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PROLOGUENINA

I took the name of a dead canary.

My birth coincided with the collapse of a nearby mine—the most catastrophic collapse the continent of Belavere Trench had ever known. All 104 men within those tunnels were buried alive that day, with the exception of one—my father—who miraculously emerged from the dust, suffocated canary in hand.

My father liked to retell that story whenever whiskey persuaded him to, which was often. “Heard the blasted thing fall right off ’is perch, I swear it! She was always bloody squawkin’, you see? Never fuckin’ let up. Named it Caranina after that singer lady, you know the one? Moment she went quiet, I knew somethin’ weren’t right. Next I knew, the whole fuckin’ place was cavin’ underfoot. Barely reached daylight.” Fletcher Harrow would gesture to me then. “Came home to find me girl were born! It were fate, you see? God snuffed that canary so that I could see Nina with me own eyes!”

He’d smile for a moment, remembering a newborn version of me, and then he’d remember those 103 men buried and grow solemn. The solemnness would turn to anger. Anger meant whiskey.

“Fuckin’ mines,” he’d mutter. Then, “Fuckin’swanksin their fuckin’ fancy robes,” and as though the words were combustible, other craftsmen, whatever their trade, would ignite.

Together, they’d cradle their cups and curse their poor fortune. They would blame the Head of House first, then all the Lords, then all Artisans for their luck in life.

There were only two kinds of people in the world, and I’d known it before I could talk. There were the people like my father, who worked honestly. Craftsmen who were paid far too little for their long days in the mines, the factories, the farms. And then there were Artisans: the fortunate. The high-society swanks with their magic.

“Who says they’ve got more to offer than us, aye?” This, from some other drunkard. “Sittin’ in their fine houses, butlers and all.”

“God’s whores,” someone would say. “If Idia appeared before me, I’d wrap me hands ’round her holy throat.”

But the Holy daughter, Idia, was likely somewhere high above laughing. The Artisans were in Belavere City, miles and miles away. And as for these men, their fortunes would never change. Their fate had been determined for them in childhood when they had been put on a train to that fancy city, prayed to Idia, and swallowed a solution that would determine if magic lived within them, or if they were of better service out in the brink of the continent, sweating and moaning and occasionally being buried alive.

Eventually one would speak too brashly or throw his glass, and the coppers would drag him out and jail him a night or two, but this was the extent of their rebellion. There was no one out here to fight but each other.

And anyway, who could raise a hand against those Artisans, whose blood was imbued with magic? Surely not this sorry lot.

I chuffed from my barstool, imagining these bloated clucks stumbling toward a blue-robed, Belavere-branded Artisan. They wouldn’t stand a chance.

“Nina,” my father said, just now remembering I was there. “Go on home, now. Tell your ma to heat some supper. I won’t be far behind.”

Ma wouldn’t be at home. Hadn’t been home in several years now. But whiskey was a magic all its own. Nothing to do but nod.

I ran barefoot down dirt roads the entire way, skipping over reeking drains and spilled coal dust. I didn’t stop until I was safely through thedoor of our two-room lodging. Then I exhaled the Scurry stench and took my tingling hands over to the Scribbler’s cranny.

A Scribbler’s cranny usually consisted of a writer’s desk with piles of waiting parchment. Artisan Scribblers were the source of all correspondence in Belavere Trench. A continent of Artisan magic had no need for boats and trains or birds to send messages, not when Scribblers could ink a page from many, many miles away with their mind alone.

There was a special sound associated with a Scribbler’s message. The parchment in the Scribbler’s cranny would crinkle just slightly, a gentle scratch would ensue, the insides of your stomach would clench. Who was sending word? What news would the ink bring?

Ma, I’d think.This time it will be from Ma.

It never was.

Our Scribbler’s cranny was not so much a cranny as the space between boiler and bench. And there wasn’t so much a writing desk as there was an old chopping block balanced atop a stool. The pile of waiting parchment curled at the corners.

I had been aching all day to sit by it, and not because I anticipated a missive from my mother. I was older now. It had been a long time since I’d bawled for her. No, this night, I awaited a letter of much more importance.

I imagined every child of twelve to be sitting just as I was, hovering over a parchment, waiting on a Scribbler who sat hundreds of miles away, curling their names and addresses in order. Over and over, I convinced myself the parchment was moving, that a spot of ink was beginning to appear, but hours passed, and the parchment remained obstinately plain.

At midnight, a clock tower chimed its warning, my father stumbled through the door and landed face-first on his cot. No ink. No cursive.

But I stayed by the boiler, blanket around my shoulders and eyelids back. And in the very early hours, the first rustles bolted through the chamber of my chest.

The parchment cracked, awakened.

I leapt from my stool.

Words unfurled from nothing.

BY ORDER OF BELAVERE TRENCH NATIONAL COUNCIL