“Here’s what I think,” Tris said instead of the captain, twirling the long tail of his hair around one finger. “Doll and me will take these two. The twins take the other two under the hull of this here airship. And the vicar wil—”
Neenah sucked her teeth. “Nobody asked your bloody opinion! Doll, you and Tris take these two cock lumps and Zig, Zag, you buggers get ‘round the ship and buckle the other two’s kneecaps. And call me ‘Captain’, you pissing oaf!”
Zig nudged Zag with an elbow and grin. Tris rolled his eyes and Doll pinched the bridge of her wide nose. Roland just shook his head. Cyan looked toward Harlequin, but the young vicar was too busy trying to hide her smile.
“Now,” Neenah continued, “there might be some Imperium buggers up near the Lover. Keep that eye of yours out, you prick,” she said to Roland. “If you’re thinking of getting dastardly on me now, at all times, bloody think again. I need you to get that portal open so we can get the void out of here.”
“And what will you be doing, Cap’n?” Tris questioned. “Sittin’ back while we do all the work?”
Neenah snorted. “Someone’s got to fly my girl.” She fixed the collar of her suit jacket. “Now, we may be skirtin’ out of here to save our hides, but I want this clean.” She fixed a glare on the twins. “No deaths. A clock to the skull works just as well. You muck it up, I don’t need anyone bloody fingering me on this. Got it?”
Both twins looked smug. “Gots it,” they said in unison.
“I swear to bloody Nocturne you better put your fingers in your ears…”
“And pull up three times,” one said.
“To gets our heads out our asses,” the other finished.
“Vicars, you’re with me,” Neenah said. Cyan stifled a chuckle but nodded.
Something about the airship captain captivated him. She wasn’t hard… no, he couldn’t go there. Never go there. He was a Shards man through and through. He caught Harlequin staring at him; his glare sent her gaze elsewhere.
Praise the Pentax. Ever since Lilia had gone rogue, he was having a harder and harder time remaining the steadfast taskmaster.
Cyan half-crawled, half-sprinted between stacks of crates after Neenah LeFleur, Harlequin behind. The captain stopped every few steps to listen. A few muffled cries and the soft clanking of cuirass to stone told him at least some of the captain’s crew were doing what was expected of them. Holding his breath, he watched Neenah slink down the metal ramp before he and Harlequin trailed.
He looked back the way they’d come and saw two soldiers lying on the ground back near the crates, both knocked senseless—and he hoped, still alive. He spied the dvergir Tris and giantess Doll worming through the stacks, dipping over the rail of the walkway and heading toward them. The twin hobgoblins hurried over toward the ship now, both sporting big dumb grins.
“Soldier up tip top,” the dvergir whispered to Neenah, flicking his thumb over his shoulder toward the ladder that was attached to the airship. “Maybe more.”
“We got this,” Cyan said. Harlequin only nodded; her face hard.
The two strafed around the walkway toward the ladder, climbing up hand over hand. The deck was made of oiled wood, stained a dark brown, sturdy and fitted to perfection. The wheelhouse was made of the same metal as the hull, glass encapsulating it. Inside was a plethora of buttons and levers, some tiny wheels and gauges, then obviously the big steering wheel.
Instinctively, Cyan ducked as a blade raked across his shoulders, shredding through his cassock. He twisted and summoned his aetheric axe in defense as the attacker lunged again with the sharp blade. The blade snaked off his axe’s misty haft and Cyan lashed out with his aether-wrought dual crescents, struck the man in the face, a gush of blood behind shattered glass. The soldier fell back, and Cyan rammed his shoulder into the man, who hit the railing with momentum and tumbled over, followed by a sickening crunch.
“How come the vicar gets to kill, Cap’n?” one of the hobgoblins said as the voidspawn below looked up at him, the other was crouched down over the soldier, a ring of crimson beginning to grow larger.
“Do as I say, you tossing whoremonger,” Neenah said, smacking the voidspawn in the head. “Get your skinny hairy asses up there on the double!”
“Notta wrong with whores,” Cyan heard one say as the pair of voidspawn climbed aboard.
The airship rumbled as it came alive, the cylinders spewing fumes of black and then it began to rise. The portal ahead of the airship began opening. With all of Neenah LeFleur’s crew aboard, the captain came over to Cyan, who was at the bowsprit.
“That little bint’s strong, hear?”
Cyan hung his head. He had failed her once again. Failed his gods. Failed his oaths. Failed to protect Amaranth. Failure, that’s all he was.
But to Neenah LeFleur, he gave her a steely glare. “We have to help her.”
“Now that’s what I bloody like to hear!”
Marrow’sLover pierced the clouds high above the Sea of Mist, clear evening sky above. They were out in the deep desert.
Cyan had an inkling of where the girl might be. “To the mines, Captain LeFleur, if you please.”
LI
Cadrianna
CADRIANNA ADJUSTED HER bootstraps, saying a long overdue prayer to Zenith.
Protect Emre, Great Father of the World. Not for my sake, but for Brynn’s. Brynn…
“SHE IS THE GODSBLOOD, CAD,” the Strix said as she tightened the other boot. The daemon blade had been quiet since they’d arrived at the mines. She wondered if it was due to all the aether built up in the area. Or if the usually quippy daemon had decided to give her some time to decompress. “HER BLOOD RUNS THROUGH YOU. WHAT SHE IS MADE OF IS OF YOU. AND I KNOW NO OTHER STRONGER OF WILL THAN YOU. IF SHE’S HALF OF THAT, THEN WE HAVE NOTHING TO WORRY ABOUT. AND ZENITH IS NOT WHO YOU THINK HE IS.”
If only I could believe such a thing, Strix. But my worry is for Emre. He may have changed, but one thing he always was is a man with a brash streak a league wide.
“I ENJOY IT WHEN A SPADE PRETENDS THEY ARE A RAKE.”
Cadrianna let out a soft chuckle, but her mood turned to focus as she finished with her bootstraps. It was time for her to atone for all the wrongs she had done under the guise of her vengeance. Emre, the lapin, and the drakken had already left for the Temple of Mother Marrow, leaving her with the Dunleith siblings to prepare for their assault on the mines. It was almost dawnbreak, almost time.
The bikrome had changed out of the graceful dark blue stola and into a simple pair of mining coveralls scrounged from somewhere in the mess hall.
“You look like shit, sister-friend,” Finnus Dunleith announced. He was leaning against the doorway, arms crossed. Although he still wore the stained black servant outfit, he appeared to have found the time to wash his face and tie his silvery hair back into an intricate braid similar to the bangles wrapping Valeria’s wrist. “The least you could’ve done is dab some rouge on or something.”
