Thunderstruck

by Shannon Delany

  Her face was bright as starlight.

  She released Jordan’s skirt, taking her free hand instead.

  A smile twitched across Jordan’s lips before fading and Rowen saw her squeeze the child’s hand.

  The girl tilted her head, addressing him again. “I’m Meggie. And just who are you?”

  Rowen went the last distance, resting on his knees. Eye level with the diminutive blond angel, he tested his most winning smile. “Hello, Meggie. I am Rowen. It is both an honor and a pleasure to meet you.”

  He held his empty hand out to her, and they shook.

  Meggie grinned. “Nice to meet you as well.”

  Rowen glanced up at Jordan, who, caught watching him, looked away again. “And you are whose darling daughter?”

  Meggie opened her mouth, but a man swooped over and whisked her away, saying, “Your pardon, good sir.”

  Rowen popped to his feet, his eyebrows tugging together. He stared at the retreating man’s back until he stopped—far from Rowen’s reach. He stopped by a sturdily built woman, swinging Meggie in his arms while watching Rowen, eyes worried. Rowen’s lips pressed together and he wiggled his jaw. “Who … ?”

  Jordan slipped her hand free of his and turned to focus on the workings of the ship.

  “Jordan?” Rowen asked. “Who are these people?”

  She sucked down a deep breath and stared at a large glass cylinder holding a clear liquid, white crystals floating near the top of the glass like finger-sized pieces of frost.

  The creak of a board behind him made Rowen swing around, his reflexes sharper than ever.

  A dark-haired young man stood there and Rowen stepped back, sucking in a breath at the sight of him. He was all at once perfect and ruined—his face a patchwork quilt, seamed together with thin white scars as if someone had cut him apart just to see how he might eventually heal. Frequently told he was handsome, Rowen knew he could not compare to this young man. Beneath the puckered skin his features were fine, perfectly symmetrical. Sharp cheekbones, dramatic eyes, and bold, arching eyebrows beat back the scars that dared try to overpower his natural beauty.

  Jordan studied the intruder’s face with an intensity matching Rowen’s own, as if she, too, had never seen his face, although it seemed she knew him.

  “I, too, am filling in some blanks,” the boy whispered, eyes searching Rowen’s face as if he had a question he was not yet ready to ask aloud. “Caleb,” he finally said in introduction before focusing on Jordan. “My dear,” he said, reaching slender (and equally scarred) hands out to her, “might you enlighten us? Perhaps tell me enough that I might not spill the Maker’s guts in front of his adorable daughter? As you thwarted my efforts once before?”

  Rowen straightened. “The Maker’s daughter?” His head snapped around to look at the man holding the little girl, the man standing as far as he could get from the rest of them. “He is the Maker—the one who Made you …”

  Words failed.

  Jordan snorted and asked, “Into this?” The words hissed with venom.

  Frustration built inside him and he took a step toward her, measuring the space between his breaths. Slowing his breathing, he steeled his demeanor. “Is he the one who did this to you?” He reached up to touch her cheek.

  She stumbled backwards as if his touch would burn fierce as any fire.

  His hand dropped away, fingers flexing at his side. “Please,” he said, forcing his voice to stay as level, as controlled, as he could. It cracked, betraying him and he cleared his throat. “Please,” he repeated. “Tell me, Jordan. Tell me so I can make him pay for what he’s done to you.” His hand moved to the pommel of his sword.

  Observing him, Caleb ventured, “I might just come to like you….”

  Jordan’s gaze skimmed Caleb to rest on Rowen, and for a heartbeat her eyes snared his. Then they darted away again, flashing like the wings of a bluebird.

  “Tell me, so I might make him pay for what he’s done to us,” Rowen corrected, the words staggering out.

  She shook her head. “I want no violence.”

  Rowen stepped forward. “Jordan …”

  Caleb slid between them, his back to Rowen.

  “Caleb,” Jordan said with a welcoming sigh, and hearing that name—no, Rowen realized, not hearing his name—was a knife thrust between his ribs.

  A knife aimed at his heart.

  Caleb kept his back to Rowen, and whispered, “Oh, darling …” Blocking much of Rowen’s view, he slipped his hand up, resting it on the slope of her bare shoulder.

  Jordan stood, motionless, her eyes locked on Caleb’s. She did not resist his touch, did not flinch away as she did when Rowen touched her.

  Rowen turned his head, looking at anything else on the raised dais—anything but the tender reunion before him featuring someone he never anticipated.

  He expected there would be some change in Jordan. That she was thinner did not surprise him. That her hair was cut short—shocking, but it was not beyond understanding. That she did not wear a shawl, or gloves, or even shoes … Strange, but surely there were logical reasons.

  Even the scar on her cheek—even as startling as it was—it was simply physical and meant less than he’d ever believed it could.

  Physical changes he grasped. She’d been imprisoned and Made a Witch.

  But for her to find someone else while imprisoned (because Caleb was surely not a passenger on this liner if his rough clothing was any way to judge) was beyond comprehension. Beyond what Rowen could bear, being so close to success but suddenly so far away.

  A guard pushed between them, reaching for Caleb, a collar and lead in one broad hand.

  Jordan spun to face the interloper, shouting, “Don’t you touch him!” Her hand shot up, sparks dancing like living lightning between the tips of her fingers.

  “Leave that one be,” the Wandering Wallace agreed.

  Wide-eyed, the guard stepped back, checking the deck’s surface one last time for any stragglers. He collared another Weather Worker, instantly crippling its powers, and rejoined his comrades by the elevator. Three groups of guards and their accompanying prisoners stood there, descending in shifts into the ship.

  “I will not let them take you,” Jordan assured Caleb.

  Rowen’s shoulders slumped but he straightened when a hand dropped onto his shoulder. Jerking around, hand tight on his sword’s handle, he found himself nearly nose-to-nose with the red-headed captain of the ship he’d only recently come to consider a temporary home, the Tempest.

  Nose-to-nose with Captain Elizabeth Victoria.

  “Evie,” he acknowledged.

  She tipped her chin to one side, and eyes fixed on his, he suspected she fought the urge to look at Jordan and her companion. “Come along, Rowen,” she said, her tone tight. “Let us give everyone time to get sorted out as we sort ourselves out. We have all just had quite a battle-filled reunion.”

  Rowen nodded, jaw clenched so hard his temples felt they’d pop. Evie was right—vexing as that was. Everyone was only coming to grips with what had just happened.

  Weather Witches, Wraiths, and Wardens had dropped from the sky at nearly the same time the Tempest came alongside the Artemesia and—and what exactly had his group done other than shoot grappling hooks at a dinner table? They hadn’t taken the Artemesia captive, nor had they fought for control of the ship. He dragged his feet across the deck following Evie.

  It was all a bit less like a battle and more like a team quietly reuniting, their secret plan already underway.

  ***

  Philadelphia

  Lady Cynthia Astraea slid from her bed, bare feet touching down on a cool wooden floor that inspired her to move with haste across her chamber and to her armoire. More correctly: to Jordan’s armoire. She had sold her own recently and had Jordan’s brought to her room instead.

  It was not as if Jordan needed it where she was.

  The coolness of the thought gave her pause. Licking her lips, Lady Astraea leaned over befor
e the nearby vanity, peering at herself. She had sold her vanity, and her armoire …

  Why was that again?

  She reached into the pocket secreted away in the top of her shift and fished out a tiny blue crystal. It warmed at her touch. Her breathing calmed, her heartbeat steadied—small comforts when she forgot things as easily as she did now. She rolled her shoulders forward, peering into the mirror to find herself more clearly in her features.

  How did that even make sense?

  Thinking that made it seem there were times she didn’t recognize herself in the features of her own face!

  Her thumb rubbed across the stone’s faceted sides, slipping down to one of its two points. It was a Herkimer diamond like any other … and yet, somehow, not like any other.

  Not at all.

  She pressed one point into the pad of her thumb, trying to untangle the thought that tumbled and turned, sliding toward the darkness at the edges of her mind.

  Her youngest daughter had been taken as a Witch. Her family had fallen from grace and she had started selling things—expensive things—to support some cause … ?

  The answer dodged out of her reach and her chest tightened. A fog seeped into her mind’s eye, slowly filling her head. “No,” she whispered, digging the tiny blue stone into her thumb so hard blood wept up around it. “No,” she hissed as she saw her eyes shift and change in the mirror, growing catlike. Specks of gold and bronze colored her irises, making her eyes glitter with a foreign and icy glint.

  The room—her bedchamber—faded, somehow becoming more distant, the edges of things growing fuzzy and indistinct. She felt further from herself … no, further from her eyes and her nose and her mouth and her fingertips … like she was being dragged down into dark waters without ever leaving her body. Her vision reduced to a single slit as if she peered out between shuttered windows, she thought different thoughts.

  She saw different things.

  No, she saw things differently.

  She tucked the blue stormcell crystal into a drawer in her vanity, far in the back of it and underneath some old letters of Jordan’s. Bothersome little thing, that touchstone. She placed it as far from sight and mind as she could, sucking her thumb until the taste of salt and iron was gone. She lounged a moment before the mirror of the less impressive vanity, then rolled her shoulders back and straightened her spine, raising her chin like a woman of good breeding should.

  She rested her hand over the spot by her heart where the Reanimator had inserted her soul stone, letting out a sigh as she rose. A skip in her step, she bounded to the armoire, and flung its doors open.

  A fine assortment of clothing awaited her. Metallic embroideries, glittering gemstone beads, pressed velvets and delicate lace. Yes, she had no qualms selling furniture, sets of silver, or an occasional necklace or brooch to funnel money to the rebels, especially when none of the items were her own. She grasped a fine gown with gold and silver birds stitched into its neckline, cuffs, and hem.

  Lord Morgan Astraea looked askance at her when she first had it brought to the estate, but she held out her hand and alluded enough about the power of her appreciation that he paid for it himself. She had worn it to dinner with him that same evening and realized then she would need to handle him carefully.

  She had been like him. Hopeful. Forgiving. Once. Nearly a hundred years ago. Right up until the time the God-fearing population of her town tied her to a stake for magicking up a flood that washed away their crops. It had been an accident.

  Still they lit a fire under her—and not in the inspirational way one might have wished. Slow to catch, its tinder damp and flames smoky, in one last show of rebellion she demonstrated how best to make a fire and burn a Witch. The lightning she’d called burst through the crown of her head, poured from her eyes, mouth, and fingertips.

  And laid all the spectators low.

  It had certainly stung, but it was over quickly enough. And from what she knew from her short time playing at being Lady Astraea, no one had dared try to burn a Witch since.

  Even the Grounded population could learn, ignorant as those without magick were.

  Her room was dim, the candles yet unlit. Rain snapped against the shutters, slipped through the spaces between and slid down the rippled glass of her windows. The reflection from one outside lamp pierced the shuttered windows, its glow wavering on the floor, warming the slender space it marked. She focused on the soft light, encouraging it to brighten. She tugged all remaining warmth from the wood floor, packing it tighter and tighter together. Wisps of smoke curled up from it, carrying the faint scent of burning wood. Pressing one bare foot against the spot, she smothered the smoldering boards with her flesh. She grinned.

  Fire no longer scared her.

  Neither did the threat of death.

  There was a knock at her door. Most likely the servant girl, Laura, come to peer in on her for the evening. The servants mostly left her be and seemed not to care when she dozed or woke. Except for Laura. For a servant, the girl was slow to respond and slower to obey. But, if Lady Marsham could train the population of an entire town to never again burn a Witch, surely she could teach one hesitant servant to step lively.

  It merely took the right sort of persuasion. She rubbed her fingertips together and smiled as sparks bridged the spaces between them.

  It was good to be alive.

  Again.

  Chapter Two

  Only the dead have seen the end of war.

  —Plato

  Aboard the Artemesia

  A group gathered by the fallen dining table, dishes and glassware shattered nearby and spread across the deck in glittering shards.

  Only one chair remained upright from the supposed surprise attack. Rowen froze, seeing how it managed such a feat.

  It was bolted to the floor.

  He focused on it, staring at the belt lashed across the back of it and lying open and loose. Nearby a small, overturned table wobbled on its rounded edge, rolling with the gentle and somehow haunted movement of the ship. Leaping forward, Rowen righted it, only breathing again when it stood still and mercifully silent.

  Evie brushed past him, sweeping garbage and clutter out of her way with a swing of her foot. Things grated and smeared across the floor beneath her boot’s sole, becoming multicolored smudges and elongated puddles between the remnants of food and drink.

  The smells of meat, wine, recently baked bread, sweat, and fear hung heavy, despite the movement of the air.

  “A bit of help, please?” Evie asked. Moving to one end of the long table she looked at Rowen.

  But Ginger Jack slipped around him and set something Rowen presumed came from one of their attacker’s lightships. Striding to the table’s far end, Ginger Jack grunted agreement and, smacking his palms down on its edge, asked, “Ready, gorgeous?”

  Evie looked from Rowen to Jack. “Are you talking to me or the pretty boy?”

  Jack snorted. “Nothing pretty about that boy from my vantage,” Jack replied, adding a laugh.

  “That’s because you’re short—you’ve got a bad angle,” Rowen returned, his chin raising arrogantly.

  “Bad angle. That must be the reason,” Jack agreed as he and Evie reset the table.

  “Must be,” Evie agreed with a wink.

  “I am very nearly as pretty as they come,” Rowen added. “And I am man enough to admit it.”

  Jack chuckled. “Is he flirting with me, Evie?” he joked. “I’d hate to break his heart, but I have eyes for another,” he admitted, “and not one of his gender,” he clarified, a grin sliding across his face. “Even though he does scream like a girl …”

  Evie barked out a laugh. “True, true! Well, for the sake of that other,” she said, “I do hope you have more than just eyes for her.”

  Jack’s grin widened. “Oh, I do. I most certainly do,” he promised.

  Rowen rolled his eyes and rubbed his chin. It was disastrously stubbly again. When had he last shaved? Before they had docked in Bangor? No w
onder Jordan was taken aback. A man must keep his appearance up whether aboard a pirate ship or a luxury liner if he wished to impress a lady, Witch or not. He brushed his hands down the front of his shirt and adjusted his collar. “You two seem quite comfortable—”

  “In what way precisely?” Jack asked, stepping away from the table.

  The flirting between the Tempest’s engineer and the ship’s captain immediately stopped.

  “In the way that you both seem quite at home considering we’ve barely been here half an hour—aboard a ship we wanted to wrest control of forcibly if need be.”

  “If need be,” Evie specified. Evie and Jack stripped off the tablecloth. “Where’s that girl?” she asked, ignoring Rowen’s implied question.

  “The servant?”

  “Yes,” Evie said, kicking the stained fabric aside. “There is a severe need of linen laundering and I would suggest a thorough swabbing of this deck.”

  Jack shrugged. “Maybe she disappeared belowdecks?”

  “Are you ignoring me?” Rowen mused aloud.

  Evie shook her head at Jack and muttered, “Someone needs to do something around here. This is a liner of good repute. Airworthy and well-formed. It should be kept in top condition, whether under siege or not.”

  “You are ignoring me,” Rowen said, incredulous. “Did you know the ship would be ours so easily?”

  “There is no need to let standards slip,” Jack agreed.

  A grumble grew in Rowen’s throat. “How long have you planned to take control of this ship?”

  Evie gave a negligible shrug. “We never intended to take control of this ship ourselves. We were simply a means to achieving a goal obviously reached before someone with an itchy trigger finger harpooned a table full of food,” she said. Her gaze fell on Jack.