Tinker's War (The Tinkerer's Daughter Book 2) (20 page)

A shadow filled the doorway and we looked up to see the others watching us. “The house is cleaned out,” Wil said. “We found a lantern, some forks and knives. That’s about it. Did you two find anything?”

“We sure did,” Brand said, laughing.

“I’ll get the wagon.”

Chapter 19

It took two hours of backbreaking work to get the anvil onto the wagon. We started by reinforcing the floor with extra wood to make sure the beastly thing wouldn’t fall through. Then we had to lift it onto the wagon, which required the use of a pulley that Wil had found hanging on the wall in one of the horse stalls. By the time we had finally strapped the massive anvil into place, it was early afternoon.

We hurriedly loaded up the rest of our discoveries and then walked over to the creek to eat lunch. Analyn had been kind enough to pack us a basket with cheese, cured meat, and freshly baked bread. She’d also provided a bottle of apple wine, though she’d forgotten that we didn’t have any glasses. We shared the bottle, taking a sip and passing it on as we ate. It was a pleasant meal, though it was over all too soon. I would have enjoyed taking the time to get to know my companions better.

“We should get moving,” Brand said eventually, eyeing the sun through the branches overhead.

Wil groaned. “Already? I need a nap.”

“You can sleep in the wagon once we’re moving,” I said. “It’s going to take a lot longer to get back up the mountain than it did coming down.”

They glanced back and forth at each other. “I hadn’t thought of that,” Wil said.

“I did,” said Jenna. “I bet we’re going to have to use one of those charges before the day’s over.”

“I hope not,” I said. “The last thing we need is that kind of noise, or the attention it will bring.”

We stoked up the fire in the steamwagon with fresh coal before we left, and then climbed back onto the wagon. I drove slower on the way back to the mountains, knowing that the extra weight we were carrying could easily break an axle. For a while, it seemed we were doing fine. Then I heard a buzzing sound in the distance, and my heart skipped a beat. I slowed the steamwagon and locked up the brake, my eyes scanning the skies.

“What is it?” said Brand. Then, a moment later, he heard it as well.

“Everybody under the wagon,” I said. “And stay still. With any luck, the pilot will think the wagon was abandoned here.”

“Maybe,” Brand said. “But the boiler is still smoking.”

I grimaced. When the fire is hot enough, coal burns so clean that you can’t even see smoke, but when the fire is cool and the coal is fresh, it smokes almost as bad as one of the Vangar’s black oil engines. We had just re-stoked the fire before leaving the farm and it was still putting out a considerable amount of smoke. We crawled into the shadow under the wagon, watching the Vangar gyroplane grow in the distance.

“I hate to point this out,” Wil said, but we’re all hiding under a five hundred pound anvil.”

We all looked up at the floorboards nervously. Wil and I were the closest, and we both inched away. A moment later, the Vangar pilot whooshed overhead. “He saw us,” Jenna whispered. “He’s coming back.”

We watched breathlessly as the pilot circled in the sky and then passed over us again, heading back to the north. A few minutes later, he was out of sight. “You were wrong,” Kale said. “He didn’t see us!”

“Maybe,” I said.

“He left, didn’t he?”

“He left,” Brand agreed. “But did he leave because he didn’t see us, or did he leave to go get help?”

Kale gulped, staring at the older man. “We should go,” I said.

The others wasted no time climbing onto the back of the wagon. In seconds, we were rolling across the foothills, moving as fast as we dared with our heavy load. “Keep an eye on that anvil,” I told Brand. “If it starts to move, I want to know.”

“Count on it,” he said. “If we drop that thing out here, we’ll never get it back on the wagon.”

“We’ve got trouble,” Wil said behind me. He pointed to the north across the plains. In the distance, I saw a cloud of dust and the dark shapes of horsemen on the horizon.

“Vangars,” Brand muttered.

I scanned the hills ahead, looking for a clearer path where I could pick up a little speed, or maybe a ravine where we could conceal the wagon. I found neither. Just smooth, rolling hills all the way up to the mountains. Then I heard the familiar buzzing sound in the distance and I knew that the pilot was going to give away our location. Sure enough, a minute later he buzzed over our heads and then circled us twice before heading back to the north.

“They know where we are now,” Brand said. “Can you make this thing go any faster?”

“Not if you want to keep it in one piece,” I said.

“They’re gaining on us fast,” Wil said. “We’ll never beat them to the mountains.”

I glanced back at the Vangars and saw that he was right. They had already cut the distance in half, and they were bearing down on us as fast as their mounts could run. I shot Brand a look. “Do you think you can slow them down?”

“I’ll try.” He picked up the rifle and settled it across the back of the seat, aiming to the north. I locked the brakes and covered my ears, grimacing as I waited for the inevitable deafening blast. And waited. I shot Brand an anxious glance. The Vangars came back into view over the next rise and then went down the other side and vanished again. After a minute, my impatience got the better of me.

“What’s the problem?” I said.

“This ain’t a crossbow,” Brand snorted. “And they ain’t targets hangin’ on a tree! Anybody else here ever made a shot like this?”

We all shook our heads. The floorboards creaked as the wind blew against us, rocking the wagon side to side. The Vangars appeared again, cresting the top of a hill. Brand lowered himself and took aim again. “It’s no good,” he said at last. “I can’t take a shot that far when we’re bouncing all over the place.” He crawled out of the wagon and knelt down on the ground, bracing his elbow on his knee to support the long rifle.

 “Now they’ll catch us for sure!” Wil said. “We should keep moving!”

“Hush!” I ordered. “Go ahead, Brand. Take your shot.”

I watched him squinting down the sights, his shoulders rising and falling with his breath. Then, the movement stopped. His finger slid across the trigger. He tapped it once and then squeezed.

Kaboom!
Brand’s shoulders twisted with the recoil. I squinted against the sunlight, watching the Vangars in the distance. Three seconds passed before one of the Vangars suddenly tumbled out of the saddle. They were close enough now that I could count them. I saw four more.

“They’re still coming,” I said. “Take another shot.”

Brand jumped up, digging out his pouch of charges and lead balls. In seconds, he had the rifle reloaded. He returned to the wagon, lining his rifle up along the back of the bench again. The Vangars were closer now, and they were much easier to target. The wait wasn’t nearly as long this time.

Kaboom!
The wagon rocked gently beneath us as another Vangar fell from his saddle. The rest of the group faltered now. They came to a stop at the crest of a distant slope, staring at us across the hills. Behind them, I saw the gyroplane sweeping across the sky.

“They’re not sure they can take us now,” Brand said. “Stand up, let them see how many we are.”

I watched the gyroplane circling in the sky behind them. “Reload!” I said. Brand frowned, following my gaze. He bent over and jammed a fresh load into the rifle. He lifted it to his shoulder.

“What should I aim for?” he said.

“The fuel tank. That propeller will keep spinning even if the engine is disabled, but it won’t go far.”

“All right.” He raised the rifle and took aim as the gyro pilot bore down on us. I wondered what the pilot was thinking. I wondered if his gyroplane was armed with some sort of weapon. It was a chance we couldn’t take.

“Don’t let him get close enough to shoot at us,” I said. Brand got the point. Two seconds passed and then
Kaboom!
again.

I heard the crack of steel in the distance and a few seconds later, the engine sputtered. The pilot changed course, heading back towards his Vangar allies with smoke trailing behind him. Then something happened that I hadn’t expected. I saw flames licking up the side of the engine where the fuel had spilled out of the tank.

The fuel tank caught fire and suddenly exploded. An orange and yellow fireball filled the sky, consuming the entire vehicle instantly. A thundering boom rolled across the plains. The flames quickly dissipated into thick, black smoke and shards of metal and wood rained down on the ground. I lowered my gaze to see the three surviving Vangars spurring their mounts to the north. My companions let out a cheer. I dropped back into the seat and released the brake, eager to be gone before the Vangars came back with reinforcements.

We saw several more gyroplanes that afternoon, but by then we were safely hidden under the trees. Each time we heard one approaching, we stopped the wagon and waited breathlessly for it to pass. Each time, the Vangar pilots flew south along the edge of the mountains and then circled back to the north. “They know we’re in the mountains now,” Brand said eventually. “They’ll probably start searching further to the east.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But they might not like what they find. The air currents are treacherous over the Blackrock Mountains, and those gyroplanes are very light. Those pilots might find themselves smashed across the side of a mountain if they try.”

“Well, if they get close we’ll be waiting for them,” he said, patting his rifle.

It took the rest of the afternoon and most of the evening to get back to camp. As I expected, we did have to stop and remove a tree from our path, but thankfully only one. The boulders were a different problem, but using Jenna’s technique we managed to roll several out of the way using long sticks as levers.

“By the time we’re done, this trail will be a genuine road,” Brand said as we watched one of the boulders tumble down the mountainside.

“All the easier to find us,” Jenna added. That was a grim thought, but unfortunately it couldn’t be helped. There was no other way to get that wagon back into the mountains.

The refugees were thrilled when we arrived later that night. They welcomed us warmly and then immediately fell to arguing about what they should do with the supplies we had recovered. Analyn took over. She quieted them with a glare and told the rest of us to get to the mess tent and have some dinner. We happily complied.

As we settled around the table and started talking about our experiences, I fondly remembered training a group of new pilot recruits in a very similar situation, many years before. It seemed odd that things could be so similar now and yet so different. The emotions were the same: the excitement, the rush of adrenaline, the camaraderie. But I was different. I knew in the back of my mind that things might change without a moment’s notice; that something unexpected or even horrific could turn all of this upside down. This knowledge tempered my happiness as I watched their smiles and listened to their conversation. Somehow, it made me feel like an outsider, as if I couldn’t immerse myself in this experience because I knew that it was all so fleeting.

Eventually, I excused myself. I found Analyn at the center of camp, happily knitting her shawl in front of the fire pit. She didn’t look up as I settled down across from her. “At last,” she said. “Tell me what happened!”

I recounted our entire adventure, staring into the embers of the fire as I spoke. Analyn must have recognized something in my voice, because she paused in her knitting and raised her eyes to stare at me. “What troubles you?” she said.

“I can’t say, exactly. It’s just this feeling I have, this feeling that something terrible is going to happen.”

She nodded. “That’s not unreasonable. We have been through all of this before, haven’t we?’

“I suppose so. Maybe that’s what bothers me. Ten years ago, I thought this was done. We weren’t ever supposed to be like this again. But here we are, huddled in our tents, praying for a chance to set the world right again. It seems so…”

“Futile?”

“Yes, that’s it exactly. What’s the point of it all? What good is it to fight and die and sacrifice so much, if everything we gain is only temporary?”

“Everything in this world is temporary,” Analyn said wisely. “Nothing lasts forever. That’s why it’s so important to fight and sacrifice for what we believe, because tomorrow it could all be gone. You have to take what you have today and hold onto it. You have to treasure it and love it and fight for it, because tomorrow it could all be gone. Even this, what we have here in the mountains that seems so insignificant, could all be gone by tomorrow.”

She finished knitting, and quietly put her things back in order. She rose from the chair and looked down at me, smiling. “I’m going to bed now,” she said. “Remember this: this moment is too precious to waste thinking about what might have been, or what should have been. This is what we have now, and we must embrace it before it’s gone.”

I watched her vanish into the tents and then drew my gaze back to the fire. Her words rang through my mind in the way that only the truth can, and somehow I understood exactly what she meant. I was reminded of something General Corsan had said to me before he died.

I rose from the fire then and went to Robie’s tent. I found him sitting up on his cot, reading. He smiled as I came in.

“An old fairy tale,” he said, showing me the book. “My mother used to read this to me when I was a boy.”

I knelt down next to him, staring into his eyes, wondering.

“What’s the matter?” he said.

I took the book from his hands and set it on the ground. “No more fairy tales,” I said. I threw my arms around him, holding him as if he was the last piece of my old life left. Tears began streaming down my face.

My defenses crumbled as I thought of the people I cared about being driven from their homes, of families torn apart and lives ruined; of our entire world crumbling before our eyes. I had never understood until that moment just how fleeting it all was. Analyn’s words had solidified this emotion for me, providing a new understanding of all that I had been feeling.