“We’ll discuss this whole forwarded message matter in a bit. But let’s see if I got the gist. Nita and Lil are locked up in a floating fortress I never heard of. Those coordinates sound an awful lot like one of Lil’s sloppy guesses. If I was a fugger trying to throw me off the scent, I sure as hell would have come up with something that was a little less fanciful than all that. So I reckon it’s the truth. You see any maps while you were in that office?”
“Just the old ones they had before the fug showed up.”
“Any new places marked on them?”
“None I could spot, but once I figured out I wouldn’t find the Ph’lac’try on the map I stopped looking.”
The captain nodded and pulled open a drawer beside him. Inside was a bundle of rolled up maps. He picked one and unfurled it to the extent that the captain’s tiny excuse for a desk would allow. Then came a compass of the circle-drawing variety, the stub of a pencil secured in its end.
“We’re here, right around where Crophaven was. If they built this in what used to be a town, and Fugtown used to be one too, then let’s assume the fug folk do all of their building in the carcass of something that was already there. So the Phylactery is going to be on this map, it just won’t be called that.” He placed the pivot on Crophaven and began to widen the points. “About here is as far as a cutter can go on a full stock of fuel and water.” He drew an arc, then moved the pivot. “This here is where Lil’s guess puts the place. Which is smack in the middle of a mountain, so we know she wasn’t spot on.”
“Which means it was definitely her that came up with these numbers,” Coop said, the weight of anxiety lifting from him as he spoke. This was the first evidence he had that Lil was still alive, and to look at him, you’d think he’d received a handwritten message telling him she was alive and well. “Ever since she dropped that navigation gadget over the side and you told her, she couldn’t use it if she was going to be climbing, she never did get us closer than fifty miles.”
Mack drew a circle around the mountain.
“And she was never much more than a hundred miles off,” he added, widening the compass for another circle. “Best guess, then, is that the girls are somewhere in this bit here.”
The section of the map that fell between the second two lines and behind the first contained three cities.
“Coyneville…” Mack said. “Looks like the ground there is all marsh. Not the sort of place you’d want to drive anchors for them chains she described. Then there’s old Caer Kaetri… She said there were hounds or some such. Wild hunting-type hounds. Caer Kaetri is dead center of a plain. I don’t know what sort of animals are left down here, but if them hounds are hunting, I have to figure they’ll be doing it in a forest. And Shuttermill has one. From the name, they probably had a sawmill, too. And if I remember correctly, that’s where that big foundry used to be. Pretty much everything you’d need to build floating prison.”
“So that’s where the girls are?”
“Best I can figure. And so long as we fill up on burn-slow and find at least one more place to soak up some water along the way, we can just about make it there in two days’ traveling, mostly by fug. Did you say anything to those boys down there about what you were looking for?”
“We didn’t get a chance to get too friendly with them.”
“Good. The Wind Breaker’s fast, but the fugger cutters are faster. If they know we’re heading to that prison, at best they’ll be able to get a message through to get them ready for us, and at worst we’ll run into a fleet between there and here. Better they don’t know.”
“But, Cap’n, they know they got Lil and Nita, and they know we’re down here. Don’t you think they’re going to guess where we’re headed?”
“I’ll give you three reasons why I think they won’t. First, there ain’t nothing a fugger loves more than keeping secrets. They keep secrets from us, they keep secrets from each other. Maybe it comes from spending all this time down here in the dark, but they like keeping other folks in the dark, too. So I don’t think they sent out a bulletin to tell every last fugger who they got and where.
“Second, fuggers think we’re idiots. Every last one of them thinks every last one of us is as sharp as a bag of wet leather. A fugger would rather tear off his left arm than give us the benefit of the doubt when it comes to figuring out where they’re keeping the girls.
“Third, and most important, if they guess we’re heading to rescue the girls, we’re dead and buried already. And if that’s the case, may as well go on through, regardless. I’d hate to disappoint the Reaper,” he said. “Get down there and help Gunner tuck those fuggers away where they won’t give us any trouble. If he told them what we were looking for, kill them. If he didn’t, let them live. We’ve a task ahead of us that’ll need more than a bit of help from the folks upstairs if we’re going to pull it off. I don’t want to be wiping blood off my hands while I’m asking for favors unless I have to.”
#
Coop and Gunner tied the captured fug folk into the most uncomfortable and embarrassing positions they could dream up, then stuffed the Wind Breaker to capacity with coal, burn-slow, water, and every spare canister of phlogiston they could get their hands on. While they stocked the ship, the captain plotted a course. He would work his way to the surface and to a trade route to the north, following it as far as he could before ducking back below the fug to approach the prison. The longer they could go without appearing to be heading toward the prison, the better, and at the moment, precise navigation was more important than stealth.
Once the course was set, he bellowed into the speaking tube. “All hands on deck. We’ve got a riddle, and the more minds we can throw at it the better.”
He and the crew assembled on the deck a minute later, including Butch, Wink, and Nikita. Coop had been once again patched up, leaving very little of his exposed flesh free of either a bandage or some manner of medical concoction. Gunner had his ankle bandaged.
“Coop get everybody caught up?” the captain asked.
“Are we operating on the theory that our two missing crewmates are being held in a sky prison over the remains of Shuttermill?” replied Gunner.
“Yes,” said the captain.
“And this theory was devised based in part on the exceptionally unexceptional navigation skills of Lil Cooper, given to us secondhand through the minds of a string of lesser primates?”
“Yes.”
“Then I’m all caught up. I just wish I wasn’t.”
“If anyone’s got any ideas about how to get done what’s got to get done, then shout them out. We’ll be there in maybe two days. Whatever we come up with between then and now is what we’re doing, because I don’t want to leave them girls in that place any longer than we already have.”
“Well, if I heard correctly, Nita included in her message the suggestion that all of the prisoners should be freed,” Gunner said.
“That was my understanding.”
“I suggest we start by abandoning that idea and simply focusing on Nita and Lil.”
“I suggest we don’t,” the captain said. “They put Nita and Lil in that place because they considered our crew to be as bad as the rest of the prisoners. If the fuggers want them folks locked up, I want them free.”
“Tremendous… Very well then. No sense making it too easy on ourselves.” Gunner sighed.
Two hours rolled by with all members of the crew pitching ideas. It didn’t take long before they all realized that the task ahead was an insane one, and they therefore weren’t likely to find their way to a solution by making sane suggestions. Outside-the-box thinking was utterly necessary, and ideally the box should be completely destroyed in the process. If time wasn’t a factor, the task might have been enormously eased by heading to their secret stash of stolen fug tech near Caldera and arming themselves properly. That would take more than a week round trip, though, and at the rate they’d been encountering raiders, they couldn’t guarantee they’d make it back in one
piece.
Gradually the plans expanded to include anything that they might be able to steal from the station below them, and the solution began to form.
Mack crossed his arms. “I think that’s about as close as we’re going to get. Everyone know their prep?”
“I’ve got to convert some burn-slow into burn-fast,” Gunner said.
“I’ve got to ditch the gig and hoist up its replacement,” Coop said.
Butch muttered something irritably.
“If I wasn’t going to be busy at the wheel, I’d do it myself, but I’ve never been good with a needle and thread,” Mack said.
Wink found Nita and Lil, tapped Wink.
Nikita followed Wink, Nikita added.
All eyes turned expectantly to Gunner.
“… Why are you looking at me?”
“This is right about where you do your naysaying,” the captain said.
“Is it going to do any good?”
“No, but best to get it out of the way,” Coop said.
“Fine. I would be remiss if I didn’t point out that this fever dream of a plan began as a jailbreak and has become the most absurd heist ever conceived. I will be frankly astounded if anyone survives. And that includes the inmates. I am understanding it correctly, right? We are planning to steal the prison.”
“Nah. Just borrow it,” Coop said.
“Ah. Well, then I retract my objection.”
“Noted. Now get to work,” said Mack.
He nodded, and the crew scattered dutifully to their tasks.
Chapter 9
I thought of this question. The Wind Breaker name sounded like something to you when you heard it first. You told me what it was, Lil tapped.
Once their message had been sent to the Wind Breaker, at first Nita and Lil had tapped out messages to one another sparingly. After they’d heard the guards joking about all of the “nervous jitters” coming from the cells, though, they realized it wouldn’t matter how much they tapped; the guards would never assume it was anything more than evidence of weakness. If there was one thing the fug folk could be counted on to do, it was assume the worst of the surface folk. From that moment they tapped away to one another, sometimes to share information, sometimes to plot and plan, but mostly just to preserve their sanity. The only time both of them were in their cells were moments like this, when the remaining Ebonwhite was taking his turn in isolation.
The name was poetic. Words that said it was fast, Nita answered. That was what I thought of.
Not me, tapped Lil.
You told me what you thought it was.
Farts.
Nita couldn’t help but giggle at the unexpected reply. The sound of laughter drew the guard’s attention.
“Quiet down in there,” the guard grunted.
The laughter descended into a genuine cough. Depending on the day and the whims of the breeze, the air was almost too dense with fug to breathe at times. The guard had two sets of temporary breathers, but he’d only once felt the need to deploy them. Nita had learned to breathe shallow until the air seemed clear, and in a way almost looked forward to her time in isolation. At least up there she could breathe deep, and she got a glimpse of unfiltered sunshine on the way in and out. Of course, isolation also meant that she was only getting regular meals two days out of every three. Today, though, neither the box nor the cell would be particularly tolerable. The wind outside her window was wailing, fat raindrops pattering against the windowpane. Another storm. The wind forced cold air and fug through the poorly sealed window and would make the isolation box a freezing and even more stomach-turning experience than usual. She didn’t even want to think about what yard time would be like in wind like this.
You didn’t mean that, Nita tapped, pulling her mind back to the conversation.
Yes I did. Wind Breaker. Broke Wind. I thought our ship’s name sounded like someone with bad gas. Made sense. Had a big bag full of gas.
Neither of them “spoke” for a moment, and Nita turned to the window. Telling time through a residue-encrusted window half-immersed in the fug was a bit of an art, and doing it during a storm was even more difficult, but it was amazing how quickly one’s sense of time adapted to one’s conditions.
Nearly lunchtime, Nita tapped.
Nearly my turn in the box, Lil replied. You knew what today was. One week. The grunts owed us muffins. You made sure you collected.
Noted.
The same horrid food was served to them a few minutes later, and a few minutes after that the surface guard came for Lil to tuck her away in the box for a day. The deckhand couldn’t even muster the energy to object or resist. She simply forced down the last of her meal, tapped out Talk to you in two days, and presented her hands for restraint. The guard, dressed in a drenched poncho and appearing even more irritable than usual, wrestled with his keys.
“Seems like I’m always the one who gets put out there during a storm. Guess I’m just lucky like that,” Lil said.
“Oh,” remarked the surface guard as he clicked the manacles in place. “The warden has canceled yard time for the day. He says the surface is too dangerous.”
“But not the box?” Lil asked.
“The isolation cell is tethered. You won’t be in any danger of being blown free.”
Lil sighed. “Figures.”
The whole exchange went through without anger or rebellion. It was no doubt precisely how the warden had intended it to happen. In just a few days, the routine had taken the fight from them. In a few days more, he might decide they had learned their lesson and would behave themselves for good. And he might have been right.
#
In the pouring rain and buffeting wind, Coop, Gunner, Wink, and Nikita sat atop the platform of a device they’d first been exposed to during their warehouse heist four months before. It was a cart with a steam engine attached and quite possibly the most convoluted control system ever devised. Everything from steering to acceleration was controlled by an array of unlabeled levers and valves. Nita had done a fair amount of fiddling and trial on the steam cart they’d stolen during their brief visits to Cache Island, and like all other areas of her expertise, she did her best to teach the others, but it wasn’t until this precise moment that the value of those lessons became clear. It didn’t help that the one they’d stolen from the warehouse didn’t quite match the one they’d stolen from Pendercrook.
“Are you sure we’re okay keeping them bombs this close to the boiler?” Coop said uncertainly. He pulled his rain gear a bit closer. It was a heavy leather coat, and snuggled beneath it was not just Nikita but Wink as well.
“They are quite inert until I insert my detonators, Coop,” Gunner said.
“And what about after you put the detonators in?”
“Then we have a precisely calibrated time before they detonate.”
“And you’re sure you’re sure?”
“I am certain.”
“As certain as the first time you blew a finger off, or as certain as the second time you blew a finger off?”
“More certain than both of those times because I learn from my mistakes. And now is not the time to have your doubts about my pyrotechnic capabilities.”
“I ain’t worried about all that. I’m just worried you ain’t as good with bombs as you think.”
“Well don’t be. We’re getting close.”
Gunner adjusted some valves to bring down the speed of the steam cart a bit as the rain hissed against the boiler beside him. They had been moving along the remains of what had been the main road leading to Shuttermill for several minutes. Now they could see the looming remains of the buildings come into the dimmer than normal light of a stormy noon beneath the fug. Bad weather had a whole new meaning beneath the surface. Falling rain mixed with the toxic atmosphere and struck the skin with an even more potent chill, like pure alcohol. And then there was the lightning. It was like something out of a nightmare. Something about the fug seemed to attract the stuff. Wind whipped the surfac
e of the fug into twisting spires, then lightning would strike them, sending a jagged lance of bright violet light that lingered in the air for tens of seconds after the thunder had died away. It was like the lightning left a ghost behind, a branching replica of the bolt, which was quickly pulled apart into a fading blur by the wind.
Visibility was practically zero, but even so there was no doubt they’d come to the right place. While they hadn’t yet reached their base, the four chains that secured the prison were visible rising up to the very surface of the fug, silhouetted whenever lightning struck. They pressed on, moving farther into the city, and watched as the dismantled frameworks of a few dozen homes and businesses whisked by them. Ahead, they could see what the fug folk had made of the city.
“Those are big guns,” remarked Coop with his usual penetrating insight.
Anchors for each of the chains were visible now. They were house-sized blocks of cement. A dozen or so yards away from each one of them was a defense cannon. As the crew was well aware, the islands of Caldera were defended by massive guns, and in their monthly decisions to risk those cannons, the crew had gotten an excellent look at them. Though updated frequently and well maintained, the cannons were first built long ago and showed their age in their massive size and crude design—magnificent artistic embellishments not withstanding. These defense cannons were lean, efficient, and undoubtedly a match for the deadliness of their Calderan counterparts. Their barrels were as long as the Wind Breaker and actuated by precision-ground gears that were almost half that size. Near the base of each was a complex arrangement of struts, chains, and linkages, which could only have been used for reloading the weapon, thus allowing it to be entirely manned by a single operator. Around each gun and its stockpile of ammunition was a fifteen-foot fence.
“One shot from any one of those would punch a hole through three Wind Breakers,” Gunner said in awe.
“Makes you wonder why they don’t have them defending every town they got,” Coop said.
“One would imagine cost is a factor. Let’s just be thankful for it.”
Skykeep Page 20
