Balanced on the Blade's Edge (Dragon Blood, Book 1) (8 page)

Zirkander frowned over at her. He couldn’t
have guessed her thoughts, but maybe he had sensed her skimming the
surface of his mind?

She pointed at the airship. “Are your weapons
able to reach them from here?”

“No chance,” the captain said. “Neither the
cannons nor the rocket launchers has that kind of range.”

Rocket launchers? Sardelle had never heard of
such a thing, but, now that she looked, could see that something
more sophisticated than a harpoon lay nestled in the artillery
weapon’s cradle. She caught Zirkander and the captain looking at
her and then at each other.

“Ms. Sordenta,” Zirkander said, “I think it’s
time for you to return to… whatever work you’ve been assigned to do
here. We’ll take care of the intruders.”

“I understand,” Sardelle said. It would be
suspicious if she tried to find an excuse to stay up there.

She walked slowly back to the courtyard
though and with hearing that might have been slightly augmented
with magic, she caught a few more sentences on her way back to the
stairs.

“Find her record, Captain. And find some of
the people who arrived on the supply ship yesterday. If nobody
remembers her… ”

“Think she’s a spy, sir?”

“We’ll see.”

I may have to escape and
come back for you, Jaxi.
Sardelle paused at the bottom of the
stairs, not sure where to go. She hadn’t been
assigned
to any work yet, so how was she supposed to
go do it?

I understand.
And
Jaxi did, but she couldn’t hide the sadness at the thought of being
left behind, and it tore into Sardelle’s heart.

There was more at stake too. If the
enemy—were these still the Cofah who had troubled the continent in
her day?—destroyed this fortress or collapsed the mountains around
it, would she ever be able to return? If the mines were shut down,
who could possibly help her reach Jaxi? For that matter, who would
help her find the belongings—relics—of her people? If she was truly
the last of her kind, wasn’t it her responsibility to save and
preserve some sign of her heritage?

Sardelle dropped her forehead into her hand.
So much lost, and she was worried about being thought a spy? What
did it even matter?

The captain jogged down the stairs, thoughts
of the archive building floating at the top of his mind. Without
looking up, Sardelle plucked the location from his mind as well as
the layout. He frowned at her when he reached the bottom of the
stairs, but all he did was point toward the laundry building.

“One-forty-three will assign you tasks. She’s
in charge of the women’s area.”

“I understand,” Sardelle said.

Sewing or doing laundry, that would be the
perfect time to let her mind wander. She refused to tinker with the
memories of those who had arrived yesterday, assuming she could
even locate them before the captain questioned them. Creating a
record for herself would have to be enough. She gazed up to the
rampart where Zirkander had the spyglass out again. With luck, this
unprecedented enemy appearance would keep him busy, and he would
forget about her.

* * *

Ridge walked through the mines, following a
stocky infantry lieutenant for a guide, while two of his hulking
soldiers trailed behind, each wearing enough armament to assault a
fortress on his own. Ridge felt like a pansy for having bodyguards,
but Captain Heriton had nearly pitched over sideways when his new
commanding officer had suggested he would take a stroll on his own.
After receiving a belated report about an attack on one of the
lower levels that morning, Ridge had allowed the escort. Besides,
his mind was more on the Cofah airship than this inspection. The
craft had left without coming closer or doing anything else, but
Ridge had a feeling it would be back. He knew a preliminary
scouting mission when he saw it. He didn’t know how long they had
been searching for the crystal mines, but now that they had found
them, there would be trouble. It was no secret what powered the
dragon fliers—and that there wasn’t an equivalent energy source out
there. Maybe someday there would be, but not yet. And without the
fliers… his people would have a hard time defending the continent
against a superior naval force.

Ridge had written a report, but there was
nowhere to send it, not until the next supply ship came in two
weeks. Someone had mentioned a pass over the mountains but that it
was only accessible during the summer months. How helpful.

“What’re they staring at?” the lieutenant
muttered, looking back and forth uneasily.

Ridge’s group was walking down a wide
corridor, and a squad of miners was approaching from the opposite
end, on their way off shift, their dirty clothes and weary faces
implied. An armed soldier following the workers watched his flock
carefully, not saluting—he held his rifle in both hands—but giving
Ridge a respectful nod. The miners were staring at Ridge’s little
troop.

“It’s either me or you, Lieutenant,” he
responded. “You tell me, am I the pretty one or are you?”

The lieutenant cast a glum look over his
shoulder. His nose had been broken a time or two in his career—or
perhaps before it. “Definitely you, sir.”

The miners slowed down, and a few muttered to
each other. They wouldn’t think to attack him with so many armed
men present, would they? All they had for weapons were pickaxes and
shovels. Yes, those heavy picks could do damage, but only in close
quarters. Of course, in the tunnel, Ridge’s group would have to
pass within close quarters.

“This is why the general never came down
here,” the lieutenant muttered, resting a hand on the butt of his
pistol. He must have read danger in the troop as well.

The first miner, a scruffy bedraggled man
wearing a bloodstained shirt and a bandana around his throat,
stepped toward the center of the passage. He removed a
sweat-stained cap, pressed it to his chest with one hand, and
raised the other—it was devoid of picks or other weapons.

“Colonel Zirkander, sir?” he asked.

“Yes?” Ridge had only been in the fort for a
few hours; he hadn’t realized the news of his arrival had preceded
him down here.

“I, uh, we want you to know… ” He waved at
his grimy comrades. “We’ve heard about your fighting out there in
the skies. Sometimes someone who can read catches hold of a
newspaper, and there’s a former pilot down here that tells some
stories about your early flights—he claims to have met you, but I’m
not sure that’s the truth. Still, real entertaining stories. We
appreciate them. And that you’re out there, fighting for our
country.” The miner eyed the infantrymen, who had their fingers on
the triggers of their rifles. “We just thought you should
know.”

It was a moment before Ridge could come up
with an answer. He’d had the king’s subjects thank him for his
service before, and received his share of hero worship from young
pilots, but he hadn’t expected felons to care about their country
or those defending it.

Ridge stepped away from the lieutenant, met
the man in the middle of the tunnel, and stuck out his hand. “Thank
you… ”

“One-fourteen,” the miner supplied, gripping
his hand.

Ridge raised his eyebrows. “And the name your
mama gave you?”

The miner blinked a few times. “Kal.”

“Thank you, Kal.” Ridge walked down the line
and shook more hands and got more names and numbers and was
surprised at the shyness, considering all the broken noses and
missing teeth in the group. “How’re you all being treated down
here? Tough but fair? Getting enough food?”

With the questions, he opened himself up to a
volcano of grievances, but he listened without making too many
promises. If the fort was attacked in the future, he needed these
men—
all
of the men—to stay put in the
mines and not make trouble. That would be asking a lot—he had been
a prisoner of war once, and he had used the first diversion he
could to escape—but Ridge might need to siphon more of his soldiers
into defense.

As he continued his tour, he crossed a lot of
apathetic miners who didn’t care a yak’s back teats about the
change of command or him, but he came across even more who knew who
he was and seemed to think something special of it. He would use
any advantage he could to win over the prisoners. He also found the
“pilot” the first miner had mentioned. Ridge had never met him and
through a few private questions learned the kid had been kicked out
of the flight academy for fighting after three months. Not that
surprising. These were all rough men. Ridge didn’t doubt for a
moment that their deeds had rightfully earned them places here.
Fortunately, none of them asked him for parole—he doubted he had
the power to grant that even if he wanted to. When he asked what
they did want, most of the requests were ridiculously simple, and
he promised to look into them. If a rockslide table, a dartboard,
and some pictures of near-naked women would improve morale, he had
no problem acquiring them.

A private caught up with Ridge and his
entourage somewhere toward the end of the tour. “Sir? Someone was
killed up top. You may want to look in on it.”

“Show me,” Ridge said.

How many deaths was that for the day? They
were far too common here.

Though nobody had made a threatening move
toward Ridge, his escort followed him to the tram.

“What sort of killing was this?” he asked the
private as the cage creaked and groaned, heading for the fading
light at the end of the passage. Twilight had either come, or the
sky had darkened further with clouds.

“A woman was hung for being a witch.”

Ridge’s stomach lurched. The prisoner he had
been talking with? Sardelle? She was out of place here, but he
didn’t think it had anything to do with witchcraft. He had her
pegged as a spy—if a poor one—or, more likely, someone who had
sneaked in to try and get a crystal. One could be sold on the black
market for a great deal. Or she might even be an academic who
wanted a sample for research—the gods knew the military had a
stranglehold on the crystals. He knew that university professors
had come to the airbase before, with bags full of microscopes and
tools, wanting to study them. Few had ever had a close up view, for
neither the king nor the commandant wanted information getting out
where the country’s enemies might pick it up. Perhaps Sardelle was
one of those curious professors who wouldn’t take no for an
answer.

Or was it that he simply didn’t
want
her to be some hardened criminal who truly
deserved to be here? It wasn’t as if a spy or a thief was much
better. A thief… might be turned away with a moderate level of
punishment, especially if she didn’t succeed in stealing anything.
A spy though… Ridge closed his eyes. He would be forced to shoot a
spy.

A moot point if she had already been hung, he
reminded himself with another lurch to his stomach. “Do you know
the name—number—of the woman who was hung?”

“No, sir,” the private said.

Ridge resisted the urge to describe her for
the private. The cage was nearing the top of its ride, the
darkening sky visible in earnest now. All around the fortress, the
pathway and rampart lanterns had been lit, though they did little
to drive back the encroaching night. It was definitely snowing,
thick swirling flakes that would make visibility difficult for
anyone flying. Good. He hoped the airship would be forced out of
the mountains and into skies where it would be spotted and shot
down.

“This way, sir.” The private opened the cage
and walked into the snow. “It’s in the women’s barracks.”

Ridge strode after the private and found
himself outpacing the man, then turning to crunch through the old
snow in the courtyard rather than following the walkways—with fresh
powder on the ground, they weren’t that cleared anymore anyway. He
had found maps of the fortress and the mines before his tour and
memorized them as well as he could. This was either a shortcut to
the barracks or… he was heading for the munitions building. Either
way, the private noticed he had lost his C.O. and jogged across the
snow after him.

Fortunately, Ridge’s memory proved accurate.
He pushed open the front door and gave the traditional, “Male on
the floor,” warning call, though the private’s furrowed brow made
him think nobody here bothered. Maybe female prisoners were
supposed to be used to random men walking into their sleeping and
bathing building. From what he had skimmed of the operations
manual, courtesies to inmates weren’t important enough to be
mentioned.

“Third door, sir,” the private said.

Ridge could have guessed that by the knot of
women standing outside, staring in, gesturing and speaking. Most
had removed their heavy outer clothing and appeared to be off-shift
for the night. Sardelle wasn’t among them.

“Sergeant Benok gave orders that the body not
be disturbed,” the private said.

“Good,” Ridge said, though he wasn’t any sort
of forensics expert. He certainly wasn’t a witchcraft expert.

“Move aside,” the private barked to the
women, despite the fact that they had already been doing so.

Ridge gave them a more cordial, “Thank you,
ladies,” though all he wanted to do was charge into the room to
check…

It wasn’t Sardelle. He told himself that his
relief was uncalled for—someone was still dead, choked to death by
a rope made from torn and braided linens, dangling from a water
pipe crossing the ceiling. The woman’s head drooped forward, her
snarled brown hair falling into her lean face. It didn’t quite hide
the swollen lip and lump on the side of her cheek. She wore the
heavy wool dress common to the female prisoners, and it covered
most of her skin, but tattoos of knots and anchors crossed her
knuckles, and more sailing-related artwork disappeared under her
sleeves. The tip of one of her pinky fingers had been cut off at
some point in her life, leaving a shiny pink stump. Her feet almost
touched the floor, and Ridge guessed her six feet tall.
This
woman he would have believed was a pirate
before ending up here.