A vast boom rang out, the whole ship shuddering beneath them.
“Blisters!” Dylan swore. “A wave just smacked our underside! The officers left the engines too late.”
Alek stared at Dylan, the shock wave echoing in his head. He wanted to ask a question about the engines and the storm, but all at once the blurry layer across his vision seemed to clear away.
“You’re a girl, aren’t you?”
“What in blazes?” Deryn’s eyes grew wide. “Did your brain get cracked that bad? You’ve known that for a barking week!”
“Yes, but I can . . . see it now!” Even after he’d known the truth, the lie had remained stuck in his mind, like a mask over Deryn’s face. But suddenly the mask had shaken free.
He touched his forehead. “Did you always look like this?”
Deryn’s answer was drowned out by the engines. Alek knew the sound from his long hours in the pods, the distinctive roar of full speed ahead. The wind drove even harder, the rain suddenly like hailstones. He pulled his goggles on again.
“You fell and cracked your head!” Deryn shouted. “The ship’s heavy with rain, remember? So they’re throwing every engine to full speed.” She turned into the gale, her arm thrown across her face, and stared up at the hump rising over them. “And that’s not all!”
Alek squinted into the wind and saw it—a white sheet rippling toward them down the slope of the spine.
“What on earth is that?”
“The water from the bowhead—all being blown back at once!” She wrapped her arms around him. “Take hold of the ratlines before it hits, in case your safety line snaps!”
As Alek dug his fingers into the ropes beneath them, another boom shook the airship. A vast ripple passed through the membrane, bucking Deryn and Alek half a meter into the air, but her arms held tight around him. Her body was a shadow of warmth inhe freezing wind.
“We’re still too low!” she cried. “A tall enough wave could hit the—”
The surge of rainwater struck at that moment, hardly knee height but moving fast. It swept across them where they lay, filling Alek’s nose and mouth. He clutched the ratlines with all his strength, and felt Deryn’s arms around him tighten. His safety line pulled taut as the torrent tried to carry them both down the sloping flank of the airbeast.
After a few long seconds the flood passed by, the water spilling away in both directions from the spine. Deryn let him go, and Alek sat up sputtering and coughing.
“We’re gaining altitude,” she said, looking down the flank. “Our speed has pushed a bit of water off.”
Alek huddled in his soaking flight suit, wondering if the world had gone mad. The wind was roaring with the fury of a hundred engines, a rain like cold gravel was tumbling from the sky, freezing rivers were pouring down the Leviathan’s length . . .
“SPINE SPOUT.”
And his friend Dylan was a girl.
“What’s wrong with everything?” he said, curling up against the cold and shutting his eyes. The world had broken the night his parents had died, and it just seemed to keep breaking.
Deryn shook him. “You’ve got a head wound, Alek. Don’t fall asleep!”
He opened one eye. “It’s a bit cold for a nap.”
“Aye, but don’t pass out!” She leaned closer, their heads almost touching. “Keep talking to me.”
Alek lay there shuddering, trying to think of what to say. The rumble of the engines seemed to be inside his head, tangling his thoughts.
“I forgot you were a girl, just for a moment.”
“Aye. That fall scrambled your attic, didn’t it?”
He nodded, her strange way with words setting off an old memory. “ ‘My attic’s been scrambled.’ You said that the first time we met. After you crashed in the Alps.”
“Aye, I was a bit loopy that night. But you sounded mad yourself, pretending to be a Swiss smuggler.”
“I didn’t know what I was pretending to be. That was the problem.”
She smiled. “You’re a hopeless liar, your princeliness. I’ll give you that.”
“Lack of practice.” Alek shivered, and they huddled closer, her face only centimeters from his. The hood of her flight suit was pulled up, her wet hair pasted to her forehead, baring the angles of her face.
She frowned. “Are you going daft again?”
Alek shook his head, but his eyelids were heavy. He felt his body stop shivering, giving up its struggle against the cold. His thoughts began to fade into the roar of the world around him.
“Stay awake!” Deryn cried. “Talk to me!”
He searched for words, but the rain seemed to strip away his thoughts before they could form. Staring at Deryn, Alek felt his mind switch back and forth, seeing her as a girl, then as a boy.
And he realized what he had to say.
“Promise you won’t ever lie to me again.”
She rolled her eyes.
“I mean it!” he shouted above the wind. “You have to swear it, or we can’t be friends.”
Deryn stared hard at him another moment, then nodded. “Aleksandar of Hohenberg, I promise never to lie to you again.”
“And you won’t keep any secrets from me either?”
“Are you sure you want that?”
“Yes!”
“All right. I won’t hide anything from you again, for as long as I live.”
Alek smiled, and let his eyes finally drift closed. That was all he’d wanted, really, for his allies to trust him with the truth. Was it so much to ask?
Then a warmth pressed against his mouth, lips touching his. Soft at first, then harder, trembling with an intensity that lofted above the storm. A quiver went through him, like the shudder of a dream-fall pulling him from the edge of sleep. He opened his eyes and was staring into Deryn’s face.
She pulled away a little. “Wake up, you daft prince.”
He blinked. “Did you just . . .”
“Aye. I did. No secrets, remember?”
“I see,” Alek said, and another shiver went through him, not from the cold. His head was clear now, and the rain chattered in the silence between them. “You know I can’t . . .”
“You’re a prince, and I’m a commoner.” She shrugged. “But this is what no secrets means.”
He nodded slowly, wondering at the warmth of her secret still on his lips.
“Well, I’m certainly awake now.”
“So it works on sleeping princes, too?” Deryn asked, then her smile faded. “I need a promise from you also, Alek.”
He nodded. “Of course. I won’t keep secrets from you, I swear.”
“I know, but it’s not that.” Deryn turned away, staring off into the blackness, her arms still around him. “Promise that you’ll lie for me.”
“Lie for you?”
“Now that you know what I am, thereno way to escape it.”
Alek hesitated, thinking how strange it was to make an oath to lie. But the oath was to Deryn, and the lies would be to . . . anyone else.
“All right. I swear to lie for you, Deryn Sharp, whatever it takes to protect your secret.” Saying it aloud made Alek’s breath quicken, and the feeling bubbled up into a laugh. “But I can’t promise I’ll be any good at it.”
“You’ll probably be rubbish. But that’s the mess we’re in.”
He nodded, though he wasn’t sure at the moment exactly what kind of mess it was. She had kissed him, after all. He found himself wondering if she was going to kiss him again.
But Deryn was staring off into the storm. Her expression grew serious.
Alek could see nothing but darkness and rain. “What is it?”
“Rescue, your princeliness. Namely, the four biggest riggers in the crew, crawling straight into a sixty-mile-an-hour headwind on their hands and knees. Risking their barking lives to make sure you’re all right.” She turned back with a scowl. “Must be nice to be a prince.”
“Sometimes, yes,” he said, finally letting his eyes close. Another shudder
passed through him, shaking every muscle.
Deryn held him tighter, lending him a sliver of her heat until the strong hands of the riggers picked him up and carried him somewhere warm and quiet.
“That will,
I trust, be the last of your heroics.” Count Volger said this too softly to make Alek’s head hurt, but the words were brittle and precise.
“There weren’t any heroics. I was only there as a translator.”
“And yet here you are with bandages round your head. Rather tricky translations, I should think.”
“Rather tricky,” said Bovril with a chuckle.
Alek took a drink of water from the glass beside his bed. He was fuzzy on much of what had happened last night. He remembered the airship free-ballooning through the strange calm of the storm, and then the engines roaring to life, lashing the rain into a tempest. Things had gotten complicated after that. He’d fallen and hit his head, then almost drowned in a surge of rainwater.
And Deryn Sharp had kissed him.
“There were important repairs to be done,” he said. “A loose antenna.”
“Ah, yes. What could be more vital than Tesla’s giant flying radio?”
“Is it working?” Alek asked, wanting to change the subject. Thinking about last night made his head spin, though it pleased him to have a secret from Count Volger.
“Apparently. Tesla sits in his laboratory, tapping out messages.” The wildcount drummed his fingers. “Instructions to his assistants in New York, to prepare Goliath for our arrival.”
Bovril began to rap out Morse code on the frame of the bed.
Alek shushed the beast. “Maybe we’ve done some good, then, getting him home so quickly. If he stops the war . . .”
Hundreds were dying every day. Rescuing Tesla from the wilderness and getting him to America quickly might save thousands of lives. What if something so simple had been Alek’s destiny all along?
“ ‘If’ is a word that can never be said too loudly.” Volger stood up, looking out at the still cloudy sky. “For example, if you had died last night, the last decade of my life would’ve been altogether wasted.”
“Have a little faith in me, Volger.”
“I have great faith, tempered with vast annoyance.”
Alek smiled weakly, falling back into his pillows. The ship’s engines were still at full-ahead, the stateroom rumbling around him. The world was unsteady.
It wasn’t fair of Deryn, kissing him. She knew the story of how his father had married a woman of lesser station, and all the disasters that had resulted. It had torn Alek’s family apart, and in turn had upset the balance of Europe. His father’s one selfish act of true love had cost more than anyone could count.
The pope’s letter might make Alek the heir to his granduncle’s throne, but it didn’t alter the fact that he’d been rejected by his own family. The slightest mark against him would cast his legitimacy into doubt. Alek couldn’t allow himself to think about a commoner that way. He had a war to stop.
He made a fist and wiped his lips with the back of his hand.
“Great faith,” Bovril repeated. “Vast annoyance.”
Giving the beast a withering look, Volger said, “The captain asked me to mention that he’ll be coming to see you.”
“He must be annoyed as well. He had to risk four men just to rescue me.” Alek closed his eyes and began to rub his temples. “I hope he doesn’t shout.”
“I shouldn’t worry.” Volger began to pace, his footsteps echoing in Alek’s head. “Unlike mine, his annoyance will be well hidden.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Darwinists see you as a link to Tesla. You’re both Clankers, and both of you have switched sides in this war.”
“Tesla doesn’t think much of my political connections.”
“Not to the Austrian government, no. But he sees you as a way to broadcast the news of his weapon.” The man mercifully stopped pacing. “You were famous already, thanks to those ridiculous articles. And soon you will arrive in America on the world’s greatest airship.”
Alek sat up again and stared at Volger, trying to figure out if the man was serious.
“He’s always been a showman. Dr. Barlow told me about his spectacle in Tokyo.” Volger gave a shrug. “It makes sense, I suppose. The best way to keep Goliath from being used is to tell everyone what it can do, and that means creating a sensation. So why not promote his weapon to end the war with you, the boy whose family tragedy started it?”
Alek rubbed his temples again. The pounding was getting worse with every word. First Deryn, now this. “It all sounds quite undignified.”
“You wanted a destiny.”
“Are you saying I should let him put me on display?”
“I’m suggesting, Your Serene Highness, that you get as much sleep as possible over the next few days.” Volger smiled. “Your headaches have only begun.”
The ship’s officers came a few hours later, just when Alek had managed to fall back asleep.
A marine sergeant shook him awake, then snapped to attention with a painful smack of his boot heels against the floor. Dr. Busk took Alek’s pulse, staring at his watch and nodding sagely.
“You appear to be recovering nicely, Prince.”
“Someone should tell my head that.” Alek nodded at the assembled visitors. “Captain, First Officer, Dr. Barlow.”
“Good afternoon, Prince Aleksandar,” the captain said, and the four of them bowed together.
Alek frowned. This all seemed oddly formal, given that he was lying here in his nightshirt. He wished they would go away and let him sleep.
Dr. Barlow’s loris dropped from her shoulder to the floor and crawled under the bed, where Bovril joined it. The two beasts began to mutter snatches of conversation to each other.
“What can I do for you?” Alek asked.
“You’ve already done it, in a manner of speaking.” The captain was beaming, his voice altogether too loud. “Middy Sharp told us how bravely you assisted him last night.”
“Assisted him? Dylan made the repairs. I only fell and hit my head, from what I can recall.”
The officers all laughed at this, loudly enough to make Alek wince, but Dr. Barlow’s expression remained serious.
“Without you, Alek, Mr. Sharp would have been un-tethered on the spine.” She looked out the window. “In gale conditions nothing is more dangerous than working topside alone.”
“Yes, I make excellent deadweight.”
“Most amusing, Your Majesty,” said Captain Hobbes. “But this modesty is falling on deaf ears, I’m afraid.”
“I only did what any member of the crew would have done.”
“Exactly.” The captain nodded vigorously. “But you are not a member of this crew, and yet you performed heroically. A copy of Mr. Sharp’s report has already been dispatched te Admiralty.”
“The Admiralty?” Alek sat up straighter. “That seems a bit . . . excessive.”
“Not at all. Reports of heroism are sent to London as a matter of course.” He clicked his heels together and made a small bow. “But whatever they decide, you have my personal thanks.”
The officers made their good-byes then, but the lady boffin remained behind, snapping her fingers for her loris. The beast seemed reluctant to come out from beneath the bed, where Bovril was babbling the names of German radio parts.
“Excuse me, Dr. Barlow,” Alek asked. “But what was that all about?”
“You really don’t know? How charming.” She gave up on her loris and sat down on the end of the bed. “I think the captain means to give you a medal.”
Alek felt his jaw drop open. A week ago it would have overjoyed him to be made one of the crew, much less decorated as an airman. But Volger’s warnings were still fresh in his aching head.
“To what purpose?” he asked. “And don’t tell me it’s in recognition of my heroism. What does the captain want from me?”
The lady boffin sighed. “So jaded for one so
young.”
“Jaded, heh,” came a small voice from beneath the bed.
“Don’t be tiresome, Dr. Barlow. The captain already knows I’ll help Mr. Tesla’s cause. Why must he bribe me with medals?”
She looked out the window at the boiling clouds. “Perhaps he fears you’ll change your mind.”
“Why would I do that?”
“Because someone might convince you that Mr. Tesla is a fraud.”
“Ah.” Alek remembered Deryn’s words in Tokyo. “And might that someone be you?”
“We shall see.” Dr. Barlow reached down and snapped her fingers again, and finally her beast emerged. She lifted it onto her shoulder. “I am a scientist, Alek. I do not deal in surmise. But when I have proof, I’ll let you know.”
“It was awful, being at war with you,” said the loris on her shoulder.
Alek stared at it, recalling when he’d said the words to Deryn in Japan. Had Bovril recounted that entire conversation to the other loris? The thought of all their secrets being traded between the creatures was most unsettling.
Dr. Barlow shook her head. “Pay no attention. These two beasts were clearly damaged in their eggs. Years wasted, all thanks to one bumpy landing in the Alps.” She reached out to straighten Alek’s bandages. “And speaking of bumps, do get some sleep, or you shall wind up as simpleminded as they.”
After she left, Bovril emerged from beneath the bed. It crawled up onto Alek’s stomach, chuckling to itself.
“What’s got you amused?” he asked.
" width="1t="0em" width="1em">The creature turned to Alek, suddenly wearing a serious look. “Fell from the sky,” it said.
It took five days for th
e sky to clear again.
The storm had pushed the Leviathan across the Pacific swiftly, carrying the airship well to the south. The coast of California stretched across the windows of the middies’ mess. A few white cliffs caught the sun, and behind them were rolling hills, grassy and patched with brown.