Chapter 3
The Duke of Malus was not an easy man to owe a servitude to, most of his lackeys were roundly fired within a few months either by desire or necessity. Brinkers however, had been with his Grace for the better part of two decades...ever since his Grace had been a young man cutting his teeth on deep games at Zero. So while the other servants were well used to his cold temper and black mood, they’d never seen his Grace show any signs of hot blood. Brinkers calmly got the good burgundy out of the cellar and prepared a tray for the penthouse library. Servants had scuttled out of the way when the Duke had returned from some errand and stalked through his thick mahogany tower doors, slamming them so hard the ancient hinges twisted off their iron screws.
Long pale fingers drummed slowly on his desk. The Duke was not an old man by Force Zero standards, but he was old enough for polite society to have given up expecting him to ever marry or sire legitimate children. He gripped the long stemmed crystal goblet Brinkers handed him. The ducal coat of arms was cut cannily into the glass and the light caught in the vertices making it almost look like the goblet was on fire. Malus tossed the contents back and crushed the glass. He opened a drawer in his desk and put something in it.
“Rough day at the office sir?” Brinkers was the only one who ever dared talk to the Duke in such a free manner, but even this was pushing it. Afterwards, while he was reflecting with the housekeeper, he confessed that perhaps it would have been better to keep his salutations to himself.
Sending him a baleful, scalding glance, the Duke threw a pen knife from the desk at his servant. It sunk into the ornately carved beam behind Brinkers, who at least had the common sense not to move or twitch a muscle. “I stand enlightened on the consequences of a few...actions.” He said, waving his long fingers delicately as if he were dismissing an invisible orchestra.”
He leaned back in his chair, “It is all quite unnecessary and tedious work. I can’t imagine why I still do it.” Since Brinkers knew that his work, as he called it, was the only thing he lived for, he did not design this with a reply, but instead went about working to make his employer as comfortable as possible.
“It’s quite damnable Brinkers” His grace said, his face almost pensive in its contemplation. “You know how much I detest braggarts, but I never fail.”
When Brinkers didn’t reply to this, he continued, “I had all of the usual precautions of course, plus the fold was in the hatch. It is an irrefutable fact that there is no reason the drop should have gone awry. This type of….incident has been done a dozen times before and the infants disposed of without any inconvenient altercations.”
“The Feds showed up then?” Brinkers offered cautiously.
“Completely hanged.” The Duke’s eyes flashed dangerously again and Brinkers almost gulped and dodged behind a settee.
“Can’t you just tell them higher gents at the Fed to drop it… ya know, fix today’s stuff?”
“Yes, but while they’re esteemable people when it comes to disposing our wishes, they’ve got a few young bucks who are exhausting in their pursuit of an ideal.” The Duke looked pensive again. “It’s almost gratifying in a way. I miss going against that sort of young energy.”
“Well, I’m sure you’ll sort it out sir.” Brinkers said briskly, picking up the tray and the bigger pieces of glass on the carpet.
“It’s not so much today’s repercussions with which I’m concerned.” His grace said, “but rather the manner in which they proceeded right through my...airnets as if they weren’t even there.” He levelled such a cold, angry glare at Brinkers that the poor man was quite frozen in his spot for a moment as he realized how little a thread his life hung on in that moment.
“No sir, oh no sir, I have never snitched on you. Sir. “ He managed to gasp out, the broken glassware trembling on the silver platter.
“Don’t be an imbecile.” His grace said, the flash of anger was gone and in its place was bored irritation. “Have my gold and black laid out tonight, I’m going to be out late.”
Brinkers walked backwards, bowing as he went “it shall be as you say sir.”
After he left, the Duke picked a shard of glass out of his fingertip and examined the small bead of blood welling on his skin. “Whoever you are, '' he said, warning the walls in case there were any domoworms deployed, “you may have won this round, but you are a mere annoyance. The house always wins.”
Chapter 4
It was some minutes before Pendle could trust herself to speech. They were in the kitchen on the Palaver, sitting at the weirdly ornate table that always looked out of place in the stainless steel and rubber of the airship. Surely the captain had lost his mind. He wanted her to go to a fancy cotillion in Force Zero? Impossible. She lifted her eyes to the ceiling, praying for patience.
Three days had passed since the l'infant incidente and the buoyancy thrust on the Palaver had been pushed to its limits. After they got back from the unmentioned incident, Pendle had pushed past the pink and rose beaded curtain she and Serene had made in the woman’s bridgehouse, and dashed into her berth. How she had gotten through tea time on Lord Brockmore’s ship the Septen with any measure of polite manners was beyond her. She scarcely remembered the ordeal, but the captain had later remarked how grateful he was that she’d impressed Lord Brockmore with her pretty manners, so she assumed she hadn’t done anything crazy like spit in his tea or throw a biscuit at him. Chris had interjected that of course anyone who looked like her, was bound to be accepted by fancy folk, and that it had nothing to do with her manners which in his opinion were sadly lacking. This sermon, he delivered to an empty cargo hold, because Pendle had already dashed off and the Captain had gone to talk to Serene about the weather.
They’d run into thunder cells over Kentucky, and the Captain and Serene were so distracted with the atmospheric pressure causing a such a non linear variation on the temperature equilibrium that it was only the short height and wide width of the Palaver’s shape that kept it afloat. Thus, it wasn’t until Pendle burned a batch of honey lentils that left the ship so filled with the smell of scorched legumes, that things felt sufficiently normal to broach the dreaded subject. Normally, under less auspicious conditions, the Captain ran the ship like a strict dictatorship. There was no questioning what jobs he took or where he decided to take his ship...and crew. The responsibilities were clear cut, and there was no crossover. Chris was the pilot, which Serene snidely insinuated was a glorified mechanic job on a ship like the Palaver since it practically flew itself. Lee was the cook, which lately he insisted felt more like working in a dog food factory, so low was his opinion of the ingredients the captain had been able to procure after their last job. Serene held the coveted spot of any airship on earth: chief meteorologist… or only meteorologist in the case of the Palaver. Pendle was technically hired as the emissions officer. Usually a grease boy or small orphan child who made sure the vents were clear and no one was going to blow up from a gas malfunction. The job used to be important in the old days when airships were prone to disappearing into a mushroom cloud of its own making, But no airship had gone the way of the Zeppelin in a hundred years, causing the Pendle’s job to be all but obsolete except in the strictest ships.
She didn’t mind however, there was plenty to do on board even a solid, dependable airship like the Palaver. Normally, pilots didn’t let anyone touch their instrument panels or yokes, meteorologists viewed their profession as something akin to pure magic or science...depending on the company with which they were talking, and cooks never let anyone in the kitchen. However, everyone on board the Palaver was prone to letting Pendle do all of that. She cheerily co-piloted with Chris, whenever the captain wasn’t around. And she had graduated from eggs to sauces in the kitchen. Serene was the only one who wouldn’t let Pendle touch or know one iota about the mysteries of the weather, but since she adored Pendle and doted on her as if she were as beloved as a little sister and as protected as a princess, it didn’t affect the peace on board the Palaver. Until now…
“You will go.” The captain said calmly, peeling an orange that he got as a treat in Miami, but which no one on the ship was in the mood to eat at the moment. “I already accepted an invitation on your behalf.”
“But you have no right to accept an invitation on my behalf!” Pendle stomped her foot.
The captain looked up at her “I was unaware your opinion in the matter was found weighty. I think it is well time you went out and joined your place in society.”
This got four pairs of eyes looking askance at him. “Unless of course you wanted to continue being an emissions monkey.”
“Oh, but I do...I do.” she said, “Please don’t make me leave the Palaver, I’ll be good and do a better job. I’ll even polish the silverware and empty the chamber system even when it’s not my week to do it. Just please don’t make me go.”
“You astonish me child, one would think I was dropping you off back into the Hatchway system instead of introducing you into polite society and letting you get pretty new clothes and new friends.”
“Bah,” she said scornfully, “What have I ever cared for clothes? And why would I want to be in polite society, I’m not...exactly… you know… polite.” She struggled for the words.
“You mean, you don’t think they’ll except ya just because yer a bastard child?” Chris asked? He was digging into a turkey leg and enjoying the conversation with relish.
“I don’t believe you were hired as a consultation service for anyone’s genealogy.” The captain said easily, but there was a warning edge in his voice that went blissfully unheeded by Chris.
“I mean, you picked her up from that hatchling school for kids who were born on the wrong side of the fancy carpet, so I just assumed…” His words got cut off when his chicken leg magically found itself relocated in the receptacle and the captain standing in front of him looked deceptively calm, but in the sort of way that made Chris think strongly of a circling shark.
“Sorry, sorry Pen, you know I don’t mean no harm.” He said, eyeing his confiscated turkey leg longingly.
“Oh shivers,” she said, “you’re just saying out loud what everyone else is thinking, and don’t I know it. I ain’t come from the type of folk that dress up in glitzy diamond shoes and waltz around with fancy lords and talk to ladies on Zero.”
“If you think you’re trying to scare me into relenting by talking with that rough slang, I’m obliged to warn you I’m well aware you’re doing it on purpose and far from being trepidatious, I’m heavily amused and comforted that you can pick up accents so quickly. It will be perfect for this job.”
“It’s a job, Captain?” Serene asked. She’d been the quietest, sitting cross legged in her usual soft green leggings and tunic. Her hair always looked like the antithesis of her name, flying out in every direction, looking like she’d been caught out in a storm, but the rest of her was calm and observant like all reputable ship meteorologists. Pendle saw her exchange looks with the captain.
“Oh, it’s a job?” she breathed with relief, “why didn't you say so? Of course I can do anything you need for a job. I thought, you were…” she drew a half sobbing, half laughing breath, but pulled herself together.
“Aren’t you supposed to know these things?” Lee asked “You know, do the magicky things with your mind and know ahead of time what's going to happen?"
"Chris!" Serene exclaimed.
"What?" Chris said, "I don't know why we always have to tiptoe around Pendle being a bit tetched in the head." He made a circling motion around his head. "you forget that I was playing babysitter when she made all kinds of weird stuff appear. She made a c-2 engine appear in an ol mail truck!" so much affronted was he by this, that Pendle couldn't help but laugh at him.
"Poor Christobel" she said, "I did misuse you sadly, and you even got arrested for me." Her eyes twinkled. "I don't think you very much enjoyed it, for you knocked out two of those beetle men. But that’s not magic...not real magic. Right?"
She looked up at the captain. The last magician had died decades earlier and it was generally felt the society was better off without them. They had a tendency to disagree strongly with the elected officials, which had led to them retiring out to the backcountry. Besides rumors that occasionally circulated about one or the other of them marrying their washer woman and having fourteen kids out in the tundra of old Siberia, no one had seen or heard of any magician in almost two lifetimes. Surely they must exist, some people reasoned logically, but so long had they been out of present society that there was now a slowly built web of sanctions preventing their existence and rewards set up for anyone who saw or heard anything about one. It wasn’t strictly illegal to be a magician, but the Feds and consequently everyone else felt a lot safer knowing they couldn’t just come back and mess everything up. Of course there were some that said it was just the Feds and a few members of the nobility who got sweaty palms and heart palpitations whenever there was a magician around blurting out things and knowing things no decent person should know. They said those things quietly though, or risked finding themselves missing some vital pieces and parts in a back alley somewhere.
“Well I wouldn’t start out the party with a narration of your mail truck story, but I wouldn’t keep you on board if i was worried.” The captain tried to spread the papers out that detailed their new job. He had a strict rule about not using any technology for jobs, because it was too easily tracked. Serene and he both knew how to form their letters with a graphite stick fairly quickly and legibly, and Serene was teaching Pendle, but Lee threw up his hands and left, telling someone to give him the highlights later.
Serene interrupted, “How will you get her the proper clothes, captain? Surely we can’t set down in Zero and be seen buying anyone or even anything there. You know how starchy the Duke’s parties are, they won’t let her near the front portico steps if they even so much as smell a whiff of the hatch on her.”
“We’re not going to Zero.” The captain, “We’re going to old Paris.”
“But sir, we haven’t taken the Palaver over the ocean in years.”
“Sir, old Paris is gone, there isn’t anyone there anymore except piles of old cobblestone and broken down ruins.”
The Captain unruffled, consulted his papers, “yes, so I’ve heard.” but there was a little smile tugging up one corner of his mouth.
