Behemoth

Lilit didn’t let him finish, but threw her arms around him, kissing him hard on the lips. After a long moment she pulled away and smiled. “I’m sorry. I was just curious.”

“Curious? Barking spiders!” Dylan cried, a hand at his mouth. “You hardly know me!”

Lilit laughed and lifted the body kite into the air. As its wings filled with the cool sea breeze, she stepped to the edge of the cliffs, her hands on the pilot strut.

“I know you better than you think, Mr. Sharp.” She smiled, turning to Alek. “You don’t know what a friend you have in Dylan.”

With that, she stepped off into the darkness … and fell from their sight.

Alek rushed to the edge of the cliff, looking down in horror. The body kite tumbled for a moment, but then steadied itself and angled out to sea. The wind lifted it up higher, almost level with the cliff tops, and for a moment they could hear Lilit’s laughter once more.

The kite turned hard, banking toward the city lights. A moment later it had slipped away into the darkness.

“Mr. Sharp,” Bovril said, and chuckled.

Alek shook his head, wondering at Lilit. Her father was dead and her city in flames—and there she was, soaring through the air, somehow laughing.

“That girl is quite mad.”

“Aye.” Dylan touched his mouth again. “But she’s not a bad kisser.”

Alek looked at the boy, then shook his head again.

“Come on. Let’s go see about Master Klopp.”

FORTY-ONE

The iron golem lay in a heap of train cars and scattered cargo, its legs twisted and torn. Only its upper half remained intact, the huge head leaning back against the wreckage of two freight cars, a sleeping giant with a crumpled metal pillow.

Deryn and Alek made their way closer, through electrical parts and shattered glass. The railroad tracks had been torn from the ground, and lay among the other debris like tangled ribbons of steel.

“Blisters,” Deryn said as they passed an overturned dining car, its red velvet curtains spilling through broken windows. “Lucky there were no passengers aboard.”

“We can get up to the golem’s head that way,” Alek said, pointing at the huge hand lying splayed in the dirt. They climbed onto it and up the walker’s arm, and soon saw two motionless forms strapped into the pilots’ chairs.

“Master Klopp!” Alek cried out. “Hans!”

One of the men stirred.

Deryn saw that it was Bauer, his eyes glazed, his hands reaching feebly for the seat straps. She followed Alek up and helped him get the man out.

“Was uns getroffen?” he asked.

“Der Orient-Express,” Alek explained.

Bauer gave him a befuddled look, then saw the wreckage around them, belief dawning slowly in his face.

The three of them unstrapped Klopp and laid him on the golem’s broad shoulder. The master of mechaniks still wasn’t moving. Blood caked his face, and when Deryn put her hand to Klopp’s neck, his pulse was weak.

“We have to get him to a doctor.”

“Yes, but how?” Alek asked.

Deryn’s eyes swept the battlefield. Not a single walker remained standing. But in the sky the Leviathan’s silhouette had swung into profile. It was just as she’d expected—now that it had dispatched the Goeben, the airship was coming about for a closer look at the wrecked Tesla cannon.

She opened her mouth to explain, but suddenly the beastie on her shoulder was imitating a soft thumping sound.

Alek heard it too. “Walkers.”

Deryn turned toward the city. A dozen columns of smoke rose from the horizon.

“Could they be from the Committee?”

Alek shook his head. “They don’t even know we’re here.”

“Aye, it was meant to be that way. But that anarchist lassie told her uncle, didn’t she?”

Bauer rose unsteadily to his feet, lifting a pair of field glasses. One lens was shattered, so he held the other to his eye like a telescope.

“Elefanten,” he said a moment later.

Alek swore. “At least those things are slow.”

“But we’ll never carry Klopp out of here,” Deryn said. “Not without help.”

“And where do you suppose we’ll get that?”

She pointed up at the dark shape over the water, still turning, its searchlights angling toward the cliffs now. “The Leviathan is on its way to take a closer look. We can signal them, and get Klopp to the ship’s surgeon.”

“A, B, C …,” Bovril said happily.

“They’ll take us prisoner again!” Alek said.

“Aye, and what do you think the barking Ottomans will do, after all this?” Deryn swept her arm across the wreckage. “At least with us you’ll be alive!”

“Ich kann bleiben mit Meister Klopp, Herr,” Bauer said.

Deryn’s eyes narrowed. After a month working with Clankers, her German was much better. “What does he mean, he’ll stay with Klopp?”

Alek turned to Deryn. “Your ship can pick Bauer and Klopp up, while you and I make a run for it.”

Deryn’s jaw dropped. “Have you gone barking mad?”

“The Ottomans will never spot us in all this mess.” Alek clenched his fists. “And just think, if the Committee wins tonight, they’ll throw the Germans out. And they owe both of us a debt, Dylan. We can stay here, among allies.”

“Not me, you daft prince! I have to go home!”

“But I can’t do this alone … not without you.” His eyes softened. “Please come with me.”

Deryn turned from him, for a moment wishing that Alek were asking this same question but in a different way. Not as some Dummkopf of a prince who expected everyone to serve his purposes, but as a man.

It wasn’t his fault, of course. She’d never told Alek why she’d really come to Istanbul—not for the mission but for him. She hadn’t told him anything, and it was too late now. They’d been together a whole month, working and fighting side by side, and still she hadn’t convinced herself that a common girl could matter to him.

So what was the point of staying?

“There’s more to do here, Dylan,” he said. “You’re the best soldier the revolution has.”

“Aye, but that’s my home up there. I can’t live with … your machines.”

Alek spread his hands. “It doesn’t matter. Your crew will never see us.”

“They have to.” Deryn stared out across the battlefield, looking for something to signal with. But Alek was