The Ruby Airship

by Sharon Gosling

  “Show us!” someone else yelled. “The birthmark! Show us!”

  “Yes,” shouted another voice, “the birthmark!”

  The Comte leaned toward Claudette once more, whispering something else in her ear. She hesitated for a moment, dropping her arm. And then she turned around.

  Claudette’s gown had been cut to leave her back bare to the mid-point, her pale skin almost translucent beneath the power of the sun. There, curling between her shoulder blades like a serpent lost from the sea, was a birthmark, several shades darker than the skin around it.

  The Comte held out his arms to the crowd, as if to say, “See? It really is her,” and the multitude cheered once more. Claudette turned around, her face settling back into a blank mask.

  “My people,” the Comte boomed, once the noise had died down once more. “I have more joyous news to impart. For I called you here not only to celebrate the return of the Lost Comtesse, but also for another reason. I am to be married.”

  There was a sudden hush, and in it Thaddeus heard Rémy draw in a harsh breath.

  “Yes,” went on the Comte, “the Comtesse and I are to be wed, joining the two great wings of our families once and for all. Rejoice with us, for the next three days will be ones of great, great celebration!”

  The crowd exploded once more as Thaddeus looked down at Rémy. She was staring up at her friend with huge, shocked eyes.

  Cantal seized Claudette’s hand and held it aloft as the crowd cheered. Then the Comte swept back into the tower, pulling Claudette behind him. The crowd whooped and cheered a little longer, and then began to filter away, excited chatter filling the air.

  “That was his plan,” Thaddeus said. “He’s not going to kill her. Once they’re married, he won’t need to. Her money will be his. And the people love him because of it.”

  Rémy shook her head. “I don’t understand. Why would she agree? She can’t!”

  Thaddeus touched her shoulder. “Rémy, I imagine she doesn’t have a choice.”

  Rémy blinked, her eyes focusing on his. “We have to get her out of here. Now — tonight.”

  He nodded. “I agree. Which means we need to know exactly where she’s being held.” Around them, the square was emptying quickly. “Come on, we need to hide.”

  Thaddeus headed for one of the many narrow alleyways that snaked between the buildings of the castle. They had to conceal themselves away from the watchful gazes of the Comte’s men, who were herding the rest of the townsfolk out of the castle’s main gate and back down to the city’s two lower tiers. He wove his way through the remaining crowds, keeping close to the high walls and out of sight. They had almost reached the passageway he’d been making for when Rémy grabbed his wrist.

  “Wait,” she hissed.

  “What is it?”

  “Look!” She pointed back toward the main gate to a small knot of soldiers who were conferring beside it. They seemed to be paying attention to one in particular: a tall, thin young man in a plumed helmet that denoted a higher rank. “It’s him,” Rémy hissed. “It’s Yannick!”

  Rémy was right. Her old school friend seemed to be a magician no more. Instead he had taken on the garb of the Comte de Cantal’s army.

  Thaddeus grabbed Rémy before she could run at him. “Let me go!” she growled, her face a perfect mask of fury. “Let me go, Thaddeus! Mon dieu, I will kill him, I will —”

  “Rémy!” Thaddeus continued to hold her as she struggled, pulling her deeper into the shelter of the alley. “Go after him now and we’re all dead! Think of where we are, for God’s sake!”

  His words seemed to bring Rémy to her senses. She stopped struggling and nodded. Thaddeus let her go, and they watched from their hiding place as Yannick and his group of men marched away.

  “He’s joined them,” Rémy said, her voice laced with sadness now, as well as anger. “How could he do such a thing? If he had just been tricked by the Comte — misled, somehow . . . But he knows the truth now, and still…” she trailed off, shaking her head.

  Thaddeus let the silence between them float for a moment before touching a hand to her back. “Come on,” he said. “The sooner we work out where Claudette is and get out of here, the better.”

  Rémy nodded, though the fury did not leave her eyes. Together, they rejoined the last of the people and slipped out through the castle gates before they were shut and bolted at last.

  It wasn’t hard to get the people of Mont Cantal to talk about the Lost Comtesse, or their city. In fact, it was the only topic of conversation that seemed to be of any interest to anyone. In the bars and cafés that threw out their colorful awnings as soon as the sun touched the yardarm. In the market and even just on street corners, the talk everywhere was bubbling with the news of the Comte’s coming nuptials.

  “How lucky that woman is,” said one smiling woman to Rémy, over a friendly lunchtime coffee. “Just think! To be plucked from the gutter to live in such a place.”

  “Yes,” said Rémy, through gritted teeth. “She is indeed the luckiest woman alive. How I envy her the chance to see inside the castle itself!”

  “Oh, I know! And to live there, too. I’ve heard,” said the woman, leaning closer with the glint of conspiracy in her eyes, “that the Comte’s given his betrothed his own room. Isn’t that marvelous?”

  “Really?” whispered Rémy. “That must be the grandest room in all of Mont Cantal, no?”

  “Oh, I should think so,” agreed the woman. “They say it’s the highest, too, with the greatest view of all.” She sighed and sank into a reverie as she finished her coffee.

  And so it was that Rémy and Thaddeus filled their day — with many cups of coffee, a few glasses of beer, much gossip, and a slow understanding of the design of the Comte’s castle. By the time they began to make their way back up to the airship, it felt almost as if they’d lived there themselves.

  {Chapter 36}

  IN AN IVORY TOWER

  When the sun had fully set, the ruby airship rose into the air as silently as a bird on the wing. J was at the controls, Dita leaning beside him as they left the relative safety of the plateau and sailed out over the city of Mont Cantal. The atmosphere in the cabin was tense. They all knew what was at stake — it would only take a single shot from one of the Comte’s riflemen to down the airship and all who sailed in her.

  Thaddeus had made a rough sketch of the castle and where they thought Claudette was being held to help J navigate the airship. Rémy sat on the cabin floor and looked at it by the meager light of a candle stub. She didn’t even move as Thaddeus sat down next to her and crowded in close, looking over her shoulder.

  “How are you, Little Bird?” he asked softly.

  She looked up then, watching the candle cast a festival of shadows across his serious face. “You haven’t called me that for a long time. I’m not certain you have ever called me that at all.”

  He smiled, though the look in his eyes was still serious. “Tonight you need to be Little Bird more than you need to be Rémy. Will your shoulder hold up?”

  Rémy flexed her arm to prove that it was healed. In truth, the wound was still sore, but it was no worse an ache than some of the bruises she had sustained during practice on the wire, and they had never prevented her from performing. She was determined that this one would not stop her now.

  “It is fine,” she said, looking once more at the picture he had drawn. It showed four imposing towers, smooth but for the single, guarded door at the bottom and the narrow, dark spaces that had been allowed for windows. For all its gleaming white paint, in Thaddeus’s drawing it looked as it truly was — more a prison than a home. How she hated the thought of her friends being caught behind those walls.

  “Tonight I will fly as surely as this ship,” she murmured, tracing a finger lightly over the paper. “Don’t worry, my policeman.”

  Thaddeus sighed. “Yo
ur policeman,” he repeated quietly. “Am I never to be anything to you other than that, Rémy Brunel?”

  Rémy looked up at him, her heart thumping a little in surprise. He wasn’t looking at her, was instead studying the paper in her hands. For a moment she wasn’t even sure he’d said anything at all. Her fingers fluttered to her throat before she remembered her opal wasn’t there.

  “You’re not,” she began, and then swallowed and tried again, “I don’t . . .”

  Thaddeus cut her off with a gentle shake of his head and a brief smile. “Don’t think of it now,” he said. “But when this is over — one way or another — we must talk. So for now, tell me, are your shoulder and your head healed enough?”

  Rémy swallowed. “Yes,” she said. “They’re better. Not perfect, but better.”

  “Strong enough for what you have to do?” he asked. “Because if not, I will do it. I don’t want you risking your life any more than we already are just by being here.”

  “I am well,” she said firmly. “I can do this. I will do this.”

  Thaddeus stared at her a moment longer, as if he could read her mind through her eyes. He moved his hand toward her, and for a moment Rémy thought he was going to touch her cheek. But then he dropped it again. He nodded and stood, holding out a hand to help her up. She blew out the candle, throwing the cabin into near darkness. They didn’t want a sentry spotting a strange light floating toward them through the night.

  Thaddeus let go of her hand, and they stood on either side of J and Dita, looking out over the looming city. The torchlights were burning still, and in their yellow flicker the castle looked sickly, its white walls flushed as if with jaundice. Rémy shivered.

  They sank toward the castle from directly overhead. They dropped toward the central tower, J letting the ruby’s gas out slowly enough for the hiss to be almost silent, even inside the cabin.

  “Better get ready,” Thaddeus said in a low voice as they sank still farther.

  Rémy checked the rope that she had already coiled on the floor of the cabin beside the airship’s main hatch. One end was tied securely to a metal ring that J had driven straight through the ship’s wooden hull. They had tested how much weight both the rope and the ring could take, and Rémy was confident it would be enough for what they had planned.

  “Okay,” said J, a few minutes later, taking a deep breath. “Countdown to hatch opening begins . . . now.”

  Rémy and Thaddeus calmly began to count, slowly and in unison as the airship sank still lower. Once the two of them had reached ten, it would be time to put their plan into action.

  “Nine,” whispered Rémy and Thaddeus together. They looked at each other, Rémy’s hand on the lever that would open the hatch. Thaddeus gave her a tiny nod. “Ten.”

  Rémy pulled the lever. The hatch opened, jerking a little at first, but silent, and then swung down smoothly on its recently greased hinges. J had made some swift adjustments so that the gangplank would fold all the way down and away. Rémy leaned out, watching it disappear from view as the night breeze ruffled her short hair. She looked back over her shoulder.

  “A little to the left, J,” she whispered. She looked out again as the ship began to drift in the right direction. “More . . . more . . . stop.”

  J threw the rudder, and the airship stopped moving and hung in the air. Rémy tossed out the rope, feeling it pay out through her hands, uncoiling as it fell. She watched as it reached its full length, hanging exactly as they had planned outside the highest window of the tower they hoped was Claudette’s.

  “Bon.” Rémy nodded and glanced at Thaddeus. He was breathing quickly, his gaze intense and fixed on her. She smiled at him, once, and then dropped silently out of the airship, slipping down the rope.

  Far below, she could see the ring of soldiers encircling the base of the tower. From the lower two town levels there drifted the faint hubbub of evening — occasional notes of music, the rise and fall of chatter as someone entered or left a bar. Around her came the haunting caw of gulls, wheeling to and from their nests in the rock of the mountain. Rémy hoped these accumulated noises would be enough to mask any she made herself.

  The end of the rope came suddenly. Rémy looked up, seeing Thaddeus’s pale face looming in the dark hole of the airship’s hatch. She glanced down once more, but the soldiers were oblivious, too intent on keeping a watchful eye front and center to realize what was going on over their heads.

  Despite her careful directions to J, now that Rémy was level with the window, she realized it was farther away than she’d thought. She reached out, but her fingers were still inches short of the diamond-patterned window panes. She glanced up at Thaddeus, but he’d vanished. Thinking quickly, Rémy hooked one foot and twisted it around the rope to make a hold and then reached out with her free leg. The motion swung her just near enough to get a toe to the narrow ledge. This she used to pull the rest of her closer, until she was flush against the window.

  Rémy tried to see inside, but though there seemed to be the remains of a fire — embers smoldered in a hearth — the rest of the room was in darkness. She made out the vague shapes of a bed and a mirror, but there was nothing to convince her that this was the right room. What if the rumors they had heard had been wrong? What if she woke the occupant, only to discover it was the Comte, rather than Claudette?

  She swallowed, her heart thumping against her ribcage. Looking down to check that there was no movement from the guards, Rémy put two fingers in her mouth and produced a soft whistle, a little like a birdcall. It was like none she heard in the air around her, and she feared that one of the guards would immediately realize that something was amiss, but there was no shout of warning, no sudden clatter of footsteps. She took a breath and made the call again. It was a tune she hadn’t called to her lips for a long time, and she could only hope that if it were Claudette inside this room, her friend would recognize it.

  A face appeared at the window, large eyes full of shock. Rémy could have whooped with happiness, for it was Claudette herself, dressed in a long white nightgown. Her friend fumbled with the window, pulling it open quietly. Rémy slipped inside, pulling the rope with her.

  “Rémy,” hissed Claudette, a horrified look on her face. “How did you get here? What are you doing?”

  “No time to explain,” said Rémy, looking toward the rumpled bed, expecting a sleepy Amélie to appear at any moment. “We’re here to get you out. Quickly, get Amélie and come — Thaddeus will pull you up on the rope.”

  Claudette looked mystified, going to the window and looking up. “What . . . ?”

  “It’s a ship that floats in the air,” Rémy whispered, glancing toward the door of the room. A light flickered from beneath it, and she could guess that there was at least one guard outside. “Please, Claudette, we have to leave!”

  Claudette turned to her. “No. You have to go, Rémy. Go now.”

  “What are you talking about?” Rémy asked, “Claudette, we can get you out. Both of you. Come on, we have to go!”

  “No, Rémy. I cannot.” Claudette stepped toward her, gripping her shoulders. “Amélie is not here with me. He has her. The Comte de Cantal has my little girl.”

  A sick feeling gripped Rémy. “Where?”

  Claudette shut her eyes against the tears that had sprung into them. “He has dungeons. They are in the caves, deep in the mountain, between the castle and the middle city — level after level of cells to imprison his enemies. He spends hours there, doing God knows what to those poor souls. He has her somewhere there, but I don’t know exactly where or how to get there. He won’t let me go to her. He won’t let me leave this room unless it is to see him.”

  Rémy shook herself. “We’ll find her, Claudette,” she said, pulling her friend to the window. “I promise. But we have to get you out now — we won’t have another chance.”

  “You don’t understand,” Claud
ette hissed. “The Comte has a messenger, standing by. If I do anything to make him angry, he’ll send word that she must be killed. No one disobeys him, Rémy. If he finds me gone, he won’t hesitate. There won’t be any time to find her.”

  Rémy stared at her friend. “But — I can’t just leave you here! Not with him!”

  “You can — you must! All he cares about is the money. That’s all he wants. Once we’re married, he’ll have it, and he’ll let me have Amélie.”

  Rémy shook her head. “But what then? What about you? What kind of life will the two of you have? He won’t let you leave, Claudette. He’ll keep you prisoner here. Forever.”

  Claudette closed her eyes. “But Amélie will be safe. What else can I do?”

  The rope twisted suddenly and then disappeared from the window. Rémy ran to it, looking out to see Thaddeus making his way down the rope. Reaching out, she grabbed his hand and pulled him to the window, glancing down at the still heedless guards.

  “I was worried,” Thaddeus said, once he too was inside the room. “We have to go, now. Every second we hang there risks us being seen.”

  “Claudette won’t come,” Rémy told him. “The Comte is holding Amélie hostage.”

  Thaddeus narrowed his eyes in anger. “Ms. Anjou,” he said. “I know what you must be feeling, but . . .”

  Claudette cut him off with a shake of her head. “But nothing, Mr. Rec. I appreciate the efforts you have made, but I must do what I must do. This you understand, I think?”

  Rémy watched them stare at each other for a moment. Then Thaddeus nodded sharply, once. “I do. Rémy, we have to go.”

  “What! We can’t just —”

  He gripped her arm with enough firmness to add urgency to his whispered words. “We’ll find another way. But there will be no other way if we are caught. Understand? We must —”