Black Bottle

“Yes,” said Caliph. “Thankfully it’s safe.” Caliph noticed how Mr. Wade’s eyes settled on him from behind his thick lenses.

Miriam scowled. She seemed to wait a moment and gauge what game he was playing. After a moment she narrowed her eyes and said, “Yes. But now we need to stop her. I believe you feel the same way, don’t you King Howl?”

“Yes. Yes I do.”

He did feel that way. But what he wanted more than anything was for Alani’s face to reappear, refrain from smiling as it always did and offer the essential wisdom he needed to navigate this truce with the Shradnae witches.

The scars around their throats were circumstantial at best but he had his suspicions. Despite all that, like it or not, Miriam was right. Sena had to be stopped. And how was he supposed to do that without real holomorphic power on his side? He needed them.

Caliph bounced his hand in the air to underscore his agreement. “We’ll go after her. Together.”

He turned to the captain. “Any word from Seatk’r?”

“None, your majesty.” The captain’s son hovered in his father’s shadow, listening intently to everything going on. Specks’ little armband ticked and a drop of blood hit the floor.

Caliph turned his thoughts back to the patients and physicians that had vanished from the tent hospital.

Many of them had managed to escape the flawless, as Miriam called the monsters. The surviving Stonehavians had fled down the teagle system into Seatk’r—an event that had gone unnoticed in the chaotic aftermath of what could only be termed the erasure of the conference.

“I can’t believe they won’t let the Odalisque moor,” said Dr. Anselm.

The government of Seatk’r wanted nothing to do with the Stonehavian airships, a fact that complicated the situation with the doctors and patients that had used the teagle system and were now stranded on the ground.

“Here’s what we’re going to do,” said Caliph. “Tell the Odalisque to come in. It’s going pick up the remaining patients and ferry them back to Stonehold along with anyone who doesn’t need to go after Sena. I assume that will be most everyone.”

“They’re not going to let us moor,” said the captain.

“Oh, they will,” said Caliph. “Seatk’r’s run by little more than a robber baron. He won’t get in our way. Not today.”

He turned to the captain and his few soldiers and gave them instructions. Then he, along with two bodyguards and Miriam Yeats took the lift down to the ground.

The ride was tense. This was in strict violation of the local government’s orders. They were supposed to be leaving, not disembarking.

As the cage opened Caliph was immediately accosted by six ragged-looking policemen from the ghetto’s ethically questionable municipality.

“You not allowed to get off,” one of them barked. His Trade was rough.

Caliph smiled broadly and walked up to the man, clearly the group’s leader based on the blue armband. “I understand. Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“We have orders. We don’t harbor you here.”

His use of harbor was chilling.

Caliph imagined the news hitting Mirayhr first, then Pandragor. Information about what had happened would spread quickly to Wardale, Waythloo, Greymoor and Iycestoke. Airships were already coming. Caliph didn’t know from where. But he knew his vessels were the targets. It would happen soon.

He kept smiling.

“I know, I know.” He raised his palms. “But,” he tried to get a word in edgewise against the man’s complaints, “but just … can we please step over here? Yes, this way. Thank you. I just want a quick word. That’s all.”

“We don’t harbor you,” the man said again. He was dirty. Poor. Clearly he took his responsibilities seriously.

“I understand. But I have people that need medical attention. We just need to pick them up. Then we will go.”

“No. You don’t moor here. You must go now.”

“We want to go now. We just need to pick up our friends. They came down on the gondolas. They’re right across the street there.” He gestured to the motley crowd gathered in the grass-striped shade of a large tree whose bark was worn shiny and covered with paint, presumably from loitering gangs. Doctors and patients peered across the street at him, looking anxious. They had been corralled by other policemen. Some of the patients were still on wheeled beds. Desperation and fear glistened on their faces. That they had not been taken to a proper jail told volumes about the way Seatk’r functioned.

“No. You don’t get off you ship.”

“I’m already off my ship. Can I please go talk to them?”

“Absolutely not.”

“All right, look, I have money.”

“No, no, no, no, no…”

“I can pay you.”

“Get back on you ship. Now!” The nose of the policeman’s bing-gun rose slightly. Caliph was unarmed. “All right.” He lifted his hands slightly. “All right, look. Will you just look at them? They need help. They’re hurt.”

“I don’t care. Get on you ship.”

“Okay, I’m getting on my ship. You see it up there? Yes?”

“Yes. Go up.”

“You see it?”

“Yes.”

“You see the guns?”

The policeman stopped. His pale blue eyes registered the slender shapes shadowing the Bulotecus’s undercarriage. They were moving. Aiming at his men. A bewildered fear filled his face. How could he have missed them? That must have been what was running through his head. He opened his mouth and started to scream at his fellows.

Caliph reached out and gripped the muzzle of the weapon. He pushed it up just as it popped like a champagne cork, right between his fingers. Men were screaming. Caliph’s other arm swung over the back of the officer’s neck, pulling him in tight, face to chest.

“Call them off! Call them off!” said Caliph.

The man was yelling in Ilek, which Caliph recognized but couldn’t understand. Caliph’s chest, however, had the undesirable effect of muffling the man’s voice.

From the Bulotecus, Caliph heard the gun turrets adjusting. He looked up. The cannons were aimed.

“Call them off!” Caliph shouted.

The man screamed in Ilek again, repeating something over and over. Caliph watched the policemen pause. They saw the cannons. Their terror was obvious. They dropped their weapons on the ground.

“All right, you’re going to let go of this.” Caliph tugged on the bing-gun. The officer let go.

Caliph snapped the weapon away. The officer stood up, hair and lapels rumpled. He looked angry and frightened, eyes darting between Caliph and the Bulotecus.

“It’s all right. They’re not going to fire. We just want our friends. Tell them to come over.”

Overhead, the Odalisque was motoring into position.

Things started running smoothly. The airship docked, the lift came down and people from the ground started boarding. Those on beds went first. Meanwhile the crews got sorted.

Based on the likely fact that warships were now coming for him, Caliph wanted to send the patients toward Stonehold on the slightly faster Odalisque. The more heavily armed Bulotecus, though not the ideal chase ship, would at least give him a fighting chance if he was engaged while pursuing Sena.