4 Chapter 4

I didn’t want to make a big deal out of it by encouraging him to take it,so I just stood there patiently as if it was the most normal thing in the world.Eventually,he stretched forward,able to reach across the width ofthe cage and pluck it nimbly from my grasp.

“I’ve never seen anything like this,”he said,turning it over in his hands.

“I hope not.I made it myself.”

His head snapped up.“You build things?”

He made it sound like I was a fancy architect,like one of the men the Regent had hired to design and build his solarium for the eclipse.“Well,no,not like you’re thinking.I made that because I grew up in a house where all the good stuff got locked away,which,let me tell you,you don’t do when you have a curious kid who knows a little bit about mechanics.I always thought about becoming an engineer when I was growing up,but making tools like that is as close as I’ll ever get.”

“Why?”

“What do you mean,why?”

“You have money and position.You could get whatever education you wished.”