The Kraken King Part II: The Kraken King and the Abominable Worm (A Novel of the Iron Seas)

by Meljean Brook

  Zenobia had no intention of exposing herself, but his bluntness was refreshing.

  By midday, the heat wrapped around them like a heavy wet blanket. The shade from the canvas canopy provided little relief. The landscape had settled into a flat brushland dotted with stiff shrubs and leafy trees. Birds chattered constantly over the hiss of the hydraulics. Feeling hot and sticky, Zenobia watched it all pass beside the walker’s swiftly undulating legs, wishing for her notebook. Surely a sketch wouldn’t be suspicious? A deer poked its head up from behind a bush, dark limpid eyes watching them approach. Then its full body came into view, and Zenobia sat forward, her mouth dropping open in astonishment. The deer here could sit on their haunches and feed themselves with their hands!

  “A kangaroo,” the governor said, as if he’d noted the direction of her astonished gaze.

  A kangaroo. Not a deer. It stared at the walker for a moment longer, chewing a mouthful of leaves, then suddenly bounded away.

  Averting her face, she silently laughed at herself to tears, stiffly trying to conceal the shaking of her body. She didn’t do very well. Though he wasn’t looking at her, the Kraken King wore a slight smile when she finally got hold of herself and dared a glance his way.

  She had been trying not to look in his direction. He would know she was—just as she could see when he was watching her. He had often. Not always. His gaze frequently scanned the landscape. But the walker was simple to drive; he’d only had to set the direction and engage the engine. Aside from guiding it around trees, the navigation didn’t require close attention. From the corner of her eye, she could see when he glanced her way.

  Now he stared straight ahead. He must be aware that she was studying his profile, but probably also knew that she would look away if he turned his head to meet her gaze.

  And she would. Instead of boldly staring at him, she would slide her gaze away. She hated herself for that.

  She hated herself for not turning away now. But she liked the look of him. She liked the way his trousers pulled tight over his thighs, and remembering how hard his muscles had been. She liked the easy grip of his big hands on the steering levers. As the temperature had climbed, he’d unfastened the buckle at his shoulder and folded the collar of his tunic down, and she liked the triangle of smooth brown skin exposed at his throat. In this heat, she’d have loved to let the flap of her tunic fall open, too. She liked his jaw, the angular lines of his face and the high set of his cheekbones. She liked the heavy-lidded darkness of his eyes and the low, brooding cast to his brows, suggesting that weighty thoughts were never far from his mind. She liked the blunt knot of hair high on the back of his head, as if he’d gathered it all together and cut straight across.

  He glanced at her face and Zenobia dropped her gaze to his mouth, because he already knew she liked looking at it and if she was going to hate herself, then she would at least please herself at the same time.

  Except it apparently pleased him, too. His mouth widened into another smile while she was watching, and she tore her gaze away and looked over her shoulder. Lieutenant Blanchett’s walker trailed behind far enough to avoid the dust kicked up from their passing.

  On the rear bench, Helene was reading one of the books she’d purchased before they’d left town. Mara appeared asleep, but Zenobia knew the mercenary had only closed her eyes and activated her listening device—not just to detect nearby threats, but those from afar. Cooper and Meeng’s flyers were tiny spots in the distance. The two men were scouting ahead, but also had to secure permission to enter the next territory, which the governor had said might take the better part of the day; they would stop at the boundary and wait for the tribe to grant them all passage. The two smaller crawlers walked a half mile ahead, one far to the right and the other to the left, staying just within sight.

  Zenobia pointed to the crawler on the right. “Are they scouting, too? Or are we hunting our food along the way?”

  He shook his head. “We don’t hunt outside the town. Only Meeng does, and even he won’t after we cross the boundary. We can take food from the sea, but hunting territories are closely guarded.”

  “And you wouldn’t want to upset your host tribe.”

  “No.”

  Helene turned in her seat, closing the book in her lap. She rested her arm on the back of the front bench. Her early sickness had passed but she looked as flushed and as sweaty as Zenobia felt. “Were the wars between the Nipponese and the Australians so terrible?”

  “Those occurred centuries before we settled here.” A slight smile softened his mouth before turning into something harder. “But I imagine they were. All wars are terrible.”

  Because of men like him, Zenobia thought. But wars were probably horrible even for the men who made them so.

  “Weren’t the wars farther north and west—closer to where Nippon is now?” Helene asked.

  “The battles were. But no one escaped the plagues. Not the Nipponese or any of the clans.”

  “After the plagues, I wonder that they allow any contact at all,” Zenobia said.

  Many of the nations in the Americas didn’t allow anyone with a nanoagent infection across their borders. Some feared that the Horde would conquer them as England had been conquered; others were terrified of the zombie infection, and didn’t see any difference between it and the nanoagents which allowed Cooper and Mara to graft the devices to their bodies.

  “A few don’t. The Wajarri do—our host clan. They believe the trade and alliance strengthens us both, and the damage from the plagues has already been done.” The governor glanced into the sky ahead, where the two flyers were specks against the blue. “Still, we’re rarely welcomed outside of the towns. Even in our host territory. So every settlement has a liaison from the host tribe who negotiates for us. Meeng is ours.”

  So Meeng might hunt and talk to the other native Australians, but no one else did. Yet the governor had two crawlers covering as much territory as they could without leaving his sight. “Are you searching for the marauders? You said the flyers don’t have a long range. They couldn’t have staged their attack from a great distance.”

  And the governor needed to find them. Mara had overheard that, too. Zenobia couldn’t imagine the Nipponese empress would destroy every town along the coast just to exterminate a small band of marauders. But Zenobia didn’t know the politics of the region. Maybe the empress would. The governor must have believed she would, because the threat had been enough to send him to the smugglers’ dens.

  Now he gave her a long, speculative look. “Yes.”

  “And if we encounter them?”

  “Then I’ll discover what I need to know from them.”

  A shiver raced over her skin. Icy and calm, his response was like a strong cold grip on the back of her neck, as if she’d just heard a little of what had given the Kraken King such a terrifying reputation.

  He frowned, watching her. “Do you fear another attack?”

  Did she? Zenobia had not even considered it. Though only two days past, the attack on the airship seemed long ago. She’d been more concerned about sunburn.

  But Helene answered for her. “Geraldine doesn’t fear anything.”

  Where had that come from? Her friend’s tone was light and teasing, but with a note of conviction behind it—the tone of someone about to impart mildly embarrassing information about a mutual friend to a new confidant.

  “Of course I do,” Zenobia said.

  “No.” Helene twisted around farther, as if to gain a better angle to speak with the governor. “When we were attacked, the airship was burning around us and it was as if Geraldine was having a picnic.”

  “That’s not so.”

  “It is. I was in near hysterics and you were gathering your papers.” She looked to the governor again. “Lieutenant Blanchett came to take us to the lifeboats, and she tells him—very calmly, even though he was bleeding and we’d already felt two explosions—that we will wait for her maid and valet.”

  Because Zeno
bia had known Mara and Cooper would protect her. They had before. And she might have appeared calm, but only because she hadn’t wanted Lieutenant Blanchett to disregard her as hysterical the moment she showed fear or anger, as so many men faced with an emotional woman did. She’d been firm, not calm.

  But she could only shake her head because Helene was already continuing. “Then we were on the flyers, those men were shooting at us, and her balloon implodes, but she doesn’t even scream. She just opens up her glider, as if she expected to all along.”

  “I saw,” the governor said quietly, his gaze on her.

  He had seen, she remembered. He’d been flying behind the marauder who’d shot her balloon. “And you’d also say that I wasn’t afraid?”

  “Yes.”

  And odd little hurt started in her chest. She felt the urge to defend herself, to explain how terrified she’d been, how her heart had pounded and she’d almost been sick with fear.

  Never had she imagined wanting to insist that she was afraid. To admit to such a thing. But Helene’s claim seemed so misrepresentative of her character.

  Yet what could she say? That she hadn’t expected to use the glider all along? Because she had. She’d purchased the device specifically for that purpose, because she might need to jump out of a pirate’s airship. Should she insist that she’d trusted Mara and Cooper to protect them? Because she had. But she’d still been afraid. She’d hired them because she’d been afraid.

  She’d always been afraid. If not actively fearing for her life, then wary and expecting that she soon would. Only when writing was she somewhere else, somewhere without fear. Somewhere no one waited to hurt her, or to use her to hurt her brother, or to extract money. First afraid of her father. Then Archimedes had destroyed Temür Agha’s war machines, so Zenobia had changed her name and crossed an ocean to find a new home, wondering if every person who came to her door was an assassin sent after her brother, unwilling to trust anyone she’d met. Then, after his debt to Temür Agha had been paid off, the kidnappings and ransoms had begun.

  The pirates and mercenaries had been careful not to harm her, but she’d had more guns pointed at her head than she ever wanted to remember. And she knew that one day, they wouldn’t wait for the ransom to be delivered. They’d panic, realizing the utter stupidity of kidnapping her. Because her brother wasn’t just a rich man; Archimedes was a man of action and his wife was a mercenary with a heart of steel. Yasmeen had once calmly shot a man who had been holding Zenobia with yet another gun to her head, and his brains had splattered over her face. One day, the pirates would think Archimedes and Yasmeen were coming for them and kill Zenobia to get rid of the evidence.

  Even now she was afraid—of the way the Kraken King looked at her, as if he saw too much, and if he looked long enough she wouldn’t need to tell him her secrets because they’d all spill out. And she was terrified that they would.

  But she’d functioned while afraid for so long. To outsiders, a little more terror must not register much at all.

  Still, it hurt that her friend couldn’t see that. Helene, who’d been with her when Zenobia’s mother had been dying, when she’d been more terrified than she’d ever been in her life. But Zenobia wouldn’t show the hurt now, not with the governor watching, too.

  With a little shrug, she said, “I’m more concerned about boilerworms than marauders.”

  She knew that would distract Helene. Her friend had spoken of the creatures several times on their journey here, recounting the many stories around their creation: that three centuries past, the boilerworms had been released as mining tools, to dig and leach minerals from the soil. That they’d been a weapon developed by the Horde. That the Nipponese had created them in their war with the Australians. That the tribes had accidentally unleashed them during their rushed technological advancement.

  Whatever had happened, Zenobia doubted that the boilerworms’ inventor had intended for them to escape their control, or to breed and grow.

  Eyes wide, Helene looked to the governor. “Do we have to worry? I thought the boilerworms only inhabited the interior.”

  “Most do.” He never took his gaze from Zenobia as he spoke. “There aren’t many this close to the sea.”

  “But there are some?”

  “Yes.”

  “How do you keep them out of your town?”

  “We drive steel retaining posts into the ground around the perimeter. The worms could dig deeper and come up from beneath, but most stay in shallow soils.”

  Zenobia frowned. She hadn’t seen any steel posts standing around the town, which meant they must be entirely underground. “They don’t go over them?”

  “No. They could, but they don’t think or reason. If they run into the steel, they begin digging in another direction rather than going over.” He looked to Helene. “They’re not a danger during the day, usually. They’re attracted to heat, and there isn’t much difference in temperature between our bodies and the air on a day like this. As long as we keep our engines and our fires off the ground, they won’t seek us out.”

  Zenobia hadn’t known that. She’d always assumed they were attracted to electrical charges and vibrations as the sea monsters were. She itched to add the information to her notebook, but would just have to remember that detail. A boilerworm wouldn’t fit in the current adventure, anyway. Perhaps in the future.

  “Have you seen one?” Helene asked.

  “Several. All small ones. I’ve heard tales of larger.”

  “Tales of larger?” From fish to success, it never changed. “Or perhaps the others were of the same small size. Men have a habit of exaggerating dimensions, especially when there is no one to corroborate the reality,” Zenobia said dryly.

  His grin hit her in the chest. She’d never known that her weaknesses were sharp cheekbones and white teeth. In the future, guarding herself against them would be wise. And she liked the dark slant of his brows too well, and the creases at the corners of his eyes, as if he grinned often and enjoyed it. A man who knew the value of humor.

  Or just knew how handsome he was.

  Helene averted her face, cheeks blazing red. Why? Zenobia hadn’t said anything even remotely—

  Oh.

  Blast it all. She hadn’t meant to refer to men who exaggerated the size of anything else. But apparently the governor’s grin had sent Helene’s imagination running straight into his pants.

  That was enough of that. She lifted her chin. “So your worm was the smallest.”

  His grin became a deep laugh. “Yes.”

  Oh, he had no shame. She’d thought he would take offense and be done with her. But despite what he’d said back in town, she was quite sure that he was taking this as encouragement.

  Well, she had no intention of providing any sort of corroboration about his size.

  A few choking noises came from Helene before she pointedly changed the subject. “What brought you to live here, Governor? In such a place, with boilerworms and kraken on your shores.”

  His laughter died. Even though it had been at her expense, Zenobia was sorry to see it go.

  And she was surprised that he answered, though she shouldn’t have been. He’d been blunt from the first and his reply wasn’t any different. “A war brought me here. I built the town to give my brother a home after our mother was executed.”

  “Your mother was executed?” Aghast, Helene shook her head. “I should never have asked such a thing. I am so sorry.”

  “Don’t be.” He glanced at her. “You’ve placed your life in my keeping on this journey. It’s your right to ask the sort of man I am.”

  “Then we’d have been smarter to find out before we left,” Zenobia said.

  “You would have been.” Unsmiling, he caught her gaze again. “You only had to ask. But if there is anything you want to know about my character now, I will tell you.”

  Perhaps to gain her trust, now that he knew she wouldn’t offer it in bed. Perhaps he’d mentioned his mother to stir her sympath
ies.

  He’d mentioned his dead mother . . . because he wanted to know her secrets.

  And this was what fear had turned her into. He’d spoken of his mother’s execution and her first thought was: He hopes to manipulate me and I cannot trust him.

  Her throat burning, Zenobia turned to stare blindly over the walker’s side.

  Helene took the invitation that Zenobia wouldn’t. Hesitantly, she said, “Your brother . . . I’m sorry if this is untoward, but I wondered. He is Nipponese, isn’t he? But you sound—and look—much different.”

  “He resembles his father. I resemble mine.”

  “I see.” The confusion in her voice said that she didn’t. “Which war were you fighting?”

  “Against the Great Khagan.”

  “Against the Horde? So you are Nipponese.”

  “No. I’m also from the Golden Empire.” He paused. “The Horde Empire.”

  “A rebel?” A sharp note of excitement rose through each word. “You’re a Horde rebel? So the Nipponese and the rebels are allied against the Khagan?”

  “No.”

  “But you have a common enemy.”

  “That doesn’t make us friends.”

  Confusion filled her voice again. “But your mother was Nipponese?”

  “No, though she came from the islands they originally inhabited. She retrieved information about the Nipponese battles with the Khagan so the rebellion could be more effective. So that we could strike when the Khagan’s forces were occupied elsewhere.”

  “Oh.” It was a heavy sound, as if the realization that his mother had been a spy had dropped right into it. But of course Helene would never say that word, fearing that the governor might take it as an insult. She changed the subject again. “How long did you fight, then?”

  “Since I was a boy.”

  “But you aren’t still fighting? The empire hasn’t yet fallen.”