Emilie and the Sky World (17 page)

“It’s just as dangerous up here, if those two ghost pirates get their way.” He glared back. “And I want to help Daniel. He was nice to me when you were being horrible.”

Emilie found that hard to argue with. Still, she had to make the effort. “If you do something stupid and get yourself killed, I’ll be more horrible to you than you can imagine.”

“Children, I’d prefer to leave both of you behind,” Professor Abindon said, leaning over the gallery railing to watch the progress below, “and it’s only the facts that you saved our lives and we’ll surely need all the help we can get that make me hesitate. So if you’re going, start climbing.”

Emilie hurriedly tucked the translator into her bag and went first, rather glad the professor gripped her arm to help her through the difficult moment of climbing from the gallery onto the ladder. She went down quickly, unnerved by the way the ladder swayed with the airship’s slight movements, her view blocked by the metal curve of the aether sails. She reached the bottom and stepped cautiously onto the aether-sailer’s hull. Lord Engal steadied her, and she managed not to grab onto his coat sleeve. The surface wasn’t as slippery as she feared. The texture was rough underfoot, more like stucco than slick metal. Lord Engal said, “Try not to stamp or move around much. I’m not certain how well sound would carry through this hull.”

Emilie tried to stand quietly. The door was round and large, almost ten feet across. Hyacinth crouched to one side, using its blossoms on a circular metal-paper control set into a niche in the hull. Efrain reached the bottom of the ladder and shakily stepped down, the professor not far behind him. Then the door popped and began to swing open.

Hyacinth slipped inside and Lord Engal crouched down to look. Emilie pulled the translator out of her bag. After a moment, it said,
This corridor is empty at the moment. Follow quickly, please
.

“He says to come on in,” Emilie whispered.

Lord Engal sat on the edge and swung his feet down, then disappeared almost immediately. Emilie realized it must be one of the walking shafts, so was prepared when she sat down and put her feet on the wall, and it seemed to jerk her forward and into the ship.

The shadowy dark was broken by the now-familiar bronze lights, except they were blinking and trembling, like candles or gas flames caught in a breeze. Emilie walked down the wall shaft and let it spit her out onto the floor of a short corridor that had only one door in the left-hand wall. Hyacinth and Lord Engal were down there, carefully peering through it. She hurried to join them, stretching up on her toes to look over Hyacinth’s head.

The doorway led to a junction with several different doors, all thick with shadows that jumped with the fluctuating lights. Emilie stepped back and whispered to the translator, “Can you see anyone?”

I feared the pirate might set a trap for us, but there is nothing ahead. I hope it does not realize we are onboard.

“Why are the lights blinking?”

It is a warning that the ship may be damaged if it continues to fly in this manner
.

Lord Engal read the translation over her shoulder. Efrain and the professor reached them, and Engal said, keeping his voice low, “We need to find Dr and Miss Marlende and Mikel before we proceed. Ask him–”

A loud bang echoed up through the ship. Emilie flinched in alarm. Lord Engal finished, “Never mind; I think I know where they are. To the control room!”

Hyacinth led them down the darkened corridor to the nearest wall shaft. The deck of the aether-sailer trembled under their feet, its engines protesting the effort of being awkwardly guided lower to the ground. “Was that a shot?” Efrain asked. “Are they shooting at Daniel?”

“Of course not,” Emilie snapped. She hoped they weren’t. “They must be trying to get the door into the control room open by shooting at it.”

“I don’t think that was a shot,” Professor Abindon said.

They went down another wall shaft and through a corridor. Emilie heard Miss Marlende’s voice somewhere ahead, and her heart thumped in relief. They reached the door that led into the cabin next to the control room where Daniel had locked himself in, and Lord Engal motioned them to wait. Emilie bounced in impatience as he stepped forward and cautiously looked through the door.

Then he exclaimed, “There, I see you’ve recovered, Marlende. Any success?”

With the others, Emilie crowded into the doorway. Miss Marlende and Miss Deverrin stood beside the still-closed doorway into the control room. Dr Marlende crouched beside it, near a large scorched spot on the wall. There were various dents and pry marks along the edge of the door, but so far, it must have resisted all their efforts. Miss Marlende swore in relief. “We were afraid you were dead!” She and Miss Deverrin both looked disheveled and weary but not hurt.

“It tried to kill us,” Emilie admitted. “We crashed the lifeboat, too, but the airship is all right.”

“We’ve tried using gunpowder from the pistol’s ammunition to construct a small explosive to get the door open, but it hasn’t worked,” Dr Marlende explained. “Mikel is guarding the door on the far side of the room, in case the creature attempts to escape that way, but escape doesn’t seem to be its plan.” Dr Marlende looked drawn and exhausted. He might have recovered, but the attack by the aether-creature had obviously been difficult on him. “I see you’re all well.” He peered at them anxiously. “Are Seth and Cobbier accounted for also?”

“Seth was hurt when the creature seized control of Daniel, and Cobbier is flying the airship.” The professor stepped into the room. “We have to get in there now. Daniel is attempting to land this ship so Dr Deverrin and the others can join him.”

“Yes, Mother, we know that.” Miss Marlende gestured toward the observation window. “If you have any suggestions…”

Emilie had been thinking frantically. “I have one. I can go around to the other door and try to convince it to let me in.” Everyone turned to look at her. Even Hyacinth extended some blossoms to see her better. “I mean, we never figured out how much it knows about the person it takes control of, did we? And we don’t know if it’s been listening to our conversation. Maybe I can convince it I’m silly enough to think it’s Daniel in there and not something that has taken Daniel prisoner.”

Professor Abindon frowned, but said, “I don’t think it’s much of a chance, but we might as well try it.”

Miss Marlende seemed less convinced. “But what would you do if it let you in?”

“Try to hit the lever to let you all in.” Emilie turned to Hyacinth. “You’ll have to describe where it is.”

I can do that
. It added,
This creature must know little about your people, not like the other one who has inhabited the elder of the camp. I hope your plan may work
.

Lord Engal had already taken off his pack and was unloading various tools. “Yes, go ahead and try. Even if it only distracts the creature for a moment, it could be of use.”

Emilie turned back down the corridor, Hyacinth, Miss Marlende, and even Miss Deverrin moving to follow her. She stopped Efrain and told him, “Stay here with Lord Engal. He and Dr Marlende might need your help.” That was a diplomatic way of saying that they might need someone to hand them things, but she didn’t want Efrain to distract her while she was doing this. And mostly, she knew she would have to act very silly, and if they survived this she didn’t want to be teased about it later.

Efrain nodded. “Be careful,” he told her, and went back to Lord Engal.

Hyacinth led the way down the corridor to the gallery and around to the cabin on the far side.

Mikel stood by the sealed door into the control room, and turned in surprise as they came in. “You’re back!” he said, relieved. “We didn’t know what had happened.”

“It was bad for a bit,” Emilie told him. “But I’m going to try to trick the creature into opening the door.”

Mikel lifted his brows. “It’s worth a try, I suppose.”

Emilie wished they would all be just a little more confident. She handed the translator over to Miss Marlende, wanting both hands free.

Hyacinth pressed its blossoms against a metal-paper control near the door. Miss Marlende reported, “It says it will open a speaking device that will let the creature hear you inside the control cabin. And the rest of us ought to conceal ourselves in the corridor.”

As they left, Miss Deverrin stopped in front of Emilie and said, “Take care. Great care. These creatures… Remember they can affect your mind.” She took a sharp breath. “I know it seems an obvious piece of advice, and probably ridiculous, coming from me. But if someone had told me last year that my father could be possessed by some aetheric monster and I would not notice the difference…”

“I understand,” Emilie said quickly. And she had needed to be reminded of the creature’s ability to affect people’s belief in it. She would like to think she was too strong and knowledgeable to fall for it, but she knew where overconfidence had landed her before.

Hyacinth signaled that it was ready, and Emilie stepped over to the square of metal-paper on the wall. Hyacinth tapped a blossom on a small hole that had opened in the wall, and she leaned close to it and whispered, “Daniel. Daniel, can you hear me?”

She heard something rustle, though the room behind her was empty and neither she nor Hyacinth had moved.
This lets me hear inside the room
, she realized,
that’s handy
. “It’s Emilie. I can help you. Please let me in.” She tried to make her voice low and conspiratorial, though she didn’t know how sensitive the creature listening would be to nuance. If this was really the first time it had taken over a human, it might not have any idea how people would really talk to each other.

There was a long pause. Then she heard a quiet footstep. She thought the creature must have stepped closer to the talking device on its side of the wall. She said, “It’s safe. The others are all in the room on the other side. I don’t know why they’re doing this to you and poor Dr Deverrin. They say you’ve been taken over by some sort of monster, but I told them I don’t see any monsters around you.” Emilie hesitated, wondering if that had crossed the boundary into too stupid to be believed. She thought Miss Marlende must be listening from the corridor and whispering a translation to Hyacinth, because it was staring at her with all its blossoms. The deck shuddered underfoot again, a reminder there wasn’t much time, and she added, “I have a weapon that can help you, if the others get in before you can land.” She needed to make it more urgent. “They have a bomb, to blow up the door! They’ll use it at any moment.”

There was silence for what felt like a long time, except for a hollow thud and a muted bang that must be coming from the effort to get the other door open. Then Daniel – or at least Daniel’s voice – said, “What… What weapon?”

“A gun,” Emilie answered, “They don’t know I have it.” She made herself sob, though to her ears it sounded unconvincing. More like a muffled squawk. “I don’t want you hurt.” She winced in anticipation and made herself say, “You know I love you.” She hoped the real Daniel couldn’t actually hear her. She felt a great deal of friendship and affection for Daniel, but love was different. “I’ll help you any way I can.”

She waited impatiently for an answer. She was beginning to think this wasn’t going to work. She tried to think of something else to say but knew piling on more reasons the creature should open the door would just make it all sound like the lie it was.

Then Daniel’s voice said, “I’ll open the door, Emilie. You know I trust you and love you. Pass me the weapon through the opening.”

The hair stood up on the back of Emilie’s neck and every nerve tingled. The words themselves were strange to hear in Daniel’s voice, but there was a tone underneath that made her skin crawl. She said, “I will.”

Hyacinth eased away from her, moving to one side of the door, flattening itself against the wall.

Emilie stepped close to the door, not sure what she meant to do. She hoped Hyacinth was telling Miss Marlende what was happening through the translator.

The door creaked and started to slide and Emilie tensed. It opened just enough to reveal Daniel standing across the threshold.

Emilie meant to lunge through the door as soon as it was open wide enough, but instead she found herself just standing there.

Daniel still looked like himself, though his clothes were mussed and he had lost his sling. His shirt was torn enough for her to see bandages on his shoulder. They were blood-stained and the skin around them was purple-black with bruises. “You’re hurt,” she said stupidly. And it was very stupid, because of course she had been there when Miss Marlende had shot him back in the Hollow World. He must have made the healing wound much worse when he had climbed the ladder.

For a moment, she couldn’t remember why he had climbed the ladder.

He said, “Give me the weapon.”

She had actually reached into the bag still hanging from her shoulder and grasped the medical kit inside before she realized what she had done. She froze, staring at him.
Oh. Oh, my
. This had to be the effect that had clouded the minds of Miss Deverrin and the rest of her party. It chilled her straight to the bone. What would have happened back at the camp if Dr Marlende hadn’t been able to resist it and warn them about Dr Deverrin? Would they all still be sitting beside the corpse of the wrecked airship, listening to Deverrin and nodding along with everything he said?

Emilie forced herself to smile. “Of course.” She drew out the medical kit and held it out. “I hid it in here.” When he reached for it, she jammed it into his face and shoved forward through the door.

He wrenched backward and hit something on the wall beside him. The door rammed into Emilie’s shoulder, squeezing her painfully as it tried to close. The breath shot out of her lungs and she couldn’t even cry out. Then Hyacinth was beside her, then above her head, forcing its body into the shrinking gap. The door slid open abruptly and Emilie staggered forward, gasping for air. Daniel swung away from her, reaching for the controls on the central table.