Buckingcrest’s smile thinned. “I assure you, my crafts are sturdy and quite safe.”
“Hm,” was all Books said.
“Come, you’re in a hurry,” Buckingcrest said. “Let me introduce you to your pilot.”
“We’re getting a pilot?” Akstyr asked. “Did Maldynado say something about that?”
Books didn’t look surprised. He didn’t look pleased either.
“Yes, I told Maldynado,” Buckingcrest said. “If he thought I’d let a pair of sword-swinging mercenaries handle one of my darlings, he was being more delusional than usual.”
As the woman turned her back to lead them to the craft, Books used Basilard’s hand code to sign, I’ll find the technical manual, and then we’ll stuff the pilot in a closet for the remainder of the trip.
Akstyr wasn’t sure the idea of having Books drive the thing was reassuring, but he smirked at the idea of their stuffy, proper professor manhandling someone into a closet.
Buckingcrest led them up a loading ramp and into the rearmost section of the craft, a cargo area. A tattooed man with a beard on a quest to swallow his face leaned against the wall, a cigar dangling from his lips.
“Is smoking wise when you’re standing beneath all that hydrogen?” Books pointed to the ceiling.
The man curled his lip at him. He had arms as thick as Akstyr’s legs. If he was the pilot, he wouldn’t be easy to stuff into a closet.
“The living quarters are in the middle here and include two private suites,” Buckingcrest called from a central corridor leading out of the storage area. “There’s even a conference room. Do you want to see the navigation area up front?”
“Yes, please,” Books said.
Akstyr started to follow, but he halted before he’d gone more than two steps into the corridor. The hairs on the back of his neck lifted, and a familiar tingle ran through him. They were in the presence of something Made, an artifact or construct crafted with the mental sciences. He hadn’t had that feeling since the team invaded that underwater laboratory in the lake a couple of months earlier. That place had been a beehive of Made activity. What he felt now… It was just one item, he decided, but that it was there at all was strange. Or maybe not. He wasn’t sure how hydrogen worked exactly, but if all it did was poof up the balloon, then this vessel would need some source of energy for propulsion. He hadn’t noticed a smokestack outside for steam-engine exhaust.
Akstyr stepped into the corridor. The pink floral wallpaper and wooden doors engraved with roses gave him no hints as to where the Made item might be-though the decor did make him feel distinctly unmanly as he stood in the passage. He opened one of the doors, but only found a pale blue room with a bed drowning in pillows and furs. Faint reverberations emanated from the textured metal floor. An engine had to be around somewhere.
After a few more steps down the corridor, Akstyr spotted a trapdoor, its edges camouflaged by the bumpy texture. He knelt and patted about until he found a handle set flush into the floor. It, too, was well disguised.
Before he could pry the handle up, a shadow fell over his shoulder.
“Lost?” the tattooed man asked from behind him.
“Just exploring,” Akstyr said.
“Don’t.”
Akstyr thought about turning and tackling the man-emperor’s spit, he’d been trained by Sicarius after all-but when he peered over his shoulder, his eyes were precisely at the level of a pistol holstered at the man’s belt. A hand rested on the grip, fingers tapping a rhythm on the ivory. Maybe it wasn’t the best moment to start a fight.
“Problem?” Lady Buckingcrest asked from a cabin that opened up at the far end of the corridor. Books stood behind her, inspecting a control panel filled with levers and gauges.
Akstyr stood. “I was wondering about the engines. Are they down there? We’ll have to be familiarized with them, won’t we? The pilot will need to fly, right, so we’ll have to stoke the fires for the furnaces?”
Now Books leaned out, his eyebrows drawn together. “You’re volunteering to do work?”
Akstyr subtly twitched his fingers to sign, Magic here even as he said, “I was going to volunteer you to do it, actually.”
“I see,” Books said.
“There’s no need for that.” Buckingcrest patted the wall. “An internal combustion engine runs the propellers, not a brutish steam monstrosity, and she uses a fuel blend that we invented ourselves. It’s a company secret, so you’ll forgive me if I don’t give you more details, but Harkon will handle refueling, should it be needed.”
“Of course,” Books said, though he signed, If this is a trap, I’m going to kill Maldynado.
“What’re you doing?” the tattooed man asked from behind Akstyr. He must have seen Books’s flying fingers.
“I thought I saw a mosquito.” Books slapped at the wall. “Got it.”
Akstyr stifled a groan. Sicarius’s training might be useful in fights, but someone needed to teach this group how to lie better. “I’ll just go out and get our cargo,” Akstyr said.
Harkon watched him like a parched alcoholic watching someone sip brandy. Akstyr had a feeling this flying adventure wasn’t going to go smoothly at all.
Chapter 10
Akstyr leaned against the wall in the navigation room, watching with some amusement as Books tried to coax flying instructions out of Harkon. Their tattooed pilot was making Sicarius seem talkative. Books had a journal out and scribbled a note every time the man flipped a switch or pushed a lever. Akstyr wondered if Harkon knew they planned to oust him as soon as possible. The dirigible was heading east, over the foothills beneath the mountains that held the dead shaman’s mine, and it probably didn’t matter if the pilot knew of that destination, but they needed to figure out something to do with him before they headed to the Scarlet Pass.
Harkon yawned, and Akstyr thought it might be a good time to go exploring.
“Anyone want something to eat?” he asked.
Both men waved negatives. Akstyr stepped into the corridor, wishing the navigation cabin had a door he could shut. He hoped Harkon was too busy to look over his shoulder. Hands in his pockets, Akstyr strolled to the trapdoor. With a little fiddling, the handle ring popped up, and he pulled the square slab open. Lighter than he expected, it almost flew all the way open to clang against the floor, but he caught it first and eased it down. A narrow ladder led into a dark compartment. The hum of an engine had grown louder. Right spot, he thought.
Akstyr crept down the ladder and crouched in the darkness. The cabin held none of the heat he associated with furnaces and boilers. In the dimness, he could make out vertical pipes running up the walls. Soft clanks emanated from the rear of the compact compartment, and a dark waist-high shape-the engine? — squatted in the center of the floor.
Before risking a light, Akstyr closed his eyes and stretched outward with his senses, trying to detect traps or dangers about the engine. The presence he had felt earlier remained, but nothing about it changed as he probed with his mind. The engine, or whatever powered it, didn’t seem to have intelligence or awareness, not like a soul construct. Maybe it was no more than a simple artifact, crafted to power the dirigible.
“Let’s take a look, shall we?” Akstyr muttered and lifted a hand.
A flame flared to life above his fingers, and the shadows receded. The light illuminated the engine, a squat steel shape punctuated with brass rods and shafts. Pipes ran out the back and disappeared into the wall behind it.
Akstyr took a step toward the engine, but halted when something stirred in the darkness lingering behind it. His flame flickered, and four reflections winked back at him from the shadows. Eyes.
Street rot, he hadn’t thought to check for people.
A metallic clack sounded. A gun being loaded? Akstyr’s concentration broke, and his light disappeared. He spun and raced up the ladder rungs.
Something clicked off the wall beside him. A crossbow quarrel instead of a bullet. Not that big of an improvement.