The Airship Aurelia (The Aurelian Archives)

by Courtney Grace Powers

  “Raft,” a voice whined from the hearth. A pointed-faced Pan stood up, scowling. “You really think it's a good idea to have them all here? What if one'a them blabs? Then what?”

  “Then you'll be runnin' scared with your tail between your legs, Kayl,” Gideon said evenly, helping Raft slide the door shut with a bang. “Shouldn't matter to you either way.”

  “Besides,” Raft added. “You think they'd rat on us after payin' us for goods? Be a right waste of money, wouldn't it?” Turning to Reece, he prompted in a quieter voice, “Well?”

  Reece and Gideon simultaneously reached into their jackets and pulled out a stack of rectangular paper shields. They'd divided the money in two to cut the risk of loss in half. Raft took the stacks, glanced his thumb over their edges, and nodded approvingly. It was like something out of a story, Hayden thought with interest, wondering if Raft would lick the shields to taste them for bad ink, like the characters in those stories always did. But all Raft did was catch him staring and glare suspiciously. Hayden shrank back, embarrassed.

  “Got those maps you asked for,” Raft said to Reece.

  “Good. But I'd like to look over the supply lists first and double-check them with your estimates.”

  Raising his dark eyebrows, Raft growled, “Don't trust me, boy?”

  “You, I trust,” Reece said dryly, glancing towards the hearth with meaning.

  “You got somethin' to say, Sheppard?” Kayl snarled, his blue eyes bulging. “I notice you're carryin'. You remember what I said would happen if you ever carried a gun when I had one on me?” The Pan reached towards the holster strapped to his leg, licking his lips.

  “Settle, Kayl,” Raft ordered sternly, pointing a knotted finger. “If you and Sheppard wanna shoot it out, you wait and do it where there aren't innocents around.”

  After a moment, Kayl huffingly slid his hand off his holster. As he turned to go, Po said in a very audible whisper, “Just forget him, Cap'n. My da always said that a man who goes lookin' for fights has too much time on his hands.”

  Hayden couldn't help but smile at Kayl's flummoxed expression. They were kindred spirits, he and Po. The innocents Raft had probably been referring to. His stomach sunk slightly. When Aurelia left…Po would be alone. Hayden would be alone.

  “Do you have a place for my crew to wait while Gid and I look at those lists?” Reece asked Raft in an undertone, eyeing the den of Pans muttering amongst themselves. “Some place they won't be bothered?”

  Raft jerked his chin at a beefy Pan with his head shaved to a single stripe of black hair and said, “Zesper, take them to the back lounge and start them a fire so's they don't freeze to death on us.”

  Hayden stayed close to Po and Nivy as Zesper led them through the chilly warehouse. Most of the walls were exposed brick, and the windows that hadn't been boarded up only had curtains to keep out the snow, sleet, and wind. They passed a number of Pans, and not just men, but women, who despite being no less scary, were at least prettier. Not that Hayden really looked. Most of them were bigger than he was.

  Zesper led them down a bottlenecking corridor and into a sitting room with cement floors, white walls, and a drafty wooden door to the back alleyway. There were a few seats beneath a hanging photon lantern, and a small hearth with wooden carvings of what looked like antlered horses on its mantel, cobwebs strung between them.

  After lighting the fire, Zesper stood, gave them one calculating look, and left.

  “Wonder why Reece wanted us to come,” Po mused as she hurried over to the fire and backed up to it, rubbing her arms. “Don't seem like we're doin' much good. Or much of anythin'.”

  “It's for unity,” Hayden answered. “He's reinforcing the feeling of being a crew.”

  Po nodded. If she was wondering why Hayden had come along—seeing as he wasn't part of the official crew and all—she had the grace to not ask. If she had, Hayden wouldn't have had an answer.

  He sighingly sat on a leather loveseat he realized upon closer inspection was actually the back seat of a gutted automobile. Turning his satchel upside-down, he grabbed his auto-encrypting journal and balanced it on one knee, then pulled out a faded leather book and set it teetering on the other. Not for the first time, he wished he was ambidextrous.

  Nivy sat down opposite to Po on the ground and started playing cat's cradle with a shoelace. Her eyes glanced over the book subtly, but anxiously.

  “I'll be careful,” Hayden promised. She nodded offhandedly, as if she already knew as much, but seemed to have a difficult time smiling. Hayden wasn't sure where the book had originally come from…only that it was important. Nivy hinted that the book had something to do with The Heron's long lost weapon, but she had had even less success wrangling a translation out of it than Hayden. The manuscript was in pristine condition, but its text was in a language that resembled common speak as much as Hayden resembled Gideon.

  The alleyway door swung open with a gust of cruelly cold wind that sent the book's pages flipping. Hayden looked up, stifled his groan, and tried to hide his face in the collar of his jacket. The newcomer was Ariel, one of the only people he genuinely disliked. She was horrible. She was also Gideon's…something. The word taskmaster came to mind.

  Ariel slammed the door behind her, scowling. He wasn't sure how, but she'd dyed over her dark Pantedan hair and turned it crimson, an impossibly red silky sheet that shivered over her white fur stole and black coat. The red hair, the slanted blue eyes, and the pale skin made her look ghoulish, but still beautiful.

  “Where's Gideon?” she asked Hayden in greeting, her drawl menacing. “I heard he was here.”

  Hayden pointed silently, and Ariel started for the hallway, the heels of her boots clicking sharply. She passed Po and Nivy, who were staring at her with looks of awe (though, to be fair, Hayden thought Nivy's awe was the kind one felt when they were staring at creature they'd only read about, but never seen), with a sneer for their game and nothing else.

  “Don't mind her.” Hayden put aside his books and joined them on the floor. “That was Ariel, Gideon's…” He floundered as Po waited curiously.

  “Sweetheart?” she suggested.

  He cringed and shrugged. He was hesitant to apply the word sweet to any part of Ariel.

  A few moments of stillness passed as Hayden watched Po and Nivy play their game, and then, inevitably, the voices rose like a distant, grumbling storm. Nivy lowered her tangled hands and tipped her head as if to make out the muffled words, but Hayden simply reached for his book and opened it to a marked page with a jaded sigh. Gideon and Ariel yelling at each other was nothing new; they were probably just saying hello.

  The slam of a door echoed through the warehouse. Ariel's boots clipped angrily as she marched into the room once more, her hair streaming behind her like flames. Gideon followed on her heels; there were angry red welts on both of his cheeks, but he looked calm.

  “—don't care, you thick, plumb-headed man-ape!”

  “—just tryin' to make me angry, you're not even talkin' sense.”

  “You don't make sense, you stupid sisquick!” Ariel grabbed the doorknob in both hands and rattled it wildly, pushing instead of pulling. “Should'a known better than to—DON'T!” she yowled like an angry cat as Gideon put a hand on the door to pull it open. Swinging around, she slapped him hard on the side of the face.

  Hayden put his book near to his face, his nose nearly parting the pages. Despite wanting to avoid attracting Ariel's attention, he couldn't help but glance over the top of the tome, morbidly curious. It looked like Ariel had tried to add another slap on top of the first, but Gideon had caught her wrist.

  “That hurt,” Gideon said simply.

  “It did?” Ariel sounded pleased. “Oh, Creed, I'm sorry. Please don't be angry with me.” Using the wrist Gideon was holding as leverage, she twirled into his side and settled beneath his arm. “I'll go get us some chocolate tea, alright? Then we can talk.” Smiling victoriously (in an evil warlord sort of way, Hayden thought and then ga
ve himself a mental reprimand), Ariel rose onto her toes, kissed Gideon, and then sidled out of the room.

  Muttering, Gideon collapsed onto the leather couch and rubbed his face.

  “What did you say?” Hayden asked curiously, lowering his book.

  Gideon closed his eyes. “That I was leavin' and might not be comin' back.”

  Cold queasiness twisted Hayden's stomach. “Why would you say that?”

  Opening his eyes, Gideon looked at him, seeming resigned. “You don't think there's a chance?”

  “I…why would there be? You're just returning Aurelia, you're not…”

  “Comon' Aitch, quit kiddin' yourself.” Rolling his shoulders deeper into the couch, Gideon shut his eyes again. His eyebrows remained slightly drawn. “Just ask Nivy Girl, she knows. Reece does, too. This ain't a normal job. All of us are goin' knowin' full well this could be it.”

  Hayden looked at Nivy, expecting her to throw off Gideon's words with a shrug, but she met his eyes and smiled encouragingly instead. It was the worst thing she could have done. She was trying to comfort him. Comfort him, and he was the one staying behind while his friends went off to face possible death.

  A thousand horrible images compounded in his head—an explosion in the engine room with Po, a gunshot wound to Gideon's chest, Reece, always throwing himself in front of other people so recklessly—he had to be there to fix them. How could he walk away from that responsibility? There and then, for better or worse, he made his decision.

  Hayden started repacking his bag, trying to appear unobtrusive as Ariel returned with two tall pewter cups. “I need to talk to Reece,” he said as if just remembering, standing. He was a terrible liar, but no one—or no one on the couch, anyways—noticed. Po and Nivy shot him pained looks as he went looking for Reece.

  “Reece?” he called, walking down the dusty corridor with a sneeze caught in his nose.

  Reece stuck his tousled head out an open door, a fountain pen in his mouth. He waved him in cheerfully.

  The room was completely square and windowless, empty save for a tall, boxy table obscured by layers of unrolled parchment. A single photon globe hung from a chain over the table, swinging slightly, making the shadows on the parchment twist and twirl.

  “What are you doing?” Hayden asked, following Reece around the table.

  Reece picked up a fist-sized cube entirely composed of silver buttons. The dimensional projector hummed softly as he turned it on and sat it amid the sprawling mess on the tabletop. With a flicker, the cube threw out a constellation’s worth of miniature transparent stars that hung suspended in the air.

  Reece thrust a hand into the stars, pointing. “Nivy outlined our expedition from Honora to The Ice Ring. I've been double-checking the planets between here and there, trying to track down The Kreft's haunts. The duke said Cronus 12 has a strong Kreft presence—”

  “They just instated a new prime minister,” Hayden realized, frowning.

  “Yeah. And according to the duke, their armies are swarming like an anthill. We'll want to avoid stepping on their lawn.”

  Hayden quietly watched as Reece leaned his hands against the table and began reading a piece of parchment with feverish focus. Peering over the table, Hayden counted half a dozen very old maps with curled, frayed edges, all covered in Reece's cramped notes, as if his handwriting had spilt from an inkwell and spread unstoppably.

  “Did you want something?” Reece asked, distracted.

  “I…I've been thinking about the…expedition. Thinking maybe I should come.”

  Reece's eyebrows climbed up his forehead, but he didn't look away from the parchment. He was quiet for so long, Hayden timidly ventured, “Well?”

  Reece paid him the briefest of glances and shrugged offhandedly. “Sure. Yeah. Come along.”

  Stung, Hayden straightened his glasses, as if Reece had delivered him a physical blow. “Well, if it makes no difference…if you don't need me…”

  Reece just shrugged again, muttering under his breath and stooping to consult his scratched notes. His hand flailed, located the pen he'd stuck through his tousled hair, and then set to jotting something in the margins of an already crammed sheet.

  For a moment, Hayden dithered between leaving the room and asking for an explanation. Was there someone else on the crew who had studied medicine for nine years? Someone else who was qualified to perform surgery, prescribe antidotes, administer stitches and straighteners? Hayden shook his head to clear it. Losing the feeling of being needed had made him feel like an outsider. He didn't want to be excluded from this. That surprised him.

  With a sudden chuckle, Reece pocketed his datascope and turned to study Hayden, a gleam in his brown eyes. “Hayden, listen to me. What I want is for you to want to come. And I think you do. You're just not willing to admit it. It's always been this way with you. You need to be talked into everything, because you want to be talked into it.”

  “Well,” Hayden said stiffly, “that's because I'm always worrying what will happen if I don't go along with you and Gideon.”

  “It's the same this time. Much as you put up a fight, you don't want to miss out.”

  Indignant, Hayden squared his shoulders and glowered at Reece. “Maybe that's not what I meant. Maybe I meant I'm always worried you and Gideon will go too far and get yourselves into trouble, or hurt, or worse without some voice of reason to hold you back. Maybe I'm wondering if that's a good enough reason for me to follow you across the Epimetheus now.”

  Reece chewed on that for a minute, peering up at the ceiling, his face troubled.

  Hayden reflexively felt guilty for snapping, though a small, unpleasant voice in the back of his head told him he shouldn't. He mentally shooed it away like a fly and began, “I'm sorry, that—”

  “You worry too much, Hayden. No,” Reece added when he saw Hayden opening his mouth, “you do. You've just admitted it. You say you always worry what will happen to me and Gid if you aren't there when we lose our heads. But when have we ever done that? Really done that?”

  “I know, I shouldn't have—”

  “You've been studying to be doctor for nine years. Well, I've been studying to be a captain. Here's what I have to show for it. Think of the captain as a kind of umbrella,” Reece mimed an umbrella by cupping his hands, “that all the responsibility rains on. The umbrella protects a base, keeps it safe. But sometimes that responsibility rains from the captain down onto someone else—a doctor, a mechanic, a navigator—and that's when they have to pick themselves up and do their part. That's all I'm asking of you. It doesn't mean you don't have a large part to play…it just means you're going to have to trust me. I don't think it's arrogant to admit I know what I'm good at and what I'm not. If I didn't think I could captain this mission, I wouldn't do it.” Leveling Hayden with a firm look, Reece asked, “Can you trust me on that?”

  Swallowing, Hayden nodded. It had never been a question of trust; he trusted Reece with his life. But it'd be dishonest of him not to admit that Reece was a creature of instinct and impulse, of feeling. Hayden liked structure, he liked facts, he liked having foresight. But then, he wasn't captain.

  “Good.” Reece suddenly grinned, drumming out a small beat on the edge of the table. He returned to sifting through his notes. “Then I see no reason you shouldn't be a part of the crew. I mean, if you can admit you want to be.”

  Hayden looked inward, considering. “I do,” he finally admitted, feeling guilty again. This time no inward voice came to his defense…maybe because he should feel guilty.

  “Another thing, Hayden. You've got to stop thinking something horrible is going to happen to us out there. It's bad for crew morale.”

  Hayden nodded again.

  All-too-familiar shouts abruptly cut into the pleasant silence, and a second later, Po and Nivy scampered into the room, looking shocked.

  “Ariel?” Reece guessed as someone shrieked like a banshee in the near distance. He nodded as if answering himself, circled the table, and slid the
door shut decisively.

  IV

  What the Birds Knew First

  Tomorrow. They were leaving tomorrow.

  Reece tucked his hands behind his head and watched dust motes stream through the streak of sunlight slipping between his cracked wooden shutters. Everything had come together seamlessly. Po said Aurelia was as ready to fly as she'd ever be without her missing pieces, Raft was paid, the ship was packed, and Hayden was coming along. If he wasn't the luckiest captain this side of the Epimetheus, he'd kiss Tutor Agnes square on the mouth.

  Hayden was already up and gone, visiting with his family. Sophie and Hugh had taken the news of his decision well; Reece had the feeling they, like him, saw Hayden as invaluable to this mission, whether or not he'd ever see it for himself.

  Yawning pleasantly, Reece rolled out of bed and landed in a pose in front of his mirror. Captain Reece Sheppard of The Aurelia. He looked like a lanky, messy-haired ginghoo not likely to be taken seriously by anybody. The only thing lending him any credence was the scar along his side, given to him the night of the masquerade. He touched the puckered skin with a frown, remembering the feeling of thinking he might die…regretting…

  Someone knocked at the door, and Reece confusedly looked over his shoulder. It wasn't much past dawn.

  “Who is it?” he croaked in his early-morning voice, picking up yesterday's shirt from the floor and forcing it over his head.

  The door opened in answer; the duke entered, looking amused. Today he wore an olive suit with a banded collar and carried a pair of black leather gloves that he tucked behind his belt as he said, “Sleeping in?”

  Reece gawked. “What are you doing here?” An awkward pause preceded his question. He never knew whether to call the duke Father or Sir, anymore.