Heart of Steel (33 page)

Archimedes almost didn't care. He wanted to slide down into the courtyard, simply
touch
the iron. But the number of zombies made that impossible, at least until he returned. He judged the length of the crane arm, followed the arc of it in his mind.

“There.” He pointed to the curtain wall nearest to the harbor. “Something could be lifted to the top of the wall and taken into that tower.”

“All right.” She met his eyes. “There's a lot of stairs.”

She was right. The castle didn't possess a regular, symmetrical structure, but sprawled across different levels of walls, towers, halls, and courtyards. Stairs running up the side of the curtain walls gave zombies easy access to the tower—there were already several stumbling along the stone walkway atop the wall.

“We kill those, then we make certain we're quiet,” he said.

 

 

They did, and even better, the tower had a door—partially
rotted, but intact, so that if any more zombies climbed up to the wall, they wouldn't see Archimedes and Yasmeen moving around inside. So long as they were quiet, they shouldn't capture the zombies' attention.

They waved the airship away and went inside. The tower had been designed for defense. The chamber was round, with only a few small openings set at an angle high in the thick stone walls—shafts for ventilation, perhaps, or to let the light in. Dust and stone debris covered a slate floor. Feathers were scattered about, the remains of nests visible in the ventilation shafts and the rafters. Heaps of old cloth had molded in piles and gave home to mice that scattered when he lifted one dark, stiff edge. A bed had collapsed on itself—and on the far side of it, lying on the floor, he found the clockwork man.

“Yasmeen,” he whispered, and slipped to his knees.

He felt her fingers against his shoulder, heard her sharp breath.

Shoulders of iron and the gear guts had rusted. A copper pendulum at the heart had tarnished and warped. The fingers were nothing but steel tubes, the arms a system of pulleys whose ropes had long disintegrated. It had no legs and no head. Just a torso with arms, partially finished and abandoned—it was the most wonderful thing he'd ever seen.

And they had to leave it here.

“Ah, God,” he said. “Ah, God.”

She crouched beside him, her arms wrapping around his shoulders. “We'll come back for it.”

He slipped out of her arms and lay on the floor. “I'll stay and guard it.”

Yasmeen snorted softly, her half laugh quickly muffled. “You don't even—”

The crack of a gunshot sounded outside. Archimedes sat up, pulse racing. He stared into Yasmeen's eyes, saw the same shock and surprise.

“Was that from the airship?” she whispered.

The airship that was hovering over the harbor, not far from the tower—and the curtain wall lay in a direct line between
Ceres
and the zombies that would be rushing to investigate the sound.

Over the pounding of his heart came the pounding of feet, the moans and growls. Jesus. He raced for the door.
Thank God, thank God
, it opened inward—though chunks were missing in the rotted wood, big enough to shove hands through. With enough pressure, those holes would likely become bigger.

It couldn't be helped. He braced the door with his weight, set his feet. “Is there another way out?”

But Yasmeen was already racing through the room, feeling along the walls, looking for one. She turned back to him, eyes wide. “No.”

“Take my grap—”

The first zombie hit. The thud reverberated through his back, but he held fast. Yasmeen shoved her palms against the door beside his shoulders, adding her weight.

“My grapnel,” he said, and two more rammed into the door. Or the same one, with a friend. His boots skidded, just a tiny bit—and he could hear more coming over the ravenous growls. “The ventilation shafts. We'll climb out.”

Maybe. The openings weren't big.

“All right. Go,” she said. “Shoot it.”

No, no. She hadn't—

“Archimedes.” She met his eyes. “You've practiced shooting that launcher; I haven't. I'll hold the door. You'll need to go up first, anyway, because the second person is going to have to sprint and climb—and I'm faster.”

“I'm stronger.” And the zombies weren't hitting the door now, but piling against it—pushing, pushing.

“Yes. So you'll need to be fast,” she said.

Goddamn it. But he nodded. “On three, we switch.”

At her nod, he counted. She slipped smoothly into his place, feet braced, jaw clenched with effort. An emaciated arm snaked through a hole, grasping hand waving near her leg.

“Hurry,” she said.

He raced to the nearest ventilation shaft, took a second to breathe, to steady his arm. The grapnel launched, hitting the ceiling of the shaft but bouncing through. Behind him, Yasmeen laughed with relief.

“Go up!”

He dropped his shoulder harness—no chance he'd make it through with it. He climbed, digging his toes into the wall to go more quickly. He pushed his head into the shaft, felt the sun, the breeze.

His shoulders didn't fit.

He tried again, another angle this time, diagonally in the square shaft. His hands were sweating on the rope, his arms aching. Every second was another that Yasmeen was holding the door. No matter how he squeezed, his shoulders didn't fit through.

Chest heavy, he dropped back to the floor.

“No,” she said. “Don't you—
No!
”

“Yes.” He braced his hands against the door beside her—
Thank God
—slimmer shoulders, and smashed the heel of his boot onto a hand groping along the floor. “It has to be this way. My manly physique is simply too powerful.”

Her eyes filled. “No.”

“Yes. Now, on three—we switch.”

He began to count, and
God
, he wished he'd kissed her properly first. He wished he'd made love to her as she'd wanted. Hard, fast, angry, slow . . . it didn't matter now.

“Three,” he said and took her place, feeling the hammering against the wood, the reverberating growls. “Now shoot me and go.”

Her gaze lifted to his. The tears were gone, he saw. Her eyes were clear, and hard, and cold. Her killing look, he knew—that heart of steel wrapping completely around her.

And then she kissed him.

 

 

Warm, firm, his mouth was everything she wanted, needed. But the zombies were growling behind him, and she couldn't linger. She didn't have much time, not if she wanted to save him.

She
had
to save him.

Yasmeen drew away, and saw his astonishment, his agony, his hope. It changed to flat denial as she said, “I'm coming back for you.”

“No—”

“Don't you
dare
die,” she said. “I'm coming. And if you're not here, you're going to break my heart, Archimedes Fox. So hold that door.”

She sprinted for the rope. Seconds later, she stuck her head out of the shaft, looked up.
Ceres
hovered above—coming to rescue them, after some fucking idiot had nearly killed them.

Her shout was met with several from the decks. The rope ladder spilled over—out of reach, but she leapt for it, swinging above the harbor cliff.

On the deck, she ignored everything but the man she wanted.

“Bigor! I need your diving suit. Now, now,
now
!”

With a sharp nod, the marine ran for the ladder. Yasmeen stripped off her jacket, her boots. “Captain! Bring that rope ladder right to the tower door!”

He stiffened like she'd shoved a burning rod up his ass. “Mrs. Fox, you don't—”

“Some bastard on your ship fired a gun and
he's going to die down there
! Give me the fucking ladder!”

Though Guillouet shook with rage, he nodded to the mate. Good. If he hadn't, Yasmeen would have killed him.

Bigor returned, carrying half the suit. The two other marines carried the rest. With amazing speed, they helped her into the thick canvas, fastened and buckled the brass over her limbs. The zombies might get a bite in between the brass plates, but wouldn't break through the canvas. The brass helmet reduced her sight to nothing, but it didn't matter: If it moved, she was going to kill it.

The canvas gloves were too heavy for a gun, but machetes were just fine. She gripped the handles. The suit felt like moving with chains tied to her ankles, her elbows. Bigor yanked the hose out of the top of the helmet, and fresh air came in.

She clanked over to the rope ladder, grabbed on, and dove in.
So heavy.
She fell to one knee on the stone wall as she landed, and they were on her, but Archimedes was waiting. Her blades hacked and chopped. The zombies growled and moaned, and there were so many but she would not stop,
she'd never stop—

A crack sounded, the snap of wood. The tower door. Oh, by the lady—the door. She whipped around, and through the tiny, blood-streaked window of her helmet, she saw the zombies pushing against it, she saw the door shatter.

Her heart shattered with it.

 

 

Archimedes held on to that. He held and held—the door didn't. Wood shattered. Hands grabbed at him. He raced across the chamber, heading for the grapnel rope. His shoulders were too wide, but
by God
, he could hold on until she arrived.

Boots digging into the wall, he hauled himself out of reach. He heard a sound like a muffled scream of rage and pain.
Yasmeen.
She'd seen the door go down.

So he'd let her know he was still inside. His revolvers were in his holsters. Gripping the rope with one hand, Archimedes aimed, fired. God, how many were in here? Thirty or forty? He'd take a good number down, but prayed for a reload to drop out of the sky.

Or for a woman with a brass suit and machetes. He laughed as she came through the door, mobbed by zombies but slashing them down with brutal efficiency. There was nothing elegant about her movements now, just vicious hacks of her blades that sent heads and arms thudding to the floor. The brass plates were covered in gore.

“I love you!” he called out, then shot a zombie coming at Yasmeen from behind, and another trampling the clockwork man. He heard more shots now, too—and there were fewer new zombies racing in. The crew on the airship must have been clearing off the wall leading to the tower. He fired until he was out. Only a few zombies left in the chamber. He dropped, triggered the springs at his forearms, and hacked the blade through the zombie that came running at him. Yasmeen finished off the last.

He heard her laugh, muffled by the helmet. The chamber floor was an inch deep in blood, deeper in twitching body parts. He wiped off the blades usually hidden in his forearm guards and pushed them back in. His shoulder harness dripped; he didn't think about it, just slung it over his arm.

The cargo lift waited outside. They stepped aboard, and Archimedes unbolted her helmet, lifted it off, tossed it aside. Her face was streaked with sweat—and tears? Her chest hit his with a clank, and she was laughing again when he kissed her, so deep, unable to stop until they were almost at the deck. He unbuckled the blood-streaked plates, the soaked canvas. Her breeches and shirt were clean, her calves and feet bare.

When the lift clanked into place, they faced Captain Guillouet's loaded gun.

Yasmeen stilled, her hand tightening on his. Archimedes waited, then realized—she didn't have a gun, and his revolvers were empty.

“Mr. Bigor, please escort Mr. Fox to the wardroom, and guard him while I speak with his wife. Keep a gun on him at all times, so that she knows not to step out of place.”

Bigor hesitated for only the briefest moment. Then he drew his weapon, aimed it at Archimedes. “Mr. Fox.”

“If you hear any kind of commotion from Mrs. Fox, shoot him.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Take him below.”

With her gaze locked on Guillouet's gun, Yasmeen let go of his hand. As Archimedes stepped from the cargo lift to the deck, he said softly, “I'll be coming for you.”

Then he saw her eyes, and
now
he knew cold. Now he knew hard.

“You'd better hurry,” she said.

 

 

No commotion.
Yasmeen could have disarmed Guillouet
and taken him down with barely a sound, but she couldn't halt a commotion if everyone saw her do it. So she would be patient.

Obviously feeling bold with his pistol aimed at her face, Guillouet stepped close. “Come to my cabin, Mrs. Fox.”

Wrapping his fist in the hair at her nape, he shoved her in front of him, tucked the gun barrel behind her ear. She walked obediently, noting the expressions of the crew around them. Vashon with jaw set and a disapproving glower, and the twin with an angrier match. Some shock. Some who wouldn't look her way. Guilt? Uncomfortable?

As they should be. When a man forced a woman into his cabin, it usually only meant one thing.

“Who shot the gun?” she wondered aloud. Their quick glances and the pain lancing through her scalp told her without a word. “
You
, Captain?”

“Twenty years on a ship and I have
never
had to shout over my own men,” he said. “And I will not talk over you. Do not speak again until I tell you to, Mrs. Fox.”

So he'd had to shoot his gun to get the attention of his crew. What had they been arguing over? Wages? Women? Did it even matter?

Not really. Captain Guillouet wouldn't be a captain much longer.