Skyborn

by Sinéad O'Hart

  “I’m not—” Bastjan began, but his words were cut off by the shriek of a whistle nearby, and the next thing he knew, the train had started to move.

  Alice stuck her head out of a compartment door. “In here,” she whispered, and Bastjan hurried after her. Crake, looking like a sardine in a tin, followed as quickly as he could, his huge shoulders almost level with the carriage roof.

  They slipped into the empty compartment. Crake’s bulk kept the children from being seen from the corridor and the drape of his oversized coat hid Wares, who was still in his bag tucked beneath Alice’s legs.

  “Yer bein’ followed,” Bastjan told Alice, as soon as he’d taken his seat. Alice fixed her gaze on the view outside the train. “Didja hear me? I said—”

  “They’re Tunnellers,” Alice said, without looking around. “Monty’s the kid with the hat. The girl’s called Pork-pie, as that’s all she ever wants to eat. They spotted me in the underground passage.”

  “The whistle,” Bastjan said, remembering. “It was a signal.”

  Alice turned to him, her eyes heavy. “They know I’m on board. There’ll be no getting away from them at the other end.”

  “What’re they goin’ to do?”

  “They’ll just follow me, probably. Word will be with Mrs P as soon as the train pulls in that I’m in London.”

  “You still haven’t said why she’s lookin’ for you,” Bastjan said.

  Alice grimaced. “I stole from her,” she said. “I showed you, when we met. Some coins and a ring. Nothing much, but Mrs P doesn’t like thieves unless they’re working for her.” She sighed. “I only meant to take enough to get away,” she continued, in a quiet voice. “Just enough to vanish.”

  Bastjan nodded. “An’ instead, you ended up with us,” he said. “Worse luck, eh.”

  “The worst,” Alice agreed, but her eyes shone.

  “I’m glad you’re ’ere, anyway,” Bastjan said. “Ain’t nobody I’d rather ’ave on this quest than you an’ Wares.” Crake cleared his throat, and Bastjan threw him a grin. The big man returned the smile. “An’ you too, o’ course,” Bastjan said.

  “I think I’d like someone who knew where they were going,” Alice said, with a laugh. “But I’m sure the airship station won’t be hard to find. I just hope we get there in time.” Her smile faded. “And that we’re quick enough to stay clear of Monty and Pork-pie.”

  “An’, jus’ so you know, I ain’t never goin’ to give you up,” Bastjan said, and Alice’s smile reappeared.

  They continued in silence for a few miles, the clack-clack of the train’s progress broken only by Wares’s contented snoring from the floor. Then the train began to slow. Alice nudged Bastjan.

  “The Barrier’s coming up,” she said. “It’s a big circular dam around the city, built to keep the water out. London would be swimming without it.”

  Soon the massive iron-and-steel construction loomed into view, its foundations lost in sparkling water and the lower half of its thick metal wall tinged green by old floods. The train made for a gap in the Barrier’s upper half and Bastjan held his breath as they thundered through. The wall rose unimaginably high above their heads and then it was gone.

  Before long, they were pulling into a vast train station, the roof arching overhead like a forest of glass and iron.

  “Come on,” Alice said, pulling herself down from her seat. “Let’s try to get out of here before the others spot us.” She carefully slung the bag, with its drowsy dog, over her shoulder. Crake left the compartment first, checking the corridor before the children emerged.

  The train rocked slowly on its wheels as it drew to a halt, and they disembarked through clouds of steam and noise into the bustle of a station many times larger, and busier, than the one they’d left behind. Bastjan hurried after Alice as she wove her way towards the turnstiles. Joining her in the queue, he glanced back one last time at the train.

  A cloud of steam blew aside to reveal Monty. He was scanning the crowd warily, his mouth drawn tight. In the same second as Bastjan spotted him, the boy’s gaze landed on Bastjan’s face and his dark eyes widened in recognition. Bastjan turned to Alice, but she’d seen him too.

  “This way,” Alice gasped, once they were through the turnstile, pulling them towards a side door. They followed the flow of people out on to the pavement, keeping their eyes peeled for Tunnellers, and then from the bag on Alice’s shoulder Wares gave an angry bark.

  “Lady!” came a voice, and Alice turned to face the rail-thin boy in his battered top hat. He was tall enough for his trousers to flap around his skinny ankles and his coat was threadbare.

  “Get away from me, Monty,” Alice said, through a snarl. The boy put his hands up in a gesture of peace.

  “Pork-pie’s already on ’er way to Mrs P,” Monty said. “I couldn’t stop ’er. She was listenin’ outside yer compartment door. Said she ’eard you talkin’ about the airship station. That where you’re goin’?”

  Alice tightened her lips. The boy looked up at Crake and down at Bastjan, his face impassive.

  “Look,” Monty continued. “It’s none o’ my business. But if that’s where you’re headin’, the sooner you get there, the better.”

  Alice took in a slow breath. “Thanks, Monty,” she said, after a moment.

  “Get the tram,” he said. “Nearest stop’s round the corner. Goes as far as Limehouse, an’ from there you’ll be on foot. But it’s the quickest way from ’ere.”

  Without another word, Monty disappeared into the crowd. Turning the corner, Bastjan, Crake and Alice saw a tram approaching the stop and they ran for it. Alice hugged the bag containing Wares close as they hopped aboard, and she and Crake pooled the last of their coins, including those she’d stolen from Mrs P, to pay for three tickets. The children stood, mostly hidden beneath Crake’s coat, as the tram ground its way through the streets, clanging its bell every few yards to clear the tracks. Eventually it turned slowly round a corner and Bastjan saw the glint of sunlight on water, somewhere beyond the rows of tall, narrow buildings.

  “Lime’ouse!” called the conductor and the tram came to a juddering stop. “All for Lime’ouse, Isle o’ Dogs, Docklands, an’ City Airship Station. Take yer baggage, mind ’ow you go.”

  Crake stepped down from the tram and reached up to lift Alice and Wares down in one arm, and Bastjan in the other. As the tram clanged away, they paused to look around. The river snaked off to their right, between stacks of tall buildings and ribbons of unknown streets. A few hundred yards away, hazy with distance, a ship was making its way into port.

  “Look,” Alice said, pointing. Near the water’s edge, a tall glass-and-metal structure rose into the sky, like a tower made of windows. An airship with a long oval balloon was approaching it, coming into dock. Its anchor rope trailed beneath it, ready to be tied off. “That’s got to be the airship station.”

  Crake nodded to the children, and they began to weave their way through the warren of warehouses and mills, trying to keep the airship tower in view. Finally they turned a corner into a street filled with horse-drawn carriages and carts piled high with all manner of things, the air bursting with noise and movement. Behind a wall on the street’s far side rose a prickle-pointed forest of ships’ masts, their rigging festooned with flags, and at the end of the street was a wide gateway.

  “City Dock,” Alice read, looking at the sign above the gate. In smaller letters beneath, it said ‘To airship terminal’.

  Dodging crowds, carts and horses, they passed through the gate. Ships bobbed in the water, like giants looking down on the world below, their prows sticking out like swords. All along the quayside were men clad in strange weatherproof clothes and hordes of haggling people wanting to buy their fresh fish. And at the end of the dock were three massive cranes, clanking and creaking as they lifted crates to and fro. From all around there was noise – voices and shouting, the grind and crack of machinery, the shriek of seagulls, the slap and ebb of the river.

 
Suddenly, Bastjan felt Alice go stiff as a statue.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked. Alice’s eyes were fixed, her face pale as milk. The red of her birthmark stood out even through the make-up. He followed her gaze, searching through the crowd, and then, like oil pushing aside the water in its path, a woman came into view.

  She was dangerously colourful, her face like old bone and her fuchsia-and-blackberry-hued hair piled on her head in a messy tangle held together with a filthy blue ribbon. Her lips and cheeks were painted red and her eyebrows were swirled on to her forehead with thin black lines, like strange handwriting. She wore a long silk robe, its ends ragged and stained. It had surely been bright once, but was now mostly thin and grey. Her lower arms were bare; they were strong-looking, her hands accustomed to hard work.

  As Bastjan watched, a boy ran up to her and handed her something too small to see, which disappeared into her voluminous robe without trace. The woman spoke to the child, her teeth looking yellow in her unnaturally white face. The boy hesitated for a moment and the woman bared her discoloured teeth. The child ran.

  Bastjan turned to Alice, knowing what she was about to say. “There she is,” the girl whispered, never taking her eyes off Mrs Palmer for a moment.

  Ada Palmer’s gaze flicked to Alice’s face and she smiled. It was a deeply unpleasant thing to witness, like watching a crack forming on the surface of a frozen lake.

  Crake moved in front of Alice, blocking her from Mrs P’s view, but the girl gave an irritated tsk. Tucking her hair behind her ears, Alice stepped around him.

  “What’re you doin’?” Bastjan hissed. “We got to get away!”

  “There’s no point,” Alice said. “She’s seen me. And this place is packed with Tunnellers. We wouldn’t get ten yards, if we tried to run.” She licked her lips. “I’ve got an idea.”

  “But—” Bastjan began. Alice only quickened her pace.

  “Well, now, if it isn’t Lady Patten,” Ada Palmer said, grinning at Alice with her yellow teeth. “Been looking for you, I have. Got something of mine, en’tcha?” She chuckled mirthlessly. “Not that it really matters what you stole. What you’re worth is far more important now. Your old grandad has the bloodhounds out for ya, don’tcha know?”

  “I am not going back to that man,” Alice said between clenched teeth.

  “Thing is,” Ada Palmer said, “when you’re a child, you don’t really have a choice. Do ya?” She stood in front of Alice and reached out one long pale arm, extending her calloused, nail-bitten hand to prod Alice under the chin. “Look at me, little chick,” she instructed. “Don’t be rude to dear ol’ Mrs P.”

  “Let’s make a deal,” Alice said. There was the barest quiver in her voice. “Let my friends go. Then you may turn me in for the reward money.”

  Behind Alice, Bastjan exchanged glances with Crake, his eyes wide with shock.

  Mrs Palmer smiled. “I en’t got the faintest interest in yer friends, Lady Patten. They can go to Hades an’ back, fer all I care.”

  “This is yer plan?” Bastjan said, but Alice ignored him. He assessed his surroundings. The Tunnellers lurked in a semicircle, keeping them hemmed in. The quay’s edge was close; the sucking darkness of the water rose and fell like the beating of a heart a few feet from his boots. He looked up at the bulk of the ship that was moored there, close enough to touch. A thick rope tied the ship to a bollard on the shore and its bowsprit stuck out over the heads of Mrs P and her gang, bobbing gently with the tide.

  Then Crake took a step forwards and Ada Palmer shouted something – a short, sharp word of command. Her Tunnellers leaped to obey. Crake cried out a warning, but his words were lost beneath a wave of noise as he was besieged by at least a dozen screaming members of Ada Palmer’s gang. They swung from his beard, pulling fistfuls of his hair, and as soon as Crake managed to loosen the grip of one child, as gently as he could, three more had limpeted themselves to him.

  Bastjan ducked as hands made to grab him. He ran for the bollard, jumping on to it before leaping for the rope, climbing up it from underneath with his hands and knees. Reaching the top, he swung on to the bowsprit. He sized up its movement, getting the feel for the up-and-down rhythm of the ship, and then he began to walk along it, his arms held wide for balance.

  On the quayside, Mrs Palmer reached out to grab Alice by the arm. Move! Bastjan told himself. Taking the last few steps at a run, he launched himself off the end of the bowsprit, tucking neatly into a human cannonball in midair. At the last second he stretched out his body, his arms and legs as wide as they could go.

  He landed on Ada Palmer’s back with the force of an elephant’s kick. The woman let out a muffled shout as she sprawled, skidding along the rough, muddy dock and landing with her face in a puddle. Bastjan hoped it contained something nastier than just rainwater.

  Ada Palmer lifted her head. Her white make-up had run, revealing her rather redder skin beneath, and her bloodshot eyes locked on to Bastjan’s.

  He tried to find Alice in the crowd. “Run!” he gasped, doing his best to get to his feet. The next thing he knew, he felt Alice’s hands beneath his armpits, helping him up.

  Crake was flinging children off, his job made much easier by the fact that most of them were now too busy making good their own escape, or stopping to laugh at Mrs P. Alice and Bastjan hurried towards him. Just before they reached the strongman, Alice flung the bag down from her shoulder and pulled it open.

  “You think you’re going to get away with this?” Ada Palmer shrieked, heaving herself up off the ground. Her robe was dripping with water and mud, and she’d lost a shoe. Her colourful hair had fallen askew and her long teeth were set in a fearful grimace.

  At a whistle from Alice, Wares burst free from the bag and launched himself at Mrs P. With a growl, he sank his teeth into the flesh of her arm. In her desperation to loosen the dog’s clamping jaws, she began to spin in circles, shouting at the top of her voice. Nobody came to help her. Instead, the children seemed to urge the dog on.

  Alice whistled again and Wares dropped away from Mrs Palmer. Bastjan could see that the worst of the damage had been done to her robe, which was now in tatters, but the woman yelled as though she’d been run through with a spear. Turning blindly to run away, she promptly tripped right over the ship’s mooring rope. She teetered on the edge of the quay, before tumbling into the water below.

  A raucous cheer rose from the surrounding children and Wares leaped into Alice’s outstretched arms, licking her face in delight.

  “I think that’ll be our cue to get out of here,” Crake muttered, herding Alice and Bastjan away from the quayside. Bastjan couldn’t help one last look back and caught sight of Ada Palmer’s bedraggled head, her wig lost to the water, coming up over the wall.

  “She never liked you, did she, boy,” Alice said, snuggling her nose against Wares’s as they hurried away into the crowd.

  “C’mon,” Bastjan said. “We got to find the entrance to the airship station – an’ fast.”

  “Airship station, you say,” came a voice. Bastjan turned to see a familiar face, black hair curling out through a battered top hat.

  “Monty,” Alice said. “You’re like a bad penny.”

  The boy gave a quick bow. “A penny’s a penny, Lady.” He nodded in the direction they were going. “The airships leave from the far end of the quay. You can’t get through the gate unless you’ve got a ticket, but I know a way to sneak round it without bein’ caught.”

  “Why would you help us?” Bastjan said. “Weren’t you tryin’ to tail us, back at the train?”

  Monty shrugged. “Anythin’ that ends up with Mrs P gettin’ chucked in the river is good, in my book,” he said. “Let’s hope she’ll be too hoppin’ mad to miss me for a bit. Anyway –” he turned to look over his shoulder – “we’d better move or she’ll be on us. This way.”

  The others did their best to keep up as the boy flitted through the crowd. Finally, they reached a wall, slick with green algae and worn smoo
th by the sea.

  “What?” Alice said. “Monty, if this is a trick—”

  “Just come on!” Keeping low, Monty crept along until he reached a large seawater drain cut into the base of the wall. “What you waiting for?” he said, ducking inside.

  Alice and Bastjan followed, their feet splashing in the thin stream of water that ran down the middle of the tunnel. Crake pushed himself in like a cork squeezing into the neck of a bottle, bending almost double as he forced his way through. At the far end of the short tunnel daylight was shining through the gaps in an iron gate.

  Then something caught Bastjan’s eye. “Hey!” he shouted. A pile of clothes and rubbish at the tunnel’s far end had just sprouted a head – one with dark eyes and a cloud of black hair.

  “Querido!” came a voice.

  Bastjan dashed forwards, pushing past Monty to throw himself into Ana’s arms. “Cuidado! Careful, please. Carmen is hurt.” Bastjan stepped back immediately and Carmen smiled wearily up at him from a makeshift bed on the tunnel floor.

  “It’s yourselves!” Crake said, his voice filling the tunnel. “What’re ye doin’ here?”

  “They found us,” Ana told him. “Quinn and his cronies. They saw us as we tried to climb up the balloon, right after we put a hole in one of the steam ducts. They chased Carmen until she fell.”

  “I will be all right, Mr Crake,” Carmen put in, with a one-shouldered shrug. “A sprained ankle. It is nothing.”

  “I’ll break every ankle he owns,” Crake growled.

  “Sorry,” said Monty. “But what’s goin’ on?”

  Alice explained the situation as briefly as she could, though Monty’s face told her he hadn’t followed the half of it. “And Ana and Carmen came ahead of us, to try to sabotage the airship and delay it long enough to—”

  From beyond the gate came a noise like the loudest hum in the world, the sound of a machine kicking into life.

  Ana and the children, with Crake at their backs, raced towards the gate and peered out across the expanse of quay that stretched beyond the tunnel. There was only one airship moored there, but straightaway Bastjan knew it had to be the right one.