Secret Heart

by Marie Brown

  * * * * * * * *

  BOOM!

  Edwin Julius sat bolt upright in his bed, heart pounding. What in the Devil's name had made that noise?

  Nothing. The quiet darkness of his room surrounded him in ordinary nighttime peace, with no explanation for the loud noise. His heart quieted, the adrenaline eased from his system, and Edwin laid back down. Must've been a nightmare.

  Hard on the heels of that thought, the Aurora shuddered violently, and his door burst open. One of the workmen charged in, carrying a lantern.

  "There's a problem, Master Julius!"

  Edwin sat up in bed, blankets falling to his lap. "What is it—" he squinted in the painful light, trying to make out features. "—Stoneman?"

  "There's been an explosion. Number two boiler's blown. And Lord Kerrigan, he's out of reach. He's gone... there again."

  As soon as he heard the word explosion, Edwin leapt out of bed, shedding his night clothes in favor of more appropriate garb. Boiler explosions were nothing to be trifled with.

  "Tell me more," Edwin said, fingers working rapidly at the buttons on his shirt. "What's the situation?"

  "Bad, sir. Very bad. There's not much left of the boiler room, or, in fact, the gondola. I don't know why we're even still in the air."

  As he dressed and the workman spoke, Edwin felt the Aurora give a great shudder, heard the timbers groan in agony.

  "We're going down for certain sure," Stoneman continued, "and I can't reach Lord Kerrigan. I just can't!"

  "It's okay, Stoneman," Edwin said, slipping on his jacket. "I'll go get him. Do... do whatever needs doing."

  "You'll take Wings with you, sir?"

  Edwin jerked to a halt after only two steps. "Good thinking, Stoneman. Yes, I'll take a pair of Wings. I've got one here, where's the nearest—"

  Stoneman extended a compact package without a word. Edwin took it, tucked it under his arm, retrieved his own emergency rescue device from its locker. The Wings offered something of a last resort, a type of overgrown kite on a harness that strapped to a body and allowed a brief period of unpowered human flight. If the situation were dire enough to need a Wing, well, the risk of catastrophic failure of the device seemed more acceptable. After all, they worked correctly slightly more than half the time...

  Julius exited his cabin, Wings held securely close to his body. The deck groaned and shuddered under his feet. How bad was the damage? He'd seen boiler explosions take out half a city block. Was anything left of the underside of the gondola?

  And what about the other passengers?

  He diverted his path to the safety railing ringing the top deck. No sense seeking out Kerrigan with nothing to report. He grasped the thin brass rail, felt it quivering in his hands, and leaned out over the edge, well beyond the strictly safe.

  Oh, dear God.

  The gaping hole in the Midnight Aurora made him want to throw up.

  Numb with shock, Julius dragged himself back onto the deck, an afterimage of devastation seared into his soul. How in hell Stoneman escaped that, he'd never know, nor how the workman had known it was the number two boiler that went out. It looked more like all the boilers had blown.

  Mechanically, Julius set himself into motion. Kerrigan must learn about this. Not like there was a blessed bit of good the man could do, but he must know, before the remains of the skyship crashed to the ground.

  By the time Julius reached the rope ladder he sought, his frozen mind thawed enough to think. He'd have to be careful up there. What words did one use when telling someone his beautiful skyship was about two thirds destroyed, and that his cousin's rooms were nothing but a memory? More than just Rebecca's rooms. All the workmen's quarters were gone, as were most of the guest quarters, presumably with the guests inside. Julius himself only survived due to a freak of chance: he'd won a coin flip over Rebecca, and gotten the forward cabin next to Kerrigan's. Otherwise, he'd be just as dead as everyone else must surely be.

  The Wings interfered with his climbing efforts. Julius wrapped an arm around a wooden rung and shifted the lumpy Wing packages into a more secure position under his left arm. Awkward, climbing a rope ladder with only one hand, but better than not having the Wings at all.

  Had the others been blown to bits? Had they fallen through the air in their nightclothes? Had any survived? Surely someone, somewhere on the large skyship, had been out of their quarters and working the night shift. Stoneman had. Maybe others survived, somewhere.

  The ladder led him up the curving side of the vast, gas-filled envelope. Edwin could certainly understand Stoneman's reluctance to come up here. Sensible people simply never did things like this. Especially not with the envelope starting to jerk and shudder in response to some aspect of the catastrophe below.

  He reached the point where the ascent turned into more of a creep, using the rope ladder for traction now against the top of the gas envelope. Awkward, with Wings under his arm. Blast Simeon anyway, for demanding a way up to the very top of his aircraft. What did he think this was, a crow's nest on a tall ship?

  There, up ahead. The dark shape of Simeon Kerrigan, apparently sulking again. Julius put out an ounce more effort and scrambled up beside his friend.

  "There's a problem," he yelled over the roar of the wind.

  "Julius, what are you doing here? Have you come to enjoy the view?"

  Incredulous, Julius glanced around out of reflex, but still couldn't see anything beyond the Aurora's running gaslights. "View? What view? Kerrigan, it's past midnight! I can't hardly see you, let alone anything else. You've got to come down. There's been an accident."

  "Nothing to worry about, I'm sure. The world is a better place up here."

  Julius peered more closely at his friend, visible in the... light. Oh, dear God in Heaven! The envelope glowed faintly orange from within.

  "Fire! Kerrigan, listen to me. Are you drunk? You are. Damn. The ship is going down, understand?"

  A muffled boom punctuated his words. Julius grabbed the man by the shoulder, jolting him out of his fog. Kerrigan's gaze sharpened and focused on him.

  "What is it, then?"

  "There's been an explosion in the boiler room. The ship is destroyed, Kerrigan. We're going down. And look."

  He pointed to the glowing envelope beneath them. The last bit of muzziness left Kerrigan's eyes and his face showed a brief flash of panic. He cursed.

  "Right, then, we're doomed. Thanks for letting me know, old man. I'll see you on the other side."

  What?

  Kerrigan rose to his feet, and Julius followed, still trying to puzzle out the meaning of those words. Simeon Kerrigan looked at him, suddenly glittering and all but dancing with excitement. He grinned.

  "What an adventure this will be!"

  Then Julius felt Simeon's arms around him, felt urgent lips press into his own. Suddenly he understood the stereotype of ladies swooning when kissed. His knees felt weak, watery. He clutched at Simeon, held on when the man tried to break away.

  Simeon ended the kiss all too soon, and ran, struggling against the wind of their passage.

  One heartbeat of confusion, two, then a sudden horrible vision of what Simeon Kerrigan meant to do.

  "Simeon, no, wait! Not without your Wing!"

  Julius started running, too, while fumbling at one of the Wing packages. His fingers felt awkward as sausages, legs trembling, heart galloping like a Derby champion. He opened it, lost ground trying to sort out the folded framework, put on a burst of speed. The Wing unfolded on its own in the strong wind. Lightweight ribs snapped into place in an act of mechanical magery. He fought his way into the harness, then lunged forward and caught at Kerrigan before he could run right off the front of the envelope. Kerrigan's wild eyes looked at him, unseeing, filled with a mad light.

  "No! Not without—"

  The envelope shuddered, interrupting his frantic words. Brilliant orange light accompanied a series of booms as the gas within the heavily oiled silk chambers lit off. Six chambers, meant to keep
the ship aloft even if one or two chambers sprung a leak. But no one had designed the envelope to survive fire.

  A shock wave knocked the two men off the foundering skyship and launched them into the air. Julius barely managed to keep hold of Kerrigan.

  "Simeon! Hang on!"

  For a terrifying moment, Julius knew he would lose his friend. Free of the supporting envelope, without his Wing which now plummeted toward the Earth so far below, still packaged, Kerrigan started to fall. Then instinct kicked in and he clutched at Julius, whose Wing groaned at the strain of supporting two men.

  Wind roared past them. Straps cut deep into Julius's armpits. He hadn't a chance to settle the Wing harness properly, not while running on an unstable surface. His arms and hands burned from his tight grip on Simeon.

  Despite everything, though, despite the pain, the terror, the flaming wreckage tumbling Earthward, Edwin Julius smiled.

  Simeon shifted in his arms, reaching carefully for the Wing harness with one hand, using it to pull himself up closer to Julius's head.

  "Why did you stop me?"

  His words blew away, barely audible. Edwin considered ignoring them, letting the wind keep them. But instead he bent his head to yell his own response.

  "I will never let you go, Simeon! Never!"

  The Wing gave a sharp crack. Edwin looked up and saw nothing in the inky darkness. The Wing lurched, cracked again, collapsed.

  Falling... falling...

  The two men spun out of control through the night, broken Wing flapping uselessly above them.

  This is it, then, Edwin Julius thought, panic giving way to a wave of peaceful calm. Nothing more to do but hold on to Simeon.

  They smashed into the Earth.