Searchterm Entry #4: The Last Brother
The fourth entry to our Search Term Challenge, a unique tale with clockwork insects — what more can you ask for? For details of the challenge, and to see other entries, click here.
This entry was written by Merrilee Faber, who won all previous rounds to date. This time, Merrilee finally lost her crown and came in second, which is still something to be congratulated for!
******
The Last Brother
“Give one to me,” Eloise whispered.
Toby saw Eloise’s hand move, a shadow in the darkness. Even as she reached back, he saw that she did not take her eyes off the window with its looming silhouette.
He shivered and reached into the box. Little skittering things bumped into his hand and the scratching sounds increased. He gritted his teeth and grabbed a handful of prickly bodies and wriggling legs.
“This is so yuck,” he muttered.
Eloise snapped her fingers at him. “Just hand it over!”
Toby pulled his hand out of the box. In his fist, two clockwork beetles sparkled in the moonlight, legs churning madly. He put the box down and tried to separate them. One of the beetles wriggled free and dropped to the ground, disappearing into the gloom.
“Oh no!”
“What?”
“I dropped one.”
“For the love of–”
The front door opened, spilling light across the lawn. They both dropped to the ground, Toby holding tight to the beetle in his hand.
A housemaid clicked and whirred along her track, a bag in one hand. The bins at the side of the house opened at her approach, and she dropped the bag in.
“Now, now!” hissed Eloise. Toby fumbled the pass, but managed to shove the beetle into her outstretched hand.
Eloise brought it close to her mouth and whispered instructions. The beetle’s madly waving legs slowed as it listened. Then it flipped itself upright on her hand. For a moment Toby thought he saw the silver flash of magic, then it jumped down and scuttled off.
The maid turned about on her wheel and hummed back towards the house.
“Come on, come on,” whispered Eloise.
Toby squinted into the darkness. “Where is it?”
“Halfway across the lawn. Come on, you, fly!”
Moonlight flashed on wings. The beetle rose into the air as if it had heard Eloise’s command. Maybe it had. Toby didn’t really know how she wielded the skill that breathed life into clockwork, the skill that made the inanimate metal dolls into living, thinking beings. The skill that, in him, had been stillborn.
His breath caught in his throat as the maid trundled through the door, which swung closed gently behind her.
“Did it–”
“Yes!” Eloise pumped her fist. The beetle must be inside, though Toby didn’t see it.
Toby’s belly rumbled. “Can we go home, now?”
“Let’s go.”
They shuffled backwards into the shrubbery. Eloise grabbed his wrist in an iron grip.
“Ow! What–”
“Look!”
He followed her gaze. The silhouette of Master Leach was gone from the window.
“Go. Go. Run,” hissed Eloise.
Toby grabbed the box and ran as fast as his short legs would go.
***
“It’s my fault,” said Eloise, fumbling with the key. “I took my eye off the window.” She thrust the door open and dragged him inside.
Toby didn’t really care whose fault it was. He wanted dinner, and he wanted to sleep. And he wanted, so badly, for his parents to be here, protecting them. It was all right for Eloise. She was sixteen, and grown up. But she never took the time to heat a stone by the fire, to slip between his sheets and warm them before bed. She never cooked fresh bread. She never made him clean his teeth before bed. Toby ran his tongue over his furry teeth. She never made food until Toby was wild with hunger. All she cared about was Dad’s stupid journal and the bits and pieces left in his ruined workshop.
“Can we eat now?” He hated the whine that crept into his voice. Hated her for putting it there. Hated his parents for leaving.
“In a minute. I–”
“No, now!” He slammed the box onto the table. It broke, and beetles poured out and spilled onto the floor.
“Grab them! Quick!” Eloise dashed about, picking up beetle after beetle.
But Toby had had enough of them for one night. “You grab them! I’m going to get something to eat!” He stormed off to the kitchen.
In the narrow hall with the broken lamp he slowed. The door halfway down was a great black maw. Toby edged along, watching the doorway, his back to the wall. Once past, he hurried down the passageway to the cold kitchen.
The bread bin was empty, and the pantry held nothing except a jar of preserved cabbage and a dead mouse.
“Where’s the sausage from last night?” he shouted. Eloise didn’t answer, so he started opening cupboards, banging pots and pans around, hoping to annoy her enough that she would come and feed him. But he ran out of cupboards. His stomach growled at him again. He stormed back down the hall, hustling past the doorway with his eyes down.
“I want–” He blinked. Where was she?
He heard a sob. Eloise sat in the corner, head on her arms. Beside her on the floor, a sack wriggled and clicked.
“We haven’t got any food,” he said.
This prompted more sobs.
“Weeza, what’s wrong?” Toby put a hand on her arm. “Weeza?”
“I just c-can’t d-do it anymore.” In the dim light of the gas lamp, the blotchy marks from her weeping looked brown and ugly. A sob caught her and she put her head down once again.
Toby watched her shoulders shaking for a moment. Then he sat down beside her, and leaned his head on her shoulder. “I’m not really that hungry. I can wait until tomorrow.” His stomach grumbled, making him a liar.
Eloise sobbed, and put her arms around him. Fear wriggled in his belly. “I’m sorry, Weeza. Don’t cry.”
She released Toby, and wiped her face with her shirt. Her hair stuck to her damp cheeks. She brushed at the stains on her shirt and pushed her hair back. “Come on. I’ll get you some food.”
“There is none. Only pickles.”
“I’ll get some.” Eloise went into the kitchen, to the cupboard under the sink. She reached in deep, brow furrowed. Then she withdrew her arm. In the palm of her hand was a shiny half-crown.
“Where did you get that?”
“Dad gave it to me before– He gave it to me for working in the shop.”
“If we had money, why haven’t we been eating?”
“Because this is the last. I’ve been saving it. Until we had nothing else.” She rubbed the coin with her thumb. “This is it, Toby. When this is gone– I don’t know what we’ll do.”
“Can’t we go work for Uncle Dorian?”
“On the farm? Is that what you want, Toby?”
Toby shrugged. “I don’t mind. At least there’s food.”
“Yes, there is.” Eloise looked down at the coin for a moment, frowning. Then she leaned forward and put a hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry, Toby. I thought– I didn’t want to let you go. But this is my obsession. Not yours.” She stood, and sighed. “At least I’ll always know where to find you.”
“Wait, you mean, you’re not coming with me?”
Eloise shook her head.
“But you have to! We can both go! Weeza–”
Eloise put both hands on his shoulders. “Toby, I need to do this. I have to. I have to find Mum and Dad.”
“Well then I’m staying with you!”
Eloise cocked her head. “Even when there’s no food in the house and I make you work on the brothers?”
Her reference to the automata made him squirm. “Yes. Even then.”
“Oh Toby.” She bent down and flung her arms around him.
Toby rested his head on her shoulder, and for just a moment he ignored the way they both smelled, ignored the growling in his belly. For just a moment, he pretended it was Mum holding him.
Something tapped against his boot, then again. He looked down.
A clockwork beetle bounced off his foot.
“There’s another beetle.”
“No, I got them all.” Eloise pulled back and looked down at the beetle. “Oh!” She bent down and scooped it up. “Back already? But–”
Eloise froze, and the beetle scuttled off her hand, hitting the floor with a crack.
“What–” asked Toby.
“Shh!”
Toby held his breath, and then he heard it.
The middle step leading up to the porch was loose, and would twist when someone stepped on it. Now it creaked; once, twice, three times.
Eloise grabbed him and hurried down the hall. She pushed him through the dark doorway.
“Stay quiet!” she hissed, and turned off the lamp.
Toby wished she hadn’t done that. He shuffled sideways until his back was against the wall, then sank down, wrapping his arms around his knees.
Across the room was the massive bulk of the brothers. One was no more than a head and lifeless limbs snaking across the floor. Eloise had scavenged what she could from his shattered body to repair the most complete brother, Lotte.
Lotte squatted against the wall, shoulders slumped, the great thick exhaust pipes jutting up over his shoulders. His head reached almost to the ceiling, even though the automaton was sitting down. The headless torso of the third brother filled one corner of the room.
Toby heard the creak of a door. A breeze rippled down the hall and into the room. It picked up the old yellowing poster from the corner and tossed it into the moonlight.
See the Bellowing Bastard Brothers!
The Vile Vagabonds from Venezuela!
Women will faint at the sight of their frightening visages!
Men will curse at their unholy life!
A shadow flickered across the poster. Outside the window, someone moved noiselessly along the wall. Toby crawled across the floor, his mouth dry as cotton. He squeezed between Lotte’s bulk and the wall, and watched the dark doorway.
A scream ripped through the silence, choking off into a sob. Eloise! Toby pushed his head out.
Something moved in the hall. Not normally, not like a person. He heard the click-click of gears. The lights in the hall came on.
A simulacrum on four metal wheels trundled past the doorway. The bottom half was made to look like a fashionable hoop skirt.
The top half was a girl.
Her arms carried metal things, sharp and shiny. Her head lolled, drool running down her chin and onto her shoulder. Around her waist the clockwork was melded to her with great metal claws.
Toby shoved himself back behind Lotte, stuffing his hand in his mouth to keep from screaming. He screwed up his eyes, but could still see the girl’s vacant stare.
Another scream, this time from the kitchen.
“Don’t hurt her, don’t hurt her,” he whispered. Toby shivered, pushed himself into the floor. Low voices came from the kitchen. Then a slap, a sob.
“I don’t know! I don’t know!”
Eloise! Get up, get up! Toby commanded. But his body refused. He couldn’t. Not with the thing in the hallway.
“Tell me!”
“I don’t know!”
Toby couldn’t bear to hear her, couldn’t bear to hear the noises coming from the kitchen. Get up! Get up now, you stupid, snivelling coward! Get up! Help her! HELP HER!
There was a click, then the sound of gears, and then a slow roar. Toby opened his eyes. The last brother jerked once. His arms came down to the floor and he pushed himself to his feet.
The ceiling shattered around him, timbers falling like rain. Toby covered his head, and felt a ringing pain as a chunk of wood glanced off his shoulder.
Lotte roared, steam thundering out of his exhaust pipes. He smashed his way out of the room in a direct line to the kitchen. Toby crawled out of the debris as the wall crumbled around the massive body.
In the kitchen, Eloise hung between the arms of a metal spider as big as a horse. The spider dropped Eloise and ran forward. Lotte brought his foot down with a crunch.
Master Leach shoved the drooling girl forward and bolted. Lotte charged after him.
“Eloise!” cried Toby, wondering if she would be crushed. But Lotte pounded past her and through the kitchen wall, crushing the half-girl under his feet.
Toby ran to Eloise and threw his arms around her. She sat down hard on the floor.
“Are you all right?”
“I think so.”
Toby pulled back to look at her. She didn’t look all right. Her eye was swollen and red, and blood trickled from her lip.
Lotte appeared out of the gloom. Steam bellowed from his exhaust, shaking the remains of the house.
Eloise grabbed Toby’s hand. “I think we’d better get out of here.”
Toby shrank back. On the floor was the squashed remains of the girl.
“It’s ok,” whispered Eloise, pulling him to her side. “She was already dead.”
He didn’t like to think of that, and turned his head away. Under the debris, something bright caught his eye. “What’s that?”
Eloise followed his gaze, then pounced on it with a cry. It was a bag made of shiny white leather. The house creaked. Eloise dragged him out into the night, under Lotte’s vast frame.
“Ask him for a light,” said Eloise.
“Who, me?”
“You woke him.”
Toby looked up. He couldn’t see Lotte’s face. “Uh. Light? Please?”
A click and whirr and then Toby was blinded by the glowing eyes. When his vision cleared he saw Eloise had dumped the contents of the bag on the ground, and was scrabbling around in the contents. With a cry she held up a letter. In the light, Toby could see his father’s illegible scrawl.
“Look!” Eloise unfolded the letter, hands shaking.
“Dear Eloise and Toby,
By now we have been gone since morning. Go straight to The Bailey Arms in Oakmont; a room is booked for you. We will–”
Eloise clutched the letter to her chest. “They’re all right! I knew it!” Colour rushed to her face. “And Leach knew it too. He stole the letter to keep us here!”
“What about the rest?”
“Later. We need to get moving.” Eloise folded up the letter and shoved it back in the bag. “We have to get the journal back to Dad. Tell Lotte to give us a ride.”
“Lotte?” The giant leaned down, and Toby put a hand over his eyes. “Can you give us a ride?”
Toby shouted in surprise as Lotte lifted him up onto the great wide shoulders. Eloise was lifted up next.
Toby looked down at the ruin of their house, and the lights of the nearby town spilling away into the distance.
“Come on, Toby, stop daydreaming!”
“Take us to Oakmount,” he said. Lotte set off with a lurch and Toby grabbed for a handhold.
“Read me the letter!”
“All right, I’ll try. But you know what Dad’s writing is like. I don’t know why he writes longhand.” She unfolded the letter and began to read.
Toby had to strain to hear her over Lotte’s rumbling as they strode off into the night.
******
Merrilee currently lives in the sand-and-fly-infested-west of Australia. She maintains a blog on writing at Not Enough Words. She doesn’t believe in magic.