grip, and took a few steps forward. She moved to get in front of him, and found herself pushed backwards.
“Not this time,” he said. “You can’t protect me every time.”
Margaret opened her mouth, and he shook his head. She had a rifle in hand already.
“If things go badly,” David whispered, “run. Actually, I'd start running now. The endothermic shells won't do more than make him angry.” He puffed up his chest, stared down the street, and Margaret could see that he’d almost forgotten she was there.
“All right then!” David shouted. “I'm right here!”
He took a step forwards.
Bins tumbled, hard nails scratched against stone walls, heavy boots crashed into the distance. Margaret fired towards the sound.
David grinned. “That scared him.” Then he almost dropped again. He turned to Margaret, almost pathetically. “Hurry. Take me back to the pub, before Cadell decides that maybe now is just the time to end this and turns around. Keep your blade ready.”
“For Cadell?”
“Ha, no, not a chance, he’d scratch strips from us, then eat them as we died.” He patted her arm. “Just in case there’s more Roilings about.”
There hadn’t been any more Roilings about, but plenty of constables and prostitutes, and enough of the latter had whistled at her salaciously on their way into the market square, by which time David was leaning on her heavily. Almost back at the pub, close enough that they could smell the beer, and whatever meat was being served up as meal of the day, David straightened.
“Feeling better,” he said. “Have to remember not to do that again. I really should have just done the head. Yes, the head would have been enough.”
Margaret still wasn’t sure exactly what it was that he had done in the first place. “Still would have left a body.”
“Yes, of course. You're right. I won't be so thoughtless next time.”
He smacked his lips. “Now, I’m hungry.” He looked at Margaret with eyes all too predatory for his face. “We’ll catch him tomorrow, Margaret. I promise. Go polish your weapons or whatever it is that you do.” She nearly punched that hungry face for being so dismissive, so damn patronising. She was a Penn! Of course, that was precisely what she had in mind.
“And what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to eat, and once I'm done I am going to eat some more,” he said. “You’re free to join me.”
Margaret declined.
CHAPTER 7
The Aerokin are mystery given flight. These great beasts of the sky, bound to their pilots by something deeper than blood or love. Lifespan, sex, intelligence — all is speculation. They are known to change names, size, shape, even pilots over the course of a life that must span decades, if not centuries.
We know nothing of their ancestry. Were they terrestrial in origin, or like the Cuttlemen, from a different world altogether? Certainly they never revolted, though they served only one people, working for others only through the agency of Drifters and their rulers the Mothers of the Sky. History has brought up only two pilots not of Drift blood. Toni Obrey and Max Magrit: the Thieves of the Air. You will find no public record of their existence, but they are still equal parts admired and cursed in Drift today.
THE CITY OF DRIFT 800 MILES NORTH OF THE ROIL — ALTITUDE 20,000 FEET
There were a dozen Aerokin in the Hall of Winds, but only one of them had her attention — the rest may as well have not existed.
“Finally!”
Kara Jade touched the curved head of the Roslyn Dawn, just a few feet from the Aerokin’s light sensors, where the flesh was soft and warm. The contact sent a soft prickle through her fingers, and soothed her. The Dawn was being washed; Kara could feel the Dawn 's purrs running through her body and up her pilot’s arms. The Aerokin slid a flagellum over her shoulder, a movement surprisingly gentle for such a huge creature. The Dawn could crush her pilot with a single flick, though she never would. Kara and the Aerokin had grown up together, which is why the last week had been interminable.
“I’ve missed you,” Kara said, and the Dawn patted her gently. “Am I being punished?” Kara asked and the Aerokin rumbled warmly, which, of course she would, she loved being cleaned, and not the frigid drenching of the northern storms, but a great warm spray. Soap, hot water and oils were being rubbed into her flesh. The Dawn 's wounds had all but healed. She looked better than she had in a long time. Even before they had flown down to Chapman and met the boy, the girl and the Old Man.
She purred again.
Traitor, Kara Jade thought.
Though it wasn't the Dawn being called a traitor on the streets. It wasn't the Dawn being whispered about in the food halls or on the streets. That was wholly reserved for her pilot. Kara ate in her room now, away from the gaze of accusatory eyes.
Kara's responsibilities towards the Dawn had been taken away from her, everything, even cleaning. She was a pilot without her Aerokin, and felt limbless, anchorless. Which, she knew, was how they wanted her to feel. She refused to play their game. The Mothers of the Sky, one and all, could just tumble from the sky as far as she was concerned.
“You’ll get soft if you keep this up,” she said, sounding as casual as she could despite the lump in her throat. “We're meant to be in the sky, you and me. Not here!”
The Dawn batted at her with her flagellum, nearly knocked her off her feet. I suppose I deserved that, she thought.
Kara was surprised that they had even let her walk into the Hall of Winds. But where else could she go? She had a small room in the pilots’ barracks, but it was little larger than the bed that it contained, and the single shelf for her book: a Shadow Council novel that David Milde had given her. She thought of him in Hardacre, and hoped he was safe. The last thing she had heard was that he was awake, when she’d left he’d been days in bed, hardly stirring, and she’d expected him to die.
“I did what they told me. Didn’t I?” she whispered in the Dawn 's ear, a hole no larger than her hand, usually closed over with a thin membrane. The Dawn was really all ears. The Aerokin could listen with her bones and limbs just as effectively, but there was something much more intimate in talking to her this way.
“You should have done more than just what we told you,” a voice said from behind her.
Startled, Kara Jade turned to see Mother Graine. The Mothers of the Sky had kept to themselves of late, hidden away, planning. She’d never expected to see one down here.
“We expect all our agents and pilots, to not merely follow our commands, but to anticipate them as well. Difficult at times, yes. But is piloting ever an easy occupation? The clouds are fickle, the sky an endless challenge. Storms come and must be engaged.”
Kara wondered how long the Mother had been standing there, and just how much she had heard. From the look on her face, a lot. At least Kara hadn’t given voice to her thoughts concerning the Mothers of the Sky, even as their imagined tumble grew more vivid. She couldn’t hide a smile. “I knew that they wouldn’t let me in here without a reason.”
Mother Graine’s expression shifted, Kara couldn’t quite tell what it meant. The Mothers of the Sky were unreadable at the best of times, beyond a certain sort of stern abstraction that could be rage or disappointment, or simply not caring at all. That she had managed to detect some sort of emotional response wasn’t a good thing.
