The Dragonbone Petticoat

Chapter Four

Elessa stared up at the vaulted ceiling of the travex station. While it was literally like a coach depot magnified to a barely imaginable immensity, that was not the first thing that came to her mind. Shot through with black metal girders, stairs, and landings, as well as colossal struts protruding from mounds of black glass embedded in the grotto floor, which ran in shimmering shafts of petrified lightning to the distant ceiling, beams of inconceivable strength that nonetheless buckled and shuddered with the arrival and departure of each travex, of which there were dozens of various lengths, linked in lighted segments studded with passengers, for one dazzling instant, the whole of underground Ardem seemed a gigantic, jumbled jewelry box. This would not be such an unusual association except that Elessa had only seen one jewelry box in her life, that of her vanished mother, whom she had not thought of in weeks, so consumed had she been with saving, then mourning, her father. In that moment, she remembered the jewelry box with crystal clarity--lined on the inside with soft, brown fur, and with a mirror inlaid in its lid that reflected Elessa's first memory of her own face. While her recollection of the jewelry box was crisp, the face embedded in the mirror was foggy, all bulging cheeks as if she had a mouthful of apples, and the other face, turned away and brushing lustrous, brunette hair, was lost in shadow, time, and memory.

As each travex disgorged its resplendent passengers onto the luminous platform, countless porters loaded and unloaded cargo and escorted the elderly and dainty both male and female, and as Roric led them through this bustling crowd across a floor threaded with tracks, they dodged the rattling advance of clicking, chugging engines, which rang their bells to part the glut of dillydallies chitchatting about too many things to find a common thread of interest, though much concerned engines, machines, and "new math."

"This is an insane disregard for safety!" Elessa shouted over the clamor. "The travexes should have their own roads!"

"In our defense...no, no, you're completely right. We have our share of accidents. We're all a little mad here," said Roric. "At least those who learned the travex timetables and know to jump at the bell. The sane ones must be dead by now."

"There are so many people--is this a city or a school?"

"Yes and yes. Even in our beginnings the distinction between education and politics was as vague and amorphous as that between science and magic. That said, the Head has become exceedingly ambitious in allowing the mission of Ardem University to encroach on too many matters..."

"The Head?"

"Our leader...the dean of Ardem."

"You mean the dean of the university."

Roric laughed. "He's the head of the whole ball of wax."

"Your country has a dean?"

"Your country has a king?" Roric's mimickry rose to an unpleasant falsetto that reminded Elessa uncomfortably of her own voice.

"Not anymore," snapped Elessa.

"That's right," admitted Roric. "We have heard of your troubles down south. Forgive me if I offended you."

"You don't mean that," said Elessa. "Your whole manner is offensive."

"You flatter me," glowed Roric.

"Flattery? I should think not."

"What you see as a personality is only another mechanism, a system of calculated contrivances, my dear. I've installed something new."

"My dear?" Elessa wrinkled her nose in disgust as she repeated the patronizing diminutive. "Is your attitude just another well-ordered machine?" <