The Guild Conspiracy (22 page)

But it was the soldier standing off to the side of the others that drew her eye. He stood with his back to her, the sun reflecting harshly off the side of his face as he peered out the dusty window, his copper-­gold hair almost luminescent in the sunlight. She'd know him anywhere.

The soldier next to Petra cleared his throat. “Lieutenant-­General, sir?”

One of the men huddled near the captain's wheel glanced up at the address, his shrewd gaze cutting from the soldier to Petra as he straightened to his full height, towering well over the rest of the men—­the same bearded officer she had seen the last time she was at Hasguard.

“I see Julian sent the girl,” he said, the distaste apparent in his voice.

A few of the other men shifted their attention in her direction, but she had eyes only for Braith. He slowly turned around, and his gaze held hers like an anchor in a storm, no words between them, just worry, fear, helplessness. Then he noticed the manacles on her wrists, the disheveled state of her hair, the rumpled clothes he had last seen her in a week ago, and he pressed his mouth into a tight frown, his expression suddenly hard as steel.

“I suppose I should welcome you aboard my ship,” said the lieutenant-­general, drawing her attention away from Braith. “I am Lieutenant-­General Stokes, First Ardian of Her Imperial Majesty's Royal Forces. For as long as you remain on this ship, you are under my authority.”

“Then maybe
you
can tell me why I'm here,” she said, raising her chin.

“All in due time,” he said, turning toward the soldier beside her. “Take Miss Wade to her quarters. She is to be guarded at all times until we arrive at our destination. No visitors.”

“Sir.”

“What destination?” asked Petra, resisting the soldier's pull on her arm. She glanced between the lieutenant-­general and the other officers, their faces dour. “Where are we headed? Where are you taking me?”

Lieutenant-­General Stokes arched his brow. “The brig, for now. Where you will stay until I have further need of you. That is all you need to know at present—­and this: attempt any sort of sabotage while you are aboard this ship, attempt to thwart our mission in any way, and your disobedience will be swiftly punished.” He gestured to her guard. “Take her away.”

She struggled against the soldier as he pulled her toward the door, searching the bridge until she found Braith again. He stared at her with his hands curled into fists, knuckles white, but he did not move, did not speak. There was nothing he could do for her now; he knew it as well as she did. Yet his eyes held on to hers with a raw determination that sparked a flame of hope in her chest.

This fight wasn't over yet.

P
etra's guard shoved her into the cell furthest from the brig entrance and slammed the metal gate shut with a bone-­shuddering clang. She staggered inside, bracing against the opposite wall with her bound hands as the key turned in the lock behind her. She whirled around, but her guard was already stalking away, taking the lantern with him.

She pressed against the bars. “Wait! Where are we going?”

He shut the brig door behind him without reply, locking her in darkness with a resounding clunk as the handwheel secured the deadbolts back into place.

She was alone.

A bell sounded somewhere beyond her prison, and she felt the ship shift and creak around her as it left the ground far behind, still no idea where they were headed—­or why. She slammed her palms against the metal bars, wincing against the pain in her wrists, rubbed raw by the hard iron.

“Dammit!”

She pushed away from the cell door and pressed her back against the opposite wall, an ache spreading through her chest as she closed her eyes and slid to the floor. She had no idea what Julian had planned, why she was aboard this ship, what fate he intended for her. She was alone and in the dark, with no idea where she was headed or what she would find when she got there.

She hugged her arms around her knees and sighed.

All she could do now was wait.

H
ours passed in dark solitude.

The ship groaned all around her. Intermittent footsteps trailed overhead. Doors creaked open and slammed shut as soldiers traversed the airship's many halls, and underneath it all, the heavy thrum of the ship's distant propeller engines pulsed through the wooden floor like a familiar heartbeat, reminding her achingly of home.

It must have been late afternoon by the time she heard someone outside the brig again. Footsteps approached, then muffled voices, a scuffle. Something slammed against the door with a hard thud, and then the handwheel spun open.

Petra clambered to her feet as the heavy door creaked wide and lantern light spilled into the room, revealing a familiar face.

“Braith?”
She gripped the iron bars of her cell, curling her fingers around the smooth metal. “What are you doing here?”

Braith barely made a sound as he hurried down the narrow hall, lantern held aloft. “I'm here to get you out,” he whispered, withdrawing a short iron key from his pocket.

He hooked the lantern on the wall, the flickering light casting a dim glow throughout the brig as he slipped the key into the lock and retracted the deadbolt. The hinges creaked loudly as he pulled the door wide and stepped inside the cell, quickly dispatching the manacles on her wrists.

The iron cuffs fell to the floor with a clatter, and he took her hands in his—­warm and firm as he looked over her wounds. He glanced up at her, worry etched across his face.

“Are you all right?” he asked.

She couldn't help but smile, relieved at the sight of him. “I am now.”

“Then let's get out of here.” He held tightly to her hand, his firm grip anchoring her to him as he dragged her from her cell toward the open brig door.

She followed carefully, aware of the sounds of footsteps on the deck above. “Braith . . . What's going on?” she whispered. “Why am I here?”

He stopped at the door and peered down the hallway with a frown. “I don't know,” he admitted. “But I intend to get you off this ship before we find out. We're about a mile out from London now—­our best chance to get you clear of whatever the lieutenant-­general has planned.”

Braith pulled her forward and they stepped out of the brig, tiptoeing past an unconscious soldier outside the door, a reddening welt coloring his brow. Hurried footsteps sounded ahead, and Braith quickly redirected their steps, dragging her down another hallway, another flight of stairs. He opened a narrow door and ushered her inside.

“Quick. In here.”

They ducked into a storage closet, filled with shelves of spare uniforms. The two of them squeezed together in the tight space, neither of them daring to breathe as another set of footsteps came and went.

When they passed by, Braith let out a relieved sigh.

“Why are we going to London?” she asked him, her voice low.

“To pick up reinforcements,” he said. “Pilots for the quadrupeds.”

Her heartbeat quickened. “So it's war?”

“Seems that way.”

“But how? Why? What happened?”

“There was an assassination a few days ago,” he said darkly. “Some British dignitary on a diplomatic mission from the queen was killed en route to Paris, supposedly by French soldiers stationed near Calais.” He tensed as another pair of footsteps neared the storage closet, his hand resting on the grip of his pistol. Only when the footsteps faded into silence did he relax. “It was all over the papers,” he continued. “After that, there were threats of retribution unless France paid recompense and claimed responsibility for the attack. When they didn't, Parliament urged the queen to declare war and send a military force against them before they attacked us from across the Channel.”

“Is that where the ship is headed next? After London?”

He nodded. “There's said to be a force of French soldiers there, war machines in tow, planning to head across the Channel into England.”

Petra's breath fell short. “Then we've failed,” she said weakly. “
I
failed.”

“This wasn't your fault, Petra. You can't blame yourself for—­”

“You don't understand. The quadrupeds, they're—­” She bit down hard on her bottom lip. “Braith, they were never repaired. Yancy got the repair order to his father, but Julian found out somehow. He stopped the report from ever reaching the Royal Forces.” She shook her head, her throat tight. “They're all going to fail.”

He swallowed hard, his face pale. “You're certain?”

“Julian said as much before he put me on this blasted airship,” she said, a cold fire blazing in her chest. “He thinks I was trying to sabotage them, and he was right. I did. I sabotaged it, without him ever knowing. All because I was stupid enough to think that I could stop him, that I could stop this war. I was wrong. And now . . .” She pressed her lips together. “Men will die because of me, because of what I've done.”

“No, Petra, you didn't know. You couldn't—­”

“I should have known!” she snapped, a deep ache settling in her chest. “I should have known.”

“You did what you could to fix them. You can't fault yourself for—­”

“Don't try to justify it, Braith,” she said wearily. “It's my fault the army is defective; you know it as well as I do. I never should have sabotaged the design.”

Braith exhaled a deep breath, and she was aware of his steady heartbeat, the two of them pressed so close together in the confined space that she could feel the rise and fall of his chest. “There may be another way to fix them,” he said, his voice soft. “It may not be too late.”

She glanced up. “How?”

A bell rang somewhere above.

“We're about to land,” he said, taking her hand and pulling her toward the door. “We need to get to an exit and get you off the ship before the rest of the soldiers come aboard.”

Petra grabbed his arm. “Braith . . . tell me how to fix them.”

He met her determined gaze and let out a heavy sigh. “There are engineers here in London,” he said quickly. “If I can convince the lieutenant-­general to repair the fault, the military engineers stationed here could come aboard and implement the repair before the quadrupeds are deployed. It's a few hours from here to our drop point in France. That should be plenty of time to fix them all.”

The airship landed with a heavy thud, and a shudder rippled through the hull.

“You think that will work?” she asked, barely daring to hope.

“It might, but
first
we need to get you off this ship,” he said, laying his hand on the door. “This is the last place you need to be right now.”

“But I can help,” she said, holding him tightly by the arm. “I know the quadruped better than anyone. Let me stay. Let me fix this.”

He pressed his lips into a frown, his expression softening as he looked into her eyes. “I can't,” he said, shaking his head. “I'm sorry.”

“But—­”

“I'm not going to argue with you, Petra. Not about this.”

He clasped her hand then, tightly lacing his fingers through hers, and before she could utter another word of protest, he opened the door into the vacant hallway and hauled her forward. They hurried down the hall and swept down a flight of stairs, steadily heading toward the base of the ship. She recognized the familiar passages—­they were close to the cargo bays now—­but then Braith took another turn and opened a panel in the wall, revealing a narrow flight of steps leading down to a hatch in the hull wall.

He guided Petra inside and closed the door behind them before heading down the stairs. When they reached the hatch door, he let go of her hand and gripped the heavy handwheel in the center of the door, and then slowly, painstakingly, it started to turn.

“There shouldn't be anyone on the ground near here,” he said with a grunt of effort. “Once the way is clear, head straight for the fences to the south of the airfield. Keep your head down, talk to no one, and you should be safe. Once you're free of the airfield, make your way into London.” He paused and handed her a folded piece of paper from his pocket. “Go to this address. There's someone there who will help you. Just tell them I sent you.”

“You're not coming with me?”

He hesitated. “No,” he said, lowering his hands from the door as he turned around to face her. “The lieutenant-­general will be looking for me soon, and I need to get back to the bridge before he realizes you've escaped.” He frowned. “I'm sorry. I have to stay.”

“Why?”

“Someone needs to make sure the quadrupeds are repaired.”

“Then let me stay too.”

“Damn it, Petra.
No
,” he said. “I don't know what they're planning to do with you, but you can't be on this ship when we get to France. We're about to go to war, and I don't want you anywhere near it when we do. You're an engineer, not a soldier. You don't belong here.”

“And you?” she said, taking a step closer. She hesitated, the question she most feared to ask on her lips, too afraid to hear the answer; though she was certain she already knew. There was only one reason he could be on this ship; she had feared it the moment she saw him on the bridge. “You're going to pilot one of the quadrupeds, aren't you?”

He deflated slightly. “Yes.”

“Braith, you can't.”

“I don't have a choice,” he said more firmly. “I swore an oath, Petra. This is what I signed up for—­for good or ill.”

Seconds ticked by in silence, her heart twisting painfully in her chest at the thought of him in one of her machines, moments away from malfunction.

“I don't want you to die because of me,” she said, her voice cracking.

His expression softened, and he slowly raised a hand to her cheek. “I'll be all right, Petra.”