Whispers of the Skyborne (Devices of War Book 3) (35 page)

“And, Keeley!”

She stopped, trying to find him in the crowd. Everyone seemed taller than she was.

“You
can
do this.”

Not bloody likely.

Aiyanna searched the galley for Synn, but couldn’t find him. Haji’s team moved about with purpose, but with slumped shoulders and quiet expressions. Normally, they bantered constantly between each other.

Sighing away the twinge of sadness in frustration, she hurried down the stairs. She was about the call out for Haji, but stopped, seeing the body on the make-shift stretcher.

Mesi.

Aiyanna closed her eyes and stopped, sending a prayer to Tarot to take care of her on the other side of life.

Then stopped herself. Was Tarot even real? Hehewuti seemed to think so. No. She’d hoped so.

What did that even mean for Aiyanna’s faith? Her prayers. Were they simply going to the programmer, whoever he was? Or she was?

It didn’t matter. The Umira Nuru had lost a very valuable member of his team. No wonder they were quiet. She’d been a friend of all, a confidant to most.

Aiyanna shook her shoulders back and kept going.

Haji looked up, his eyebrows raised over tired eyes. “He is in his rooms.”

“Thank you.” She turned to head back up the stairs to the living quarters, but paused. “I’m sorry about Mesi. I know she meant a lot to you.”

Haji shook his head with a shrug of his wiry shoulders, working on his skitter unit. “When this is all done, I will be surprised if any of us remain among the living.”

She agreed, but kept her words to herself. She took the stairs as quickly as possible and ducked down the long, compressed hallway. Doors that all looked alike lined each side, coppery-brown, rounded at top and bottom, a wheel to open and seal it with. She reached Synn’s, which had no identification. The other doors had a mark, a symbol, something to denote who’s room it belonged to. His did not.

Without knocking, Aiyanna spun the wheel and entered.

He turned at the bed, his hands on his belt. “Aiyanna.” He frowned at her, then sighed and returned to what he was doing. “I thought you would have stayed on Enhnapi.”

Where it was safe? She released a shaky breath. “I meant it when I said I would stay by you.”

He cleared his throat and rubbed his forehead before grabbing for his static array pistol and his bullet gun. “Why are you here?”

Aiyanna’s gut tugged, letting her know the
Layal
had taken off. She bent her knees a little, but didn’t stagger. She was getting better. “I need to discuss something with you.”

He grabbed a fresh shirt, thought better of it and draped it back on the bed, remaining shirtless. “Now is not a good time.”

He looked so fierce and intimidating. She wondered if he even realized it. The Mark along his neck rose, hissing at the heavily humid air before sinking back into a black tattoo along his skin.

He finished belting the leg holster for his bullet gun onto his thigh. “You’re still here.”

Right. She shook herself. “It’s about Nix.”

He straightened and turned away, the look on his angular, chiseled face harsh and stark. “We’re heading into battle and you want to discuss Nix.”

The engines on the floor above them took on a different tone.

Aiyanna cleared her throat. “I need you to keep her close.”

“No.”

“Synn, please just listen.”

He spun on her, the vein at his temple popping into place, his face tantalizingly close to her own. “I said,” he said softly, “no. I’m about to go into a battle that will make this one look like child’s play.”

She watched him stalk away, his muscles flexing in the dim
lethara
light.

“We’ve already lost too many today. With her close, we’re likely to lose more.”

Perhaps now really wasn’t the best time for this. “It’s only—” She cleared her throat again. Why was she even fighting this fight? Did she believe any of the words she spoke? Really? Hehewuti did, but was that enough anymore? “Synn, the nanites—”

He interrupted her with a forceful breath and turned on her. “The nanites. The programmer. This person who we don’t even know. And because he says she and I are different, that we somehow work better together, then it is so?”

She swallowed.

“The only thing I somewhat believe is that someone is trying to destroy our world. The plays for power make too much sense. The fight over pleron, a material we have no use for? Yes. I do believe these Skyborne are trying to kill us.”

Aiyanna rubbed her forehead.

“But I do not believe I need to keep that woman close to me.”

She had no idea how she was going to win this argument.

He tucked a sheathed blade into his red sash and turned. He stopped in front of her and leaned down, his nose touching hers. “I understand why you believe,” he whispered against her lips.

Really? Her heart beat, heat coursing through her body. Did he have any idea what he did to her? Knowing that man, probably not. However, believe? She couldn’t understand why she would believe in anything anymore. “Tell me she’s at least on this ship.”

He raised his head, narrowing his blue eyes for a moment. He quirked his lips. “She is.”

She raised her hands, palm out, and bowed her head. “I will continue with my arguments later.”

He inhaled a breath and lowered his head, his expression grumpy, and opened the door. “Yes. I know you will.”

She stared at the open door, digging her nails into the palms of her hands as she balled them into fists. She had to do better next time. If they failed…

He had a point. Maybe she couldn’t believe in Tarot anymore. Maybe the intuition of Tarot was nothing more than a programmer twisting her mind through the nanites running in her system.

But the Skyborne would destroy them if they failed.

No. She had to do better next time.

Rose stood at her bench and working on her bay door. Her landing hadn’t been excellent and she’d dented it on the hinge side.

Bettie brushed past her, a full load of cartridges on her rolling cart.

“Someone’s helping to load the bombs, right?” Rose called to her.

“You betcha!” Bettie didn’t slow her step. “I ain’t takin’ that on my own.”

With the bay doors closed, it was easier to hear people. Without the roar of the engines, she could even hear herself think.

She wished she couldn’t. There should have been thirteen planes on these landing pads. Instead, two were empty. Sigmund’s and Walter’s.

She pushed her own cart up to the
Wise Girl
and starting loading her cartridges. At least they’d died in battle instead of because of her design.

No bodies, though. With her people, there was never a body to send home. Most were lost at sea or burned. She’d hold a memorial later, when they were done with next battle.

If she had anyone to hold a memorial with.

She paused and stared around the bay, watching all of her remaining people work to reload their planes, fixing anything that had jiggled loose or had broken.

Who was she going to lose next? Reuben? Bettie? Agnes?

Jake?

She bit her lip and finished loading her ammunition, longer than her hands were long. She had to stop thinking like that. They were going to battle. They would win.

And those who were cunning and lucky enough would come back to her.

And one day, if she were really lucky, the fighting would stop and she could stop worrying about which of her friends would never make it back.

One day. She hoped that day came soon.

Khayal Layal: Keeley

K
EELEY’S LEGS SHOOK AS SHE
stumbled off the wing of the plane. She stood on the flight deck of the
Layal,
clutching the one bag she’d brought with medical supplies.

The pilot, Ethel was her name, leapt onto the pad and took off her flight cap, tossing around her brown curls with a laugh. “Now, that was a fairly frightful flight.”

No kidding. Keeley swallowed the bile that seemed permanently lodged in her throat.

“Well, orders are for you to go to the port bay.”

Keeley didn’t know where that was. She’d left before Synn had progressed this far in his designs. She turned, staring into the high ceiling of the landing area, refusing to look down. Metal grating walkways lined both side, allowing, if she chose to look, a view all the way to the bottom.

Ethel smiled at her and gave her arm a slight squeeze. “Down that way, love. At the menagerie, hang a left, go down the stairs, and you can’t miss it.”

Sounded easy enough. “Is Synn here?”

Nodding chipperly, Ethel reached for a rolling cart. “Just got back with the Umira Nuru. So, yeah. He’s around someplace. But, listen, doll, it’s a pretty big ship. Only way you’ll find him is by hunting him down.”

Which wasn’t something Keeley wanted to do.

Bucking up her courage, Keeley walked in the direction Ethel had sent her.

I was in the starboard galley when Du’a let me know Keeley was on board the
Layal.

She’d been the one who’d really saved me in Sky City. Joshua had been all right. He hadn’t really warmed to me. Yvette didn’t even like me. The only reason I’d survived Sky City had been because of Keeley.