The beastie waited a moment, then blinked and scuttled away.
Deryn gave him a long stare, then shook her head. “You’re both daft. I can see to my own clothes, right?”
“Of course.” Alek pulled at his own threadbare sleeve. “But I could use a bit of tailoring myself.”
“True. You’re looking a bit less than princely.” Deryn straightened with a sigh. “Well, I have duties to attend to. See you when we get to Tokyo, I suppose.”
“I suppose so.” He smiled at her.
Deryn turned and strode back into the engine pod, shouting at the engineers to give Mr. Tesla some peace. Alek stayed out on the boom, staring down at the water a little longer and wondering at what he felt inside.
Whatever her name was, he had missed his good friend these last few days, rather a lot.
“A bit of tailoring,” Bovril said thoughtfully. “End message.”
SEVENTEEN
Alek pulled on another jacket, then scowled at the mirror. His Hapsburg Armor Corp uniform was just as threadbare as the others, shiny at the elbows and missing two buttons. Had he really spent the last weeks walking about in such a disreputable state?
“This seems unwise,” Count Volger said.
Alek fingered the jacket’s frayed epaulettes. “I have an ambassador to impress, and I doubt the tailors in Tokyo are expensive.”
“I’m not talking about the cost, Alek. You’re practically penniless, in any case.” The wildcount glanced out the window—one of the spires of Tokyo was sliding by, alarmingly close to the gondola. “I’m talking about that girl.”
Alek picked up the silk piloting jacket he’d worn the night of the Ottoman Revolution. “Her name is Deryn.”
“Whatever she calls herself, you’ve managed to escape her influence at last. Why risk another entanglement?”
“Deryn isn’t an entanglement.” Alek pulled the jacket on and considered the effect. “She’s a friend, and a useful ally.”
“Useful? Only in that she’s taken that beast away.”
Alek didn’t answer. Deryn had dropped by his stateroom the night before to “borrow” Bovril. Alek found that he missed the creature’s weight on his shoulder and its murmurs in his ear. The perspicacious loris had offered comfort when everyone else had betrayed him.
“You can’t trust her,” Volger said.
“Nor can I trust you, Count. And Deryn, at least, can tell me what the
“Tesla does their thinking for them these days. Imagine, trying to requisition this whole ship to take him to America! It’s madness to believe that the Admiralty will allow it.”
Alek raised an eyebrow. “That was my idea, you know.”
“Ah, of course.” With a sigh Volger stood up from the desk and went to his traveling trunk. “This is a diplomatic affair, not a costume party.”
Alek pulled off his Ottoman piloting jacket. “Perhaps it is a bit too colorful for a British ambassador.”
“You’re taking a risk, believing in Tesla.”
“He wants peace, and has the power to make it happen.”
“Let’s hope so, Your Serene Highness. Because if you support him publicly and he turns out to be mad, the whole world will think you’re a fool. Do you think the people of Austria-Hungary will want a young fool for an emperor?”
Alek’s glare was wasted on Volger, who was rummaging in his trunk. He pulled out a deep blue tunic with a red collar.
“My Hapsburg House Cavalry uniform.”
Alek said, “Do you think I’m being a fool?”
“I think you’re trying to do something good. But doing good is rarely easy, and no weapon has ever stopped a war.” Count Volger handed over the cavalry tunic. “But who knows. Perhaps the great inventor has changed all that.”
“And you wanted to murder him.” Alek pulled the tunic on. The sleeves were too long, of course, but a decent tailor could fix that. “Or was that whole business just an idle threat to shake me out of my sulk?”
The wildcount smiled. “Two birds, one stone.”
The streets of Tokyo teemed with steam trams, pedestrians, and beasts of burden. The morning sun had crested the buildings, but the strings of paper lanterns hanging overhead still glowed. Each was filled with a little swarm of flickering insects, like a handful of stars.
Alek was always uncomfortable in crowds, and here in Tokyo he felt especially conspicuous. There were no other Europeans about except the pair of marine guards following him. Many of the Japanese men wore western clothing, but the women were dressed in long dresses dyed in indigo and scarlet patterns, with broad silk belts that gathered into bundles on their lower backs. Alek tried to picture Deryn in such a getup, but failed completely.
The two technologies mixed more elegantly than he’d expected. Streetcars huffed out clouds of steam, but the most crowded were yoked to oxenesques for extra power. A few rickshaws putted along behind diesel two- legged walkers; the rest were pulled by squat, scaly creatures that reminded Alek disturbingly of kappa. Telegraph lines crisscrossed the sky overhead, but messenger lizards scampered along them, and carrier eagles wheeled against the clouds.
“Are we lost yet?” Deryn asked.
“Lost,” declared Bovril from her shoulder, then went back to burbling snatches of Japanese.
Alek sighed, unfolding Dr. Barlow’s map for the fortieth time since they’d left the airfield. It was exasperating, not being able to read street signs. On top of which, addresses worked differently here in Japan. Instead of the numbers running along the avenues, they went clockwise around city blocks. Pure insanity.
According to a local scientist friend of Dr. Barlow’s, a whole street of tailors catering to Europeans was hidden somewhere in this madness.
“I think we’re close,” Alek said. “You don’t suppose those two could help?”
Deryn glanced at the marine guards shadowing them. “They’re only here to keep you from running away.”
“Hardly necessary. I’m quite happy to be on the
Deryn gave a snort. “Aye, thanks to your new boffin pal.”
“He’s a genius, and he wants to stop this war.”
“He’s a complete nutter, you mean. Dr. Barlow says his talk of Goliath is daft!”
“Nutter,” Bovril said with a chuckle.
“Of course she would say so,” Alek said. “Mr. Tesla is a Clanker scientist, and she’s a Darwinist—and a
Deryn started to reply, but her head swiveled as a food stall drifted slowly past. The whole thing was drawn, customers and all, by a squat two-legged walker. One of the cooks was chopping thin layers of dough into fine noodles; the others were slicing mushrooms, fish, and eels. The smell of buckwheat and prawns carried on the steam rising from the boilers, along with the tang of vinegar and pickles.
“Might want some of that later,” Deryn mumbled.
“Want,” Bovril said.
Alek smiled. He’d learned in Istanbul that food could always distract Deryn from an argument. But she
