“Why stay in such a place?” Cas thought of the support and camaraderie she got from her unit back home. After the awkward discomfort she had always experienced with her father, it had been a delight to have a different sort of family, one with dozens of brothers and sisters to work with and talk to, people who did dangerous work and formed close relationships through the experience. Just thinking about it, about them, made her chest ache with homesickness.
“There aren’t many places available to me,” Tolemek said dryly.
“Now. You must have made a choice somewhere along the way.”
He leaned back, propping his arm on the desk. “You mean after the unit I commanded was decimated in an airship battle with some pesky Iskandian fliers?” He gave her a frank stare. Her first thought was that he was referring to the previous summer’s battle again, but this must have been something different. He wasn’t commanding anything here, was he?
“I was twenty-four and had just made captain at a ridiculously young age. My father was finally proud of me. I got orders to defend the Starlight Sailor, one of our greatest airships, made more so by the fact that it was carrying one of our most legendary admirals and two top diplomats to a treaty negotiation to enlist some of the jungle shamans from the south. Then, out of the clouds—” Tolemek stretched his hand toward the ceiling, fingers spread, “—comes Wolf Squadron. Somehow, they’d gotten intel about our plans and they swept in, strafing our decks with bullets, killing my men left and right. We had artillery weapons and took some of them down, but as you well know, they’re good at cat-and-mouse games. The Starlight Sailor went down, plummeted into the ocean. The admiral, the diplomats, a decorated airship pilot... all died. There were few survivors.”
Of whom, he was obviously one. His sarcastic bitterness was palpable, so she resolved to keep her mouth shut.
“For punishment, I was stripped of all my rights and privileges as an officer and discharged from the army.” He lowered his arm and stared down at his hand. “There was nothing to return home to. My father said I was dead to him. I didn’t know what to do or where to go. Eventually I got a letter of condolence from another former army officer, a Colonel Goroth who’d been my instructor at the officer proving grounds and who’d had a similar run-in with Wolf Squadron. He’d also been cast out of the army and had his family turn their backs on him. He’d always been a warrior at heart, even when he was teaching, and he couldn’t give it up. He was a mercenary for a while but eventually became a pirate. He invited me to join him out here, and feeling like I was practically a criminal already back home, I joined him.”
“Captain Slaughter?” Cas asked.
“So he eventually became.”
“Look, I don’t mean to be unsympathetic, but you—your people—chose this war. My people want to be left alone. That’s all we’ve ever wanted. We’re doing everything we can to keep our homeland.”
His forehead wrinkled. “You’re rebels who broke away from the empire, killing all of your rulers in the process.”
“We’re the native inhabitants of that continent. Your stupid rulers came and set themselves up without being asked. And all of that happened hundreds of years ago anyway. It’s idiotic that your people are still wasting resources trying to get us back. If they think we’ll ever be content little imperial subjects, they’re delusional.”
A knock sounded at the door, and Cas nearly jumped out of her seat. For a moment, she had forgotten where she was and that she was surrounded by a ship full of pirates who would happily slay her.
“Come in,” Tolemek called.
“Is this all right?” Cas whispered, lifting her un-shackled arms.
Tolemek flicked his hand dismissively as the door opened. A nervous cabin boy stood there, holding a tray with plates and a carafe on it.
“Come in, boy. Set it down.” Tolemek pointed to the desk.
The kid couldn’t have been more than twelve or thirteen. What calamity had come to his life to bring him here? Maybe he was some pirate’s son. And here she thought she had been born into a disturbing family business.
“Yes, sir.” The boy glanced toward the terrariums—hah, Cas wasn’t the only one nervous about whatever the Deathmaker kept in there—then scurried to the desk. He set down the tray, looking like he would bolt for the door, but stopped long enough to point at one of the plates. “That one’s yours, sir. Cook made you more on account of you being bigger.”
“Did he.” It wasn’t a question.
“Yes, sir.” Now, the boy bolted.
Slices of bread, fish and sauce, and an orange. There was nothing gourmet about the trays or the presentation, but Cas was hungry enough that she could have wolfed down ten or twenty of the nasty ration bars pilots took on longer missions.
After the door closed, Tolemek set the plate with the larger portion down in front of her. “If you’re hungry enough to risk the cooking, I’d try that one.” He put the other plate in front of him, though he didn’t pick up the fork or knife.
Belatedly, it occurred to Cas to find the boy’s words suspicious. “You think that one’s poisoned?” She nodded to the smaller portion.
“No, they’re not going to kill you. But based on a conversation I had with the captain, I wouldn’t be surprised if there might be a dose of a truth serum that would encourage you to answer my questions honestly.”
Huh. And he wasn’t going to use it on her?
“Truth Serum Number Three?” she asked. She had never heard of such a concoction, unless one counted the honesty-encouraging effects alcohol had, but his scientific interests seemed to be broad.
“More like seventeen. Affecting the human mind in a predictable way isn’t as easy as blowing things up.”
“How about affecting the human body? Killing people. Is that easy?” And did she truly want to know the details?
Tolemek looked away. “Killing people isn’t difficult. There are numerous substances in the world that are poisonous to humans.”
“Why seek them out? Why create something that...” Cas prodded a piece of fish with her fork. Hungry as she was, this conversation, and the fact that someone might have been playing with the food, had her worried about sampling.
“If you’ve ever wondered if the smith regrets forging the sword that ends up taking an innocent man’s life, the answer is yes.”
Cas had not wondered that, but she did now. With smiths, it would be rare for them to find out how and when their weapons had been used. Though, in making a tool for killing, there could not be much doubt that it would be used. A sword, after all, had no other purpose. No one blamed the smiths, she supposed, but what he had done—or, as it sounded like, allowed to be done with his work—was orders of magnitude worse. It was, wasn’t it?
Tolemek stood up and walked across the cabin to the clothes trunk. He opened the lid and pulled out a couple of tins of sardines and packages of crackers, brought them back, and set them beside Cas’s plate. “An alternative if you wish it.”
“Thanks,” she mumbled. The packages were Cofah, but the Iskandians had similar types of travel rations, so she believed they had come from some general mercantile—or been plunder from some ship’s supplies—and were unlikely to have strange serums added to them.
“The wine is probably safe, and there’s water in that pitcher. If you don’t need anything else, I believe I’ll get some rest. Dawn is only a couple of hours off.”
He rooted in a cabinet and found a couple of blankets. He tossed one on the hammock, then spread another out on the floor. He blew out the nearest lamp and took the floor position for himself, lying down without a mention of shackles or a suggestion that she stay out of trouble and not wander off. A sign of trust? Or was he going to leave her to her own devices to see if he could trust her in the future? Belatedly, she remembered her mission had been to try and win that trust.
“Tolemek?” she asked.
“Yes?”
“My face feels better. Thanks for the salve. The Cofah army sho
uld have tried it before turning it down.”
For a moment, he didn’t answer, and she wondered if her compliment had seemed out of character, and he knew she was trying to win him over. It was the truth though, even if she wouldn’t normally have admitted it. Whatever his salve was exactly, it was doing more than disinfecting wounds. Already, a cool tingling had replaced the pain in her face, and the swelling seemed less extreme.
“You’re welcome,” he finally said. “You’re the first woman who’s expressed appreciation for one of my formulas.”
“Do women usually show up on your doorstep all bruised and battered and in need of one of your formulas?”
“They don’t show up here at all,” Tolemek said drily. “But when I’ve sought them out, they’ve usually been alarmed by my reputation and my work—my passion.” He said the last in a whisper, an ache in his voice. “Of course, every now and then, one is unsettlingly intrigued. Like she relishes the idea of having her own pet monster.” His tone grew dry again when he added, “I already have that relationship with Goroth.”
Cas didn’t know what to say to that. Monsters weren’t supposed to know they were monsters, were they? Her father certainly never saw himself that way, as far as she knew.
Tolemek rolled onto his side, turning his back to her, so he must not expect a response. Or maybe he felt he had shared too much of himself. Cas could understand that. She didn’t talk much about her own demons with others. What could be gained from it? Some things were just better kept to oneself.
She peeled open one of the sardine cans and ripped into a package of crackers. Maybe if she were good tonight, Tolemek would be less wary tomorrow. But how long did she have to escape? If she didn’t take the first opportunity, would she regret it later, as she had in the jungle?
After she finished eating, she picked up the jar of salve. Tolemek’s back was still to her. She swiped out some of the goo, stuck her hand under the baggy prison tunic, and dabbed at her other injuries.
Tonight she would rest, rest and heal. Tomorrow, she would think of escape, or if not escape—for where could she go from here?—sabotage. She eyed that lower bookcase, reminding herself to investigate it as soon as she had a chance. Crashing the airship might be extreme, but there were other ways to cause trouble. She smirked at the idea of bringing the craft into an Iskandian port while all of the pirates were sleeping. Nothing but a fantasy, she supposed, but surely she could come up with something to do. Even if she could just find a way to send a warning to Zirkander, that would be helpful. Then he could find a way to turn the trap on pirates.
• • • • •
Tolemek stood on the deck next to the helmsman, his hands clasped behind his back, the wind whipping his hair around. A dense fog hung over the sea ahead. He couldn’t see through it, but he knew it was a man-made phenomenon rather than a natural one. He ought to know. With the help of an engineering friend, he’d invented the machine that made it. To someone in the distance, it appeared more like clouds than fog, and certainly not like anything that could hide a flying pirate outpost with the capacity to hold a thousand men and several docked ships at one time. Only those with the coordinates, coordinates that changed every month, could find the stronghold.
“You get any information out of her?” the captain asked, coming up beside him.
“Good morning to you, also, Captain.”
“Morning was four hours ago. Tired after the night’s activities, were you?” Goroth smirked at him.
Odd how long they’d known each other and how little Goroth truly knew about him. They had shared more as instructor and student back at the proving grounds than they had in the six years they had been flying together. But that had been a different world, one where trust was the norm rather than the aberration. He considered Goroth a friend and was closer to him than most others here, but not a confidant.
“They were grueling,” Tolemek said.
Let Goroth think what he wanted of that. In truth, that conversation with Ahn had worn him out. He had wanted to give her enough of himself that she started to believe he was trustworthy, or at least that whatever plans he might have for Zirkander, he would try to keep her safe, but he had shared more than he intended. Oh, his military record was on public file with the Cofah, and there were any number of pirates who knew who he had been before he was the Deathmaker, but her questions about the people who had died because of his toxic inhalant, he wasn’t sure why he had answered them. Because she hadn’t been afraid of his laboratory and his work and she had talked to him like a human being? Or because he simply hadn’t had anyone to speak honestly with for so long? It was a strange world that he’d come to be in, one where one could talk more openly with one’s enemies than with one’s friends.
“She still sleeping?” Goroth asked.
“Yes.”
“Still chained up, right?” Goroth’s eyes narrowed. “Most people would be afraid to touch any of your concoctions in there, but she’ll be desperate, and I know you have things that could make trouble for us in the wrong hands.”
In the wrong hands. Odd how right and wrong had different meanings depending on a man’s perceptions and world view.
“She’s chained in the corner, yes.”
Initially, Tolemek had let her rest without restraint, knowing he would sleep lightly with someone else in the cabin, and trusting that he would hear if she started rummaging around. Besides, he had a few booby traps protecting the truly dangerous mixtures. But that morning, when he had woken to find her slumbering in his hammock, arms and legs flung about in a position that only a monkey could find comfortable, he had checked her hands and found a vial tucked in one. Brown Goo Number Three. He’d been more amused than annoyed—she was a prisoner; what could he expect?—and had plucked it from her grip without waking her. He had also shackled the wrist closest to the pipe again, leaving food, water, and a chamber pot within reach. The ship was already cruising into the fog bank, and he wasn’t sure when he would get back to check on her. Goroth usually dragged him to meetings with other captains whenever they docked. In part because Tolemek could contribute, but probably more as a status symbol. Some of the captains had bodyguards; Goroth had the Deathmaker.
“You ask her about the energy sources?” Goroth asked.
“She doesn’t know where they come from or how they’re made.” And all right, he hadn’t asked, but Tolemek doubted a young lieutenant would know about something that had to be top secret over in Iskandia, judging by how little the rest of the world had managed to figure out in the three decades those fliers had been in the sky.
“How about secrets related to Zirkander? Anything we can use against him?”
“She’s been close-mouthed anytime I’ve mentioned him. She won’t betray him, I sense.”
“Willingly, you mean,” Goroth said. “Didn’t she eat the food I had Cook send?”
“No, she was suspicious of it.”
Goroth slapped a hand down on the black railing, startling the helmsman a few feet away. “No wonder you didn’t get anything useful out of her.”
“She’ll have to eat eventually.”
“Your patience is admirable and annoying,” Goroth said.
“Thank you.”
He pointed a finger at Tolemek’s nose. “If the truth serum doesn’t work, we’ll need to try a more direct method of interrogating her. I know you don’t like to torture girls, but she’s Iskandian scum, and she doesn’t deserve the gentlemanly treatment.”
“I wasn’t aware being chained in a hammock was gentlemanly treatment.”
“You know what I’m talking about. Don’t let her sexy little prisoner smock dull your senses, Mek.”
Tolemek snorted. That canvas bag she was wearing was about as sexy as a box. If he had any better clothes to offer her, he would have done so. He hoped to find something on the outpost that at least fit her. There were enough female pirates that there ought to be a little shop somewhere.
Goroth clasped his fore
arm. “If we get Zirkander, you could take his head back to the emperor. Maybe it would earn you the redemption you always wanted.”
“I have given up on that dream. Camp Eveningson was to Cofahre what Tanglewood was to Iskandia. Those prison guards and their cudgels were extremely excited to see me.” Tolemek rubbed his ribs at the memory. He never had figured out who had leaked his name as the person responsible for all of those deaths, even if someone else had used his aerosol, but there were ears aplenty on a pirate ship, and any man might have wanted to see trouble come to him. Or maybe the governments had simply studied the remains, known of his work, and figured it out on their own.
“Administrations change,” Goroth said softly, “and memories fade. Delivering Zirkander would go a long way toward softening their attitudes toward you. And if, before killing him, we could extract information on the energy supplies, that would be an even greater gift that might be offered up. Your lieutenant might not know anything about where they come from, but I can’t believe the same would be true for Iskandia’s great pilot hero.” His lips twisted as he said this last. One man’s hero was another’s mortal enemy.
“And what will you seek should we successfully kill Zirkander? Your old job back at the proving grounds?”
Goroth released his arm and chuckled. “No, this life suits me. There’s nothing left for me back there. This is home—” he extended a hand toward the deck of the ship, now wreathed by the thick fog. “For me... it’s just personal. You know that.”
Tolemek nodded and repeated, “I’ll work on her tonight.” Maybe he could extract some information about Zirkander from her, enough to satisfy Goroth, without resorting to potions or anything that would lessen her opinion of him.
He sighed, wondering when that had started to matter. He hadn’t even known the girl a full day yet.
“Outpost, ho,” the watchman called from the crow’s nest near the base of the balloon.
After a few more seconds, Tolemek could see it for himself, the long flying airbase, with six massive envelopes keeping it aloft, five thousand feet over the ocean, along with massive steam-powered propellers that buzzed beneath each corner. Nearby, chimneys wafted smoke into the sky, smoke that blended with the fog, disappearing in the miasma. More propellers lay dormant at the back and the sides of the long platform, those needed only for repositioning.