Captain Fenna's Dirigible Valentine

by Heather Hiestand

  He wanted her to see him as a man. But he followed her gamely through the market stalls, knowing he’d take the lead again as soon as she spotted a promising fellow. Noelle’s pram cleared a path easily, making it simple for him to follow Terrwyn. He didn’t enjoy watching her gaze at the muscles of other men.

  “I am used to more reputable men than this,” she muttered, after glancing at one shady, extravagantly mustached specimen, dressed in striped trousers. “The Owlers I grew up with were more family than business partners.”

  “Those days may be gone.”

  “Yes, but I’m doomed if I can’t trust the members of my crew.”

  “Have you ever discovered how your father fell? What went wrong?”

  She stared at him. “You mean you never heard the story?”

  “No.”

  “It was over a woman,” she said softly. “But she died, and our betrayer is dead now too, while I was in Newgate.”

  “No greed then, but love or lust?”

  “Yes. No one benefited from bringing the Blockaders down on us. The man responsible died in battle against them too, later on.”

  They could see the sea from where they stood on the edge of the market, so when Terrwyn nodded, Ian pushed Noelle’s pram toward the blue water, but he hadn’t made it ten feet when his captain touched his arm.

  “How about him? Boardmen can’t make much.”

  A young man, short but muscled, paraded up and down with two pieces of slim wood draped over his coat, advertising a performance.

  “I think you’re right. Let’s talk to him.”

  “I thought I was doing the talking.”

  “He’s young. Trust my instincts.”

  He shrugged. “I have to. You hired me, after all.”

  Ian stayed against a restaurant wall with the pram, away from the throng, as Terrwyn chatted with the boardman. She looked a picture in her lightweight summer blouse and skirt, the wide sleeves emphasizing her trim waist and generous hips. Her black tresses, piled under a large-brimmed straw hat trimmed with poufy ribbons, were displayed just enough to emphasize her creamy olive-toned skin.

  The boardman’s eyes widened as the beautiful woman paid attention to him, then his lips pursed as she made her pitch. It seemed to be going well judging from the pleased expression on the young man’s face. Terrwyn’s hands were in the air, as if demonstrating the movement of an airship, when Ian noticed her shoulders stiffen. After a moment when her entire body seemed frozen, she turned and looked at Noelle.

  Terrwyn’s face was stark white as if the blood in her body had rushed south. He looked around but could see no reason for her distress. She looked like she could faint. A large family blocked his sight of her for a moment, and when he could see her again, she was shaking the boardman’s hand, then she crossed the boardwalk to the pram.

  “We need to go,” she said, taking his arm.

  “What’s wrong?” Ian asked, putting his hands on the pram’s handle.

  “I saw Rand on the beach.” Her arm vibrated against his, as if she were trembling. “He’s with family, I think, but still.”

  “Who is Rand?” He turned at her urging and began to retrace their steps toward the fish market, moving as quickly as he could without attracting attention.

  “Noelle’s father. Rand Hardcastle. The current sheriff of Newgate Prison.”

  He stayed close to her, wishing he could take her in his arms. But they had to keep walking. “The last person you’d want to see in all of England?”

  “Exactly. Obviously he knows I escaped. If he told a constable they’d arrest me.”

  He glanced at the pram. “Does he know Noelle is his?”

  “She’s mine,” Terrwyn said, with her customary fierceness.

  “You know what I mean.”

  “Yes.” Her voice became bitter. “No one else would have dared touch me once I was passed up to the under-sheriff. He’s smart and could certainly have done the math, at least once he knew when Noelle was born. I didn’t show until the last couple of months because I was so undernourished.”

  Ian heard running steps behind them, faster than their already swift pace, then a shout. “You there!”

  Terrwyn didn’t turn, just swore, kept moving.

  “You there, stop!” shouted another voice.

  “We’re less than a mile from the train station,” he said. “Head to the left.”

  Terrwyn pushed her hip against Noelle’s pram, changing the direction. Ian kept the wheels on the ground and they maneuvered around a large group ambling down the street, enjoying the summer sun.

  A whistle blew as they made a sharp left between two fish stalls. The pram wheels slipped on old fish guts as they moved deeper into the maze of stalls. After a couple of minutes, the sound of shouts and whistles diminished.

  “They’ll expect us to go to the station.”

  “You don’t know that. Hardcastle might think you’re living in Brighton.”

  She nodded. “That’s true. No one knows I have family still alive in Hastings. With any luck, I’m easily lost in a large city.”

  They moved back onto the main street. Ian could see the flint and limestone edifice of St. Paul’s Church in the distance, a short trek from the train station. They were in a poor district, full of substandard housing for fishermen and their families. Police probably stayed out of the area, so they shouldn’t run into authorities.

  They were almost past the church, walking fast, when Ian heard a man yell, “Terrwyn Fenna!”

  ~*~

  CHAPTER FOUR

  Terrwyn turned, a sick feeling of helplessness blooming in her chest. The last time she’d felt like this was the day before her sister and Captain Andrew had rescued her from Newgate. She’d sworn to never experience this sensation again. Would she never escape that hellhole?

  They had moved fast. How was it that Rand had seen them? The pram must have been slowing them down too much. Should she pick up Noelle and abandon it?

  In a split-second decision, she opened her reticule and pulled out her heater instead.

  “Take Noelle to the station,” she ordered Ian. “Board any train you can, then make your way back home. If I don’t return, give her to Cari Fenna to raise.”

  “Don’t let them take you,” Ian said.

  “I’ll die free.”

  His voice lowered, that clear blue gaze she rarely saw directly staring into her eyes. “That’s not what I meant.”

  “Go,” she ordered. “Keep my child safe.”

  “What about you? You need to be safe too.”

  “I can take care of myself. Noelle can’t. Will you take her for me? Please?”

  His fierce expression softened at her womanish begging, but at least he listened. He took a step toward the station, cursing under his breath, as she turned away.

  She walked in the direction of the seaside, not allowing herself to glance back as the pram wheels rattled away. Would she ever see her daughter again? She couldn’t think about that now, needed to consider battle tactics. Her father’s long-lost human voice came into her mind, ordering, “Separate. Isolate. Destroy.”

  Rand came into view on the other side of the church, his tall, cadaverously thin body covered in the finest summer wool suit. He looked prosperous, respectable. Alone.

  Her lips twitched in satisfaction. This would be easy.

  She held her heater at her side, the silver handle camouflaged against her similarly-colored skirt. When Rand was in range, she narrowed her eyes, judging her target. Without thinking twice, she fired.

  His fingers spasmed and he staggered back, but didn’t fall. The ray should have killed him. Had she misjudged her range? She swore, fired again, at his neck this time, but he spun and the ray missed him.

  One of the church doors opened and people came pouring down the stone steps. In moments, families were exiting the gate onto the street in between her and Rand. She couldn’t fire again, not into the crowd, so she took off at a fast walk, hoping to h
ide among the churchgoers.

  Trotting alongside a family, she hid her heater in the folds of her skirt, wishing she had a holster. When she felt a hand on her elbow, she spun around, the heater out in a flash.

  Rand sneered and held up his hands, uninjured. Why wasn’t he wounded?

  “You’ll be surprised to know I don’t want you.” His fleshy lips pursed.

  Admittedly, she was surprised at that. If only she could fire on him here, but the ray could go through him and kill someone else. She was a free trader, not an outlaw murderess.

  She whirled away from him, heading back toward the church now, entwining herself in the crowd. He stayed at her heels, hunting her. She could move into the working-class neighborhood, hide herself behind a crumbling tenement or in an alley. As long as Noelle was safe, nothing mattered. All she needed to do was to draw Rand away from the train station.

  “Give me the baby and you can stay free, my Welsh rose,” he said, keeping pace with her easily, curling his lip.

  “I’m not your anything,” she snapped, using anger to hide her revulsion and fear. She had to plan, not give in to the nightmare. Why had she brought Noelle? If it had just been her and Ian, they’d have had no problem ending this.

  But she’d wanted a family outing—not that Ian was family, exactly, so she had to deal with this all on her own. Why had she given into the desire to pretend to be a normal woman for once? Back to tactics. If she could get Rand on her other side, he’d be close to buildings. She could risk shooting him then, because the building would be behind him if she aimed correctly.

  “But the baby is. I know it’s mine. Boy or girl, Terrwyn?”

  She ignored him and continued to look for a way to end this. What if she tripped him, and shot him against the cobblestones? Would the churchgoers grab her and call for a constable? Probably. Could she talk them into letting her go free before the authorities arrived?

  “Give me the baby and you can walk away. I don’t want you and you can’t want the baby.”

  He was so wrong about that. One look at the sweet, pinched features of Noelle, born aboard an airship docked on a beach on Christmas night, and she knew she’d never experienced love until that moment.

  She stopped dead on the pavement and he made another step or two before realizing what she’d done. In a flash, she’d lifted her skirts and dashed across the narrow street in front of a hansom cab. She ran into a greengrocer’s, hoping the hansom had blocked Rand’s view, and didn’t slow her pace until she saw the proprietor.

  “Sorry,” she apologized, “but I need a back way out.”

  He pointed to a door mutely and she pushed through and ran into a storage space behind the store. The alley door was closed and she paused with her hand on the doorknob. Did Rand know she would run to the train station? No, as Ian said, he didn’t know where she lived. But she couldn’t lead him home either. Except Noelle needed her milk. Cari was visibly increasing now and tired easily. Her milk had all but dried up for now. Lleu was weaned. Terrwyn had no choice. She had to get a train back home to Noelle as soon as possible.

  Tentatively, she opened the door and scanned the alley. Since it was empty, she trotted toward the train station, keeping to the alleys. A few minutes later, she was through an archway into the train station. She hadn’t seen Rand so she bought a ticket to the county town of Lewes, which would take her in the right direction.

  Half an hour later, she boarded the train, suspicious that she’d managed to spend this amount of time unmolested by Rand or his cronies. What would his next step be? What horrors had she unleashed by looking for crewmates in a city so connected to London?

  *****

  She crept into her cousin’s home early the next morning. Summer sun made the two downstairs rooms bright and cheery despite the early hour. She hated to interrupt their rest, but after three quarters of a day without her daughter, she was both spiritually exhausted and physically in pain.

  After she crept upstairs she knocked on the door where her cousins slept until she heard Owen’s answer.

  “Do you have Noelle?” she asked, opening the door.

  Cari rubbed her eyes as she sat up in bed. Owen yawned and rolled over, his balding pate visible above the covers.

  “Of course not. She was with you in Brighton.”

  Terrwyn’s thoughts stuttered. She clutched her sore chest as she tried to comprehend the loss of her certainty that her child would be here. “We had trouble. Cavill took her. I told him to come here.”

  Owen sat up abruptly, his brow creasing. “Have you been to the cave?”

  “No.” She shook her head frantically. “Noelle would need a wet nurse. He wouldn’t take her there.”

  “What happened, Terrwyn?” Cari said in a hoarse morning voice.

  “Noelle’s father saw us in Brighton. I got away, but Cavill and Noelle weren’t in the train station and I saw a train to Hastings had already left. They should have been here last night.” Her hands tightened to claws around the sides of her body.

  Owen pushed back the covers, displaying a striped blue and white nightshirt. He knew who Noelle’s father was. “You go to the caves. I’ll visit Ian’s mother. Is the Christmas in town?”

  “No, I think they’re in France.”

  “That’s one less place to look then. Mrs. Cavill will have suggestions, and she’d know how to find a wet nurse,” Cari said, struggling up. She winced and pressed her hands to her stomach.

  Terrwyn winced at the sign of her cousin’s pain. “I’m sorry I woke you. I’m frantic.”

  Cari made a shooing motion. “Find your daughter. Take the loaf of bread from the box and some cheese. You need to keep your strength up.”

  Terrwyn smiled faintly. Thankfully years of being watched by callous guards had taken away her ability to cry. Inside she was a mushy wreck, but outside she appeared hard and focused. She couldn’t speak, so she just nodded at Cari’s kindness.

  Downstairs she found the cheese, and then sliced some and laid it across the bread for herself and Owen. Two bottles of milk had been delivered to the kitchen door so she took those and poured it into glasses. Owen joined her a few minutes later and after their rushed meal they separated.

  No one was at the Valentine. Rhys and Hatchet, Jonas, even Meg, were on the Christmas. Captain Andrew had heard of a massive government warehouse outside Paris freshly stocked with spirits and they’d planned a raid. Terrwyn had been glad for Meg to be trained aboard the larger, better-manned airship. But now she wished she had crew, though seeing the town from the air probably wouldn’t help her find Noelle.

  She had to be realistic. Had Ian Cavill been in league with Rand all along? The thought staggered her, but as long as he had that brass hand he was in some way connected to the government. Since she hadn’t seen Rand at the train station, she suspected he’d left Brighton by airship, but that meant he could be anywhere.

  As could Ian Cavill. As could her baby daughter.

  She changed her dusty, dirty clothes quickly in the tiny cabin, trying not to look at the bassinet where Noelle slept. The tiny cabin smelled like fresh laundry and milk. She paid Cari to do the washing and she must have been by yesterday. Otherwise, nothing was disturbed. No evidence that Rand knew she had an airship existed.

  With a cry of frustration, Terrwyn snatched up a fresh nappy and some pins, and shoved them into the pocket of her serviceable skirt, a narrow, practical affair much different from the now travel-stained silver gray skirt she’d worn the day before. Noelle would certainly need a change when she found her.

  She looked for Owen at Midwife Cavill’s house and was shocked to find the lady in bed. Cavill hadn’t been exaggerating when he said she was ill. That was one truth in his favor. Pale and thin, Mrs. Cavill’s hands, worn to vein and bone, shook when she saw Terrwyn.

  “Your cousin just left, dear,” said the midwife. “I sent him to my younger son’s place of business, in the hopes he’s seen Ian and your sweet baby.”

  Terrw
yn scrubbed her eyes with her fingers. “Did I know you had a second son?”

  “Most likely not. He’s just eighteen and he’s a clerk in a counting house.”

  “What do you think happened?”

  The midwife shook her head weakly. “Perhaps he went where there would be strength and weapons. Where is Captain Andrew?”

  “In France.”

  “I’m so sorry. I just don’t know. But you can trust my son with your daughter’s life. He adores her, and you.”

  “I’m his captain.”

  “You are a beautiful woman,” the midwife asserted. “The stuff of fantasies for boys his age around here. Why, you were practically a fairy story back when your father and the Christmas ruled the skies.”

  Ian had fancied her years ago? This was news to Terrwyn. Sure, she’d seen that clear-blue gaze of his following her, and she’d noticed he didn’t only look at her eyes but at her curves. Still, she hadn’t realized the fascination ran so deep. “It was never like that. My father was a free trader. A good one, but not king of the Owlers. And I was crew, nothing more.”

  “Your beauty set you apart.”

  “It did me no favors,” Terrwyn snarled, to distract herself from her thoughts. “What did it get me but a life as a doxy? And now, what?”

  “Assurance that Ian would never do you harm,” Midwife Cavill said quietly. “He’d sooner spite the sun.”

  Terrwyn stared at the ill woman. While she’d suspected Ian had feelings for her, he’d never voiced them openly, to her at least. Since he’d never spoken she was able to ignore her own growing respect for her handsome second mate and remain focused on her work and child.

  She knew she needed to let the midwife rest and get back to her search. Bright circles of color had appeared on Mrs. Cavill’s cheeks.

  “Is there anyone I can call for you?” Terrwyn asked.