Not that she’d noticed restrictive clothing while enjoying the sleep of the dead. Now, though, Sabrina saw that her top was significantly the worse for wear. So she stole a moment to pull a replacement over her head as the ship’s chief culinary officer picked her way down the ladder with tray in hand.
She’s catching on fast, the captain couldn’t help thinking, noting the way Charlotte’s feet remained steady on the rungs despite a bout of minor turbulence. Once on the same level as her boss, the other woman offered a steaming mug of tea along with the painkiller Sabrina had been itching for from the moment she’d opened her aching eyes.
Nicholas was out of his gourd to want to keep Charlotte off my ship, the captain decided, lips quirking upward. This woman is invaluable.
Crew assessments would have to wait, though, because Sabrina had more important matters to attend to. Like figuring out how to exit the jet stream and achieve their destination with life and limb intact...and without wrecking her inherited ship.
To that end, she swallowed the pill along with a tremendous gulp of not-quite-scorching tea and mused aloud: “I wonder where we are?”
Cradling the warm mug in both hands, the captain attempted to answer her own question by peering out the transparent sides of the observation bubble at the distant land below. They’d definitely left the mountains behind, but it was hard to tell whether the flat land they were speeding across was coastal shield or prairie. Presumably the former since jet streams ran from west to east...but who knew what had occurred while the captain was recovering from her bout of altitude sickness.
“Um, I’m not really sure...” her chef answered. A crease formed above the younger woman’s nose, proof that Charlotte was unhappy to disappoint her captain. But Sabrina waved apology aside as she gulped down the rest of the tea then slipped cold feet into waiting boots. She hadn’t really intended the question for anyone other than herself.
“I’ll figure it out,” the captain soothed. “In the meantime, can you assemble the crew? I need to check on a few things, then I’ll meet them in thirty minutes on...”
She’d been about to say “on deck,” but obviously no one was leaving the pressurized cabins until Sabrina found a way to pull her dirigible out of the jet stream that currently hurried them along their way. Luckily, Charlotte had a better idea for a meeting location.
“The crew will be coming to breakfast right about then anyway. Well, not the first mate—he’s been on watch since you fell asleep and he went to bed half an hour ago. Other than Nicholas, though, everyone else should be in the galley right when you need them.”
At the mention of Nicholas, nausea-inducing memories instantly darted through Sabrina’s unsteady mind. “Daddy knew how to take advantage of an opportunity,” her uninhibited tongue had explained as she fell through the air in the fiery arms of a dragon. “After all, there really was no law enforcement for years after the Change. So the risk was minimal.”
As always, Sabrina’s skin crawled at the recollection of what she’d discovered when Frank’s death finally offered her free rein of the inherited airship. Unfortunately, the captain possessed even more reason to wince now since she’d soon have to watch Nicholas’s face crinkle in disgust as his memories began to line up with her own.
And yet, despite being afraid to meet the tall shifter’s deep, dark eyes, Sabrina’s cheek twitched at the thought that Nicholas wouldn’t be waiting for her in the galley along with the rest of the crew. Meanwhile, Charlotte’s easy familiarity with her first mate’s given name set off an entirely different set of unpleasant emotions.
Way to go with the mixed messages, brain.
“Perfect,” Sabrina said, covering up unfamiliar confusion with familiar efficiency. “Would you mind giving our passengers breakfast in their cabins so we can keep this meeting to crew only? And be sure to take a minute to put your own feet up—you’ve gone above and beyond the call of duty today already. Thank you.”
Then, dismissing both chef and thoughts of an absent shifter, Sabrina nearly leapt up the ladder before jogging down the hallway toward engineering. She had dials to read and gauges to check, battery levels to monitor and a heading to chart. There was no reason to waste time thinking of the way her drunken breezes had stroked against Nicholas’s skin, no reason to regret her human hands failing to enjoy the same opportunity.
Shaking her head at her own foolishness, Sabrina pushed Nicholas out of her mind with an effort. She was a captain and he was a distraction. It was time to remember her primary duty—protecting the wellbeing of the Fairweather ship.
***
She didn’t make it all the way to her goal, though, before a hand reached out of a darkened doorway and drew her inside. And for a split second, Sabrina relaxed into the moment. Perhaps this was Nicholas trying to steal a kiss? Perhaps the shifter had somehow found it within his heart to forgive her for the sins of her father?
But then Gleason’s garlic-scented breathing wafted over her face. The door shut behind them and a light flicked on overhead. To her dismay, Sabrina found herself standing in a cramped storage pantry nose to nose with the thoroughly unpleasant man she’d been avidly avoiding for the last two days. And from the expression on the merchant’s face, he didn’t appear pleased by her recent actions, not one teeny, tiny bit.
“We’re flying east,” Gleason spat out before she could go on the offensive. “East instead of west. And the only dragon in sight is that stiff-necked Aerie aristocrat. What exactly do you think you’re doing?”
Perhaps it was merely the surprise of seeing Gleason’s jointed nose when she’d been gearing herself up to greet a batch of newly hired crew. Or maybe it was the loss of that delightful daydream about Nicholas’s super-heated skin. Either way, Sabrina felt her wayward fingers straightening a row of gallon-sized jars on the shelf beside her while her lips stubbornly refused to spit out a retort.
I’m trying to bring honor back to the Fairweather name, she wanted to say. Isn’t it obvious?
But her mind’s eye filled with the frowning faces of customers and friends. No one would look at her in quite the same way once her secret seeped out. Instead, there would be whispers of shock and disdain, a dense cloud of silence dogging her heels during the next trader’s festival...assuming she even dared show her face on Central Avenue the following spring.
As if sensing her weakness, Gleason stepped up into her personal space until they stood toe to toe. He shouldn’t have been intimidating, though, not when Sabrina’s own superior height allowed her to peer down at the top of her blackmailer’s head. Physical strength aside, Sabrina was captain of this ship and no one would bat an eyelash if she ordered Gleason clapped in chains. When it came right down to it, she had nothing to fear.
Still, the captain’s throat tightened and her pulse sped up. She wondered if this was how the little girls in the hold of the Intrepid had felt when her father brought customers aboard to view his wares. Was Gleason’s malice her much-deserved punishment for unwittingly profiting from Frank’s lucrative but soul-crushing trade?
“Have you forgotten about your brother?” Gleason’s voice lowered to a hiss while specks of spittle sprayed out to land on Sabrina’s neck and chin. “Do you want...?”
But before he could twist the metaphorical knife deeper into her gut, the door opened and the little brother in question stepped inside. “I thought I saw you come in here,” the tablet in his hand said while Zach himself met Sabrina’s eyes with the faintest hint of mischief on his lips. “Looking for pickles?”
The teenager wasn’t tapping at the device, laboriously keying in each word as Sabrina had seen him do the day before. Instead, she suspected he’d been listening outside the door the entire time and had composed his side of the upcoming conversation before he’d even turned the knob. And despite being a genius, a pre-written conversation would only go so far.
Still, something about her brother’s solid presence—or maybe the open doorway behind his back—did what her interna
l pep talks had failed to achieve. Zach’s smirk reminded her that a blackmailer only possessed the power he’d been freely given...and she was sick and tired of giving Gleason any power over her at all.
“I haven’t forgotten anything,” Sabrina answered, surprised by the firmness of her own voice as she took one tiny step forward so the merchant was forced to retreat up against a massive bin of potatoes. This time when she spoke, the words flowed out in a torrent. “I haven’t forgotten that I’ve already repaid the initial loan balance twice over, that if your interest rates hadn’t risen every year then I wouldn’t be even conditionally in your debt. I’m willing to finish paying off the money you think I owe, but nothing else. I won’t kidnap dragons, I won’t trick my friends, and I won’t cower in the face of a threat you have no interest in carrying out.”
Because something about spilling her guts the day before had indeed been freeing. Even if doing so had burned an important bridge...well, Sabrina still possessed her ship and her livelihood and her honor. No matter how many doors Frank’s heritage closed in her face, hard work would gradually open other doors back up. Heck, Sabrina would cut down trees, learn to plane lumber, and build those hatchways herself if she had to.
“So if I told your brother right now...” Gleason began.
But Zach, who’d been listening avidly, dropped one quick tap onto the screen of his tablet causing that clunky computerized voice to ring out yet again. “You’re going to tell me that my father was a slave trader, that he trafficked in children to be sold as sex objects. Big whoop. Who do you think my mother was? Where do you think I came from?”
Something deep in Sabrina’s heart broke at the understanding that Zach had known Frank’s secret all along, that he had understood the evil viscerally because he’d lived through it. Was that enough to explain the boy’s strange unwillingness to speak?
But she didn’t allow herself to wallow in pity or curiosity. Instead, raising both eyebrows, she glared down at the weak little man who stood spluttering against her food stores. “You’ll regret defying me...” Gleason began.
“I don’t think so,” Sabrina answered. Then, meeting her brother’s gaze, the pair strode together out of the pantry and back into the hallway of a ship that now, more than ever, felt like a family affair.
A family affair. But an honorable one.
Chapter 19
In the end, there was no time to debrief her brother or to worry over what damage Gleason might get up to now that she’d slipped his leash. Because the rest of the morning flew by in a round of crew briefings interspersed with preparations for pulling the Intrepid out of the jet stream and down into the calmer atmosphere closer to land.
Or, rather, closer to sea. Because her chief engineer’s calculations suggested that they’d nearly achieved the shore, and Sabrina had set the border between land and ocean as the starting clock for the operation to come. Perhaps the paucity of turbulence over water would turn the impossible into merely a tricky maneuver.
Perhaps.
“Ocean sighted, captain.” The call came in over the intercom as Sabrina nibbled on a cinnamon bun in her isolated observation bubble. Cookie would never have dreamed of bothering himself with snacks, but the delicious treat hand-delivered by her new chef wasn’t the primary reason Sabrina’s lips quirked upward into a hint of a smile. Instead, the energy that had been thrumming through her veins for hours now kicked into high gear as show time approached.
“Please alert the crew,” the captain answered, whistling up an air current to carry her through the hatch rather than wasting precious seconds ascending the stairs in the ordinary way. Then she headed down the hall and continued upward, noting with pride that each man who peeled away from his station to join her appeared just as excited and ready as she was.
“Dominic, you’re in command if I lose consciousness on deck,” the captain started, still trotting toward her destination and not bothering to meet her bosun’s mate’s eyes. “Vent hydrogen if necessary to get us out of the jet stream then let her fly straight out to sea. I’ll bring the ship around once I wake up.”
“Yes, captain,” Dominic answered, his face only mildly pasty as he considered commanding a dirigible on his second day ever spent floating above the earth.
Not that Sabrina expected to have to test her officer’s mettle so soon. Venting hydrogen wasn’t in the plans either since enemy dragons might catch up at any moment, with lost hydrogen equating to less ability to evade attack. Instead, the captain planned to use her own magic to rip the Intrepid out of the jet stream, then take on ocean water as ballast to hold them in place once she brought the ship back down to a more manageable elevation.
But it was good to have a backup maneuver scheduled, just in case.
“Donald, please make sure our passengers are seated and not moving around the ship. It’s bound to be a bumpy ride.”
This particular young man she was less sure of. Donald had helped defend the Intrepid yesterday along with everyone else, but she had a feeling the intensity of the youth’s desire to be chosen as crew had less to do with a yearning for adventure and more to do with the attractive qualities of a certain chief culinary officer. Nonetheless, although the sailor had gone all doe-eyed at breakfast when his sweetheart entered the room, he’d still managed to perform his duties ably in the interim. Sabrina had no doubts that the sailor could carry out such a simple task as she was giving him today.
Then the final airman, George, held out the length of nylon rope she’d sent him hunting for and Sabrina cleared her mind in preparation for battle with the elements. She twisted the line around her waist three times, tied it solidly in place, then looped the trailing ends over one shoulder.
“Wish me luck, men,” the captain said. Then, pushing the button to open the hatch, she scrambled up the stairs and out into the wild wind.
***
Nicholas dreamed of water. Of water and secrets and lives lost to his own misjudgment.
The dragon flew out of the mists of sleep into a memory that could have begun fifteen or twenty or twenty-five years ago. “Once upon a time...” That was how Sarah had always begun her stories while raising six small dragonets all on her lonesome in the hard years that followed the Change.
In this dream-hazed memory, the family had gathered around a fire kindled out of forgotten furniture and scavenged deadfall way on top of the easily defensible Sunsphere. The dragonets’ bellies would be nearly full, Sarah’s nearly empty. And to help them all forget the craving for a little more dinner, Sarah would spin fairy tales until every one of her sons fell soundly asleep.
At the time, the glass walls of the Sunsphere had held in heat, a smoky haze hovering above all of their heads where sooty gases slipped out of seams in the cobbled-together stove pipe and turned the ceiling into a blackened mess. But in Nicholas’s dream, the Sunsphere was instead open to the star-studded sky. His adult form hovered in that unrealistic space above, dragon wings silent as they beat hot air downward to assist a family that could always use a little more warmth in the winter months.
“Tell us a story about King Arthur,” one of the young shifters piped up after they’d all sat staring into the flames for a good long while. In Nicholas’s dream, the foster siblings were two and five and sixteen all at once, decades merging together into a memory that transcended time. Similarly, the boy who spoke could have been Mason or Sam or Zane or Jasper or Alexander...or even Nicholas himself...until Sarah spoke and focused the dream onto a single brother.
“Which story do you want, Sam?” Sarah asked, smoothing down the rumpled hair only to watch it spring back up in her hand’s wake.
And as if their mother’s touch had created Sam out of nothing, Nicholas could now see his foster brother more clearly. Sam the dreamer, the boy who spent his spare time sketching intricate mechanical devices that he swore would make everyone’s lives easier. At eleven—about the age he now appeared in Nicholas’s flickering vision—Sam had taken apart the elevator and foun
d a way to rebuild the device using weights and pulleys that operated without the need for electricity. The resulting dumbwaiter had made it ten times easier to ferry supplies up to their hidden home and was the first step toward creating the Aerie.
But younger Nicholas was less appreciative. “Sam always wants to hear about Sir Galahad,” he complained, disconcertingly popping into focus beneath his adult counterpart’s hovering belly as the boy spoke. At eleven, Nicholas had been a rough-and-tumble dragonet without the quiet, thoughtful demeanor he’d later donned. Shoving his sibling none too gently, young Nicholas expanded on his initial thought. “Galahad was a sissy. I want a story with swords and fighting and brotherhood instead!”
Sarah smiled, ignoring the growls of roughhousing shifters as easily as she’d stretched two ancient cans of chicken-noodle soup to feed seven mouths earlier in the day. “How about we meet in the middle?” she suggested...and then popped out of existence as the dream shifted, twisted, turned darker and colder.
“We’ll build a reservoir!”
For a moment, older Nicholas sensed nothing but the familiar voice spiraling up out of the darkness. Then Sam materialized, tall and gawky at sixteen, his sharp cheekbones nearly pushing their way out of his freckled skin. The young man burst into Nicholas’s study in human form but with dragon wings unfurled to speed pedestrian feet. At that age, Sam had been moving, moving, always moving, relentlessly unable to sit still.
Sixteen-year-old Nicholas, in contrast, had been a dark pool of still water. He bent over to shield an incipient solar panel with his body as water droplets flung out from Sam’s dripping hair to scatter across sensitive electronics. “Do you mind?” younger Nicholas growled.
Sam didn’t even bother to acknowledge his brother’s annoyance. Instead, he spoke in his usual sharp exclamations. “Look!” he said, ignoring the delicate wiring that had consumed Nicholas’s teenage years. Unrolling a damp scroll he’d been carrying tucked underneath one arm, he knocked un-soldered connections astray with gleeful abandon. “If we dam the rivers here and here,” Sam explained, poking fingers at points near the confluence of the Holston and French Broad rivers, “we can flood the entire valley upstream.”
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