The Secrets of Solace

by Jaleigh Johnson

  The Merlin.

  Lina walked over to inspect the airship, checking to see whether any new debris had fallen from the cave ceiling since the last time she’d been here. Thankfully, everything looked the same. The ship was fine.

  When Lina first discovered the chamber, the vessel was half-buried from a cave-in. Back then, the debris pile was so large in places that she could scramble up and down it to stand on top of the ship’s rigid frame. That was how she came up with its name. The bluish-gray hue of the nose cone and the black bands painted on the horizontal and vertical stabilizers at the rear strongly resembled the plumage of a type of falcon called a merlin. And the ship itself, with its landing wheels only half deployed, reminded her of an injured bird resting on the ground. She found writing on the side of the ship, strange looping symbols and slashes that probably declared its name but in a language Lina had never seen before, so she decided to name the vessel herself.

  For eight months, she’d been meticulously digging the ship out of its stone prison. Dozens of healing cuts and blisters covered her hands from moving all that rock, and rough calluses made the skin of her palms smooth and shiny. For Lina, these were badges of honor. She’d done the work all on her own, finally uncovering the part of the ship she’d been the most eager to find.

  Lina approached the last remaining rock pile, a cluster of boulders wedged between the underside of the ship’s hull and the ground. Behind the boulders was the outline of a door, barely visible through a thick layer of dirt. Using the glow of the candles and lanterns to guide her, she reached up and ran her swollen fingers along the seam between the hull and the door. The hairs on the back of her neck prickled. So close. Tantalizingly close. If Lina’s examination of the ship was correct—and she’d had ample time to speculate over the last eight months—once she cleared the boulders away, the doorway would open into a gangplank and provide access to every part of the ship.

  But that was also where the problem arose. Lina stepped back and surveyed the four large boulders tightly wedged against the door. Hello, my nemeses, she thought, rolling her eyes. We meet again. She’d nicknamed the boulders Pain, Wrath, Ruin—and Lumpy. She’d run out of inspiration on the last one. Lina had tried everything she could think of to pry the boulders loose, scraping, yanking, digging, and heaving with every tool in her arsenal. She’d worked until her hands and arms bled, but she hadn’t been able to dislodge any of them. They were wedged too tightly. She figured she needed at least one more pair of hands to help her lever the boulders out of place.

  Only help was the one thing Lina couldn’t ask for.

  Partly, the issue was size. Lina sat down on Wrath and rested her chin on her hand as she contemplated the puzzle. Very few people in Ortana were small enough to fit down that first narrow passage to the chamber. And she wasn’t about to trust her secret to the ones who were. All it would take was for somebody to let it slip to the archivists that she’d found an intact airship. Lina didn’t know how long the Merlin had been here or who had built it, but she knew that if the archivists discovered the airship’s existence, they would come with shovels and excavators and dig the ship out for themselves.

  Lina wasn’t about to let that happen. Not after she’d worked so hard for so long.

  Compiling accounts from numerous other worlds, the archivists had conducted extensive studies of the technology of flying vessels, and Lina had spent many late nights in the library studying their findings. The Merlin most closely resembled the design for a rigid airship, or dirigible, with its twenty-five-foot-long cylindrical body and two steam propeller engines situated near the rear of the craft. If this were the case, the internal framework would contain a set of lifting bags that, when filled with a gas lighter than air, provided the means of flight. But as far as Lina knew, dirigible technology was purely theoretical, at least in her world. No one had ever built, let alone successfully flown, such a craft. The only type of airships in regular use in Solace were small, short-range gliders, which were almost exclusively flown by sky raiders, because they were unstable and prone to crashing.

  Not long ago, King Aron of the Dragonfly territories announced his intention to develop a new kind of airship—one that was equipped to handle a long journey and could travel safely over the impassable Hiterian Mountains to the uncharted lands of Solace. But the war stalled his efforts, and the ship was never built.

  The Merlin was exactly the type of ship King Aron must have envisioned: sleek yet powerful, roomy enough, even with the gasbags, to carry a crew. The engines were a problem, though. They were far too small to handle the Merlin’s bulk, which would make maneuvering the vessel extremely difficult. So why had such small engines been used? The answer to that mystery, if it existed, lay inside the ship.

  Lina stood up and walked over to her worktable. She’d arranged her books on airship technology in a small alcove in the wall behind the table. She selected one on engines and managed to get it open to a bookmarked page. Since she hadn’t been able to get inside the ship, her secondary goal was to attempt to start one of the steam engines, but Lina hadn’t tried it yet. She wanted to make sure she studied all the manuals thoroughly, but she had to admit that part of her hesitation was the unsettling length of the list of things that could go wrong if she mishandled the pressure.

  “Although all my research indicates that the engines should work perfectly,” she said, glancing at the lumatites. Again, they didn’t answer her, but it was so quiet and lonely in the cavern, Lina liked to make some noise every once in a while, even if it was only the sound of her own voice. “I mean, it’s not like I can compare exact models,” she continued. “This technology is still substantially different from anything the archivists have recorded in their accounts, but the evidence is there, and in the end, a steam engine is a steam engine.” In theory, she could start it without getting inside the ship. She’d studied the schematics that were most similar to the Merlin. She could make it work. Probably.

  Lina closed her book with a snap and walked over to the ship. Restlessness took hold of her. Maybe it was because of her encounter with Tolwin and Simon. They’d taken her hands away, made her weak and helpless. She couldn’t stand feeling that way. But it was more than that. Lina was tired of studying. She wanted action, to put her theory about the ship into practice.

  “And you don’t want to lie there dormant forever, do you?” she asked, this time addressing the ship. Lina approached the starboard engine and laid her red, swollen hand against its smooth metal surface. As soon as she did, she noticed that some of the feeling had returned to her tingling fingers. She breathed a sigh of relief. She wouldn’t be helpless much longer.

  As Lina stood there in the silence, considering what she was about to do, her restlessness shifted, becoming something desperate, like longing. The feeling came on her so suddenly and so intensely, it made her gasp. She took a step back from the ship, shaking her head as if to clear it. After a moment, the emotion subsided, and she felt like herself again.

  Lina took a breath and forced herself to calm down. She couldn’t let her emotions take over. She needed all her concentration for this. But she knew what she had to do. If starting up the ship’s engines was the only way to make progress on her own, well, then she would take the leap of faith that she could keep the steam pressure stable.

  She had to wait another hour for the swelling to go down enough for her to use her screwdriver, but then Lina removed the large, curved metal plate that covered the engine components. Truly, the engine was in fine condition, which was surprising, considering the size of the craft. Lina would have expected it to be damaged beyond repair when it was scavenged from the scrap fields up north. Typically, something this large would have fallen in hundreds of pieces. But maybe one of the archivists had worked to repair the ship long ago, using bits of their own technology. It would explain the odd mix of familiar and strange mechanics, Lina thought as she ran her hands over the engine. It might also account for the engine’s small size.
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  You’re stalling, she scolded herself. It’s time to do this.

  She’d already loaded the airship’s small firebox with coal as part of her advance preparations. Her water had come from an underground stream that flowed through the back of the chamber. Once she checked that her quantities were right, she needed to start the fire and increase the heat gradually, monitoring the pressure as steam production began. All together, the process would likely take several hours, so she was in for a long day and night.

  Lina took a deep breath and, before she could change her mind, reached into her apron for her matches.

  —

  A little before midnight, about the same time Lina’s hands finally returned to normal, the airship’s propeller started to turn. Lina quickly backed away from the engine as the buzz and whir picked up, stumbling and sliding over rocks in her haste to get a good view. When she was steady again, she stood, openmouthed, and stared at the ship.

  It worked. Lina’s heart pounded. It worked. Pressure was stable, and the engine itself showed no sign of damage or deterioration. The Merlin, so long forgotten by the world, was coming back to life. She just needed someone at the controls to bring her the rest of the way.

  Lina was no pilot, of course, but she longed to be inside the ship, sitting at those controls. She dreamed about flying over the mountains to the uncharted lands. Goddess, it wasn’t fair! Frustration burned in her chest, and she picked up a rock and hurled it against the wall of the cavern. She was so close! If it weren’t for those stupid boulders! There had to be a way to move them.

  Careful to avoid the propeller, Lina ran to the front of the ship and crouched down beside Lumpy, the smallest of the boulders. She took out her pry bar and fixed one end in a spot between the boulder and another, smaller rock. Grunting, she gathered the pent-up anger and frustration that raged inside her and pushed down with all her strength. Blood rushed to her face, and she clenched her jaw as she threw her weight against the pry bar. Sweat rolled down her face, stinging her eyes, and the sound of the whirring propeller filled her ears.

  And for a brief instant, she thought that this time the boulder would give way.

  But suddenly, Lina’s strength gave out, and she collapsed beside the boulder, her pry bar clattering to the ground. Tears burned in her eyes, and she raised her fist, wanting to punch the boulder. Instead, she let her hand drop. She’d lashed out once before in a fit of anger—that was how Wrath had gotten its name—and ended up with bruised and bloody knuckles to show for it.

  Dragging herself to her feet, Lina trudged over to the engine to start bringing the pressure down. She didn’t want to leave it running long on its first test. As she worked to shut the engine off, the noise of the propeller gradually died away, and the familiar hollow silence consumed the chamber, which made her misery complete. Again, Lina found herself wishing there was someone here with her. Between activating the steam engine and Tolwin humiliating her in front of the other apprentices, she’d experienced incredible success and spectacular failure all in one night—but no one had been there to share any of it with her.

  It doesn’t matter, Lina told herself sternly. The most important thing was that the engine had worked. She used the thought to try to pull herself out of her dark mood. All her work over the past eight months had been worth it for this moment.

  She walked along the length of the ship, running her hand over its metal surface as a slow grin spread across her face. “I promise I’ll find a way to open the door,” she whispered, and this time the words were for herself. I will open the door. She turned to go back to her worktable, reenergized.

  And then she heard the rumbling.

  A chill went through Lina’s body. No, it can’t be. Please, no. But the rumbling continued, building steadily in intensity. Instinctively, Lina stepped toward the ship, bumping against the hull as a tremor shook the cavern. The Merlin trembled—Lina felt the vibration through her back. She whipped her head around wildly, seeking shelter from what she knew was coming, even as thin streamers of dust and small rocks fell from the cavern ceiling. She looked up, and a scream welled in her throat.

  A thick cloud of dust billowed from above as a shower of much bigger rocks began to fall, landing in a rush of noise all around her. A stone clipped her shoulder, and Lina flinched, dropping to her knees. She threw up her hands to protect her face just as another rock glanced off her arm, and she cried out in pain.

  Her worktable—if she could just get there…crawl underneath.

  Another rock smashed to the ground, inches from crushing her leg.

  She’d never make it across the room. Frantic, Lina crawled toward the gap beneath the edge of the ship’s hull and one of its half-deployed landing wheels. Tucking into a tight ball, she put her arms over her head, careful to cover the wristband holding the lumatites with her other hand. The stones were still falling dangerously close, bouncing off the ship’s hull, but it was the best protection she had. She squeezed her eyes shut and braced for more rocks and pain. She wanted to scream for help, but fear choked her silent. There would be no one to hear her anyway. For all she knew, she was about to be buried alive with the ship, and no one would find either of them.

  Suddenly, the grinding shriek of metal against metal filled her ears. The sound came from somewhere above her, drowning out even the deafening crash of falling rock. Despite her fear, Lina opened her eyes, looking for the source of the sound.

  Stone dust filled the chamber, but through the brown clouds and by the faint light of the lumatites at her wrist, Lina saw something that didn’t make sense. A shadowy curtain hung above her head. Was it just the ship? No, it was bigger, a sheet of metal that extended outward from the ship’s upper hull. Whatever it was, it blocked the shower of debris, forming a wide shield above her. Lina didn’t dare move to get a better look at it while the rocks were still falling.

  She stayed tucked beneath the ship for what felt like an eternity but was probably only a few minutes. Gradually, the tremors in the cavern quieted, and the deadly rock falls ceased. For once, Lina was thankful for the ensuing silence. She lifted trembling hands and checked her head, searching for wounds. Her arm and leg hurt where the stones had hit her, but they were no worse than the other scrapes and bruises she’d collected that night.

  Still, a trip to the medical wing was probably a good idea, before anything else went wrong.

  Lina shook the dust out of her hair as she stood up. Her knees trembled, threatening to buckle. She took a deep breath to steady herself. That was close. Too close. There had been small tremors in the cavern before, but never anything like this.

  She took a few more breaths, and when she’d calmed down, Lina raised her arm to shine the lumatites on the metal curtain above her. She wanted to get a closer look at what had saved her life.

  The first thing she noticed was that, unlike the Merlin’s hull, this metal had a liquid, shimmering quality to it. Scrambling up on a pile of rocks so she could reach, Lina ran her fingers carefully over its surface and encountered a softness that reminded her of silk. But no, the surface was rigid. Wasn’t it? She dropped her arm and walked from the ship, examining the surface as it tapered to a point roughly twenty feet away.

  Lina gasped as the truth of it hit her like one of those falling rocks:

  The metal curtain was a wing.

  She ran to the front of the ship and faced the nose cone. Sure enough, another wing sprouted from the starboard side. Somehow, when she’d started the engine, she must have inadvertently activated a mechanism that caused them to deploy.

  “But that doesn’t make any sense!” Lina burst out, elated but equally confused by her discovery. None of the dirigible designs she’d seen in her books had said anything about wings—the lifting gases made them unnecessary—let alone ones that extended and retracted from the ship. And why hadn’t they activated when she’d had the engine at full steam? Were there other power sources at work in the ship she didn’t know about, ones that had triggered
when she’d started up the engine?

  So many questions, and with them came the excitement; it bubbled up, banishing her earlier fear. Lina ran back to the rock pile she’d been standing on and grabbed some more stones lying nearby to build it higher. She climbed up on them again, this time raising both hands to lay them flat against the wing.

  Suddenly, with a yelp, Lina snatched her hands back. That feeling—had she imagined it? No, she hadn’t. She touched her fingers to her lips, and a slow smile spread over her face. Giggling nervously, she reached out again to press her palms against the wing. This time she was prepared for the warmth and subtle vibration humming under her hands.

  The hairs on the back of her neck stood up as she considered the implications of what had just happened. She had triggered something when she’d started that engine. And the tremor she’d felt just before the cave-in—could it have come from the ship? Maybe it was some sort of internal power source that was now running independently of the steam engine. Without being at the control panel, she had no way of knowing.

  I have to get inside the ship! But Lina tamped down her excitement and forced herself to think about the situation logically. Maybe it was just a matter of getting bigger tools or a longer pry bar. The archivists’ Technology division—or Gears and Steam, as most people called it—had to have something she could use to get those boulders loose. But would the tools fit through the narrow passage? She had the overwhelming urge to go find out, but she knew it was pointless. This late, the workshops in the Technology division would all be locked up tight.

  With a sigh, Lina had to admit she’d done all she could for now. But what a day! It had started out perfectly miserable and ended in a breakthrough with the Merlin that was better than anything she could have dreamed.

  She jumped down from the rock pile and went over to her worktable. Dust and stones littered its surface. The lanterns were out, their glass shattered, and most of her tools and books were scattered all over the floor. Lina gathered them up and put them back on the table. Then she went around to the handful of candles still burning on the stalagmites and blew them out. Using just the lumatites for light, she made her way back to the passage, squeezing through the Hourglass and earning herself a few more cuts and scrapes on her way to the Heart of the Mountain.