been routed, folks in the Mansion started getting lax about enforcing the laws. And once the revolution hit, and the old Svik dynasty was torn down for good, it made a window for a revival. The Blighted Revival, they called it.”
“After the Blighted Tree,” explained the attaché, “the first living tree of the Wood.”
“I thought the Council Tree was the first living tree of the Wood,” said Prue.
“And that’s how you’re going to run into problems,” said Ambrose. “The North Wood’s just a bunch of cultists and bumpkins. According to the Southerners.”
The attaché had moved to the desk and was sorting through the massive pile of papers that lay heaped there. “Now if you wouldn’t mind, Ms. McKeel,” he said. “We have a lot of work to do here. Those Svikist collaborators’ heads are not going to chop themselves off.”
Prue blanched. “But is it safe?” she asked, bewildered. “For me to go out there?”
“Oh, I’m sure you’ll still find support,” Ambrose said. “You are the Bicycle Maiden, after all. Go out there and show them what you’re made of.”
“But they called me a Savi-, a Svikist!” She had some difficulty pronouncing the word. It was a silly thing. She qualified: “Which I’m not.”
“Oh, I’m sure you’re not. And it’s unlikely that you’ll be beheaded, anyway. You’ll have enough defenders to save you that fate.” Ambrose had moved over to the attaché’s side and was helping him sort through the stack of papers on the desk. Prue had paused by the door, thinking.
“Please,” she said. “Can you help me? I just need to find out what happened to the other maker,” she said.
The possum glared at Prue. “If you take my advice, you’d drop the whole affair. Grave robbing is a capital offense, you know. You’re on your own, Bicycle Maiden. We’ve got enough trouble as it is. We’ve got executions to decree, censures to sign. An angry, violent people to appease. Don’t drag us into your little quest.”
“What about, like, a paper trail?” asked Prue desperately. “There’s got to be some record, somewhere. Of the exile.”
The attaché pushed a stack of papers in front of Ambrose, who’d taken his seat behind the desk. The Interim Governor-Regent-elect began signing the papers as the attaché slid them under his pen, like a practiced casino card dealer laying out a blackjack hand.