Ticker Read Online Free Page B

the grandfather clock. The low whine of the Pixii in my ears settled alongside the rapid staccato of my Ticker. With the next step, I cursed the silk whisper of my skirts, but it didn’t muffle the sound of a footfall behind me, another tinkle of disturbed glass before an arm about my waist lifted me from the ground. The strong hand over my mouth prevented me from calling out for help.
    Like a shawl of frost, a sort of terrible calm settled over me. Twisting my hand about until I thought it might snap, I jammed the Pixii into my attacker’s bare wrist.
    No use lying to yourself, Farthing; this is going to hurt.
    The Pixii discharged with a burst of phosphorescent blue light, and electricity shot through both of us. Every muscle in our bodies contracted, and then my assailant went limp. I stumbled forwardbut kept my feet. Instead of shuddering to a stop, my Ticker hammered merrily in my chest.
    Nic vaulted into the hallway, brandishing a fire shovel. Still without his glasses, he’d need more than luck to land a blow, though he hadn’t let that stop him. “What’s happened now?”
    “An ambush.” It took me only a second to recharge the Pixii, and then I sat atop the intruder’s chest and jammed the metal foreprongs under his chin. “Rise and shine.”
    When the stranger opened his eyes, another frisson of white heat traveled from the base of my skull to every extremity, somehow just as real as the discharge from the Pixii. I peered into eyes so dark gray they were one blink away from black, and imagined ridiculous things: spreading a blanket for a picnic, sharing a pair of gold binoculars at the opera, snowy sled rides with furs up to our chins . . .
    A sudden silence in my chest told me that the clockwork heart had ceased pumping the blood through my veins. I realized that I shouldn’t be touching this man, though he remained very still. Almost too still.
    “I’m afraid you have me at something of a disadvantage, Miss Farthing,” he finally said.
    “As you do me,” was all I said in response. I could feel the blood draining from my face. My hands went cold. My feet prickled as though snow-kissed. Looking down at him, I whispered, “So this is what dying feels like.”
    The stranger caught me in his arms as I fell back, but Nic’s frantic shout seemed to come from a great distance. Remembering the jolt the Pixii gave me just a few minutes ago, I tried to tell Nic to use it again. My nearly incoherent mumbles must have conveyed the message. All at once I heard the whine of the charge, felt a rip and tear of fabric at my throat and cold metal against my skin, thenenergy raced through me. My eyes flew open, and I gasped for air with a horrible sucking noise. I lay prone on the floor between the coatrack and the wall. The stranger knelt over me now, one hand gripping the Pixii.
    Before I could say or do anything to reassure him, he charged it and zinged me a third time—what I deserved, perhaps, for attacking him earlier. I convulsed around the pain, then my world constricted to the wild gray gaze of the stranger as he took me by the shoulders.
    “Miss Farthing!” He sounded like a Cylindrella record player, winding down. “Can you hear me?” He put his head to my chest and checked my respiratory functions. “Say something.”
    “It . . . isn’t . . . nice . . . to electrocute people, sir,” I sputtered.
    “She needs a stimulant,” Nic said, stumbling forward and tripping over the edge of the carpet. “And something sweet to bring up her blood sugar.”
    “Plum cake would be nice.” Colors were brighter than they ought to be. I thought I could taste yellow.
    “I’ll plum cake you!” Nic said. “I think that scared another ten years off my life!”
    The first ten were scared off the day that Warwick implanted my clockwork heart.
    “How long has she been having these kinds of episodes?” the newcomer asked, scooping me up in his arms and carrying me to the chaise in the study. After