The Chimney: The Merc Papers

by G. T. Spoor

  “Well, I don’t happen to agree with everyone.”

  “You don’t happen to agree with anyone.”

  “I don’t see why women can’t be Mercs. I’m as good as any of them, and I’ll prove it.”

  “How?”

  “By finding out who Squeaky Voice is and getting my gríma back.”

  “Your what?”

  “My… stuff, my property.”

  “Oh, and how do you plan on doing that?”

  Emily sank farther into the chair.

  “I haven’t actually thought that far ahead.”

  Sarah sighed. “Well, I don’t know about you, but I’m going to bed. Supper’s in the kitchen if you’re hungry, but I wouldn’t stay up too late. You have work in the morning.”

  Work—that was going to get in the way of her investigation.

  When Sarah closed the door of her bedroom, Emily pulled herself up from the chair and headed into the kitchen. It wasn’t difficult to find supper. A large pot of Sarah’s overspiced stew was sitting on the stove. She ladled herself out a bowl and sat down at the table with it. After taking a few mouthfuls, she slid it aside. Food wasn’t a big priority at the moment. She had to start planning her next move.

  The way she saw it, her biggest obstacle was New Doral itself. She was still new and didn’t know her way around. The culture, the technology, she hadn’t quite figured out how everything worked yet. Her first excursion into the city on her own resulted in an altercation with three Blue Tigers. While she felt the events were justified, it was hardly a good start. If she was going to investigate her abduction without a proper license, she would have to stay well clear of the Mercs. Otherwise… well, who knows what punishments the city would dish out. However, that was only the beginning. She was out of place in New Doral, which meant she would need a guide. Unbeknownst to Sarah, she’d just become Emily’s partner.

  Chapter 6

  Lost One, Found One

  Emily pulled at the hem of her uniform. It wouldn’t go down any farther—not without serious consequences. Sarah said she took it in, but it seemed she took it in in all the wrong places. The skirt felt shorter and the blouse was even more revealing.

  “You keep tugging on that, hon, and you’ll really give the customers a show,” Kate said as she walked past her carrying yet another tray of empty plates. Emily followed her into the kitchen where Sarah was already loading up her next order.

  “This is humiliating,” Emily said, pulling at her blouse this time. “I feel like everything is falling out.”

  “You look fine,” Kate assured her.

  “I don’t look fine. I look like a—”

  “Like a what?”

  “Like a… It’s just not my style.”

  Sarah laughed. “I’ve seen your style. Pants, tunics, baggy jackets…”

  “So, what’s wrong with that?”

  “I hate to tell you, but you dress like a man.”

  “I wear what I want to wear.”

  “And that haircut doesn’t help either,” Kate added.

  “What’s wrong with my hair?”

  “Well, for starters, it’s too short—and too white. It makes you look like an old man.” She laughed.

  “I think she looks adorable,” Beth said. The cook was dishing out the last of the fried potatoes and roasted beef. The lunch shift was finally slowing down.

  “I didn’t say she didn’t,” Kate protested. “I’m saying she should think about dying it. Maybe go blond.”

  Emily pulled at her hair. “What’s wrong with my hair? I like my hair this color. I am quite happy with the way I look.” She then pulled at the hem of her skirt. “Well, maybe not at the moment.”

  Picking up the reloaded tray, Sarah hoisted it on her shoulder with little effort. She made the job look too easy.

  “Look, Em, you’ll never land a husband if you don’t advertise.”

  “I have no desire to find a husband,” Emily replied.

  “Oh yeah, I forgot. The fifth tenet, wasn’t it?”

  “It has nothing to do with my teachings, and, for your information, it’s the third.”

  “Tenets?” Kate asked. “What are you talking about?”

  “It’s nothing,” Emily answered.

  “You have too many rules. You’ve got to let yourself go. Enjoy the moment,” Sarah said as she departed with the tray of food. Emily leaned against the counter and sighed.

  “How can I enjoy the moment dressed like this?” she asked.

  Beth placed a large bowl of stew on a second tray and slid it toward her.

  “Don’t let it get to you, child. From what I understand, walking the path is not easy.”

  “Wait, you know about the path?”

  “Can’t say that I do, but I have known a few dowers in my time.”

  “It’s not only that. I knew coming to New Doral wouldn’t be easy. It’s just that…”

  “Then why did you come?”

  Emily shrugged and picked up the tray. “It’s not important,” she answered.

  Carrying the food into the main room, she stopped in the doorway and took a deep breath. Today wasn’t much different from yesterday. Sarah and Dot took the main floor while Kate took the opposite wall. Emily was stuck with the booths again, and same as before, the booths weren’t that busy. She’d only had ten customers all morning, while the others had nearly twice that and Kate even more. Right now, most of the other tables were occupied while Emily only had two booths filled. Still, it was probably for the best. She simply wasn’t as good at handling the customers. The amount she earned in tips was a testament to that.

  Forcing herself to smile, she took the bowl of stew to booth number six, where a heavyset man with a thick black beard waited impatiently.

  “It’s about time, girl,” he growled before grabbing the bowl off the tray. Without so much as a thank you, he started shoveling the food into his mouth. Not the most civilized diner but still not the worst she’d had to deal with today.

  “Will that be all, sir?” she asked.

  Lifting his face out of the bowl, he glared at her. “For now,” he said as gravy dripped from his beard.

  Emily nodded politely and stepped away from the table. For some reason, she didn’t think she was going to get much of a tip from him. Heading back to the bar, she stopped at booth number two, where three men were finishing up their lunch. She had high hopes for this table. Not only were they the friendliest customers she’d had all day, but they were the most understanding. They were willing to cut her some slack after she explained it was her second day on the job. They weren’t even mad when she initially mixed up their orders.

  “How was everything?” she asked.

  “Wonderful,” the man sitting against the wall said. He looked older than his two companions and was sporting a seriously wild-looking mustache, the ends of which protruded from each side of his face and curled into spirals.

  “Is there anything else I can get you?”

  “Not at the moment, love.”

  With nothing else to do, Emily sat at the bar and soon found herself listening to the three men as they continued their conversation. It wasn’t difficult, seeing as they were talking quite loudly.

  “That’s what I was tellin’ ya, Sam. She can outrace any of those newer ones.”

  “Only if she can stay out of the yard for more than a month.”

  “Oh, come on, that’s not fair. She’s a fine ship. She needs a little attention from time to time, that’s all”

  “Please, that ship spends more time in the yard than the rest of the fleet combined.”

  “That’s only because of the new Mana-Tech engines they outfitted her with. The Aeolus was never this unreliable.”

  Emily jumped off the barstool and ran to the table. “Excuse me. But did you mention the Aeolus?”

  The young man with short blond hair looked up at her and grinned.

  “Well, indeed I did, miss.”

  “So you guys work on t
he Aeolus?” she asked.

  “Only Harold does,” the man with the wild mustache replied. “Me and Carl, we work the engines of the Boreas.”

  Carl said nothing and only nodded.

  “I would have thought the Aeolus left port by now,” Emily said.

  “I should hope not.” Harold laughed. “I’m the navigator. She ain’t going anywhere without me, or at least she ain’t gonna get to where she’s going.”

  “So it’s still in New Doral?”

  “For another three days. She was held over for refitting, but we’ll be back on schedule soon enough.”

  Sam laughed. “When has the Aeolus ever been on schedule?”

  “More times than the Boreas, I can tell you that much.”

  “You wouldn’t happen to know of a steward by the name of Brian, would you?” Emily asked.

  “Brian?” Harold’s face went blank for a moment. This was not a man used to thinking. “Can’t say that I do,” he answered slowly.

  “He has dark skin, dark eyes, he combs his hair back and to one side.”

  “Wait a minute. You’re talking about Macias?”

  “That’s him. Brian Macias.”

  “Yeah, I know the dude. Kind of squirrelly. Can’t say I’ve actually talked to him none, but I’ve seen him around some. Fact is, I saw him this morning.”

  “He’s on the Aeolus now?”

  “Should be, unless he got leave.”

  “Doyle!”

  Emily turned to see Tom glaring at her from across the bar. He was pointing at something on the far side of the room. When she looked, she saw the heavyset man with the thick black beard waving frantically at her. He was trying to get her attention and didn’t seem pleased at being ignored. He was even less pleased when she turned her back on him.

  “Where is the Aeolus now?” she asked Harold.

  “Well, she’s still in the shipyard.”

  “And where’s that?”

  “Where it’s always been. West coast, tier thirteen. You can find her in berth three.”

  “Thanks”

  “Doyle!” Tom bellowed.

  “Yes, yes, I’m going.”

  ~~~***~~~

  “So, how did you do today?” Sarah asked. She had spent the last couple of minutes counting out her tips. Folding the small stack of fyn, she stuffed it into her pocket.

  “Better than I expected,” Emily answered.

  “That’s wonderful. I knew you’d get the hang of it eventually, and I’m sure the alterations I made to your uniform didn’t hurt either.”

  “That’s not what I meant.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  Emily hung her uniform on the hook. She felt better getting back into her own clothes, even if they weren’t her own clothes.

  “I met a man—”

  “You met someone?” Sarah’s eyes lit up. “That’s wonderful.”

  “Not like that. He’s a navigator on the Aeolus and—”

  “Navigator? You mean he’s an airman? Well, I guess it’s not bad for a start.”

  “He said he saw Brian this morning.”

  “Brian? Brian who?”

  “Brian Macias? You remember, the man who set me up. The one who probably poisoned me. According to Harold, he’s on the Aeolus and the Aeolus is still in dock.”

  Sarah frowned. “Oh, that Brain. You’re still going through with that?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I thought you’d given up on the whole thing. You know, put it behind you seeing as you couldn’t get your Merc license.”

  “Put it behind me? They tried to poison me. They took everything I own and tried to sell me into slavery. That’s not something I can simply put behind me.”

  “I guess, when you put it that way. But I thought you were finally fitting in.”

  “I don’t know if I’ll ever fit in.”

  “Well”—Sarah grabbed her jacket off the bench—“if there’s anything I can do to help, let me know.”

  Emily grinned. “Funny you should say that. I need a partner.”

  “A partner?”

  “I need someone who knows their way around New Doral. Someone who understands how the city works.”

  “Why me?”

  “I trust you, and… well… you’re my only friend.”

  Sarah smiled. “Since you put it that way—where is your ship docked?”

  ~~~***~~~

  A tram to the lift. A lift to tier thirteen and a jitney over to the shipyard. It was a simple trip, but Emily was sure she would have gotten lost somewhere along the way if it hadn’t been for Sarah. As it was, they reached the very edge of the city where several airships were berthed, all in various states of disrepair. Beyond the shipyard, the barren plains of Eryona stretched all the way to the horizon, where the sun was setting behind the distant mountains. Emily stopped to take it all in. She never thought she’d miss the sky. Growing up, it was always there. It was one of those things she had taken for granted. After nearly a week in New Doral, she never thought she’d see it again.

  “What do you suppose happened to that one?” Sarah asked.

  Tearing her attention away from the world, Emily looked to where Sarah was pointing. One of the airships was suspended over the docks by four large cranes, although it wasn’t much of an airship anymore. The engines were torn out and the decking was missing most of its boards, exposing the skeletal structure, but what held Emily’s attention the most were the deep claw marks cut into the steel hull.

  “It looks as if it was attacked.”

  “By what? A large bird?”

  “I don’t think so,” Emily said. “See those scratch marks along the base? This ship was on the ground at the time.”

  “That’s pretty good, lass.” A dower sat behind one of the crates, a long pipe clenched between his teeth. He was dressed in the familiar gray uniform of a New Doral engineer. “Notice anything else?” he asked.

  Emily studied the airship closer.

  “I don’t see any impact damage, so it must have descended slowly. A controlled landing. There are also several areas of the rail that have been torn away. That would indicate more than one of… well… whatever it was that attacked it. I don’t think it was pirates. The markings are too… chaotic.”

  “Very good.” The dower slowly got to his feet and removed the pipe from his mouth. He tapped it against the side of his boot before stowing it in his breast pocket. “She was brought in two weeks ago, found on the plains of Eryona, near the Nokana region. Abandoned. Nobody on board. Crew, passengers, all gone.”

  “What happened?” Sarah asked.

  The dower shrugged. “Nobody knows, or at least, nobody’s saying. Personally, I think it’s the scree.”

  “What are the scree?”

  “A dwarven fairy tale.” A tall vir dressed in a white suit stepped up behind them. He didn’t seem at all happy with the dower, or anybody for that matter. “That’s all the scree are, a dwarven fairy tale.”

  “Then how do you explain the condition the ship was found in?” the dower asked.

  “Simple,” the man in white said. “The ship obviously landed in one of the forests, which would account for the damage to the base of the hull. After that, it was probably stripped down for usable parts by any number of the nomadic savages.”

  “And the crew?”

  “Left. More than likely they went searching for help. Lost in the Eryona region no doubt. It can be a treacherous place.”

  “That kind of makes sense,” Sarah remarked.

  The man in white grinned. “See? Not everyone believes in fairy tales. A logical explanation for everything. Scree indeed.”

  “Mock all you want, Mr. Rupert, but I’m telling ya, there are more things below the earth than the mana.”

  “If that were so, dwarf, then why haven’t any of the mining companies found anything?”

  Now it was the dower’s turn to grin. “Simple, Mr. Rupert,” he said while walking away. “Sometimes
we must hurt in order to grow.”

  “What’s that supposed to mean?” the vir called after him, but the dower was already gone.

  “It’s an old poem,” Emily said. “Sometimes we must hurt in order to grow. We must fail in order to know. We must lose in order to gain because some lessons in life are best learned through pain.”

  Sarah slowly looked over at her. “Oh, that’s pleasant,” she said sarcastically.

  “My father taught it to me.”

  “Dwarven superstition, if you ask me,” Mr. Rupert scoffed.

  There was a haunted look in the man’s eyes as he stared up at the ship. Maybe he wasn’t so sure about his explanation after all. Suddenly he turned to the two women as if he only now realized they were standing there. “What are you two doing around here, anyhow?”

  “We’re looking for the Aeolus,” Emily said.

  Sarah looked up at the ship. “That’s not it—is it?”

  “Of course not. That’s the Njord.” He pointed toward the far end of the docks. “The Aeolus is on the opposite side of the yard,” he said before walking away.

  “He seemed pleasant,” Sarah remarked.

  Emily dismissed him with a wave of her hand and began walking to the other end of the dock. “Forget about him,” she said. “At least we know the Aeolus is still here.”

  “What do you suppose that dwarf meant when he said it was the scree.”

  “Dower.”

  “What?”

  “They are dowers, not dwarfs.”

  “Dowers, dwarfs, what difference does it make?”

  “Preference. If they wish to be known as dowers, then it is only proper to refer to them as dowers. I assume they find the word dwarf offensive.”

  “Fine, then what do you suppose the dower meant when he said it was the scree?”

  “I have no idea,” Emily lied. “But it doesn’t matter because that’s the Aeolus.”

  The airship was docked in the third berth from the end. It appeared to be in good form and, from what Harold explained, was only in for a refitting. Emily wasn’t sure what that meant, but from the looks of it, it had something to do with restocking. Tall cranes were lowering pallets of crates and barrels onto the decks while engineers were recasting some of the lines. Emily recognized the crew members from their uniforms and decided that was the best place to start looking for Brian.