Behemoth

was an old woman, no doubt the fearsome Nene that Alek had talked about.

Bovril seemed pleased to see her. It scampered down from Alek’s shoulder and across the balcony, then crawled up to the footboard of the bed. The beastie stood there with its fur ruffling in the breeze, as happy as an admiral at sea.

Alek bowed to the old woman, introducing Master Klopp and Corporal Bauer in a stream of polite Clanker.

Nene nodded, then turned her steely gaze on Deryn.

“And you must be the boy from the Leviathan,” she said, her English accent as posh as Zaven’s. “My granddaughter’s told me about you.”

Deryn clicked her heels. “Midshipman Dylan Sharp, at your service, ma’am.”

“From your accent, you were raised in Glasgow.”

“Aye, ma’am. You have a good ear.”

“Two of them, in fact,” Nene said. “And you have an odd voice. Your hands, please?”

Deryn hesitated, but when the old woman snapped her fingers, she found herself obeying.

“Lots of calluses,” Nene said, feeling carefully. “You’re a hardworking lad, unlike your friend the prince of Hohenberg. You draw a bit, and you do a lot of sewing, for a boy.”

Deryn cleared her throat, remembering her aunties teaching her to quilt. “In the Air Service we middies darn our own uniforms.”

“How industrious of you. My granddaughter tells me you don’t trust us.”

“Aye … well, it is a bit awkward, ma’am. I’m under orders to keep my mission here a secret.”

“Under orders?” Nene looked Deryn up and down. “You don’t appear to be in uniform.”

“I may be undercover, ma’am,” Deryn said, “but I’m still a soldier.”

“Undercover,” Bovril said, chuckling. “Mr. Sharp!”

Deryn glared at the beastie, wishing it would stop saying that.

“Well, boy, at least you’re honest about your doubts,” Nene said, dropping her hands and turning to Alek. “So, what do your men think of our walkers?”

Alek answered in Clanker, and soon Klopp and Bauer were peppering Nene and Zaven with questions.

Deryn couldn’t follow half of it, but it hardly mattered what language you said it in—this revolution was well and truly stuffed without cannon. Zaven was barking mad to think otherwise.

Even Alek couldn’t see the truth. He was always on about how it was his destiny to help the revolution, to get revenge on the Germans and end the war. That was a load of yackum, Deryn reckoned. Providence wouldn’t stop the sultan’s walkers from chewing up the Committee’s antiques, as easy as a box of chocolates.

She pulled out her sketch pad and stared down at the parade again. The elephants were lining up beside a long pier, their guns elevating, readying to salute a warship.…

“The Goeben,” Deryn murmured. The ironclad’s new Ottoman flags fluttered bright crimson, her Tesla cannon glittering like a steel spiderweb in the sun.

Lilit had been right—the sultan was flaunting his power today. Even if the Committee could beat those elephants somehow, they’d still have to face the big guns of the Goeben and the Breslau.

Or perhaps not. Less than a month from now the Leviathan would be headed up the Dardanelles, guiding a beastie hungry for German ironclads. Admiral Souchon might have fought kraken before, but nothing like the behemoth. The creature was supposedly powerful enough to sink the sultan’s two new warships in half an hour.

Now, that would be a barking good night for a revolution to start.

The problem was, Deryn couldn’t tell the Committee what was coming. If just one of them was a Clanker spy, letting the plan slip could spell doom for the Leviathan. She was duty bound to keep quiet.

A torrent of smoke poured from the war elephants’ cannon, rippling into a vast dark cloud on the sea breeze. The sound arrived long seconds later, as tardy as distant thunder. Then the Goeben’s guns returned the salute, ten times louder and more fiery.

Deryn sighed as she began to sketch the scene—there were too many barking pieces to this puzzle. The behemoth might sink the German ironclads, but it couldn’t slither onto land and fight the sultan’s elephants as well.

Behind her the discussion had grown heated. Zaven was proclaiming in Clanker while Klopp shook his head, arms crossed.

“Nein, nein, nein,” the old man kept repeating.

If only there were a simple way to handle a hundred and fifty tons of steel …

Then, all in a flash, it came to her.

“Hold on, Mr. Zaven,” she broke in. “It doesn’t matter that your walkers haven’t got cannon. We can fix that!”

Alek shook his head tiredly. “There’s nothing we can do. He says the army has strict control over cannon and ammunition.”

“Aye, but you don’t need anything so fancy,” Deryn said. “When the Dauntless was hijacked, the attackers had nothing but a few bits of rope.”

“Hijacked?” Nene asked. “I thought the Dauntless’s rampage was due to sloppy piloting.”

Deryn snorted. “Don’t believe everything you read in the papers, ma’am.” She pointed down at the armored elephants. “See how there’s a pilot for each leg? The hijackers lassoed our men and yanked them off, then climbed up to take their place. That’s how you stop those metal beasties. Knock out a couple of pilots, and you stop them completely!”

“Perhaps on the Dauntless, where the pilots ride out in the open,” Zaven said. “But the men down there are well shielded.”

Deryn had thought of this already. “Shielded from ropes and bullets, maybe. But they must have vision slits, like Alek’s Stormwalker did. What if something spicy got through them?”

“Something spicy?” Nene asked.

“Aye.” Deryn grinned, turning to Alek. “I never told you about how I rescued the Dauntless, did I?”

Alek shook his head.

Deryn took a moment to compose her thoughts, knowing she had their full attention now. “It was my idea, in fact. The barking diplomats had no proper weapons aboard, so I snatched up a big bag of spice powder and hurled it at one of the hijackers. The smell of it knocked that bum-rag right off his saddle! And armor will only make things worse—imagine being stuck inside a wee metal cabin with a snootful of spices!”

“Spices,” Bovril repeated quietly.

“That hijacker could hardly breathe,” Deryn said. “And my uniform was pure dead ruined!”

“The army doesn’t control hot peppers,” Nene murmured, and Alek began to translate for Klopp and Bauer.

Lilit turned to her father. “Do you think it could work?”

“Even a foot soldier can fight a walker that way,” Zaven said. “The Committee can flood the streets with spice-wielding revolutionaries!”

“Aye, but think bigger than that,” Deryn said. “Unlike the German walkers, yours have all got hands. I reckon that Minotaur beastie could throw a spice bomb half a mile!”

“Farther than that,” Lilit said, then smiled. “If Alek can manage not to crush it first, that is.”

Alek hmphed a bit. “Klopp says he can rig something up—some sort of magazine to hold the spice bombs. We’re standing above a mechanikal factory, after all.”

“Parts aren’t a problem,” Zaven said. “But the hottest spices are sold by the pinch. We’re talking about buying tons!”

“If I can provide the money, are you willing to try?” Alek asked.

Zaven and Lilit both looked at Nene. She raised an eyebrow, staring at Alek.