Leviathan

Alek didn’t wait for Hirst’s command. He pushed the saunter forward hard. A sputter erupted for a moment in the tangle of gears and pistons. But then the engine roared back to life, the propeller spinning into a shimmer of sunlight.

“Check your bearings!” Hirst yelled over the noise.

Alek saw what the man meant—the airship was veering to starboard, his engine pushing harder than Klopp’s. The black teeth of the mountains loomed ahead.

He pulled the saunter back a bit, but a moment later the ship was swinging too far the other way. Klopp must have also seen the turn and pushed his own engine to compensate.

Alek growled with frustration. It was like two men trying to pilot a walker, each with control of one leg.

Mr. Hirst laughed and shouted, “Don’t worry, lad. The airbeast has the idea now.”

Alek squinted against the icy headwind. Stretched out beside him the creature’s flank had come alive. Waves traveled down its length, like a field of grass rippling in a strong wind.

“What’s happening?”

“They’re called cilia. Like tiny oars stirring the air. The beast will steady us, even if your Clanker engines can’t.”

Alek swallowed, unable to take his gaze from the undulating surface of the airbeast. Working on the engines, he’d tried to think of the airship as a vast machine. Now it had become a living creature again.

Somehow the tiny cilia were guiding them down the valley. It was like riding a horse, Alek supposed. You could tell it where to go, but it chose where its own footsteps fell.

Hoffman nudged his shoulder. “Say farewell to our happy home, young master.”

Alek looked to his left. The castle was shooting past beside them. Provisions for ten years, and he’d spent all of two nights there… .

But it was much too close—the castle walls were almost level with the engine. Below Alek the dangling drop lines were still dragging along the snow. And they were headed straight toward the frigate and its scouts.

“We’re not climbing!”

“Looks like we’re carrying an extra half ton or so,” Hirst shouted. “The boffins can’t have been this wrong! Are you certain these engines aren’t heavier than you told us?”

“Impossible! Master Klopp knows the exact weight of every piece of the Stormwalker.”

“Well, something’s holding us down!” Hirst yelled.

Alek saw flickers of light before them—more ballast spilling from the forward tanks. Then something solid spun past below.

“God’s wounds!” Hoffman swore. “That was a chair!”

“What’s going on?” Alek yelled at Hirst.

The master engineer watched another chair flutter toward the ground. “They’ve sounded a ballast alert. Everything we can spare, over the side.” He pointed ahead. “And there’s why!”

Alek squinted against the icy wind. A white haze was rising in the distance. Metal limbs flashed in the sunlight, churning up a cloud of snow.

The Herkules was hurtling up the valley toward them. At this altitude the Leviathan’s bridge would crash straight into its gun deck.

Alek’s instinct was to pull back on the saunter. But the signal patch was still red. Losing speed meant losing lift, which would only make things worse. And turning about would take them into the guns of the pursuing zeppelins.

Hoffman grasped his arm, leaning in close and muttering in fast German, “This may be the wildcount’s fault.”

“What do you mean?” Alek asked. He’d hardly seen Volger since their argument the day before. The count had sourly agreed to the plan, but hadn’t helped at all with the engines. He’d spent the day hiking to and fro from the wrecked Stormwalker, transferring the wireless set and spare parts to their new cabins in the Leviathan.

“We were moving things to your cabin, sir. Twice he had me wrap up a gold bar in your clothes. And heavy they were too.”

Alek closed his eyes. What had Volger been thinking? Every bar of gold weighed twenty kilograms. A dozen hidden bars would be like having three stowaways aboard!

“Take the controls!” he cried.

THIRTY-EIGHT

The struts leading to the airship were vibrating like piano strings, pulsing in time with the engine. The metal shivered in his hands, and Alek held tight against the icy winds, climbing quickly past the startled master engineer.

“Where are you going?” the man shouted.

Alek didn’t answer, his gaze fixed on the ground slipping past below. He couldn’t see how Dylan scrambled about on those ropes so casually. The leather safety harnesses the Darwinists wore hardly seemed thick enough to hold a man’s weight. Of course, they were probably made of fabricated leather, but that was only more unnerving.

The cilia rippled wildly on the creature’s flank, an ocean of shimmering grass, the ratlines fluttering in the wind. At least he wouldn’t have to dare the ropes. The struts led straight to an access hatch, which sat between the two ribs supporting the engine’s weight. Alek crawled through and headed down.

After the freezing wind outside, the warmth of the creature’s innards was welcoming, even with its odd and bitter smells. The ribs had a set of cross-ties between them, so Alek could imagine he was simply climbing down a ladder instead of crawling beneath the skin of a huge beast.

He’d been a fool not to realize that Volger would smuggle everything he could aboard the airship. The man never stopped scheming, never left the next step unplanned. Volger’s preparations for this war had taken fifteen years, after all. He wasn’t going to leave a quarter ton of gold behind without a fight.

Alek reached the bottom of the ladder, then dropped through another hatch into the main gondola. But then he paused, looking up and down the swaying corridors of the ship… .

Where was Volger’s cabin? Working all night on the engines, Alek hadn’t even slept in his. It didn’t help his sense of direction that crewmen were running everywhere, carrying furniture and spare uniforms to be tossed overboard.

Then he noticed that the gondola floor was tipping slightly to the left. Of course. The cabins they’d been given were all on the port side. And toward the bow—so the gold was dragging down the airship’s nose!

He ran forward until he spotted the familiar corridor. He threw open the door of Volger’s cabin. It was empty, except for a bed, a storage locker, and the Stormwalker’s wireless receiver on the desk.

Volger hadn’t left the gold in plain view, of course. Alek pulled out the desk drawers, but found nothing. The locker held only clothes and weapons from the castle stores.

Dropping to the floor, he spotted a map case under the bed. Alek reached underneath and tried to drag it out, but it wouldn’t budge—as heavy as a solid block of iron. He braced his feet on the bed and pulled at the case with both hands, but it still wouldn’t move.

Then Alek realized that the bed had to be far lighter than the gold, and flung it aside. But the latches of the map case were locked. He’d have to throw the whole thing out. Alek stood and pushed open the window, then tried to pick up the case.

It wouldn’t lift a centimeter off the ground. It was far too heavy.

“God’s wounds!” he swore, kicking at the lock.

“Looking for this?”

Alek looked up. Count Volger stood in the doorway, holding a key.

“Give me that, or we’re all dead!”

“Well, obviously. Why do you think I’m here?” Volger shut the door and crossed the room. “Beastly business,