A Study in Darkness (16 page)

Jasper Keating stood there, his entire body sparking with fury. But it was Imogen, standing just behind him, that captured Evelina’s gaze. Her face was turning white as paper.

“Oh, bloody hell,” Imogen whispered, but no one noticed her curse.

NICK LEANED OVER THE SHIP
’
S RAIL, AIMING ONE OF STRIKER
’
S
home-made weapons toward the darkness below. The bosun had spotted a lighter craft dogging their path, but it was hiding in the darkness and using the clouds for camouflage. The one advantage they had was that their tail wasn’t aware they’d been made. The moment the little bugger grew confident enough to put its nose out, Nick would blow it to smithereens. Last night’s escapades, nearly losing Striker and all, had been enough to put him in a killing mood. Poole was watching the other side, with the same orders to fire only when he could get a clear shot.

As dawn crept over the horizon, the ground below was emerging into view. Individual features of the landscape gained form and depth from the purple shadows, visible now because the clouds were starting to shred to pieces. Bad luck for their tail, but bad luck for them, too. All ships were exposed in a clear blue sky.

Nick was grateful for the brisk tailwind hurrying them along. The
Jack
could outrun most airships, but the ache in his limbs was a reminder that the best-laid plans could turn to a piss-pot when least expected. He’d only dangled upside down on that damned ladder for a few minutes, but it was as close to a crushed skull as he planned on getting for a good long while.
Striker—who didn’t have the best head for heights—still hadn’t seen fit to sober up, and Nick didn’t blame him one bit.

He thought he saw the shape of a balloon and wheeled toward it.

What is it?
Athena asked.

The shape dissipated into mist. Just a suspicious-looking cloud. “Nothing.”

Do you wish me to outrun the nuisance?

Nick had thought of that. With Athena’s help, they could ascend to heights few smaller ships could reach. Then they could pepper the clouds with cannon shot. “No. I want to see who they’ve sent after us before I blow him out of the sky.”

As it pleases you, Niccolo. But I wonder, what do you expect to learn?

He didn’t have an answer for that, so he went back to waiting and watching. The weapon was heavy, and Nick used the rail to support the nose. Striker was one of the finest makers in the Empire, but his inventions were typically small cannons that exploded, electrocuted, or otherwise turned things to a crisp. Some of this was the result of working for so long as the Gold King’s streetkeeper and some of it was Striker’s own unholy glee when something went up in flames.

On the bright side, he was a deft hand with things like the aether distiller that filtered out the rarified gas during high-altitude flights. It then condensed the distillate in long, copper coils and stored the lime-green liquid in steel canisters until it was released into the ship’s balloon. Nick had only the most basic idea of how the thing worked, except that it needed more attention than a high-class whore to keep it running. Perversely, Striker loved it with all the fondness one would lavish on a charmingly wayward child.

Nick ran the crew by letting them do what they did best and tried to learn what airmen’s skills he could. He might have been captain, making plans and taking risks, but, on a day-to-day basis, he made sure he earned his keep. Today, that meant watching for annoyances on their tail. The task held the same bizarre combination of boredom and anxiety he’d felt waiting for his turn to take the center ring.

A few yards to his right, the package sat slumped against the water butt, shivering in the gray dawn. A dark growth of beard intensified the hollows of the man’s cheeks, and a lack of sleep drew circles under his eyes. Nick noticed that someone had given him a blanket and a mug of tea—probably the helmsman, Digby, who always treated prisoners with courtesy. The
Red Jack
must have run out of custard cream biscuits, or their prisoner would have one of those, too. The thought reminded Nick that he was more than ready for breakfast.

“Captain Niccolo,” the package said, his voice hoarse from the damp.

Nick didn’t bother to look up. “What?”

“Where are you taking me?”

It should have been a reasonable question, but the paper that the Schoolmaster had stuffed into Nick’s pocket had a separate set of destinations than the ones he’d given out loud. Since there was a traitor around, Nick was all for paranoia.

“North,” was all Nick said. He frowned at the memory of the fight at the tannery, the silence filled by the gentle
whop-whop
of the tail propeller.

“I know we’re going north,” the man said acidly.

Nick turned, a little amused by his irritation. “I’m not saying more.”

The package narrowed his eyes. “I know we’re not going to Skye. The Steam Council blasted the rebels out of that base three months ago.”

That was news to Nick, but he kept his expression bland and returned his attention to the clouds. The sun was turning the sky the color of a strawberry cream dessert. Yes, he was definitely hungry. “You talk like we’re in open warfare.”

“Aren’t we?” The man blew on his tea. “You’re pointing a gun at something.”

“I’m annoyed.”

“The Scarlet King’s soldiers tried to bake your arse.”

A vision of the hot harpoons, flaring so near the
Red
Jack’s balloon, made Nick flex his fingers around the stock of the weapon. “Their mistake.”

“Your ignorance. You don’t even know who I am.”

“I don’t ask my cargo’s name, even when we give it tea and a blanket.”

“My name is Elias Jones.”

“Should I care?”

“I care. I’m more than cargo.”

“You should have thought of that before taking on Holmes.”
And endangering Evie
. “Now you’re nothing but a package.”

“By accident, not design. You’re nothing but a pirate. Was that by choice, Captain? Why take up the red flag?”

Nick almost laughed at the question.
To make my fortune and impress a girl
. It had been that simple, but there had been a thousand complications, too. He’d stolen Athena, and the deva had needed a ship. He and Striker had just killed Dr. Magnus, and he wasn’t sure they were safe from the law. Worst of all, Evie was in love with Tobias Roth—tall, blond-haired, handsome, and every inch the English ideal of cultured elegance. Nick had been heartsick and angry, with nothing but poverty and loneliness ahead.

When he’d turned to the skies, it had been an act of defiance. He saw himself swaggering into a drawing room in a suit as fine as Jasper Keating’s, showing the world that he’d made enough money to call himself a gentleman. Showing he was every bit as good as Roth.

Somewhere between that moment and now, he’d grown up. There was no way he would ever be anything but an orphaned boy with no last name and skin the color of pale coffee. A vicious mutt from the gutter. “Piracy pays well.”

“So does espionage, on occasion.”

Conversation ended when something glinted on the brass of Nick’s weapon. He looked to the east, squinting into the bright streak of the sun. “Athena, can you sense anything?”

There was a pause. Although the deva was quick to detect any change in the atmosphere, or to track the flight of birds, she wasn’t always any better than he was at picking up on approaching vessels. She was a creature of wind and flight,
and not attuned to land creatures hauled into the air by machines.
There is something right above our tail
.

Right at the angle where the sun blinded him. “Then move.”

No sooner had he spoken than the ship swung around and up faster than it had any right to. Fortunately, the
Red Jack
’s crew was already on the alert. The motion took Nick farther away from the enemy, and he scrambled across the deck to Poole’s side. The bosun already had the other craft in his sights. Nick hoisted his own weapon, grunting as its weight connected with his sore shoulder. Both men pulled a lever on the side of the guns that started them humming with a mosquito-like whine.

Through the telescopic scope, he saw the craft come into view as the
Red Jack
sailed upward. It was a small zephyr-class craft, built for stealth more than for power, with a pair of small propellers to either side of the prow and stern. The balloon was striped with the red of the Scarlet King. Then he saw the face of the pilot—no one he knew—and then the mate. That face rang a bell. He’d beat him at a hand of cards—a friendly game in a tavern a month or two ago. Nick wished he hadn’t remembered that.

Digby, the helmsman, ran up on his left, thumping against the rail. He’d come to know when Athena took over and his services could be better used elsewhere. “Holy shite. Their gun ports are opening.”

Nick had stalled as long as he dared. Any guns the zephyr had would be small, but no less deadly at this range. “Fire at will.”

Poole’s weapon flared, Nick’s an instant later. A jolt shot up his arm, making his boots skid against the deck, and the weapons snarled with a sound like ripping silk. There was a ball of light and rushing air, and the terrified look on the faces of the men. They clearly hadn’t been expecting aether guns. And then the entire gondola was engulfed in crackling blue energy.

The two men flew backward, shot across the deck by the charge. The propellers died almost instantly as the connectors inside the equipment melted.

“Go!” Nick commanded.

Going!
Athena said, diving away from the zephyr as fast as the
Jack
could fly.

One second. Two seconds. Nick watched the zephyr recede as distance grew between them, his mouth dry as sand.
I gave the order to fire. They had their gun ports open. They meant for us to die
. And yet his guts still writhed with the horror of what was to come.

The corona of blue energy died away as suddenly as it appeared. The zephyr looked dead—no voices, no motion, no threat of violence.

Wind thrummed through the rigging and stung Nick’s face. A minute must have passed, the image of the ship now shrinking to the size of a dinner plate from their viewpoint at the stern. Other members of the
Red Jack
’s crew were gathering with doomed expectancy. There was a chance the zephyr’s men were still alive, but Nick hoped to hell that wasn’t the case because there was no chance of rescue now. Zephyr-class ships used hydrogen.

“No sparks,” said Digby, always the optimist. “Maybe they’ve something worth taking.”

They probably did, but Nick knew better. Aether weapons worked through the ship’s systems, and sooner or later all that sizzling energy built up a charge, and then sparks.

“Wait for it.”

They meant for us to die
. He remembered the hot harpoons last night—the men to either side of him would have been burned to charred husks. Poole was barely twenty-one, still gangly and unfinished. Red-haired Digby, with his fiddle and tea, wanted to make his fortune and open a tavern. If they were forced to take sides, Nick had chosen these men for his own, and he would defend them to his death.
The package was right. This is no longer the occasional knife in the dark. This is open warfare
.

The explosion came so suddenly Poole jumped—a whoosh of infernal wind and a sheet of flame crawling into the sky, turning their faces to hellish masks with the reflected orange glow. It lasted only seconds, and then the balloon was gone, leaving the gondola a fiery skeleton raining
debris into the pearly dawn light. There hadn’t even been time to curse.

Nick felt the young bosun shaking. His own insides felt little better. He clapped a hand on Poole’s shoulder. “Go get yourself a drink.”

Poole didn’t need to be asked twice. Neither did the others. Only Digby lingered, a frown on his usually smiling face. “Do you think there are more ships chasing us?”

“Double the watch. I’ll split the time on the topside with Smith and Poole.” He was one of the few who didn’t mind taking the perch on top of the balloon. “I don’t think anyone else will be following after that, but I’m not taking any chances.”

Digby nodded and loped off to find Smith. Nick slumped against the rail, his mind a blank for one precious moment.

A seagull landed on the deck with a graceless flap.
Fish?

Nick heard the question inside his head. Since he’d been working so closely with an air deva, he’d started to hear the language of all birds and not just the ash rooks. Unfortunately, they weren’t brilliant conversationalists.
Sorry, no fish
, he replied.

The gull ruffled its feathers and sulked.

Still manacled, Jones hadn’t moved from his position by the water butt. He took a sip from the mug, his chained wrists making it awkward. “Quite the show.”