Behemoth

Istanbul now, not with a giant Tesla cannon overlooking the city.

Lilit let out an exasperated sigh. “Well, since neither of you boys can be bothered to explain, allow me.”

She held up one hand, ticking off points on her fingers.

“One, the Leviathan is clearly on its way back to Istanbul, or you wouldn’t care about this Tesla cannon. Two, whatever it’s up to can help the revolution, as Alek just said. And three, this all has to do with your secret mission.” She hesitated a moment, staring at Dylan. “Your men were captured near the kraken nets, weren’t they?”

Alek opened his mouth again, wanting to interrupt before she figured out the truth. But Lilit silenced him with a wave of her hand.

“Everyone thinks your mission failed, but they don’t know that you weren’t captured.” Her eyes widened. “You plan to bring a kraken down the strait!”

Dylan looked miserable, but only nodded. “Not really a kraken, but close enough. And a fine plan it was too. But it’s all ruined now! We have to tell Malone about the cannon, or get a warning to the Admiralty some other way.”

“But this is perfect!” Lilit said.

“Perfect in what way, exactly?” Dylan cried. “That cannon is a death trap, and the Leviathan is headed right toward it! That’s my ship we’re talking about!”

“We’re talking about the liberation of my people as well,” Lilit said softly, her eyes locked on his. “The Committee will deal with this problem, I swear.”

“But my mission was meant to be top secret.” Dylan shook his head. “I can’t let it go forward if a daft bunch of anarchists know about it!”

“Then we won’t tell anyone else,” Lilit said. “Only we three have to know.”

Alek frowned. “The three of us can’t destroy a Tesla cannon.”

“No, we can’t. But …” Lilit held one hand up, her eyes squeezing shut for a moment. “My father plans to lead the assault on the Goeben himself, with four walkers. But if the Leviathan and its sea monster can deal with the ironclads, we have those walkers to spare. So on the night of the revolution, we explain everything to my father, then head to the cliffs and tear this Tesla cannon to the ground!”

“Someone might find out,” Dylan said.

“What if we only use pilots we trust?” Alek asked. “Lilit’s walker, mine, Klopp’s, and Zaven’s. No one else has to know what’s going on.”

Lilit shrugged. “No one else is volunteering to fight the Goeben, after all.”

Dylan stared at them both, a look of terror in his eyes.

“But what if we fail?” he said softly. “They’ll all burn.”

Lilit reached across the table and took his hands in her own.

“We won’t fail,” she said. “Our revolution depends on your ship.”

Dylan stared at her hands for a moment, then looked helplessly at Alek.

“It’s the only way they can win,” Alek said simply. “And the only way to complete your mission. Your men sacrificed themselves for this, right?”

“Oh, you had to say that,” Dylan said with a groan, pulling his hands from Lilit’s grasp. “Aye, all right, then. But you barking anarchists had better not make a mess of this!”

“We won’t,” Lilit said, beaming at the boy. “You’ve saved the revolution again!”

Dylan rolled his eyes. “No need to get all moony, lassie.”

Alek smiled. They really were the most amusing couple.

THIRTY-SEVEN

Deryn spread her arms out straight, and waited.

“R …”

She dipped her left arm forty-five degrees.

“S …”

She let her right arm drop, the screwdriver in her hand pointing straight down.

“G!” said Bovril, and ate another strawberry. Then it tossed the stem over the edge of the balcony, leaning its head through the rails to watch it fall.

“How do you like that?” Deryn cried. “It’s learnt the whole barking alphabet!”

Lilit and Alek stared at the beastie, then at her.

“You taught it this?” Lilit asked.

“No! I was just practicing my signals. I was saying the letters out loud, I suppose, and after a couple times through …” Deryn pointed at Bovril. “The beastie joined in, as quick as a bosun’s mate.”

“And that’s why you want to bring it along tonight?” Alek asked. “In case we need to send semaphore signals?”

Deryn rolled her eyes. “No, you daft bum-rag. It’s because …”

She sighed, unsure exactly how to say it. The loris had a knack for noticing important details, just as Dr. Barlow had claimed. And tonight was the most important mission that Deryn had ever been a part of. She didn’t dare leave the beastie behind.

“Perspicacious,” the creature said.

“Aye, that’s the word,” Deryn cried. “Because it’s barking perspicacious.”

Two weeks before, Zaven had put his posh education to use and explained the loris’s species name to Deryn. It turned out that “perspicacious” meant the same as “shrewd,” or even “farsighted.” And though that didn’t sound like the sort of thing a beastie could be, it certainly fit.

Alek sighed, and turned toward the family’s apartments, where Nene’s tortoise bed was emerging, covered with maps fluttering in the breeze. The old woman called to Lilit and Alek.

As they walked away, Alek said over his shoulder, “All right, Dylan. But I have a walker to pilot. So you’ll be looking after it.”

“More than happy to,” Deryn said softly, scratching the loris’s wee head.

Only having the beastie about had made it bearable, working with Clankers and their lifeless machines, smelling of exhaust and engine grease. The bustling splendor of Istanbul was still so alien, its foreign tongues too many to learn in a lifetime, much less a month. Deryn spent her days printing newspapers she couldn’t read, and wondering what the prayers gliding over the rooftops might mean. The intricate geometries of Zaven’s carpets and tiled ceilings dazzled her eyes, and even the wondrous food often proved to be—like the rest of the capital—too sumptuous.

But hardest of all was being so close to Alek, while still hiding from him. He’d shared his last secret with her, and Deryn realized now that she could have told him that same night, in that dark hotel room with no one about to hear.

But every time she’d tried, Deryn had imagined the look of horror on his face. Not that she was a girl in boy’s clothes, or that she’d lied to him for so long. All that yackum Alek would soon get past, she knew. And then he would love her, she knew.

But that was the problem, because there was one thing that would never change.… Deryn was a commoner. She was a thousand times more common than Alek’s mother, who’d been born a countess, or even Lilit, an anarchist who spoke six languages and always knew which fork to use. Deryn Sharp was as common as barking dirt, and the only reason that didn’t matter to His Serene Highness, Aleksandar of Hohenberg, was that she was also, in his mind, a boy.

The moment she could be anything more than a friend, she would be, and then