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The captain’s forearm felt every bit as dense as it looked, straining at the seam of the coat. Briar tried to keep her fingers from fluttering out of nervousness, but it wasn’t like a handshake where she could squeeze and make her position known a little more firmly.
The captain patted her nervous hand, and said, “Lady, so long as you wear Maynard’s mark and respect our peace, we’re bound to respect yours. There’s no need to fret. ”
“I believe you,” she said, and it might or might not have been true. “But I have more things to fret about than your proximity, I promise you. ”
“Your son. ”
“My son, yes. I’m sorry, you didn’t mention your name, Captain… ?”
“Hainey. Croggon Hainey,” he told her. “Captain for short. Captain Hainey for long. Crog, in passing. ”
“Captain, yes. I do thank you for the assistance. ”
He grinned to display a row of shocking white teeth. “Don’t thank me yet. I’ve done nothing but treat you as I’m bound to. My fellow friend and airman may or may not give you any further assistance. ”
Crog led her between the creaking, swaying airships that moored themselves in the wider paths between the massively thick trunks. They bobbed against their leashes and bumped gently against the treetops, brushing their undercarriages with evergreen boughs and bird nests.
The nearest of them was a slapdash affair that looked wholly improvised and yet thoroughly solid. If anything, it looked too heavy to fly. It boasted a steel-plated, canoe-shaped basket the size of a rich man’s living room and a pair of gas tanks as big as a poor man’s wagon. Riveted, stitched, bolted, and tied together, it loomed over the clearing where it was held by three long, fat ropes.
A rope ladder trailed on the ground, dangling from the bottom of the ship’s underside. Beside it, in the shade of the strangely shaped craft, a man sat in a folding wooden chair. In the crook of his arm rested a bottle of whiskey. The bottle rose and fell against his chest as he breathed, and if it weren’t for the goggles over his eyes, it would have been obvious that he was stone asleep.
Crog stopped a few yards away from the almost-snoring man and said in a rumbling whisper, “Ma’am, allow me to introduce Captain Andan Cly. And there above his thick-boned head you’ll see his ship, the Naamah Darling. Wake him with kindness, and—if possible—at a distance. ”
“Wait, you’re not going to—”
“Oh no. You’re the one who wants the favor. You can nudge him awake for it. Best of luck to you, ma’am. And if he won’t take you, the best I can offer is a trip in three days, at our next gas run. Or, if he lets you ride and drop, then you can look for the Free Crow on Tuesday, docked at the Smith Tower. It don’t cost me a thing to pull you out, though you might think to bring me a present if I do. ”
He pulled her fingers off his arm, and until he picked at them she hadn’t realized she’d been clenching at his sleeve. “Thank you,” she told him. “And I do mean it, thank you. If you lift me out on Tuesday, I’ll find a way to pay you. I know of places, and things inside the city. I’ll make it worth your while. ”
“Then I’ll be the one thanking you, ma’am. ”
He disappeared back through the maze of trees and ropes and hovering ships while Briar tried not to cringe at the presence of the man underneath the Naamah Darling.
Andan Cly was not precisely slumped, and not precisely seated in the wood-slat chair. His light brown hair was cropped so close that he appeared almost bald, and his ears sat high on his skull. The left one was pierced with three silver studs. The right one remained plain. He was wearing a dirty undershirt and a pair of brown pants that cuffed down into boots.
Briar thought that surely he must be too cold to sleep, but as she crept towards him she felt the temperature rise. By the time she stood in front of him, she was almost sweating—and then she realized that he’d positioned himself underneath the ship’s boilers, which were steaming themselves into a fully heated state.
She didn’t step on a twig or tap her foot against a rock. She didn’t move, only stared, but it was suddenly enough to bring him awake. Nothing signaled this change of state except a sharpening of his posture, and then a sleepy finger that lifted his goggles until they sat on his forehead.
“What?” he asked. The question was not specifically a demand or complaint, but it sounded like it could’ve been either.
“Andan Cly?” she asked, and added, “Captain of the Naamah Darling?”
He grumbled, “Speaking. To who?”
It was Briar’s turn to ask, “What?”
“Who am I speaking to?”
“I’m… a passenger. Or I want to be. I need a lift, and Captain Hainey said I should talk to you. ” She left out the rest of what Crog had said.
“Did he?”
“Yes. ”
He twisted his head left, then right, and all the joints in between cracked loudly. “Where do you want to go?”
“Over the wall. ”
“When?”
“Now,” she said.
“Now?” He drew the bottle out of the crook in his arm and set it down on the ground beside the chair. His eyes were a clear, vibrant hazel that almost looked like copper, even in the half-lit shade of his ship. He stared at her, not blinking nearly often enough for her comfort.
“My son; he ran away,” she condensed the story, “He’s gone into the city. I have to go in after him. ”
“You’ve never been in there, then?”
“Not since the wall went up, no. Why do you ask?”
“Because if you’d ever been inside, you’d know better than to think some kid’s in there alive. ”
She met his glare blink for blink and said, “My son might be. He’s smart, and he’s prepared. ”
“He’s an idiot,” Andan corrected her. “If he went inside. ”
“He’s not an idiot, he’s only… uninformed. ” She settled on the truest word, even though it hurt her to say it out loud. “Please, listen. Help me. I’ve got a mask, and if I can get inside I can find my way around all right. Crog said he’d pick me up on Tuesday—”
“You think you’ll live till Tuesday?”
“Yes. I do. ”
“Then you’re an idiot too. No offense. ”
“You can offend me all you like if you’ll take me over the wall. ”
He made half a smile as if he meant to laugh at her, but the upward swing of his lip lost its momentum. “You’re serious. And stubborn. But you’ll need more than that”—he pointed at the rifle—“and Maynard’s mark if you want to stay in one piece down there. ”
“But if I respect the peace—”
He cut her off. “Then some of the other people you meet inside will respect the peace, too. But not all of them will. There’s a madman named Minnericht who runs part of the city, and big quarters of Chinese folks who might or might not be friendly to a strange white woman. And your friends the crooks will be the least of your problems. Have you ever seen a rotter? A real hungry one?”
“Yes. I saw them during the evacuation. ”
“Aw. ” He shook his head. While his head moved his eyes stayed casually locked on her belt buckle. “Those things? They weren’t hungry. Not yet. The ones who’ve been starving inside for fifteen years, they’re the problem. And they move in packs. ”
“I’ve got plenty of ammunition. ” She patted the satchel.
“And an old repeater too, I see. That’ll be useful. But eventually you’ll run out of shot, and if the rotters don’t get you, Minnericht’s men will. Or the crows might. There’s no telling with those damn birds. But let me ask you a question. ”
“Another one?”
“Yes, another one,” he said crossly. He aimed one long finger at her midsection and said, “Where did you get that?”
“This?” From reflex, she grasped the buckle and looked down at it. “It… why?”
br /> “Because I’ve seen it before. And I want to know where you got it. ”
“That’s no business of yours,” she argued.
“I guess it isn’t. And it’s no problem of mine if you don’t get over the wall to look for your kid, Mrs. Blue. ”
For a moment, she couldn’t breathe—she could only swallow. The fear clutched her throat and she couldn’t speak, either. Then she said, “That’s not my name. ”
He said back, “Well, that’s who you are, aren’t you?”
She shook her head a little too hard and said, “No. Not since the wall went up. It’s Wilkes. And my boy, he’s a Wilkes too, if you’ve got to assign a name to him. ” The rest came spilling out too fast, but she couldn’t stop it. “He thinks his father was innocent because you’re right, he’s a little bit of an idiot, but he’s gone in because he wants to prove it. ”
“Can he prove it?”
“No,” she said. “Because it isn’t true. But Zeke, you’ve got to understand, he’s just a boy. He don’t know any better, and I couldn’t sell him on it. He had to go see for himself. ”
“All right. ” He nodded. “And he knows about Maynard’s mark, and he found a way inside. He went under, I guess?”
“He went under. But the earthquake we had last night—it flattened the old runoff tunnel. He can’t get out that way, and I can’t get in. Now will you take me over the wall, or won’t you? If you won’t, then say so, because I’ve got to go ask someone else. ”
He took his time answering her. While he decided, he looked her up and down in a way that wasn’t altogether offensive, but wasn’t too flattering, either. He was thinking about something, and thinking about it hard; and Briar didn’t know what it was, or how he’d guessed so easily, or if Maynard could help her now.