Captain Gravenor’s Airship Equinox (Steampunk Smugglers)

by Hiestand, Heather

  Philadelphia yawned and stayed against the window wall of the cage while the twins performed their usual morning duties. When One caught sight of the brass hand on the bench as he was emptying the chamber pot he did a double take and nearly spilled the contents.

  “You have finished it?”

  “It hasn’t been tested,” Brecon said.

  “But it will be today?” said One, his eyes bright with avarice.

  Brecon realized the hand would be worth an incalculable amount of money. Without thinking, he took a step toward it just as the twin did. They stared each other down, One with the odiferous chamber pot in hand, him with his sharp iron hook poised at chest level.

  With a glance at his hook, One sneered and high-stepped out of the cage. He slammed the door shut and marched off with the chamber pot sloshing. Two trailed after his brother, leaving their food tray just out of reach.

  Philadelphia knuckled her eyes with an air of utter confusion.

  “Male posturing,” Brecon said by way of apology.

  “You mean stupidity,” she said. “Can you pull in the tray? We have nothing but an inch or two of water. I cannot think and starve at the same time.”

  “The only way it would work is if I could stab the hook into the tray and it’s too far for that.”

  “We’ll get the brass hand working then. With your reach it may just be doable.”

  He nodded, wishing his first act with the hand would be more noble than fetching a tray of porridge, but it couldn’t be helped. After he’d unbuttoned the cuff of his wretched, torn shirt and folded it up to his elbow, he undid the strap and then unlaced the cuff of the attachment. She had seen his stump before, but something had her swallowing hard when he revealed it.

  “Looks a bit sore this morning,” he said. “I shouldn’t sleep with the hook.”

  “You need ointment.”

  “I’ll be fine.” He grabbed the silk stump cover he had sewn himself and placed it on his arm, then she picked up the hand.

  “Your fingers are shaking.”

  Her chin jutted forward, erasing her slight underbite. “You are mistaken.”

  “I didn’t mean it as an insult.”

  “Hold out your wrist, underside up.” He did as instructed and she placed the open cuff around him. “Hold the hand steady, please.”

  Her fingers didn’t shake as she laced him up, using a braided ribbon she’d created from the silk. With every grommet that tightened, he felt a prick of pain as she embedded the hand more tightly into his wrist. At least the sharp connections were not deep, and she promised the blood would be minimal.

  “I made you a list of movements that work the hand.”

  “I saw it. I think I know them.”

  “Really?”

  “I can think of little more important to me than this,” he told her. “Now let me see what I can do.”

  He rocked his wrist back and forth, his skin aching as the silk rubbed against his tender flesh, the connections poking into his stump, but the fingers opened and flexed as designed. “I am amazed at your skill. It works perfectly the first time, and you’d never designed one until now.”

  She smiled, a happy curve of her lips he’d never seen before. “I love this work. I truly do.”

  The only reward he could think to offer was her cooling porridge, so he went to the bars and gingerly inserted his arm. It didn’t work right away, but when he lay down on the floor and stretched out, he could just manage with his brass fingers, using his good hand as leverage to press against the bars to gain that useful extra inch of reach. He pulled the tray forward, cursing when his fingers suddenly lost their grip.

  “Try again,” she suggested.

  “I can pull it in now, or you can.”

  “Use the hand. You need the practice.”

  Focusing so hard he felt sweat beading on his forehead despite the chill morning air, he flexed the fingers again and grasped the tray. After a tense moment when they didn’t respond, the fingers bent to the tray and he was able to pull it to the bars.

  “We’ll have to eat through the bars.” She coughed.

  “I can do that. It is a strange feeling, to have the capability without the sensation.”

  “I would imagine. But I hope you will gain some feeling in time.” She frowned, and he could see her mentally making adjustments.

  “It is wondrous, nonetheless,” he assured her. The pain was already subsiding.

  “I am glad.” She offered him that truly happy smile again.

  He didn’t return it, for now came the less pleasant part of the operation. First this woman had made him whole again, or as nearly whole as anyone not the Creator himself could, but now the torture would begin. She would learn to do the things to him that the Blockaders did to their enslaved men.

  *****

  Torture began after breakfast. Or so Philadelphia planned. She didn’t know quite how the Blockaders created the electric shocks.

  “You may think you are risking death, but I assure you we will avoid that in these experiments.”

  “How?” Brecon sat on the bench with his back against the wall. She hoped it would hold him up if he lost consciousness.

  He had wished aloud that they had an armchair.

  “I will ensure we only create a shock running up your one arm. If we don’t create a pathway to your heart, the current should not be lethal.”

  “Such a relief,” he murmured.

  “Furthermore, we will keep our tests short. That will protect you as well. And finally, we will do what we can to keep the voltage as low as possible.”

  “Excellent.”

  “Frequency is also an issue, but I am not sure how much time the captain will give us before she becomes impatient.” She rubbed absently at her chest.

  “I do not think that is a factor. She cannot feed us any more poorly than she does now without risking starvation and she needs your mind to function. Also, it is August and the temperature in here is unlikely to lower to the point we will freeze.”

  “But it does give us a timetable. We certainly do not want to still be here in November.”

  “Considering how fast you made the hand I doubt that would be a problem.”

  He had spoken too optimistically, Philadelphia realized four days later, when she had yet to create a shock that did more than give him a little zing. He reported that the hairs on his arm had risen, but she had observed his head of thick black hair. Not even the small hairs at the back of his neck had risen.

  “You could create more effect with a kiss,” he observed during one experiment.

  She fumbled the wires she was toying with. “Really, Mr. Gravenor.”

  “Come, we are past formality after all this time. We’ve been beasts in a cage for what, two weeks now?”

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered, knowing this was all her fault. If he hadn’t tried to rescue her, if they hadn’t lost the time to escape the BAE, he wouldn’t be here.

  “Something else would have gone wrong,” he said, as if reading her thoughts. “After all, I made the decisions that led me here, whether you became involved or not.”

  “I do not know how to create the effect,” she told him. “The BAE reportedly cause shocks through the air somehow. Your brass hand is working perfectly, but I can’t reproduce it.”

  “You need more data.”

  “I need more data,” she agreed.

  He stepped forward, and tucked a strand of blond hair behind her ear with his brass hand.

  She flinched.

  “No, don’t. I’ve become quite precise with my movements.”

  She stilled, allowing him to stroke her cheek with his slender brass fingers. She could hear the whirring of the motor and pulleys inside. Standing entranced by the proximity they shared, an unusual closeness as they had been careful to give each other space during their ordeal, she didn’t move until she heard boots on the stairs, the loud clatter of the twins and a lighter boot as well. Mindful of the edges of the f
iled brass fingernails of the hand, she stepped back and turned.

  Captain Red Kite swept into the room, her scarlet frock coat billowing around her tall but stocky body, her brothers in step behind her.

  “I will hear your progress,” she announced.

  “Open the door,” Brecon suggested.

  Philadelphia admired his bravery. He still insisted on being considered an honest free trader, member of the crew, not a criminal tarred by association with a Hardcastle. She wished he’d never seen her that day. But no, for the first time, her heart rebelled at that notion. She wasn’t sorry. Not anymore. His handsome face had lost six months of pain lines and disappointment when she had first strapped the brass hand to his stump. She had given him his manhood back, in his eyes, at least. From her point of view, the man she’d first seen had been every bit as virile as the man with the automac hand who stood a little in front of her, guarding her.

  The captain attempted to stare her champion down, but after a tense two minutes, she rolled her eyes and gestured to the twins. One opened the door. Two grabbed Brecon’s arm and tugged him to the captain.

  “Can you open it, grasp with it?” she asked, voice taut with avarice.

  Brecon demonstrated. “The lady is a genius. Remember she didn’t design the original hand, merely the invention that inspired it.”

  The captain didn’t bother to glance up. “And has she learned its secrets? Has she been able to electrocute you?”

  “The light isn’t flashing red,” Two observed. “I want to see you get shocked.”

  “Let’s have a demonstration,” the captain suggested.

  Brecon flushed with anger. Philadelphia put a hand on his arm and felt the muscles bunch, though he had the self control not to make a fist with his human hand.

  “I cannot reproduce the airborne electrocution component,” she said. “Not so far. It was not part of my work. Have you ever seen a Blockader brass hand? We do not know if it even looks like mine. I’ve only seen them from a distance.”

  The captain raised an eyebrow. Her face became a mask which Philadelphia could not read. “You need an example?”

  “My work was mostly mechanical and electrical in nature. It was based on actual contact. Whatever causes the electrocution with the brass hand is done through the air.”

  “The air?”

  “Yes. My understanding from stories Mr. Gravenor has heard is that the hand starts to flash if the enslaved crew member is too far from the airship. I would assume the shock reaches the battery in the hand through the air somehow.”

  “Is that possible?”

  “I suspect they are using the newly discovered aetherial component of air.”

  “Aetherial?”

  “Yes, or aether. I read a paper on it once. It is assumed that aether particles can be charged somehow, but I’ve never worked in that field. The BAE must have someone on staff who has, or they’ve stolen more technology from somewhere.”

  The captain regarded her for a moment, then the nostrils at the end of her short pug nose flared. “Expect an original brass hand tomorrow, then.”

  Philadelphia inclined her head.

  “One,” said the captain, as she strode away. “Bring our friends a good mutton stew tonight for dinner. And a second cot.”

  When the woman was gone Philadelphia permitted herself a smile. Success! But Brecon wore a worried frown.

  “Where,” he asked, “are they going to get a brass hand? If they had one already they’d have given it to you.”

  ~*~

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Brecon woke to the sound of a groan somewhere outside the cage.

  “Oh good, you’re awake.”

  That voice he recognized. One. Brecon blinked and wiped the sleep from his eyes. He heard the key inserting into the lock and the cage opening.

  “The captain said to treat you better now, so I didn’t want to kick you awake and risk her wrath.”

  Brecon started to stretch, then thought better of exposing vulnerable bits to One’s boots. He curled into a half-moon and found the floor with his stocking-covered feet. His first night of sleep on the cot had him more rested than he’d been since he’d landed in the cage.

  He heard a groan again and this time was able to focus on the noise. Blast it.

  In front of him lay the body of a man, his brass hand obvious as it blocked his face. Also obvious was the wound on his arm. Then he rolled onto his back and Brecon saw he had been gut shot, the kind of wound that was fatal, though it might take hours for him to die.

  He gritted his teeth against the smell of lacerated bowel. “Where did you get him?”

  One shrugged. “We had ourselves a little raid in Cardiff last night.”

  “Killing a BAE officer is one thing, but this man is an enslaved crewman.”

  “You needed a Brass Hand.” One’s shoulders crept up defensively. “We took the oldest one.”

  Brecon could see silver strands in the man’s hair, but that didn’t mean much, considering the hard life he must have led. “Is there anything to be done?”

  “He’s done for,” One said. “Does she need to see it before the bloke dies?”

  Brecon heard a rustle of skirts then Philadelphia appeared at his side, in front of the bars. She pressed a filthy handkerchief to her face and blinked hard.

  “I do not know what I need to see,” she said. “Nothing happened to the hand as you took him off the airship?”

  “It blinked red as we took him, but we moved fast and sped off as soon as we had him aboard. The blinking stopped once we were under way.”

  “The light is certainly related to the distance from some power source,” she said.

  Her voice was calm, in what Brecon privately called her scientist mode. How could she act so with a dying man in front of her?

  “Isn’t there anything to be done?” he asked. “Could we give him some water, laudanum?”

  One lifted the man with his boot. The crewman flopped onto his back bonelessly when he removed his boot. “No need to trouble yourself. He is dead now.”

  Brecon heard a little gagging sound from Philadelphia and slid his gaze to the side. Now he saw the faint trembling in the lady’s limbs, knew she was fighting hard for control. No, she wasn’t so indifferent after all.

  Escape. The word came seriously for the first time in days. They had to get out of here. The captain had never been so ruthless about human life before. She had turned some kind of corner in her head, gone too far.

  “Do you want me to detach the hand?” One asked.

  Brecon saw scientific curiosity fight against revulsion of the smell of the body. But the fevered light slowly left her eyes.

  “Can you bring the Brass Hand up close to the cage, please, and unstrap the hand slowly so I can see how it attaches?”

  One nodded and bent to his task. Philadelphia muttered something unintelligible as he sliced up the sleeve covering the top of the brass hand and detached the thing.

  Brecon didn’t see much difference between the dead man’s hand and his, though this version did have a strap around the elbow joint. That may have been because the man’s amputation was higher than his was. He wondered if the man had lost his hand in some other way than a Blockader amputation given the placement, but he’d never know.

  One thrust the hand at Brecon. He let it fall rather than touch it.

  “Do you need the body?” One asked gruffly.

  Philadelphia sighed. “I need to know if he has any mechanical contraptions on his person.”

  One sniffed. “I’ll look.”

  She picked up the hand from where it rested on the ground and brushed off a piece of straw. Brecon saw none of the light of scientific excitement in her eyes, only sadness that this man had died, and fear. He gripped her shoulder with his hands, tried to communicate solidarity with his gaze.

  She stared back at him, cradling the brass hand as if it were a babe. What was she trying to communicate to him? Trust, maybe. That was
what he read in her eyes. She trusted him to get her out of this horrible place.

  One dropped a dirty dagger to the floor. “That is the only bit of metal I found,” he reported.

  “Is it an ordinary knife? It could be disguised,” Brecon suggested.

  One snorted. “Like I’d hand you a weapon.” He flipped it over with his boot. “Looks like any other to me.”

  “Take it,” Philadelphia said. “And please, take him before he spoils.”

  “You don’t want to reanimate him?” Two poked at the dead man’s ribs. “Keep him as a servant?”

  Philadelphia’s face went green. She thrust the hand at Brecon and ran to the back of the cell, resting her head against cool stone.

  “Why taunt her?” he demanded. “She’s done nothing to you.”

  One pressed his lips together. “The Blockaders took our little brother, Gravenor. He tried to escape, of course. So he got a brass hand. It killed him when he tried to escape again. He must have been one of the first, didn’t know what it was capable of doing to him. We only found out because one of the men heard an officer boasting about how many had died during a mutiny. Just drinking in a pub in Cardiff, boasting about dead men, his own countrymen.”

  “How did they know for sure it was your brother?”

  “He had a tattoo, and a lazy eye.” One rubbed his nose. “Men kept asking him for details for just that purpose, in case they could figure out who got killed.”

  “I am sorry for the death. But it isn’t Miss Hardcastle’s fault. She didn’t apply her inventions to the purpose they have been used for by the Blockaders.”

  “But she invented them just the same. She’ll never be a Red Kite. You wonder why the captain is so hard on her, well now you know. If you sympathize with her too much, you’ll ruin your chances too, Gravenor. That lady will be the death of you, just like she was for my brother.” One turned and grabbed one of the dead man’s legs and started tugging.

  Two came down the stairway and helped, taking the corpse’s shoulders. They dragged the body to the wall. Brecon saw a flash of light as they opened a recessed door he hadn’t noticed before, as the room faded into murkiness at that point. They rolled the body out. A fat trail of blood pointed to the door, as if to illuminate the path there.