He fought the urge to look again at his detestable mark, made more detestable by the Unholy Hosts. “Truly?”
“It hurts, doesn’t it?”
He squeezed his hand into a fist and let it go. “Yes. Just enough to let me know it’s there.”
Eurynomos nodded. “It’s like a foot perpetually in the door now. I’ll be able to just hear you even if you don’t draw any blood. But I shan’t be able to come without blood being spilt.”
“But the amount needed will be less?”
“The amount will go back to what it was at the beginning. But then it will increase eventually once more. Sacrifices. Balance. That’s what it amounts to.”
“I see. A ‘gift’ indeed.”
“If not a gift then a reprieve. But just remember, Leo. A gift…can sometimes be returned.” The daemon grinned but before Leopold could ask, Eurynomos spun and shrank until he was nothing but a spark and then winked out.
He stared at the space that had been so recently occupied by his friend—and he was grateful they were friends again, though a long conversation was needed—before Mingli elbowed him. “Well? Are you ready?”
“Yes. Let’s go.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
THEY RAN AROUND the main tent down the deserted avenues of the fair toward the lone dirigible. It was tethered to a wooden mooring mast with a winding staircase. Leopold took the stairs two at a time and when he reached the top and walked across the gangway, he yanked open the unlocked door.
Mingli was right behind him and he strode straight for the pilot’s bridge. “Do you know how to fly this thing?” she asked.
He studied the gears, the gauges. Gas valve control. Gyroscopic compass. Ballast control. The two wheels, one for rudder, one for elevator. At least he had listened during the tour, even if he didn’t quite know what everything meant. And all the damned labels were in German. “Er…certainly. Why not?”
“Why not?”
“I mean I think I can ferret it out. Look. Here’s how to start the ruddy thing.” He jammed a gear forward but nothing happened. “The forward controls should have…”
“Telegraphed a message to the engine room.” She folded her arms over her chest.
“Oh hell. I forgot about that. I don’t suppose you know how to get the engines started.”
“And why would I know that?”
“Well, you know everything else!”
“Thank you. But I am not quite that accomplished.”
“Very well. Then I will go to the engine room and you steer the vessel.”
He moved forward but a hand on his arm held him back. “But I…” She bit her lip. “I’m not sure I can…”
Bolstered by the warmth of magic surging through his system, he clasped her arm reassuringly. “You can do it, Miss Zhao. If anybody can, it would be you. I’ll signal you from the engine room that all is ready.”
He escaped out a small door and hurried along a metal walkway till he reached the engine room. This being a smaller craft than the Valkyrie class from their tour, it had only one engine. But the boiler that powered it was stone cold and it would take a long time to fire up.
For an ordinary man.
Leopold whipped off his coat and rolled up his sleeves. He couldn’t help but glance at the new band wound round his wrist. Spreading his arms, he gathered a ball of power until it glowed like a fiery globe in his hands. He held it for a moment, stabilizing it, then shoved it forth toward the boiler where it sunk through the copper and immediately boiled the water. The gauges needles’ instantly rose and the system groaned with the sudden influx of steam.
He got on the talking tube. “All engines ready. Full ahead?”
“Yes,” came the tinny reply through the tube. “Let’s do that.”
“You’re supposed to say ‘aye, aye.’”
“Just do it, Leo!”
“Aye, aye,” he muttered, grabbed the lever, and forced it over. The steam released into the pipes and the propellers sputtered to life. “Hooray!” He leaned toward the other window and saw those propellers also spinning. Clapping his hands, he grabbed his coat, slipped it back on, and retreated out the door to the bridge.
He stuck his head in and smiled. “We’re under way!”
“Yes we are.” She blew a long strand of hair out of her face. Holding onto the rudder wheel for dear life, she pointed to the other one. “Take charge of that wheel, will you. It helps us go up or down.”
“Jolly!” He trotted toward it and took hold. “Did you release the mooring?”
“Oh double damn!” She reached up and pulled a lever marked “anbinden”. The airship jerked and then floated free.
Leopold gently turned the wheel and the nose rose. “Outstanding! Steer us, Miss Zhao. We can catch him.”
But when he looked out the control room windows, the lights from Waldhar’s ship were far ahead.
Leopold concentrated. He attuned himself to the airship, to the wind, and closed his eyes. With his mind and his magic, he moved the ship into the proper place, found the slipstream, and let the ship go. It seemed to spear forward and Mingli made a sound of surprise. When he opened his eyes, she was scowling at him.
“Warn a girl next time.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“What did you do?” She clutched the wheel, staring straight ahead out the window as they zoomed forward. Now it didn’t look as if Waldhar’s ship was all that far away. In fact, they were gaining on him.
“I simply set us in the slipstream. We’ve got a tail wind now.”
“You’ve got your magic back.”
“And then some. I have never felt more powerful.”
“Just have a care. If it leaves you suddenly, you don’t want to be caught off guard.”
“Quite right. No need to get cocky. If I am anything it is cautious.”
They fell silent with only the drone of the propellers for company. Leopold felt compelled to rock forward, urging the airship faster as Waldhar’s lights became more distinguishable, and his airship filled more and more of the window’s view.
Leopold shook his head. Even after the many sights he had seen in Sitra Achra, Von Spiegel’s skin face being pulled off was something he knew he would relive in his nightmares.
The lights of London broke over the dark landscape below like a shining beacon. It was vast, more than Leopold realized, and if he weren’t in such dire circumstances, he might have stopped to enjoy the view.
But as he looked over the tiny street lamps marching away in row upon row, he could also see the blackness beyond it. It wasn’t all that far to the channel as the crow flies. If Waldhar was allowed to cross the channel… but no. Leopold didn’t care about borders or laws. Not in this instance. This was entirely beyond the scope of the judicial system. He’d follow the bastard to the ends of the earth to stop him. At least his golem scheme was done, but who knew what else he might conjure in his sick imaginings?
“Once we catch up to him,” said Mingli, “any thoughts how we’re to stop him?”
“Er…” He hadn’t thought that far ahead. The immediate imperative had been to at least catch up to him. “Have we any weapons aboard?”
A crash of shattered glass, and after Leopold rose from his instinctive need to duck, he glared at the window. A bullet had passed through the glass and left a spider web of cracks. “They’re firing at us,” she confirmed, crouching behind the wheel. “But I think…” She made a quick survey of the instruments before her. “Yes.” She grabbed a lever and released it, fixed her hands on two handles, and fired.
A Gatling gun. Leopold had never seen one in operation before and watched open-mouthed as the rounds pierced the sky. They were now close enough to see the result as it shredded a flag, blew up a lantern, and strafed the gondola, putting out all the windows. The sailors were visible through the empty ports, shaking their fists at them.
“Good shot!” he shouted over the gun’s roar.
She stopped firing and peered out t
he window. “Duck!”
Something whistled toward them and shattered the remaining glass. It rolled along the floor and settled under a table.
Leopold grabbed Mingli’s hand and rushed her out the door just as the world burst apart.
The gondola exploded, rendering the control room useless. It was aflame in no time. They staggered along the catwalk inside the hull. And all around them were gas bags full of hydrogen.
“We have to get out of here,” he gasped.
She coughed. Her poor gown was the worse for wear what with explosions tearing it to shreds. “Where do you suggest we go?”
He glanced all around the iron framework. “Up.”
He began to climb and Mingli followed suit. He could feel the dirigible losing control. And altitude. If they couldn’t get to the outside and leap to Waldhar’s airship they would lose him. Not to mention that they would soon explode.
He reached the top of the arc of steel and tried to ignore the glare of fire from the disintegrating control room. Mingli was right behind him and he reached down to help her up the last step. He took his knife and ripped a hole in the envelope above them. The rush of air and wind blasted his hair back. He climbed and headed for the nose and the battens. He kept checking over his shoulder to make certain Mingli was holding on.
Waldhar’s immense Valkyrie class ship loomed ahead of them, but Leopold heard the change in the engines. They were maneuvering away from Leopold’s doomed ship. He didn’t need to tell Mingli to hurry. He assumed she could well hear the change in the droning engines for herself.
The Valkyrie class ship dipped, flying below their vessel that passed bumpily over it. Leopold reached back and took her hand. They shared a significant look before he leapt, pulling her with him. His grip tightened on her hand, determined not to let her go. They landed with a bounce on the outside of Waldhar’s hull, and began to slide down its curved surface. Before they went over the side, he grabbed the first thing he could; a mooring line.
Leopold saw the flare before he heard or felt it. He yanked Mingli to the side, as far away from the exploding airship as he could. The boom sent a shockwave that rocked the Valkyrie class. Leopold grasped tight to the line with one hand and Mingli’s delicate gloved hand with the other.
The hull’s envelope seemed to melt away as it descended rapidly. The ruptured aluminum skeleton glowed from the flash fire and the whole crumpled in on itself as it spiraled downward. He hoped it wouldn’t land on his flat—or worse!—a theatre.
He made certain that Mingli had a good hold of her own mooring line before he let her go to climb.
“Why are we climbing?” she shouted from below.
He turned. “We can’t very well get into the gondola. I’ll cut a hole and we’ll get in that way.”
“Won’t that scuttle the ship?”
“Remember, the hydrogen is in gas bags between the envelopes. It’s not a balloon.”
He took out his knife and waited for her signal of approval before he carefully felt for a rib and sliced through. He wanted to be as close to the framework as possible in order to have something to climb down. The material flapped away, beating on the outside of the hull, as he slipped the blade back into his coat. He put his head in first and scouted. Spatters of mud were everywhere. The golems. But these hadn’t ripped the hydrogen bladders as it had in the other smaller ships. He had to assume that Waldhar’s own flagship would be more secure.
He pulled himself through, grabbed onto the rib, and climbed down the short treads embedded in the aluminum. Mingli followed.
When they were both safely settled on the catwalk, he noticed Mingli had her gun in hand again. “Where to now?” she asked.
She was delightfully disheveled. Her hair had completely fallen out of its careful coiffure and sooty smudges decorated her face. Her gown was torn and dirty and would be unfit for anything after this. And yet there was a spark in her eyes that spoke of eagerness despite appearances to the contrary, and it was suddenly endearing. He wanted to kiss her, but his previous boldness had worn off.
Before he had a chance to answer, he heard the shouted, “Halt!” behind him.
Sailors, many with faces spattered with golem debris, were lined along the catwalk. Some had guns, others had clubs.
He turned to Mingli. “How’s your magic, by the way?”
“Couldn’t be better.”
“So, gun or enchantments?”
She flipped the gun down, lifted her skirts—much to the wide-eyed enjoyment of the sailors—and holstered it. “Enchantments.”
They raised their hands at the same time. His choice was to freeze them in place. But hers was to send them blasting back. They landed in a rigid pile in the far corner against a rib.
She sneered and dusted her hands. “That’s for lobbing that grenade at us.”
“Well done,” he muttered. “Do you suppose that’s all of them?”
“In this big a ship? I doubt it.”
“Then let us go to the control room.”
“That won’t be necessary,” said Waldhar.
Across the expanse of the hull’s interior, the man himself, dressed in a uniform with a multitude of brass buttons and epilates and complete with sword hanging from his side, stood on a catwalk. A hatchwork of guy wires and the keel longitudinal framework separated them.
Leopold narrowed his eyes. “As you can see, Waldhar, your plans have come to ruin. Sic semper tyrannis.”
“Tyrant? I? You’re such an amateur, Kazsmer. But I expect it of your race, this inability to reason, to see the big picture.”
“You insufferable jingoist. I’m here to stop you. Yes, to be bested by a Hungarian Jew and a Chinese woman. How’s that affect your world view?”
“Very little. I do have another garrison of sailors at my disposal, you see. It’s too bad you felt the need to destroy my airships. But there are factories full of them across the channel.”
“You’ll never get there. I’ll see to that.”
Waldhar chuckled. “I must say, I am surprised to see you here and unharmed. But I inferred by the damage to the golems that my Device was disabled.”
“Destroyed more like,” said Mingli with vigor.
“Oh? How tiresome. I shall then have to build another.”
“I don’t think so,” said Leopold. “You don’t have a daemon to power it and I’ll never let that happen again. If I have to go to the Prince Consort myself, I will see to it that none of your compatriots sets foot on these shores again. And as for doing business, well. I doubt very much that there will be much importing of goods from Germany.”
“You would condemn a whole people because you do not like me? That’s very undemocratic of you, Kazsmer.”
“You’re right. Just any companies having to do with you or your ilk. I remember faces and I’m sure I can put names to those at your house party. That’s a lot of friends of yours who will be quite annoyed with you.”
Waldhar frowned. “You think they’re my friends? They are my tools. I don’t need friends. Odin didn’t need friends when wandering the earth. He had minions and slaves. As I will have.”
The catwalk shuddered and Leopold didn’t have to look up to know that more of Waldhar’s men had come to join them.
Waldhar raised his hand. “Halt. Ich werde damit umzugehen.” The sailors held off and waited as Waldhar drew his sword.
Leopold smiled as he pushed Mingli behind him. She made a sound of protest and punched her fist into her hip. “And I’ll just stand here once it all goes pear-shaped, shall I?”
He said nothing in reply as he withdrew his wand from his pocket and extended it into a foil.
Waldhar chuckled. “Ah. I’m impressed. But a foil against a saber?”
Leopold looked at his blade. “You’re right.” The blade shimmered and the wand and thin blade metamorphosed into a saber with a proper hilt.
“Very impressive,” said Waldhar. He stepped delicately over the guy wires to a wider catwalk in th
e center of the hull and postured. “Have you been schooled in the proper technique, Kazsmer? My training has been in old Teutonic swordsmanship.”
“Mine has been somewhat more…eclectic.” His father taught him his first feeble attempts. It was Eurynomos who completed his education.
He saluted with the sword and positioned in en guard while Waldhar followed suit.
It was all a foolish gesture, he knew that. He could take down Waldhar with a mere flick of his wrist. But there was something to be said for the politer things, for formality. After all, in Waldhar’s eyes, he was a serf and serfs did not duel with nobility. But he would show this man that he was no one’s serf.
That is, not until the Unholy Host called in their marker.
His gaze settled on Waldhar’s face, on his shadowed eyes that followed each little tick of Leopold’s brow, each movement of his hands. There was a pause. And then Waldhar cocked back his arm and with the vengeance of the Valkyrie, came at him. Both swords engaged with the spark of steel on steel.
Waldhar’s style was as formal as Leopold suspected it would be. His back was straight, his thrusts where elongated, he parried with little movement of his wrist.
Leopold’s was serviceable, more like a foot soldier than a knight.
And he was beginning to see how a more formal style could be beneficial. Waldhar’s swift and studied slashes didn’t seem to tire him in the least, whilst Leopold’s more brash and athletic bravura kept him winded. Perhaps this had been a foolish conceit. He spared a glance toward Mingli and her body language confirmed that she thought his decision to go through with this dance to be mere male posturing. He should just use his magic and be done with it…but with a jolting wash of dismay, he felt his magic receding. Had he used too much? Was it because Eurynomos was so far away? No, his flush of magic had come from the Unholy Hosts, but it seemed their “gift” was fleeting.
He took several steps back from Waldhar and reconsidered.
The saber slashed down at him again and he managed to block it with his blade. But now he was definitely on the defensive. He stumbled backward over a guy wire and righted clumsily. He brought his sword up in time to avoid a slash to his leg, and scrambled back.
The Daemon Device Page 26
