Engines and werewolves

Chapter 62

“Cheeky,” she says weakly, as I slide my hand up her leg. “Take me dancing first.”

I roll my eyes, and pull out the canteen. It’s heavier than I expected, nearly half-full, and it takes me a second to understand. “You haven’t been drinking, have you?”

“Wasn’t thirsty,” Marvel says. Her lips are cracked, and her tongue rasps over them. Her voice has gone dreamy. “’Sides. Logical. If you collapse, we both die. If I pass out, you’re already carrying me.” She closes her eyes. “Or just leave me. ’S all right. Doesn’t hurt. I’ll just sleep awhile, and come after you when I’m feeling better.”

“Marvel.” When she looks up, I force the canteen into her mouth. She gags for a moment, then swallows. When I take it away, she coughs, and looks up at me resentfully.

“What are you so eager to get back for, anyway?” The water seems to have revived her a little. “You want to get back to working for the Butcher? Fighting crabs?”

“Better than dying here.” I strap the canteen to my belt, significantly lighter now.

“Is it?” She looks at me, and I can see tears in her brown eyes. “Nobody leaves the ship. Is that really a life worth fighting for?”

“You fought for your life, even after you found out … what you are.” I grit my teeth. “Are you giving up now?”

“Maybe my father was right.”

I want to slap her. I want to take her in my arms until she stops crying. For a fleeting, weird moment I want to kiss her. Marvel’s not the only one feeling a little loopy, clearly. But I push all that away and grab her by the shoulders, hoisting her up once again on my back.

“Victoria…,” she says.

“Listen.” I take a deep breath. “I am not going to die on this ship, do you understand? My sister is waiting for me. She needs me. That means I’m getting out of here, no matter what.”

“It must be nice to have someone waiting for you,” Marvel says, talking into my shoulder.

“And I’m not leaving you behind,” I go on. “Not after I’ve hauled you this far. You can come with me to Racktown and do … whatever you want to do. I don’t care. But you’re not going to stay here, and you’re not going to die.”

There’s a long pause.

“Always wanted to see the Empire,” Marvel says in a small voice.

“You will. We’ll…” I pause, at a loss for what Marvel might actually like about my filthy, smoky Racktown. “We’ll climb up the hill and visit the Emperor.” And maybe pay a visit to chong wu while we’re at it.

“Sounds nice.”

“And get the best noodles in the city. I know a place. And plum juice.”

“Mmm.”

I start walking. Marvel is hot against my back, like I’m carrying an oven. She’s fallen asleep again, her wheezing breath whistling in my ear.

My arms have gone past pain and into tingling numbness. I don’t dare stop, not now. I’d never start moving again. I follow the gray thread up stairs and around corners, across bridges and through intersections. If a crab finds us now, we’re finished, because I don’t have the strength left to fight a butterfly. Fortunately, all we see are more strange mushrooms and the tiny gray lights that live inside the pillars.

When change comes, I’m almost too far gone to notice it. There are lights ahead, not the distant, colorful stars but ordinary torchlight, its flickering glow supremely alien here in the darkness. Specks of it swim in front of my vision, like fireflies. I run my sticky, dry tongue over my lips.

I’m supposed to do something. What is it?

Oh yes.

“Here!” The reedy screech is the best shout I can manage. “Over here! We need help.”

The torchlight pauses, then shifts. Someone has heard me.

So that’s all right, then. I lay Marvel down, as gently as I can, and fall over. I’m unconscious before I hit the ground.

This business of waking up in strange rooms with no memory of how I got there is getting really old.

The unfamiliar ceiling this time is metal, the rust-flaked fabric of Soliton. I’m lying on a proper sleeping mat, with a heavy, tasseled blanket pulled up to my neck. The room is small, lit by oil lamps, with the usual eclectic decor. It’s certainly a step up from the half-flooded cell Pack Nine called home, or even Sister Collins .

There’s a table and two chairs on the other side of the room. Olite is sitting there, a book open in front of him. He looks at me as I move my head, and smiles.

I sit up abruptly. The blanket falls to my waist, and I realize belatedly that I’m n***d underneath. One of Olite’s eyebrow quirks, very slightly, but I refuse to frantically cover myself for his benefit. If he wants to stare at my chest so badly, let him. Blessed knows there’s little enough to stare at.

“Victoria,” he says. “How do you feel?”

“Better than last time,” I mutter. My limbs ache, but with the deep pangs of exhaustion, not the stabbing pain of injury. “Where am I?”

“Back in the Upper Stations, in the guest quarters of my clade. It was some of my people who found you.”

“Where’s Marvel? Is she all right?”

“At Sister collin’s.” Olite c****d his head. “I’m told that she had quite a severe fever, but Sister collin expects her to recover with treatment. She hasn’t woken up yet.”