“Don’t much care if I’m rude or not,” he growled. “You’re not getting aboard.”
She ought to leave it at that. Just turn around and head back to her cottage.
“I saw these ships in action over Liverpool. But this is the closest I’ve ever come to one. I’m an engineer. How can I not see how they work?”
Fletcher exhaled. Then nodded. He strode ahead.
Kali followed, her heart throbbing with dread and determined excitement.
He had to be a fool. Or mad. He was certain the moment Kali set foot inside the ship, his haven would be gone.
Yet she’d been at Liverpool. She had a right to see what had helped tear her life apart—though she hadn’t phrased it in exactly those words.
He paced ahead. He should’ve known the moment he saw her that his burial on the island was over. She’d drag him back to the realm of the living—to the danger of everyone.
Even worse, when he’d spotted her moments earlier, a jolt of pleasure hit him. As if he’d actually wanted to see her again. Signs of life within him that he didn’t want. Easier to be dead, numb.
“What’s her name?” she asked behind him.
“Persephone.”
“Pretty.”
“Wasn’t me that gave the name to her.” They’d gotten closer to the airship, and as they did, he felt it pulling upon him, that slight gripping sensation through his body, as Persephone drew on his implants to feed its batteries. He’d grown so used to the sensation, he barely felt it anymore.
The keel had been smashed into the ground, and half the hull had been buried with the impact. But that still left the other half aboveground, its portholes and gun ports staring out at the moor. As he and Kali reached the ship, she frowned at the remainder of the hull. Twenty feet of airship towered above them.
“There’s no door,” she noted.
“Don’t need one.” He leapt and grabbed onto the railing at the quarterdeck, then pulled himself up. Standing on the top deck, he braced his hands on the railing to look down at her. Her mouth had dropped open and her eyes were round as cannon shot.
“I’d heard Man O’ Wars were strong, but . . .” She shook her head.
“Nothing to twist your wrench about. We can all do that.” They’d taken him and other recently-made Man O’ Wars and trained them for nearly a year before letting them out into the world. Strength like theirs, unchecked and unknown, proved a greater liability than asset. Still, there had been mishaps and accidents.
He could leave her down there. Keep her from boarding and preserve the solitude of his crypt. Instead, he picked up a rope and tossed one end down to her.
She looked at the rope, smiling darkly. “I used to be damned good at climbing. Not so agile anymore.” She rapped her knuckles against her prosthetic leg.
“Grab one end. I’ll pull you up.”
For a moment, it looked as though she’d refuse. Beneath the spice hue of her skin, she’d gone ashen. But she gripped the rope, then looked at him and nodded.
He pulled. She weighed so little, and his strength was so great, that she practically soared up the side of the ship. She actually let out a small gasp. And then suddenly she flew over the rail. Right into his arms.
She let go of the rope and grabbed onto his shoulders for balance. At the same time, he dropped his end of the rope and wrapped his arms around her to hold her steady. They pressed against each other, chest-to-chest, their faces mere inches apart. Her warm, startled breath fanned across his face. Close as they were, he caught all her scents: wool, tea, machine oil, cool air, and warm woman.
Pulling her up the ship hadn’t raised his pulse. Now it thudded through him.
They stood like that for . . . he didn’t know how long. Time drifted like the mists as he held her—the first woman in his arms in a long, long time. And he didn’t know how long before the Battle of Liverpool she’d been embraced by a man, but the three months since must’ve felt lengthy to her, as her pupils were wide and dark, her breath not slowing, the flutter of her pulse in her neck speedy.
“Down, please,” she rasped.
“Let go,” he answered.
She seemed surprised that she continued to hold onto him. So they both unhooked their arms from each other awkwardly, and she slid rigidly down the length of his body. Tender and romantic, it wasn’t, yet he’d had no choice but to feel her curves on her way down, and realize she didn’t wear a corset.
As soon as her feet touched the deck, she stepped backward and made herself busy looking around. Looking everywhere but at him.
He’d no idea what to say. He hadn’t been good at protocol before, and three months of living death hadn’t helped his skills.
“Welcome aboard the Persephone,” he finally muttered.
She walked the length of the deck, studying everything. The ship hadn’t landed evenly, so the deck had a small tilt to it. As she examined the telumium panels mounted into the rail, her fingers tracing the punctures from ether bullets, he hovered close.
“You don’t need to worry that I’ll steal anything, Captain Fletcher,” she said over her shoulder.
“I said not to call me Captain.”
She faced him. “But you’re the captain of this ship.”
“Was the captain. Now it keeps me alive and I keep her from becoming an aviary.” Yet even as he spoke, a bird landed on its nest, built on what had been the central support. “Seen enough?”
“Not yet. Besides,” she added, hefting her satchel, “I’ve brought you a present, and it’d be the height of rudeness for me to leave before I gave it to you.”
“Present?” When was the last time he’d gotten a gift?
Her mouth curled. “I thought it was something you could use out here, all alone.”
“Tell me what it is.” He reached for the satchel, and she held it out of his reach. Which wasn’t entirely true, since taking it from her would’ve been absurdly easy. Yet something odd was happening in his chest. Something that felt vaguely familiar. Enjoyment.
“No present until I see it all.”
He raised a brow. “We’re talking about the ship, right?”
His odd enjoyment gleamed brighter as she actually blushed. Good to see that he unsettled her as much as she did him.
“The ship,” she confirmed.
He debated a moment longer—there’d be no turning back once she went below decks and brought her bright energy into the place that he haunted—but he could see the bright curiosity in her eyes, and it pleased him.
Saying nothing, he walked to the companionway and she followed. The stairs leading below were mostly intact. Despite her insistence that she could manage, he offered her his hand as she descended the steps. To his surprise, she actually took his assistance. She wasn’t wearing gloves, and he didn’t need to, and he tried not to think about the pleasure of holding her hand again, feeling its delicateness combined with strength. But he let go as soon as they reached the bottom of the companionway.
The passageway sloped to the right, but Kali walked carefully along it, keeping one hand braced against the bulkhead. He followed her gaze as she stared at the metal plates mounted along the bulkheads, small brass canisters were attached to some of them, and copper tubes leading away from the cylinders.
“Batteries,” she said. “They power the turbines. And they draw their power from . . . you.”
“I run the turbines at night when I’m on the ship to drain the batteries,” he explained. “Keeps ’em from topping off.”
“That’s what I hear at night.” Her fingers ran along the copper tubes. “I don’t know what these do.”
“Take ether generated from the batteries to tanks.”
She frowned. “You’re not flying anywhere.”
“Most of the ether I release from the storage tanks, but I keep some of it saved for my weapons.”
Kali fell quiet, and as they moved along the passageway, he watched her studying his ship. She winced at the damage the airship ha
d taken, not just the splintered wood and bent metal, but the holes left by ether cannon blasts, the open cabin doors revealing quarters and other work and living spaces that had been smashed apart by enemy fire.
He nodded toward a cabin’s open door. A large hole had been torn in the exterior, and the small room was empty. “These were Mayhew’s quarters. A lieutenant who liked to tinker. Always spending his free time holed up in there, messing about with wires and gears. Nothing like what you do, though.” He peered at the bare cabin. “All his tools and supplies are gone. You could’ve made use of them.”
She patted her tool belt. “I wouldn’t have come to this island without being well supplied.”
Next, he pushed open the door leading to what had been the officers’ wardroom. It still had some of the furniture, and an exterior wall, though the glass was missing from two of the portholes, and all the framed prints that had once hung upon the bulkheads now lay in a pile in a far corner beneath a film of dust.
“This is where the officers ate,” he said.
Stepping to the table, she opened her satchel and removed a muslin bundle. Opening the bundle, she took out a small clockwork cricket. She turned the key, and the little mechanical insect hopped cheerfully. Its belly glowed softly, and every few moments, it chirped.
“Should I bother asking if that’s your design?” he asked wryly.
“If it’s ingenious,” she replied, “it’s mine. And I didn’t bring anything that I didn’t build or create.”
He scooped up the cricket. A whimsical little thing. Purposeful in its jauntiness. The light from its belly illuminated the roughness of his palm. “This is my present. A child’s toy.”
Now she shrugged. “A little company is always welcome.” She looked at the broken chairs, the debris littered across the floor. “There were no other survivors.”
“No.” When she looked horrified, he added quickly, “I was the only one on board when she wrecked. I’d made everyone else abandon ship as soon as I saw she wasn’t going to make it.”
“You couldn’t abandon ship, too?”
“Someone needed to pilot it, make sure it didn’t crash into anywhere inhabited.”
She stared at him. “But . . . you could’ve died.”
“I did, in a way.” He paced over to the heap of broken pictures in the corner and toed his boot through them. Prints of other airships and seafaring vessels—as though he or his officers would ever forget that they were in the navy. Maybe the men outfitting the ships thought images of land would make him and the rest of the crew long for things they couldn’t have. But he never missed dry—or solid—land. His home had been the sea, and then the air.
From behind him, she murmured, “You must’ve been scared.”
“As hell.” He turned back to her. The ashen light through the portholes traced along the angles of her face, and the golden hoops in her ears. Women had seldom been aboard—the Aerial Navy had a strict policy about spouses on airships, and as the captain of the Persephone, he insisted his crew find their pleasures on land rather than bring hired companionship on board. Kali was incongruous here for many reasons.
“Wasn’t much choice in the matter,” he continued. “And I’d just been in battle. Death’s always a possibility when engaging with the enemy. The biggest surprise came when I awoke after crashing.” He glanced down at his shirt and coat, covering the telumium plate on his pectoral. “We’re durable, us Man O’ Wars.” But he needed to stay dead. A fate he’d learned not just to accept, but embrace.
Except when she’d arrived on the island. Then his heart had begun to beat again. It had always beat, but now, now . . . he felt the chill of his self-dug grave begin to dissipate every moment in her presence.
“Battle,” she mused, walking toward the portholes. She lightly touched the empty brass frames. “And you crashed here three months ago.”
He waited. It was only a matter of minutes before she understood.
No, he was wrong. It was a matter of seconds, because she whirled back to face him, color leeching once more from her cheeks.
“You were there at Liverpool,” she said quietly.
He nodded.
Her gaze was hot. “You said nothing earlier.”
“I didn’t know what . . .” He dragged his hands through his hair. “It’s not a topic that’s easy to breach. And I thought that you wouldn’t be much pleased with me if you knew.” As if her opinion of him meant something.
“Why the hell not?” She took a step forward, eyes snapping electric fire.
He glanced down at her leg.
She snorted. “As though I’d blame you for that. This”—she tapped the artificial limb beneath her skirts—“was a gift from the Hapsburgs and the Russians when they attacked. I’d probably be dead if the navy hadn’t shown. There wouldn’t have been any medical teams looking for survivors.” Still, she continued to scowl. “Gods and goddesses, it confounds me that you’d think I’d be angry.”
Strange. He’d faced brutal combat on sea and in the air, had undergone the incredibly lengthy and painful process of becoming a Man O’ War, and had stared down death dozens of times. Yet the potent force of this one woman actually made him edgy, gave him an uncertainty he’d never once known.
“I thought maybe you’d blame us for not getting there sooner. Not doing enough. For being the cause of your loss.”
“From the enemy’s first fusillade to the appearance of the navy,” she argued, “it was a matter of hours. You couldn’t have gotten to Liverpool much sooner. As for not doing enough”—she shook her head—“when I was able to watch the skies, I saw the skirmishes. It made me dread the airships. But I also saw the British aerial fleet trying to save the ports, pushing the Hapsburgs and Russians away from civilian targets. One British ship deliberately took Russian fire to keep them from dropping bombs on one of the worst slums in the city. I saw it.”
He smiled mirthlessly. “Then we’ve already met.”
Her scowl dropped away. “That was your ship? This ship?”
“The same.”
“You must’ve realized that Valentine Grove was just a slum. But you saved it anyway.”
He glanced away, then back. “Lives are lives.”
Several moments passed with her simply staring at him, looking baffled, angry, awed. Suddenly, she strode out of the wardroom. He set down the cricket, then followed at a distance, not trying to catch her, even when she clambered up the companionway. But when she reached the top deck, instead of trying to scramble down the side, she paced what was left of the quarterdeck. He stood near the ramshackle remains of the pilot’s house, watching her. At least she no longer looked frightened of the airship.
“Both of us there,” she muttered. “Both of us here. Kismat? Is something written in our astrological charts? Fate?”
Though she spoke under her breath to herself, he could still hear every word as if spoken plainly.
“Coincidence, not fate,” he said, causing her to stop in her pacing. “A string of choices we both made and now here we are.” He spread his hands, taking in the deck of the downed airship, the moors rolling all around them, and the whole of the island, set apart from the world. “You’re a woman of science. You know fate or kismat or whatever word you want to call it doesn’t exist.”
She stalked to him. “Tell me. Everything.”
He didn’t want to speak of it, to think of those last few hours of his life before he’d come here, to this rocky, windswept hereafter.
It was clear she wouldn’t be put off. May as well rip the plaster off and get it over with, he thought.
Most of the forecastle had broken apart when the ship had crashed, but enough remained for him to stride to it. He rested his boot on the bottom of the rail and looked out over the moorland as if they were waves or the tops of clouds.
“I was at Greenwich when the telegram came,” he said. “The enemy had taken too many defeats—an important munitions plant destroyed a year ago, the failed att
empts at incursion in the United States—and they wanted to strike a devastating assault against us. Hurt us. Make a statement. So they went for our most important port: Liverpool. Any airship stationed in Britain was dispatched. We got there as soon as we could, but the enemy had worked fast. Half the city was gone by the time the Persephone arrived.”
“My half,” she said, coming to stand behind him. “My offices were near the docks.”
He cursed lowly. The docks had been one of the hardest hit. Even from the height of his airship, he’d smelled the burning wood and charred flesh. And she’d been there, in the thick of it. Her leg crushed and death all around her.
He wouldn’t have been able to help her, or the people at her offices. The damage had been wrought. Slim comfort in that knowledge, though.
Thoughts like that had haunted him since he’d crashed here. They were always close, like whispers in corners.
“We did what we could to minimize civilian casualties,” he said. “That meant chasing the Huns and Russians away from the city, so if their airships crashed, they wouldn’t do it on anyone below. The Persephone went after a Russian cruiser. Herded the ship north. But we took heavy damage in the pursuit.”
He turned his gaze skyward, his mind conjuring images of the Russian ship ablaze, and the ghostly picture of his own airship, barely holding together as she hunted her prey.
“The Russian ship broke apart over the sea in the Inner Hebrides,” he went on. “It wouldn’t be much longer before the Persephone met the same fate. But I had to save my crew and keep the airship from hitting any settlements. So I made them abandon ship.”
“And then you were alone,” she said quietly.
“A Man O’ War is never alone, so long as he’s got his ship. Like a married couple, we are.”
“So you and your wife crashed together. Here.”
“Romantic, wouldn’t you say?” His smile felt wry while his insides turned cold. “She dies, I die.”
“Except neither of you died.” She nodded toward the turbines. “I can still hear her humming, and her lights shine at night.”
“She’ll never fly again,” he said. “Poor lady. A bird with her wings clipped. Not much of an existence for an airship. And me . . .” He stared down at his hands. “I’m living,” he conceded, “but not.”
Zoe Archer - [Ether Chronicles 03] Page 5