Star Veil

by E J Kitchens

  “You searched her trunk—left at the dock as the man said—and her jacket and purse. There’s nothing there to help me finish the Star Clock.” He pulled a revolver from his pocket. “And there was this. In her trunk. Along with a couple more and a case of throwing knives.”

  “Yes, I remember. Fine weapons those. Not ones for a novice either.”

  “My thoughts exactly.” He returned the gun to his pocket. He’d locked the other items up in the safe in his room. And there was the blank journal. There was something odd about the feel of the pages. And why a completely blank journal? It looked expensive enough to be a gift, yet it wasn’t inscribed. Journals seldom filled up just before a journey, making it more likely that a person would pack either one partly used journal or one almost-filled one and a blank one. Was it for copying the blueprints to his inventions? Or was he too suspicious now that he had a truly great invention—and that not even of his own design—to guard?

  It had been three months since Marianna had given him Star Chronometer and Navigation, but he’d not finished the clock. He’d taken apart, rebuilt, and created blueprints for the compass and sextant, and he’d passed on the designs to trusted Sky Keepers. Even if the Time Keepers got ahold of them, they likely wouldn’t have a clue what they were for. A clock was more obvious, however.

  Davy and Philip sat in silence, Philip contemplating the unconscious woman and Davy the bland afternoon light diffusing through the open window. What would real sunlight look like? The pink of dawn? The multitude of colors at sunset? He’d read of those in forbidden ancient books. But now? Evenly spaced crystals in the Star Veil glowed in the day, creating a sky similar to perpetual cloud cover, then dimmed at night to individual lights, creating a pale imitation of what he believed must be breathtaking.

  Davy picked up the woman’s goggles, which along with her hat and jacket lay on the table beside her, and rolled them back and forth in the lamplight. “These aren’t lenses for correcting vision.”

  “Ah. I thought you’d get around to noticing that sooner or later. Did you see her eyes?”

  “Under these?” Davy answered, noting how the goggles tended to dull colors.

  “No. Lift her lids.” Philip demonstrated the action on his own eyes.

  “Why would I do that?” He paused. “Did you?”

  Philip shrugged. “Seen the doctors do it before. Seemed like the thing to do. Anyway, you should take a peek.” He cleared his throat. “Before she wakes.”

  Davy raised a brow but moved to the bed and carefully opened the girl’s right eye. A grotesquely large pupil, an iris like a tangle of multi-colored threads, like the back of a brilliantly hued tapestry, stared blankly up at him. Though a shiver escaped his control, Davy managed not to jump back. Feigning indifference, he lowered her eyelid and returned to his seat. “A rare color that.”

  “Glad I warned you, huh?”

  “Yes,” Davy admitted, and added a moment later, “We can’t take her back and collect the right woman, thanks to pre-programed automatons. When she wakes, we’ll see what we can find out about her.”

  “What about the Star Clock,” Philip asked, “since she’s no help?”

  Instead of answering, Davy frowned and returned to his private study and workroom, Philip following. He and Philip took their accustomed chairs and stared thoughtfully at the incomplete clock, as if it could tell them how to fix its own problems. The all-important timepiece, an unimpressive thing that would resemble a palm-sized locket with a white face and twelve numerals on the front when finished, sat in a padded box on his workbench. The Star Clock really had nothing to do with stars, other than the inventor’s claims that it could keep accurate time on land and sea and even among the stars, by which he poetically meant the cloud paths Davy regularly traveled. Davy suspected that wherever the stars were, things were a bit different there than here. Still, they had to have the Star Clock and have it able to keep time accurately despite the motion and temperature of its surroundings, along with the instruments and the few charts Marianna and Bertram had found, in order to precisely determine their position and navigate themselves.

  The various unusable cogs, gears, and springs lying about the fragments of the clock itself taunted him. Even if he’d been able to purchase what he’d picked out at the parts store, he’d still be missing some unusual pieces. He couldn’t custom order them without suspicion or gain what he needed to make them himself. Blasted Time Keepers and pirates.

  Chin in his hands, he studied the twelve Roman numerals and smaller dividing marks, each neatly painted and newly dried, on the clock face. He was still intrigued by the notion of time measurements being based on twelves and sixties rather than the ten-based system of the financial world. But twelve was a nice number, easily divisible. Apparently, clocks made a tick, tick, tick or a tick, tock, tick, tock sound. He was inclined to think that might become annoying, or perhaps soothing in its familiarity over time. One tick a second, sixty ticks a minute, three thousand six hundred ticks an hour, and twenty-four of those hours in a day. Were real days equivalent to the sky crystals’ brightening and dimming cycles? How long was a second? However long, he’d gladly put up with any amount of tick, tock-ing to be free of the Time King. If only that were the only cost of what they hoped to achieve.

  Davy stilled, then a smile curved his mouth. He was already committing treason. Why not add a little more to it?

  “I can’t buy parts anymore, it seems,” he said, sitting up and meeting Philip’s eye, “so we’ll have to take a ship.”

  Philip’s eyebrows rose, but then he grinned. “The lads will be disappointed.”

  4

  Prism woke to a ruckus.

  “Pirates!” The word screamed into the room through the open window like a chilling breeze.

  Her eyes flew open. Colors everywhere. So many hues, dizzying and beautiful and almost deafening in their own way, all crying out for attention, bombarded her along with the repeated cries of pirates and calls to secure the airship.

  Airship?

  Prism jumped from the bed, noticing but not considering the well-furnished officer’s cabin she’d woken in. She snagged her goggles and jacket from the nightstand and started for the door, fumbling to get the lenses over her eyes. Still sluggish from whatever had been in the dart, she tripped over a trunk that was remarkably familiar. More than that, she noted with a dulled surprise, it was her trunk. It’d been her present on her fourteenth birthday. It was almost the same glossy ebony all over even without her goggles. She loved it for that reason. The key was in the lock. Had whoever shipped her off packed her guns and knives? Her journal?

  She unlocked it and flipped it open. Thank you, Maker. The book, the record of her lifetime of travels, lay on top. She stuffed the small book and the ink needed to use it and her paint brushes into her jacket pocket and tore through the rest of the trunk.

  Finding nothing useful in the way of weapons, she lifted her ruffled skirts and pulled the small derringer from her leg holster, then darted out the unlocked door. Had the pirates distracted her captors so much they’d failed to search her or lock the door? Not that she was complaining.

  Prism stepped onto the deck, then ducked to the left, away from the loudest sounds of fighting. She couldn’t spot the pirate ship, but the air was damp, gray with clouds, the deck to her right filled with fighting men. But not ten yards away to the left, the off-white of folded parachutes attached to the deck railing caught her eye. As fast as her wobbly legs would carry her, Prism darted from cover to cover until reaching the parachutes.

  Stowing the derringer in her pocket, she pulled a parachute from its holder, but her hands refused to do more than hold it. She stared at the parachute’s assortment of straps as her mind considered the fall awaiting her, the unknown landing point.

  “Think about the harem in Amezak, Prism,” she ground out. Using the book’s record, she could at least find her way somewhere far away from there.

  She slipped the parachute onto
her back and fastened the awkward straps, her hands speeding their work as someone yelled for her to stop. Prism grabbed the railing and began to hoist herself up.

  “Stop!” Strong hands jerked her away from the railing, spinning her around toward the ship and divesting her of the parachute in one smooth motion. A motion that sent her barreling into the chest of an irate captain.

  “Are you trying to get yourself killed?” he bellowed. The airship lurched with a strong wind, and the sounds of the fight went quiet as the man who’d kidnapped her without a thought yelled at her with a mix of horror and fury in his face so strong it rocked her back on her heels.

  “I-I don’t understand,” Prism stammered. Was that a value for her life in his eyes, not simply fear for the loss of a hostage?

  “It’s obvious you don’t understand parachutes,” the man roared. “You could’ve gotten yourself killed jumping with it strapped like that. And we’re over the ocean!”

  Prism blanched and looked around, praying for another route of escape, but around them crowded sailors. Only sailors. No pirates. Only sailors and sailors with makeshift pirate costumes, some including a skull and crossbones crudely drawn on their faces. One, blond and taller than most, the one who’d prevented her from jumping, even had a tattoo on his wrist. A tattoo of two close shades, as if he’d tried to cover one by inking over and around it. He looked as anxious and confused as the rest.

  Prism took another step back, away from the audience that was too close, away from the yelling, away from the scene that didn’t make sense.

  The captain’s eyes widened. “No!” He lunged forward, and she was once again slung over his shoulder, then hauled below deck and tossed onto a bed.

  But somewhere in the bouncing journey, she regained her senses. He didn’t want her harmed. Perhaps she could reason with him. Once he quit hauling her about.

  “Will you stop that?” she cried as she righted herself on the mattress.

  Breathing hard as he leaned on the table beside the bed, the captain shook his head. He jerked up as a breeze blew through the room, smelling oddly of gunpowder and stew. He dashed to the open window and slammed it shut. The captain’s look as he turned to face her practically dared her to try to escape. He crossed his arms and leaned against the glass.

  “Morning, lass. I’m Philip, the first mate.” A man slightly older than her father and looking just as fit and shrewd, entered and locked the door behind him. “And what my captain means by that steely-eyed look of his is ‘not if it keeps you from killing yourself.’”

  Prism blinked, then crossed her arms. “I have no intention of killing myself.”

  Both men studied her as if to ascertain the truthfulness of her statement. Prism could think of only one way to confirm it.

  She pulled the derringer from her pocket. “Nor do I have any intention of being taken to Amezak. So if you’ll kindly drop me off at some other port of call, I would be most obliged.”

  The two men gaped at her, then turned on one another.

  “You didn’t search her?”

  “Neither did you, apparently.”

  “Hush!” she cried. The two men snapped around to face her, indignation as well as a healthy dose of surprise clear in their faces. “Put your hands up.”

  “Now look here, young woman,” the captain began, but Prism cut him off.

  “I am looking, and I see a room I didn’t come to by choice.”

  He shut his mouth.

  “Who are you?” Prism aimed the gun at the captain’s shoulder. She couldn’t bring herself to point it at his heart, not after she’d seen the horror in his eyes earlier. But that didn’t mean she trusted him completely.

  He raised his hands, a mask of calm slipping over his features. His expression reminded her of the one she wore before her father commenced sending very sharp blades her way in their act. She put the captain in his early thirties, of an upper middle-class family, and of a respectable upbringing. Except for a propensity for kidnapping, he was likely a good man.

  “Davy Bowditch,” he said, calmly. “Captain of the Dawn Singer. And you are?”

  Bowditch? Marianna’s brother? The one she and Bertram were so eager to find? “Abigail Andrews,” she said, trying not to let her confusion show.

  “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Miss Andrews.” He bowed. “May I present my first mate, Philip Orren?” He gestured to the other man, who also bowed.

  “I won’t say it’s my pleasure,” she retorted. “Why did you kidnap me and where are you taking me? I’ll never go to Amezak, so if that’s your plan, you might as well give me back the parachute and teach me to use it. I’ll do whatever it takes to stay free of the prince.”

  Davy blanched. “I didn’t kidnap you, Miss Andrews … intentionally. You see, you were—”

  “I was not in danger. The pirate attack at the parts shop was an illusion. Those weren’t real shots or breaking glass. Close in sound, but not the same. My father’s a sharpshooter, among other things, and I know what all manner of guns sound like. I also know about illusions. Why all that if not to take me? Are you working for Prince Onesu? Or did the troupe decide to cast me off when Papa wasn’t looking? Sell me to another circus and you’re to deliver me?”

  Davy’s eyes widened, and he glanced at his companion. He lowered his hands, his expression gaining an unexpected solemnness. “I didn’t kidnap you, Miss Andrews … of the Andrews Brothers’ Circus?” When Prism nodded, he continued, “You were a bargaining chip. Your father had something I needed, and to get it, I agreed to keep you safe for a year.” His brows drew together. “At least that’s what I believed when I took you from the shop.”

  Her father? Prism’s grip on the gun faltered, but she raised it quickly before Davy could take advantage of her lapse, though he didn’t seem inclined to do so. “My father would never sell me, and that man in the shop was not my father. Even if Papa asked you to keep me safe, bargaining chips are not carried away tossed over shoulders.”

  The first mate smirked, but Davy frowned, the kind of look designed to make sailors tremble.

  It didn’t work on her.

  “The pirate Cavan O’Connor isn’t terribly fond of me,” Davy said with a sigh, “so when both his men and the Time Keepers were bearing down on me in the store, the situation became untenable. I had to leave without the conversation I had hoped to have with you and your … companion. Hence, the GunPoof and the shoulder-carrying.”

  “The gun what?”

  “The GunPoof, an invention of mine. Apparently, I need to work on its sound quality.” Davy indicated his outside jacket pocket. “May I retrieve the message from your father?” When Prism nodded, he pulled out a telegram and handed it to her. “Does this mean anything to you?”

  Captain Bowditch—Marianna said to contact you. Have solution. Prism. Yours if care for daughter 1 yr. If agreeable to you, meet July 25. Last Parts Store. Look for father, daughter pair. —Cal Andrews, Andrews Brothers’ Circus

  Prism’s heart plummeted, and as much as she tried to find a safety net, none presented itself. Her father … Hadn’t he been acting strangely since Amezak, where they’d also been separated from Marianna and Bertram? Had the couple left something important with him, and now he was trading it in to get rid of her? So the troupe could travel to profitable Amezak without trouble and he could distribute the banned copies of the Word there? A chill settled in her chest. He could’ve talked to her about it. Said goodbye. Not abandon her.

  Prism handed the message back to the captain. “You’re Marianna’s brother?”

  “Yes.”

  “What about the pirates?” she whispered.

  “We left them in the shop.”

  “I heard someone yelling about pirates before I went on deck. Can I help in the fight? I’d rather not be locked in a room, simply waiting to see who wins. My …” she swallowed hard, “… father trained me as a sharpshooter and knife thrower.”

  The captain’s brows drew together, a
nd she thought she saw compassion in his eyes. “That’s very courageous of you, Miss Andrews, but the pirates haven’t found us yet. I’m sorry you were alarmed by our mock battle. We travel through areas frequented by pirates and train often.”

  “The greater the risk, the greater the profit—and the fun.” Philip winked at her.

  “And the people in those areas are in great need of what we can get through, since fewer ships make it,” Davy added.

  Prism smiled weakly. “In that case, if you don’t mind, I’d like a nap.”

  5

  And the people in those areas are in great need of what we can get through. Davy rolled his eyes. Since when did he need to justify his actions? To strange women at that. He tapped the butt of his dinner knife against the table. As soon as Marianna came out of hiding, he was going to have a talk with her about promising his help without his permission.

  “She’ll come,” Philip said with a smile. “She’s got sense, that one.”

  “Too much sense,” Davy said, the edge to his voice drawing Philip’s attention.

  “What is it?”

  “Someone was in my study—with the book and Star Clock.”

  “The machine—”

  “Unharmed as far as I could tell,” Davy said, “but a page is missing from the book. I noticed it after the mock attack earlier.”

  “Surely not the girl—”

  “Why not? Who else would’ve had the opportunity? It was done while we were on deck.”

  “But if she’s working for the Time Keepers, she’d have destroyed the clock and book—probably the whole ship too—not tried to run away.”

  “She could be working for someone else.” Davy rubbed a hand through his hair. He had no doubt the circles under his eyes were darker than usual. “Even if we finish this Star Clock and get it to work, if we’re not careful, and the Time Keepers don’t kill us first, we’ll just set up another dictator. I can think of a number of people who’d kill to get the technology for their gain instead of getting it to the world, that pirate Cavan O’Connor among them.”