[Closed] All of This Turbulence

[Tom Cooke]

A Private Shipyard • Uptown

Nighttime on the 24th of Yaris, 2719

S
ilverfish. He still thought they looked like rolled-up silverfish.

He swallowed dry, sour spittle. The platform was a shadow just overhead. He’d seen shapes moving round on it, before he’d come right up to it; he’d thought one was familiar, but he couldn’t be sure. Now, the world had narrowed down to the ladder in front of him, creeping upward through the dark in a glint of orange light on slick metal. He put one hand on it, then another.

The soft lanternlight licked his hands into strange shapes. It caught coppery in the curling red hair, played in the veins and the flickering bones and the soft spray of freckles. Caught gold in the wedding-band. He felt the metal beneath his fingertips, warm and clammy. It unearthed a memory he didn’t want; he squeezed his eyes shut and tried to reconcile himself.

The skies had been clear for days, but the capital was too full of lights to see all but the brightest of stars. The ships were shadow against shadow – big, bulky shapes, silhouettes that bobbed gently in the air, their moorings loose and then taut and then loose again. Even on a night like this one, Yaris was windy; the shipyard was a forest of creaking wood and leather, of rustling rigging.

You could’ve narrowed everything down to those few moments. The dry night breeze was the first cool one he’d felt in what seemed like half the time since the War of the Book. He felt it lapping at his face, gentle-like, a kinder promise of cruelties to come. He heard the jangle of a lantern, metal on metal, saw his escort’s flickering circle of light picking out the cobbles at their feet; it was a private hazy world. His head ached, nagging and insistent.

He was tired, tired in a way that’d sunk into his bones, tired like he’d never been – before. He felt sunken; he felt the sweat beading underneath his stiff collar. The sun had shown its scalding face full-on for days, had pounded its fists against the broad Uptown streets. In the wake of political season, Stainthorpe was quieter, but the squat grey cage of it heated up like an oven in the summer and dry season. During the day, he felt dazed; the evening was a whirl of color and light, of clinking champagne glasses, of gentlemen in evening dress sitting on patios, of Anatole, Anatole, Anatole, but sometimes, soft and secret, a different name.

He could hear the rush of his pulse like distant tides, and he couldn’t look up at those great shapes like tethered flying whales. If he looked up, he’d lose himself in the motion, and the ground underneath his feet would be no more solid than artevium.

They didn’t help, all those ships hanging about like ghosts. He skimmed them with his eyes, when he could; he’d expected to see scarred wood and missing hulls, but he’d only seen sleek, slim shapes.

“Nearly there, sir,” grunted the man at his side. The man’s name was Langley, and Hawke had sent him. A private carriage had taken him to a private shipyard, and Langley had met him at the gates. He was a tall, but thin for a human; he was getting on in years – though younger than Anatole, he had a head full of grey hair – and spoke in rough, quiet tones. He liked him. They’d spoken very little. Once, he’d’ve tried to strike up a conversation; he might’ve even pulled out the Tek, like a flash of colorful scarves in the pocket of a somber black waistcoat. He knew better, now.

Anatole’s thin fingers tightened around the metal. He nodded once, gritting his teeth and setting his jaw. Then, putting the dull throb in his lower back out of his head, he set his heel on the first rung. He pulled himself up, feeling the muscles in his arms – such as they were – strain to take what weight of him there was. The metal was clammy underneath his hands; he tried not to think of it.

Yesufu pez Edun was a friend of Anatole’s, he knew that much, and that didn’t commend him. He had dealings with Hawke, but so did everyone along the Vein. He was a poppies man, a Thul’amat-educated merchant-of-a-merchant-family, Crocus-turned-Bull Elephant with the plague and the unrest. That he’d invited Vauquelin – among other Viendan Reformists – to his estate in the isles, to discuss the upcoming turning of the Symvoulio, sat ill with him; that it sat ill with Hawke sat worse.

The sending had come on short notice. He’d been planning on a commercial voyage, paid for out of pocket; the King had recommended otherwise, and the King’s recommendations were not to be ignored. And so, on the evening of one of the hottest days so far in Yaris, two days before he’d’ve left of his own accord, he was climbing up to the platform of a private airship he didn’t know, to fly to the isles and lodge under the protection of Brothers he didn’t know.

If they weren’t going to off him before then. It’d occurred to him plenty of times; even now, as he tackled the last rungs of the ladder, he didn’t know whether it’d be a mercy or a shame. He’d hate to tell Ava he went like this – funny, how that was his first thought – but when Hawke snapped, even an incumbent jumped.

He was flushed by the time he pulled himself up over onto the platform. He could hear Langley behind him, carrying up his baggage. Darkness swarmed at the edges of his vision, floaters drifting like motes of dust. As he gained his bearings, he saw one other figure – just one? – on the platform with him, and then –

His eyes traveled up. It was a small craft, like the – it was a small craft, the Uccello di Hurte, but like all aircraft, it seemed impossibly large. Spare moonlight shivered across the chainmail skin of the balloon, limned the swell of the hull, shot pale highlights through the dark mahogany. The wind drifted it; the moorings went taut, then loose. A thin scrap of a shape fluttered down from the gunwale, and he swallowed another lump in his throat.

One thing at a time. His eyes skated back down the hull, down to the slim, familiar shape on the platform. A whirl of impressions hit him – too much drink; blood on his knuckles; the sting of alcohol; a bright, sharp, well-organized field, mingling with his – automatically, he set them aside. He took a step forward, bowing low. “Mrs. Ibutatu,” he said when he rose, a little breathless. It was Anatole’s thin smile he gave her, but his eyes were wide with surprise. “Good evening.”

Langley’d carried up the bags behind him, one under his arm, one slung across his back. “Ma’am,” he said, bowing politely himself.

[Niccolette Ibutatu]

Night, 24th Yaris, 2719
A Private Shipyard, Vienda

Niccolette let the wind whip at her skirt at the edge of the platform; she had no fear of falling. It tugged at the hem of her cloak and the pale lavender-gray gown beneath, and snapped the fabric and send it rippling. Her arms were crossed over her front, and she held her gaze firmly away from the ship overhead.

She had made the climb one-handed, the other sweeping the fabric out of the way of her legs. She had made the climb unhesitating, unafraid, with the steady click of black boots against the rungs of the ladder. She had made the climb without looking up, without listening, as if by focusing on the beat of her heart and the steady rhythm of her breath, she could keep from hearing the familiar creak of chainmail and leather, the groan of tether ropes and wood.

For just a little longer, she could stand at the edge of the platform and breathe. She found the rhythm of it, the one that called to the mona, that drew in the world beyond and offered it a taste of her own life, and sent it back out just a little different. A deep, steady rhythm, in a count all her own, which sent her thoughts scattering away.

She had wept. She had wept herself dry, that day, twice, although it was not such a challenging feat in the Yaris heat. She had wept until she was sick and empty and drained, and then, not long later, she had wept again. And then she had washed her face, and she had sat in silence and stillness among the flickering candle flames, until the day had beckoned too urgently to be refused.

And then she had dressed, and gone to the lobby of the Belleverie, and the concierge had found her, and whispered, discretely, about the person - said with an edge - waiting for her in one of the drawing rooms. A private drawing room, the concierge had added.

“Aremu,” Niccolette had meant to bow - she had thought to bow - but then she was pressing forward, and wrapping her arms around him.

He had stiffened, she remembered, and then his arms had wrapped around her as well. She had not cried; she was quite proud of it.

After a few moments they had sat, and Niccolette had poured tea for them both. “He,” she said, bitterly, “asked me to escort Incumbent Anatole Vauquelin to the Island,” she sighed. “A small ship - a private flight,” her hand had tightened on the tea cup, fingers white, and she set it back down without a sip, and buried them in her lap.

Aremu had looked at her, and waited.

Niccolette looked back at him. “Just a few days,” she whispered. “There and back, some meeting with Ada’xa Yesufu. I - will you come?”

Niccolette had readied herself to be asked why; she had turned the question over and over in her mind, and she had thought of what she would say. I cannot do it alone, she would tell him. I need you. Please, Aremu; do not make me do it alone.

Aremu had nodded, and taken a sip of his tea, and set his cup down. He had cleared his throat, and looked up at her, and tried to smile. “Of course, poa’na.”

Niccolette had sat, breathless, and then she had cried, just a little, but it had only been a trickle of tears, and not sobs, even if she had shaken so hard she could not drink the tea. Aremu had sat with her through it, and let her squeeze his hand, and when she had finished they talked of details - inconsequential things - until she was calm.

The rest of the day had gone in a whirl of preparations; and now she was here, standing at the edge of the platform, watching a head of red hair shot through with gray, thinning, emerge from the ladder. He took a few moments, and Niccolette waited, for once, until Vauquelin turned to her.

“Incumbent Vauquelin,” Niccolette said, and bowed, precisely the right depth. The incumbent was breathing hard, she noticed; his field was a sour note at the edge of hers, and Niccolette pursed her lips, faintly, for a moment. Not, she thought, quite as sour as the last time she had felt it. Her gaze flickered over the human who had followed him, and she did not acknowledge him.

“I look forward to having you as a guest in the Islands,” Niccolette said, politely, mechanically, with an air of boredom to the words - reciting them like student would recite a newly memorized spell, although without any of the will. Nonetheless, they dropped from her mouth, made real in the world, and she could not deny them.

Niccolette turned then, and glanced over her shoulder at the tangle of luggage.

Aremu rose from whatever straps he had been working on, his right hand finding his pocket. He eased forward with slow steps, and Niccolette turned back to Vauquelin, and waited. She waited, until she saw Aremu draw level with her, until she saw a ripple of tension tighten his shoulders as he felt the brush of Vauquelin’s field, until there could be no mistaking the lack of his own.

“This is Aremu Ediwo,” Niccolette said, her gaze fixed on Vauquelin. Her field flexed, a sharp, bright wash of living mona that was gone before it could more than register. “He shall be joining us.” Her chin lifted, and she looked at squarely at Vauquelin across the platform, and she dared him to defy her.

At the edge of her gaze, Aremu bowed, tucked his hand away once more, and eased backwards, just out of Vauquelin’s range.

[Tom Cooke]

A Private Shipyard • Uptown

Nighttime on the 24th of Yaris, 2719

D
idn’t expect it’d be you, he almost wanted to say, like the words could disperse the ghost of her. Like the shadows would shift over the familiar features and turn them into a similar, but not identical, face. His eyes traced the shape of the hull behind her, and he felt like it was a ghost, too. He half-expected to see the Eqe Aqawe, and the chills hit him in little rippling waves. The sweat on the back of his neck was cold indeed.

But of course. In a laoso sort of way, it made a damned lot of sense. It made so much sense it hurt. The estate in the isles. Uzoji’s estate. The Ibutatus’, he reminded himself, and was suddenly full of wondering. He shouldn’t’ve lingered on it, but he couldn’t seem to help it. The Eqe Aqawe had gone down, they’d told him, somewhere over the sea, and suddenly Uzoji had been cut out of the tapestry of his life – but he’d never wondered what’d happened to all those severed threads, or how the thing’d knit itself back together. Such as it had, leastways.

Who took care of the plantation, now? What’d happened to the crew? What’d happened to…? He’d seen Niccolette twice since Uzoji’s death; once in Vienda, once – hazy, barely-remembered; he almost thought he’d imagined it – in the Rose. They weren’t flying, he didn’t think. Hadn’t thought. Was she tending to Uzoji’s estates? Was he staying with Niccolette, at the Ibutatu house?

Movement. His glance flicked aside from Niccolette. He’d been right, before; there’d been another shape on the platform, slight but a little taller than the galdor. He couldn’t make out much in the shadow of the hull; he tore his gaze away from the shadows, managed to look back at the other galdor. His smile flickered as she confirmed it; he was the Ibutatus’ guest.

He couldn’t see anything in her face, not in this blasted dark, and she spoke like there was nothing in it; she spoke even and measured and empty. He was inclining his head politely, preparing to fling back more emptiness of his own, when a shape melted from the shadows.

He knew him even before the light wrested his face from the dark. It was the tension in the line of his shoulders, underneath his shirt; it was the way he edged in, silent, until the edges of his field just lapped against him, then edged away.

Something sat on his heart like a painful weight, and his heart fluttered like a crushed bird. He was grateful he couldn’t see anything of Aremu’s eyes, not even a glitter; he could still see the flickering shadows of his eyelashes on his cheek, etched out in lanternlight.

Niccolette’s field flexed against his. He jerked his glance away from the imbala; he saw her standing across from him, her chin up, her kohl-rimmed eyes fixed on him. He couldn’t’ve been sure what his face was doing; he couldn’t’ve been sure what he wanted it to do. What if he was scowling? And would it’ve been worse if he hadn’t been – if that polite wrinkle of a smile was still plastered on his face? The muscles in his face felt numb.

Why are you looking at me like you don’t know me? asked a very small voice. There was something off about his posture, but he couldn’t – he wondered if he was hurt – he swallowed tightly. His chest hurt. His mouth tasted bitter. Why did he care? It wasn’t as if it’d meant anything anyway; he supposed the imbala’d had his fun. You know what they say about human men, another small voice whispered, and he felt something inside him knot like a fist.

He took a neat step forward, heel-to-toe, and offered the imbala an equally neat smile. He bowed deep, deep as he’d bowed for Niccolette; when he rose, he looked him in the eye. “Sana’hulali, Ada’xa Ediwo,” said Anatole, smoothly. He smiled again at Niccolette, sniffing. “I thank the both of you for your hospitality; I assure you, the notice is as late for me as it is for you. I do hope it’s no great inconvenience.”

Lady’s grace, but the walk and then the climb had taken it out of him; he had spent far too much time in his office, over the past few months. He shot a glance upward, where the ladder fluttered. He shivered a little, openly, and it wasn’t much of a facade; he felt like his belly was full of moths. Langley was lumbering around them with the luggage. Anatole clasped his hands behind his back, bounced a little on his heels, and hummed a nervous laugh. “My, my.”

[Niccolette Ibutatu]

Night, 24th Yaris, 2719
A Private Shipyard, Vienda

The night was nearly moonless; in the darkness, Niccolette could hardly make out the expression on Vauquelin’s as he stared at Aremu. There was always the faintest expression of a sneer to him, but - she had been wrong before in trying to read it. She didn’t know what to make of the way the shadows carved it into his thin-lipped smile, or the lingering silence that hung between the three of them.

But Vauquelin stepped forward and bowed, and offered Aremu a polite greeting. Niccolette let go of the tension in her field, and she knew there was an edge to her breathing that should not have been there, and did her best to smooth it out. One more obstacle, she thought, aching. One more moment.

“Sana’hulali, Incumbent Vauquelin,” Aremu said, softly, behind her, and she felt him edge back just a little more; drifting through her field, but keeping just out of Vauquelin’s range. There was something tight in his voice, and Niccolette felt a prickle of guilt rise from her chest, and she swallowed it back down.

“Naturally not,” Niccolette said, and found a smile as polite as his, red-painted lips curling in her tightly-set face. “It is a trip I have been meaning to make for some time.” She turned back to the edge of the platform, and fixed her gaze on nothing in particular in the distance.

Aremu’s glance lingered on the back of her neck, and Niccolette did not dare to look at him. Not a lie, she told herself, aching. Not a lie, not a lie - her right hand slid beneath her cloak and settled on her side, holding tight, and she smiled through it, as if the view pleased her.

“Good evening!” A voice called from above, tinged with a light Bastian accent and a curl of amusement. There was an echo of movement, and a formal coat rippling in the wind as a man descended the ladder, quick and easy.

Isidore Giordanetto dropped the last few feet to the platform with an easy smile, his goatee freshly trimmed and framing full lips. He bowed, politely, first to Niccolette, then to Anatole, inclined his head to Aremu, and ignored Langley entirely.

“Mrs. Ibutatu, please,” Isidore stepped forward, one broad hand reaching for her arm. “Not so close to the edge!” He laughed. “Quite a daredevil, isn’t she,” he flickered an amused glance at Anatole, lips curling at the edge.

“Captain,” Niccolette said coolly. They had met in the early afternoon, and she had not thought much of him then; he was not changing her opinion, as of yet. All the same, she eased back, and crossed her arms over her chest again, and smiled.

Isidore turned to Vauquelin then, and bowed, smiling. “Incumbent Vauquelin, a pleasure,” he said, rising. “I am Captain Isidore Giordanetto. Welcome to the Uccello di Hurte; she has given us Her blessing tonight, with this wind.” He He was perhaps in his mid-thirties, two inches taller than Anatole, with a handsome, weather-beaten face; his goatee was well-styled, and a neat contrast to his military-short hair.

“Mrs. Ibutatu,” Isidore said, turning back to Niccolette. He smiled again. “We have arranged a sling to bring you up to the ship.”

Niccolette stiffened, and held, counting the breaths in and out. “Did you,” she said, softly, and she held her field still and empty, her breath coming slow and even.

Isidore smiled, like a little boy pleased with himself, waiting.

“How - thoughtful ,” Niccolette forced the word out; her hand crept back to her side again, and she found another smile somewhere in her chest.

“Mr. Ediwo,” Isidore turned to him. “Would you -“

“I shall climb,” Aremu bowed.

Isidore hesitated; he shifted, hands behind his back. “Are you sure?” He smiled. “With your hand...”

Aremu looked at him through the dark; Niccolette could see nothing on his face. Her anger burned in her chest, clean and easy now, but not a flicker of it showed in her field. She held onto her side so hard it ached, fingers crumpling the delicate silk.

“Yes,” Aremu said, frowning. “I am sure.”

There was a whistle from overhead, and a length of fabric began to descend, down towards the platform.

Isidore smiled. “Quite,” he said, aomething like uncertainty beneath the smooth current of his voice. “Well - in that case - Incumbent? Should you care to join Mrs. Ibutatu in the sling?”

[Tom Cooke]

A Private Shipyard • Uptown

Nighttime on the 24th of Yaris, 2719

S
ana’hulali, Incumbent Vauquelin, came a soft, familiar voice; Aremu Ediwo stepped back, surely as Anatole’d stepped forward. He couldn’t make out much about his face; it was pitted with soft shadows. There was no reason it should trouble him. The heart in his chest, the heart that wasn’t even his, fluttered weakly underneath a pile of stones. Aremu was watching Anatole intently, tension in all the graceful lines of him, hand deep in his pocket.

(I wouldn’t. I’d never. Not even like this. You don’t have to worry about the incumbent; you can relax, as much as you ever do. As much as you ever did, with me. I promise; I’m made of lies, but I’d never lie about that, no matter how hurt –)

Niccolette turned away, back off the edge of the platform. The wind picked up; it coiled through her hair, tugged through his. He wished it was enough to wash all that polite laoso out of his mouth, or wash his head clean of his headache. He could barely stand to look at Aremu, so he looked anywhere but, and that’s when the voice came trilling down over the gunwale.

He went down the ladder like the wind had plucked him from the Uccello and placed him on the platform. The captain, he thought dumbly. His eyes lingered on the close-cropped hair and the well-groomed goatee – the coat, the boots – a military man? An officer? He bowed to Niccolette first, who hadn’t turned yet; he bowed to Anatole; and he gave a paltry excuse for a dip to Aremu. Behind his back, he could feel his hands twisting together. He kept the thin smile on his face even as he warned Niccolette away from the edge of the platform, but when he met his eye, he couldn’t quite help raising both his eyebrows.

Rolling the name round in his mouth, he dipped low to mirror the captain’s bow, though not quite as low as he’d done for the two Bad Brothers. “Captain Giordanetto,” he beamed. The imbala lingered in the corner of his eye.

Not a Brother, he thought, with a warm weight of certainty. Maybe, maybe not, but he’d’ve bet a couple concords not. It made sense; this trip was above board, and a well-lit captain gave it more legitimacy. Did he know he was working for Hawke? Feeling Niccolette’s field, bright and sharp and indectal at the edge of his porven, he had a hard time believing this kov didn’t know who he was working with. Was that field even stronger than the last time he’d felt it? Clock the Circle, he didn’t want to know.

His eyebrows twitched, again, at the suggestion of the sling. To the smarm’s credit, he offered Aremu the same courtesy – and it didn’t surprise him a whit, I’ll climb in that soft firm tone. What did surprise him was the way Giordanetto hemmed and hawed, and then – what about Aremu’s hand?

Anatole’s flat grey eyes only flicked over the imbala once, only with the mildest of curiosity. With your hand, he thought. An injury. That would explain it, the way he was holding himself. His gaze lingered for a half-second on the rumple of his hand in his pocket, then danced away, back to the captain’s face. Niccolette was just a shape in the corner of his eye, but he thought he saw a familiar bulge at the side of her cloak. He felt dizzied with all the things he should’ve known and didn’t; all the things he shouldn’t’ve, and did.

The breeze carried a whistle down from the rustling rigging, and the shape of Aremu moved away on his periphery. That explained it, he thought, and he was satisfied, because he had to be. When the captain turned the question to him, there was a brief pause. Overhead, a slip of cloth was lowering itself, a funny little spot against the hull.

Absolutely fucking not, he wanted to say. Who the fuck do you take me for? He could feel the rope ladder burning into his hands – different hands, strong hands – still grappling and struggling, mind on fire with all that empty air underneath him. There was no reason to be proud about this. Aremu hadn’t shamed him for his fear; he remembered clinging to the railing in the dark, the deck heaving underneath his boots, and then Aremu, close…

One fist was balled tightly behind him. It was a conscious effort to let go; his fingers came open stiffly, shaking. He massaged the one hand with the other, and found himself running his fingertips over his wedding band. The feel of it sent a shock through him; the feel of his hands underneath his uncalloused fingertips, the feel of everything –

“Thank you. I would climb,” replied Anatole lightly, “only the walk from Bellington has me simply exhausted. Perhaps next time.” He smiled at Giordanetto again, and he inclined his head and shoulders politely as he moved past him for the saddle; but his lips twisted sourly as he shot a look back at Niccolette.

It wasn’t long before the sling was level with the platform, and he found himself settling in one side of it, holding onto the rope with one thin wrist curled round. More anxiety shot up through him; he felt like all his hairs were prickling on end. The hand in his lap was balling itself into a fist again.

Why was Anatole’s body doing this? What stake did it have in any of this? These were his feelings, not its. Why did it ever cry – hitch its breath and spill out tears such that Tom couldn't help but yield? Why did his chest hurt like somebody had driven a knife through his heart?

He shut his eyes, briefly, waiting for the brush of Niccolette’s field. The thin smile was still on his face, but there was something brittle about the set of his lips.

[Niccolette Ibutatu]

Night, 24th Yaris, 2719
A Private Shipyard, Vienda

Niccolette watched the sling descend with even, steady breaths.

“We’ll send it back down with some of the men for the luggage afterwards,” Isidore was explaining, with a smile. “No need to trouble yourself – we won’t so much as jostle it.” He laughed, and came a little closer to Niccolette.

Niccolette did not look at him, but she did ease her gaze away from the sling, and her hand from her side, and her face twitched at something that was as close as she could manage to a smile.

“No need to be nervous,” Isidore was saying, smiling, and Niccolette watched his hand lift – hover over her shoulder – she felt Aremu move behind her, then, a short, sharp jerk, as if he could not help himself. Isidore lowered his hand, but not onto her shoulder, and glanced around instead.

“It’s not quite like one of the larger ships,” Isidore was saying, smiling, “but you’ll get quite used to it.”

Yes, Niccolette wanted to say. I know. She managed another thin-lipped smile, and something like a nod. Was it lying, to nod? No; no, she didn’t think so. She would have to ask Aremu – she would have to ask – she would –

Niccolette closed her eyes for a few long moments, fingers slowly twisting her wedding ring back and forth. No, she thought; no. A few moments, and then a few moments more. Her breath was hitching, and she smoothed it out, slow and steady. Her eyes opened, and she watched Anatole climbing into the sling. The sling! Her jaw clenched, and to hold her field indectal was as hard as anything she had ever had to do.

Niccolette glanced left, and she saw Aremu watching her.

He rolled his eyes – the faintest flicker of the motion, just enough to tell her what he meant – and Niccolette almost broke, then, her face twitching at a smile, tears stinging her eyes. It was a clean break, though; it opened up the wound, as if it could drain; it gave her the strength to take the last few steps, to settle into the other side of the sling, and curl her left hand around the ropes, golden ring glittering in the slivers of moonlight.

Vauquelin looked tense, Niccolette thought, idly. She didn’t know why; she couldn’t bring herself to think on it, any more than that. This close, there was no escaping the jangle of his field. She sighed, and rested her forehead against her hand, and smoothed them both, forcefully – reached out through the mona, and pressed her order upon him. It was unbearably intimate; she never ought to have done it once, let alone again – but she could not stand the touch of his porven a moment longer.

When she opened her eyes Isidore was watching her. She couldn’t feel his field; he was a little too distant for it. Had he felt hers? She could not bring herself to care.

Isidore smiled, then, and made a signal with one extended hand, and the sling began to lift.

The letter had been regular enough; not the utter silence he had lingered in for months after the funeral, writing missive after missive that went unanswered as he struggled to hold the plantation together – struggled, because he was a man whose word meant nothing in court, who could not be trusted by any authority – struggled, because they knew him at the heart for what he was, empty and truthless – struggled, because Niccolette was in Anaxas, lost in her grief, and it was Aremu that Uzoji had trusted to hold the plantation together.

But she had begun to write; for a little time, there had been the answers and signatures he needed – and then the letters had grown strange, stranger and stranger, drifting, until he had gone to Anaxas himself, in Roalis. And since his return, there had been easy, regular correspondence, twice weekly; the sort of letters he had written, painstakingly at first, for Uzoji.

And then – a request to come to Vienda, short, but the sort of short that was familiar to him, by now, after years of this work. And then, below the last line of it, squeezed in the space that should have been left before the signature, in a shakier, slanted hand:

Please.

Aremu had sat, and he had touched the word with his fingertips, frowning, and he had gone, then; he had packed, and he had been on an airship that day.

Aremu stood on the platform, and watched the sling began to lift, Niccolette with her heels crossed and Incumbent Vauquelin looking as if he might be sick onto the sling, both of them silent.

Giordanetto cleared his throat, and Aremu turned his gaze to the Captain.

“I’m glad we’ve a moment alone,” Giordanetto said, smiling. Aremu’s eyes flickered to Langley, and then back to the Captain. There was a beat of silence between them.

“Captain,” Aremu said, politely, and he bowed again.

“Mrs. Ibutatu is a widow,” Giordanetto said, his eyes sweeping over the imbala. He made a faint face of disgust, as if he had tasted something foul. “And my countrywoman. She deserves to be treated with the utmost respect. Do you understand me?”

Aremu watched him across the platform, breath coming slow and steady.

“Do you understand me?” Giordanetto’s voice lowered, and he stepped a fraction close; Aremu felt his field pulse with the heat of static mona, and the weight of it clawed over his skin, stinging, firey hot.

“Of course, sir,” Aremu bowed, and straightened up, both arms at his sides.

“Good,” Giordanetto said, and smiled. “Good. I trust we’ll have no more difficulties, then?”

Aremu cleared his throat, and answered honestly. “None with me, sir.”

He was smiling to himself as he began the climb; a small grin, at first, and then a wider one, until it was wide enough that he had to hold it back, and swallow it politely down. He climbed easily, one-handed; he did not hold the rungs, but set his hand on the side, and moved it steadily up with each motion of his legs, his right arm held close to his side.

He outpaced them, the slow movements of the sling; and if it was deliberate, if he rushed the climb, he wasn’t sorry for it in the least. It meant he was there, when the sling reached the edge of the ship, and the crew extended their hands in to steady the Incumbent and Niccolette. It meant it was his hands, the one of flesh and the one of wood, that extended to the Bastian; he knew she needed neither, but if they were to be offered nonetheless, he thought she would prefer his.

And Niccolette took them, both, evenly – her left holding the wooden one firmly, ring clinking softly against the wood, as if she knew he would not offer it if it could not bear the weight. He felt the straps at his elbow and shoulder tighten, and he smiled at her, and lifted her carefully from the sling, so they stood on the deck together.

Niccolette sighed, then, letting go.

“Here, madam – here,” One of the crew was saying, the ship swaying beneath them, offering her one of the straps against the railing. Aremu watched her, balanced lightly on the swaying deck. Niccolette made a little face, and slid her hand into the strap, and held it without hesitation. She lifted her gaze to the ship, then, slowly, tracing the dark silhouette of the balloon against the stars.

Aremu looked up at it with her, feeling the wind sway them both. Slowly, carefully, he tucked the wooden hand away once more, back in his pocket, and glanced around the deck, finding the contours of it, the door inside, the places that would be good to climb. Later, he promised himself, and glanced back up at the chainmail-covered leather above, with an ache in his heart. Later.

[Tom Cooke]

Uccello di Hurte • Aloft

Nighttime on the 24th of Yaris, 2719

H
e couldn’t bring himself to pay attention to the sound of voices across the platform, and the wind half-swallowed them anyway. Soon enough, he felt Niccolette’s field, sharp and cool like the flat of a knife against a feverish brow. The ropes gave a jerk, and his stomach gave a lurch.

He managed to open his eyes briefly, just as the saddle was lifted off the platform. He closed them quick enough, soon as he saw the ground falling away underneath; but lingering in his head was the sight of the captain and Aremu. Something sat ill with him.

Will Giordanetto be a problem? He wanted to ask Niccolette, suddenly. Is he one of us? Where do we stand with him? He kept his mouth shut. He didn’t know how much she knew, how much any of them were supposed to know. Any questions would give him away. Anything at all would give him away.

So the way up was long. He kept his fingers tight round the rope, and his lips sealed shut as if with wax. The wind picked up. His stomach turned over again. The whole of him felt made of wax.

The living mona mingled with his. The clairvoyant particles tangled up in his porven pulsed against her field, as if curious; he felt Niccolette’s will through them, whispering, through his ley lines. His lip twitched. He remembered that night, now, through a water-logged lens. If nothing else, he remembered what it’d led to; he remembered lying on his side in circles of chalk two weeks later, the mona itself stilling his field around him, giving him a brief taste of peace.

Don’t impose your order on me, he thought, unbidden. I’m a wild thing. He felt rage quiver through his bones; his clairvoyant mona stirred with it. The faint blush of red shift, for a few precious seconds. It startled him, that red tang, so much that it didn’t last. A cold tendril of fear wrapped round his heart, and he shifted away from the other galdor, crossing his legs.

He barely had time to think when he heard men’s voices, sharp and clear in his ear, and creaking, and the thump of boots on wood. He opened his eyes, saw —

“Floods,” he hissed between his teeth, jerking his head up. It was easier to look at the gunwale, at the familiar railing — easier, after a fashion — he tried to empty his head out of thoughts. He had to; he had to get up on deck. The saddle shifted (dangerously, it felt like) as Niccolette shifted to get out; his eyes followed her, saw glimpses of things, moving bodies, fluttering coats, faces, Bastian and Anaxi and —

He saw Niccolette’s pale, slim hand, her fingers intertwined with long, dark fingers, calloused fingers, familiar fingers. Niccolette’s other hand was holding something else; his eyes lingered on it, unable to understand. It was a hand made out of wood.

“Incumbent,” came a Bastian voice. There was another hand in his face, small and a little plump, but tanned and rough. He took it, unthinking, and found himself pulled up from the saddle; he found another hand at his elbow, and another — more men — around him, helping him over the railing.

A press of bodies and fields. He smelled leather and, faintly, cologne, and underneath it sweat, and maybe whisky. His breath was hard and sharp in his lungs; the air scraped the inside of him like a knife. He peered through the men, round a shoulder, over a bald head. Aremu’d helped Niccolette aboard, and they were looking together up at the shimmering chainmail of the balloon.

He blinked, looked away. He had the misfortune of looking over the railing, then.

There were still hands at his elbows; otherwise, he felt like he’d’ve pitched off over. He saw a swarm of lights. It was moving, everything was moving, and he could barely focus his eyes. It was like a knot, like a fist made of stars, cut through the middle with a lick of sparse-lighted dark. The river, he thought dumbly. “Incumbent,” came another man’s voice, high and nasally.

He was aware his mouth was open. His jaw was tingling, and he clamped it shut tight. His head spun. As he tore his eyes away from the sprawl of Uptown, he got a glimpse of Aremu’s profile, and then he was looking into another galdor’s face. It was roundish, dusted with black stubble, studded with two large dark eyes that were staring at him.

“Show me where I’m quartered,” he stumbled out, dry-mouthed. He wasn’t smiling anymore. “Give the captain my deepest — give the captain — show me,” and he fluttered a hand toward the cabin.

“Of course, sir,” came an assortment of mumbles; he wasn’t paying attention, not as an arm took his, not as he found himself shambled like a walking corpse across the deck. After a few steps, all but the round man melted away, though he could hear a few mutters — a chuckle — behind him, something about that striping thing, something about what do you have to do to make such a mess.

He found he didn’t care. He found he couldn’t think of much of anything; he knew he’d be sick, and what little dignity he had left didn’t want to be sick on deck, in front of everyone. He sure as hell didn’t want to see the blasted thing pick itself up and leave its moorings. He’d had his way, he’d’ve drunk himself to a stupor during the whole way; he had half a mind to even now.

Mostly, Tom wept because he was angry.

He’d held himself together through the sick; when he’d emptied himself of everything, he’d cleaned up, best he could, and had the sickbowl carried away, and laid down in the small dark cabin on the little narrow bed and tried to sleep. The winds had carried the Uccello di Hurte from her moorings sometime earlier, and now she was in the air, swaying gently underneath him.

For the first hour, he’d thought of nothing. It was as if he had to burn his mask off, with the heat of his anger and with his hot salty tears. There was too much of Anatole in his head, stuffing it like cotton; but he set flame to it, his face buried in his pillow until he could feel it again, his stiff hands knotted in the sheets until the voice in his head was his own.

Then, the creak and sway lulled his hitching breath, and his eyes and mouth were too dry to cry anymore. Earlier, he’d peeled himself out of his coat and his fine waistcoat, slipped out of the noose of his silk necktie. He’d slipped off Anatole’s wedding ring and put it in the pocket of his trousers, and held aloft in the dark, with his eyes shut, he could barely tell that they weren’t his hands. He had no thought but what little cool breath sifted through the close-set walls and over his bare skin.

Tom didn’t doubt Hawke had a cruel sense of humor; he’d seen enough of it, that day in Intas. Hawke would’ve had to have a cruel sense of humor to take him back on in the first place, the self-proclaimed ghost of a tough. Mung, mung, mung. He’d been so godsdamn mung.

And now they were drifting over land and sea, the three of them, to stay under a dead man’s roof.

His head was quiet enough now to make room for wonder. His heart ached. What must this have meant for Niccolette Ibutatu? She said she’d been meaning to make this trip; had she not been back to the isles? Who, then—? And he thought of Aremu’s wooden hand, clasped in Niccolette’s, jammed in his pocket. A flood of answers rushed through him. He thought of Aremu climbing the ladder, one-handed. Still faster than the sling.

Anger, again; no more weeping, but he curled in on himself like another silverfish. The anger didn’t last for long. In its absence, he wasn’t sure what to feel. He hadn’t the strength to look ahead, to the coming week, not with Ada’xa Yesufu, not with Niccolette and Aremu. Looking behind was closed off to him; he had only to think of Aremu Ediwo’s hands weaving a braid from his loose hair to feel like a mung.

It might’ve been two hours, or three. It was still dark when he shifted to sit up, testing his aching stomach. He had no more sick to be. Wiping his brow, he pulled on a clean shirt, then rose to his feet gingerly, holding tightly to a handle set into the wall near the door.

The tangle of sweaty sheets behind him felt like the last layer his soul had to shed. He didn’t know where he was going, but he wanted to get out. Carefully, he opened the hatch and slipped out into the hall.

He traced the walls with his fingertips. In the dark, he was bodiless; he slipped back into all his old motions, padding catlike along the hall. A chill breeze swept down it, and all the hairs on the back of his neck prickled. The boards were cool, too, underneath his bare feet.

They creaked and shifted; supporting himself on the wall, he felt himself shift with them, the muscles in his legs adjusting to hold him steady. He didn’t think on the familiarity of this, or who’d taught him how, fingers tangled together. He felt that if he let go, and a mant wind rocked the Uccello, he’d go down face first. This time, he was grateful for the sturdy metal ladder, though all of him trembled and strained in protest as he pulled himself up it.

The gust that buffeted him when he opened the door to the deck was enough to knock the wind right out of his lungs. Holding onto the doorframe, he coughed, then choked out a laugh. He couldn’t hear his laughter over the wind, but he could hear it swell through him, almost painful in his chest. He grinned out into the night, cause he could see the moons clear, half and crescent, glinting off the rippling chainmail overhead. He stuck his head out and lingered in the doorway for one more moment; the wind plucked at his loose shirt, raked cool fingers through his tousled hair. He took a deep breath.

Working his way to the railing was harder. He felt like a newborn bird, all gangle and useless twig legs. When he looped his wrist through the leather — reflex; unthinking — he stopped breathing, shut his eyes. A sharp breath in, but he couldn’t open them for a few seconds. The wind and dark stirred up ghosts in the air around him.

He held onto the railing for a long time, worried he’d be sick again if he opened his eyes. He was starting to wonder why he’d come out; he’d go back in soon enough, he reckoned, back to — a cramped, warm little cabin. He grit his teeth and opened his eyes instead, and jerked his head up.

And laughed again, fingers tightening on the railing. Everything else slid away.

He’d never seen them, without the lights of the city. Not on his trips from Vienda to Brunnhold, or even to the Rose; not on the commercial airships, where he’d spent most of his time sick or staring at plots on pages. But on the Uccello, on a near cloudless night, the wind swept them across the sky like spilt phosphor.

Something eased inside him. Something else tightened. He’d thought he was dry of tears; he felt tired, tired and angry, at the pressure welling and prickling in his eyes, and the stiffness in his jaw. No more, he wanted to beg, no more, no more. His muscles were tired from being racked. He looked out over the map, and it was so easy, suddenly, to imagine it inverted, to imagine the stars as pinprick holes in a great dark blanket; it was so easy to imagine some endless light looking through the holes, down over Vita.

They all had different shapes, colors, but he didn’t know their names. Light teemed between them, blurred some together, but some were brighter or stranger than others. The first bright star, he thought. He felt silly; he didn’t even know if he was facing the right direction. He burned to find it, though — he felt desperate. Empty-stomached, wrung out from crying, he felt like if he could find it, he might begin to know where he stood.

But he couldn’t find it, after what could’ve been a few minutes or an hour. Feeling hollow and brittle, he slid his free hand along the railing and made to turn. But he didn’t want to go back to the room. He looked out over the deck, and a whim took him with the force of urgency.

Careful, Tom lowered himself down to the deck and let his hand slip from the railing. He wavered, like a sapling in the breeze, but didn’t fall. He crept out a little ways, until the whole of the sky was overhead, blocked only marginally by the balloon; then he laid down on his back.

After the cramped quarters, the hard wooden boards against his back were a relief. The tapestry sprawled out above him, a hundred lights peeping through. He lay there, looking up at the stars, and found he could breathe again, deep and full. Tom knit his fingers over his chest and rested his head back; he watched, and searched, and wanted.

[Aremu Ediwo]

Night, 24th Yaris, 2719
Uccello di Hurte, in the skies over Anaxas

Giordanetto had smiled, showing them to the control room. Showing Niccolette, Aremu thought, aware of the distinction, and aware, too, that it only made him more determined to follow. Niccolette’s face was calm and blank, like a mask made of ice; there were shivers rippling through her, Aremu thought, and her hands were pale with the cold of the deck still.

“It’s the best view for taking off,” Giordanetto was explaining with a smile. “Here, Mrs. Ibutatu, there’s a step down,” he extended his hand, and smiled.

Niccolette’s gaze flickered over him, and she settled her hand in his, and let him help her down, skirt rippling with the motion.

“My dear,” Giordanetto said, eyes wide. “Your hands are like ice. Are you all right?” His other rested on top of it, and rubbed, very gently.

Niccolette drew her hand back, smoothly and evenly and unhesitatingly, so that Giordanetto was left hovering in the air. “Quite,” she said, and smiled.

Aremu did not sit, but stationed himself against the wall, and took hold of one of the sets of straps there with his hand. Giordanetto left the heavy ebony wheel to one of his crewmen, and sat himself in a leather seat next to Niccolette, smiling and talking still. Aremu heard the murmur of her voice even so often, polite and even, and he was proud of her, even though it ached.

And then –

He felt it, the moment they loosened the tether; he felt the hum of the engines stir through the ship and ripple through the wall, filling his chest with their rhythm. Aremu let the rhythm of his breath become theirs, and he fixed his gaze on the window and watched. They rose; they rose, slowly, drifted away from the mooring, and left the ground behind, and all the world with it.

There was a current; he felt the moment the ship settled into it, the wind that had ruffled their faces below was a beacon here, guiding the ship, drawing them onwards and steadily upwards. Aremu’s heart ached, and loosened, and drifted too, and he closed his eyes for a long moment; the nose of the ship was pointed up, then, and he could see a scattering of distant, wind-blown clouds and, above it all, the sweep of the stars.

Giordanetto had fallen silent; Aremu fixed his eyes on the shine of Niccolette’s hair, and wondered.

“Should you care for some dinner?” Giordanetto had escorted them from the bridge as well, smiling, holding the doorway open. “We have an excellent chef.”

“No,” Niccolette said. “I shall retire.” She glanced over her shoulder, down the long hallway, and then back to Giordanetto.

“Of course,” he bowed, lightly, and Aremu felt his gaze linger as the two of them walked away.

Niccolette was shaking; she was shaking with the force of her whole body, and Aremu shifted behind her, so that he filled the space between her and the captain, still watching them. She made it to the door; she fumbled at the knob, and made to slump against it, and Aremu reached past her and turned it, wishing he could brace her.

Niccolette stumbled in, and dropped to her knees on the carpet, fingers digging into it, head bowed forward, hair tumbling loose over her shoulders. She shuddered – Aremu heard a sob, and then she shook her head, and sat back upright, and rubbed her left hand over her face.

“Bar the door,” Aremu said, quietly, standing in the opening still.

Niccolette glanced back over her shoulder at him, her eyes glittering with tears, a twist of fury scattering across her face. “Do not tell me – ” Her voice was no more than a whisper, hot and furious, but it shattered and broke. She shuddered, and gripped herself tight, shaking on the carpet.

Aremu held in the doorway, and though the door to the bridge was closed, he could not mistake them for alone. He waited, there, and held, until he saw Niccolette nod. And then, and only then, did he shut the door, gently, and leave her in peace. He heard the hitch of her breath before she was even alone, but he didn’t look; there was nothing he could do.

Aremu lingered just a moment in the hallway, until he heard the scrape of something heavy on the floor behind the doorway. He made his way down, then – down, and down again, to a smaller room, with his rucksack tied down and a cot for sleeping. There was a narrow window, the shutters nailed shut.

Aremu studied them, and then he shrugged. He sat on the couch, and took his clothing off; his shirt, first, button by button, slow and careful, and he folded it and set it away. Then the straps; the one that ran cross-body, first, and then the ones that secured the prosthetic to his shoulder and elbow. He wound them up, carefully, and tucked them into the proper opening in his bag. The hand itself he removed last, and he set it carefully on the bed. He massaged his forearm, eyes closed, thumb digging into the tendons that ran down it, trying to loosen the ache in them, feeling the lines the straps left behind, so familiar that he thought the indents might one day be permanent.

And then Aremu opened the top flap of his bag, carefully, and took out his other prosthetic. He settled it on his wrist, propped his arm against his lap, and tightened the straps. He reached inside again, and found the claw hammer attachment. Carefully, he screwed it into place, one easy twist at a time.

Then, rubbing his right shoulder with his left hand, he rose and crossed to the window. He lifted his right arm, and, open at a time, drew one the nails that held the shutters closed – one, and the next, and the next, until they all drew open in the whistling breeze, and fresh air gusted through the cabin. Aremu sighed, breathing in deeply, and eased them a little further open, so that he could see the glimmer of stars beyond.

And then, carefully, he wrapped the nails up in a length of string, tied them together and hung them from the wall next to the shutters. He went back to his rucksack – he unscrewed the hammer, turn by turn, slow and careful, and tucked it away in its kit; he unstrapped the prosthetic, and tucked that away too. And then, last but not least, he drew his dark brown shirt back on, and did the buttons up, one by one.

Aremu lay back on the cot, and sighed; if he shifted, propped himself between the bed and the wall, he could see a sliver of the night sky through the window, just a sliver. He watched it for a little while, feeling the rocking of the ship. Like a child’s cradle, he thought, irrationally, but once he had thought of it he could not let it go.

He rose, then, and paced the confines of the small room, hand around his wrist behind his back, his jaw tight. He paced, and he ached; he pressed himself to the window, and watched the stars; he held against the doors, and listened. In a little while, there was a burst of noise and laughter; in a little while, there was stillness and silence outside.

Aremu eased himself out of the room; he could not bear the enclosure any longer. He made his way down the hall, silent in the dark, and up the ladder to the door that led outside. The wind whistled over him as he opened it, plucked at the fabric of his shirt, whistled over his face and neck, and Aremu smiled to feel it. He pulled the door shut behind himself, easy and silent, and leaned back against it, tilting his head back with a deep sigh.

He opened his eyes, then. Even from beneath the overhang, he could see them, the stars sweeping through the sky above. Aremu sighed, again, with pleasure this time; after a few days in the Rose and Vienda, where the light polluted the sky and choked the stars out of sight, it felt like freedom to see them so.

Aremu lowered his gaze to the deck, and froze; moonlight glittered on a tangle of red hair, spilled out against the boards, pale skin beneath, a small, slight figure.

Not freedom, Aremu thought; not freedom. There was no freedom here, not for him; not for either of them. She already knew that; he was sorry he had let himself hope.

“Sir?” Aremu stepped forward, and then forward again. He held at the invisible line, the distance that would keep him out of the Incumbent’s field – then, slowly, he crossed it, carefully, into the space where the man’s porven rioted against his nerves, into the space where there was no hiding what he lacked. His right arm tucked against his side, wrist resting gently at the edge of his pocket, although there was no bulge inside it now.

“Sir?” Aremu knelt on the deck, gently, and kept what he could of his space, looking worriedly down at the Anaxi, a frown knitting his face together. “Are you all right?”

[Tom Cooke]

Uccello di Hurte • Aloft

Nighttime on the 24th of Yaris, 2719

F
irst bright star in the sky. He swept them with his eyes, but there were so many it was dizzying; he hadn’t seen them appear, one by one, with dusk, and he couldn’t say which was brightest. How could anyone pick shapes out of such a tangle? He couldn’t narrow his sight enough to see just one line, one cluster, at a time. He could’ve drawn lines among all of them with his eyes, knit them all together in a web. It wasn’t a map but a ball of yarn.

For a while, though, the tracery of those lines was good enough. The wanting, a voice whispered, was enough.

Other thoughts filled his head. He’d been reading about ley couverture; there was a fringe scholar at Brunnhold that’d been brought to his attention, and he’d never talked to the chip, but he was reading everything of hers he could get his hands on. What of it he could understand, anyway. It was easy to imagine, looking up at the swirl of dust overhead, all of Vita having its own ley lines, linked to everything arcane. If he blurred his eyes, the lights spread over the dark sky and filled all the spaces in between. It was like a party, he thought — not a space in the ballroom that wasn’t thick with the mona. He felt himself starting to drift, and he didn’t much care.

He should’ve known he wasn’t alone, but he didn’t. Not ‘til he saw a shape slide into his periphery, blocking out a section of stars. Quiet as ever, Aremu stood above him, and Tom wondered if he was dreaming; the imbala was saying something, but the wind was ferrying his voice right over the gunwale and away into the night.

His voice, again, and the shape of him knelt. Tom felt a pleasant tug at the closeness of him, then a trickle of icewater down his spine. No dream, tonight.

He froze. He couldn’t look at the figure in the corner of his eye, but he saw the ripple of a dark shirt in the breeze, the long line of one arm, the wrist just tucked into a pocket. He could feel his own field buzzing against his nerves, and thought Aremu must be able to feel it, too. He could feel Aremu’s eyes on him, and his skin prickled and crawled. He couldn’t bear to imagine what the imbala saw.

He’d almost forgot everything. He felt another spike of anger. Of course Aremu would come out here; of course, out of everyone else on board, it’d be him, seeking the solitude of the deck at night. And of course, gods damn him, he’d come check on the incumbent. Tom stared fixedly upward, but he couldn’t focus on the stars anymore.

“Quite all right, Ada’xa Ediwo.” He heard the hard edge in his voice and frowned.

Earlier, he’d given some thought to it, as much as he could bear. He knew distance was for the best; the last thing he wanted to do was give the imbala grief. All the same, he thought of Giordanetto down on the platform with Aremu, and of the looks he’d seen the crew give him.

His eyes finally wandered over to the face a few feet from his, the figure crouched just this side of his field. He could see the glitter of Aremu’s eyes underneath his furrowed brows. There was still no recognition in them; he didn’t know if it’d be worse, if there had been. Distance tempered disgust, and was better by far than horror. An ugly little man with a porven field wasn’t the worst thing you could be.

Tom pushed himself up a little, propping his elbow on the deck. Immediately his head spun; he pursed his lips, pressing the heel of his palm to his forehead ‘til the dizziness left him.

He tried a smile. “I’d rise and bow again,” he added, “but I’d either topple on my face or be sick on your shoes, which would defeat the purpose.” The hard edge had softened; he found words like those easier. “Just looking at the stars. Don’t let me disturb you.”

[Aremu Ediwo]

Night, 24th Yaris, 2719
Uccello di Hurte, in the skies over Anaxas

For a moment, Aremu had thought the incumbent was dead. That, he thought, would have been difficult indeed to explain to Hawke; Niccolette had been charged to keep the man safe for this journey, and it would have been hard to tell Hawke that he had wound up dead on the deck of the airship practically before they’d left the outskirts of Vienda. Aremu knew, and Niccolette did too, that she might not have many chances left.

But then he’d felt the riot of the Incumbent’s porven, and at least he’d known then that the cause wasn’t lost. The galdor didn’t respond to the questioning tone in Aremu’s voice; not even when the imbala came closer and asked more directly, not at first, and Aremu wondered if he would have to drag him inside, one-armed, across the deck – manage the heavy door, he thought, somehow, and carry him down the stairs. At least he was small.

The incumbent’s eyes were open, Aremu noticed, pointed up at the sky. The moon leeched the light from his pale skin; the night dug shadows into the harsh lines of his face. There was something sneering about his look, and when he spoke, there was a hard edge to his voice. It was, Aremu understood, a polite way of telling him he had disturbed the man.

He was still crouched in a kneel, but he inclined his upper body in a respectful bow, and eased himself back, away, back towards the shadows of the overhang – out of the range of the man’s field. The Incumbent had been polite, earlier, Aremu thought; as polite as any Anaxi. That was unfair; he’d been much more polite than most. He had bowed as deeply to Aremu as he had to Niccolette, and there had been no trace of mockery in it, not that Aremu could detect; and he had come, over the last few years, to know it in all its subtle shades.

He looked tired, Aremu thought; it was there in all the lines of his face, as if all his years had caught him all at once. He hadn’t thought to – he hadn’t thought. What did the politician think of all this? Niccolette was meant to be guarding him; he must know that. Was he afraid? He’d looked nauseous on the way up to the Uccollo, and he’d nearly lost his dignity on the deck; they had, Aremu was sorry to know, all seen it. The gossip had been whispered to Giordanetto with more than a hint of amusement; the crewman had not troubled to keep his voice low.

The galdor eased up onto his elbows, and spoke to Aremu as if he were a man.

Aremu dropped his gaze, still crouched just distant enough. “I am the one who disturbed you,” he pointed out, gently. “My apologies, Incumbent.” He held there a long moment, not sure what to say or do. Niccolette had not said much about Vauquelin, but he had the oddest impression she was – perhaps not quite fond of the man, but that she did not mind him. He couldn’t think what she’d said to make him think that; perhaps there wasn’t anything in particular. She had been defensive of Aremu, all the same, down on the platform; he didn’t know that she was helping, but he appreciated the effort, more than he could say.

He had made himself dizzy, Aremu noticed, to be polite. He swallowed, a little, throat moving, and rose, slowly and carefully. He nodded again to the Incumbent, and eased carefully past him, along the edge of the deck, towards the spot he’d found earlier. There were no rungs; he imagined they had a ladder up to the roof inside, but he hadn’t wanted to search for the hatch; he doubted, anyway, that he’d have been able to find it.

Instead, carefully, Aremu climbed up onto the railing, left hand reaching up for the edge of the lower part of the roof of the cabin; he grabbed hold, balanced on his toes on the narrow ledge and pulled himself up, planting his right elbow when he got high enough. A gust of wind rocked the ship, but it didn’t so much as nudge him; Aremu lay on his stomach, and let it pass.

He rose easily onto his knees, hand and wrist planted against the roof, and tilted his head back, glancing up at the balloon above. Another gust of wind rocked the ship; Aremu made a face, knowing he had better wait until the air smoothed out. That was all right; there was plenty of time. He sat and eased his legs over the overhang, and held there a moment, sitting on the flat roof, his hand and wrist in his lap, looking over the silhouette of the ship and the stars above. Once, carefully, curiously, his gaze strayed down to the Incumbent not so far below, then eased back up, and away.