Amid Wind and Stone

by Nicole Luiken

  Her gaze slipped past Broken Nose and landed on Audrey. She smiled widely. “Well, if it isn’t the very pigeon I most wanted to net. Good job.” She waggled her fingers at Broken Nose. “You may go now.”

  “But—”

  Irritation crossed her face. “You’ll get your money, but right now I have business. Guard the door outside.”

  Broken Nose and his boyos slunk out, glancing back resentfully.

  “The Admiral’s daughter,” Queenie said, circling Audrey in a way that made her feel decidedly uncomfortable.

  Audrey stiffened her spine and imitated the way her mother treated impertinent servants. She raised an eyebrow and turned to Jack/Piers/The Phantom. “Well, Piers? Aren’t you going to introduce me to your mother?”

  Queenie’s left eye twitched, but otherwise, she didn’t react.

  Piers shot Audrey an irritated glance but stepped up to the challenge. “Mother, this is Lady Audrey Harding. Audrey, this is—”

  “Queenie will do,” his mother said sharply.

  Piers rolled his eyes. “I don’t think I even remember your real name.”

  “Why did you tell her about our relationship?”

  “I didn’t. Billy guessed,” Piers said shortly.

  So Broken Nose was Billy. Audrey tucked the information away for later. Her father would arrest Billy and his minions for this outrage.

  “So now Billy knows, too?” Queenie’s mouth tightened. “You should have laughed in his face.”

  “I couldn’t. I needed a bargaining chip to make the bullyboys back off.”

  Queenie laughed scornfully. “What’s this, chivalry?”

  He flushed but stood his ground. “Why did you kidnap Audrey? Did you order Norton’s death?” His voice grew hoarse.

  “Robert’s dead?” She sighed and shook her head as if in sorrow. “I only wanted him contained. The fool must have tried to run. What a waste. You know I was fond of him, and he’s been very useful to us over the years.”

  Audrey didn’t believe Queenie’s protestation of innocence for a moment, but Piers’s shoulders relaxed. “You shouldn’t have sent Billy and his boys to collect Norton. They only understand violence.”

  A shrug. “You weren’t here.”

  Piers flinched.

  Audrey’s temper flared. How dare the harridan lay the burden of Norton’s death on Piers? She spoke up. “What about me? Why did you send the bullyboys to kidnap me at the ball yesterday?”

  Piers jerked his head and stared at her, mouth open. “What? When was this?”

  “It was after—” Audrey stopped and cleared her throat. Her heart was racing. If Queenie didn’t want it known that Piers/Jack was her son, she really wouldn’t like it that Audrey knew Piers was The Phantom. Enough to shut Audrey’s mouth permanently? “After the parade, at the Children’s Ball,” she finished.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Piers said, his eyes flashing. “I’m taking Lady Audrey back to her family.” He rested his hand protectively on the small of her back.

  “In a little while,” Queenie said. “She’ll be perfectly safe here, with Billy and his boyos outside.” It was a pointed reminder that she held all the cards.

  Piers’s hand tightened at her waist. “No one will be hurting Audrey.”

  Queenie rolled her eyes.

  “Why are you doing this?” Audrey asked her. “Are you a Siparese agent?”

  Queenie laughed. “No. I’m in this purely for the money.”

  “What money?” Audrey insisted. “Billy says you’re not playing middle this time. So where is the money in causing a war between Donlon and Sipar?”

  If she’d expected the woman to confess to being Qeturah and having a secret plan to shatter Air World and drain it of magic, she was disappointed.

  Queenie smirked. “There’s plenty of money to be made in wars, my dear.”

  Money was made in selling weapons and uniforms to the Crown, perhaps, but not if the war ended in a week.

  Queenie addressed her son. “We’ve talked about this for years, and it’s finally here: our opportunity, our big score. One more week and you’ll be able to become Mister Piers Tennyson in reality. But a Piers Tennyson who has just inherited a fortune. You can become one of the nobility and marry a girl like her, if that’s to your taste. But I need a little more time. One week.”

  He hesitated.

  Audrey tensed, willing him not to listen.

  Queenie took his silence as capitulation. “It’s only for a few days. Why don’t you take her to your room and make her comfortable? As long as she does as she’s bid, she needn’t have any contact with Billy.”

  A muscle flexed in his jaw. “Billy is a thug.”

  “Billy is a tool,” she corrected. “My tool. He’ll do as I say, never fear.”

  Strangely, that was exactly what Audrey did fear. “Piers?” she pleaded. “Don’t do this. You must see that I have to go home.”

  He closed his eyes. When he opened them again, he shot her a smile and turned on the charm. “Think of it as an adventure. Confess, Audrey, you hate staying at home. You’ll be perfectly safe here for a few days, and just think of the stories you’ll have to tell.”

  Audrey started to protest that there was a lot more at stake than her desire for adventure, then shut her mouth with a click. She’d be better able to reason with him once he was separated from Queenie. She followed him into the heel of the boot.

  His room was small and cozy with a bunk against the wall and a writing desk jammed in one corner. Miniature airships swung on wire from the ceiling.

  “See? You’ll be as snug as a bug in a rug. And I’ll stick around to keep you company as much as I can,” Piers promised.

  How could she convince him Qeturah couldn’t be trusted? That this could end in disaster for all of Donlon? She wet her lips and tried. “Piers, does it seem as if your mother has been acting strangely? Assigning you unusual jobs, working for herself instead of as a middle?”

  “Maybe. What are you getting at?”

  Deep breath. “That woman in the other room isn’t your mother. Her name is Qeturah. She’s a sorceress from the other side of the mirror.”

  Piers smiled uncertainly as if he didn’t quite get the joke. “If she isn’t my mother, then where is my mother?”

  “Murdered.”

  His eyes blanked. They changed color from gray to clear. She could see right through them. Extraordinary.

  “What?” he asked, a note of violence in his voice.

  She squeezed his arm. “I’m sorry. I hope I’m wrong, but…” She didn’t think she was.

  “Of course you’re wrong!” His voice slammed around the little room like a blast of wind. “My mother wasn’t murdered by her reflection. That’s insane!”

  Audrey just shook her head. Her heart ached for his loss. “You know her better than anyone. Has she been acting like herself?”

  He was trembling, and his clenched fists kept fading into transparency. “I do know her, and you’re wrong.”

  Audrey hated to push him, but her life was at stake—maybe the entire fate of Donlon or Air World. “About the time when she started acting odd, had she just changed the shop’s location?”

  Piers stilled, and she knew she’d guessed right. “And if she had?” he asked defensively.

  “Go back to where the shop used to be and do a little digging. Ask if a body was found.”

  He raked his fingers through his dark hair, making it stand on end. “You’re speaking nonsense. I can’t listen to any more of this. I have to go now. Sorry.” He backed out of the room and turned the key in the lock.

  The room was equipped with a window. Audrey watched through it as Piers flew away in phantom form.

  She considered climbing out the window but glimpsed Sideburns stationed outside. Perhaps she’d get lucky, and he’d fall asleep later.

  The key turned in the lock, and Qeturah whisked inside. In one hand, she held a blunderbuss, in the other, two sheets of paper. “Copy thi
s out word for word and sign it.”

  Reluctantly, Audrey accepted the stationery and seated herself at the small writing desk. She dipped quill in ink and copied the message.

  Father,

  I’m being held hostage by Siparese agents. They’ll kill me unless you follow their instructions. Please do as they say.

  Your Loving Daughter,

  Audrey

  Resisting the urge to crumple the paper up, Audrey handed it back. “He won’t do it,” she said baldly. “Whatever it is that you want from my father, you won’t get it. He’s a Harding. Duty is bred in our bones. Honor comes before family.”

  Qeturah’s lips quirked, amused. “I’m quite familiar with your father’s stubbornness. That’s not the point of this.”

  Audrey scowled, off balance. “Then why kidnap me?”

  Qeturah pocketed the missive. “Your abduction will make him vengeful. Aggressive. That’s what I want.” Still holding the blunderbuss high, Qeturah tossed a pair of handcuffs to Audrey. “Shackle yourself to the bed frame. Do it properly, or I’ll get Billy in here to do it for you.”

  Seething, Audrey obeyed.

  Qeturah gave the cuffs a quick tug to be sure they were secure, then backed out of the room and relocked the door.

  Five minutes after that, long before Audrey had come up with a satisfactory escape plan, the dirigible rocked back and forth and abruptly began to rise.

  It stopped thirty feet up in the air, effectively turning the gondola into a prison.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Above

  Stone World

  Leah watched as the red stone on Jasper’s back first mottled and then transformed into pink flesh. After a long moment, Jasper stopped shuddering under her soothing fingers and faced her.

  Her heart clenched. An intense wave of emotion overcame her: yearning, desire, grief. Except for his golden eyes, he was the exact image of Gideon, even to the subtle red flecks in his dark hair. Straight nose, strong cheekbones, well-shaped mouth.

  “Well? What do I look like?” he asked.

  “You’re very handsome.” She couldn’t resist tracing the dark line of his eyebrow.

  “I look human?”

  She nodded. “Yes.”

  Hesitantly, he touched his hair and the less craggy contours of his face and newly rounded ears. Then he stared at his hands, so much smaller than the crude mitts of his gargoyle form and lacking claws. He traced his tongue over his fangless teeth. “It feels strange.”

  She laughed softly. “I’m sure it does. You’ll get used to it.”

  He stood and had to make a quick clutch to save his now too-big shorts from falling off. He cinched the rope belt, then rubbed his shoulder, wincing. Leah noticed a star-shaped bruise—the remnant of the bullet’s impact. She shivered. If he’d been flesh and blood when he got hit…

  A scraping noise made her turn. Forty feet away, the door to the stairwell swung open. Burt emerged, his forehead streaming sweat.

  “Run!” Jasper took her hand and pulled her after him.

  The Above was a huge and supposedly deadly place. If they could just hide for a little while, surely their pursuers would give up?

  They ran parallel to the water trough. Up ahead, the trough punched a hole in a wall. Leah hadn’t even realized they were in a building. It was enormous, and the roof had caved in, letting in large swaths of sunlight. Also drifts of sand.

  A shout from behind them made her glance back. Her steps slowed in dismay. Two more Unskilled men from the repair party had joined Burt and were now giving chase.

  At least none of them had a gun.

  Jasper tugged her arm, and Leah focused forward again, running as hard as she could. Her lungs soon burned, and her breathing grew labored.

  Her foot slipped on a layer of sand. Jasper wrenched her upright. She kept running, but her ankle began to throb. She cried out.

  Jasper swept her up in his arms but had to set her back down after only a few steps. His cheeks flushed. “Sorry. This form is weak.”

  A glance back showed that Burt and one other man were gaining on them.

  “Can you change back to your gargoyle form?” Leah asked, while they hobbled along together, her arm around his shoulder.

  “I don’t know how!”

  Burt would catch them before they made it to the place where the water trough exited, but a section of broken wall lay much closer. Leah veered left. “This way!”

  They reached the rubble fifteen feet ahead of Burt. Jasper boosted Leah onto a block, then scrambled up after. Leah tried to climb higher, but the next rock moved under her foot.

  Burt reached the foot of the wall. Jasper barred his way while Leah frantically sought a more solid foothold.

  “I have no quarrel with you, scavenger,” Burt told Jasper. “I’m after the girl and a gargoyle.”

  Jasper snarled at him, and Burt’s mouth dropped open. “Y-your eyes,” he stuttered. “How did you—?”

  Under less dire circumstances, Leah would have laughed at his confusion. She gained another few feet of safety and peered over the broken wall. The dead city lay a mile to the left: a jumble of spires and broken blocks.

  Sand had drifted so high, it formed a ramp up to the top of the wall. Her stomach clenched. How solid was it? What if they sank in it and were trapped or smothered?

  A second Unskilled man joined Burt and started to climb.

  Jasper stamped on his fingers, but his bare feet had little effect. The Unskilled yelped but hung on. With his other hand, he swiped at Jasper’s leg.

  Jasper twisted free, but Burt boosted his partner, and now the man had a knee up on one of the boulders.

  “Come on!” Leah called from the top of the wall.

  “Go!” Jasper yelled.

  So stubborn. “Not without you!”

  Jasper kicked the Unskilled man in the gut, then scrambled up after her. His foot came down on the same unstable rock she had narrowly avoided. It rolled, but by then he was past and on his way to the top.

  Burt cried out and fell back as more rocks and scree slid. The second man hunched on the boulder, unharmed but trapped.

  Leah bared her teeth in satisfaction, but when Jasper joined her, their section started to wobble, too.

  He grabbed her hand. “Run!” Pell-mell, they sprinted down the dune. Jasper whooped, laughing, and a surge of reckless exhilaration made Leah grin back at him; she felt alive in a way that she hadn’t since her world shattered.

  At first, the softer, more forgiving sand helped her ankle, but on the tenth stride, she suddenly sank to her mid-calf. She floundered. Jasper paused to yank her free, and his own feet started to sink.

  The whole dune crumbled underneath them.

  Ashes! Her heart jumped into her throat. She tried to run faster, but pain shot through her ankle. She stumbled again, falling. She tried to release Jasper’s hand, but he clung to her. Both of them fell together and rolled down the dune in a dirty, choking landslide.

  At the bottom, Leah struggled to sit up. Her legs were half-buried, and her hair was full of sand. Her gaze sought Jasper and found him in a similar state, stunned but alive.

  Burt and the other Unskilled man stood at the top of the wall. Burt put one foot onto the soft surface, then hesitated.

  The man Jasper had kicked pointed at the sky. Abruptly, both men vanished back down the other side of the wall.

  Leah blinked in confusion. And suspicion. “Why did they leave?” Had someone else circled around in front of them? Anxious, she climbed to her feet, then had to clutch Jasper to avoid putting weight on her throbbing ankle.

  Jasper swore under his breath. “Look at the sky.”

  Leah raised her head. The sky on Stone was neither the red of Fire nor the blue of Water World, but rather a dark, egg-yolk yellow. Only, now, a band of dirty gray filled the horizon, and she could hear a dull roaring. On Holly’s world, that noise had meant engines. Here, she feared it signified something more ominous. The hairs on the back of
her neck rose. “Is that—?”

  “A sandstorm? Yes.” Jasper spat to clear his mouth of sand. “We need to find shelter.”

  Preferably somewhere without enemies. The city was too distant. Scanning their surroundings, Leah spotted a half-buried shed. “There’s something, but it’s at least half a mile away.” She bit her lip. She couldn’t tell if it was sufficient shelter, and her ankle still hurt. Go back and risk arrest, or go on?

  Jasper ground his teeth. “If I were a gargoyle, I could take us safe Below the earth.”

  “Your choice,” Leah called over the rising wind. She would only be arrested; he would be re-collared. “Go on or go back?”

  “Go on.” He put his arm around her waist, supporting her as they hobbled forward.

  The wind continued to rise, first gusting, then shrieking before they’d covered more than a third of the distance. Tiny particles of grit and sand stung their exposed skin and cut down on visibility. Leah pulled the neckline of her robe up over her mouth.

  “What about you?” she shouted at Jasper.

  He shrugged. “I’ll be fine.”

  Leah studied him doubtfully. His chest was bare, his legs were uncovered from the knee down, and he was barefoot. On the other hand, he wasn’t coughing, nor did his skin look as reddened as hers. Maybe being a gargoyle gave him some protection even in human form; Gideon’s skin had always been hot no matter if he were boy or dragon.

  Fifteen steps farther on, Leah halted. Her muscles tensed. “I can’t see it!” The shed had vanished behind the curtain of blowing sand.

  If Jasper replied, his voice was lost on the wind, but his arm pressed into Leah’s back. She trudged forward, trusting him to guide her.

  The wind howled in her ears like a demon and snatched at the hem of her robe. The material flapped around her knees. It became harder and harder to suck in a breath through the cloth filter over her face. She stopped squinting and simply closed her eyes. They would either walk into the shed or miss it and die. Her exposed wrists and hands felt lacerated.

  The world narrowed to the simple effort of putting one foot in front of the other—a test of endurance that she would have failed without Jasper’s arm around her.