Captain Gravenor’s Airship Equinox (Steampunk Smugglers) (2 page)

“Thanks. I needed the reminder.” He spun the wheel, and
squeaking, the airship turned east.

“What’s her name?” the woman asked, referring to the
airship.

“Doesn’t have one yet. She’s experimental.”

“In what way?”

“None of your business,” he said with a growl.

“Tell me.” She lifted the spyglass. “They’re following us
out over the Channel.”

Of course they were.
So much for secrets. “Look
down. You see that hatch? Open it for me, will you?”

She knelt down and lifted it. “What are those?”

“Pedals. Ratchet up the contraption, will you? You are about
to see experimental in action.”

He shifted, still holding the wheel, as she pressed a lever
that elevated a wheel attached to pedals, like the front of a bicycle. Glancing
down, he stepped on the pedals and began to cycle.

The strain immediately broke sweat on his forehead. The
mechanism needed adjustment.

She ran to the railing. “We’re gaining altitude.”

“That is the point.”

“You’re shooting hydrogen into the balloon?”

“I said it is experimental. It’s meant to be a two-person
airship.”

“How is that possible?”

He pointed down. “Underneath, I’m charging a battery that
runs a motor. You no longer need crew in the ratlines, opening and closing ports
in the balloon. It’s all controlled from here.”

“No one could keep that up for long.”

“I’m a cripple. Someone in the best condition could do it.”

“You may have lost a hand, but the rest of you appears to be
in fine condition.”

He glanced over, trying to determine if her tone was
admiring or sarcastic. It was neither. She spoke like a doctor, detached and
professional. Though her gaze did seem to be focused on his thighs.

“Who are you?” he asked. She had to be the strangest female
he’d ever met.

“My name is Philadelphia.”

“Brecon.” He took his hand from the wheel and wiped sweat
from his forehead.

“Allow me.” She pulled a black-edged handkerchief from a
pocket in her skirt and dabbed at him. “Do you want me to take a turn?”

He smelled camphor and mint as she wiped away his sweat. “Take
the wheel. Keep moving east. You’re going to see a hill. Behind it is an old
castle ruin with an exposed basement. We’ll descend just as quickly as we
gained altitude, deflate the balloon. I hope it will provide camouflage. If
they stay over the Channel as long as I expect, it should be okay.”

“That’s the best you can do?”

“Have a better idea?”

“I do not believe you can keep pedaling that long.”

“Just like a Welshwoman. Always complaining.”

“I’m not Welsh.”

“You may not have the accent, darling, but you obviously
live here.”

Her lips pursed. “Only in recent months.”

Sweat running down his nose, he estimated their altitude.
“We need two hundred more feet,” he panted.

She kept one hand on the wheel while she put the spyglass to
her eye. “I can just see the hill. Two minutes at our present speed.”

Gritting his teeth, he pedaled faster, knowing the keel
probably wouldn’t survive another bash and skim operation. His ears popped and
he knew they were moving up at an increased rate. In a few seconds, he could
see the hill too. Were they high enough to miss the turf?

He heard her gasp, but she didn’t say anything, just gripped
the wheel, staying on the course he’d ordered. The puffs of smoke continued
steadily from the spyglass, telling him the Blockader airship had probably left
the Channel to chase them over land. He hadn’t gotten a look at their airship
but he hoped it was an old, slow one. They didn’t have much time to hide.

Below him, he saw the grass and scrub-covered hill. Saint
David be praised. “Get ready. The ruin begins in two hundred yards.”

She turned the wheel. “Very well. Where is the basement?”

“Go over the main building. The basement is a little to
port.” He’d stopped pedaling, and maintained altitude.

“I see it.”

“Now!” he yelled, mostly to himself. He knelt down and
pulled a lever to the left of the pedals, then began to pedal in reverse. The
gears screeched at him.

“Needs oil.” This direction was even harder. He was nearly
blind with sweat pouring down his face.

“Faster! We aren’t going down fast enough.”

His breath began to squeak as he exceeded his lung capacity,
but within seconds, they were all but falling into the old basement.

“Hold on!”

Philadelphia wrapped her arms around the wheel. He fell off
the pedals and grabbed for the hatch. Would they set the entire bloody airship
on fire with this stunt? He flipped backward as the keel met not dirt, but a
puddle of water at the bottom of the basement.

Stunned, he lay still for a second as stars danced through
his vision, and then he crawled to the other end of the airship. He turned off
the burner. When he peered over the railing, he could see nothing but inky
blackness underneath as the airship swayed. Then the heavy fabric of the
balloon dropped over his head.

Thank God it was lighter than the standard design or it
would have crushed them both. Pushing at the fabric, he belly crawled back to
the bridge.

“Ouch!” Philadelphia complained as he kicked her leg with
his boot while trying to find a place to flatten on the narrow platform.

“Shhh. Even if they can’t see us, they might be able to hear
us.”

“I wish I could see the spyglass.”

“Patience.” As his senses sharpened, he heard chugging to
the south, the familiar sound of an airship. “There they are, the rotters.”

“Not too long ago, I believed ardently in their mission.”

He wondered what had happened, though not enough to risk a
conversation now. How did a beautiful woman nearly become a suicide? “I’d say
you changed your mind.”

She shushed him now, as the chugging came so close that they
could hear voices over the airship noises. Nothing distinct, just faint shouts
on the wind. From the sound, Brecon could tell the Blockaders had continued to move.

A minute later Philadelphia moved against him. He shot out
his good hand and placed it on her back to keep her still. Even through his
glove he could feel the sticky warmth of her back. “They might fly a pattern
over us. We’ve got to stay down here until dark.”

The airship rocked again.

“Is it airtight?” she whispered

He could feel her quivering under his hand. “Depends on what
damage we did on the cliff.”

She sighed, her breath warm against his ear. At least she
didn’t want to die anymore.

“I’m sorry I cut your back. How much damage did I do?”

“I don’t think it’s very bad, but I think I shall stay on my
stomach.”

It was hard to get a sense of the pain she might be in from
a whisper, but the blood he felt and smelled worried him. “Where is that
handkerchief of yours? I can cover the wound, at least.”

Her fingers fumbled against the wood for a minute. When she
mewled, he knew her hands had found a splinter. The deck hadn’t been treated
and varnished properly yet. How had a simple test run gone so wrong? He should
have gone out closer to dark.

“Never mind,” she said after a moment. “I have no idea where
it is.”

He heard more chugging. The airship was flying a tight
pattern. Had they seen something suspicious? “Then rest.”

“And don’t think about drowning?”

“Exactly. I don’t think we are sinking, anyway.” He didn’t
hear any cries of success from above either. Had he hidden them properly?

“From your mouth to God’s ear.”

The gentle sway of the airship on the water relaxed him,
until he heard the chugging again some indeterminate amount of time later. As
expected, they were going to keep looking, for a while, at least. He wondered
if he’d be able to get his airship aloft again. He’d never tried to do it from
the water. At least airships were designed from water craft, not wagons. His
family designed boats as well as airships. In fact, most of their airship work
was black market, for the smuggling trade, which was how he’d managed to fall
across Terrwyn Fenna’s path on Valentine’s Day. Her family, revered among
smugglers, had decided to have a new airship built when old Gladstone fell from
power and they thought the skies would be safer again. But she was an escapee
from prison, and when the Blockaders recognized her, she and her family had
tried to escape Cardiff with Brecon aboard to help. They had escaped, it was
true, but he’d lost his hand in the process. He’d thrown in his lot with the
Red Kite free traders once he’d healed sufficiently to leave the fishing family
who had nursed him back to health, since he knew better than to show his face
in Cardiff again.

Still, he didn’t begrudge Terrwyn her freedom. She had a
daughter to care for, and a new man, from all reports. He’d heard they were in
France. But he’d lost all urge to woo her, even if she had been the most
beautiful woman in Cardiff. Beauty could get you killed.

The woman lying next to him, now no one would call her a Fenna-quality
beauty, from what he had seen. Her features, while balanced, were a bit too
defined. Her nose had a razor edge, her sharp chin jutted above a long, thin
neck, which hardly seemed able to hold up the patrician head and overabundance
of bright blond hair. What she had was personality.

“Do you have a husband somewhere, or children?” he asked,
after the chugging had gone away.

“No. I lived with my brother, but he died in June, so I went
to live with my cousin, since his widow didn’t want me at the estate.”

“Why not?”

There was a long pause, during which he began to hear a
faint pinging, which he recognized as rain against the balloon. At least they
were warm and dry, trapped in an air pocket under the fabric.

“She blamed me for his death. When she returned from Italy,
where she had been living, she ordered all my things destroyed and cast my
sister and me out.”

“Was his death your fault?”

“Certainly not,” she snapped.

“Where is your sister?”

“She has fallen into the role of housekeeper for my cousin.
Her interests have always been more domestic than mine.”

“Why did your brother’s wife blame you and not your sister?”

“That is a very long tale,” she said.

He kept his chuckle low. “I have the time, madam.”

She sighed. “I showed mechanical talent from an early age,
strange in a female,” she began.

Then he heard chugging again and squeezed her arm to stop
her speech. The chugging intensified as the airship flew overhead. It moved
south a bit, then turned and circled back, crossing directly over their
location, then travelled north-west.

Would it turn again
? Yes. Ahh, he recognized it now.
“We’re clear,” he said with satisfaction when the airship turned again.

“How do you know?”

“They flew a figure-eight pattern. It’s the free traders. We
must be clear.”

“They were searching for you?”

“Why would they not? Test flights are notoriously
unreliable, and we’ve been down here for hours.” He heard a clank above them,
then a metallic squeak. “Move quickly now.”

He grabbed for her hand and squeezed, then reached around
until he found the two steps leading up to the platform and crawled down them.
“We need to make for the railing for safety.”

Just as they reached the deck, something large slammed
against the balloon.

“They’ll be trying to hook the chain handle at the top of
the balloon.”

“Not an exact science,” she said, crawling along the deck
with him.

“Which is why it is best we are far from the center of the
airship.” The deck rocked beneath them as the crew tried to hook the chain
again, but hit off center. “They cannot see very well in this gloom.”

“Is it still raining?” she asked.

“I cannot tell with all the noise.” He heard swearing above
them, then someone shushed the swearer.

“Do you find that rain changes the efficiency of your
airship? Or a change in the barometric pressure in general?”

“It certainly affects the crew.” He winced as another loud
clank offended his ears. They did realize that their iron hook could damage the
deck underneath the balloon, did they not?

“Has anyone ever been killed during this hook and eye
maneuver?” she asked.

Whoever this woman was, she was too interested in the
mechanics of the Red Kite operations. “Not to my knowledge.”

“I’m guessing they aren’t fishermen,” she muttered. “Or they
would starve.”

“Light travels faster than sound, which is why these idiots
appear bright until you hear them speak.”

“Ha.”

There. He heard the sound of metal sliding along metal. “It
takes them four times to calculate properly in this weather, apparently.”

“I suspect it was luck.”

“Come along, and do not forget to be appreciative to them
who have rescued you.” He put out his hand, finding where the hull began, and
started his ten foot crawl toward the coal bucket and the ladder to the burner.

“I was trying to die.”

“You had not made the ultimate decision as of yet,” he
returned.

By the time he’d reached his bucket, the balloon had been
partially winched above the deck. It would inflate completely before they had
the risk of being smothered with fumes. He filled his bucket and crept up the
ladder to relight the engine. Once he had it going he climbed down the ladder
and checked the vat of water, instrumental in the creation of hydrogen for the
balloon. It was still more than half full, and the two large tubes for oxygen
and hydrogen hadn’t been damaged, so he returned to the platform to begin the arduous
charging of the batteries that would allow the balloon to refill.

As the balloon inflated above them, the chugging noise from
above intensified and moved away.