ANYA
The summons arrived with the evening rain. It wasn't delivered by a courier or a raven, but by two men built like stone golems, their oiled greatcoats shedding water onto the dusty floor of my workshop. They wore the silver-and-black livery of the Royal Guard, a sight so foreign in the grimy Artisans' Quarter that the neighborhood children stopped their street games to stare in silent awe.
I didn't share their wonder. I felt a familiar, cold dread seep into my bones, a feeling I hadn't experienced since the day the Arcane Conclave had come for my father.
"Anya Valerius?" the taller of the two guards asked. His voice was a low rumble, devoid of any warmth. He didn't look at me, but at the mess around us: the scattered brass gears on my workbench, the half-assembled clockwork bird with its intricate silver filigree wings, the scent of solder and machine oil that clung to the very air. His lip curled in a faint, almost imperceptible sneer. Magic-users always looked at artifice that way—like it was a lesser, dirtier thing.
"I am," I said, wiping a grease stain from my palm with a rag. I kept my voice steady, my posture straight. Father had taught me that. Never let them see you bend, Anya. We may work with brass, but our spines are made of steel.
The guard produced a sealed scroll from inside his coat, the royal crest of a crowned eagle stamped in dark blue wax. It wasn't a request. It was a command. "By order of His Majesty, King Theron, you are hereby summoned to the royal palace. You will bring your tools."
My tools. My heart hammered against my ribs. It was happening again. Father had been summoned in the same way, ordered to bring his finest chronometers and gauges. He had been accused of "technological heresy," his work deemed an insult to the pure magic that powered the kingdom. He'd been exiled, his name disgraced, leaving me to run this small repair shop and shoulder a debt that felt as heavy as the sky. I was all that was left of the Valerius legacy, and I had a horrible feeling that legacy was about to be extinguished.
"May I ask the nature of my summons?" I asked, my voice betraying a slight tremor that I hated.
The guard's gaze was as cold and unyielding as the winter sea. "Your services are required for a matter of royal health. That is all you need to know." He turned to his companion. "Secure the tools. We leave at once."
Panic, cold and sharp, threatened to overwhelm me. I thought of the half-finished automaton on my desk, the commission that was supposed to pay our rent for the next three months. I thought of the small, locked chest under my bed that held my father's most dangerous, most brilliant designs—the work that had gotten him exiled.
The second guard began to roughly shove my delicate calipers and gear-cutters into a rough burlap sack. A spark of anger cut through my fear.
"Be careful with those," I snapped, stepping forward. "They are precision instruments, not firewood."
The guard paused, looking at me with a flash of surprise. He was probably used to people cowering. I met his gaze, my jaw set. For a moment, the three of us were locked in a silent standoff in the small, cluttered workshop, the only sounds the ticking of a dozen clocks on the walls and the drumming of the rain on the roof.
The tall guard sighed, an annoyed, weary sound. "Put them in the artisan's case," he instructed his subordinate, gesturing to the leather tool roll on my bench. "And be careful. It seems we have a master craftsman in our presence."
The sarcasm was thick, but I ignored it. I watched as my tools were carefully packed away, a small victory in a battle I was certain to lose.
As they escorted me out of the workshop and into the waiting black carriage, a single thought echoed in my mind, a chilling premonition that felt as certain as the turning of a gear. My father had been summoned to be broken. I was being summoned to fix something. And I had a terrible feeling that in this kingdom of crumbling magic and rising machines, the broken things were far too dangerous to touch. The carriage door shut with a heavy, final thud, sealing me in with the scent of wet wool and my own rising fear. We were heading to the heart of the kingdom, a place of power and secrets, and I knew, with the cold certainty of a perfectly balanced clock, that I might never come back.