Fall of Sky City (A Steampunk Fantasy Sci-Fi Adventure Novel) (Devices of War) (9 page)

Her eyes lit with approval. “Then you will be guarded.” She rose to a seated position. “Varik,” she called.

The door opened and the man in the long coat with the oiled hair and pointed beard stepped through the door. “Yes, my queen?”

She beamed at me. “Tomorrow, Synn Primus shall be going to classes. Please organize it. Make sure he obeys all the rules.”

Varik eyed me, one eyebrow raised slightly, his hands clasped before him. “Of course, my queen.” He turned and left.

She closed the book. “Come, young Primus. Let us eat. And then you can regale me with all the wonders you learned today.”

I watched her disappear with a wary gaze. I wasn’t sure what game she was playing.

But I knew I couldn’t lose. Not again.

CHAPTER 7

YOU WILL ALWAYS BELONG TO ME

I stared
at myself in the tall gilded mirror. I’d changed over the past months. I was more wiry, my face harsher. A scar zigzagged across my right eye. The pin-striped pants and black vest hung from me like I was a wraith. My Mark rose above the folded collar of my white button-up shirt in charred scars.

I didn’t recognized the man in the mirror.

Varik knocked on the door.

I tried not to appear too eager as I stepped into the hall.

Apparently, I failed.

“This is a trap, you understand,” Varik said as he led me down the narrow, winding stairway.

I maintained my silence. I didn’t want him reporting that I’d spoken out of turn.

“She knows you’re looking to escape.”

I couldn’t tell if he was an ally or the enemy, but I wasn’t going to trust him. Nix did. That was enough for me.

“I was her pet once too, you know.” He took in a deep sigh, his step even. “She always gets what she wants.”

I looked at him in a whole new light. “What does she want?”

“To own you.” He glanced over his shoulder at me. “As soon as she does, she’ll discard you.”

“Like she did you?”

He raised his chin.

My mouth fell open. “Do you honestly
want
to be owned by her?”

“You will see. You fight and fight and then one day, you find you’re fighting for the sake of fighting, not because you have no wish to be had by her.”

I clenched my jaw. That wasn’t likely to happen.

“Has she taken you to bed yet?”

I kept my gaze straight ahead, not wanting to speak of it.

“Have you ever lain with a woman?”

My eyebrow twitched. This was not the conversation I wanted to have at the moment.

“Take my advice. Stop fighting her. Just enjoy it. It’s sex. It’s meant to be something to look forward to.”

“I’d rather not.”

He stopped at the door at the base of the stairs and turned to me. “Then she will continue to hold it over you. As soon as you accept the enjoyment, it will cease to be a punishment.”

I blinked, but decided to ignore him. I didn’t want to “enjoy” a single second of her. Today I was going to class. I would see what things I could learn, what routes I could possibly use to escape. So what if she knew that’s what I intended to do. I’d just have to be more cunning.

He interrupted my thoughts. “Speak to no one. Touch no one. Go to classes. She will visit less and less the more she thinks she controls you. However, should she see you getting close to anyone, you will feel the consequence.”

There was a lot about that man I didn’t know. “And now that she owns you, do you have friends?”

“Friends are a luxury.” Varik walked into the yellowing sunlight. “And with Nix, who else would I need?”

Hmm. Who else indeed.

As soon as I stepped onto the green grass between the buildings, the call of the sky overtook me. I stopped, raising my face to it, feeling its endlessness overwhelm me, the air caressing my skin. Studying the sky, shock washed over me. The green orb, Melbon, wasn’t where it should have been. It was high and to the right, a dim green speck against Kel’mar’s red domination. I should have been able to see clouds and land and oceans.

I searched for Festoos, the large orange glowing rock that had been in my sky before I’d been taken captive. It was no longer there. Granted, there were several tall buildings blocking my view, but the asteroid should have been off to my left and just now starting to grow dim and distant.

How long
had
I been in captivity? Nearly an entire season? How was that even possible? My mind raced. All of the ice would be gone except at the distant caps. We were fully into summer.

I stared blankly around me. I’d missed my opportunity to capture my spitfire falcon. Even if I did manage to escape, I would have to wait an entire turn, five to seven years, before I could attempt to capture my falcon.

Varik had set me up in a language course, the astronomy class, and another on the history of weapons. I was frankly surprised by the last class. Though by the conversations I had with Nix each night, I soon realized she was testing my willingness to submit. She would tell me of old passages through the city that most people had forgotten, saying it as if she’d slipped.

I knew her game and I was going to be better at it. I had to be.

So I played my part. The days turned into weeks, the weeks to months, and still we played. But by now, I was getting better.

I followed Varik’s advice, keeping a distance between myself and my classmates.I spoke only when I had to, which wasn’t often. Everyone basically gave me a wide berth as though I were contagious.

The more time I spent studying, the more I wanted to explore.

The collegium was nestled in the middle of Sky City with large squares of grass and trees and bushes. It almost looked like land even though it wasn’t. The only real way to escape was to somehow disable the city, but no matter how I tried, I could not figure out how it floated. The only thing I knew was that it was filled with a constant hum.

Everything was metal, which was alien to me. We didn’t have a lot of metal to begin with, so I had no idea where it came from. The towers that seemed to rise into the heavens and touch the stars were made of this metal, as were the roads. The rare motor car I spied on the streets surrounding the collegium and the odd flying face scanning devices were also made of the metal.

However, I spent my time in three short buildings made of stone and clay, each with large, colored glass windows. The language department was the smallest of the three buildings, but the one I enjoyed the most. Not because of what they taught. Frankly, I knew more than they were teaching. As a wanderer of the world, I spoke nearly every language fluently, could read most of them, and there were only a few dialects I didn’t know.

There was a girl.

I knew it was a bad idea, but there was just something about her that made me feel…happy.

Her name was Keeley and she smelled like sunshine. She was shorter than me, and wore the green and gold of the House of Coins. Her long, unruly red hair was in a braid almost every day. She was quiet and didn’t push, but she was also my partner, the one I was meant to practice with. That meant she was one of the select few I was allowed to talk to.

Varik always lingered close by. Watching. Though as the months went by, he watched from further away. They were starting to trust me.

“I’m going to labs after classes,” Keeley said softly as we worked on our paper on the origins of Handish. “My brother, Josh, is playing with a new weapon.” She shook her head, giving me a derisive look. “He wants to show me. You should come.”

I glanced at Varik. “I don’t think I’ll be able to.”

She nodded. “Queen Nix has you on a very short leash.”

I didn’t say anything as I scribed our report to the piece of smooth parchment.

“Well, if she allows it, my brother and I spend a great deal of time in the laboratories.”

My pen scratched upon the surface in long flowing letters.

“I’m actually working on a project of my own that I could use a little help with. It’s—” She shook her head. “It’s complicated, but I have an idea on how to better fertilize fields.”

I let out a surprised huff of breath. “I doubt I’d be much help in that regard. I know nothing about fertilizer.”

Her green eyes widened in horror. “Oh, no. I know that.”

I chuckled silently.

She scrunched her nose and hunkered down next to me, her pen joining mine. “I need help with the machinery. You’re interested in motors. This would be an excellent time for you to see one.”

“Hmm,” I said, watching Varik in the corner of my eye. “I’ll ask.”

She hid her smile.

That night, Nix joined me for supper and I regaled her with the wonders of the advancement of weaponry, and a few of my ideas on the use of plasma.

She took a quiet moment and set down her fork. “I hear you and Keeley Fabius are becoming close.”

I narrowed my eyes and tipped my head at my goblet. “She is my partner in languages, and she has many interesting theories on inventions.”

Nix’s lips flattened.

“Actually, she has a problem with a motor.” I shook my head with a frown. “Something about fertilizer? I’m not quite sure. However, she has asked if I can join her and her brother in the laboratory after classes.”

Nix was quiet for a long moment, her hands still.

I poked a green floret and plopped it in my mouth.

“What is your intention with this girl?”

My expression opened as I kept my gaze lowered. “I am intrigued by your city and its people. I want only to become a part of it and to help if I can.”

She said nothing.

I raised my gaze and smiled, allowing a certain amount of excitement to bubble to my face. “I am eager to look at a motor. I’ve seen the designs, but I wish to put my hands upon one.”

A smile lit her lips and she reached over to take my hand. “Of course you may. On one condition.”

I was shocked. That seemed a little too easy. “What, my queen?”

Her dark eyes pierced mine in triumph. “Kiss me.”

My heart skipped, but I kept my smile even. “A kiss? Do you play, my queen?”

She dipped her head coquettishly. “Perhaps.”

I was confused and nervous at the same time. “Do you wish it now?”

She nodded. “I do.”

I didn’t know exactly what to do. I’d never kissed a girl before. No. I had, but never—I took in a deep breath and rose to my knees, moving to her side.

She looked up at me expectantly.

My hands didn’t know where to go, what to do.

“You appear nervous, young Primus.”

“I’ve ne—” I shook my head and brought my lips to her cheek.

She dodged my advance and laughed. “Have you never kissed a woman before?”

“Not like—” My face flushed with heat. “I don’t—”

She laughed again and rose to her knees. Her gaze captured mine, her hand rising to cup my cheek. “It’s quite simple. You see what you want,” her breath feathered along my lips, “and then you take it.”

My heart raced.

“Don’t you want me?”

I met her gaze. “No,” I whispered.

She ducked her head and peered at me through her lashes. “I want you.”

“I know.”

One corner of her mouth rose. “Do you want to work on that motor?”

Blood rushed through my ears as the scent of her perfume swept through my nose, my body awakening with the sound of her voice, her closeness.

Her gaze fell to my belt.

I gritted my teeth, cursing my body as it reacted to her proximity.

She smiled triumphantly and inched closer. “All you have to do is take—” She placed both hands on my chest, her fingers moving in slight circles. “—what you want.”

I wanted to go to the laboratories, to see what they were working on, to see if there was something I could use to escape. I reached for her, cupping her head in my hand, my breath coming harshly.

“Do you want me?”

“No.” Yes.

Our breath mingled, her chest rising and falling, pressing into mine in an anticipation I felt as well. I took her lips with my own, using my hand to pull her closer, feeling her body press against mine.

She moaned and her lips moved, devouring me.

My body answered as if it had a will of its own. I groaned, needing, wanting to feel more of her. My other hand wrapped around her waist, pulling her toward me, feeling her warmth along my body.

She pulled out of the kiss with a chuckle and gasped for air, leaning back against my hand. She studied my face and obviously liked what she saw. Her smile grew and triumph filled her eyes.

I took in great gulping breaths, blinking, trying to figure out what had just happened. What had come over me? What had I done?

She tucked a finger under my chin and raised my face to meet her gaze. A single ebony eyebrow rose. “You may go to the laboratory.” She stood smoothly and headed toward the door. “Just so long as you remember you are mine. You will always belong to me.”

As the door closed, I should have felt victorious.

But instead I felt as though I’d just lost something.

CHAPTER 8