When We Have Wings

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When We Have Wings Page 30

by Claire Corbett


  Peri turned on Finch. ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘Ah,’ said Finch. ‘You really haven’t spent much time around fliers. Don’t worry, that’s just Rafael—Raf; he doesn’t mean any harm. He’s one of your rescuers, you know. Anyway, it’s a compliment. Ground suck is anything that pulls your attention away from flying.’

  A circle formed around the fire as fliers arrived and gathered to talk while they ate. Peri’s stomach fluttered with the tension of her uncertain status as both prisoner and member of the group. She was on probation. It was up to her to prove herself to them. They had to trust her enough to let her return Hugo, as she’d promised. Hugo cooed at her in her lap. She answered him under her breath, mimicking each sound. Aboowah. Baabow. He patted her cheeks and looked into her eyes. She stared back, falling into that open gaze.

  Finally, nine fliers had joined them. Peri could not see Jay. They were armed with knives, Peri noticed, though several also had holsters on arms or legs for compact weapons she’d never seen before. She would have liked to take a closer look at those but knew better than to try. Peri searched their faces. Which one was Niko, the famous Pale Male who wasn’t sure if Jay should have rescued her? That man there, wading out of the river, who looked about forty and was now besieged by other, very young fliers, who were surrounding him, almost mobbing him, talking to him, questioning him, competing for his attention, that must be him. Niko must be the name he used with this group in which everyone had an assumed name. He cast a sidelong, curious glance at Peri. Before she looked away in confusion she had a glimpse of a tall, rangy man with steel-coloured wings and a thin, elegant face. His hair stood up in silver bristles, as if he were an enormous, short-crested parrot.

  The fliers were talking about the extremes to which they pushed themselves, the tightness of their spirals, the speed of their descents. While Peri was struggling to follow what they were saying, Hugo snoring softly against her, someone came and stood over her, blocking out the stars. Jay.

  ‘How did you go?’ Jay said to Finch.

  Peri waited for Finch to answer, to hear her verdict. ‘Good,’ she said. ‘She specked out.’

  Jay laughed at the expression on Peri’s face. ‘Specked out is good. Means you went so high you became just a speck in the sky.’ He crouched next to Peri, opening the small bag he’d set down on the ground. ‘Give Hugo to me.’

  Peri lifted the sleeping baby into Jay’s arms. Gently, Jay removed the bandages from his hands and feet. ‘Hey, little brother,’ he said as Hugo woke briefly, then drifted back into sleep once his bandages were off. Jay inspected Hugo’s skin, then wiped it over with a cloth he’d removed from a package. As he bent his head over Hugo, the lightning bolt striking across his hair gleamed in the firelight.

  ‘More antiseptic and new skin,’ Jay said, sealing the old bandages up and putting them into the bag. ‘Look, skin good as new, eh? Kids heal so quickly. He won’t need any more dressings. Even his bruises are changing colour faster than yours.’

  A bellow went up from the other fliers as they realised Jay was among them.

  ‘Safety meeting!’ one yelled. ‘Safety meeting, safety meeting, safety meeting,’ the others chanted until Jay stood up and walked over to the centre of the group. He patted the air with his hands to quiet them.

  ‘Looks to me like you’ve already started your safety meeting,’ he said, gesturing to the bottle of something, Peri presumed it was beer, in Raf’s hand.

  ‘Yeah, safety meeting started at least a half-hour ago,’ Niko said from where he lolled against a log, his wings draped over it. The younger fliers formed a semicircle opposite Niko at a respectful distance.

  ‘Please, sir,’ said Raf, ‘I wanna know how to pay the rent.’ The others laughed. ‘C’mon, safety meeting. Give us your energy lecture, man.’

  ‘Bullshit,’ said Jay. ‘You can’t be serious. You are such a bunch of fucking wuffos, you really are.’

  ‘Steady on,’ said Niko.

  ‘Safety meeting, my arse,’ said Jay. ‘You all need to get some sleep.’

  ‘We have to wind down,’ said one of the young women. ‘We had some big air today.’

  ‘What’s a wuffo?’ whispered Peri.

  ‘Newbie,’ said Finch. ‘They’re always saying, What for you do this? What for you do that? So, wuffos.’

  ‘Big air, eh?’ Jay was snarling as he paced the circle, clearly enjoying himself. ‘Big air, Jesus, you call that, what you had today, big fucking air? It never ceases to amaze me what a pathetic bunch of wuffos you all are. Certain members of Audax,’ he spun gracefully on one heel, acknowledging Finch and Niko, ‘excepted. You poor little rich kids get your treatments all paid for by Daddy as your graduation present, your wings are slapped on by some ignorant doctor who’s not even a flier, you’re booted out the door with a gazillion pills and a year’s membership of the Dead-as-a-Fucking-Dodo Flight Gym and you think you can fly!’

  As Jay turned again in his pacing, Peri admired the way the lightning bolt zigzagging across the back of his wings seemed to glow with its own light.

  ‘Well,’ Niko said, ‘we don’t, actually. That’s why we’re here. We’re not all as lucky as you, with your six years of rigorous training with the best of the best. All at taxpayers’ expense too.’

  ‘Luck,’ grunted Jay. ‘You call what I’ve done and what I’ve been through luck? Anyway, I know all that, I’m here, aren’t I? I’m not off somewhere making my goddamn fortune.’

  ‘You’re a good man,’ said Niko. His voice was quiet and Peri was fascinated by the way each flier strained to hear his every word. If Jay was their commanding officer then Niko was their political leader.

  ‘Okay,’ said Jay, holding up his hands. The light from the fire illuminated his brown face from below and struck sparks of red from the iridescent undersides of his wings. ‘You want me to talk about energy, eh? So, someone recite the first rule of flying.’

  ‘Maintain thine airspeed, lest the ground arise and smite thee,’ yelled Raf.

  ‘Yes,’ said Jay. ‘That’s it. Airspeed is one form of energy in the bank while you’re flying. It’s your scarcest resource, by far. First thing is: every millisecond you’re in the air, you’re paying rent, eh?’

  ‘Right!’ roared the young fliers.

  ‘And why are you paying rent?’

  ‘First law of motion!’ said Raf. ‘The first law of motion states: A body at rest tends to remain at rest, while a body in motion tends to remain in motion in a straight line unless it is subjected to an outside force.’

  ‘And that outside force is?’

  ‘Gravity!’

  ‘So every second you’re in the air you’re paying rent. In energy. To overcome the force of gravity. You’re paying tax, too, and what is that tax?’

  ‘Drag!’ said the young fliers.

  ‘Alright. Drag and dissipation of energy through heat loss in accordance with the second law of thermodynamics. Now, what do you have in your energy budget? What’s in the bank, people?’

  There was a rattling of feathers among the fliers. One of the young women said, ‘Well, muscle power?’

  ‘What gives you muscle power?’

  The young woman looked around her uncertainly.

  ‘Fuel. Respiration. So, food and oxygen, yes?’ said Jay.

  The fliers nodded.

  ‘I’m glad we can agree on that,’ said Jay, raising his eyebrows. ‘So, that’s chemical energy and it goes one way only; it’s not reversible. Once we use it, it’s gone, transformed into work and dissipated as heat and drag. Also, it takes time to convert fuel into chemical energy for flight. But we have several other forms we can use. Such as?’

  ‘Lift,’ said Niko.

  ‘Lift as in the force generated by a body moving through a fluid? That’s mechanical energy and without it we couldn�
��t fly at all. When a flow of fluid is deflected by a solid, such as your wings, the flow turns one way and creates lift in the opposite direction, according to the third law of motion.’

  ‘I was thinking more about thermals, things like that.’

  ‘Good. That kind of lift includes thermals, compression, convergence, ridgelift, wave lift, glass-off and wind. All those forms of lift are ultimately solar energy; you use it to supplement your own chemical energy. Of course solar energy is not just your glorious ally, it’s also your most terrifying adversary, as anyone who has flown into wind shear or rotors or thunderstorms knows only too well.’ Jay glanced over at Peri and winked. Peri was grateful she was seated away from the fire; she hoped no-one could see her blushing.

  ‘In the real world we can’t be said to be using up solar energy when we use the lift in a thermal. But there’s another very important form of energy we use all the time. I’ve mentioned it already.’ Jay stared around the circle. ‘No? Didn’t any of you study physics? Pale Male?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Niko. ‘A long time ago. Remind me. Remind us.’

  ‘Mechanical energy,’ said Jay.

  ‘Uh, you mentioned airspeed,’ said Raf.

  ‘That’s one form of it. Airspeed is kinetic energy. The amount of kinetic energy is proportional to the square of your airspeed. And?’

  ‘Ah, actually I do know this,’ said Niko. ‘Potential energy.’

  ‘Yes. In other words, your altitude. Most of the time that’s the biggest deposit in the energy bank you’ve got. Remember what they drill into you in Flight Gym: When in doubt, hold on to your altitude. No one has ever collided with the sky.’ Jay paused.

  Peri lifted her head and looked up at the stars. I managed to collide with the sky. If breaching the wall of the updraft wasn’t colliding with the sky, then what was it?

  ‘We use this potential energy constantly,’ Jay continued. ‘Every time we take off from a cliff we’re converting potential energy to kinetic energy. Every time you glide or dive or bank you’re converting potential energy to kinetic energy. Every time you use your speed to push you higher, you’re going the other way, converting kinetic energy to potential energy. Your kinetic energy and your potential energy together make up the mechanical energy at your disposal. Now, there are some very beauti- ful things about mechanical energy: one, it’s fast. You can convert it into the form you need instantly. Two, it’s reversible. You can convert altitude to speed and back again, in just the way that a rollercoaster does, as many times as you like, though you’ll dissipate some energy as you do it.’

  ‘What about what you said earlier about airspeed being a scarce resource?’ said Raf.

  ‘You can see now that of all the forms of energy you’re using, airspeed’s your most limited. Therefore, it’s your most critical variable. Pay attention to it. You run out of airspeed faster than anything else. Keep it for when you need it; when all else fails it’ll buy you a few crucial seconds but that’s all.’ Jay paused to take a mouthful from the bottle that Raf opened for him.

  ‘If you run into trouble remember this: you will always have exactly enough airspeed to get you to your crash site.’ Jay looked around the circle as they laughed. Peri waited for his attention. When he finally glanced at her, she felt a rush of giddiness, like falling.

  ‘Now, how does all this affect your flying? Well, for ordinary City fliers, not so much. Most of their flights are short. Some of this stuff they’ll do instinctively, like using house thermals for soaring or ramps for take-off: they’re topping up their energy account with altitude, see? But we’re different. You’re different. You’re learning how to fly long distance and under all sorts of conditions. And to do that, what I’ve said will really start to change the way that you fly. You’ll prepare your flight plan strategically, sketching out your projected route, altitude, response to anticipated weather and other conditions, with everything that I’ve said in mind.’ Jay handed the bottle back to Raf and resumed pacing, his hands outlining each of his points in the air.

  ‘Your strategy will affect your behaviour during flight too; that is, your tactics. You need discipline when you think about your energy budget. For example, on a long flight you’d never just soar up to a higher altitude whenever you damn well felt like it, as you’d be cashing in airspeed and a whole lot of chemical energy too.’

  Peri’s cheeks burned. Jay was describing how she’d flown that last day with Hugo, before the storm; raggedly, impulsively, climbing and diving with hardly a second thought. She’d tried to find and use lift but she’d flown without discipline or understanding. And she’d actually thought she could make it across an entire continent. The birth of a supercell storm had escaped her notice until it was too late. She should dig a hole in the ground and cover herself with dirt for shame. She hardly deserved to be alive after the stupid things she’d done.

  ‘Instead,’ said Jay, ‘you’d wait until you found a thermal or ridgelift and you’d use that to take you up to cloudbase. You’d also be very aware of blue holes; you wouldn’t just launch yourself into the space between clouds thoughtlessly. You’d think about whether you should skirt it and use the lift under the clouds around its rim to get you around the hole and on your way. You might even attempt dynamic soaring, gaining kinetic energy by repeatedly crossing the frontier between air masses of differing velocity. Birds of prey are good at this: they climb into the wind gradient, swapping ground speed for altitude, while preserving airspeed. They can even gain energy by turning downwind and dropping through the wind gradient. But that’s getting real technical now, eh? You’ll have the chance to practise some of this tomorrow. Now get some sleep. You’re going to need it.’

  Peri didn’t like the sound of that but she was too tired to ask questions. She said goodnight to Finch and crept away with Hugo to the sand-floored sleeping shelter. For the moment decisions were out of her hands. Tomorrow she would appeal to Jay. Perhaps Finch would vouch for her, tell him her story. They were so strong, these fliers, so much more powerful and confident. How could they think she could pose any danger to them?

  Sleep came so deeply that it was as if her consciousness winked out, light swallowed by a black hole.

  Sunday morning I woke up sunk in dread. I didn’t want to face the chaos of my flat. The disarray was a good reflection of the mess the case—and my life—had become.

  Assuming Peri and Hugo were still alive, my flat was now the most dangerous spot for her to show up—the Raptor was bound to be watching it—but there was no way to warn her.

  I hauled myself out of bed. Being already exhausted and demoralised made it the perfect time to do something useless, like drive back out to Abbey Lee Wright’s place.

  This time, a man answered the door, looked me up and down. ‘What are you selling?’

  I showed him my licence, asked after Abbey Lee Wright. The man shook his head. ‘Bought this place from them a year ago. Don’t know where they moved to. Some fancy place they’d had built for them.’

  ‘They?’

  ‘Abbey Lee was the wife.’

  ‘They were fliers, weren’t they?’

  ‘Yes, they were.’

  ‘Kids?’

  ‘Look, what’s this about anyway?’

  ‘Everything’s fine,’ I said. ‘They’re not in any trouble. Just trying to find someone who used to work for them, that’s all.’

  The man nodded. ‘They did have kids. A toddler, I think. And a baby. Very little. I do remember that.’

  ‘Did you meet the husband?’

  The man laughed out loud. ‘Oh, yeah. Once.’ He shook his head as if he couldn’t believe what he’d seen.

  ‘Something odd about him?’

  ‘Oh, it’s just . . . you wouldn’t forget this guy. Not if you’d seen him.’

  I was really interested now. I had this feeling right at the
back of my head, a feeling I got sometimes when I knew something was about to join up, two different strands of information weaving together.

  I smiled. ‘What was so unforgettable about him?’

  The man laughed again. ‘The wings. Never seen anything like it. I mean, stripes, right? Red and green and blue and gold. Guy was a freakin’ licorice allsort.’

  I sat at a table outside the Best Quality Cafe Isn’t It in Central Lines. Mind you, the concept of outside was a little theoretical here; this winding lane was more like a tunnel because the houses and shops and warehouses met overhead, plunging the street into perpetual twilight. This most crowded part of Central Lines would be great to live in if you were a vampire; no risk of exposure to sunlight. No risk of a Raptor spying from on high either; he’d see nothing but a baking savannah of patched, rusted, peeling roofs.

  I shifted my chair; hot air from the bakery across the street was blasting me and my other side was being cooled by a fan from within Best Quality Cafe Isn’t It. It was still early but sweat trickled down my back and my shirt was wet under the arms. Frying eggs and spicy smells from the cafe competed with synthetic perfumey roses and limes from the soap factory, and a stench of dirty water, blocked drains and grease traps.

  A waiter came out, set down the house specialty of fresh buttery roti and hot malted.

  ‘Thank you,’ I said, wondering whether to ask after Mira, deciding against it. PapaZie hadn’t specified a time, just said to meet her in the morning.

  I studied my slick. My exhaustion was shading into that euphoria which can overtake you after a night or two of bad sleep, my mood elevated by my visit to the house that used to belong to Abbey Lee Wright. The new owner’s information was just what I’d needed to point my searches in the right direction and I’d found her, the right Abbey Lee Wright.

  Wife of David Brilliant, MP.

  Christ on a bike.

  So Luisa, or at least a Luisa, had worked for David Brilliant. Of course, as rich fliers Wright and Brilliant would have all kinds of help, including a nanny for their—I checked—yes, two kids. How had they got those children? I studied images of Abbey Lee—she was thin, like most fliers, but that didn’t prove anything. The thing now was to find out if a Luisa was still working for Brilliant. If not, why not? If she was missing, why hadn’t they reported it?

 

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