"But ..."
She shook her head and gave a cry of frustration. Why could he not understand? "Look," she said, "we're just little people, aren't we? We always have been. Little small people, trying to live our lives, but always at the mercy of men like Uncle and Shkin and Masgard and Pennyroyal and ... and Valentine. So yes. It feels good to be as strong as them; it feels good to fight back and even things up a bit."
Tom said nothing. By the light of the instrument panels she could see a fresh bruise forming on his head where it had struck the chart table. "Poor Tom," she said, leaning over to kiss it, but he twitched away again, staring at the fuel gauges.
"The tanks are only half full," he said. "You knew that when we took off. If we go back, we might never reach Wren. Anyway, those slaves will have got poor Fishcake by now."
Hester shrugged awkwardly and wished he'd let her hold him. His obsession with the Lost Boy angered her. Why did Tom have to be so concerned about other people all the time? She controlled herself. "Fishcake will be able to look after himself," she promised.
Tom looked hopefully at her, wanting to believe her. "You think so? He's so young...."
"He must be twelve if he's a day. I lived alone in the Out-Country when I wasn't much older than that, and I did all right. And I didn't have his Burglarium training." She touched
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Tom's face. "We'll find Wren," she promised. "Then we'll find fuel, and go back to Brighton and get Fishcake, when things have calmed down a bit."
She put her arms around him, and this time he did not pull away, although he did not exactly hug her back. She kissed him and ran her fingers through his thinning hair. She hated fighting with him. And she hated Fishcake for making them argue like this. She hoped the other Lost Boys were already using his nitty little head for a football.
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33 Departures
***
THEO AND WREN HAD not waited for the Storm to recapture them. They were running away through the gardens when they heard the Stalker Fang's death cry echoing between the trees.
"What was that?" Wren wondered, stopping, shocked by the awful, lonely sound.
"I don't know," said Theo. "Something bad, I think."
They ducked into the shrubbery as another Green Storm squad went running past. The soldiers' helmets blinked with orange light. Peeking behind her, Wren saw that the Pavilion was starting to burn.
"Theo] It's on fire!"
"I know," he said. He was standing near to her, near enough that, in the firelight, she could make out the goose pimples on his bare chest and see that he was shivering
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slightly in the chilly air. Suddenly he put his arms around her. "You should let the Storm take you, Wren. Cloud 9 is going down. You might be safer as a prisoner. I can't let them take me, but you could. You should go back."
"What about you?" she asked. "I can't just leave you here."
"I'll be all right," he said, and then said it again, trying to sound more certain about it: "I will be all right. This place is sinking slowly. It'll come down in the desert, and I'll try and make my way south; there's a static settlement in the Tibesti Mountains, south of the sand sea. Maybe I could make it on foot."
"No," said Wren. She pulled herself away from him, because when he was holding her, her brain stopped working and she found herself wanting to agree with everything he said, but she knew deep down that he was talking rubbish. Even if he survived Cloud 9's fall, setting out across the desert on foot would be suicide. "I'm staying with you," she said. "We're going to find a way off, and that's final. Come on. We'll head back to the aerodrome. Maybe there's a flying machine that's still usable...."
She set off through the smoky gardens, feeling unaccountably hopeful and rather pleased with herself, but when they reached the aerodrome again, she saw that it had been destroyed more completely than she'd realized. The Ferrets' prefab hangars and barracks had been ripped open and scattered, and of the machines that had been caught on the ground only scorched shards remained. But among the ruins of the summerhouse where she had spoken to Orla Twombley the previous night, she found a couple of fleece-lined leather jackets hanging incongruously from a coat stand
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that still stood upright and undamaged amid the rubble. That seemed some sort of consolation. She threw one to Theo, who pulled it on gratefully, hanging up his silver wings like an angel banished from heaven.
Snuggling into the other jacket, Wren tried to think of a new plan. "All right," she said. "Maybe we will end up in the desert. We'll need water, and food. And a compass would be useful...."
Theo wasn't listening. A rustling in the foliage beyond the ruins had caught his attention. He gestured for Wren to be quiet.
"Oh, gods!" she whispered. "Not the Storm again?"
But it was only Nimrod Pennyroyal. Shkin's first shot had slammed against the Tin Book in his robe pocket, breaking several ribs, and the second had grazed his temple, knocking him out and covering one side of his face with blood, but he had regained his senses and dragged himself down to the aerodrome with the same idea as Wren and Theo, of finding some way off Cloud 9. Looking up plaintively at them from the shrubbery, he whispered, "Help!"
"Leave him," said Theo as Wren went toward him.
"I can't," said Wren. She wished she could. After all the things he'd done, Pennyroyal didn't deserve her help, but not helping him would make her as bad as he was. She knelt down beside him and tore a strip from the bottom of her tunic to bandage his head.
"Good girl," Pennyroyal whimpered as she worked. "I think my leg's broken, too, from when I fell.... That devil Shkin! The beast! He shot me! Shot me and flew off!"
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"Well, now you know how poor Tom Natsworthy felt," said Wren. Blood soaked through her makeshift bandage as soon as it was in place. She wished she'd paid more attention to Mrs. Scabious's first-aid lessons back in Vineland.
"That was entirely different," Pennyroyal said. "It was-- Great Poskitt ' How do you know about Tom Natsworthy?"
"Because I'm his daughter," said Wren. "What Shkin told you about me was true. Tom's my dad. Hester's my mother."
Pennyroyal made gurgly noises, his eyes bulging with terror and pain. He watched Wren tear another strip of fabric from her clothes, looking as if he expected her to strangle him with it. "Isn't there anybody on this flaming deck plate who is who they say they are?" he asked weakly, and went heavy and limp in Wren's arms.
"Is he dead?" asked Theo, coming up behind her.
Wren shook her head. "It's just a flesh wound, I think. He's fainted. We have to help him, Theo. He saved us from Cynthia."
"Yes, but only so he could get his hands on the Tin Book again," said Theo. "Leave him. Maybe the Storm will find him and take him with them when they leave...."
But behind him, with a roar of aero-engines, Hawkmoths and Fox Spirits were beginning to rise from behind the trees, casting long shadows on the smoke as they threaded their way out through Cloud 9's rigging. The Storm were leaving already.
Oenone Zero had been dragged out of her dreams by the stink of burning curtains. There was a pain in her head, and when she tried to breathe, sharp smoke caught at the back of
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her throat and made her choke and gasp and roll over onto her back.
Above her, flames were washing across the ornate ceiling of the ballroom in rippling waves, like some bright liquid. She pushed herself up, groping for her glasses, but her glasses were smashed, and the flames were rising all around her. Among them she saw the scattered pages of the Tin Book beginning to blacken.
She plunged through a swaying curtain of fire and out onto the terrace. It was a blur of smoke and firelight and running bodies, and as she reeled through it, looking for the stairs, General Naga barred her way. She backed away from him, tripped over a fallen Stalker, and sat down, helpless, in the path of the armored man.
"Dr. Zero?" he said. "This ... this attack ... it was your doing?"
r /> Oenone knew that he was going to kill her. She was so full of fear that it came seeping out of her mouth in thin, high-pitched noises. She squeezed her eyes shut and whispered a prayer to the god of the ruined chapel in Tienjing, because although she'd never had much time for gods, she thought that he must know what it meant to be frightened, and to suffer, and to die. And the fear left her, and she opened her eyes, and beyond the smoke the moon was flying, full and white, and she thought it the most beautiful thing she had ever seen.
She smiled at General Naga and said, "Yes. It was me. I installed secret instructions in the Stalker Grike's brain. I made him destroy her. It had to be done."
Naga knelt, and his big metal hands gripped her head. He
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leaned forward and placed a clumsy kiss between her eyebrows. "Magnificent!" he said, as he helped her to stand. "Magnificent! Set a Stalker to kill a Stalker, eh?"
He led her away from the fire, through staring, flame-lit groups of shocked troops and aviators, out across the lawn toward the Requiem Vortex. He took a cloak from someone and wrapped it around her trembling shoulders. "You can't imagine how long I've waited for this day!" he said. "Oh, she was a good leader in those first few years, but the war's dragged on, and she keeps wasting men and ships as if they're counters in a game. How long I've tried to think of a way.... And you've done it! You've rid us of her! Your friend Mr. Grike has run off somewhere, by the way. Is he dangerous?"
Oenone shook her head, imagining what Grike must be going through. "It's hard to know. I suppressed some of his memories to make room for my secret programs. Now that he has fulfilled his duties, those memories will be starting to resurface. He'll be confused ... perhaps insane.... Poor Mr. Grike."
"He's just a machine, Doctor."
"No, he's more than that. You must tell your men to search for him."
Naga waved a couple of sentries aside and climbed the gangplank of the Requiem Vortex. Inside the gondola, he guided Oenone to a chair. She felt terribly tired. Her own face stared back at her from his burnished breastplate, smeared with blood and ash and looking naked without her spectacles. Naga patted her shoulder and muttered gruffly, "There, girl, there," as if he were calming a spooked animal.
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He had a soldier's touch, awkward and unused to gentleness. "You're a very brave young woman."
"I'm not. I was afraid. So afraid ..."
"But that's what bravery is ; my dear. The overcoming of fear. If you're not afraid, it doesn't count." He fetched a flask out of a hatch in his armor. "Here, try some brandy; it will help to steady you. Of course, we won't let anyone know that you were responsible. Officially, at least, we must mourn the Stalker Fang's passing. We'll blame the townies. It'll fire up our warriors like nothing since this war began] We'll launch attacks on all fronts, avenge our leader's fall ..."
Oenone spluttered at the sharp taste of the brandy and pushed the flask away. She said, "No] The war must stop...."
Naga laughed, misunderstanding. "The Storm can still win battles without that iron witch telling us what to do] Don't worry, Dr. Zero. We'll do better without her. Blast those barbarian cities to a standstill] And when I take my place as leader, you'll be rewarded--palaces, money, any job you like ..."
Dazed, Oenone shook her head. Watching this armored man stride about the cramped, battle-damaged gondola, she saw that she had underestimated the Green Storm. War had made them, and they would make sure that the war went on and on.
"No," she said. "That's not why I--"
But General Naga had forgotten her for the moment and was issuing orders to his subofficers: "Put out a message on all frequencies: The Stalker Fang has fallen in battle. Need for calm and stability at this tragic time, etc., etc. In order to continue our glorious struggle against Tractionist barbarism, I am
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assuming supreme command. And prepare the Requiem Vortex for departure; I want to be back in Tienjing before one of our comrades tries to seize power for himself."
"And the prisoners, General?"
Naga hesitated, glanced at Dr. Zero, and said, "I won't start my reign with a massacre. Bring them aboard. But please tell that Pennyroyal woman to stop singing."
The Stalker Grike watched from a hiding place among the bushes as the Storm's boarding parties hurried back aboard the Requiem Vortex. Someone with a bulhorn was shouting, "Mr. Grike! Mr. Grike! Come aboard! We are leaving!"
Grike knew that Dr. Zero must have ordered them to find him and felt grateful to the surgeon-mechanic, but he did not show himself. He had to stay on Cloud 9. The girl he had seen outside the ballroom was not among the prisoners who were being shepherded into the air destroyer. If she was staying, Grike would stay. In some way that he did not yet understand, that girl was connected with Hester. Perhaps by staying near her, he would find Hester again.
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34 Finders Keepers
***
FISHCAKE LAY IN THE dunes behind the beach. Numb with cold and betrayal, he watched as Brighton fired up its battered engines and paddled lopsidedly away, the voices of the victorious Lost Boys drifting raucously across the water with the smoke.
He had barely escaped with his life. As the Lost Boys stormed the museum, he had run like a hare from the hunt, out of a back entrance and away through the burning streets, sobbing hopelessly, "Mr. Natsworthy, come back, come back ..." until at last he reached the city's stern and flung himself blindly off an observation platform there, seeking safety in the sea.
The swim to the shore had exhausted him, and he had almost drowned in the surf. Now, tired and frozen as he was, it was time for him to move again. For hungry desert towns
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were rolling past him through the dunes, and fierce amphibious suburbs were steaming toward him, drawn by the wrecked airships and flying machines that littered the sand and washed in and out on the surf. Fishcake, who had never been near a Traction Town before, could barely believe how high their wheels towered over him in the smoky air, or how the ground shook and shifted as they went lumbering by. Choking on exhaust smoke and upflung sand, he scrambled away from them and ran into the desert.
He really was a Lost Boy now. He had no idea where he was, or where he was going. He ran on and on, hour after hour, slithering over dunes, stumbling across dry expanses of gravel and piles of barren rocks. He was scared of the dark and the deep shadows, which were growing deeper still as the moon sank toward the western horizon. At last, on the bank of an empty creek, he collapsed, hugging his damp knees against his chest for warmth and whining aloud, "What's to become of poor little Fishcake?"
Nobody answered, and that was what scared him most of all. Gargle and Remora and Wren had let him down, and the fake mummies and daddies had tricked him; Mr. Shkin had failed him, and Tom Natsworthy had abandoned him; but he would rather have been with any of them than out here on his own.
The moon gleamed on something that lay nearby. Fishcake, who had been trained to hunt for gleaming things, crept closer without thinking.
A face gazed up at him from the sand. He picked it up. It was made of bronze and had been quite badly dented. There were holes for the eyes. The lips were slightly parted in a
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smile that Fishcake found reassuring. It was beautiful. Fishcake held it to his own face and peered through the eyeholes at the westering moon. Then he stuffed the mask inside his coat and moved on, feeling braver, wondering what other treasures this desert held.
A few dozen yards farther on, his sharp eyes caught a movement down on the floor of a dry watercourse. Nervous as an animal, he edged closer. A severed hand was creeping across the gravel. It appeared to be made of metal. It moved like a broken crab, dragging itself along by its fingers. Wires and machinery and something that looked like a bone poked out of the wrist. Fishcake watched it, and then, because it seemed to have a sense of purpose about it, he began to follow.
Soon he began to pass other, less lively body parts: a torn-off metal leg bent
the wrong way and draped across a boulder, then a gashed and dented torso. The hand spidered over that for a while, then crept on its way. A few hundred yards farther on he found the other hand, still attached to most of an arm, feeling its way toward a slope of gravel and small boulders where stunted acacia trees grew.
And there he found the head: a skeletal gray face cupped in a metal skull, surrounded by a tangle of cables and ducts. It looked dead, but as Fishcake crouched over it, he knew that it had sensed him. The lenses of the glass eyes were shattered, but the spidery machinery inside twitched and clicked, still struggling to see. The dead mouth moved. So faintly that Fishcake could barely hear, the head whispered to him.
"I am damaged."
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"Just a bit," Fishcake agreed. He felt sorry for it, poor old head. He said, "What's your name?"
"I am Anna" the head whispered. Then it said, "No, no. Anna is dead. I am the Stalker Fang." It seemed to have two voices, one harsh and commanding, the other hesitant, astonished. "We were taken by Arkangel," said the second voice. "I am seventeen years old. I am a slave of the fourth type in the shipyards of Stilton Kael, but I am building my own ship and ..." Then the first voice hissed, "No! That was long ago, in Anna's time, and Anna is dead. Sathya, my dear? Is that you? I'm so confused...."
"My name's Fishcake," said Fishcake, a bit confused himself.
"I think I am damaged," said the head. "Valentine tricked me--the sword in my heart--I'm so cold ... 50 cold.... No. Yes. I remember now. I remember. The Zero woman's machine ... and General Naga stood by and let it happen.... I was betrayed."