Choose Omnibus (Choose: An Interactive Steampunk Webserial Book 3)

by Taven Moore

  None of it would mean a Roith’delat’en thing if he lost Bones.

  Hank shook his head. “I can’t.”

  Gideon’s brows winged upward. “Begging your pardon . . . have I been speaking to myself?”

  “My first mate. I can’t leave without him.”

  “Who—the ticker again? You can’t save him. If you chase him now, you’ll lose everything! You must leave!”

  Hank snatched the invitation out of Gideon’s hand. “I’ve already lost everything once, Mr. Inspector. I won’t let it happen again.”

  23. Pansy

  “Please be seated, Miss Gates. The auction will begin shortly.”

  Remora smiled at the uniformed usher, allowing him to slide a chair beneath her as she sat. All of the chairs in the women’s bidding booth were backless, in deference to the bustles in fashion. The small booth was almost entirely empty. Women were not forbidden from commerce, but rarely opted to attend such modest auctions. The dark, fabric-draped room bolstered Remora’s spirits. She had arrived on time and unmolested. Truly, she did not need Jinn fussing over her all the time. She was, after all, a Price.

  Montgomery’s tail tightened around her throat, his tiny hand pulling slightly on her hoop earrings. She busied her hands with her skirts. Patting him would most certainly not make him feel more at ease.

  A passing waiter with a tray of hors d’oeuvres slowed to her lifted hand and she accepted a small plate of fruits. Breaking off the first grape, she offered the delicacy to the nervous shonfra, hoping he would accept. It was small trade for his act as a pet, but it was all she currently had to offer.

  “You’ll spoil the beast if you keep doing that.”

  Startled, Remora turned to see the woman seated beside her, also feeding a grape to the vibrant green and pink shonfra seated upon her shoulder. A thin leash trailed from the woman’s gloved wrist, connecting to a jeweled collar around the shonfra’s neck. The green shonfra fluttered its wings and danced upon her shoulder, reaching with all four hands toward the treat.

  “Not that it’s ever stopped me,” the woman said with a smile before turning back to face her shonfra. “I do love my little darling, don’t I, Mumsypoo?”

  Mumsypoo chittered in reply and the woman fed him the grape, smiling proudly at him as if he’d done something clever.

  When Montgomery pushed away the hand holding the grape, Remora set the fruit plate down onto the seat next to her, uneaten. She couldn’t blame him. She wasn’t feeling very hungry, either.

  “I’m Pansophy Pennyworth-Price. Everyone just calls me Pansy though. I don’t believe I’ve seen you around before. Are you new to Bespin?” Pansy held out a gloved hand.

  It would be rude to ignore her, so Remora reached out her own hand and shook. “I’m Remora W—Gates, here on behalf of the Gates Foundation.” Remora’s face flushed at the slip. She had yet to become accustomed to her nom de guerre. She could only imagine the sort of incident her true identity would cause.

  Pansy didn’t seem to notice. “Gates Foundation? Interesting, I’ve never heard of them. What sort of business are they in, that they would send such a pretty young thing to an auction house?”

  Remora opened her mouth to answer, but Pansy clapped her hands together and kept speaking, a waterfall of speech that seemed unending. “I just adore your dress, by the way. I’d meant to say something immediately upon your seating and then forgot, can you imagine that? Me, Pansy Pennyworth-Price, neglecting to comment on fashion! What would my editor at the newspaper say? Well, I needn’t ask, I know exactly what he’d say. He’d say, ‘Pansy, you’ve had one too many flutes of champagne today,’ and so what if I have? A girl’s got to live a little, don’t you think?”

  Pansy tittered, one hand over her lips as if she’d just said something wicked. Remora found herself at a loss for words, an unfamiliar occasion. Pansy continued undeterred. “Did you choose the dress to coordinate with your shonfra? The red and blue stripes are quite unorthodox, but they match his fur pattern beautifully! He is a gorgeous specimen, excepting for the wings, of course. Terrible thing, that. I noticed you don’t have him on a leash, but then again, without his wings, how far away could he possibly get?” The woman gasped, eyes darkening. “Well, I declare, I had not thought of that. Did you clip them?”

  “No!” Remora burst out, horrified. “Of course not! He lost them in a terrible accident. I would never do such a thing!”

  “Oh, that is a relief to hear. Not that he’s had an accident, that’s a tragedy, dear, and you have my sympathies. I know it’s becoming quite the in thing with some ladies who cannot control the little beasties, but I believe it is such a waste! The wings truly do add to a shonfra’s beauty, and it’s so handy, once you teach them to fetch your things for you, don’t you agree? My editor wanted me to write a piece on the fashion but I refused, utterly refused, and I’ll not hear another word on the subject!”

  Remora nodded, not certain what sort of response the woman expected. The nod seemed to satisfy her, for she pulled another grape and fed it to her shonfra. While she held the treat just out of his reach so that he struggled to reach it, Pansy commented, voice deceptively idle. “You do seem a bit familiar. What was it you said your name was?”

  “Gates,” Remora said, a trickle of trepidation working its way down her spine.

  “Gates, you say?” Pansy glanced over at Remora, her blue eyes sharp. “I know all the families of note, and there’s not a single Gates among them. That dress you’re wearing is no cheap bauble, and you hold yourself as if the title ‘gentry’ was a mantle of honor, so you’re not working class shined up for a spectacle. It’s funny, though. There’s a girl with the same first name as you. Remora, wasn’t it? A Price straight out of Westmouth, heir to the bulk of the Price fortune and would you believe it? Word has it she vanished the day official mourning for her father’s death ended. She was a pretty little thing, they say. Red hair, pale skin, slight build, astonishing gold flecks in her brown eyes. Not a traditional beauty, but certainly a prize for the suitor who managed to catch her eye, even before one figures in the dowry and inheritance.”

  Remora’s face went cold. She should deny all of this, but she couldn’t quite make her mouth move.

  “Gossip papers say she was killed by assassins, or kidnapped by Shinra, or that she fell in love with a pirate captain and sailed away.”

  Remora swallowed.

  Pansy sat back, a satisfied look in her eye. “Officially, she’s on holiday, and neither the Price family nor the Seraph will allow a shred of news to the contrary. If you ask me, though? Off the record, I think she left for good reason. I think that if she were alive, she would only stay in hiding for good reason. As a matter of fact, she might even use a pseudonym to hide her identity from people who didn’t have all the facts. Like knowing that her middle name was ‘Windgates’ and combing official registries for any names that might spark attention.”

  “If you see her, dear,” Pansy leaned forward, pulling a slim white note out of her silken clutch. “Do give her my card. I would just love to chat with her.”

  Remora reached for the card, but Pansy didn’t let go, eyes intent on Remora’s. “They call me the bloodhound, dear, and it’s not because I’m ugly. Once I get a scent in my snout, I’ll follow it to the grave. Do keep in touch.” Pansy smiled and released the card.

  Remora took the card from Pansy, still numb. Montgomery tugged on her earring, just hard enough to startle her, and all the sudden, she found her tongue . . . and her fury. How dare this woman confront her in public and imply that she was owed even the tiniest sliver of Remora’s story? Remora’s spine straightened and she put as much steel into her gaze as she could muster, which was quite a bit indeed.

  “You want a story, Miss Pennyworth?” Remora said through teeth gritted in a smile. “I’ll give you a story. I’ll give you a story so big you can choke on it.” Remora lifted her hand, the translator watch still affixed to her wrist. She spun the face once.


  “Offer your shonfra another grape.” Remora said.

  Taken aback, Pansy lifted an eyebrow. Remora said nothing, and neither did Hackwrench.

  Pansy lifted another grape and Mumsypoo sat up, his four forearms reaching for the treat with the same adorable urgency as they had before.

  “Grape! Grape! Please to give a grape. Want a grape. So hungry. Hungry. Mean woman, please give grape, please please. So hungry!” the watch translated.

  “Wh-what . . . I don’t—” Pansy stuttered, obviously shocked.

  “Grape!” demanded the little green shonfra again, and Pansy immediately handed over the entire plate of fruit.

  “SO HAPPY! Grapegrapegrape.” The translation trailed off as the shonfra stuffed about ten grapes into his mouth, rounded globes bulging against the skin and fur of his cheeks. Gently, Pansy lifted the green shonfra from her shoulder and set him on the chair next to her, along with the plate.

  Remora lifted the watch toward Montgomery, indicating that he should speak if he so desired. He did.

  “We are not pets, Pansy Pennyworth-Price. We are not mere animals, to be snatched from our homes and bred like kittens, taken from our mother and our brothers before we can be taught to speak properly. We are a people, and we have been wronged.”

  If Pansy had been surprised by her shonfra’s verbalization, she was utterly speechless at Montgomery’s.

  Remora smiled gently at her. “This is Montgomery Hackwrench,” she said, introducing him formally. “He is not my pet, but rather my willing companion, and a valuable member of my crew.” Remora faced the green shonfra directly.

  “What is your name?” she asked him.

  He blinked at her, eyes wide, then spat out all of the grapes so that he could answer her directly. “Mean Lady says MumsyMumsyMumsypoo.”

  Montgomery spoke this time, more gently than she’d ever heard him. The watch translated. “What is your tail name? Mine is Montgomery. My mother gave it to me when I was so small I could not even see.”

  After a moment of silent deliberation, the shonfra spoke. “Petra”

  “It is a pleasure to meet you, Petra,” Remora said, then extended a finger. Petra stared at it, then reached out all four of his hands to grip the finger, shaking it.

  Remora pulled back her arm, then unbuckled the translator, holding it out to Pansy.

  “If I gave you this, what would you do with it?” she asked.

  Pansy looked from her to Hackwrench, then to her own green shonfra.

  Her eyes glistened over and she started to speak once, then cleared her throat. “I would . . . I would give Petra a voice,” she said.

  The shonfra looked at her, and she looked down at it, as if she’d never seen it before. “Petra,” she said, then paused. “I am so very sorry.”

  The shonfra cocked his head to the side, then put out a hand to pat her on the cheek. “Nice lady,” the watch translated.

  Remora took Pansy’s hand and wrapped the fingers around the translator device, leaning forward. “You take that story and you do good things with it, Miss Pennyworth-Price, and if you do, I’ll make sure Remora Price gets that card of yours.”

  Pansy bit her lip and took the watch, nodding. “You see that she does.”

  The announcer’s baritone broke the moment. “The auction will begin in one minute. Please, everyone take your seats.”

  Remora turned away, startled. She had almost forgotten why she was here.

  She opened her auction booklet and scanned the page. The tiara she was here to bid on would be available immediately following the interlude. Two more hours, and she would have the first piece of her puzzle.

  24. Remora’s Choice

  “Our next item,” the auctioneer announced, “is a truly unique piece, donated by an anonymous party. Lot number seven-hundred seventy-seven.”

  Remora’s hands trembled as she lifted the opera glass to the bridge of her nose and peered to the front of the room. This was it. The time had finally arrived.

  Distorted slightly through the glass, a uniformed footman stepped from behind the heavy curtains, carrying a purple velvet pillow. The footman lifted it for the auctioneer’s approval. The white-wigged auctioneer peered down at the item through his own glasses and finally nodded assent. The pillow was brought to a marble pillar in the center of the room, where it was deposited.

  As the footman made his exit, Remora trained her glass upon the item up for bid.

  The tiara.

  Truly a gorgeous piece of history, this delicate piece of jewelry actually pre-dated the end of the Seraphim War. Legend said its gems had belonged to a powerful tribal priestess, who had gifted them to the first Seraph to make contact with her nomadic tribe of peoples. The Seraph had commissioned the gem into a cogsmithed marvel, but it had disappeared at the height of the war.

  Many believed the piece to be lost forever, perhaps sunk to the bottom of the ocean during a maritime airship battle or destroyed in one of the early cogsmithing explosions. Somehow, it had surfaced here, at this modest auction, donated by an anonymous benefactor.

  Not that any of the auctioneers knew this, of course. Remora had done extensive research before leaving Westmouth, based solely on the rough description of the tiara found within the folded note that had sent her on this journey.

  Completing her search had exhausted not one but three of the most expansive libraries available, and she had been required to ask her father to procure some of the more sensitive volumes on her behalf.

  Curiously, the oldest tomes did not seem to agree on the publicly-accepted knowledge of past events. The books generally agreed on the larger, well-known events, though some of the older tomes seemed to be missing a few pages.

  Many smaller events though, seemed to disagree wildly from book to book. One recounting of the tiara’s history, for example, had the original jewels not gifted, but rather forcefully taken from the priestess and her tribe. Indeed, the tome visited the destruction of her people in gruesome and unnecessary detail.

  All of which was absurd, of course. The Seraph were the saviors of humankind. Before their arrival, so many years ago, humanity did not even have true cogsmithing.

  The auctioneer’s baritone broke Remora from her reverie and she straightened. Now was hardly the time for introspection!

  “On the auction block, we see a jeweled tiara. Our experts have dated the metals and style back even further than our original expectation of Early Vakaan, presumably even as early as Late Atrebatean. This is a once-in-a-lifetime chance to own a piece of our own history. Accordingly, we have upped the starting bid price from 100 doubloons to a more respectable 400 doubloons.”

  The crowd began to murmur, and Remora clenched her fist, crushing the program. Despite not fully identifying the tiara, this did put a crimp in her plans. A higher bid start would pique the interest of a crowd growing bored with the proceedings and send the bidding into uncomfortable territory.

  Remora Price could unquestionably afford the piece, regardless of price. Remora Gates, on the other hand, had a much more modest budget. The last thing she needed was someone poking into the finances of the Gates Foundation and finding that all funding came from the Westmouth Price coffers.

  “Do I hear 400? 400, thank you, Sir Bothringham. 450? Do I see—ah, yes, good man, Duke Northington, so good to see you here. 500? Yes, thank you. 550?”

  Remora glowered at the heated bidding below. There was hardly any sense in adding her bids until the heat died down. Men were notoriously finicky about being outbid by a woman, and her participation might drive the price of the item higher for that reason alone. No, she would wait until the bidding slowed to two, and add her bid at the end, so that no man need take her involvement as some sort of competition.

  Someone, a man, cleared his throat just behind Remora’s chair. Remora’s eyes widened and she felt Montgomery tense upon her shoulder as she turned to the speaker.

  A tiger dresl footman. An incredibly well-dressed footman, to be precise. Hi
s suit was primarily white, with black accents and golden shoulder tassels. Obviously too well dressed to be an assassin.

  Remora relaxed, though she noted that Montgomery did not.

  “I’m afraid this is terrible timing, as I have an interest in the current—”

  The dresl did not speak. Rather, he held out a golden platter, etched with a complex design of feathers and gears. In the center of the platter, a gilded envelope rested, along with a matching letter-opener shaped like a feather.

  “Remora Windgates,” read the hand-scripted golden letters upon the envelope’s surface.

  Careful, that. Someone who knew Remora’s real identity but chose to allow her the anonymity of withholding the last name.

  From the corner of her eye, she saw Pansy, eyes wide as dinner plates, leaned ever-so-slightly away from the footman.

  Remora picked up the envelope and the letter-opener, neatly splitting the wax seal before unfolding the heavy paper.

  “You are cordially invited to dinner,” read the letter. “Come immediately, come alone, come unarmed, and, of course, come hungry. Should you decline this invitation, you and everything you love shall be utterly destroyed, beginning with your ship and ending whenever I get bored. It takes me a very, very long time to get bored. Do not disappoint me.”

  The card was signed in the same flowing, golden script as the envelope.

  “Dame Vakaena.”

  Remora sat there, staring at the words.

  Dinner with a Seraph. Under other circumstances, it would be an incredible honor. The text made it clear, however, that she was not a guest.

  What could the Seraph possibly want with her? Could this have something to do with Snow?

  Remora remembered that Snow had been taken, along with her cousin Percy. Jinn and Mosley had gone to track them down, and she had to believe that Jinn would be successful.

  If she left now, she would lose the tiara. Whoever purchased it would almost certainly move it immediately, and once it left the auction house, it would be under impenetrable guard. Not that she looked forward to thievery, but she had hired a pirate captain for a reason. She had not assumed that all of the shard owners would simply hand them over.