Storm of Shadows (Lumineers 1)

CHAPTER 25: THE TRUTH

Tabby returned to Elias's workshop through the roof hatch and packed up his most immediate belongings in a trunk. Then she steeled herself and ventured downstairs. It took courage to witness the disarray she'd seen the night he was arrested.

With mechanical movements, she began putting things back into place. The longer she worked, the more she hated the constables for their complete lack of disregard. There had been no need for the careless ransacking.

Nit helped too, in the form of a monkey, using little monkey hands to move smaller objects about. They worked in silence as her mind turned over and over. Everything she touched grew more precious to her. Even the scraps of metal she often complained about sorting.

"I miss him too," Nit said, reading her thoughts.

"This was always the one place I could escape the chaos for something familiar," she mused aloud. Now it was just as disorganized, just as unpredictable as her life and her future.

After about two hours, with sweat beading across her skin, she sighed and plopped into the chair at Elias's workbench. It had been the first thing she'd moved back into place. Nit settled down beside her.

"It might take a while." She looked over the space. They'd made a dent, albeit a small one.

"Chroma wasn't built in a day," Nit answered.

Ignoring the disarray as best she could, she did what felt familiar. She ventured upstairs and brewed a pot of coffee, raided the pantry for some stale biscuits, and set about her work.

Her first order of business was an army of insects. She decided on dragonflies, as they were her favorite, with their stained glass wings. These, she decided, would act as lookouts, much the way her bees had. Nit, with their superior abilities to communicate, would act as commander.

She'd brought a small supply of prisms and gold with her. The rest of the confiscated contraband she'd reclaimed would stay at Steiner's. Only a quarter of what was taken had been reclaimed. A basement full of items, prisms, rare metals. A heavy sigh escaped her chest. At least she'd managed to gather up the most valuable pieces of it.

"Years," she muttered. "Years of gathering and collecting. And for what?"

After fitting her dragonflies with sockets and prisms, she went upstairs to refill her coffee cup and retrieve her prism revolver. It was the one project she had never shown Elias. She regretted that, now. Even though he didn't condone guns. While she didn't like them much either, there was no stopping the allure of what she attempted. Or the genus of it, if it worked.

Nit got her attention when it was half past one. Midnight would be expecting her soon. "I'm so close," she mused, glancing at them before turning back to her work. Just because she couldn't stop herself, she took aim and pulled the trigger. Nothing happened, of course, and she didn't expect it. But the prisms rattled around in their glass cylinder, each end set with golden sockets to funnel the energy.

With a forlorn sigh, she replaced it and closed up shop. The windows were still boarded, and it was better that way. Elias had been beloved by all. Even The Forsaken wouldn't dare brake in, mostly because Elias paid them well to keep watch. She'd have to pay them in his stead if the agreement was to continue. She thought about seeking Marcus out. They had poker in two days. Perhaps she would ask him then, to put more eyes on the workshop.

Gathering her belongings, she made her way to Marley's for a bite, stopping by the begging children of Crock's Row. Maggie was happy to report an improvement in her mam's health since administering the magic medicine, as she called it.

She dolled out meat pies for all of them, and a few coins, then made her way across town.

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