Maledictus Aether (33 page)

“What do you plan on doing
now?” I question, and this solicits a sound of confusion from my
companion, so I clarify. “Surely you don’t plan on being my Quarter
Master forever, right? There must be other things you wish to
do.”

He says something along the lines of
is that it
and it makes me lift my head up so we can lock eyes, and
while I frown at him he smiles warmly at me.

“Most of what I want to do involves you,” he informs me,
and this honestly comes as a surprise. “There
are
a few
things I want to do, but none of them really require I leave.
Besides, this is one hell of an experience and I love every moment
of it, with its ups and downs.”

“So you do not want to go find
your family?” I ask, and he shakes his head. “Nor captain your own
ship? Raise a family?”

He groans, clearly annoyed by
this point, and as he pulls himself away to get to his feet, I
watch him while protesting his protest.

“Excuse me for assuming, then,
but normally men want to continue their bloodline,” I scoff, and he
turns to face me with his arms crossed, frowning at me. “So I do
believe my assumptions are not exactly that far-fetched.
Furthermore, I-”

“As far as I am concerned, my family is dead,” he cuts in,
making me frown in irritation. I was going to get to that. “I saw
you condemn your own mother to whatever fate befell her without
batting an eyelash, and after that
heartfelt
speech of
yours do you honestly think I do not think I am surrounded by a
family too?”

I lean back against my hands,
sighing.

Bloody hell.

“I am perfectly content with being your Quarter Master, and
have no desire to captain my own ship; I doubt I could do a better
job than you in either case,” he continues, and this time he leans
forward, knees on the edge of the mattress and using his hands to
keep his balance as he brings his face close to mine. I can feel my
ears burning at the close proximity. “Finally, about the raising a
family thing: my bloodline ends here.”

My eyes widen remarkably at
this statement, and he grins. Every breath he exhales ghosts over
my skin, and I am soon enough quite hyper-aware of his
position.

Cue my face burning up even
more.

His statement does not help at
all.

“Bloody hell,” I groan, falling onto my back and pressing
my hands to my face. He remains where he is while I attempt to hide
the blush painting my face an interesting shade of red. “You are
out of your mind; you stupid, bloody wanker you are seriously more
than I can withstand.”

The man laughs at my actions,
shaking his head before sitting on my thighs so he can pull my
hands from my face after wrestling against my resistance a bit.
After pressing them together at my chest and wrapping them with
his, he reaches up to brush my hair from my forehead; when I close
my eyes at the gesture, muttering something rude about him coddling
me like this, he kisses my forehead.

“Careful; you will hurt my feelings,
Captain
,”
he mutters against my skin, his lips brushing lightly on my
forehead. I screw my eyes shut even more tightly in response. “We
wouldn’t want that, now would we?”

“Sod off,” I hiss, and he
laughs once more, pulling his face away from mine long enough to
pull my hands over my head and hold them there with one hand,
gripping my wrists loosely yet tightly enough to refuse escape.
When I open my eyes to glare at him, he grins at me in that way
that always invokes mixed reactions within me. “Quit being a bloody
tease already.”

“Aye-aye, captain,” he
chuckles, and just as I’m about to spit a swear at him he captures
my lips, tipping my head up with his free hand. His hair cascades
over us both, tickling my skin, and I manage to free my right hand
despite his grip so I can press it behind his head, fingers
tangling in the locks.

“You’re the reason my hair is
always a mess, you know,” he states as he pulls back for a breath,
and I ignore the comment, forcing him back for another kiss.

I do not even acknowledge the
statement; if he was annoyed by this fact, he would have told me to
stop by now.

A little later in the evening, we lay together under the
blankets, watching the celestial map unfold around us as we
continue on course. His arm is wrapped securely around my waist and
his fingers tickle at my bare stomach, and despite my protests he
has not relented to that; so I’ve begun ignoring it as well as I
can despite the circumstances. Lucian has me pulled back against
his chest, his chin resting on the crown of my head.

“Are you still planning on
doing what you told me?” he inquires, and I nod lightly, the light
of the moon spilling over us and the slight mess to my chambers.
“Will you tell me why?”

“Tomorrow,” I state, closing my eyes and resting more fully
against the warm body behind me. Sighing, he accepts the promise
without a protest. “Believe me; I am not planning on doing this
without reason.”

“I believe you,” he says, kissing me lightly beneath my
right ear. I swat his head away, telling him not to be so greedy so
soon, and he simply laughs at me. His words of
you’re one to talk
make my face heat up, and I decide to ignore that.
Laughing in my ear, he brings his chin back to the crown of my
head. “You are such a child.”

“I will throw you off this
ship,” I warn, and he scoffs lightly.

“Sure you will,” he muses,
holding me a little more tightly against him. “Sleep well,
then.”

Humans have become dependent of Aether. We use it for
everything now, from engines to a life source, knowing the truths
and ignoring it. Embellishing it to make it appear much less
harmful to us than it already is. Ignoring the facts, and replacing
them with the facts that are actually beneficial.

Even I am guilty of such a
thing.

Aether
rots, like any
other organic matter, but it rots so slowly we seem to forget that;
a good supply of Aether can take decades to start decomposing, and
when it does it actually erodes any other organic matter touching
it. It eats away at the things around it and poisons any liquids it
touches.

When it starts rotting, its
efficiency starts deteriorating as well.

No one knows how the
Alitis
landed so
rudely, but my theory has to do with that very same material. I
first became suspicious of this on Dracia, when the Aether of a
building came away on my fingers; the smell of rot goes without
saying.

My theory is that the engines, as they run on Aether and is
the very reason why the ship sails, deteriorated to the point where
they became useless, which is why the engines were so bloody
complicated to fix. Furthermore, as the engines recycle their own
Aether, it was simply re-using rotting liquid, and as such only
allowed for the metal to deteriorate at a quickened pace.
Even
if
the Fleet had not attacked, the ship would not
have flown for much longer.

The same thing goes for the Skylands. The Aether within
will rot, and is beginning to rot in some cases, and eventually
they will fall to the earth. There is no Skyland that will survive,
unless something is done for them and an alternate source is found
to power the engines, at the very least.

That is a design I am tackling,
but will not be completed for some time.

As for my father’s Skyland, I have decided to quicken the
process. It holds treasures of the likes none have ever seen, and
once we bring what we can to the cargo bay of the
Atlas
I order my crew to set the Skyland on fire, burning every
building and tree to ashes. The
Atlas
hovers some
ways away, within firing range, and once everything has burned to
ashes the broadside cannons open fire, relentlessly attacking the
harmless island until, finally, after hundreds of chunks of the
island has already fallen away the rest of it falls from the skies
to the earth beneath it.

I watch all this from the
gallery with Lucian at my side.

The last stop is London, where
I step into the home I called my own until I became aware of what
was happening behind closed doors. It survived relatively unscathed
from the battle, with only parts of the home toppled to show for
it, and I can safely pick my way through the wreckage and run my
hand over the mantle, the guardrail running down the staircase, my
eyes looking over every last detail.

The memories that come to me are not happy ones, but still
I walk through; a handful of my crew waits outside, and when I join
them we set fire to my childhood home as well, the congregation of
churchgoers next door watching nervously, switching their focus
between the burning building and the Sky Pirates among
them.

I lost everything. I’ve lost my
blood relatives, my mother once and my father twice, but only my
father’s passing did I mourn. My home, which honestly never really
was one to me to begin with; I am an outcast, more than ever, to my
hometown.

I have also killed, be it
justified or not, and given permission for the rape and eventual
murder of a woman. I have killed countless men and women through my
plans, and many have died under my command for my selfish
goals.

Yet, there is still much to be gained from all this. I have
a family of the likes I would have never imagined; I have found a
strange, but enticing, passion to pursue, however forbidden it may
be landside; I have built and repaired the impossible; I have
discovered a world unlike anything I have ever experienced; and I
have stepped out of my father’s shadow.

Despite everything I have lost
and everything I have done, I do not regret a thing. Not the crimes
I have committed, not the love I have indulged in, not the crimes I
have allotted.

I cannot regret any of my actions, especially as I grapple
onto another ship and swing onto the deck, blood singing for the
conquest and eventual prize at the end – plunder for the Sky
Pirates, slaves to be sold in the market, a ship sent careening to
the earth the way countless of ours have been, and building up the
Sky Pirate Confederacy, where the world my forefathers dreamed of
is a reality. I only ever truly feel alive as I board another ship
– the other exception being those moments shared between Lucian and
I, who stays by my side throughout it all – and I have come to
realise that you do not have to be a good person to be a hero. You
just have to know who you are and stay true to that.

So I will keep fighting for
people the only way I have ever known how.

By being me.