Agatha H and the Voice of the Castle

by Kaja Foglio

  Due to one of the more fanciful of Airshipman traditions, no ship will ever fly directly over the town itself. This is a shame, as theoretically, the aerial views of Castle Heterodyne alone would be spectacular.

  —Out and About the Empire on Ten Guilders a Day —Dame Mòrag MacTavish/Waterzoon Press/ Amsterdam

  The air was tense aboard the shocking pink airship that hung over Mechanicsburg. The captain stood quietly, apparently enjoying the glorious view of the mountains on the horizon, but his hands, clasped behind his back, were white knuckled. On the surface, everything appeared ship shape, polished, and crisp, but in his heart he knew that everything about this berth stank like bad balloon wax.

  When the Aerofleet Merchant Board had first outlined the job it had seemed like a dream come true. Captain of a brand new ship—from the Stockholm Yards, no less! Conveying a lost heir to her new kingdom, along with her royal sponsors, who would win over the town with a display of loose wealth and largesse. If all went well, there was even the possibility of a permanent commission.

  Then the rip panel had been pulled. The town? Mechanicsburg. The girl was a supposed Heterodyne heir, and her noble sponsors were a pair of privileged, overbearing ne’er-do-wells that he would as soon have had jettisoned before the ship warped away from the dock.

  In addition, the preparations had been rushed, less than twenty-four hours from oath to float. He hadn’t had the time to properly vet or shake down either the crew or the airship before they’d left, and he’d run them blue doing inspections and drills while on the fly. The old-timers, at least, had appreciated that. The fledglings had been too busy running to grumble.

  The supposed heir had boarded ship in Vienna and no one had seen her since. She kept to her cabin—her needs seen to by her sponsors and the flock of silent minions she had brought with her.

  The captain smiled humorlessly. Well, he’d done his part. The girl had been delivered safely. They’d touched down right in the main square of the town and she’d been escorted off in style. He’d been ordered to take the ship back up, to hover at an unnervingly low two hundred meters and await further orders.

  The gentlemen who paid the bills stood in the main Observation Bay. The tall, equine one—Duke Strinbeck10—had been watching the girl’s progress through an elegant brass telescope. Finally, he let out a huge gust of breath and lowered the scope.

  “She’s in the castle,” he announced.

  His companion, a portly, white-haired man who called himself Baron Krassimir Oublenmach, had been striding back and forth, seemingly deep in thought. Now, he positively beamed. “Excellent!”

  Strinbeck regarded him with a slight frown, swung the tube up again and idly scanned the town. “I certainly hope so,” he muttered.

  Oublenmach grinned. He knew he made his fellow nobles feel uncomfortable. He clapped Strinbeck on the back. Oh yes, as stiff as a board. He could feel that even through his metal gloves.

  “Come, come, young fellow, you’re still worried?”

  Strinbeck, who had never been much into the whole “fellowship” thing to begin with, pointedly detached himself from his overly familiar companion. “Of course I am,” he snapped. “It’s too soon. I don’t like being rushed.”

  To his surprise, the older man took him seriously. In a rare flash of insight, Strinbeck realized that Oublenmach was as worried as he was—but better at hiding his misgivings. “You think Zola isn’t ready?”

  Strinbeck waved a hand irritably. “No, no. She’s perfect.” The hand flicked towards the window. “I’m worried about the castle.”

  Oublenmach regarded Castle Heterodyne with a frown. “Ah yes, the castle is the unpredictable element, is it not?” He faced Strinbeck and grinned that disquietingly evil grin of his. “But it always will be, sir. No matter how much we prepare. No, we had to move! All that lovely build-up in Balan’s Gap? Old Klaus wounded? Either one of them would have been temptation enough, but both together? Carpe diem!”

  Strinbeck irritably snapped his telescope shut and wondered what fish had to do with anything. “But what about that giant Heterodyne girl over Sturmhalten? Even your people haven’t found her yet! Which is inexcusable! I mean, she was bloody enormous!”

  Oublenmach began to laugh at the joke, and then his eyes glazed slightly as he realized that Strinbeck was quite serious. “One thing at a time, sir. One thing at a time. Once everything is in place, our girl will effectively be the new Heterodyne. Vox machinae, vox populi, eh?

  “Then, when do we capture the other…aheh…no doubt enormous…girl, she’ll just be another pathetic Heterodyne impersonator, and if she does give us the slip as it were and get in, why then, Zola will simply see to it that she’s ‘killed by the castle.’ That is what it does best, is it not?”

  “Let’s just hope the castle doesn’t squash our Zola first, eh?”

  Oublenmach rolled his eyes. “Oh enough, sir! The dice are thrown and we’ve loaded them as best we could! Think positively, your Grace! The castle will fall to us! The Doom Bell will ring, and Europa will—”

  Oublenmach’s voice was rising with excitement, but Strinbeck cut him off with a sigh. Oublenmach was so enthusiastic that Strinbeck cringed whenever he had to endure a prolonged conversation with him. Right now, Oublenmach was positively exhausting. “Yes, yes! A new era for everyone. Do spare me the glorious blueprint. I’m going to have a bit of a lie-down.”

  Oublenmach dismissed him with a wave. This was the sort of casual impertinence that caused Strinbeck’s jaw to tighten in fury. Soon enough, you jumped up peasant, the duke promised himself for the thousandth time.

  Once the duke had left, Oublenmach turned to the captain, who’d been standing woodenly behind them. “Captain Abelard, I assume your drop-reels are properly engaged.”

  Abelard was used to getting questions from nervous passengers about the state of assorted equipment, but this was a surprise. The drop-reels were a rather unnerving method of exiting a low-flying ship. Not the sort of thing you’d expect a ground-hugger to even know about.

  “Of course, sir.”

  “Excellent. Show me.”

  There was no polite way to refuse. Oublenmach was paying the bills and it was patently obvious that there was nothing otherwise occupying the captain’s time. Thus a short while later, he was treated to the sight of the small man examining one of the cunning little devices with a practiced eye.

  “You look like you know a bit about drop-reels, sir.”

  “Oh, indeed, indeed,” Oublenmach called out cheerfully. “Saved my life any number of times.”

  As the captain digested this intriguing bit of information, he was caught by surprise as the little man slapped the cable release, causing the drum to begin unspooling.

  “What the devil are you doing?”

  Oublenmach had donned a pair of canvas airman’s gloves and swung the drop-reel around, slapping the gripping jaws closed with a snap. “I am giving in to foolish fancy, sir,” he said gaily. “Too much back-room plotting ruins a man’s digestion, it truly does, sir! When I pick a man’s pocket, I like to do it to his face, and I’ll not steal an Empire any differently!”

  Before the captain could stop him, he swung out and hung from the control rods. “If poor Josef asks, I’ve gone for a drink! Au revoir!” And with a laugh, he twisted the grips and dropped out of sight.

  The captain swore and peered downwards. He then grunted in surprise. Annoying fellow he might be, but Oublenmach handled the drop-reel like an expert. As the captain watched, he disengaged at exactly the right moment and touched down lightly even as the reel spool began yo-yoing back up the line. He then waved a perfect signal-corps “safe aground” sign before turning and sauntering off.

  It was a reflective captain who stowed and locked down the reel before making his way back to the bridge. He had thought that their assigned height had been a symptom of this whole poorly thought-out affair. Too low to hide but still high enough to fall hard. But he was reassessing that now. He was
convinced that Oublenmach’s departure, as spontaneous as he had tried to make it appear, had been part of the man’s plan from the start and that the duke was in for an unpleasant surprise. What else was he misjudging?

  He glanced out the window in time to see one of the freakishly odd birds of Mechanicsburg squawk at the sight of the ship and veer off. “We’re still pink,” he grumbled. “Let’s not forget that.”

  He ran an eye over the bridge trying to see it with fresh eyes, and what he saw was not good. On a milk run like this, the bridge crew should be relaxed. Making idle chatter. Checking out a new town was always a source of entertainment, with crews observing the ebb and flow of the street traffic and making bets as to the locations of the best taverns and sporting houses.

  But there was none of that here. The entire watch was on edge. With a practiced eye, the captain scanned the crew and found the center of the storm. It was Kraddock—and that was worrying all by itself.

  Mr. Kraddock had started as a “rigger rat” when he was nine and claimed that he could still count the number of times since then that he’d actually touched ground. He’d fought skywurms in the realms of the Polar Ice Lords and seen the Great Western Wall of Fire. He’d survived air pirates, storms, hypothermia, blowouts, and the skybends, yet here he was at his wheel, fretting like a dirt-foot.

  With a sigh, the captain stepped up behind the man. It was a sign of Kraddock’s level of distraction that it wasn’t until the captain leaned in and quietly asked, “A problem with your wheel, Mr. Kraddock?” that the old fellow snapped into a textbook picture of attention.

  “No, sir!” he barked. “Wheel is secure, sir!”

  The captain came around so that he was looking the man in the face. Oh, he was worried about something, all right. “Well what is it, then? Come on, out with it, old-timer.”

  The wheelman grimaced and tried to avoid his captain’s eyes. “Well, Captain, I don’t like to second-guess orders. ’Specially with an officer that’s been around like yourself, sir. Not my place, you know? But… we’re in Mechanicsburg airspace.”

  And that said it all right there. A lot of the newer crewmen were listening in, without trying to look like they were. No doubt they’d already got an earful of stories about the place. Outside the windows, in the light of day, the town looked positively picturesque. But Kraddock—and the captain—knew that that was just a new coat of paint on a sleeping dragon.

  The wheelman saw the look in the captain’s eyes, and felt emboldened. “A lot of the old hands…we…we don’t like it. Sir.”

  But this was a bit too close to participatory democracy for the captain’s taste. He stiffened. “The Baron has proved that Mechanicsburg airspace has been safe for close to twenty years, Mr. Kraddock,” he said loudly.

  Kraddock nodded vigorously. “Oh, yessir …but…”

  Abelard knew he’d regret asking. “—But?”

  “But, beggin’ your pardon, Captain, but everyone knows it… We’re kind of…conquerin’ it, ain’t we?”

  And with a start, the captain realized that, like Kraddock, he was terrified at the thought of what they were involved in. He’d just tamped it down so far that he hadn’t even known it.

  But it had been twenty years… “Yes,” he admitted. “Just like the Baron did. So?”

  Kraddock hesitated. The captain rolled his eyes. It was too late to tell him to hold his tongue now. The best way to deal with this would be to lance it and let it all spill out. “You may speak.”

  The old wheelman nodded. “The Baron, yes. But… he was…an old friend of the family, as it were. And if he’s ruling the place, he’s doing it with a mighty light touch on the wheel, if I may say so, sir. Whereas, our…young lady…” He took a deep breath and his voice dropped to a whisper. “She ain’t really a Heterodyne.” He paused. “Is she?”

  Captain Abelard made it a practice to never lie to the crew. On the other hand, he knew when to stop talking. He pulled down the General Address speaking tube.

  “All hands—” he said crisply, “are to keep a weather eye out. Immediately report anything odd to two officers!”

  A sigh of relief blew through the bridge. Strategically, nothing had changed, but they knew that their captain was taking things seriously. Kraddock saluted sharply and stood a bit taller. “Very good, Captain.”

  Abelard returned the salute and, with a measured calm, sat in the command chair. He felt a little better, but not much. For the thousandth time, he wondered why they had made the damn balloon—

  “Pink,” Gilgamesh marveled. He leaned full against the stone of the windowsill and stared. “It’s pink.”

  Dr. Sun entered the room, a tray-laden nurse following several steps behind. “Have you seen—”

  “I see it, Sifu.”

  The old man came to his side and gazed up at the hovering dirigible. “It is very—pink.”

  “Yes, I see that too.” Gil swung away from the window. “I want the city sealed. I want a full squad of clanks sent up to the castle, and I want a full report on what’s happening.”

  Sun nodded agreeably. “You will not go yourself?”

  Gil shook his head. “No. I need to stay here with my father.” He glanced toward the hospital bed where Baron Wulfenbach lay. “NURSE—!” He pointed his walking stick at the woman who had entered with Dr. Sun. She paused beside the Baron, a full hypodermic in her hand.

  “What is that?” Gil’s eyes narrowed. “Nothing was ordered for this patient.”

  The nurse gave him a matronly smile. “Don’t worry, young man, this is just a vitamin that we give all—”

  “Do not move. Sun?”

  The old man’s voice conveyed his fury. “She is not one of my people.”

  “Too late!” The woman screamed in triumph as she brought the syringe down towards Klaus. “Die, tyrant!”

  Before Doctor Sun could move, a bolt of electricity spat forth from the tip of Gil’s stick, catching the woman full in the chest. She was knocked back hard, bursting into explosive flames before she hit the far wall.

  Gil strode to his father’s side, brushing off bits of flaming debris. “My father appears to be unharmed,” he told Sun. “That was lucky.” He began a deep breath of relief but was surprised to find himself jerked about and staring into the face of Dr. Sun. The old man was furious.

  “What the devil did you just let off in my hospital?” Sun roared at him, giving him a solid shake.

  Gil held up his cane. It was a light, ornate swagger stick such as any fashionable young man might carry, but the blue glass bauble at the top was lit with a fading glow-heat pouring off it.

  “Just a little something I’ve been working on, Sifu. A lot of it is Agatha’s, but she was working from my designs. I’ve managed to solve most of the remaining problems. I was a bit worried about effect spread, but…”

  His vision blurred as he was given another shake. He realized that Sun was staring at him with a stone-cracking gaze. He wound down.

  “Pretty neat, don’t you think?” he finished weakly.

  Sun pinned him with his gaze for another second and then spun to the charred corpse on the floor. “An assassination attempt! In my hospital! Who would dare?”

  Gil checked some of the dials on the medical machinery. “Now that they know my father is helpless? Many would dare.” He shoved the dead woman aside with his foot. “She’ll be but the first.” He glanced at the now-coated walls. “I think we’ll need a mop.”

  Sun rang for an orderly. “She certainly wasn’t a professional,” he sniffed.

  Gil snorted. “No, she wasn’t. She was too slow.” Sun bit his lip as he considered this. Gil continued, “The professionals will wait. They’ll let a few overly enthusiastic amateurs go first to see what happens.” He kicked one of the larger charred lumps under the bed. “We should leave my father here. Let the assassins enter and then…disappear. Keep it a mystery. Keep them guessing.”

  “What? Keep your father here? In the same room as a corpse?�
� The doctor was appalled. “…Although… she is cauterized…” Sun frowned and slowly combed his hand through his beard. A knock at the door made them jump, but it was only an orderly. Sun met the man at the door, purposely blocking his view. He requested a broom, a dozen blankets, and several cartloads of ice. “At the very least we can sweep her up and put her in the closet,” he said cheerfully as he shut and locked the door again. “There is still a fair amount of her I can use.”11

  He stood over the remains of the dead woman and looked at Gil with a raised eyebrow. With a sigh, the acting ruler of the Wulfenbach Empire rolled up his sleeves and began to clean up his own mess.

  Sun shook his head. “I wonder why—”

  “Why?” Gilgamesh interrupted as he shoved the closet door closed, “Because Wulfenbach troops turned the people in her village into owls—”

  Sun blinked. “You what?”

  Gil waved a hand. “—Or we might have deposed her favorite mad prince or hung her lover for piracy or banished the Heterodyne Boys or poisoned the well or raised the price of herring…” Gil wound down and took a deep breath. “The reason isn’t important, Sifu. Neither is the truth. What is important is this: she was just the first.”

  The old man nodded. “Then you had better clear your mind and be prepared.” He headed out the door. “As should we all. We must transfer as many patients as we can—”

  Doctor Sun was about to close the door behind him when Gil stepped forward and put a hand on his arm. “Sifu—when you come back? Don’t forget to knock.”

  Sun nodded, and the door shut between them. Gil took a quick turn around the room, examining the vents and tapping at certain points upon the floor and ceiling. Satisfied, he again checked his father’s machinery and finally allowed himself to once more stare out the window at the airship that floated above the town.

  “That can’t be Agatha,” he muttered. “Unless they tried to fake us out by switching ships…” He dismissed this with a wave. “No, they’d want to hide, and I told Wooster to get her to England…” He gnawed on his lower lip.