Maledictus Aether (20 page)

“For parts – you know that,” I
shoot back, and the man sighs in defeat, rubbing the back of his
neck. With a sigh leaving my lips, I turn my gaze back to the large
city of the damned, feeling a thousand eyes upon me. “There is also
something my father mentions in his journal, and I would like to
examine this before we head to Terra Australis.”

The man turns curious blue eyes
onto me, and I look back at him a moment before I shrug a shoulder,
offering a lopsided smile.

“You have the list, right?” I
question, and in response he pulls a sheet of paper from the pocket
of his coat, waving it in the air. “Would you mind obtaining these
parts on your own, Lucian?”

In the middle of tucking the list back into the pocket of
his coat, he raises his head and regards me curiously, frowning. I
wave off the concern, looking towards the city harbouring mixed
feelings about our landing; the locals of this
Skyland don't take too kindly to other ships
docking, even if the intentions are not hostile. Licking my lips
nervously, I slip my gaze back to my companion and offer him what I
hope passes for a reassuring smile.

“Once you are finished, meet me
here; have another accompany you, and have that man return to the
ship,” I continue, and this time I pull out a sheet of folded
parchment from the inner pocket of my tailcoat, where I keep my
father's watch, and hand it to him. When he carefully takes the
paper I hold onto it a moment longer, pulling him closer only long
enough to speak into his ear, to avoid being overheard. “They will
be watching us, so lose your follower before you come join me.
There is something hidden here that cannot reach the wrong eyes –
therefore, come alone.”

I pull away, retracting my hand
and offering him a slight grin before I step away from him. He
thaws, still giving me that quizzical look, but tucks the paper
into his pocket without once glancing at it and trusting my word on
good faith alone. My grin fades into a smile of open relief, before
I salute the man with two fingers and turn my back to my
confidante, to weave my way through stacks of crates and wary men
and women working along the docks.

It'd be hard to describe the scent of Dracia, as it is a
mixture of oil, ozone, baked goods and something indescribable,
something crisp and frigid that is reminiscent of those rare
moments I could steel onto the gallery and take in the atmosphere
of the skies we sail in. There is also the scent of old metal in
the air, most likely from all the metalwork that has seen better
days – as Dracia is one of the older
Skylands, one of the first, and is what one would call a
metropolis of sorts, for various reasons.

It is a series of
Skylands connected together through thick steel cables and
iron chains shining with the tell-tale sign of Aether worn with age
and time, metal bridges spanning between each to connect the triad.
The lowermost one where ships dock is referred to as
Abussos
, the Greek word for bottomless, and probably had some
sort of implication in the past – but that has been lost with the
times. This one mostly consists of maintenance shops for ship parts
as well as blacksmiths dealing solely in automechanoid parts, so
generally strangers to the Skyland can obtain what they seek
without reaching the residential sector or even the third area,
which is dedicated only to political and educational
businesses.

My destination today is a small information building near
the bridge sp
anning between
Abussos and Akedémia, the educational district. It is a small,
abysmal building that has seen better days and has not seen
activity in quite some time. The door is boarded up with a sign
clearly stating that it has gone out of business, and the wooden
building itself looks ready to collapse. I ignore the warning signs
completely and slip between two buildings after making sure that I
am not being followed or watched, waiting in the darkness a moment
with my breath held to ensure that I am, in fact, alone. I hear
footsteps, but they are distant and come from the activity
happening on the streets of the Skyland, so with confidence
powering my heart I pass between the ramshackle building and the
other in better repair, a general store by the looks of it, and
avoid the openings of the windows by passing beneath them at a
crouch.

The scents I come across as I skirt towards the back are a
mixture of tea and baked goods, as well as the scent of rotting
wood and
Aether. As my hands
scrape over the rotting wood, looking for an opening into the
broken-down building, the sticky residue that clings to my fingers
only serves to inform me how reliant we are to this substance, and
how quickly it deteriorates. It leaves a sickly-sweet smell that
almost makes me gag, but before I can heave a plank shifts,
clattering inwards noisily and making me freeze, holding my breath.
I tense, waiting for the raised alarm, but I hear
nothing.

I only breathe a sigh of relief
once I slip into the dark room, the smell of rot even more
prominent here. The temperature is chilly, to say nothing of the
atmosphere, and as I rub my right arm to try and bring a bit of
warmth to my one remaining human limb I glance around at the gloomy
atmosphere.

The windows are caked with dirt
and grime that has accumulated over the years, and the wooden
furniture has come loose and fallen to pieces completely at some
occasions. There is a staircase going up that doesn't look too
safe, and the light fixtures that had been in place on the ceiling
have long since crashed to the floor, sometimes breaking through
the floorboards completely. Casting my eyes about, I remember my
father's words in his journal.

There is a secret hidden
beneath the stone of Dracia, and one of the few entrances can be
found inside the information house in Abussos, behind the forgotten
door of the staircase.

I walk over the dusty
floorboards, testing my steps before I tread to ensure that the
ground will not give beneath me. The wooden boards protest greatly
but do not surrender to my weight, allowing me to reach the side
panel of the staircase and feel with my fingers for a protrusion.
The thought that I am doing the same motions my father made while
he was alive, following in the footsteps of a man who has left me a
heavy legacy, graces my mind but I push it away just as my fingers
find a small indent in the wall almost at the same level as my
knees, so I crouch on my toes and explore the fissure with
care.

Finding a small lever and pushing against it, I hear
a
click
just before I can pull the wooden door towards
me, swinging it open on rusted, protesting hinges. Hot air pours
out in a rush, confusing me greatly, and brings with it the scent
of something old and undisturbed. The smell of Aether with it, and
something... something I cannot quite define just yet, but familiar
nonetheless.

I glance around one more time
before I slip inside, leaving the door open only slightly – enough
so that Lucian will find it easily, but not enough for someone to
see it if they don't know what they are looking for.

The door leads to a winding
staircase that descends into the depths of the heat I can already
feel clinging to me, making my clothes stick to my body, and I
search around for a source of light I can bring with me down under.
There is a single lamp hanging off a hook by the door, unlit, and
after fumbling in my pockets I come out with the one item I brought
in case, a box of matches, and after ensuring that the lamp has
enough oil I light a match and bring it to the wick, lighting it.
After shaking it to douse the flame I discard it on the wooden
floor, taking the lamp from its hook and descending the wooden
steps that spiral down into the yawning abyss.

It seems to go on forever, the heat fierce despite the
altitude the
Skyland is at
and the smell of oil, mildew and something inexplicably
metal
permeating the air around me. My steps resound in the dark
space lit up only barely by the lamp I hold aloft in my hand, and
each step protests with my weight – drowning out the sound of my
clipped breath and my own limbs, pneumatics working almost silently
and metal slipping against itself. My heartbeat, despite the noise,
is a constant drumbeat in my ears.

Finally, after descending for gods know how long, the last
step brings me to a corridor that gradually widens, reaching a
flat, cracking wall with no features lain into it save for a brass
door set with thick rivets into the wall. There are more lamps
hooked to the walls here, unlit, and through the wall thick pipes
and cables snake out of the room within, the hiss of steam evident.
There is a sigh that follows each hiss, a pause, before the
bone-jarring sound screams through the room once more, escaping its
confines. The pipes are covered with a thick slime that comes off
when I slide my fingers over the metal, the foul, pungent odour
of
Aether rotting away
reaching my nose.

I breathe through my mouth as
my eyes scan the surface, licking my lips and not even daring to
guess at the contents of the room. Satisfied with my initial
curiosity of this strange display, I walk towards the door itself
and examine the impressive lock that dominates the rightmost side.
It has an intricate design lain into the copper and an inscription,
Latin I believe, decorating the perimeter.

Curiously, I dig in the pocket of my tailcoat and pull out
the brass key my father had left in his treasury, along with
Zenith
that now rests at my side, and slip it into the lock.
The lock offers a bit of protest, obviously worn with age and time,
but nonetheless yields to the key and allowing me to turn it. A
very concerning
chunk
echoes in the air around me, and the
key slips from my grip as it is pulled into the lock
itself.

I step back, watching the display with a jaw that is
threatening to lower as the inscription starts to move,
esto tu populo
piratarum
, and it as well is
taken into the brass lock. Gears, long immobile, begin to move with
a slight wine of protest and the hiss of steam is almost deafening.
Then, the vices holding the door on its right side open with a
loud
chunk
, one after the other, and the door is
released.

Ever cautious, I walk up to the wooden door and carefully
push on its surface, testing it; the object swings open with a
squeal of protest, but little else, and the hot air once again
rushes at me. The smell of oil, machinery and
Aether is even thicker here, and I push the door
wide enough to slip through, leaving it open so that Lucian can
follow me afterwards.

My lamp lights only the
immediate vicinity around me, but just by seeing this monstrosity I
know what to expect, and my mouth goes dry.

Thick pipes the size of my thigh run along the ceiling,
forcing me to crouch slightly as I walk along, and the hiss of
steam travels along these as they snake throughout the giant engine
room. It's sweltering in here, the stench of
Aether so thick I gag a moment and then cover my
nose as I push onwards, holding the lamp high enough to see a few
feet in front of me. The shine of brass keeps catching my
eye.

The machines themselves are littered everywhere; the large
engines that allow this
Skyland to stay aloft dominate the space, connected to each
other through thick cables, thin and thick pipes, and gauges line
along all of these, as well as valves and levers. I'm left
dumbfounded, the floor at my feet slick with the Aether rotting
away upon this machinery.

What does my father want me to
see here?

I come across it after almost tripping over a handful of
pipes stretching along the ground and banging my head on another as
a result, making me swear vividly. Rubbing the spot, I skirt
beneath this obstacle and lift my lantern up higher, coming to a
break in all the machinery to a circular area, possibly in the
centre of the lowermost levels of the
Skyland itself. There is another lantern hanging by
the ceiling, and after lighting it I hook it back onto the chain,
given a little extra light to glance around the room
with.

This room still has cables and
pipes snaking along the floor, the larger ones skirting around it,
and in the centre lies a large machine with steam bellows
stretching to the low ceiling on either side, pipes travelling from
these to the machines along the side. The hiss is louder here, and
along one side of the crude circle I stand in there are gears
turning, connected to cables and various other instruments to power
this large machine.

There are also tables here.
Tables covered with books and papers, design plans and crates,
locked boxes and stools to rest on, though not many. I make my way
to a table covered with these papers and books, setting the lamp
down on the surface after clearing a spot for it and looking
through the blueprints.

Digging for a while through plans for the monstrosity in
the room, ledgers and documents relevant to this
Skyland, I come across something
rather strange. It has a completely different penmanship and isn't
as old as everything else in this room. Picking up the sheaf of
pages bound in a leather thong – by hand, a little clumsily but who
am I to judge – with the first page beginning simply with the
following.

The Full and Complete History of Piracy
The Rise and the
fall of
the
Alitis
Gladio
, and the Beginnings of
the Trade
Cephas Kennedy Watkins