Balanced on the Blades Edge #2 Deathmaker (13 page)

One man paused to eye her canvas prisoner’s outfit. She wondered if he recognized the style. She smiled, waved, then ducked into an alley. She hid behind a pile of boxes that doubtlessly passed as a trash collection area, dropped her hands to her knees to catch her breath, and peered back the way she had come through a crack between the boxes. The man was staring down the alley in her direction. He scratched his jaw. Cas checked the ammunition in her pistols and loaded rounds to replace the ones she had spent. She had stolen enough bullets for a quick skirmish but not an all-out gunfight. The man returned to his walk. She couldn’t help but wonder if her presence would be reported. She hadn’t seen a mirror and wasn’t sure how crazy she looked, but she doubted she looked anything like a pirate.

“Something to remedy.”

Enough running around like a blind fool. She needed to slow down and figure out how to reach the flier without getting caught. And she had to assume she would need to spend time to learn if it was operational too. Even in the distance, she had been able to tell it was an older model.

“One thing at a time.”

* * *

“I want answers,” Goroth said as he and Tolemek walked back from the meeting. “I want that truth serum in her gullet, and I want to have a long chat with her.”

Tolemek kept his sigh to himself. He doubted Ahn had the knowledge Goroth sought. Depending on how long she had been in the prison and how long she had been in Cofah clutches before arriving there, she might not know anything about Zirkander’s secret assignment. From that soldier’s words, it sounded like this had all occurred recently. “You know where I keep it,” he said.

“You’re not going to help question her?”

Tolemek would prefer to be there to keep Goroth from growing overly irritated—and violent—if he didn’t get the answers he wanted. “I’ll help. I didn’t want you to think I was impeding you.” Or that more brutal methods would be required.

“I don’t think that. I just think you’re forgetting who she is because she’s young and cute. Don’t—what in all of the hells? The ship is smoking!” Goroth sprinted ahead.

Tolemek stared at the black plumes wafting from the portholes on the starboard side toward the stern—where the engine room was. His stomach went for a swim in his boots. Maybe Goroth was right. He had been too lenient, and now she had escaped and done something to the ship.

“You don’t know it’s her,” he muttered and ran after Goroth, though he couldn’t imagine what else might have happened. The Roaming Curse captains were all allies, and no other pirate outfits were allowed to dock here.

By the time he reached the end of the gangplank, no less than four men had rushed up to Goroth and were explaining the situation—or maybe making excuses—speaking a thousand words a minute. Hoses ran through the hatchway leading below decks, and a sword was randomly lying beside them.

A moan of pain came from beside Tolemek. He ran over to Grimsaw, who was sitting on the deck against the railing and struggling to tie a makeshift bandage around his knee.

“What happened?”

“That bitch shot me,” he groaned.

“My—the prisoner?”

“Who else?” It was a testament to Grimsaw’s distress—or pain or anger or both—that he glowered at Tolemek and answered sarcastically, forgetting his usual wariness toward the Deathmaker.

“I’ll get something for your knee and find the sawbones as soon as the fire is out.”

Tolemek ran for the hatchway, intending to help the men below decks, but Goroth lunged out of the group and clasped his arm.

“Your prisoner did this,” he said.

“I know.”

“And she’s gone.”

Tolemek frowned, though he could hardly claim to be surprised. She had probably set the fire as a distraction. But how had she escaped from his cabin to start with? He had taken that vial from her hand and left her locked up.

“Didn’t you shackle her?” Goroth demanded.

“I did, actually, and I searched her before leaving this morning.”

Goroth grumbled some choice curses under his breath, his fists clenched so hard his knuckles stood out as much as the bones on his breastplate.

“I’ll find her,” Tolemek said.

“You better. Go do it now. We’ll handle the fire.”

Tolemek hesitated, not wanting to abandon the ship if it was in danger—this was the only home he had, and all of the mixtures he had made and the ingredients he had gathered were in that cabin. He would hate to lose everything again. Not to mention his collection of pets. “Will you get my spiders and snakes out if my cabin proves to be in danger?”

“Spiders! What a thing to care about now.” Goroth looked like he wanted to punch Tolemek. Perhaps it hadn’t been the right thing to mention, but in addition to keeping them as pets, he extracted venoms for some of his work.

“Snakes too.”

“Just get the girl.”

“Very well.”

“And put her in a devils-cursed cell when you get her, not your cabin where she has access to who knows what.” Goroth flung his arm toward the smoking portholes.

A throat cleared behind them. Most of the men who had reported to the captain had run back to help with the fire. This was someone Tolemek hadn’t seen before. Clad in browns and blacks, he wore nothing resembling a uniform—and his left sleeve was tied in a knot at his elbow, showing his arm to be cut off at the joint—but there was a badge pinned to his jacket. The Roaming Curse outpost had patrol officers? Tolemek had never seen such a thing.

“Who are you?” Goroth demanded.

“Post Administrator and Port Inspector Dancun. Keeping the outpost safe for all.” The man spoke in a deadpan voice, his lips barely moving. He pointed at the smoke wafting up from the craft’s stern. “That’s a problem.”

“We’re working on it.”

“You’ll have to move away from this berth until your fire has been out for at least two hours. We can’t risk it spreading.”

The captain looked like he wanted to gnaw off a few of his own teeth and start spitting them at the man like gunfire. “We need access to the outpost.”

“You can access it again two hours after your fire’s out.”

Goroth glanced at Tolemek, made a shooing motion, and mouthed, “Go.”

Tolemek was about to when a cabin boy strode out of the smoking corridor, walking quickly, though his eyes were riveted to something he was holding. It was the young fellow he had left outside his cabin to guard Ahn. A strange net was tangled around his shoulders. With one hand, he was holding up his trousers, and with the other he held... Odd, Tolemek recognized that flask.

“Sir,” he blurted, charging straight toward Tolemek. “I wanted to make sure you had this, and that the fire didn’t—that everything was safe.”

Feeling rather confused, Tolemek held out his hand mutely. The boy sagged in relief as soon as the flask left his fingers, then launched into an explanation. Tolemek’s silence continued as he listened and digested the information.

“Lieutenant Ahn?” the administrator asked, joining them.

Tolemek hadn’t realized the man had been listening. He frowned. The cabin boy had blurted Ahn’s name during his explanation. He hoped it wouldn’t mean anything to the port inspector. A vain hope, apparently, for the man was pulling a small notebook out of his pocket. He laid it on the railing so he could flip through the pages one-handed. Tolemek glimpsed names, dates, and notations in extremely neat printing.

“Go help with the fire, boy,” Goroth ordered. He too was frowning at the administrator and his notebook.

The page flipping stopped, and the man pointed to a name. “Ah, yes. I thought that sounded familiar. Lieutenant Caslin Ahn. Flight name: Raptor. Member: Wolf Squadron. Active since the third of Maynok, 937.” His tone never changed as he spoke.

“Who is this hedgehog?” Goroth, standing behind the administrator’s back, mouthed.

Tolemek could only shake his head. A pirate outpost ought to be the last place one could find someone so organized. He might admire such meticulous note-taking in other circumstances, but not now.

The administrator lifted his brows. “You did not think it important to report that your vessel contained a wanted pirate enemy, Captain Slaughter?”

“I’ve been busy.”

“This is a bounty,” the administrator said, “though I’m more concerned about maintaining peace on the station. She will need to be located.” The inflection in his deadpan voice never changed, but his eyes had a slight gleam as he said, “This can be accomplished easily with enough people searching.”

“I’ll find her,” Tolemek said and headed for the gangplank. He had to make sure he found Ahn—Caslin—before this overzealous port attendant put the word out to everyone. It would be nice to use her first name, now that he knew it.

Goroth caught up with him at the gangplank, lifting a hand to make him pause. “I’ll take care of the fire. And you’re welcome.” His squint said he placed the blame for the mess straight on Tolemek’s shoulders. Rightfully so. “It might be a while before I can bring the ship back over though—” he waved to the smoke, “—so you’ll be on your own over there. Stay out of trouble. Meet back here—no, let’s meet at the Squatting Crow, midnight. Just in case we’re under scrutiny.” He frowned at the administrator who was making notes in his book.

“I’ll have her,” Tolemek said.

Chapter 8

T
here were two guards wandering around the dragon flier, occasionally answering questions but mostly turning away curious pirates who ambled close. Cables stretched across the bronze wings and ran to eyelets on the landing pad, as if force were required to keep the craft from taking off. Fliers did look vaguely like crouching dragons, wings spread, ready to leap into the air and take off, but they were ultimately just machines and wouldn’t go anywhere without a pilot. This particular craft looked like it had been pulled out of the depths of the ocean, with brown sludge dulling the hull and crusty grime caking the wings. Some kind of banner or sign hung from the cockpit. Cas thought it might declare the craft’s owner—whoever had salvaged it—but she was too far away to read the lettering.

She crouched on the roof of one of the sturdier buildings, keeping her back to a vent spewing bacon-scented smoke. It wasn’t much in the way of cover, and she felt exposed, since many of the airships docked to either side of the floating outpost had decks as high as her position. She wished night would fall, but she had no concept of how soon that might be. The strange fog that hugged the whole place hadn’t abated.

Shouts came from a nearby street, and a squad of men ran into view. Their eccentric clothing, most of it doubtlessly plundered from ships all around the world, kept them from looking like an organized military unit, but they were sticking together and peering into alleys. They were also armed.

Cas flattened to her belly. She didn’t recognize them as men from Captain Slaughter’s ship, but she hadn’t met everyone there either, having been busy starting fires in their engine room.

What if Slaughter had told everyone on the station about her and had them hunting for her? She craned her neck to look at his ship—she couldn’t see the deck, but its big black balloon was distinctive and visible. Though, oddly, it seemed farther away than before. She risked rising into a crouch again. Yes, it had moved away from its berth and floated perhaps a hundred meters away from the outpost. Something to do with her fire?

A faint rumble reached her ears, and Cas forgot about the searchers and Slaughter’s ship. The noise sounded familiar, very familiar. Propellers.

She checked to make sure the search party had moved off the nearby street and that nobody was creeping up on her before focusing on the nearest of the giant propellers that helped hold the outpost aloft. Their hum was a constant here, and it continued on as it had before. This was a new noise, and it seemed to be coming from the fog beyond the outpost rather than some machinery on it. And there was more than one propeller making the noise, she was sure of it. She couldn’t guess why they were coming—they couldn’t know she was here... how could they?—but the rumbling grew louder and filled her with hope.

An eardrum-piercing wail erupted from horns mounted on poles at the corners of the outpost. Someone else had noticed the noise and knew what it meant.

The first dragon flier came into view, yellow eyes and a gray snout painted on the nose of the craft. Cas grinned so hard her mouth ached. Wolf Squadron.

Several more craft followed the first out of the fog. She couldn’t make out the numbers on the sides of the fliers yet, but she recognized an attack formation when she saw one. She caught herself standing and waving, but forced herself back into a crouch, not wanting to draw the attention of enemies in the streets below. Pirates were flooding out of buildings, shouting over the sirens and racing to artillery weapons stationed along the edges of the outpost and also on some roofs.

Before the twelfth flier came into sight, the first was already firing, strafing the side of the outpost and spraying bullets. No, it wasn’t aiming at the outpost but at the airships docked along its edge. Pirates were out on the decks and running toward weapons, the same as the people on the station were doing, but everyone had clearly been caught off guard.

The fliers streaked toward Cas’s end of the outpost, and she shrank back, bumping into the vent. They couldn’t possibly know she was alive, and they might kill her without knowing she was there. She ought to run for one of the few brick or stone buildings—they would be the most likely to survive gunfire—but if the pilots started lobbing explosives, it wouldn’t matter how thick the walls were. Besides, she wanted to know what they were after.

The answer to her question came almost immediately as the three lead fliers swerved in, under the giant balloons that marked the ceiling of the outpost, and veered toward the flier. Her first thought was that they might have some crazy plan to throw cables around it and take it with them, but that would be dangerous even without the pirates firing at them. A gray cylinder shot from the teeth of one of those fliers, exploding when it struck the landing pad near the salvaged craft.