The Aeronaut's Windlass (39 page)

Ferus nodded sagely. “No, not a bit like your mother. Can’t have that.” He took the third mug in a comfortable grasp and smiled. “In fact, you are quite right, Miss Lancaster. There is a method to my madness. Well. To
this
particular madness, at any rate.” He took a deep draft from the third mug, though at least he hadn’t finished it in a single gulp.

“And what would that be?” Gwen prompted him.

“You must understand something of what we do,” Ferus said, “or this will seem like foolishness.”

“We? Etherealists, you mean?”

“Precisely,” Ferus said, with another politely suppressed belch. “A great deal of what we strive to achieve happens as . . . as an instinct, I suppose one might say. We touch upon forces that others cannot sense.”

“You mean the ether.”

Ferus waved a hand in a rather exaggerated gesture. “That’s simplifying a monstrously complex concept to its barest core, but yes, that will do. We sense etheric forces. Most people do, to some degree, though they rarely realize it.”

“I’m sure I don’t know what you mean,” Gwen said.

“In fact, you do,” Ferus replied. “That gauntlet you’re wearing, for example.”

“Yes?”

“What do you feel in it?”

“Nothing in particular,” Gwen replied. “The crystal is a bit cool against my palm, but it always is.”

“In strictest point of fact, miss, it isn’t,” Ferus said. “If you found yourself a thermal meter and compared the crystal’s temperature to that of your skin, you would find them to be almost precisely the same.”

Gwen frowned. “I assure you, sir, it is quite cool.”

“It isn’t,” Ferus replied. “What you feel is the etheric energy that courses through the crystal. But your sensation of it is . . . something your mind was not sure what to do with, when you first encountered it. A wonderful place, the mind, but if it has any kind of disappointing failure, it’s that it always attempts to put new things into the context of things which are already familiar to it. So your mind apparently decided, upon encountering this new sensation, that it might just as well label it ‘cold’ and get on with your day. And you are far from alone—it’s one of the more common reactions to the first direct exposure to an intense field of etheric energy.”

“The crystal on my gauntlet tingles,” Benedict said, nodding. “A bit like when you’ve fallen asleep on your hand and the blood comes rushing back in. Though I’d never heard it explained in quite those terms before, Master Ferus.”

“That sounds like nonsense,” Gwen said. “Something is cold or it isn’t, sir.”

“Ah!” Ferus said, pointing a finger at her. “I had no idea you had an interest in philosophy! Splendid!”

“I beg your pardon,” Gwen said. “I never mentioned philosophy.”

“Didn’t you?” Ferus replied. “You just heard Sir Benedict confirm that his experience with a weapons crystal was significantly different from your own. There is but one reality; that is true—but the two of you experience it in slightly different ways. The older you get, I should think, the more you will come to understand that the universe is very much a looking glass, Miss Lancaster.”

“Meaning what, precisely?”

“That it reflects a great deal more of yourself to your senses than you probably know.”

“Rubbish. If I look at a blue coat, I see a blue coat. The fact that I’m looking doesn’t change that.”

“Ah,” Ferus said, raising a finger. “But suppose that what you see as the color
blue
is the same shade that Sir Benedict sees when he looks at something you would call
green
.”

“But that doesn’t happen,” Gwen said.

“How do you know?” Ferus replied. “Can you see with Sir Benedict’s eyes? And if you can, I should love to know the trick of it.”

Gwen blinked several times. “So you’re saying that it’s possible that when I see blue, he sees green?”

“Not at all. He sees the color blue,” the etherealist said. “But
his
color blue. Not yours.”

Gwen frowned. She opened her mouth to object again, thought about it, and put her teeth together. “And if Benedict does, then perhaps everyone else does, too?”

Benedict smiled down at his cup. “It would do a great deal to explain the aesthetic tastes of House Astor, you must admit.”

“Ugh,” Gwen said with a shudder. “Yes, those people simply cannot coordinate their wardrobes properly.”

“Now then,” Ferus said, after another pull from his mug. “That’s something perfectly simple and relatively minor—colors. What if other fundamental aspects of life seem quite different to others? What if their experience of heat and cold is different? What if they sense pleasure or pain differently? What if, to their eyes, gravity draws objects sideways instead of down? How would we know the difference, eh? We’ve all learned to call the same phenomena by certain names from the time we are quite small, after all. We could see things in utterly unique and amazing ways, and be quite ignorant of the fact.”

“That sounds remarkably slipshod,” Gwen said. “I’m sure that God in Heaven would not have created the world and its residents in such a ramshackle fashion.”

“Ah!” Ferus said, beaming. “There, you are a philosopher already! A great many reasonable folk who have gone before you have put forth a similar argument.”

“The real question, of course,” Benedict said, “is why on earth it matters. After all, we seem to have a common frame of reference for blue, and when she says ‘blue’ I know what she is talking about, even if my blue is her green.”

“It matters because it is philosophy,” Ferus replied with an expression of sly wisdom. “If all philosophers took questions like yours seriously, Sir Benedict, they’d find themselves straight out of a career, now, wouldn’t they?”

Gwen sipped at her tea, frowning some more. “But . . . I’m not saying that I agree with your proposition, of course, Master Ferus, but let us suppose that you are correct, for the sake of argument.”

“Let us suppose,” Ferus said.

“Then it would mean that . . . for all practical purposes, each of us lives in our own . . . universe-Spire, would it not? Perceiving all of it in our own fashion.”

“Go on,” Ferus said.

“Well,” Gwen said, “if that is the case, then it seems quite remarkable to me that we’ve managed to establish any kind of communication at all.”

Ferus arched an eyebrow. “Quick study, Miss Lancaster, very quick. Indeed. When we connect with our fellow mortal souls, something quite remarkable has happened. And perhaps one day, if we all work at it diligently and manage not to exterminate one another, we may even be able to see through one another’s eyes.” He beamed. “But for now, we’ll have to make do with making good guesses, I suppose. Food for thought.” He finished the third mug in another pull and waved for more.

Benedict cleared his throat. “Master Ferus, I’m afraid we’ve wandered from the original point.”

“Have we?”

“Why are you getting drunk?” her cousin prompted gently.

“Ah!” Ferus said. He held out his empty mug to Benedict. “Would you mind terribly?”

“Your turn, I think, coz,” Benedict said easily.

Gwen sighed, and fetched another pair of mugs for the etherealist.

“Lovely,” Ferus said, and gulped some more. “Perceptions of etheric energy change from mind to mind, just as you and Sir Benedict demonstrate with your weapons crystals. And if one changes one’s mind, that also changes the nature of those perceptions. This will allow me to perceive those energies in ways in which I would not normally be able to do so.”

“You’re getting drunk,” Gwen said slowly, “so that you can experience etheric energy differently?”

Ferus held up his mug and said solemnly, “Think of it as goggles for one’s mind, instead of one’s eyes.”

Benedict sipped at his drink, frowning. “You think you’ll be able to sense the Aurorans’ weapons crystals?”

Ferus waved a hand. “No, no, there are so many of those things about, it would be like searching for a needle in a barge-load of needles.”

Gwen turned her teacup idly in her hands and said abruptly, “You think there’s another etherealist here, don’t you? And you think that . . . by changing your mind, it will be easier for you to find him.”

Ferus nodded, though the gesture made his head wobble a bit. “Top marks.” He put away another mug, and this time his finishing belch was rather louder. “Extrapolate.”

Benedict suddenly smiled. “If you could sense him, he could sense you. So you are also changing your mind to make that more difficult.”

Ferus slurred his sibilants severely. “Astute, sir, sincerely astute.” He peered down toward the bottom of his mug. “Though I confess, I have not changed my mind quite this thoroughly in some time.”

“Why?” Gwen asked. “I mean, why do you believe there’s another person like you here?”

“It’s complicated,” Ferus said. “Or I seem to remember that it is, at any rate.”

“The Auroran Fleet,” Benedict said thoughtfully. “Their attack was precise. As if they’d had some kind of beacon to show them exactly where to dive through the mists. Could an etherealist manage such a thing, sir?”

“I daresay,” Ferus said.

Gwen set her teacup aside. “And have you . . . changed your mind sufficiently to locate this person?”

Ferus eyed her and then his mug, unsteadily. “It would seem not. But it’s likely a question of distance, methinks. If we get closer, I’ll have a better sense of it.”

“And that’s why you’re contacting the local cats,” Gwen said. “To give you an idea of where to start looking.”

“Time,” Ferus said. “There’s no time for a search pattern.” He closed his eyes for a moment, and Gwen thought that he suddenly looked several years older, and several years wearier. “There’s never enough time, you know.”

Gwen traded a frown with her cousin. “Sir?”

Ferus shook his head. He took a swallow from the mug and put it down again. “Time to slow down now, I think.”

Gwen nodded, and felt somewhat relieved. “Too much of such an indulgence can be dangerous, sir. What now?”

“Now?” Ferus sighed, without opening his eyes. “Now we wait.”

“Is that wise, sir?” Benedict asked politely. “You do say that we’re short on time.”

“We always are,” Ferus said. “At the moment it is all we can do, I’m afraid. Best get comfortable.”

Gwen and Benedict traded another look, and Gwen nodded firmly. “In that case,” she said, “I shall ask for properly hot tea.”

Chapter 31

Spire Albion, Habble Landing Shipyards, AMS
Predator

T
he door to Grimm’s cabin opened a few inches and Kettle said, “Skipper, something you’ll want to see.”

Grimm blinked his eyes open, long-accustomed reflexes swinging his legs out of his bunk and his feet to the floor before he was able to focus his gaze. Night had fallen and the cabin was lit only by the light of a few large lumin crystals that were hung around Landing’s shipyards, shining wanly through the small windows. He felt as though some kind of gum were squeezing his eyelids shut, but he knew it was nothing more than simple weariness. He must have been asleep for less than three or four hours for his body to feel so reluctant to get out of his bed.

“Skipper?”

Grimm felt an irrational surge of annoyance at the pilot and promptly clubbed it into submission. Kettle hadn’t slept much more than Grimm had, and the man wouldn’t have woken him if it wasn’t important. “I hear you, Mister Kettle. I’ll be out directly.”

“Aye, sir,” Kettle said quietly, and closed the door.

Grimm fumbled a lumin crystal to life, quickly washed himself from a basin of tepid water, and dressed. Captains did not arrive to address a crisis looking like an unmade bed. They were always calm, confident, and neatly turned out. If an enemy battleship was about to unleash a full broadside on a ship, the captain would face it with his hat straight and his cravat crisp and square. Anything else undermined the faith of a crew, increasing the chances of casualties, and was therefore unacceptable.

That said, a captain knew very well how time-critical any number of issues could be. On a Fleet ship, Grimm would have had a personal valet to manage a good many things and save him considerable personal time on a given day—but
Predator
, as a private vessel, could not afford the luxury. The upshot being that it took him nearly four minutes, instead of three, to cleanse himself, dress, buckle on his sword, tug his hat on firmly, and appear on the deck. His arm ached restlessly without its sling, and he could have done with a shave, but all things considered, it could wait until morning.