by Karen Kincy
Konstantin coughed. “I apologize for the way things went.”
“Thank you so much for conveniently swooping in and rescuing us, archmage.”
A hint of pink touched Konstantin’s cheeks. He narrowed his eyes.
“Next time,” he said, “maybe you should pay less attention to finding a shiny new minion and more to staying in one piece.”
Wendel inspected his nails. “My shiny new minion distracted the border patrol.”
Ardis imagined the vampire sinking her teeth into Officer Zlatkov’s lifeless body, which gave her a perverse satisfaction.
“Oh, right,” Wendel said. “You could have called off the border patrol yourself.”
Konstantin’s gauntlets clinked together as his hands curled into fists.
“I would have,” he said.
Wendel curled his lip. “Before or after the Bulgarians interrogated us?”
“They interrogated you?”
Wendel laughed scornfully. “God, what did you think would happen?”
“They acted against my orders. I didn’t ask them to treat you like criminals.”
They could be considered criminals, though Ardis neglected to mention that.
“What did you tell them?” Wendel said. “They knew an awful lot about my past and present. They promised a rather unpleasant future.”
Konstantin spoke crisply. “The Archmages of Vienna research each of their employees.”
“Employees?” Wendel said the word with spectacular derision. “I’m not your employee.”
“You will be once we work on the Eisenkriegers.”
“Am I getting one of those little flower pins, like Ardis?”
Konstantin scoffed. “No.”
Wendel started to speak, but Ardis interrupted him.
“Stop,” she said. “Both of you. Just stop.”
They stared at her, nonplussed.
“All I want for Christmas is one day without fighting,” she said.
Konstantin furrowed his brow and looked almost wistful.
“Fine.” Wendel looked considerably less wistful. “But you may be disappointed.”
Before Ardis could ask what he meant, the sleigh driver reined in his horses. They had arrived on the outskirts of a city.
“Phillipopolis,” Konstantin said. “We have to walk from here.”
Snow hushed the city and lay unbroken on many roads. Streetlights gleamed like fireflies, scattered here and there, and suffused the fog with gold. Ardis jumped from the sleigh, pinpricks dancing through her numb legs.
“I feel undead,” she muttered.
Wendel arched an eyebrow. “Believe me. You aren’t.”
“I’m afraid to ask.”
Konstantin climbed from the sleigh and fished out a pocketwatch from his coat. The watch’s dial glowed with technomancy.
“It’s two o’clock,” he said. “Technically, it’s Christmas.”
Wendel leapt to the ground with surprising grace, Ardis thought, considering how his muscles had to be just as stiff as her own.
“Technically, it’s my first Christmas as a free man,” Wendel said.
Konstantin looked sideways at him. “How sad.”
Wendel hated pity in all its varieties, but this time he faked a flattering smile.
“Can you make it all better, archmage?” he said. “Can you give me the Christmas gift I have been dreaming of?”
Konstantin blushed to the roots of his hair. “And what would that be?”
“Don’t take the bait, Konstantin,” Ardis said.
Wendel grinned. “Too late.”
Konstantin shook his head and started walking, but Wendel followed at his heels.
“I want asylum,” Wendel said.
“Asylum?”
“I’m tired of everyone trying to kill me.”
“You belong in an asylum,” Konstantin muttered.
Wendel laughed, then frowned as if he hadn’t meant to humor the archmage.
“Is that a no?” Wendel said.
“Talk to me after you fix my Eisenkriegers.”
“You drive a hard bargain, archmage.”
Konstantin snorted. “Yes, because not killing you is a bargain.”
“As if you would.”
“God,” Ardis sighed. “I’m so tired of you two bickering.”
Shivering, she plodded through Phillipopolis.
In a frosty field near the center of the city, a sleek zeppelin with a sky blue gondola hovered at a mooring mast. Ardis recognized the golden flower on the zeppelin’s fins as an edelweiss, the symbol of the archmages.
“We’re traveling by airship?” Wendel said.
“Obviously.” Konstantin broke into a boyish smile. “I love zeppelins. I can’t be bothered with those buzzing little airplanes.”
Wendel’s shoulders stiffened. He slowed and craned his neck to inspect the zeppelin. Ardis wondered if he didn’t like flying. But she had seen him on an airship twice before, and he hadn’t been this suspicious.
“Excuse me,” Ardis said. “Konstantin, where are we flying?”
The archmage’s smile faltered. “My apologies. You fell asleep before I could explain things a bit more clearly to you.”
“Our destination?”
“Prussia.”
“Prussia?”
Ardis glanced at Wendel, but he had the face of a statue. He tilted his head as he gazed along the zeppelin. She had no way of knowing how he felt about returning home. If he even thought of Prussia as his home anymore.
“Why?” Ardis said.
Konstantin touched his knuckles to his mouth. He sucked in a breath, then sighed.
“We are at war,” he said.
Ardis stared at him for a minute. Dumbfounded. Even though she had known there would be a war. They all had.
“With who?” she said.
“Blame Russia,” Konstantin said. “They declared war on us.”
“On Austria-Hungary?”
“And Germany. By necessity.”
Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia may have been cousins, but that didn’t mean they had aced diplomacy. A tangle of alliances meant yet more countries would be dragged into the fight—starting with Germany and Austria-Hungary on one side, Russia and Serbia on the other.
“Did Russia say why?” Ardis said.
“To retaliate against Project Lazarus.” Konstantin met her gaze. “They won’t tolerate an army of Eisenkriegers. When the Order replied to my telegram, they accused Wendel of selling our military secrets to the Russians.”
Zlatkov’s words echoed in her ears.
She whored herself out again to the Russians when they paid more money than the archmages. Because she was a greedy little bitch.
Ardis felt her heartbeat in her throat. She met Konstantin’s eyes.
“You can’t think it was us,” she said, “or I wouldn’t be talking to you now.”
“Wendel said it was Thorsten Magnusson,” Konstantin said.
“Thorsten betrayed the archmages. He told the Russians about Project Lazarus.”
Konstantin shook his head. “Ardis, I—”
“We tried to stop him. Thorsten didn’t care what the consequences would be. He even said that war was good for business.”
“Ardis.” He met her gaze. “I believe you.”
Her breath escaped in a sigh. “I should have done more.”
“The archmages tried to stop this war. But the Hex wasn’t enough.”
Konstantin touched her back and nudged her toward the zeppelin. When she looked into his eyes, she saw understanding there.
“The Russians are invading East Prussia,” he said. “It’s not too late to stop them.”
Ardis glanced at Wendel. “Is that how you convinced him?”
Konstantin’s smile looked distant. “It seems he still has some loyalty to his family, as much as he would like to deny it.”
Certainty settled over Ardis with the weight and comfort of armor.
This would be her future.
She strode to Wendel and waited by his side. When he looked at her, she recognized the tension of worry in his face.
“Wendel,” she said. “Are you ready?”
Wendel sighed but said nothing.
They walked beneath the zeppelin’s underbelly. Stairs corkscrewed inside the tower of the mooring mast. Konstantin bounded upstairs, his boots clanging on steel, and Ardis followed at his heels. The railing felt slick with ice under her hand. She reached the nose of the zeppelin, where a swaying gangway led inside.
A man in a smart blue uniform saluted her. “Welcome to the Wanderfalke.”
Peregrine falcon. Ardis hoped this airship was as fast as its namesake.
“Thank you,” she said.
Konstantin waved at her. “Captain Himmel, meet Ardis. She’s one of our mercenaries.”
Himmel glanced at Ardis with honey-colored eyes. A smile curved under his waxed mustache. She arched her eyebrows, and he broke into a grin. If Himmel was flirting, Ardis doubted Wendel would appreciate that.
Shockingly, she didn’t hear a single sarcastic comment.
Ardis frowned and glanced back over the gangway. Empty. She squeezed past Konstantin and ran back to the mooring mast.
Wind whistled in her ears and tugged her toward the edge. She leaned over and saw Wendel halfway up the mooring mast. He stood with his head down, his hair in his eyes, and clutched the railings on either side.
“Wendel!” she said.
He lifted his head. “Yes?” he said, managing to sound irritated.
“What are you doing?”
Something strange crossed his face. “Catching my breath.”
Ardis narrowed her eyes. She didn’t believe Wendel for half a second. But she knew he wouldn’t tell her the truth with Konstantin and the airship captain watching from the nose of the zeppelin. She waved him onward.
“We don’t have time for this,” she said.
Even from here, she could see Wendel clench his jaw. His grip on the railings tightened, and he yanked himself up a flight of stairs. He ran the rest of the way and stopped where she blocked him on the gangway.
Panting, Wendel stared at Ardis. “Excuse me.”
She lowered her voice. “What’s wrong?”
Wendel shook his head, still breathing too hard.
“Tell me later,” Ardis said.
She stepped aside to let him pass, and watched how he crossed the gangway with his head high and his shoulders rigid.
At last, they all boarded the Wanderfalke.
Konstantin thinned his lips. “Wendel, how good of you to join us.”
Wendel didn’t even retort, though he eyed Himmel.
“Captain Himmel,” Konstantin said, “this is Prince Wendel of Prussia.” He coughed. “Formerly, anyway.”
“There’s no need for obsolete titles,” Wendel muttered.
“Sir.” Himmel stood at attention. “This is the necromancer?”
Konstantin gave him a meaningful glance. “I’ll take them from here. Prepare to cast off, and plot the fastest course to Prussia.”
“Yes, sir.”
Himmel saluted the archmage again and stepped aside to let them pass.
Konstantin led them down a gangway that ran deeper into the zeppelin. The gangway had no walls, like it might on a passenger airship, and Ardis could see the duralumin skeleton of the zeppelin in the dim light. The gangway leveled out as they reached the lower deck. Konstantin held the door and waved them through into a corridor. They passed doors marked as the kitchen and the wireless telegraphy room.
“Your cabins are on the upper deck,” Konstantin said.
Ardis raised her eyebrows. This must be a flagship zeppelin.
They followed Konstantin upstairs to a deserted lounge and dining room. On both the port and starboard sides, promenade decks slanted to overlook the ground. Ardis wandered to the windows and stared at the snowy roofs of Phillipopolis. With a jolt, the zeppelin cast away from the mooring mast and floated into the sky.
“How long is the trip to Prussia?” Ardis said.
Konstantin joined her on the promenade and stood with his hands clasped behind his back. He frowned, his face thoughtful.
“Fifteen hours in good weather,” Konstantin said, “though airship travel has been restricted ever since the declaration of war.”
“Are there enemy airships?” Ardis said. “I didn’t think Russia had any.”
“They don’t.” Konstantin smiled grimly. “But Britain does, and there’s talk of them allying with Russia against us.”
“Wonderful,” Wendel said.
Ardis glanced over her shoulder. Wendel lingered in the shadows, not looking at the windows, his arms crossed. Her chest tightened as she realized why he had been acting so wary. He was afraid of heights.
Or perhaps Wendel was afraid of falling.
Ardis would never forget the look on Wendel’s face as he plummeted to his death. But she had assumed he had forgotten it all. Did he remember her standing on the Serpent’s Tower as he dropped through the darkness?
Did he remember dying?
Ardis shivered and hugged herself. Konstantin was staring at her now.
“Sorry,” she said. “It’s a little cold.”
Konstantin dipped his head. “The Wanderfalke is outfitted with shielding technomancy, though temperature regulation isn’t a primary concern. We care more about hydrogen containment.” He cleared his throat as if realizing he had gone off on a tangent. “May I suggest your cabins? They tend to be warmer.”
Wendel waved at nothing in particular. “Lead the way.”
They left the dining room and walked down a corridor lined with doors.
Konstantin pointed out the first and second doors on the left. “These will be your cabins. Let me know if you need anything.”
“Thank you,” Wendel said. “You make a decent airship steward, archmage.”
Konstantin sniffed. “Good night.”
Ardis opened the door to her cabin and discovered a small bare room with a single berth. Light glowed from a wall lamp shaped like a porthole. Ardis glanced back at Konstantin, who hesitated in the doorway.
“Merry Christmas,” Konstantin said. It almost sounded absurd.
Ardis nodded. “Merry Christmas.”
Wendel lingered behind the archmage. Ardis caught his eye, but Konstantin let the door swing shut between them.
Ardis tried not to worry about Wendel. Frowning, she kicked off her boots and killed the light. She crawled into the berth, still fully clothed, and yanked the blankets over herself. The moment her head hit the pillow, exhaustion anchored her there and dragged her down. She drifted underwater in an ocean of sleep.
~
Outside the window, a maidenhair tree danced in the wind and scattered its golden leaves over the streets of San Francisco.
Ardis sat at the dinner table. The naked blade of a jian rested on the old wood. When she touched the Chinese sword, it ignited under her fingertips. Enchanted flames crawled over the steel and whispered against her skin.
“Chun Yi,” she whispered.
Her sword smoldered with its own fire, brighter than the autumn leaves.
“Yu Lan!”
Her mother, Jin Hua, swatted away her hand. Jin Hua looked distracted, her long dark hair twisted back in a careless bun.
“Put down that sword,” Jin Hua said.
Ardis did as she was told. Jin Hua delivered plate after plate of delicious food until the table groaned under its burden. A whole pot of wonton soup, an embarrassment of dumplings, roast duck swimming in sauce, pork cooked with mustard greens, and Ardis’s favorite, sesame chicken with handmade noodles.
Her mother pressed a pair of chopsticks into her hand.
“You need to eat,” Jin Hua said. “For the baby.”
“What baby?” Ardis said.
Jin Hua poured her a cup of fragrant jasmine tea. “Don’t be silly, Yu Lan.”
/> When Ardis looked down, the world went askew. She was pregnant? She rubbed her round belly. Very pregnant.
“Mama?” Ardis said, her words unsteady. “I’m having a baby?”
Jin Hua smiled. “Sooner than you think.”
FOUR
Ardis jerked awake and clutched fistfuls of sheets in her hands. Her pulse hammered in her ears. She pressed herself to the mattress, trying to piece together the fragments of the dream, but it still didn’t make much sense.
Unless…
Ardis slipped her hand under her shirt and touched her belly. It felt as flat as it ever did. But that didn’t stop the panicky little jitter to her heartbeat. She had been careful, she had taken precautions. She couldn’t be pregnant.
Though, with enough bad luck, she knew she could be.
God, what would Wendel say about her dream?
Talking to him about babies didn’t seem like a conversation they could have right now. Or ever. And she had never been remotely intrigued by the realm of tiny helpless wailing things that demanded tributes of milk.
Ardis propped her elbows against the berth and pushed herself upright.
“It was just a dream,” she muttered. “A nightmare.”
Because of course an accidental baby would be a nightmare. She was a mercenary, for heaven’s sake. She pressed her lips together and decided to stop thinking about it. The part with the sword was the most interesting, anyway.
Barefoot, Ardis tiptoed to the next cabin and slipped inside.
Wendel lay with his arm curled around a pillow. He lifted his head.
“Ardis?” he whispered.
Her stomach tightened. “I couldn’t sleep.”
“Ah.”
Wendel swung his legs over the edge of his berth and patted the spot next to him.
“Join me in the insomniacs club,” he said. “Very exclusive. Only the best clientele.”
Ardis sat close to Wendel. Her dream darted through her mind again. She inhaled and held the words in her mouth.
Wendel’s smile faded. “What is it?”
Ardis touched her belly. There was no baby. Maybe there never would be.
“Nothing,” she said.
“Don’t lie to a liar,” Wendel said gently.
“You first.” Ardis raised her eyebrows. “Tell me why you couldn’t sleep.”
