Faster Than Falling: The Skylighter Adventures

by Nathan Van Coops

  The captain lapsed into silence as Samra steered them through the dark.

  Samra glanced over twice before finally opening her mouth. “My dad wanted to move us away from the Mother so he could be a chief of his own globe. I think he wanted it more than anything.”

  “Chief? Would that make you some sort of princess?”

  “No. It just means I’d be stuck playing with Willis Mintz like a little kid. He’s my neighbor Khloe’s little brother.” She frowned. “And it means someday they’d probably want me to marry him.”

  “Ah. I see.” The captain pointed toward the moonlit horizon. “Little more to the left. We want to follow that tree line south.”

  Samra concentrated on making the correction.

  Captain Savage picked up one of the charts next to her. It was only partially illustrated. The navigator had been sketching in new details, but most of the sheet was still blank. “I guess it’s a good thing you ended up with us then. Out here in the wilds, we don’t have to care what our parents say. As an airship pilot you could spend time with whomever you please. Do a good job, you’d even get paid. Maybe buy your own ship someday like I am.”

  “It’s not yours yet?”

  “Nearly,” the captain replied. “We get back to port, I’ll sell this load to the pod dealers and have enough to provision the ship for one more run. Should be enough to pay the crew, too. One more good load and I’ll be able to pay off the loan.”

  Samra brushed her fingertips across the power levers. She tried to imagine what Kip and Rufus would say if they found out she’d gotten to be an airship pilot. Maybe when she got back to the patch, she could get them positions too, and they’d go off and have grand adventures together.

  But that was impossible.

  The raiders had attacked the patch. Joining them would be traitorous, wouldn’t it?

  She studied the captain. “You said my people attacked you first, but I don’t believe you.”

  Captain Savage nodded. “Yeah. I didn’t think you did.” She leaned over and looked Samra in the eye. “Listen, I’m not going to try to con you, okay? We usually go after anything that floats up here and sometimes that involves taking things from other people. We weren’t out to take your house specifically, or attack your people. We didn’t know anyone was onboard that pod of yours when we took it, but even if we did, it wouldn’t have mattered much. We needed the pods. I know that might make us seem like your enemy,” the captain continued. “But it wasn’t personal. It’s just life.”

  Samra swallowed once and looked back out the window.

  “If it makes any difference, that was before I knew what your people were really like,” Captain Savage said. “Where I come from, people consider sky folk to be another variety of wild animals. I didn’t know we’d be attacking someone like you. That’s the truth.”

  “And now that you know?” Samra asked.

  “Well, now I know you are something different. And we were wrong,” Captain Savage said. “And if there’s a way to work something out with your people—some way we could trade for those globes without stealing them, then I think that would be better for everybody. Nobody should need to get hurt.”

  “Why do your people want them? Don’t you already have enough to fly with?” Samra asked.

  “Sure. We can keep the fleet afloat easy enough with the little pods we find floating around, especially up here in the north, but down in the Thunderlands, pickings are getting slim. They’ve harvested most of the decent pods already, and people always need more.”

  “Why?”

  “To keep their homes from falling down some ghastly hole, mostly. You sky people have it easy. You float around all day and never have to worry about setting your foot on the wrong patch of ground or disappearing into a crevice. Sinkholes are so bad in some places, you can fall for a thousand feet before you finally go splat. Down south we’ve got underground rivers and shifting sand lakes. They swallow up whole villages while people are asleep in their beds. Not a fun way to wake up.”

  Samra had seen sinkholes from the patch. In the east, there were some that were miles wide with glittering lakes at the bottom. From the Heights, she’d always thought they were pretty. She’d seen the shifting sand lakes, too, but hadn’t thought much about what it would be like to live near one.

  “Why don’t you just move?” Samra asked. “Go somewhere where they don’t have sinkholes. People in Womble live on the ground and their town hasn’t been swallowed up.”

  “Trust me, I’ve thought about it. Plenty of folks down south wouldn’t mind finding a stable mountain for a change. But my father won’t leave the desert,” Captain Savage replied. “So his people won’t either. He’s looking for something out there, and he’s not going to leave till he finds it.” She swung her leg back down from the desk and rested both feet on the floor. “So that means we still need lift pods. And the bigger the better.”

  She leaned over and rested her elbows on her knees, leveling her stare at Samra. “If you can help me get in good with this patch of yours, I could make it worth your while. You could be the key to a whole new era of trade. Those big globes of yours are worth a lot of money where I come from. You play your cards right, work with me a little on this, you might even end up rich.”

  Samra searched the captain’s face. “I don’t want to do anything to hurt the patch. I have friends there. My parents live there.” The thought of her father’s angry glare came back to her, as he stood embarrassed on the stage. Then she remembered Kaleb and the knife she had threatened him with. Maybe the high council wouldn’t even let her back on the patch at all. Maybe they’d get one look at her aboard the raider ship and banish her forever. Would she even be allowed back?

  “You want to see your friends and family. But you want your freedom, too. I can read it on your face.” Captain Savage leaned closer. “It’s one thing to be loyal, but you don’t want to be just a pawn in someone else’s chess game.”

  “What’s a pawn?”

  “It’s someone always getting sacrificed for the greater good, and never getting any choice in the matter. It’s an old game with old rules. The piece you want to be is the queen. The queen does what she wants and controls the game.”

  “Are you a queen?” Samra asked.

  The captain brushed a strand of hair away from her face and let her gaze drift out the front window. “Not yet.”

  At that moment a dark mass swooped down from above and alighted on the prow. The creature had wide, flapping bat wings but its body was much closer to that of a bird. Its beaked head swung from side to side as it stretched its wings and searched the bow. Its taloned feet scraped the deck and it waddled its way toward the glass of the cockpit.

  Captain Savage stood and calmly fastened the locks back onto the controls. “Go to bed, Samra Coley. We’ll talk again later. You’re relieved of duty for the night.” Samra glanced out the window at the creature pacing the bow.

  “I don’t have to . . .”

  “This one I can handle,” the captain replied.

  Samra moved to the door, and by the time she got there, the captain had picked up her whip and opened the hatch to the bow walk. Samra stood in the interior doorway and watched the captain work her way around the front of the ship.

  The nightbeast turned and faced the new threat, cawing hungrily in her direction. The beast took two steps forward and was partway to the third when the whip moved. It was almost too fast for Samra to see. The striped lash ripped away fur from the creature’s body and it shuddered. The beast recoiled a step, studied its adversary, and extended one wing. The whip flashed again and this time the creature made up its mind, extending its other wing and spinning around before launching itself into the black.

  Samra waited for the captain to turn around, but she didn’t. She took a few more steps instead and took up the position the beast had vacated. The same position Samra herself had previously occupied, staring at the horizon.

  Samra finally conceded her n
eed for sleep and trudged back through the ship to her hammock in the hold. The room was stuffy with hot breath and snoring. It took her a while to get comfortable in her hammock, strung up in the position last belonging to the dead man whose spot she’d taken. As she drifted off to sleep, she wondered if the captain was still outside, one woman against the elements. She assumed that she’d come back in by now, but part of her could see her in her imagination, still straddling the bow and facing off against the night.

  Samra thought that whatever lay ahead, the night would lose.

  23

  CHANE THE KNOWER

  Atlas couldn’t sleep. He knew he ought to, but his mind wouldn’t let him. He blamed it on the smell.

  The grove of the tree people was musty and dank. The canopy was a blanket, smothering the air and pressing it down on them. He’d spotted several worms the size of his finger in the floor of dead moss and desiccated leaves. To make matters worse, there was a hole. It was only five inches in diameter and at least three feet away from where he was lying, but he’d made the mistake of noticing it. He’d made a further mistake by looking down it.

  They were not on the ground. They weren’t even close. There were things glowing in the night down that deep dark hole that were either very small or very far away. He knew which one.

  This wasn’t how it was supposed to be.

  Atlas didn’t mind heights. At least he didn’t mind them when he was flying above them. But he ought to be happily ensconced in the Sun Dragon, sleeping in the pilot seat, secure in the comfort of the airship’s lift bags. He ought to be safe in the cockpit with Fledge for company, his harpoons for protection, and the glow of his lanterns for cheer.

  He didn’t know where the cliff fox was now. He didn’t even know where the Sun Dragon was. This was all wrong.

  The sky boy was sleeping. Kip.

  Atlas studied the huddled figure of the Skylighter curled against the base of one of the trees. His skin glowed, ever so faintly, as he breathed. Something inside the boy was reacting to the dense air here, even as he slept. It left beads of moisture on his forehead. He was hot.

  Atlas pulled his jacket a little tighter around himself and wondered how that could be possible. If anything, the damp and dank of this grove seemed to be robbing him of all his warmth. The few tree people he could make out in the dim light didn’t seem concerned with the damp either. Perhaps their hairy coats kept them warm and insulated enough in the night. Atlas couldn’t imagine what it would be like to live this way. Especially to choose it.

  He let his eyes wander to the area where he had last seen the knower. The old man had limped his way back to a grotto at the far side of the grove. It was treacherous footing, but the man had managed it. At least he hadn’t fallen through the floor.

  Beyond the distant branches, light flickered against a backdrop of vines. A fire? Perhaps the old man was cooking something.

  Tree people apparently didn’t believe in dinnertime. While the creatures had variously disappeared into the canopy and come back munching fruits or other edibles they’d found, no one had offered anything to Atlas. Every man or woman for themselves, it seemed.

  Atlas was no longer bound, but he still felt like a prisoner. Every time he shifted in place or rolled over, it was with eyes on his back. Still, the lure of the fire was strong, and he felt it was worth investigating.

  He carefully got to his feet. Somewhere in the darkness to his left, a creature grunted. He waited, but when nothing else came of it, he took a few cautious steps. He crossed the grove slowly, casually. He wasn’t running anywhere. Not trying to escape.

  He scanned the canopy, but a few more grunts were his only opposition. The creatures in the trees let him continue.

  Atlas glanced back to where Kipling was sleeping. The Skylighter hadn’t taken the invitation to trade with the knower yet. Despite Atlas’s encouragement, he seemed reluctant to share any information about his patch. It was an obvious choice as far as Atlas was concerned. Trade some general knowledge on Skylighter life for some actually useful and needed information about his ship and their route? The deal couldn’t get any better than that. Finding the Sun Dragon was paramount. Every moment they wasted here, Enzo and his captors were getting farther away. When the sun came up, they’d need to be in pursuit.

  If that meant letting this knower learn what he needed about Skylighter life, then Atlas could help with that. He knew plenty from what Enzo had told him. He’d simply have to take matters into his own hands.

  Atlas crept up to the tree that the knower had turned into a sort of lean-to shack. The front face of the abode was a latticework of branches woven together and covered with wide, slick leaves. The top arched inward and connected to the trunk of the air tree. From this makeshift roof a rolled-up bit of metal protruded at an angle and acted as a chimney. Smoke and the occasional spark drifted out the top and wafted lazily into the air, only to settle back down around the tree in a hazy cloud. The entire situation seemed to Atlas like a disaster waiting to happen, but the smell issuing from the chimney along with the smoke made him think that perhaps the risk was worth it.

  “Come on in. I’ve got plenty to spare.”

  The voice came from the gap at the side of the lean-to. Atlas had thought himself stealthy as he approached, but apparently his presence was obvious enough. He ducked his head and peered into the side of the knower’s space. The man was seated cross-legged on a cushion, facing a wide, shallow metal bowl. Inside the bowl a little fire was burning, and above the fire a plucked bird was roasting on a spit.

  “Tree grouse,” the man said. “With a bit of herb seasoning and sea salt. It’d be better with a coat of pepper sauce, but I’m all out. But it beats chewing roots and berries like the tree folk. I’ll bet you’re hungry.”

  Atlas had been hungry before, but in the close proximity of this new delicacy, he felt famished.

  “Sit down before you fall down,” the man said, and tossed Atlas a cushion from the little pile of belongings on the far side of the lean-to. In the corner, the man had organized the remainder of his goods. There was a tall travel pack, some saddlebags, and a pile of miscellaneous sacks and boxes. The boxes were small, wooden units, tied in bundles and neatly stacked together.

  One of the boxes lay open at the man’s feet, empty with the exception of a few remaining bits of straw. The straw from the box appeared to have ended up as kindling for the fire, and the primary content of the box was now in the man’s hand—a fat, stumpy glass bottle, half-full of brown liquid. The man corked the bottle and tucked it away behind him as Atlas settled onto the floor. “Thought you might drop by.”

  Atlas watched the man for a moment, then let his eyes drift back to the bird on the spit.

  “I failed to get your name, son. Afraid our introduction lacked a bit when it came to pleasantries. What do they call you?”

  “My name’s Atlas.”

  “Ah. Holder of the sky, are you?”

  Atlas shrugged.

  The man ran a hand through his beard and scratched at his chin. “Well, maybe they don’t teach the Old World tales where you come from. Back there, Atlas was one of the Titans. A god condemned to hold up the heavens and keep them from touching the ground. Do they still teach you about the place we came from? The world before this one?”

  “My grandfather told me no one really remembers the Old World. He says we can learn about it in school, but no one has ever been there. He says it’s long gone now.”

  “Gone? Hmm. I think it’s still out there. Far away maybe. Hard to get to. But there’s folk who think it can be done. Hard to say.” The knower leaned forward and prodded the roasting bird with a knife. “Just about ready now. Here, grab yourself a piece.” The man pulled at the bird’s leg and gingerly pried it free with the help of the knife. “Use one o’ them leaves there.”

  Atlas fumbled through a pile of the wide, glossy leaves stacked near the wall and folded one into a dish to hold the grouse leg. The man dropped the hot leg
onto the leaf, then stuck his fingers into his mouth to cool them off. He sucked on them a moment, then shook them. “Nothing fancy around here, but it gets the job done.”

  Atlas’s mouth was watering, but he waited for the man to pry his own piece of bird loose.

  “What’s your name?” he asked. “Do you have an Old World name, too?”

  “Can’t rightly say,” the man replied. “My name’s Chane. Don’t know how I came by it. Suspect I had a daddy who knew at some point, but he was long gone by the time I could ask him.” He blew on the piece of meat at the end of his knife and took a tentative bite. He spoke again as he chewed. “And I can’t say it doesn’t pain me a bit, the not knowing. Seeing as I’m in the profession of knowing things and all. But I suppose there are some mysteries we’re just meant to carry around with us.”

  Atlas knew he was at risk of burning his tongue but he couldn’t hold back any longer. He held the bird leg up to his mouth and took a bite. It was juicy on the inside and browned around the edges, just how his aunt Amelia cooked fowl back home.

  As he chewed, he could sense the knower sizing him up.

  “So you’re the pilot, huh? You flying around all on your own? How’d you manage that?”

  Atlas angled more of the grouse into his mouth. “It’s not hard,” he mumbled. “My grandpa taught me. He’s the best pilot there ever was.”

  Chane leaned back. “Is that so? Well, I’m surprised I haven’t heard of him. Or maybe I have. What’s his name?”

  “Enzo Mooreside.” Atlas licked his fingers. “He builds the best airships, too. Fast ones.”

  “And he does this all the way up in the mountains?” Chane asked. “Where does he get the fuel, being so far north? The way I hear it, all the fuel is either out in the desert or down in the Thunderlands.”