The Tremblers

by Raquel Byrnes

  “Michelson happened upon a plot to bomb our factory. Defiance rebels killed him. The entire building was leveled.”

  “What?” Cornelius shook his head, shocked. “We just had him for dinner and now he is dead?”

  “Yes, I just received word our facility fell to a mob last night. They happened upon Michelson’s carriage while searching for survivors. I received an aether missive about the incident a short time ago.”

  “Were there any?”

  Rothfair looked up, perplexed. “Any what?”

  “Did any one live?” Cornelius asked, his face twisting. “Nearly one hundred workers would have been there, Father.”

  “Oh,” Rothfair answered. “No.”

  “Oh, no.” Cornelius shook his head. “How terrible.”

  “Yes, we will have to double security at our other facility,” Rothfair said, noting his son’s expression. “What?”

  “Nothing.” Cornelius looked at him for a moment, something obviously on his mind.

  Rothfair waited him out for as long as he could muster the patience.

  “Out with it,” he shouted and Cornelius flinched.

  “What if Miss Chace will not have me?” His face burned beet red.

  “You are handsome, charming, and very wealthy, Cornelius,” Rothfair said, surprised at his son’s doubt. “Why would she say no to join our family?”

  “Miss Blackburn and she were close.” He shrugged, looking helpless.

  Rothfair walked to the window, his fists clenched. Why could his son not do the simplest things without constant reassurance? “You will wait a respectable amount of time, of course, but Miss Chace will likely be relieved her name has not been tainted by association with the Blackburns. And if there are other suitors, I will take care of them.”

  “That is not…I do not…”

  “Are you holding out for love, Cornelius? This is larger than your personal preferences and affections. With your future wife’s father on the regulatory body and you at the Ignition Lab, Rothfair Power and Works will have an advantage over our competitors for the Union’s coal contracts.”

  “This is about business? You sell my future to the highest bidder?”

  “I am trying to secure your future,” Rothfair said, his throat catching. “I am fighting for not only yours, but of many. I need you to do this because there are things that must be done free of the countless committee votes and studies that waste valuable time. Ever since The Great Calamity our halls of power are clogged with every manner of delay and there is no time for that. Not now. We must act.”

  “I don’t understand, Father.” His eyes were wide, the need for guidance stamped clear on his face. “What needs to be done?”

  Rothfair did not answer. Instead, he walked his son to the door, opened it, and gestured silently.

  Cornelius left with a wary backwards glance.

  Rothfair double checked the lock on the doors before heading for the back stairs. He pushed through the double doors leading into the remains of a wine cellar. The quakes destroyed most of the vintages and some shards still remained on the stone floor as no one but Rothfair possessed a key. He moved through the dark room, up the back steps that led to the street behind his brownstone, and climbed aboard his mechanical carriage.

  Ten minutes later, he pulled into the dark alley behind the warehouse. Vast double doors without handles barred entrance to the secure building. Drawing a small metal box from his pocket, he centered the magnetized apparatus to the front of the door. Punching in a series of numbers into the device, he waited. It whirred to life, the gears clicking within the casing as it moved the internal locking cylinders of the vast doors. With a final clang of metal, the warehouse doors eased open.

  Rothfair pushed through, striding to the end of the darkened building toward a small caged-in area in the back. Nestled against the far wall, a space protected by electrified grid walls, housed the inner workings on Rothfair’s dealings.

  A tall man, thin beyond what one would think healthy, stood at a workbench in the glow of filament lights. His rumpled black suit and ragged black hair spoke of a sleepless night spent working.

  “Verne,” Rothfair intoned, nearing the grid.

  The thin man glanced over his shoulder, his hand going to a concealed lever beneath the bench. A buzz sounded and the door to the work area clicked open.

  Rothfair entered, peeling off his overcoat and tossing it aside. “Have you made progress?”

  Verne strode over to a sheet-covered form on a nearby table. “Only that there are more now.” He ripped the material back, revealing the inert body of a Trembler.

  Rothfair stepped to it, eyes narrowed. “Th—this is a child.”

  “Yes. It is small, but everything else seems exactly as the others.” Verne nodded, arms crossed, fingers pulling his mustache as if inspecting a piece of furniture.

  “How could this be a child?” Rothfair pushed his hands through is hair, fighting the urge to scream. The small body of a boy twitched minutely beneath the harsh light. “Is he…has he passed?”

  “Hard to tell with them.” Verne shrugged. “Doesn’t react to anything.” He reached down and poked the body with the glass mixing wand in his hand.

  The child did not move.

  Rothfair gulped against the bile rising in his throat. He leaned over, taking in the telltale bluish hue that gave the appearance of having slipped through a frozen lake, but it was the damage to its limbs that sent Rothfair’s stomach churning. Breaks and tears all over the small body mirrored those he’d observed in others. Yet this was the first child he’d seen. The others; workers, miners, staff at the facilities were all adults. How was this possible? “Where did you find him?”

  “A few yards off the east bank.” Verne pulled the sheet back up. “Lots more there too.”

  “That’s miles from where they should be.” Rothfair wiped sweat from his brow with a kerchief. What began as a controllable problem now seemed to be spiraling out of control. Something needed to be done before the weight of this revelation crushed everyone involved. He moved away, a wave of nausea roiling within. “And the other matter? Is there any word on the man from the roof? The one who took Miss Blackburn?”

  Verne nodded over to a wooden cabinet, the door held shut with a chair under the knob. “Found the machinist.”

  Rothfair blinked, continually reminded that he often underestimated Verne’s abilities and callousness.

  “Is he alive?”

  “Was a few hours ago.” Verne turned back to his work, the thick goggles obscuring his gaze as he returned to the chemical mixture bubbling before him.

  Rothfair shook his head, striding to the cabinet, and knocking. A frantic movement within told him the man still lived. “I need to speak with you.”

  “Through the door?” the lower class accent slipped through the wood.

  “No, civilly, but only if you agree to cooperate.” Out of the corner of Rothfair’s vision, Verne pulled a knife from whatever hiding place he kept it and silently placed it on the counter next to the burner. Rothfair returned his attention to the voice on the other side of the door. “Do you agree?”

  “I—I do.”

  Rothfair opened the door and wrinkled his nose at the odor of sweat that wafted from the confined space.

  The man, a worker dressed in a soiled uniform, sweated profusely, his fat hands wringing as he stood in the cabinet.

  “Come out of there, Mr...”

  “Janus,” the worker said and shuffled into the room. He eyed Verne with fear before turning his gaze back to Rothfair. “W-what is it you want from me? What have I done to be carted away without notice?”

  Rothfair motioned for Janus to follow. They stopped at a table set with the tattered remnants of large foil wings. Lifting a piece with his gloved hand, Rothfair held it aloft, gauging Janus’s reaction.

  “These belong to a mechanical cycle, one used to abduct a woman.” He set the metal sheet in Janus’s hands. “The man who used
the cycle took an innocent witness, and you, Mr. Janus, are my only connection to this mysterious individual. A traitor.”

  “What…I don’t have any cause to consort with traitors. I would never help anyone cause trouble for the Union, sir. I promise you that.”

  “I searched for anyone capable of this type of work within the dome, and I believe your specialized process makes you the only man who could have manufactured these wings for his machine.”

  “I don’t do this kind of work. I repair steam carriages and other—”

  Rothfair put his hand up, stopping him. “I know what you do, Mr. Janus. I also know that continuing to do so would be very difficult without one of your hands.”

  Verne appeared at Rothfair’s side, the knife gripped in his large fist.

  Janus looked at it and back at Rothfair. His face changed, the fear replaced with defiance. “If this man finds out I betrayed him I will have worse problems than finding work.”

  “How would he find out?” Verne asked. “We’re completely safe in here.”

  “No one is safe from him and his kind,” Janus cackled, a congested, wracking laugh that made Rothfair cringe with disgust. “He’s one of them knights. Warriors for The Order. Either way, I’m not crossing him or the people who control him.”

  “You must be mistaken,” Rothfair intoned. “The Order would not go against the Union.”

  “I know what I know.” Janus shook his head, lips pulled tight. “I saw his shackle. He is a knight of The Order and if they are involved in all of this, then you will need more than Union Soldiers and electrified walls to stop ‘em.”

  “Tell me his name,” Rothfair snapped.

  “This man did not just kidnap a girl, as you say.” Janus shook his head, tapping the metal wing with his index finger. “He wrestled her from a squadron of armed soldiers, blew his way off the roof of a building, and caused several accidents to avoid capture. People said he soared through the air while shooting like some sort of madman.”

  “I don’t care how spectacularly he did it,” Rothfair snapped, tired of this man’s dire warnings. “I care why he did it. What would The Order want with Blackburn or his daughter?”

  Janus shook his head, his face tense. “I have nothing to say.”

  “You fear him this much?” Verne looked at Rothfair, fascinated. “Why?”

  “This man you seek, he cut a swath through Outer City’s roughest port, to break some woman out of jail six months ago. Tussled with that crazy sheriff to do it.”

  Rothfair snorted. “Why would he do that?”

  “Because he remembers loyalty,” Janus said, folding his arms. “And betrayal.”

  “So do I,” Rothfair growled.

  “He incinerated three battleships mid-air when they tried to chase him down, is what I heard from a cousin who barely escaped the whole thing,” Janus countered, holding up three fingers. “Blew them right outa the sky with some sort of fireball.”

  Rothfair said nothing. He’d have to verify that with his sources inside the Security Forces. Still, a larger problem reared. Had The Order betrayed them? He would not put it past them. “What else do you know of this man?”

  “If he asks your help, you give it. If he tells you to forget, you do.”

  “You made this for him, you must have a way to contact him.”

  “I don’t remember,” Janus crossed his arms.

  Tired of all of this; the never ending fear and stress, Rothfair nodded to the knife in Verne’s hand. “You will.”

  21

  Ashton bent over the rusting rudder controls of the boat and tried to jerk them free once more. The converted airship had all the tools of the sea vessel it had been before taking to the sky; unfortunately, they were all in disrepair. With the air bladders melted and only one unbroken mast to support the sail, they had very little chance of making shore without a way to change directions, but try as he might, he could not concentrate.

  Every sway and dip of the vessel reminded him of their precarious position. Ominous shudders pulsed through the water, buffeting the ship as steam hissed from surfacing heat plumes all around them. In the distance, a crimson glow bubbled the surface, the dark shape at its center growing ever larger.

  Ashton wrinkled his nose at the gaseous cloud passing across the bow. A hot eddy of air moved it quickly, but his eyes watered all the same. The soft glow of the Tesla Dome’s grid just beyond the haze was promising, but the fact that they did not yet need gas masks gave credence to his guess that they were still a ways off shore.

  He scanned the dark waters beyond the railing, searching for the tell-tale silhouette of a horde ship. These waters had more than just the dangers unleashed by the quakes. Bands of pirates and looters trolled the seas near the coast. Without a security force ship as their chaperone, they were exposed to attack. He closed his eyes, straining to hear the metal grind of the steel-bottomed ships pirates used to ram passenger and cargo vessels.

  Another thump against the hull elicited a stifled yelp from outside and it pulled his gaze. There, moving in the darkness, Charlotte toiled on the sails while Berkley erected the aethergraph antennae. Dark swaths of clouds floated past the nearly full moon, muting the light and casting mottled shapes on the deck. She worked by candle, the glow of the flame pooling on her dark tresses.

  He’d lost himself earlier. Embracing her and kissing her as if she were his to do so. She is so brilliant, so brave. I don’t know if I am losing my way with her or if I am finally, after so long, finding it once more. Shaking his head, he wrenched on the locking pin only to shear it off. He wiped his brow with a sleeve and found his gaze going back to Charlotte. His doubt with The Order fueled the unsettled feeling within him, and yet he knew it was Charlotte’s influence that gave him pause. From the very moment he’d encountered her she’d relentlessly pulled him from what he had always known and trusted. She saw the world differently and he wasn’t sure if he hated or loved her for it.

  Where he strove to understand intellectually, Charlotte’s compassion seemed deeply personal. First for her father and then Berkley, setting off a near riot in Port Rodale out of fear the old man was in danger. It was a reckless path, but so far it was the one course of action that achieved results. Berkley knew the tinkerer her father spoke of, Collodin, something Ashton had not been able to discover entering queries with his informants. Trusting Charlotte’s instincts, even though reason railed against it, seemed the best route.

  He’d always filtered his decisions through the prism of The Order’s goals, but now with everything coming to light, The Order’s betrayal, and her father’s secrets, Ashton found himself unable to get his bearings.

  Colonel Blackburn saw fit to direct the journal and its secrets to this mysterious Signor Collodin. That now seemed the only course of action that made sense, especially if Collodin could decipher the journal’s strange markings. There was no time to lose. The Trembler he and Charlotte encountered up in Outer City was not the first he’d seen there and certainly not the only one he knew to exist outside the wasteland. Something was terribly wrong and they did not have the luxury of time to untangle all the clues.

  Outside, Berkley lifted the glass dome of the aethergraph receiver and extended the two filament wires of the machine. Muttering under his breath at the shock of a residual charge, he positioned the metal caps on the end of either antennae, and attached the drive crank to the small steam works box at the base of the contraption. The older man struggled to wind the machine with the required force.

  Ashton stood, wiping the grease off of his hands as he made his way out onto the deck.

  “Lizzie sent me,” Berkley said to Charlotte as Ashton walked up to join them.

  “That is how you knew to come and get us?” Charlotte asked. “You are part of Defiance?”

  “Since its inception eight years ago,” Berkley muttered. “Though it is not what it once was.”

  “How do you know Collodin?” Charlotte asked. “Have you met him? What is his
role in all of this?”

  “Slow down,” Berkley grumped. “I said I have heard of Collodin, but I know nothing more about him.”

  “You said he was mad,” Charlotte argued.

  Ashton raised a brow, watching Berkley. “Is he?”

  “There are rumors,” Berkley muttered. “But his location I did not know. I asked colleagues and friends to seek further information after we spoke, Lizzie being one of them. That is how she alerted me to help you. She was much relieved to have an ally at Port Rodale.”

  “So I am no closer.” Charlotte visibly slumped. “There is nothing more on Collodin?”

  “Well, that is what I am attempting to decipher,” Berkley huffed. “Lizzie said she had a lead on where he may be, but the first order of business, however, is to send out a distress call. We are mere hours from another attack. I am sure of it.”

  “Are we close enough?” Ashton asked, bending and taking over the task. “To the shore, I mean? Aethergraph signals begin to dissipate as soon as they leave the Tesla Domes, do they not?”

  “How does it get to Outer City hotels?” Charlotte rubbed her jaw, a shiver shaking her small frame. Still unable to locate her father’s cloak in the rubble of the ship, Ashton peeled off one he’d found with Berkley’s things, draping it over her shoulders. She looked up at him gratefully. “Are there enhancers of some sort between the earth and the clouds?”

  “There are repeaters,” Ashton explained, and squinted as the brilliant tendrils of electricity arched across the empty space between the two metal caps. He took in the mismatched electrodes and too large connectors and raised a brow. “Mechanisms that capture and re-broadcast the aethergraph signal. A particularly large one dangles on a large cable, hundreds of feet below Port Rodale. Although this machine is a design I have not encountered before.”

  “Tommy-rot!” Berkley said with irritation. “This is one of the first aethergraph receivers ever built…or rather, one of the first designs. And the signals don’t dissipate outside the dome. The Union Security Bureau interrupts them.”

  “That is not possible,” Ashton said.

  “Believe what you will,” Berkley snapped. “Even after all you have seen.”