But hopefully it wouldn’t come to that. Not all men were like her father.
Zenobia glanced at the porthole. Bright sunshine streamed through the window and fell like a warm cape across her shoulders before spilling over Helene’s bed. “If you want to lie down, I can shutter the—
Oh!
”
A hard jolt tossed her forward against the writing desk. Her inkwell skidded across the surface and tipped. Zenobia wildly grabbed at it, black ink splattering over her fingers. Her pen clattered to the boards.
Then all was still.
On the bed, Helene stared at her, wide-eyed. “What was that?”
She had no idea. Zenobia looked to the seating area. Mara was already on her feet, the needle and hem dropped to the floor. Despite Mara’s black dress and lace cap, there was nothing of a lady’s maid about the mercenary now. A pistol was in her hand; Zenobia didn’t know where it had come from—under Mara’s skirts, beneath the chair, out of thin air. Anything seemed possible.
The mercenary tilted her head and flexed her jaw, activating the listening device grafted into her ear. But if Mara heard anything to indicate what had happened, she didn’t say.
Her flat gaze swept the cabin before landing on Zenobia. “I’ll return shortly.”
Zenobia nodded. Unspoken was the command that Mara and her husband Cooper had given to her every time a would-be abductor had broken into her home:
Don’t leave this room unless you have absolutely no other choice.
Shouts and the pounding of boots filled the quiet as Mara slipped into the corridor, and were muffled again when she closed the door.
Zenobia stood, wincing at the sharp pain in her ribs where she’d struck the edge of the writing desk. Likely nothing cracked or broken, but she could expect a nasty bruise.
It wouldn’t be her first bruise, however. She couldn’t let it slow her down now. She sank to her knees, reaching past the trunks stored beneath the bed. Her fingers hooked around the leather straps of her glider and she dragged the folded contraption out.
As she returned to the desk, running footsteps sounded along the corridor. Four or five men by the sound of it. The copper pipes overhead began to ring as someone on the deck above struck a warning, signaling everyone in the airship. Zenobia didn’t know what that particular pattern of rings meant, but it didn’t matter. A warning could never be a good sign.
She shoved her pages into the glider’s waterproof satchel. Only two chapters, but she didn’t want to lose nearly a month’s work. What else would she need?
Money. Papers.
She hauled out her trunk from beneath the bed and tossed out the clothes and books. The combination lock to the false bottom was hidden beneath the handle. She peeled away the cover and twisted the number dial.
The bottom compartment popped open. She grabbed her identifying documents and the packet of letters from Archimedes that she’d been using as the basis of her story.
Helene watched her in confusion. “What are you doing? It’s likely only a problem with the engine.”
Which was still huffing away, the ever-present rumble in their ears and the vibration through the boards. If the boiler had blown, causing that jolt, the engineers would have already stopped the engine.
“It’s best to be prepared, don’t you think?” Zenobia needed the strength of both hands to lift out the bag of gold—enough coins to convince anyone that there would be a hefty ransom available if she and Helene were kept alive. “Where are your travel papers?”
Her friend’s face cleared. “In my trunk.”
While she retrieved them, Zenobia looked out the porthole. Only a cloudless sky above and turquoise water below. If they were under attack, it was not coming from this side of the ship.
She crossed the cabin and peeked out. They’d been quartered on the officers’ deck, toward the front of the airship. The door across the passageway was closed, blocking a view of the opposite porthole. The corridor was empty—except for the companionways. Aviators rushed up and down the ladders. Her heart racing, Zenobia withdrew into the cabin and shut the door.
A terrible rumble came from the rear of the airship, rattling the wardrobe against the bulkhead. An explosion? Standing absolutely still, Zenobia strained to listen. In the center of the cabin, Helene did the same, her face white and her eyes wide.
Then the floor fell out from under her feet.
II
Zenobia slammed into the deck. The impact knocked the breath from her chest, cutting short her terrified cry. Black spots swam in front of her eyes, but the airship seemed to have steadied. Zenobia hadn’t. She wobbled onto her knees as Helene retched her lunch onto the bed. Pregnancy or fear. It didn’t matter.
Desperately swallowing down her own panic, Zenobia buckled the glider straps over her chest and shoulders. Unfolded, the contraption could carry two. They’d be all right.
The door flew open, banging hard against the leg of a toppled chair. Hope leapt into Zenobia’s heart—but it wasn’t Mara and Cooper. After weeks of dinners in the captain’s cabin, the face and uniform were familiar. Lieutenant Blanchett. His usually good-natured expression had tightened into sharp lines. Blood dripped from a cut at his hairline.
He held out his hand. “Come. We must run to the lifeboats.”
“Not yet.” Zenobia caught Helene’s wrist when she took a step toward the door. Blanchett was a nice man. Likely a capable one. She wasn’t placing her life into his hands. “We are waiting for my maid and her husband.”
“Geraldine!” Shaking her head, Helene tried to tug Zenobia forward.
“Madame, I must insist—”
A gloved hand clapped over his shoulder. His lean face streaked with soot, Cooper said, “Help the others, Lieutenant. We’ll escort them.”
If Blanchett was surprised to see a maid and valet heavily armed with guns and blades, he didn’t show it. He only glanced into the cabin again. “Is this acceptable to you?”
Zenobia was already rushing forward. “Yes.”
He nodded to Cooper. “Take them through the aft cargo hold. The main deck has caught fire.”
Then she was racing down the corridor, her hand linked with Helene’s, Cooper ahead and Mara behind. The battleship had astonished her with its size when she’d first boarded—at least six times longer than the skyrunner her sister-in-law captained—but now the length of the deck seemed terrifyingly endless. Amidships, smoke boiled from the companionway and rolled across the ceiling. She held her breath passing through the acrid cloud, trying not to hear the screams from above.
Fire. That was almost always the end of an airship. A naval battleship’s balloons were hardier than most, but with a single leak in the envelope, an explosion became inevitable.
She shouted back to Mara as they ran. “Who’s attacking us?”
“Men on flyers!”
From another airship? Or from a boat?
Ahead, Cooper dropped into the companionway to the deck below. Zenobia climbed down the ladder as quickly as she could.
“Pirates?” she asked breathlessly.
Shaking his head, Cooper reached up to help Helene down the last few steps.
Mara joined them. “The flyers are of Nipponese design, but the pilots don’t wear a crest.”
So possibly smugglers, pirates, or mercenaries. But Zenobia couldn’t ask anything more. They rushed down the next ladder to the cargo deck.
Wooden doors barred their way into the hold. With his blunderbuss, Cooper blasted through the wood surrounding the locks before shattering the bolt housing with two kicks from his mechanical legs. Zenobia’s ears were still ringing as they entered the dim, humid bay, quickly making their way past stacks of crates and barrels. Muffled gunfire from outside sounded through the thick hull. No cannon fire. But that
had
to be the purpose of the smaller flyers: They were more difficult to shoot down than another airship would be. It would be like a bear swatting at bees—except the bees had stingers that could set the bear on fire.
They reached the loading doors built into ship’s hull. Mara urged Zenobia and Helene to the side before hauling down the lever. With a rattle of chains, the heavy steel doors slid apart.
Sunlight spilled in. Zenobia blinked, her eyes watering. Her shoulders ached, the gold in her pack a deadweight on the glider’s wide leather straps. A hot breeze caught her dress, the cotton saturated with sweat and clinging to her skin. Helene’s palm was slick against her own. Her friend’s breath pumped in short, sobbing gasps.
Outside, gunfire cracked over the rattling huff of the airship’s engines. Fewer shots rang out now. Were the marauders being driven off or had the aviators been forced to retreat from the burning deck? Zenobia couldn’t tell.
Gripping the edge of the door in one hand, Cooper leaned out and glanced up before pulling himself back into the hold. “The flyers are concentrating on the upper decks, but a few others are circling.”
A high-pitched engine whined closer, louder. Mara pushed Zenobia and Helene up against the door—out of sight and behind thick steel. A flyer buzzed past, then another.
Zenobia had expected they would look like the machines from New Eden, resembling dragonflies, but these had light, slender frames suspended beneath sleek, silvery envelopes. She’d never seen anything with a balloon move so quickly.
“There,” Mara said, pointing out over the water. Cooper looked through the loading doors and nodded.
Zenobia sidled closer to the opening, the hot wind from outside blowing into her face. Her gaze searched the sky before she spotted a dark shape floating on the horizon. A ship.
“You think that’s where the flyers came from?”
“No. That’s a Nipponese ironship—and that’s where we need to go.”
To an unknown ship? But she wouldn’t question it. She’d hired Mara and Cooper to keep her safe. If she couldn’t trust that they knew how to best go about it, they weren’t worth a single denier.
There was no time to discuss it, anyway. Her heart gave a heavy thump when she saw the smoke billowing from the airship’s bow. The flames hadn’t reached this part of the vessel yet, but it wouldn’t take long.
“What about the lifeboats?” Helene’s voice was high and thin.
Cooper spared her a glance. “There’s blood in the water and this is megalodon territory. Without quick rescue from that ironship, soon there won’t be any lifeboats.”
“They’re coming around again. Two flyers.” Mara’s warning preceded another high-pitched whine. “Back. Get back.”
Holding her breath, Zenobia pressed back against the steel doors, her fingers gripping Helene’s.
But they weren’t the only ones stepping away from the opening in the hull. Cooper dropped a kiss to Mara’s mouth and backed away from the doors, making his way down the narrow row between the stacked crates. Crouching at the edge, Mara lifted her hand, five fingers extended. She began to fold them down, one by one. Counting.
The whine grew louder. Mara’s hand clenched into a fist.
Her husband sprinted to the open doors and leapt from the airship.
The crack of Mara’s pistol cut Zenobia’s cry short. Then astonishment stopped her dead when Cooper slammed into the first flyer pilot.
They’d perfectly timed his jump. The machine rocked wildly, then a body tumbled from the pilot’s seat and Cooper gripped the steering lever, straightening its course. The second pilot had slumped over—shot by Mara, Zenobia realized. His balloon slowed to a stop, hovering beside the battleship’s hull.
She still hadn’t found her voice again when Cooper brought the balloon alongside the loading doors. Mara squeezed onto the seat behind him, the machine bobbing under her added weight. She glanced at Zenobia.
“We’ll return shortly with the second flyer.”
Zenobia nodded. The balloon’s engine wound higher and Cooper flew forward. Less than fifteen seconds later, Mara kicked the dead pilot from his seat and took his place.
“He’s your late husband’s
valet
!” Helene stood beside her, staring after the pair. “And she is only a maid!”
And Zenobia couldn’t think of a single lie to explain it. Fortunately, their approach saved her from a response.
Hovering just inside the loading bay, Mara pointed to Helene and called over the noise of her engine. “You’re lighter than Mrs. Inkslinger, so you will ride with my husband!”
While the taller Zenobia rode with Mara—keeping their combined weights as low as possible, because the machines were designed to carry one. The flyer tilted when Zenobia stepped onto the runner. She followed Mara’s example and pulled her skirt up over her knees before swinging her leg over the small bit of room left in the saddle. The engine’s vibration instantly made her entire bottom itch.
“If you have a handkerchief, wave it behind us,” Mara said over her shoulder. “We don’t want the aviators to shoot us in the back by mistake.”
She didn’t have one. But Helene did—and was already waving it through the air, though they hadn’t yet left the cargo hold.