The mess of winding caves opened out to a wider gulch or gully deep underground.

A stone ridge spanned the gap like a platform and there was the gush of an unseen river that echoed somewhere in its depths.

‘Oh no,’ Flora remarked, as she fought for breath. ‘Over that way’s the wide open area we came from, with the workshop. We’ve come full circle.’

Henry was the last to catch up. He heaved for air and leaned on his staff like a crutch.

‘Running might be easier without you wearing all that metal,’ remarked Irene.

Henry didn’t have the breath to argue.

‘Shh!’ Aisling hushed the others and pointed to the far side of the gulch.

Somewhat incongruously, the frontispiece of a mansion was set into the rock wall.

The mansion featured columns that had plume-like embellishments at the top and were arranged across the building’s façade.

The long, rectangular windows were framed by arches and stone balustrades, and they were lit from within by electric lights.

Outside the house was a garden made entirely of stone, with handsome walls and archways that separated statues, fountains, and lawns made of raked pebbles.

‘I think they’re still following us. We have to hide,’ Henry said with dismay. Together, the miners crept up to the house and hid behind its garden walls.

Gifrey’s automatons soon arrived, and marched towards the house. They arrived in two files of maybe a dozen each. They wielded pickaxes and shovels as well as factory tools such as heavy spanners and mallets.

The synchronised, relentless stamping of the automatons didn’t falter even as they turned their heads this way and that and scanned for their quarry.

A balcony door opened on the upper floor of the mansion set into the rock wall, and from it emerged a man.

He wore a white jacket as a doctor or chemist might wear and hobbled as though he had a false leg.

One of the man’s arms appeared to be encased in brass, as was one side of his skull, into which a glowing green monocle was set that covered his eye.

‘Oho! What’s this? Old Gifrey finally making his move?’ the man roared.

The man whipped up a device which he wielded like a musket and aimed it at the first automaton that marched down his path.

The miners flinched as a blast emitted from the end of the man’s device. It was as loud as any hunting-rifle.

A flash of lightning erupted from the device’s end and struck the nearest marching statue.

In rapid succession, the man cranked a lever and gave more repeated blasts. One automaton fell and others lost chunks and crackled with fire, but they didn’t break their relentless march towards the mansion.

The golden child caught up with the group of mechanical men as fast as his steady jog allowed him.

‘Halt!’ he cried, after a click and a whirr.

As one, the automatons ceased their advance.

‘Aurelius? What’s the meaning of this, boy?’ the hobbling man demanded as he emptied a collection of metal rods from his lightning device and stuffed new ones back in their place.

The golden boy made his way to the front of the group. Now that the noise of the skirmish died down, a distant baying, howling, wailing, and screeching could be heard from the enraged fae in the caves.

‘Master Edwald, lord Gifrey sends his apologies. He gave a hasty order to the workers to follow some intruders who were spying on him.’ He gave a click and a whir. ‘He didn’t tell them they couldn’t come here, or even what to do with the spies if they caught them, so I had to chase after,’ Aurelius called up to the man.

‘Who was spying on him, lad?’ Edwald answered. ‘Does that mean they’ve come here?’

At that moment, something which appeared to be a flock of crows arrived and whirled around the balcony. They beat their wings and screeched at the source of the magical disturbance.

Enraged, chattering rats appeared from various shadows and crevices and they leapt about and thrashed with rage.

‘Shoo, shoo! Begone, wretched pixies! Hob-goblins, troll-spawn! Back to Hell with you,’ Edwald cursed and swatted at the air.

‘The spies are some other miners who have come down here. They were picking at an old seam, then they came to spy on father, and want to steal from him,’ Aurelius explained, after the frenzy of maddened fae creatures had abated.

‘Oh, confound it. New prospectors down here, causing trouble and meddling with things?’ Edwald swiped at one last crow before the flock dissipated.

‘I haven’t seen them. We’ve got a fragile peace, your father and I, and we don’t need interference with how things work,’ Edwald grumbled. He gave a small laugh. ‘This time, I thought the old man had had enough and was going to put me out of business with his dratted… machines’.

Edwald took some deep breaths and leant on the balcony rail.

‘Now, would you kindly take this rabble away? This whole business has had me quite worked up. I trust my next delivery shall be on schedule,’ Edwald gave some uncomfortable wheezes as he spoke.

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‘Workers, about turn! Go back to the workshop and resume your duties,’ Aurelius called out.

In unison, the puppets that remained functional headed towards the workshop. Aurelius moved to pick up the remains of their fallen comrade, whose wreckage smouldered on the ground.

‘Oh, Aurelius. Dear boy. I do apologise for that,’ Edwald said, in an affectionate tone.

‘You know how jumpy I can get. You know, as one who helped make you, I am fond of you too, you know. I wouldn’t turn this old contraption on you; old Zeus, my lightning zapper. It’ll be the future, you know! As will you! I do rather feel sorry for you, however, having to put up with that great windbag. Don’t tell him I said that. Let’s keep that between you and me.’ Edwald smiled and gave a wheezy chuckle.

‘Goodbye, Uncle Edwald,’ Aurelius said, and dragged away the broken automaton.

The miners, witness to all of this, waited in silence. They tried to ignore the agitated scampering, crawling, or scuttling cave wildlife that moved all around them, on them, and in the seams of their uniforms.

Edwald stood up straight with a groan and headed inside. The miners crept closer to the windows to observe.

Inside the house was a beautiful hallway of marble tiles that was overlaid with red carpet. Mahogany wainscoting bordered the embossed floral wallpaper, over which hung oil paintings set in gilded frames.

A series of crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling all along the length of the corridor. Their strands of cut glass sparkled like diamonds from the pearlescent glow of integrated electric lights.

Furniture of gold, glass, and varnished wood lined each side of the corridor, along with a stately grandfather clock.

‘Where did all that come from?’ Aisling breathed in wonder.

‘Good Lord. Heavens preserve us,’ Irene murmured in bafflement.

‘How in the world did he get all this down here, and all the materials for it?’ Percy wondered aloud.

They watched the strange, hobbling man addressed as ‘Uncle Edwald’ as he walked down a flight of stairs.

Edwald made his way to a room at the front of the building which appeared to be a workshop or laboratory of sorts.

The miners could see careless heaps of stone, timber, iron ingots, cave plants, lumps of scrap, and other salvage lying about. At the window was something that was a cross between a work bench and a stone altar.

To the miner’s astonishment, Bard stepped into the room along with Edwald. This time, however, he wore a royal blue overcoat instead of a beige one.

Bard gave a parp on his horn and began to make an address;

‘Oyez, oyez! Hear ye, hear ye. Here is our evening update;

‘Today shows the fragility of peace,

the fraught bonds of trust that fray under stress.

Wanton Gifrey flouts civil relations

and retains thee captive under duress.

‘A blasé parade of might doth he make

to strong-arm thee to labour for his will.

A glimpse of the ruthless ends he may take;

should his wrath be roused, he would do thee ill.

‘Hooded eyes regard your art with cunning.

Envious, he covets all your inventions.

In want of these, extortion he exerts;

shackling contracts are his intentions.’

‘I know that much, Wakeman, my dearest friend and advisor. The porcine oaf is a wanton, greedy man; an artless industrialist who only cares to pile wealth and stuff his guts,’ answered Edwald with resentment.

‘The issue with Gifrey is that he has a workforce of doltish, crude golems working for him night and day. The ore they wrench from the earth is as shoddy and crude as they are, mixed as it is with useless iron pyrites,’ Edwald raved in anger.

‘Unlike he, my lord is an artisan,’ Bard, or Wakeman as Edwald called him, bowed and flattered without shame.

‘For his industry he uses my art, my craft! He styles himself a lord among his rusty puppets, and those poor, wretched servants he treats like dolls too – have you seen them? The fae-folk he has dressed up like waiting maids. Ugh! What a swine,’ Edwald gave dark mutterings in reply. He picked up a chunk of iron pyrites and examined it closely with his glowing eye.

‘Gifrey regards all his minions dearly.

For Aurelius he’s a father’s pride.

One worker’s loss may sour thy relations.

A good-will gesture may thy favour tide.

Although to do so may pain thee sorely,

an enviable gift you could provide.

Given through cunning, pledged insincerely,

trinkets should appease while our time we bide.

Lo, circumstances new may yet arise

to tilt the scales of opportunity.

Who’re the intruding, prospecting spies,

could their favour be won, scuppering Gifrey?’

Bard strummed his lute and looked heavenward as he made a show of appearing to ponder.

‘Curse my luck to have to depend upon that swine of a man. All I want to do is create works of art and beauty. I want to inspire admiration and even envy at my works and skill,’ Edwald seethed.

‘The day will come when I shall have amassed sufficient to build an opulent home, and have manufactured new marvels of our modern age. I would live like a prince! I should earn a place in history for my labours!’ Edwald coughed. ‘Someday sooner, rather than later, I hope.’

‘What a shame that I have to rely on his iron ore when he does not appreciate the fruits of my labours. He; the sole provider, and the sole customer of my wares! What irony, what irony. He threatens me with the army he keeps and today had marching at my front door with weapons at hand.

‘Perhaps a small token of friendship in the right place would make all the difference. If I can present myself as grudgeless, blameless, and full of good will, who could blame old Edwald?’ the old man reasoned with a scheming grin.

‘Barbarous, crude golems could be misled,

puppets tangled, with their strings intertwined.

The bull tricked to charge at thin air instead

Befuddled becomes the ringleader’s mind.

A wily play is that which is needed;

touch light the balance with masterful tools.

If by brute force, will can’t be asserted,

within fool’s gold could be gold for the fools.’

Bard strummed and appeared to crease his brow in thought.

‘Why yes, I am struck by a most brilliant thought! This simple, useless chunk he brought me; why it would only take a fraction of my craft to turn it to something more. This poisoned gift could be given and sow the seed of his undoing.’ Edwald grasped the chunk of iron pyrite in his metal fist and gave a malicious grin.

Edwald put a glove over his one remaining human hand, and drew from a sealed container what the miners presumed was a rod of charged lodestone.

From this close, the miners could see Edwald better.

Edwald’s mechanical arm wasn’t merely encased in metal; it was made wholly of brass, as was the seven-fingered hand at the end of it. Each of its digits had the form of a delicate tool or instrument which moved and clicked independently.

One of Edwald’s legs was a wooden prosthetic, and the white jacket protruded with unusual edges and angles which suggested that more manufactured elements lay beneath.

All of this was overshadowed, however, by the eerie green glow of his right eye which appeared to be a glass or gemstone orb that was lit from within.

His human form, or what was left of it, was that of a frail man, made pale by sickliness. The places where his skin met metal elements were swollen by infection.

The miners ducked out of sight as Edwald turned towards the work bench by the window. Without daring to breathe, they could hear him lay the metal chunk on it, and the clink of tools.

There was a small exclamation of pain from Edwald, then a green glow was visible from within the room.

The window opened and noxious, curling smog wafted out, among painful-sounding coughs from Edwald.

Aisling peered up at the open window, and her eyes widened in astonishment. There at the windowsill, what had once been a rough chunk of pyrite was a perfect, gleaming nugget of gold.

Before anyone could stop her, Aisling grabbed it.

‘Good Heavens above, my Lord! It has been seized!’ Bard, otherwise known as Wakeman, cried aloud.

‘Curse you, little thieves!’ Edwald roared after the miners as they ran for home, although Percy thought it ended in a wicked chuckle.