Thunderstruck

by Shannon Delany

  Catrina dropped to her knees with a whine, scooping the money up and pressing it back into the open mouths of the bags.

  “Do you understand now, Catrina? No matter how Jordan has changed, no matter how difficult things are between her and I, no matter how our story ends—whether together or apart, whether comedy or tragedy,” he assured—”I will never feel differently about you than I do right now.” He shook his head and Jack stepped up to him, resting a hand on his shoulder. He shook it off. “I do not love you. I cannot like you … I hate you, Catrina. I hate you. For what you did to Jordan and, selfishly, because of what hurting her did to me.”

  Catrina tightened the cords running through the bags’ necks, and stood, quivering. She stepped up to him, her hands reaching out for his own shaking arms, reaching out imploringly for his hands, now balled into fists.

  Jack stepped between them, warning, “Do not. We should go.” He wedged himself between them, placing his back to Catrina. “We must go. Now.”

  Rowen nodded. “Yes,” he said from between clenched teeth. “Now.” He was first to turn toward the exit. He led the way to the door, hearing Jack close behind. He reached for the doorknob, but Catrina’s voice stopped him as his fingers closed on the cool brass handle.

  “Rowen.”

  He stiffened at the sound of his name, and straighting, he slowly turned back to face her, the hurried noise of her heels clattering their way across the marble floor as she raced toward him.

  She held the pouches out to him. “Take the money. Just take it,” she insisted. “Hate me all you want.” She shook her head. “I cannot change what I did nor how you feel. But in this cause—abolition—we are united. I want to see slaves of all colors and kinds freed. It is the way the world shoud be. The way it must be. So take the money. Let me help people. Let me show that, whether you are mine or hers, that I do want to be a person who helps others. That I am a person who wants to change the world. For the better.”

  Rowen grunted and watched darkly as Jack crossed the distance to where Catrina stood, her eyes holding the ghost of hope.

  ***

  Aboard the Artemesia

  That night the nightmares were worse, like something of the captain lingered on Jordan even though he was dead—even though she felt no sense of him in his rooms or on any belongings. He was dead everywhere else in her nightmares.

  She ran, he chased her. She was cornered, he found her. He grabbed her wrist even as she tried to slap him, holding her hand before her eyes, useless. And then she noticed how her fingers flickered when she stared at them—flickered and changed in number. She had four fingers, then seven, then a bushelful …

  Something inside her shifted. Woke. This was not reality and not memory. This was only a dream. Her dream. She focused on her ever-changing fingers and held the fact in her mind. This was merely a dream. And the captain, who had no power in the waking world, should have no power here either.

  Suddenly free of his grip, she gave a shout, and hit him. Hard. He flew backwards and she took a step, out of the corner he had driven her into, and into the light. She raised her hand again. Around her feet a breeze grew and played, making soft sounds. Amid her flickering fingers she felt lightning flutter and course. And then the world flashed white and hot and the only thing left of the captain was a mark where a small but of ash smoldered and smoked before being whisked away by the singing breeze.

  She had evaporated him.

  Eradicated him.

  She stood on the Artemesia’s deck having destroyed the last bit of him holding sway over her by using the very power he thought made her a slave.

  She woke.

  For a while she listened to her own breathing; she concentrated on the feel of the bed beneath her and the soft and normal noises of a ship groaning and whispering—singing in its peculiar way—in flight.

  Her ship in flight.

  Her stomach growled and she sat straight up in bed, her hand on her rumbling tummy, and she realized that, although she was certain she had been hungry since being aboard the Artemesia, this was the first time she had felt the hunger. This was the first time she wanted to eat. The first time she truly wanted to go on. To go forward. To fight for something more than simple, desperate survival. Untangling herself from her bedsheets, she jumped into her dress and raced Topside to satisfy the rumbling like thunder in her gut, grinning like an absolute dolt the entire time.

  An absolute dolt just beginning to live again.

  ***

  Philadelphia

  Jack nodded as they slunk out of the shadows along the tall wall, recognizing the way they had come. “This is it,” he whispered, the words coming out more question than fact. Rowen clenched his jaw and led the way, slipping through the gate, around the end of the massive home and into the expansive backyard. Jack prepared to lope across the garden to the pod, but Rowen grabbed his shoulder and held him back, squinting at the rambling house, part fieldstone and part brick. “I must see someone inside,” he apologized.

  “You must be joking,” Jack muttered, examining the house himself. “This is the Astraea estate, aye?”

  “Yes.”

  “Are you certain they actually remain on the premises? They were found Harboring, so would they not …”

  Rowen shrugged. “Old Morgan Astraea was of decent rank but he was of even finer finances. He would not leave the family home unless he had lost far more than rank.”

  “And you must talk to him?”

  “No,” Rowen said, “most certainly not. But I must talk to his wife. Reassure Jordan’s mother.”

  Jack rubbed his brow. “The woman who brought him down?”

  “It was not like that,” Rowen grumbled. “Jordan was Morgan’s offspring as sure as a sizzling summer day is long. And … I am not sure it should matter if she was not. They have been husband and wife forever. And he certainly has not always been an easy man to live with.”

  Jack sputtered. “So if Jordan is not Astraea’s he should still keep the wife?”

  Rowen groaned. “I do not know. I know decidedly little about everything right now,” he admitted, glowering. “I only know keeping Jordan will always be what I choose over losing Jordan.”

  “You are a stronger man than I.”

  Rowen shrugged. “I am merely a man in love. There is more strength in that—in love—than I ever expected.”

  “So you must see her mother.”

  “Yes. Jordan will ask after her. And she should know her daughter lives.”

  “You did not want to see your own mother …”

  “The fact you question that decision only proves you have never met the woman,” he concluded softly. “Distance is best for now, I think.”

  Jack sighed. “If I knew my mother, I would want to see her—know her,” he mused. “But she wanted none of me, so…” He shrugged.

  “I am truly sorry for that,” Rowen said.

  “Eh, it is no great loss,” Jack claimed. “Men grow up without mothers or fathers—or in my case without mothers and fathers—all the time. We still turn out well enough if we put our minds to it.”

  Rowen nodded agreement. “Shall we?”

  Jack shrugged. “If you think we will be welcome …”

  “Lady Astraea is one of the most gracious hostesses in all of Philadelphia. She would even welcome the Pope!”

  “Bold words. Lead on!”

  They were not far inside when a maid spotted them and ran the opposite direction.

  “You know her?” Jack asked, fingers flexing at his side.

  “No. And her reaction is not a good sign …”

  “You think not?” Jack quipped.

  “We had best hasten our way to Lady Astraea. She will straighten things out.” Rowen jogged down the hall, ducking his head into open doorways as he went, Jack behind him.

  They found Lady Cynthia Astraea as the staff found them.

  “Interesting,” she drawled, draped across a delicately embroidered divan. “Rowen. And
you’ve brought a friend.”

  “Lady Astraea?” Rowen asked, realizing she looked like Jordan’s mother—well, very nearly—but the way she sat and spoke … It was as if he faced a stranger.

  “If memory serves,” she rested a hand on her chest and her eyes flickered and seemed to change a moment, “there is a substantial reward offered to whoever turns you in …”

  Together Jack and Rowen took a long step back.

  Lady Astraea raised her hands over her head and slapped them together. “Gather them up!” she called.

  But a young woman stepped forward, saying, “No, milady.” Her eyes nervously darted to Rowen as if she sent him some message with the glance. “I am sorry, but I do believe it is your bedtime …”

  A broad-shouldered older African man with salt-and-pepper curls shoved his way through the group and, looking at Jack and Rowen, shouted, “Go! Go now!” and he leaped onto Lady Astraea, covering her mouth with a rag.

  Her eyes rolled back in her head and with a shudder they closed, and she sank down on the divan, unconscious.

  Rowen and Jack spun on their heels, running back the way they had come. Out the mansion’s back, past the well-manicured gardens and into the hedgemaze. With determination born of desperation they turned their pod around, shoved it to the slate stairs at the edge of the great granite hill on which the Astraea property sat and, jumping in, had just enough time to snap their buckles before the pod tipped nose-first down the staircase with a horrible grating noise and spread its wings, gliding over the rooftops of the Below and searching out an eddy to carry it higher.

  Chapter Fifteen

  Take the whole range of imaginative literature, and we are all wholesale borrowers.

  —Wendell Phillips

  Aboard the Artemesia

  Tsu complained, “I thought we were going Topside.”

  “And we shall, lovely girl, so we shall,” the Wandering Wallace assured. “But first I need to procure a few pleasant distractions for our friends upstairs. We will be in Philadelphia soon and must look the part, yes?”

  She nodded.

  They wandered down the hallway, Tsu following obediently as the Wandering Wallace tested cabin doors, popping them open and sticking his head inside. He scanned each room, looking for the little details that told him this was a prime spot to hunt. A beautiful trunk, an elegant pair of shoes, a well-cared-for carpetbag… He stepped all the way inside, opening the door wide to encourage Tsu to follow.

  “Here,” he said. “This is a good spot to try….” He immediately went to a trunk setting at the foot of the room’s cot. It was nicely painted, with very few scratches or dents in its wood. The leather handles retained a subtle suppleness to them that was often lost with time, and the locking mechanism was highly polished brass. “Lovely, lovely …”

  “What are you doing, Wallace?”

  “Shopping,” he said, glancing over his shoulder at her. He crouched before the chest and tried the lid. “Hmmm. Only good things are kept inside locked trunks, do you not agree?”

  She smiled and headed to the cot. Pressing down on its thin mattress with her palms, she tested it for give. Then she sat and crossed her legs, allowing one knee to peek out of her silk robe.

  The move did not go unnoticed. He winked at her. “Lovely, lovely,” he agreed. “But there is no time for such niceties,” he complained, “not so near revolution.”

  He reached into his sleeve and withdrew one of the many small tools he regularly carried. He slipped the tip of it into the lock’s hole and wiggled it, listening. The tumblers clicked and the lock popped, releasing, and allowing him to open the lid wide.

  “Ah, ah, ahhhhh,” he said, pulling out a shawl. And another. And one more. He unfolded each, laying them across the foot of the cot to display their fine designs. Flowers, birds, and frippery. Next came fans, each of elegant design. He snapped them open then hopped to his feet and made a show of fanning her. “Adjust your kimono, dear pet, or I will be constantly fanning us both—the sight of you warms me so I might start to steam.”

  She giggled and rolled her legs onto the cot, coming onto her knees. “Kiss me,” she whispered, leaning toward him.

  But thinking of the fox in the other room—the fox that had been far more than a fox—he pulled away. “Come, come,” he commanded, scooping the shawls into his arms and closing a fan to tap her teasingly on the tip of her nose. “We must prepare our friends for this most amazing journey into Philadelphia. They will need guidance, surely, and I will need you, dearest, to stop tempting me into other things.”

  Pouting, she murmured, “Of course.”

  “Beautiful girl, there is much to be done—an entire world to conquer.” He winked, and exited, certain she would follow shortly.

  It only took a moment before he heard her feet hit the floor and she was beside him.

  They emerged Topside, he with an arm looped around her. “Look, look, look,” the Wandering Wallace proclaimed. He strode immediately to Meggie, who sat at her normal place on the Topside dais—not so close to Jordan as to get accidentally stepped on, but not so far away from her to not be able to see and hear precisely what she was doing. She glanced up at him, a smile spreading across her face immediately.

  She set down the jacks and ball.

  “Look what we have returned with!” the Wandering Wallace shouted, whipping the shawls out before him, their fabrics dancing as if they had lives of their own. He rushed to Meggie and dragged one around her neck so that she giggled and snatched it from his hand, and then he tossed one across Jordan’s shoulders and threw another high into the air before it drifted down, settling on Maude’s lap.

  Behind him walked Miyakitsu.

  Bran pulled up short and squinted. She still seemed somehow different from the Wandering Wallace’s companion he had thought he had grown used to seeing. Somehow odd. Yes, her outfit was the same, from her kimono down to her shoes and socks—Maude smacked his arm, seeing him watching Miyakitsu—perhaps it was just the jewels. But her body language was slightly … stiffer? As if she had not truly stretched for a very long time, or as if her muscles remained cold and tight even on such a warm day.

  “You are staring at her. Again,” Maude hissed.

  He widened his eyes and scooted closer to her on the deck. Slipping his arm around her waist, he pulled her tight to his side, moving so that his lips nearly brushed her ear as he said, “There is something different about her—don’t you see? Something strange …”

  She reached up and placed a hand flat on his face, playfully pushing him a few inches away.

  But only a few inches.

  She puckered her lips and rolled her eyes. “There is something strange about you,” she teased.

  He winked at her but he dropped his volume, going more and insisted, “I am serious. There is something wrong with her. Something about her makes me uneasy.”

  The Wandering Wallace was fanning Meggie as she chased him around the dais, the child laughing more and more with every step she took. As he teased her he also instructed. “There is a language to fans,” he called, dodging her grasping hands. “Your fan may speak for you when you would rather not say a proper word.”

  “Like a secret language?”

  “Very much like,” he agreed.

  “Show me, show me!” she shouted, grabbing for the fan again.

  “No, no imp, this one is mine,” he said. “Is it not magnificent? Here,” he added. “This is an appropriate fan for such a grabby little monkey….” He handed her a far more simple-looking fan.

  Meggie pursed her rosebud lips in disappointment, watching the Wandering Wallace’s fan with a hunger in her bright eyes.

  “Now,” the Wandering Wallace said, demonstrating. “Rest the fan on your right cheek….”

  Meggie did so.

  “That means yes.” He switched the side of his face that he set the fan on and said, “And this is no.”

  Meggie mimicked his moves, utterly serious.

&nbs
p; Bran’s attention wavered from the two of them, noting how Maude subtly copied the moves as well. He had never seen her sporting a fan. As a previous member of Holgate’s staff, he would have wagered that she fanned herself with her hand or anything else that was nearby. Or perhaps she adjusted the neckline on her blouse …

  His eyes drifted to her bosom, and he swallowed hard, imagining Maude dappled with sweat and soft and warm beneath his touch …

  He tore his eyes away and whistled a sloppy and nervous tune before refocusing his attention on Meggie and the Wandering Wallace.

  “Cover your left ear … That tells your friend not to tell your secret.”

  Meggie nodded solemnly.

  “Ah.” The Wandering Wallace turned his attention to Bran and Maude a moment and adjusted his fan so that it half-opened across his face. “We are being watched.”

  Meggie copied the move, turning briefly to peer at her parents before she spun back to the Wandering Wallace.

  “Or,” the Wandering Wallace said, “twirl it in your left hand and you say the same thing. We are being watched. And we still are,” he added with a laugh.

  Even Jordan had paused at the ship’s helm to watch the Wandering Wallace and her favorite passenger.

  “I see you staring at my marvelous fan,” the Wandering Wallace teased. “Keep your monkey paws off it,” he said, giving a derisive snort.

  Meggie growled, declaring, “I am no monkey!”

  “No, that is true—you seem much less monkey-like when you growl … More like a troll,” he mused. “And trolls may not touch my fan either.”

  Bran’s opened his mouth to comment, but Maude touched his arm in a way that said, Wait.

  The Wandering Wallace snapped his fan shut. “That is one you should know,” he said. “It means, I’m jealous!”

  “I am not jealous,” Meggie said, stomping a foot.

  “Then perhaps you’d rather learn to say, I wish to be rid of you!” He closed the fan and touched the tip of it with one finger.