“Less than you’d think.” Maldynado eyed the nearest stairwell, as if angry hordes of passengers might charge down it at any second. “I guess the emperor’s chat with the captain didn’t go well.”
“No kidding.”
“The captain probably assumed the real emperor wouldn’t sneak onto his boat in the middle of the night or have only one out-of-uniform enforcer sergeant for his personal guard. We… probably should have foreseen that.”
“Whatever. I’m off stoker duty now, right? You’ll need me to fight.”
Leave it to Akstyr to worry about himself first. Then again, Maldynado couldn’t imagine many tasks less appealing than shoveling coal. “Yes, let’s find the others before the masses get organized.”
“Are you
really
robbing people?” Akstyr sounded hopeful, as if Amaranthe’s usual plans were a touch altruistic for his tastes.
Maldynado thought of the tracking device in his pocket. “Not… exactly. But we did have a shootout in a suite upstairs.”
“Nice,” Akstyr purred.
Maldynado, concerned that there’d be more shootouts before the day ended, couldn’t muster as much enthusiasm.
• • •
Maldynado and Akstyr were jogging up the stairs to the deck where the officers were housed when a body flew over the railing above them. A captain’s blue hat fell off, revealing tousled gray hair. Bed-head was the least of the man’s problems. He flailed and cursed before disappearing into the foggy blanket covering the river where a splash announced his final fate.
On the deck above, pistols fired and swords clashed.
“Looks like they started without us,” Akstyr said.
“Our team’s latest hallmark,” Maldynado said. “Hurling people from steamboats.”
He and Akstyr reached the top deck and almost crashed into the back of a mob gathered around the entrance to the officers’ quarters. The attackers wore everything from full uniforms to hand-tailored clothing to nightshirts to, er, that fellow was nude. The group claimed such varied weapons as swords, ceremonial muskets, and kitchen cutlery—no rolling pins, thank the emperor. Two old women on the outskirts were dismantling lounge chairs and throwing cushions. At the center of the throng, Sespian, Yara, Basilard, and Books fought to keep the crowd at bay. Though better armed, it soon became clear from their defensive strokes, that they didn’t want to kill anyone, and the mob, perhaps sensing this, was forcing them into a tight knot.
“Thieves!” one of the old women cried as she hurled a chair cushion. “Highwaymen!”
Maldynado would have laughed—especially when the cushion beaned someone on her own side—but there were far deadlier weapons in the mix. Even as he watched, someone in the back jumped onto a chair and pointed an old flintlock pistol over the heads of the crowd. Maldynado charged, grabbed the man by the sides, and lifted him overhead. He took five great steps and hurled his burden over the railing. He whirled back, expecting people at the rear to notice him and attack, but they were so intent on the targets in front that they hadn’t seen Maldynado or Akstyr.
In fact, Akstyr had returned to the stairs where he crouched a few steps down. Hiding?
Maldynado frowned. Akstyr was rarely the first to jump into a fray, but he didn’t usually
hide
.
Akstyr lifted a hand and beckoned him over. “I have an idea. Watch my back for a few minutes.”
“Magics?”
“The
Science
,” Akstyr said.
“Yes, yes, do your thing. We can discuss titles later.”
Akstyr let his head droop, his eyes closing. Maldynado danced from foot to foot, alternately watching the mob and the steps to the lower deck. Though he wanted to join in the fray, and help the others, Amaranthe would give him a hard time if he let Akstyr be run through by someone with a makeshift spear. A few shouted questions of “What’s going on up there?” convinced him more people would be charging up those stairs soon anyway. He braced himself to defend Akstyr’s back.
A scream possessing the vocal power of a cannon—it came from one of the cushion-flinging ladies—threatened to rupture his eardrums. More screams and shouts burst from the crowd. Maldynado spun about in time to see two huge, bulky creatures with shaggy black fur shambling down the deck. The fog and the wan lighting couldn’t hide the claws like daggers, the fangs like swords, and the naked hunger in their fierce predatory eyes.
“Makarovi!” someone yelled.
Several men leaped over the railing without looking twice. Others gripped weapons and braced themselves as the towering creatures lumbered closer.
“That’s impressive, Akstyr,” Maldynado whispered, then added, “That
is
your doing, right?” After all, they’d been near a river the other time they encountered makarovi—
real
makarovi—too.
Akstyr, eyes clenched shut, didn’t respond.
A few worldly passengers squinted with suspicion, perhaps suspecting magic. It didn’t matter. The distraction gave Sespian, Books, and the others an advantage. With nobody paying attention to them any more, they grabbed people as fast as they could, pushing them toward the railing. Books and Yara worked together. Sespian, though the slightest of the group—even Yara had wider shoulders than he—did an impressive job of wrestling people overboard on his own. Though short, Basilard was built like a steam dozer, and he simply lifted people over his head, as if they weighed no more than sacks of potatoes, hurling them over the railing with several feet of clearance.
The pair of “makarovi” stopped a few feet from the edge of the mob. Maldynado had suspected them illusory and hadn’t thought Akstyr would let the monsters reach the crowd, where people would realize they could simply swipe their fingers through the images, but he wasn’t prepared for what actually happened. The massive, fanged creatures reared on their hind legs and grabbed each other about the waists. Before Maldynado’s gawking eyes, they started dancing.
He couldn’t help himself. He broke out in guffaws.
“They’re illusions, you idiots,” someone in the dwindling crowd shouted. “Don’t let the—”
Books’s fist silenced the man.
Maldynado tapped Akstyr. “Come on.”
He was done guarding backs. It was time to help the team finish swabbing the deck.
It didn’t take long. Though a number of the warrior-caste passengers must have been military officers at one time, they were all older men, and most of them were strangers, not people who had spent months training together and learning to work as a team. The only time Maldynado faltered was when one of those old ladies raced up to him wearing a red dress, a ruby necklace, and numerous complementary rings. She snarled and raised a hand, displaying fingernails painted to match her jewelry.
“My lady.” Maldynado lifted placating hands of his own. “I don’t want to throw you overboard.” She had to be close to eighty. “Why don’t you just wait over—”
The fingernails flashed. A trained warrior such as Maldynado should have moved out of the way more quickly, but he’d underestimated their potential as a weapon. The nails cut through the fabric of his shirt and drew blood.
“On second thought… ” Maldynado dodged a second attack, hoisted the woman, strode to the railing, and dropped her over the side.
Basilard, Yara, and Sespian were handling the remaining attackers, and Maldynado had time to probe his wound. The crazy woman had torn through the shoulder of his shirt, leaving his upper arm and left pectoral muscle exposed. The fabric flap waved in the breeze.
“This job is terrible on wardrobes.” Maldynado took off the remains of his shirt and used it to dab at drops of blood welling from the fingernail gash.
“Unbelievable,” Yara said.
“I know. She was scarier than any of the men.” Maldynado waved at the river. “I pity any alligators that cross her path.”
“I meant that you’ve found a reason to take your shirt off again. How is it that you never catch a cold when you’re always running around half-naked?”
“My lady, I have a constitution of steel.” Maldynado posed for her, flexing his biceps. “Want to feel it?”
“Unbelievable.” Yara stalked away.
Maldynado shrugged and joined the others who were tossing the last few men over the side. These had gone down in the fight and didn’t put up much of a struggle. Maldynado, reminded of clothing concerns, remembered to tuck a few business cards into pockets before he hoisted folks over. After hiking back to town without their belongings, some of those people might be inclined to visit Madame Mimi’s Evenglory Boutique.
Basilard noticed and signed,
What are you doing?
“Keeping my word, however inconvenient I find it. That’s the kind of man I am.” Maldynado spoke loudly enough for Yara to hear, though she pointedly had her back to him.
Maldynado tapped his bare chest and signed.
Is she looking at me at all?
Basilard heaved the last person over the side.
I have more important things to do than monitor her looks.
“Oh, come on, Bas. You notice everything.”
At this point, it’s a foregone conclusion that we’re taking over the ship, right?
Basilard signed to the others, ignoring Maldynado.
By then, the team had gathered in front of the officers’ quarters, and Books translated for Sespian.
“Yes,” Sespian said, “We’ll have to. My plan to win over the captain didn’t quite work as I’d hoped.” Sespian rubbed his face, perhaps to cover the sheepish expression that came with the admission. Despite the long night, he didn’t have any beard growth hugging his jaw. Should he and Akstyr ever have a race to see who could grow a mustache the quickest… it’d be a boring contest to watch.
“Must have been a short discussion with the captain,” Akstyr said. “I wasn’t in the boiler room long before security barged in, blathering about an impostor emperor leading a band of highwaymen.”
Books kicked him in the shin. “
Sire
.”
“
Sire
. I was lucky I was actually shoveling instead of working on—” Akstyr glanced toward the spot where the dancing makarovi had been, “—things.”
“Things?” Maldynado asked. “I think the emperor has figured out your secret occupation by now. Him and fifty other witnesses now practicing their swimming skills.”
Akstyr grimaced, perhaps remembering that there was a gang with a bounty on his head.
“If we force everyone to… disembark,” Sespian asked Books, “do you think we can pilot and power the steamboat with this small team?”
Books rubbed his own jaw—it had no trouble sprouting hair, and he was already bristly enough to scrub dishes with his face. “Two on stoker duty, one or two people in the engine room, and one at navigation. That leaves one person free to guard prisoners, should we find any we wish to take.”
“Such as Brynia?” Maldynado asked, noting that she was nowhere around. If the team didn’t have her, it wouldn’t matter that they controlled the steamboat, because they wouldn’t know where to take it.
Books winced. Had he been the one to let her escape? “Yes.”
“Your duty roster doesn’t factor in time for sleep,” Sespian said.
Books spread his arms. “It’s a luxury we don’t always receive.”
“Very well. Let’s get rid of any lingering opposition and see what we can do.” Sespian looked at each of them. “Does anyone have experience piloting a steamboat?”
Nobody raised a hand.
“I had a wind-up steamboat as a child,” Maldynado said. “I could get it racing around the bathtub without clunking against the walls more than once or twice a lap.”
That earned him a number of unimpressed stares.
“It was a joke,” Maldynado said.
Books lifted a finger. “Whoever you decide on to navigate, Sire, I heartily suggest that Maldynado be placed on stoker duty.”
“Understood,” Sespian said.
“You crash one dirigible… ” Maldynado muttered as the team dispersed.
Before Basilard walked away, he signed,
Your butt.
What?
Maldynado checked his backside, thinking he’d sat in something.
That’s what she looks at when you’re not facing her.
“Ah!”
I knew she looked.
So, Yara wasn’t a chest-and-biceps gal. She liked tight buns. Maldynado was on the verge of plotting a way to display those buns more fully for her, when Basilard signed again.
Miraculous that she bothers, considering your spelunking comment.
Basilard walked away before Maldynado could do more than groan and wonder if
everyone
had heard his earlier exchange with Yara.
I
t was hard to hide from a swamp full of soldiers when one’s stomach was growling louder than a busy sawmill blade. Weariness dragged at Amaranthe’s battered body, and each step irritated the cut and bruised bottoms of her feet. Though she’d obtained a knife and a rifle, fate hadn’t been kindly enough to favor her with a chance to acquire boots or clothing. Everything from her feet to the bullet gash at her temple ached, and she wanted to crawl into a dark hole, curl up on her side, and hide until the pain went away.
She had lost track of how many times she’d evaded her hunters by inches, slipping beneath a pond full of lilies or scrambling between shrubs just before men passed. Luck wouldn’t favor her forever. Even now, they were herding her. She’d long since lost track of the trail and, not twenty minutes earlier, she’d glimpsed the massive dome of the
Behemoth
in the distance. She’d made no progress and was no better off than she’d been when she started out. Her earlier notion that she might, Sicarius-style, take down each soldier in the swamp one at a time seemed foolish now. After the first man had disappeared, the others had started searching in pairs. She’d thought of sniping from the treetops, but the alligator had stolen her soldier before she could search him for ammo, so she only had a few bullets.
For the fiftieth time, Amaranthe glanced toward the canopy, wondering if darkness would ever come and if she’d have more luck slipping through their net at night.
She stepped around a cypress tree and almost landed on a dead soldier lying face-down in the mud.