Cold Stone & Ivy Book 2: The Crown Prince (The Empire of Steam)

by H. Leighton Dickson

  The ice began to melt, just a drip from the deadwall and even in the twilight between life and death, he lingered, his body not quite ready to give up. He had died so many times that it was confused, not knowing how it was done and waiting for the fall of ice that would begin the healing. But not this time, not when the horse was so near.

  He was dimly aware of great green eyes, of the smell of rosehips and leather and a flash of colour and the song of elements. It was finished and he smiled, but it was not remotely like the sun.

  ***

  Vienna Extra Daily

  Earthquake Reveals Ancient Roman Settlement

  On the eve of the funeral of the Crown Prince, witnesses report another earthquake outside the entrance to the Hofburg at St. Michael’s Gate. According to witnesses, the circular Michaelerplatz rippled and heaved before finally belching a great cloud of dust. When the dust cleared, there was a giant sinkhole in the centre of the Michaelerplatz, revealing a city here-to-fore hidden underground. Walls, windows, cellars and foundations have been found intact and a local historian claims that they are likely from the times of the Romans. That alone would have been newsworthy but witnesses say that immediately following the earthquake, a large animal was seen emerging from the dust and rubble. Some witnesses claim that the animal was in the shape of a very pale horse.

  Police have roped off the sinkhole and are continuing to investigate.

  Chapter 27

  Of Physics, Metaphysics and the Resurrection of the Crown Prince

  She was in the middle of affixing her blouse buttons when Alexander Dunn walked into the room.

  “Oh Penny,” he whistled. “Don’t you look dollymopish?”

  She whirled and swung, her palm connecting with his cheek in an instant, and he exhaled, his breath bringing with it the odours of brandy and whiskey and Cuban cigars. He straightened and rubbed his cheek, grinning.

  “Well, that was exciting. What was it for?”

  “For lying to me! For leaving me hanging in that room without a means of escape! For having me waste my time searching an apartment for a stone that was clearly not there!” She turned her back to him and stepped into her skirt, began the process of affixing the buckles at the hips. “For all I know, this was a ruse to simply see me in my undergarments and had nothing to do at all with the Star of Morocco.”

  “Oh Penny, that’s where you’re utterly mistaken.”

  “I am never mistaken,” she snorted. “Except when it comes to trusting international jewel-thieving rogues like you. A mistake I shall never make again.”

  His hand appeared in her range of vision, dangling the largest diamond locket she had ever seen in her life. Her breath caught in her throat.

  “Oh,” she gasped.

  And she spun back to face him.

  “The Star of Morocco! But where was it? It wasn’t in his room. I searched high and low!”

  “Yes you did, Penny and for that, I owe you my thanks.” He stepped back to a silver tray and set about to pour himself a Scotch. “I had my suspicions that he carried it on his person, but I couldn’t be sure. Especially when this would likely be our one and only meeting.”

  He offered her a glass. She took it.

  “So what happened to the forgery? Who stole it and how did Maximilian come into possession of the real deal?”

  “I suspect he’d stolen it ages ago and replaced it with the counterfeit,” he said. “When I saw it that night at the palace, I could tell at once it was a forgery but why? Who would go to so much trouble to steal such a diamond, then replace it with something so perfectly crafted. Clearly, the thief was a man of some means.”

  “Clearly.”

  “Also, the Star of Morocco is a symbol of the Empire of the Known World, and who is the heir to that Empire? Who is being stifled politically and socially in that same Empire?”

  “Why, Maximilian of course!”

  “Precisely! He disappeared moments before the lights went out, leading me to believe that he himself had thrown the switch. He wanted someone to steal the fake locket, if only to become the hero in restoring the original.”

  “Earning him political and familial points on all counts.”

  “He was the logical suspect.”

  He smiled and raised the glass in a toast, drained it in a shot.

  She studied him, his devil-may-care attitude, his roguish demeanor, his playboy charm. She swirled the glass, watched the amber liquid splash inside the crystal.

  “And so you stole it.”

  “They were expecting me too. I couldn’t disappoint.”

  “So tonight?”

  He set the glass down and stepped toward her.

  “My apologies, Penny. I truly did believe it was in his room.”

  “So you picked his pocket over drinks, substituted the false locket, and made it back unnoticed.”

  “I did.”

  “That’s very clever of you.”

  “Isn’t it, though?”

  “But I can’t let you keep it. Its stolen property of the Viennese government.”

  “I wouldn’t dream of it.”

  He held it up to the light, colours flashing like a kaleidoscope across her face. But he reached forward, tucking it in her corset between the arch of her breasts.

  “Keep it. You have caught me fair and square.”

  His fingers touched her chin, raising it to meet his.

  “I am your prisoner, Miss Dreadful, body and soul.”

  She swallowed, raised a brow.

  “Justice is an uncompromising mistress.”

  “So I’ve heard.”

  She held her breath, her entire body tingling in anticipation when he blinked, then blinked again. He frowned.

  “Did you…?”

  “Slip opiate into the Scotch?”

  “Yes.”

  “No!”

  “Damnably clever for a Girl Criminologist.”

  Dunn began to buckle to the floor. She caught him.

  “No, I didn’t. I give you my word!”

  “I did,” came a voice from behind.

  With the rogue Alexander Dunn in her arms, Penny turned to see Julian standing in the doorway, cigarette holder gleaming in the darkness.

  ***

  They didn’t beat him. They didn’t need to. He had nothing left to fight with and truth be told, he didn’t really care overmuch. They could do what they willed. For the first time in a long time, he was actually an innocent man. It would be poetic justice, all things considered.

  The iced door to the chapel shattered inward, courtesy a familiar red beam of Eisenmänn light, and the stairs leading down to the courtyard disintegrated under the blast. Hussars lowered the Empress Elizabeth first out into waiting arms down below, followed immediately by Valerie, Gisela and the Emperor himself. Then it was his turn, and they dragged him by the arms and pushed him out the doorway. There were no Hussars to catch him as he fell.

  Guards pulled him to his feet and bound his hands behind his back, taking time to secure the prosthetic so he could not slip free or cut the bonds. They went through his pockets, pulling out the only item he had in his possession – the folded page from Franz Salvatore’s old bible with the list of questions on the back. They passed it to Valerie and he looked away from her to study the courtyard. It would likely be the last thing he saw. A firing squad would shoot him at dawn. It was the Gilded way.

  The Commons were alight with torches and tech, a snowy sea of soldiers and politicians and generals. In the windows of the Swiss Wing and the Treasury, faces were pressed against the glass as staff and servants alike gathered to watch. High above them, airships circled across the night sky, the Stahl Mädchen precariously low to the ground and targeting what was left of the Court Chapel. Her cannons were silent and waiting.

  There was a fight breaking out behind him as the Kaiser of Blood and Iron was lowered onto the snow. A circle of physicians had stepped in to examine him but he batted their hands away, flailed at them with his g
ood arm. Both Gisela and Franz Joseph moved to intervene but he cursed at them in German, Russian, English and all the other languages that found a home on his tongue.

  Christien couldn’t help it. He laughed.

  The man whirled and immediately, the fox-like eyes grew wild.

  “You English are mad,” he snapped. “Mad as March hares! What have you done to me? What have you done?”

  And he broke free of the protective ring, staggered over to the young physician, trailing Silver Hussars in his wake.

  “There will be no more patience,” he growled. “No more good will. The time when Blood and Iron lies down like a dog at the feet of Steam is over! Do you hear me?”

  “Wilhelm, save your strength,” said Franz Joseph. “This man will be shot at dawn. You need—”

  “You dare presume to tell me what I need?” The Kaiser’s face was red, the tendons in his neck taut as soldiers at attention. “Wales, the old peacock, has orchestrated this and he will pay! Look at my arm!”

  He waved it in front of the Emperor’s face.

  “This is what his arrogance has done! But Blood and Iron will not be crippled. I will not be crippled! I will have a new arm, like Wales’! Like his!”

  He pointed at Christien.

  “No, it will be better than his! My Eisenmänner are only the beginning! The world will see our new technologies and marvel! The mighty arm of Blood and Iron will usher a new day of science and progress and power.”

  “That ‘mighty arm’,” muttered Christien. “Looks rather like a desiccated cat.”

  There was a moment, a brief heartbeat of a moment, when the Kaiser was speechless. But it was only a moment. He bellowed, slamming his good fist into Christien’s middle and sending the young physician to his knees. A savage backhand across the cheek and he collapsed into the snow. Valerie was there in seconds, straddling him with her skirts and shielding him with her body. She faced the Kaiser, eyes steely, hands curled into fists.

  “Leave him alone,” she said.

  “Stand aside, girl.”

  “I said leave!”

  Wilhelm moved to strike her but the Emperor barked and Hussars moved swiftly, grabbing the Kaiser and ushering him ungracefully out of the Chapel Commons and into the safety of the Hofburg. The gaggle of physicians followed, taking the Empress with them.

  Gisela appeared and together, the two sisters helped him to his feet. They turned toward their father.

  “No firing squad,” Gisela said. “This man did what we asked. The shame is ours to bear.”

  “The plan was ours, Pappa,” said Valerie. “Not his. We wanted to bring Rudy back. We did.”

  “Your heart has been broken,” added Gisela. “And the Empire compromised. We all wanted to restore it.”

  Franz Joseph smiled sadly, reached out to stroke Valerie’s cheek.

  “My daughters,” he said. “My beautiful girls. You have the hearts of lionesses. But the law is the law. This man will die now.”

  He stepped back.

  “Assemble a firing squad in the centre of the Commons and order the Stahl Mädchen to open fire. Destroy the Court Chapel!”

  With that, Hussars yanked his arms, dragging him to the centre of the yard as the dreadnought opened fire on the Hofburg.

  ***

  Boom boom boom

  The cannons of the Stahl Mädchen boomed like the ticking of a great clock. In the middle of the courtyard, Christien watched the walls explode and the black draping catch fire as the cannons coughed out their iron balls with flame and fury.

  Boom boom boo-

  Then nothing.

  Through gaping holes in the walls, colours flashed and circles spun into life, a display of fireworks from within the chapel itself. The airship’s cannons fell silent and all eyes in the Commons looked up.

  The dreadnought rippled and pulsed, growing smaller then larger, smaller then larger and suddenly, it disappeared altogether from the sky overhead. There was a moment and Christien realized that like everyone else, he was holding his breath.

  Without warning, the chapel exploded outwards, limestone and marble and wood raining from where it had been, for ‘where it had been’ was now occupied by an airship.

  Masts sticking out of holes in walls, canvas and sails and iron sheets and twisted metal, balloon hissing with combustible gas, the Stahl Mädchen creaked inside the Court Chapel. Airshipsmen could be seen scrambling from the hull and leaping down the short distance to the ground below. Swiss guards and Hussars rushed to the wreckage when a flash of light lifted them all off their feet and a wall of sound sent them soaring as the hydrogen ignited and the dirigible erupted in flames. The roar was louder than anything in the world.

  In the sky where the airship had been, however, a crystalline ball hovered, flashing and spinning like the large black orb that had appeared in the Chapel. It hovered only a moment before dropping unceremoniously to the ground, crashing and shattering into a thousand pieces. He threw himself into the snow to avoid being shredded by a thousand icy daggers.

  A second boom now as, inside the chapel, the dreadnought’s engines exploded, sending out a second wave of heat and light. It was blinding and snow in the courtyard melted immediately, covering the winter grass with water. Sound was distorted as both screams and sirens echoed across the night sky and he lay for a while, waiting for his senses to return. The Hussars had abandoned him in the chaos so he rolled to his knees, waiting for a rifle butt to the head but none came. With a deep breath, he willed his prosthetic to release the metal hand and it did, ejecting it into the puddles and freeing him from the bonds. He snatched it up, affixing it with a twist and scrambled to his feet, ready to bolt. Before he did, however, he threw a quick glance behind him where the orb had crashed.

  He realized he was not going anywhere just yet.

  For pushing up out of the wet grass in his white uniform was Rudolf Franz Karl Joseph, Crown Prince of Austria.

  ***

  Once, when she’d been younger, it had snowed in London for over a week. Snow never stayed in London but this time it did, and the city had been paralyzed. Not Ivy Savage, however. She had braved the drifts to visit the Library in Whitechapel and that night, she’d read to Davis about houses in Canada made entirely of snow. They’d draped blankets over the kitchen chairs, brought in icicles as carrots and slept in their winter coats to pretend.

  Odd how she would remember that now.

  Her head was spinning so she lay quite still, watching the stars and the moon in the sky above her. Watching the sparks fly high into the night, watching the airships circle like warring dragons over her head. She was still sleeping, still dreaming. It was obvious, especially when the mustachioed face of Crown Prince Rudolf hovered into view.

  “Wach auf, junge Dame.”

  She smiled at him.

  “I don’t speak German,” she said. “But soon. I promise. I’m so sorry you died. I think you would have made a terrific king.”

  He reached down, plucked two metal rings that had become wedged in the laces of her corset.

  “Yes, those are yours. I borrowed them. I’m a borrower. So sorry.”

  He slipped one on over the white glove, tucked the other into a deep pocket before he disappeared from view. She propped herself up on her elbows to get a better look at the panorama of her dream and her heart thudded once in her chest.

  It was no dream.

  Flames roared in what had once been the Court Chapel of the Hofburg, airshipsmen dead and dying on the ground all around. Two Sentinels standing guard at the entrance to the Commons and a sea of Hussars staring at her. From every window in the buildings surrounding the square, faces were pressed against the glass, staring at her. In fact, everyone who was not dead was staring and she realized they weren’t staring at her, but at the man in white uniform standing in the middle of the field.

  Only the crackling of the fires could be heard from the Commons.

  It was like a wave sweeping across the ocean of bodie
s as one by one, people sank to their knees. All the generals, all the politicians, even Valerie and Gisela and dear, battered Christien, all bowed with reverence and awe before the Crown Prince. Only one other man in the entire crowded courtyard remained on his feet, too overcome to do anything else but stare.

  “Mein Sohn,” said Franz Joseph, his voice barely a whisper.

  The prince raised a hand to touch his head. He frowned.

  “Pappa?” he said.

  “Mein Sohn,” repeated the Emperor and he took a tentative step forward, then another but ran the rest of the way to throw his arms around the young man. Together, they buckled to the ground as Imperial tears streamed down the proud old face.

  “He did it,” she heard Christien say. “By god, he did it.”

  Ivy looked around.

  “Where is he? Where’s Sebastien?”

  She spied a dark mound in the grass and her heart thudded once more. She rolled to her feet and scrambled toward it.

  ***

  “Remy?”

  It was Valerie. She had crossed the courtyard and dropped to her knees beside him. In the light cast by the burning dreadnought, he couldn’t help but marvel at her beauty. It was his weakness and he cursed himself for it.

  “He did it,” she breathed. “I knew he could.”

  He said nothing, began tightening the cables in his wrist.

  “He is a miracle man. All of the world will know it now.”

  He steeled his jaw as he worked, remembering the sight of the sword pushing up through the greatcoat.

  “I’m sorry for everything we have put you through, you and your brother and your little girl. You will be rewarded by my father.”

  He looked up at her.

  “All we want is an airship to take us home.”

  “You will have it. The best in our fleet.”

  “The best in your fleet is currently inside the Court Chapel.”

  She looked away now and he felt vindicated.

  “Rudolf!”

  The crowd parted as Empress Elizabeth rushed through, pausing only a heartbeat before following her husband to the huddle on the ground. It might have been beautiful had it not been so surreal.