Liberty

by Lindsay Buroker

  The seams split open, and the scorpion sprang out by the thug’s heel. The man had only made it to one foot, with his knee still on the deck, and he raised his club to defend against an overhead blow from Cedar. The scorpion whirled toward him, leaped into the air, and stuck its stinger into his calf.

  If the man felt it, he did not show it. He bellowed as he blocked Cedar’s attack, then lunged to both feet again and whipped that club toward Cedar’s temple. Cedar barely ducked in time. The thug charged in, his knife leading. Cedar skittered to the side, knocking the blade away with the barrel of his rifle. The thug raised both of his weapons, but he paused, a confused expression coming over his face.

  Cedar hefted his rifle, clearly intending to take advantage of the man’s hesitation, but before he could swing, the big brute toppled over backward. He didn’t make a move to break his fall. No, he slammed down like a day-old corpse. When he struck the deck on his back, Kali could see his eyes, and they were frozen open. She swallowed. Maybe he already was a corpse.

  Cedar held his defensive posture for a moment, but as soon as his enemy didn’t move to get up, he dropped down and dug into a fallen man’s ammo pouches. He rifled through them, finding bullets to fit his rifle. Even though it only took him a few seconds to reload, the battle turned in those seconds. Seeing their leader dropped demoralized the gangsters—and some of them were noticing that the other two airships had crashed or were on their way to crashing into the city below. The soldiers and Mounties took charge of their faltering enemies, pressing them back against the railing and shooting or clubbing anyone who wouldn’t drop their weapons.

  Commissioner Steele, still gripping his bloody side, looked up at Cedar, who hadn’t gone far. He stood with his rifle reloaded and met the Mountie’s eyes. Kali tensed. There was nothing else she could do, but she hoped that officer had seen what had happened, seen who saved him.

  Cedar bent and offered Steele a hand. The veteran Mountie was hard to read, his face not even giving away the pain he must feel. Kali expected him to refuse the offer, but after hesitating a few seconds, he accepted the hand. Cedar pulled him up, offering him support while the soldiers finished taking care of the gangsters.

  “Kali?” Cedar called, then nodded when he spotted her. “Think you can land this boat without crashing it?”

  “What makes you think I would crash an airship?”

  A scream of, “Look out!” drifted up from the city below, the second airship smashing down upon some hapless building, Kali supposed.

  “No particular reason,” Cedar said, his eyes twinkling.

  Epilogue

  Cedar closed his eyes, enjoying the late summer sun beating upon his hat, the smell of spruce and pine in the air, and the peaceful sound of a stream gurgling through the narrow canyon and into a deep pool. Birds chirping in the tree furthered the sensation of serenity. His horse tugged at the reins, wanting to munch on a clump of grass, and Cedar gave the animal the freedom to do so. They were in no hurry, and the knowledge that he could return to the city without being shot at or imprisoned relaxed him to the point that he contemplated a snooze.

  “It looks like a drunken donkey wrote this using his tail and charcoal filched from a fire pit,” Kali groused, apparently not as relaxed as Cedar. She paced along a rocky outcropping draped in lichens, alternately peering at it and peering at the map she had acquired from Amelia.

  “What does the writing of a sober donkey look like?” Cedar asked.

  “Something a lot more comprehensible than this.”

  “We’ve been absolved of our supposed crimes, at least in Canada, everyone in the city smiles and tilts their hats when we walk down the streets, the mayor lent us his personal horses for this trip, and your Hän helpers are cleaning up your airship and sewing the envelope.”

  “What’s your point?”

  “There’s no need to be grumpy.” He tilted his head back, letting the sun warm his face.

  “Gratitude and horse loans are temporary. The Liberty is designed to run on flash gold, so I’ll have to completely rebuild the engine and add a furnace and boiler if we don’t find it. Also, I’m not grumpy. I’m just perturbed because your snake-kissing mortal enemy couldn’t draw a decent map to his hiding spot.”

  “Maybe he didn’t truly want Amelia or anyone else to find it.”

  “Then he shouldn’t have drawn a map at all.”

  “If I help you find the flash gold, will you relax and enjoy the day with me?”

  “If we find it, I’ll strip naked and swing from the branches.”

  Cedar lifted his eyebrows. “I had no idea that’s how you relax and enjoy your days. I figured wrenches and screwdrivers would be involved.”

  “They typically are, but I thought you might appreciate a show.”

  “No need to change your habits for me.” Cedar left his horse and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “Though if you wanted to be nude while wrenching and screwdriving, I wouldn’t mind overly much.” He waggled his eyebrows at her, then nodded toward the map. “You think it’s in these rocks somewhere?”

  “The written directions mentioned a canyon and a rock face. The map at the bottom looks like a picture of the moles on Cudgel’s butt. If those are terrain features...”

  “They were drawn by a drunken donkey? Yes, they are messy.” Cedar lowered his arm. “I’ll poke around in the rocks, see what I can find. After tracking the scalawag for so long, I’ve a notion about how he thinks.” He climbed up the lichen-covered rocks, wanting to peek in a few crevices fifteen to twenty feet up.

  “I’ve seen how he thinks too. Don’t stick your fingers in any holes that might have snakes in them.”

  “I’ll endeavor not to.”

  As Cedar climbed, he doubted he would find snakes in the crevices, as it would be hard to keep them trapped and fed in such small niches, but he wouldn’t be surprised if some booby trap or another awaited them. He placed his hands carefully and lifted his eyes to each hole before sticking his fingers into them. While he clambered up and down and across the rock face, Kali used a stick to prod nooks on the ground level, all the while muttering about donkey-tail writing.

  The shadows lengthened as the sun traveled across the sky, and Cedar’s fingers grew tired from holding up his weight. He’d claimed to know how Cudgel had thought, but that wasn’t helping him discover anything, and he had searched each nook and cranny twice now.

  “Are you sure the map is pointing to this rock face?” he asked.

  Kali had stopped searching, too, and was glaring around her and flicking her stick at anything close enough to succumb to her wrath. “Not sure about anything. I told you, this scarcely looks like a map at all.”

  “Yes, moles and butt cheeks, I remember.”

  Cedar shifted his weight so he could turn and look out over the canyon. The trees blocked much of the view—they were far enough from Dawson that nobody had logged back here—but he could see the stream and pool through the branches. The deep water of the pool sparkled in the afternoon sunlight. He turned back toward the rocks, thinking to climb higher for an even better view, when a jolt went through him. The sun was too far down in the sky for any light to be reflecting on the surface of that pool. He peered more carefully at the spot.

  “Kali?” he said slowly. “Does that pool seem to be shaped like a nice round set of cheeks to you?”

  “What?” She looked up at him and then toward the water.

  “I only ask because those sparkles of light are moving, and they remind me a touch of the flashes I’ve seen your gold make when it’s fired up.”

  Before he finished speaking, she charged out of sight. As Cedar climbed down, a big splash came from the direction of the pond. Had she jumped right in?

  He jogged to the water, reaching the edge as Kali’s head popped up, water streaming down her face.

  “It’s down here,” she blurted. “I need a rope. It’s too heavy for me to haul out by myself.”

  “Lucky for you, I br
ought one.”

  “Reckon I’ll have to kiss you later for your thoughtfulness.”

  He tipped his hat in her direction, then retrieved his rope and helped her haul out her precious—and heavy—treasure. Cudgel had wrapped it in canvas, perhaps aware of its ability to flash and send out lightning-like streaks of energy, but enough of it had fallen away for some of those streaks to escape. A good thing too. Even though he’d bragged about knowing Cudgel’s mind, he wouldn’t have thought to look in the water.

  Back at the horses, Kali hardly noticed that she was dripping and that her sodden clothes stuck to her body. She clutched the block of gold in her hands and wore a goofy grin as Cedar adjusted his saddlebags so the burden wouldn’t bother the mare.

  “This is it, Cedar,” she breathed.

  “A way to great fortune and a life of ease?” he suggested.

  “Don’t be foolish. A way to power my airship. And she’ll be the fastest, most beautiful ship in the sky. And, if we happen to run into any of those Pinkertons that are still after you, they’ll never catch up with us.”

  “I’m amenable to that.” He plucked at her soggy sleeve. “I guess you’ll have to get naked now. If only so you don’t freeze as the sun goes down.”

  “I don’t plan to freeze ever again. We’re going south. Way south.” Her grin grew even wider, as she no doubt contemplated a winter that didn’t involve snow or ice.

  Seeing her so pleased warmed his insides, especially given how seldom he had seen her so clearly pleased.

  “Mind if I collect that kiss now?” he murmured, distracted from the saddlebags.

  “While I’m wetter than water?”

  “Don’t you want to warm up a touch?” He shifted closer, trying to make his chest look like an appealing place to snuggle into for warmth.

  “All right, but if you distract me, and I drop this gold on your toe, I can’t be blamed.”

  Cedar slipped his arms around her waist. “I didn’t realize you found me so distracting.”

  She leaned against his chest. “You didn’t know that you’re almost as engrossing as an engine in need of fixing?”

  “Am I? Or is it just that you’ve found your flash gold, your airship is about to be in the air, and you can finally enjoy life? Life and… other things.” He attempted an alluring leer.

  “All of those things, I think.”

  “Good.”

  He lowered his lips for a kiss, which she returned with pleasing enthusiasm. The block of gold lay wedged between them, throwing off little flashes. Fortunately, Kali did not drop it on his toe.

  • • • • •

  The view was magnificent. Kali couldn’t stop standing at the railing, looking down at the Rocky Mountains, their peaks already sheathed in snow. The Liberty soared as high as the birds, whispering through the clouds, only the soft whir of the fans stirring the air. The engine ran seamlessly below the deck, powered by the last block of flash gold in the world. At least for now. Kali had recovered Amelia’s journal from the crashed gangster ship and would try to make more of it someday. She had never used flash gold for extended periods of time and had no idea how long it would last. Someday, she might need another block of it to keep her airship in the sky where it belonged.

  “I can’t help but notice that we’re heading east rather than south,” Cedar drawled from his spot on a deck chair, his long legs stretched out and the wide-brimmed hat he had found somewhere pulled low over his eyes.

  Kali leaned her back against the railing and faced him. “Is it hard to notice those things with your hat pulled over your eyes? I thought you were napping.”

  “Napping? I’m your chief of security. It wouldn’t be proper for me to nap while on the job.”

  Kali had told him she would need a security man if she started running cargo in and out of Dawson, but she hadn’t decided if she meant to go back again right away. She wanted to see the world first. As far as security went, they should be able to outrun any military or pirate ships they spotted, so she thought they would be safe—it wasn’t as if she expected trouble from her crew. Tadzi was the only one who had come along in the end, though Kali had offered Kéitlyudee and her hard-working relatives a place on the ship if they wanted it. Only Tadzi had truly felt like an outcast among the Hän, much as Kali always had, and had left his family for the adventure. Kali had gone to talk to his parents to see what they thought about their son leaving, and had learned that they’d already decided he would always be a burden on the tribe since he couldn’t run and hunt. They had let him go easily.

  “So… you’re just checking your eyelids for light cracks?” Kali asked, noticing Cedar had folded his hands behind his neck to pillow his head as he tilted his face toward the afternoon rays.

  “Precisely so. Letting the sun revitalize my body after a harrowing summer. A harrowing few years, truth be told. Wouldn’t mind if the sun were a bit warmer. I can feel the arctic chill of winter coming on.”

  “It’s still a week from September.”

  “What’s your point?”

  “I figure we can risk spending a few more weeks in the Dominion of Canada before hightailing it south for the winter. I’ve got a closer locale in mind for our first destination, but you’ll have to give me more precise directions once we get past the mountains.”

  “More precise directions to what?” Cedar pushed his hat back and met her eyes.

  “You once mentioned wanting to return to your family to tell them that your brother’s death had been avenged.”

  Cedar lowered his hands to his thighs. “You’re taking me home?”

  “Since you’re not a criminal anymore, I reckon it’s safe for you to show up there. And if you’ve got kin back there that have been missing you and wondering if you’re still alive… seems right to visit when you can.” Kali wondered what it would be like to have kin who missed her and wondered if she was alive. With her parents both gone, and neither of them being overly doting when they’d been alive, she’d never known that feeling, but others seemed to put stock in it.

  “That’s right considerate of you, Kali. I wouldn’t have presumed to ask, especially since this is your maiden voyage, but I appreciate you thinking of me. If my grandparents are still alive, I bet they’d like to meet you.”

  Kali nibbled on her lip, not sure whether to be intrigued or terrified by the idea of being taken to see his kin. How would he introduce her? As his friend? His employer? His sweetheart? The crazy woman who’d blown him out of jail?

  Cedar patted the chair next to him. “Why don’t you join me for that porch sitting we talked about? Deck sitting?”

  “I’m not sure that’s wise. Tadzi is navigating. We might end up smashed into a mountain if I leave him alone too long.”

  “He seems to be doing an admirable job. I haven’t heard any distressed squawks from birds being sucked into the fan housings.”

  Kali scowled at him. “How was I supposed to know those swallows would all fly up in a fit when we took off? That’s not my fault.”

  “Might be that your knack is for engineering and that we should find someone else to pilot. Tadzi might grow into it well. Of course, I’m not sure professional pilots are supposed to have to stand on a box to see where they’re going.” Cedar patted the chair again. “Sit for a spell? Since nobody’s trying to shoot us currently and the nearest Pinkertons are a thousand miles away, I can start properly courting you.”

  “Oh? And that involves sitting… here?” She nudged the chair next to him with her toe, and it wobbled on its uneven legs. He had built the two wooden loungers with spare parts during their first day of flying, perhaps envisioning his dream of deck sitting with her, but she was fairly certain they were the first pieces of furniture he had ever constructed.

  “It’s sturdy enough.” Cedar gripped the armrests of his chair and wiggled his backside. Even though the seat wobbled, it did not collapse, and he did not cry out or complain of splinters in his cheeks.

  “Yours looks s
afer than this one.” Kali nudged the empty chair with her toe again.

  “Oh? Perhaps you should join me in it.”

  “I suppose I could.” Kali looked toward the horizon. “It doesn’t look like we’re in danger of hitting any mountains presently.”

  Cedar patted his thigh invitingly.

  Feeling a little shy, and less than confident in the soundness of the chair, Kali settled onto his lap. He pulled her close, adjusting her so her legs dangled over the armrest. She looped an arm around his shoulders for support and because it felt nice. They had been so busy over the weeks and months that she’d barely stopped to notice his attractive attributes. They weren’t overly marred by the handful of scars he sported or the tousled aspect of his dark hair. He’d shaved that morning and she ran her hand along his jaw, enjoying the sleek feel of it. She looked forward to the south, where a man didn’t need a beard nine months out of the year to keep warm.

  “You said I’d know it when you started courting me,” Kali said, “on account of my heart flopping around in my chest like a dead fish.”

  “I’m quite positive those were not the words I used.”

  “It was something to do with my heart.”

  “Well, supposing I start courting you, and you let me know what your heart does?”

  “Reckon I can do that.”

  “Good.”

  He rested his hand on the side of her face, brushing her skin with his thumb, sending a little shiver through her. Then he guided her mouth to his, their lips touching as he nestled her against his chest. Her heart might have done something, but she forgot to pay attention.

  THE END

  Afterword

  Thank you for following along with the Flash Gold Chronicles. I hope you enjoyed this last installment and will check out my other books if you haven’t already. You can also visit me at http://www.lindsayburoker.com and on my Facebook author page. I’m active on Twitter at @GoblinWriter. Thanks for reading!