Quillblade (15 page)

Andrea's voice cut him off. ‘I think we just lost the luxury of debate.'

Lenis hadn't noticed the lookout slip out while everyone was arguing, but there was fresh snow on her hood. ‘The Shôgo's forces have surrounded the base of the airdock. Either someone told them we're here or they didn't wait for the snow to stop before searching the airdock.'

Arthur pushed himself away from the wall. ‘And the airdock authorities?'

‘No sign of them. It could just be the weather keeping them indoors, but I'd say the Yûgata are leaving us to fend for ourselves. The Warlord's forces aren't doing anything yet, but there's no way to tell when they'll move.'

The captain rose to his feet. ‘It appears we are to become sailors for a while! Despite our misgivings, we must do the best we can. Lord Knyght, I want you to take Miss Florona and ready the balloons for deployment. Namei, secure ropes leading between the balloon bays and the bridge and from
the bridge to the rear hatch. Miss Shin and Mister Jackson, to your posts. We'll need a course to Heiligland.'

Shin moved to obey but asked, ‘Heiligland?'

Kenji followed her out of the galley. ‘It's still the closest landmass to the north. It's a long way to Ost and we don't want to be in the water any longer than we have to.'

Their voices faded as they moved out of earshot.

The captain went on, ‘Mister Hiroshi, please prepare some rations for the bridge so we do not need to return to the galley during our trip.'

‘Yes, sir,' Hiroshi boomed. ‘For how many?'

‘Three. I will join Mister Jackson and Miss Shin.'

‘Four,' Andrea countered. ‘We're going to need to keep a lookout for Demons. I'll remain in the crow's nest for the journey.'

The captain turned to her. ‘The crossing will be worse in the crow's nest.'

The lookout shrugged. ‘We're going to be lit up like a beacon for any Demons in the area. I'd rather be uncomfortable and see them coming than sit back at ease while they sink the ship out from under me.'

‘Very well.' The captain turned to Lenis. ‘Master Clemens, ready the Bestia as well as you can. We leave within the hour. Anyone without an assigned task may help the others with the balloons.'

‘Yes, sir,' the crew replied in unison and stepped to their orders.

Lenis remained seated, too stunned to move. After all his anxiety, it appeared the captain had harboured no intention of selling him off in Shinzô after all. Of course, he could always do it later, in some other country, when the Warlord's forces weren't waiting to attack them, but even if he did it was doubtful Lenis would ever find his way back into Lord Shôgo's hands now.

Lenis returned to the engine room in a daze. What if the captain had no intention of selling him at all? What if he didn't mind what Lenis could do? Didn't fear it? What if he
wanted
a slave around who could think for himself? For the first time since Lenis had left Itsû, he actually felt his spirits rising.

Namei was waiting for him by the Bestia hutch. ‘Lenis,' she said before he had a chance to speak, ‘I'm sorry about before. I didn't mean anything by it, it's just –'

His thoughts were elsewhere. ‘I'm a slave and you're a warrior.'

‘No, it's not that. Look –'

Arthur's voice came echoing down the hallway. ‘Namei!'

Namei snapped her mouth shut, opened it again as if she was going to say more but then thought better of it. She sighed and then pushed past him.

Lenis watched her go, unsure of what he could say, or if he even wanted to say anything. ‘Be careful.'

She paused for a moment before climbing up to the deck.

For the next half an hour the
Hiryû
was full of activity as the crew set about completing their preparations. Lenis watched them come and go from inside the engine room where he worked quietly with the Bestia. The others carried armloads of rope and provisions out onto the deck and brought snow and wind back in with them. The usually warm engine room caught the brunt of the frigid air that swept in through the open hatch.

Lenis knew that a quick getaway was out of the question. In this weather the engine would take too long to warm up before they could flee the airdock, and then there was the time it took to unfurl the balloons and fill them with air. The Shôgo's forces would discover what they were doing long before they were ready and be upon them before they could launch.

Lenis made small adjustments to the engine as he tried to figure out a way of warming up the engine block, filling the balloons and launching the
Hiryû
before the Shôgo's forces boarded them. For the first time in a long time he felt he had a real stake in what was going on. He wasn't just doing what the captain said to help the others escape; Lenis was doing this for himself. Hope stirred deep down inside him, and he wasn't about to let a bunch of Shôgo warriors take it away from him. If there were a way for them to get out of this and away from Shinzô, he would find it.

Andrea's voice suddenly came through the speech tube and Lenis jumped. ‘Captain, we're out of time. They must
have been watching us because they're on their way up the airdock now.'

‘It is time,' the captain replied. ‘Master Clemens, start the engines.'

Lenis stared at the engine block and sweat broke out all over his body. His brain was ticking over, formulating a plan. It was a risky one,
beyond
risky. He was sure no one had ever been stupid enough to try it before. It would almost certainly cause him serious injury, being this close to the engine. The Bestia, too, might get hurt. The whole engine might blow up! If Lenis hadn't just felt the faint stirrings of hope he would never have even attempted it, but he had, and it was worth it.

Sensing his resolution, Aeris jumped into Lenis's arms and they started to move. Lenis opened the engine block and placed Aeris on the ground beside it before hurrying back to the hutch, banging his knee against the engine as he did so. Ignoring the pain that shot through his leg, numbing it from the knee down, he scooped up Atrum, Ignis, Lucis and Aqua, all at once. Sensing his turmoil, the Bestia writhed around in his arms and Ignis started to climb the side of his head.

Gritting his teeth against the Bestia's claws, Lenis pushed Atrum into the compartment below the engine block. Then he hunched Aqua and Lucis into the crook of one arm and reached overhead with the other to open up the pipe that ran from the engine room up through the
Hiryû
's holds. With some difficulty he juggled Lucis into the cavity. When she was secured in the pipe Lenis wrested Ignis from the top
of his head, wincing from the scratches the Bestia inflicted on him, and held him next to his face. This was the dangerous bit. The Bestia felt his fear, but they trusted him. Lenis inwardly cringed. He was willing to risk his own safety, but what right did he have to endanger his Bestia?

‘They're almost here,' Andrea's voice came to him.

‘Master Clemens,' the captain's voice followed, ‘we need the balloons full and the engines running.'

‘Atrum, cloak us!' Lenis shouted and the compartment below the engine block was suddenly empty as the Bestia vanished. That bought him a moment to think, but only a moment. Was there anything else he could do other than what he had planned? He couldn't think of a thing. There were too many factors. The snow. The height of their mooring. The distance from the airdock to the ocean. The approaching warriors. If only he had time, he was sure he could come up with an alternative. Of course, if he had time he could just do things the proper way, waiting for the engines to heat up in their own time.

Time. He was all out of it and only had one plan. He was going to do what any engineer with a week's experience could have told him was a dangerous and idiotic thing to do. He was going to switch the Bestia powering the
Hiryû
without shutting down the engines first.

Lenis pushed aside his doubts and placed Ignis in the engine block. ‘We have to warm up the engines, Ignis. As fast as you can!'

Ignis was only too happy to oblige. Heat radiated off him in waves as Lenis closed the engine block's hatch. Ignis's power continued to build, but Lenis waited until he was glowing hot before pulling the lever that woke the
Hiryû.
A blast of power exploded from the engine block. The hatch blew open with a screech of tortured metal, sending Aeris and Lenis, with Aqua still nestled in his arms, flying against the far wall. The engine didn't just come to life, it roared, groaned, spluttered and cracked as the power of the flame Bestia flowed into it. Wave after wave of heat filled the engine room, radiating off the now-glowing metal machinery and the pipes that fed off of it. Lenis felt his skin burning. The engines were too small for Ignis's intensity. They weren't going to hold. Any moment now they were going to burst apart, tearing the
Hiryû
to pieces.

A scream shattered through the speech tube as the airship wrenched away from the airdock and began plummeting.

‘The balloons!' Lenis tried to stand but the force of their descent thwarted him. Now was not the time to hesitate. He was about to pump air into an engine full of fire. If the airship
only
exploded he'd be lucky, but it could work. It
would
work. He just had to trust that his Bestia could work alongside one another, Ignis drawing in his power while Aeris released hers. ‘Aeris ... please ...'

The tiny Bestia heaved herself upright with her powerful hind legs. Lenis could feel her determination. With one burst of effort she leapt right into the inferno of the engine block.
Lenis was blinded by Ignis's raw power. He shaded his eyes but couldn't see anything inside the engine block.

‘Come on, Ignis! Pull back!'

A tearing jolt brought the airship to a stop and they were moving, not down but forwards. The speed of their departure brought tears to Lenis's eyes, and he hugged Aqua to his chest as the brilliance inside the engine block dimmed. His Bestia had done it! The engines had shifted from heat to momentum as Ignis dampened his fire and Aeris pushed pressurised air through the warmed pipes, both of them synchronising their power perfectly.

Then the
Hiryû
jerked to one side and began falling again. They'd lost one of their balloons, either because they'd hit something or because the Warlord's forces had got in a lucky shot. Either way, they were sinking.

Lenis closed his eyes, ignoring the searing pain spreading across his skin. After everything he and his Bestia had risked, everything they had
achieved,
they were still going to fail.

It took longer to fall out of the sky than Lenis would have thought. From all around him came horrible sounds. The
Hiryû
's mast-shaft groaned as it was jerked off kilter by its one functioning balloon. Lenis didn't know if it was strong enough to survive intact, or if it would rip itself out of the side of the airship. Someone, Arthur or the captain, was shouting. Someone else was screaming. There were no words. There was only noise. The deafening roar of the machinery could not quite drown out the terrified cries coming from his
companions, nor the disembodied voice shouting incomprehensible commands through the speech tube.

Aqua felt almost weightless in Lenis's arms. He tried to remember what he was supposed to do with her. Then they hit something and Lenis went flying forwards until his face smashed into the engine block. It was almost a relief to feel the cold of the metal against his skin, until he realised with horror that it wasn't cold he was feeling but a heat so intense it tore into his flesh. He wrenched himself away and found himself upright and staggering. Images swam before him and the distressed clamour continued as the
Hiryû
tried to limp along the ground. Aeris! Aeris was
inside
the engine block with Ignis!

‘Ignis! Stop! Enough!'

Lenis wasn't sure if the words came out right, but the brightness coming from the engine block faded. The
Hiryû
was still dragging itself forward, but that couldn't be right. The friction should have stopped them by now, unless they weren't moving along the ground but through water. They had somehow made it to the ocean! Their fall from the airdock and subsequent shaky flight had taken them out over the city and all the way to the water. They'd done it!

Lenis started to laugh, a dreadful, painful laugh. His right cheek still burned and he had to force himself not to touch it. Whatever else happened, they had done it. They had escaped Shinzô.

Aqua was squirming around in his arms so he let her go. This was no time to lose focus.

The hatch to the engine block was hanging by a single hinge. He nudged it aside with his knee, earning himself a fresh burn, and reached into the furnace to pull Aeris's scorched body out. Ignis quietened immediately and stepped lightly out of the machine, unharmed. Lenis held a barely breathing Aeris close with one hand and touched the doorway to the compartment below the engine block without thinking. He snatched his hand back, but the damage had been done. His hand was burning. He gritted his teeth and yanked on the metal, freeing Atrum from the compartment. The Bestia crawled out, panting and looking haggard. Lenis looked down at Aqua, who was pressing herself against his injured leg.