Behemoth

stuck here, so it hardly matters who goes first. And you are the lightest, after all.”

“So my foolhardiness has produced the correct strategy, Count?”

“Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.”

Alek didn’t answer, but the creature bristled on his shoulder, as if sensing his annoyance.

Klopp let out a chuckle as he knelt and tied the heavier rope around Alek’s waist. Soon it was secure, the other end gripped by Bauer, Hoffman, and Klopp in a tug-of-war line.

“Quickly now,” Volger said.

Alek nodded and turned away, walking down the slope of the airbeast’s head. The others let the rope out slowly, a gentle pull at his waist. It reminded Alek of when he was ten and his father would let him lean out from castle parapets, keeping a firm hand on his belt. Of course, back then he’d felt much safer.

The slender cable stretched out ahead, disappearing among the dark struts of the mooring tower. Alek grasped the cable in both hands.

“I hope you’re not afraid of heights, beastie.”

The newborn creature just looked at him and blinked.

“Right, then,” Alek said, and stepped off into the void. He dangled for a moment from his hands, then swung his legs up to wrap them around the cable. Though its claws sank deep into his shoulder, the beastie didn’t make a sound.

There was one good thing about hanging faceup like this—Alek couldn’t see the dark ground below, only his own hands clenching the rope and the stars above. He pulled himself away from the airship hand over hand, the cable cutting into the backs of his knees as he inched along.

Halfway across, Alek was breathing hard. His injured rib had begun to throb, and his hands were losing feeling. The night air turned the sweat on his forehead cold. As he inched away from the airship, the rope hanging from his waist grew longer and heavier.

He imagined the cable snapping, or his fingers slipping. He would fall for an awful moment, but the rope around his waist would swing him back toward the airship, smashing him into its nose—maybe hard enough for the whale itself to awaken and protest.…

The mooring tower grew closer, but the cable in his aching hands sloped gently upward now, and was harder than ever to climb. The creature began to moan softly, mimicking the wind in the struts of the tower.

Alek gritted his teeth and pulled himself the last few meters, ignoring his burning muscles. For once he was thankful for the years of Volger’s cruel fencing lessons.

Finally a metal strut came within reach, and Alek wrapped an arm around it. He hung there for a moment, panting, then hauled himself up onto the cold steel of the tower.

With shaking fingers he untied the thick rope from around his waist and knotted it to the strut. Now that it stretched all the way back to the airship’s head, the rope seemed to weigh a ton. How had he carried it so far?

Alek lay on his back and watched as the others prepared to cross, dividing up the satchels of tools and weapons. It was odd to see the Leviathan from this head-on perspective. It made Alek feel insignificant, like some minuscule creature about to be swallowed by a whale.

But the darkness beyond the airship was vaster still. It was dotted with the fires of the protesters at the airfield gate, and past those, the lights of the city.

“Constantinople,” he said softly.

“Mmm, Constantinople,” the creature said.

FIFTEEN

Climbing down the tower was simple. A set of metal stairs spiraled through its center, and the five of them descended quickly.

Or was it six of them now? Suddenly Alek could feel the weight of the fabricated beast riding on his shoulder. The single word it had spoken made the animal heavier somehow, as if its uncanniness were something solid.

Alek hadn’t told the others, of course. Volger was terrified enough of message lizards. Why provide him with another excuse to get rid of the newborn creature?

At least it seemed to know when to stay quiet. Since speaking that one word, it hadn’t uttered another sound.

As they neared the bottom of the stairs, Alek found himself level with the airship’s bridge. Light from worm- lamps shone through the windows, silhouetting two officers on duty inside. But the faint green glow didn’t reach the shadows within the tower.

The Leviathan’s guards stood at attention in the airship’s hatches. Ground men in red fezzes faced them, the two groups watching each other warily. The rest of the Ottomans were at the airfield gates, keeping an eye on the protesters.

No one was guarding the base of the mooring tower.

The moon was climbing, a fat crescent in the sky, and the tower cast a long shadow pointing west, away from the city and the crowds. Volger lead the others along that slender finger of darkness, heading for an empty stretch of fence at the airfield’s edge.

Alek wondered what would happen if they were spotted now. The Leviathan’s crew had no authority here on Ottoman soil. But he doubted that the Darwinists would let their only engineers slip away without a fight. For that matter, the Ottomans mightn’t take kindly to foreigners trespassing on their airfield.

All in all, it seemed better to remain unseen.

Suddenly the newborn creature stood up on its hind legs, its ears twisting back toward the ship. Alek came to a halt and listened. The distant shriek of a command whistle reached his ears.

“Volger, I think they’ve—”

A hydrogen sniffer’s howl pierced the night. The sound came from near the engine pod—someone had found the bound and gagged Mr. Hirst.

“Keep moving,” Volger whispered. “We’re half a kilometer from the fence. They’ll search the ship before they think to look out here.”

Alek broke into a run, shuddering to think what beasts the Darwinists would send after them. The six-legged sniffer dogs? The awful flechette bats? Or were there even worse creatures aboard the ship?

The alarm spread along the long, dark silhouette behind them, the gondola lights flickering from soft green to brilliant white. On Alek’s shoulder the creature softly imitated the sounds of the alert, the barks and cries of the hounds, the shouts and whistles of command.

“I’m not sure that’s helpful,” he muttered to it.

“Helpful,” the creature repeated softly.

A minute later a blinding searchlight lanced out from the ship’s spine. At first it pointed at the airfield gate, but slowly it began to turn, like a lighthouse on a dark ocean.

So much for the Darwinists letting them slip away.

“You four go ahead,” Klopp said, his face bright red. “I can’t keep running like this!”

Alek slowed his pace, taking the man’s heavy tool kit from him. “Nonsense, Klopp. Spreading out just makes it easier for them to spot us.”

“He’s right,” Volger said. “Stick close together.”

Alek glanced over his shoulder. The light was swinging toward them, rippling across the grass like a luminous wave.

“Get down!” he whispered, and the five of them dropped flat to the ground.

The blinding light flashed past, but didn’t stop on them—it had been aimed too high. The spotlight crew were searching the airfield from the outside in, checking the boundaries first. But Alek doubted Klopp could make it to the