fabric of her blouse caressed his cheek. It stayed death with a tickle, beckoning him from his daze.
“Verity?” The airship listed badly and seemed to be in freefall. He anchored his arms around her bare waist, then reached up and hoisted himself up by her jodhpurs. “Hold on,” he told her, “I’m almost there.”
Tangeni and Reardon gripped her half chaps. High above, a formation of five enormous birds scythed between the balloons. Their bites at the canopies rocked the entire ship. They were piercing the ballonets. Embrey heaved himself up into Reardon’s grasp, and two more aeronauts arrived to haul him aboard.
“Look out!” a cry came from above-from Philomena perched in the bough nest, fending off the monstrous birds with her grappling pole.
Embrey followed her gaze low to the port bow, where a rogue flier had begun its unstoppable climb for Verity. Its wingspan had to be around forty feet-more like a dragon’s than a bird’s-but the flapping membrane was translucent and wafer thin.
Pterosaurs!
Several aeronauts emerged from B-deck toting rifles, but the Empress’s violent shudder spilled them into each other. A familiar hiss-crack sounded from somewhere aft. Immediately the pterosaur flinched as a fresh hole appeared in the middle of its right wing. Someone had had the right idea. My steam-pistol? He scanned the deck and spotted the second weapon right away. It was teetering on the brink several feet from him, beneath the bulwark. The bird opened its long beak and gave a gutteral caw. Christ. Why hadn’t Tangeni pulled Verity up yet? She had to be snagged on something.
Embrey dove for the pistol and fired a snapshot. Hiss-crack! The bullet clipped the pterosaur’s snout but didn’t stop it. He could almost drop something onto it at this range. Instead, he took aim and pipped the creature right between its eyes. More shots rang out aft. Some hit. The pterosaur folded its wings, gave a spastic flutter, and then writhed as it fell.
He helped Tangeni and Reardon free the buckle of Verity’s half chaps from a twisted rivet she’d ripped loose from the bulwark post. She was lightheaded when they hauled her aboard. Embrey and Tangeni steadied her while she regained her bearings. The blood had rushed to her head. Her face was almost purple.
“Will you be all right?” he shouted above the pterosaur shrieks and volleys of gunfire. “I need to join the fight.”
She nodded blankly. Tangeni reassured him. “I’ll take it from here. You try and pick them off as they clear the balloons. And get Reardon to take Billy below. This no place for a boy.”
Embrey dashed aft to the quarterdeck. Reardon was already escorting young Billy below-one less problem to solve, at least. All around the ship’s hindmost section, riflemen ducked in sequence to avoid passing pterosaurs and then leapt up in the same order to unleash a volley. He couldn’t speak for their marksmanship, but these African aeronauts were stalwarts. He climbed to the poop deck and took the place of a man who’d bled to death. The three fatal gouges in his chest suggested monstrous talons had gored him. Embrey fired his remaining bullets and then used the dead man’s rifle to pick off the last pterosaur. The other three fliers fled eastward above the geyser clouds, regrettably in perfect formation.
As he helped his injured brothers-in-arms down to sick bay-five were wounded, though not seriously-he met Verity’s gaze on the quarterdeck. Blouse torn and hanging loose, fiery hair licking the breeze, she looked a fright. Yet, unkempt, she was also insanely beautiful, more unreal and more desirable than ever.
The urge to gush his relief pressed hard against the cork in his heart. Surely they couldn’t be enemies after this. Their mutual gaze held. An insensible longing to take her in his arms threatened to overpower him. Then he remembered his name.
They exchanged brief nods instead.
Chapter 9
What was it with everyone vouching for Lord Embrey like he was some kind of Nelson or Wellington? Yes, he had a knack for being in the right place at the right time, and he was handy with a rifle, but in case they’d all forgotten, she had saved his life over the side of the ship that afternoon.
“Either you admit him or I say precisely nothing on the subject of time travel,” Reardon protested, arms folded as he sank back in his chair. Her new cabin barely had enough room to seat two guests, so Tangeni had emptied most of Captain Naismith’s belongings and replaced them with three more chairs from the officers’ mess.
“And you already know my opinion.” Tangeni fingered the lieutenant’s insignia on his tunic. “Without Lord Embrey, Professor Reardon would have been hanged and the flying dinosaur would have snatched you for certain.” He turned away. The two men sat in complicit silence, watching the oil lamp.
Marvellous. I’m being bullied by my own personal press-gang!
But at this moment, Reardon and Tangeni were the two most important men to her in London. For the sake of the mission, it behoved her to keep them happy. And after all, her boycott of Embrey was personal. If rescinding it would benefit the plight of the camp…so be it.
“Very well, let him in.” She glared at her first officer but he merely shrugged in reply. Reardon opened the door, called for Embrey. A cool gust brushed her face and made the lamp flame flicker while the handsome blond traitor strolled in.
“Where’s Billy?” Reardon asked his aristocratic comrade.
“Below, eating supper with Kibo and Djimon. The lad’s become quite popular since he pipped the pterosaur.”
“With your steam-pistol, was it not?” Verity seized the chance to segue into civil conversation with him. Ignoring their rancour altogether seemed the only way to proceed. And he looked improbably dashing in the wavering light.
He addressed her briefly, “Yes, ma’am. My pistol.” His glance ricocheted off her. “Reardon, this had better be deuced important. The lads in the fo’c’sle are setting up a game of gin rummy. They fancy they’ll own my estate before morning, while I beg to differ-”
“Oh, you needn’t play gin rummy to count your good fortune, old chap.” Reardon’s subtle rebuke made Verity smile.
“I see. And to what do I owe this privilege?”
“We’re to confer on…all the essentials of our survival,” the professor replied. “Most important, Verity here is eager to know how I plan to return us to our own time.”
Embrey looked up, striking electric sparks in her gaze. “The lady has a healthy curiosity.”
Yes, and the gentleman is eyeing my breasts. She attempted to repel him with a scowl. He continued to watch her, to study her. She cleared her throat, distracting him.
“ Eembu is thirsty?” Tangeni rose and stood between her and Embrey, perhaps to dispel the awkward moment.
She looked at up at her first officer. “Yes. There’s a kettle of hot water on the sideboard.”
“I know. I gave it to you.”
“Really? Fiddlededee.” She shook her head at how girlish that sounded.
“Tea?”
“No. I’ll have something with a little bite.”
“A posset? I see you have the ingredients already prepared.”
“I do?” She deflected Embrey’s latest questing glance, and gathered herself. “Yes, of course I do.”
“I know. I gave them to you.” Tangeni began whistling tunelessly to himself.
Why, the smug…
Embrey called over to the Namibian, “I’ll have a brandy, my good man-neat, and you can keep the spoilers.”
“I apologize, Lord Embrey. Spoilers?”
Verity sighed and crossed her legs. “He means he just wants the brandy, Tangeni.”
