Rebel Skyforce (Mad Tinker Chronicles) (9 page)

“Oh, now I see how you had such a tough decision. You had your head up your arse,” Dan replied. He tossed his own cards down to reveal two aces, matching the two from among the common cards.

“You little—” Zinn began.

“Hey now!” The huge southern Kheshi stood and reached for the discarded cards. He flipped them by the handful, over the vocal protests from the other players. The dismay over the breach of Crackle protocol faded into a different sort of fury when the cards were shown. “I threw down the ace of swords. Where did you get a second one?”

All eyes turned to Dan, who just sighed. “Your eyes are going, friend. Might not fit your proud warrior image, but you should look into a pair of spectacles. That’s no ace.”

Madlin had looked away along with everyone else, and when she looked back, the card trapped under the Kheshi’s meaty finger was the two of swords, not the ace.

“How did you—”

“I didn’t do anything,” Dan replied. “
You
just spat in my eye by calling me a cheater to cover your bad memory and fading eyes, old man.” He reached out and pulled the pot into his stack of coins and trade bars.

The Kheshi looked around the table. “You
saw
it, all of you! This little imp is a sorcerer.”

“Am not,” Dan replied indignantly. He tried to maintain a look of offended pique, but a grin fought its way back to the fore.

The Kheshi shouted something in a language Madlin didn’t recognize and leaped across the table. Coin, cards, and scoundrels all scattered in the Kheshi’s wake. A simmering hatred brewed among gamblers of a certain ilk. The suspicion that everyone was out to cheat them bubbled just below the surface, and came to a boil the instant proof was offered. The whole room erupted in chaos as offended gamblers took out their frustrations on the accused cheat—whoever they guessed it was, once the room had devolved into a general melee. Other, more opportunistic sorts scrambled for the scattered coins and sought the nearest exit.

Madlin drew her revolver and pressed herself as flat against the wall as she could, abandoning her chair as an untenable position. A young woman might have made a tempting target of opportunity, but most Kheshis were peculiar about honor when it came to women. She might be carried off as a prize at the end, but unless she waded in among the brawl, she didn’t expect anyone to come after her. The gun helped on that account.

When Dan was buried under a muscled brute three times his heft, Madlin worried for his safety. Her glances around the room strayed often to the door, looking for an opening to bolt. When no one seemed likely to clear a path for her, she waited and watched the combat. Men fell upon one another with tankards, fists, and the occasional knife. She didn’t see anyone with a firearm drawn besides herself. Two of the serving girls were pressed against the far wall of the card room, using their drink platters as shields.

As she watched the action, she saw the serving girls edging around the periphery of the room. Someone had taken them in tow and was sneaking them clear. Dan! Madlin hadn’t been able to keep track of him, and had assumed he was still on the ground somewhere in the worst of the rumble. He had the hood of his cloak up, but by his build and manner, she knew it had to be him.

As Dan reached the door and ushered the two relieved serving girls through—Madlin’s ire rose as he swatted one on the backside to urge her into the front room—he looked over to her. “Time to go!”

Madlin gestured to the clutter of tables, chairs, and angry, drunken gamblers littering her path. She was startled as they slid out of her way, and in her fright almost believed that she had somehow done it. But Dan beckoned to her with the path cleared, and she rushed though the parted furniture and out the door.

“Thanks,” Madlin said, short on breath after finding she’d been holding it as she cowered against the wall. “What possessed your pox-rotted mind to start a fight?”

Dan opened his mouth, then closed it and raised a finger. “Just a moment. Almost forgot something: Don’t start something and leave it unfinished.” Dan pulled the door to the card room closed, but just before it latched, a tiny spark flew from his finger.

Click.
The door shut. From within the room Madlin heard a sound that few from Tellurak would know: the ignition of a gas burner, or at least something that sounded like one. There were screams from within.

Madlin was aghast. “What did you just do?”

“Two reasons for everything,” Dan said, mimicking the cadence of a professor’s lecture. “First, I won.” Dan hefted a sack slung over his shoulder beneath his cloak. “Second, I showed you how dangerous magic can be. You sure you want to learn magic that will make you scream like that if you misstep?”

Madlin gave a tight nod. She wasn’t sure, but neither was she about to spoil her hopes of saving her foot.

“Let’s get out of here. Takes a lot to rile the constables in this lawless town, but this should do it.”

Dan took Madlin by the hand and led her out into the streets.

Chipmunk awoke in a darkened cabin, alone. She was aboard the
Jennai
, still parked on the valley floor, undergoing repairs. The quiet wrapped around her like a blanket, isolating her from the world outside. She could hear her breath quickening as she prepared to put Dan’s advice into practice.

It was so simple, or at least it sounded simple the way he explained it. The act of using aether cleansed the body. “
It’s like fire in your veins,
” was how he had put it. Chipmunk had never felt the fire. Apparently, empowering simple rune structures wasn’t enough to have a noticeable effect. She needed something that channeled more power through her.

For a moment, Chipmunk had forgotten about Madlin, but she found her thoughts drifting to her twin’s circumstances. Madlin was asleep fully clothed with the exception of her boots and gun belt, locked in a room with a thirteen year old madman. It was hard to think of Dan as anything less after his display at the gambling hall. There had to have been fifty people killed in the fire, and for what, to test her resolve? It had almost worked in deterring her, but she wasn’t willing to give up on curing herself so easily. Chipmunk touched her forehead and rubbed away at the memory of Dan’s fingers on Madlin’s skin.

“I can wake up at any time, just you remember that,” Chipmunk whispered to the darkness. By his description of the spell, Dan would be able to see and hear through her, but that would be all. She kept her hands away from her sensitive areas, in case he had lied. Madlin was at the whim of Dan’s self-restraint, which was scant comfort.

She found the curtain to the cabin’s window and let in enough moonlight to see by. In the washed out light, she found her right boot and her crutch; she planned to keep off her infected foot entirely. It was more awkward than using the foot for balance, but less painful.

The corridors of the
Jennai
were guarded, but only by sleepy soldiers with little concern that they might find trouble. Chipmunk had little to worry about from them, since she was in command. If anyone could wander the ship at night, it was her.

“General Chipmunk?” one guard whispered at her approach. He spoke Acardian. “Is that you?”

“Anyone else stumbling about on a crutch around here?” Chipmunk replied.

“Anything I can help you with, ma’am?”

“Bucket of water,” she replied. It was hard to make out the soldier’s reaction in the scant light from the corridor windows. “For my foot,” she added.

“Of course, ma’am,” the soldier said, sounding relieved. Chipmunk couldn’t imagine what else he might have thought she needed a bucket for, unless perhaps she was planning on scrubbing floors in the middle of the night. She stood and waited as the soldier went off to find her one. There were a great many demands placed on her in her position as General, but at least there were certain perks as well.

The soldier came back minutes later with a steel bucket in one hand and a jar in the other. The bucket looked like it was from the coal room, rinsed off. The jar she had no ready guess for.

“What’s that?” she asked.

“Biggest bucket I could find. Hope it fits your foot. Oh, and I found some epsom salts. Thought it couldn’t hurt.”

“Thanks,” Chipmunk replied. “Bring it to my cabin, will you?” She gritted her teeth at the slip, and hoped the soldier didn’t notice that, either. She was still in the habit of asking for things, rather than giving orders. She caught herself doing it too often, habits long ingrained in her because she had always been a follower, and in Madlin because she had grown up in equality-conscious Tinker’s Island.

The soldier didn’t make use of the offered option to decline her request, and followed after her halting gait. To the man’s credit, he didn’t patronize her by offering his shoulder or arm for support. Chipmunk used a corridor wall to help balance.

“What’s your name, soldier?” she asked just as they arrived at her cabin.

“Calair, ma’am. Renfry Calair.” It was a Hurlan name, which made the Acardian understandable. Hurlan had its own language, but few spoke it outside their borders. Acardian was a sister tongue and taken up by most Hurlans who traveled.

“Well, Freeman Calair, thanks for your help.”

“If you need anything, I won’t be far,” Calair replied.

Chipmunk shut the door and set the epsom salts aside. It was a thoughtful gesture, but she had no intention of putting her foot in the water. She sat down on the bed and took a few deep breaths to steel herself. She went over Dan’s lesson:

“You don’t know any real spells, so you’re going to need to try the other way. Remember how I said I keep warm with aether? Well, it’s like that, but you’re going to go a bit hotter. You need to burn the rot out like a fever. Draw in aether and hold it. Let that burning sensation thrash around inside you. It’s going to hurt, but that’s how you know it’s working.”

The bucket was for the aether when she was done with it. She hoped it would be enough, but she was willing to risk melting metallic walls and floor panels if it came to it.

Another steady breath: air in—hold for two beats—air out. Chipmunk let her muscles relax. Lying back in bed with her back to the wall, she picked up her left foot and crossed it over her knee, where she could see it in the pale light. She hadn’t noticed before, but there was an odor to it that shouldn’t emanate from living flesh. The safety pin came away easily and Chipmunk slowly unwound the bandage, dreading the sight beneath.

The foot was dark, far darker than Sosha’s skin, a deathly hue that benefitted from insufficient light. The surface was wrinkled and puckered, like something beneath the skin was eating away at it—which she supposed it was. Chipmunk closed her eyes, reminding herself that in a few minutes, the rot would be gone. Dan might have been many things, but he had never set her amiss on magical matters. It had to work.

Chipmunk calmed herself until she felt adrift, risking falling back to sleep, but needing the freedom from distraction so she could concentrate. She drew in aether, just a trickle. There was no cause for rushing things. A little warm glow welled inside her, like the feeling of gulping hot cider on a cold day. The cool inrush of the aether chilled her around that growing ball of heat in her core. It wasn’t long before the heat began to spread throughout her body. She was no expert on anatomy, but it didn’t feel like it flowed through blood vessels, but poured down her limbs like they were made of dry sponge, soaking in water.

There was no concept of time. She wished that she hadn’t left her pocketclock with the ship’s navigator, so that she would have something to ground herself. Brushing aside that unhelpful thought, she kept up the flow of aether as she warmed. The chill of her draw was no longer enough to overcome the aether already within her. The pleasant warmth had grown to the heat of a steam room, of standing too close to the boiler. She cut the flow and waited to see what happened as the stored aether worked its way around inside her.

The tinker’s brain in Chipmunk’s head told her that with the inlet valve closed, the system should maintain a steady temperature, less heat lost to the air over time. The principle held for any liquid or gas—aether was neither of those. Despite containing the same amount of aether, the burning sensation kept growing. A furnace door opened, and Chipmunk stood right in front of it, unable to back away from the waves of heat pouring forth. Instinctively she put a hand over her mouth to protect her lungs from the blistering air she imagined around her, though the cabin was cool everywhere but inside her body.