Chapter Twenty. In Which the Trio Suffers the Perils of Public Transportation
CHAPTER TWENTY
In Which the Trio Suffers the Perils of Public Transportation
Paulo didn’t seem suspicious when Risa scurried out, nor did he look concerned when Javi followed, complaining about the third attempt on his life via dangerous unsanctioned carriage driving. Amina, however, rose an arched eyebrow at Risa in silent question, which Risa refused to respond to.
The more pressing matter was the wide plain that stretched before them.
Cast in shadow, it was barren except for a wooden platform a few yards away.
Whatever once grew there had long ago died.
Sunlight hadn’t graced any part of the land in what might have been years. Only an empty wasteland remained.
Risa glanced upward. The shadow was being cast by a dark object that resembled an unmoving silver cloud. She watched as black specks detached from the shape and floated downward like fluttering leaves shucked from a dying plant.
San Cirilo.
This was the city of airships. A collective of steaming contraptions that called itself an autonomous state, hovering over a darkened region of the Kheadish kingdom.
Large buildings sprouted from the tops like weeds, most of them carved from the same steel as the hulls of the ships.
Other vessels boasted exposed cavernous insides where smaller buildings had been built within their bowels.
Some were monstrous juggernauts, their outer skin giving no indication of what lay inside.
Some possessed flattened disks supported by a steel hull, gardens and parks and small lakes decorating their surfaces.
The combination of magic and science was a testament to their mortal hubris. The shadow that San Cirilo cast left the world below sheathed in decay.
Several figures on the platform huddled against the barrage of wind created by the floating city.
These were all people who had converged at the port, seeking the ferries that would spirit them up to the floating city, though they knew not what it might hide or what lay waiting.
Some came from the west, where Monpira and, beyond that, Spearbelly and Barrow lay.
Others had trekked from the south, where Kheadon’s capital was nestled.
And to the east beyond the horizon was the desert separating Kheadon and Amina’s kingdom.
“It’s massive,” Amina said, her voice a mix of wonder and disgust.
San Cirilo was massive, and grotesque, and a marvel of technological advancement.
It was impossible to perceive the true magnificence of San Cirilo beneath its haunting breadth. Tiny blimps zipped back and forth from ships hovering halfway between the ground and the city proper.
“I must leave you,” Paulo said, patting Amina’s head. He gave her shoulder a brief squeeze. “Be safe, little wolf. And come visit when you can.”
Amina nodded. “I will.”
Paulo returned to his cart, gave the three of them one final look, and climbed into the driver’s seat. Amina watched him go, face buried in Brunie’s fur, and when Paulo was quite a ways ahead, she turned and hurried up the platform steps.
People crowded the platform edge, determined to be first in line when the airship destined for San Cirilo opened its doors.
If people weren’t pushing their way to the front, they were gathering around a lone shed at the end of the platform.
AIRCAB TICKETS was hand-painted above a cutout window, and the assembled crowd before it ranted about fare hikes and lack of visible improvements, though no one was behind the window to take note of complaints.
There was a sign indicating that the attendant was “on break, be back in 101 minutes,” with no way to know when the countdown had started.
A grinding shudder ran beneath the platform as a smaller, darker shadow began to creep over it.
Above them, a small blimp had detached from the airships that hovered between San Cirilo and the ground, traveling down a thick cable fastened to the platform.
It was too tiny to carry everyone gathered there.
If they didn’t manage to get on this ship, they would be left exposed on the platform, and Risa, unlike Javi, wasn’t optimistic enough to believe everything would be fine.
Especially when her bad luck was part of the equation.
Amina turned to them, hood lowered, hair a curly black mass around her round face. “Thank gods you’re both unnaturally tall. No losing you.”
Javi bent until he was face-to-face with Amina, his eyes narrowed in accusation. “Do you look different?”
Amina grimaced and ducked back under her cape, hiding her face.
But there was no following up, no need for the princess to avoid the question. For El Gib—mustache and all—stood a few feet away, surrounded by his goons. The moons embroidered upon their black tunics and tattooed on several of their limbs were the same shape as the rictus smiles they all wore.
“Well, well, well. What do we have here? Looks like this will be a two-for-one sale, lads.”
Oh no.
Amina’s hands flew to the twin hilts at her hips.
“How’d you find us?” Javi asked.
El Gib’s sneer turned thoughtful as he cocked his head. He turned to Eyepatch—Carlos, Risa recalled—for an answer.
Carlos shrugged. “It doesn’t make any sense. Last I remember, we were in Monpira.”
Their recruiting efforts for the heist must have been a success, judging by the number of Sanguines who were unfamiliar to Risa. Bella, the object of Javi’s ill-fated attempt at seduction, was also there, unfortunately. Bella wore no hat today, her blouse cut with a deep V that revealed her tattoo.
Risa had known her curse would catch up to them.
There was no outrunning it—not through a tunnel or through a market or on the back of a cart hidden beneath a tarp.
She just hadn’t thought it would happen while they were waiting for public transportation or surrounded by dozens of people who seemed uninterested in the fight moments from breaking out.
The patrons minded their own business with a determination Risa had to admire, concerned only with the small blimp growing closer, pulley gears clanking loudly as it prepared to dock.
“Wait—” Javi wagged a finger at El Gib, who wore an open vest several sizes too small for his potbelly, apparently forgoing the uniform the new recruits were forced to wear. “Didn’t the Wolf gut you?”
Risa’s gaze fell to Mustache’s round stomach. Several old wounds marked his skin. Nothing suggested that, just yesterday, a supposed-dead princess had tried her hand at gutting him.
El Gib also glanced down in observation. “Huh.”
If her curse somehow made mercenaries heal faster, she was going to lodge a very wordy objection against the universe.
El Gib shook his head. “Who cares!” he shouted. He pulled out a machete from behind his back. “Grab ’em.”
Javi scoffed, “Are we not going to question the physics? You can’t hide a hacking instrument in your back pocket!”
Risa remembered what Paulo had said. That El Gib might have had half a brain, but Bella had a full one.
“He’ll double the bounty,” Risa told the pretty woman who had almost captured the prince the day before. “If you let us go.”
The woman’s eyes widened with interest. Carlos looked between Bella and his leader, caught between loyalty and greed.
Javi sputtered, “I don’t just carry around twenty-four thousand reales—”
Risa ignored him. “Twenty-four, and we’ll add some jewelry,” she told Bella, who nodded along with the words, already calculating how to split the money among the group.
El Gib pointed his machete at Risa. The blade looked deadly sharp. She had no desire to test that.
“That’s not the deal, Bells. We kill the prince. And her, too, for good measure.”
Bella whipped the coiled tendrils of her black hair over a shoulder. Her brown doe eyes narrowed on El Gib.
“There’s a better deal on the table, Eto. We should take it.”
“This isn’t the time for a coup,” he snapped, then pointed his weapon at Carlos. “Carlos, get him.”
Before Carlos could move, Risa was pointing an accusing finger at El Gib’s mustache.
“Aren’t you all suspicious about why he’s so determined to kill this idiot when there’s more money to make keeping him alive?” Risa was desperate, scrounging for any bit that would derail this clear setup her curse had orchestrated.
Bella regarded Risa for a long moment. Whatever she divined from staring made her angry. “Eto’s got a side deal!”
Risa felt as if the world were closing in on them, not unlike the tunnel walls back in the Underground Pass.
Starting a fight seemed ill-advised when they were being pressed in on all sides by Sanguines and innocent—if aloof—bystanders alike.
Especially when the Sanguines wouldn’t hesitate to hurt and kill whoever was in the way.
The aircab was taking its sweet time docking, and there was nowhere to run or hide among the flat, desolate land that surrounded the platform for several miles.
Risa needed to find a way to save them. At least until the aircab settled at the platform.
“He does!” Risa confirmed, though she didn’t really know.
“Fine, I’ll just kill the boy myself!” El Gib shouted. He lunged for her but was knocked aside by a wayward elbow from a random patron.
Bella shoved Risa into Javi’s chest and held up her own weapon, two half-circle blades, one in each hand.
Mayhem exploded. El Gib swung his machete at Bella, but that didn’t seem to please one of his fellow Sanguines, who ran beneath his raised arm and rammed their head into his stomach.
Carlos started for his friend, but was stopped by one of the new recruits, who had some “complaints to file” and needed to speak to him immediately.
The others jumped into the fray, new and old fighting while El Gib and Bella stared each other down.