Riveted (45 page)

Annika woke to a soft
whump!
A familiar sound, but not
here.

Beside her, David lifted his head. “What was that?”

“The snow tunnel collapsing, I think.”

“Was there a quake?”

“I didn’t feel one.”

She sat up with him. There were different sounds now. Distant shouts, loud cracks.

Not the crack of ice. Gunshots.

He threw back the blanket. “Hurry, into your clothes—”

A loud crash came from nearby, followed by a rumble that shook through the ice walls.

“Hurry,” he finished. “That didn’t come from beneath us.”

She yanked on her trousers, a pair of stockings. Her tunic and coat. She spun in a circle, searching for her boots, then remembered—“I left my boots in the steam room.”

“I’ll get them. Don’t move. Scream if you need help.”

She nodded, then pulled on her hat, wrapped a scarf around her face. Blowing out the lamp, she waited in the dark.

David returned too soon. “The tunnel did collapse—it’s blocking the way. I’ll carry you up and around.”

Hating that she would be a burden, even for a short time, she sighed as he swung her up. “You’re carrying me everywhere.”

“I’ll carry you anywhere.”

He always knew just what to say. Annika smiled, linked her arms around his shoulders. David left the bedchamber slowly. The tunnel had fallen in on itself halfway through to the next chamber, the sides still standing waist-high, braced by the surrounding ice. Cold air bit her cheeks. The heavy
huff
of a troll’s engine joined the shouts, the shots—and above that, the sound of a larger engine and the hum of propellers.

“The airship,” Annika whispered.

They reached the end of the tunnel. Broken blocks of snow mounded at his feet. David peered toward the clearing. Annika arched her neck to look, but her view was blocked by the still-standing tunnel wall.

“What do you see?”

“They’re killing the guards.”

Who? “The laborers?”

He nodded, eased back. Annika stared up at him, trying to grasp what it might mean. The laborers were rebelling against di Fiore. Källa had been right. But if they planned to destroy everything, kill anyone who’d been in authority or part of the capsule project…that included her and David, too. Paolo, Källa, and Olaf.

She hoped they would be more determined to escape than bent on revenge.

“We can’t wait here,” she whispered. “If they come, there’s nowhere to hide.”

“I know. Hold on.”

Carrying her against his chest, David climbed up the fallen side of the tunnel—away from the clearing—and quickly moved behind the standing wall, where he crouched out of sight.

“We’ll stay on this side and head around to the laboratory to find your sister,” he said softly. “We can use the roofs as cover.”

Not all of the roofs, she saw. Someone had driven a troll into the bathing room, where it had crashed through the ice blocks and tipped over into the dugout floor. Another troll lay on its side in the middle of the clearing, engine huffing and nose steaming. Bodies littered the snow, blood crimson against the white. Where were all of the laborers? She could still hear gunshots, shouts, but there was no one alive in the clearing.

A body dropped out of the sky and onto the bath chamber, smashing against the troll’s flank with a dull clang.

Slapping her hands over her mouth to stifle a shriek, she looked
up. The airship. The rebelling laborers had taken the airship. She flinched as another body fell—an aviator. David’s arms tightened around her. Then more bodies, and she buried her face in David’s neck as the crew slowly rained down, some of them already dead, some of them screaming until they hit the ground.

Someone above unhooked the ferry cruiser’s tether; the cable slithered to the snow. The airship flew slowly south, the propellers turning lazily and steam billowing from the tail, as if they hadn’t known to close the vents. The night quieted, except for the huffing of the fallen troll.

Only two of the big machines had been wrecked. “Do you see the third troll? We need it now that the airship is gone.”

David shook his head, rose from his crouch. His gaze swept the clearing, the surrounding buildings. “They didn’t leave any weapons, either.”

“Källa should have something.” Her gaze lit on the two-seater balloons. One had deflated—a stray bullet, perhaps—leaving an engine-powered balloon, and the pedal balloon. “Are we going to stay here tonight?”

“I hope to God we don’t.”

She agreed. They could be in Vik by midnight. “We need to fire up that balloon so it’ll be hot enough by the time we’re ready to go.”

Her heart pounded as they crossed the clearing, and she listened for any sound over the
huff
ing of the troll. Nothing. No one shouted or shot. Either everyone was gone or dead, or there were others hiding, too. She started the balloon’s burner, and they crossed the clearing again, down the steel steps. The hearth chamber was dark, cold. Annika could only see faint shadows, but David moved without hesitation to the far snow tunnel, pausing to look in each chamber they passed. He entered the tunnel leading to the laboratory, abruptly stopped.

“It’s us, Källa,” he said into the darkness. “The others have fled.”

A lamp flared, revealing Annika’s sister. She lowered her sword,
dragged a pair of goggles down around her neck, the lenses reflecting an eerie green. “Where are your boots, Annika?”

“The bathing chamber. But it’s destroyed.”

“We don’t have extra.” She sighed, shook her head. “We’ll figure out something. Come back to the laboratory. Have you seen Lorenzo?”

“We assumed he’d be with you,” David said.

“No. He left a few hours ago with the troll to retrieve the foreman’s body. But I haven’t seen him since…and he took the suit. I can barely get a word out of Paolo.”

They followed her into the laboratory. Olaf lay sleeping on one of the tables, bundled in a swaddle of furs. Beside him, Paolo worked over a sheet of calculations—weeping, Annika realized. The man’s eyes were red, his cheeks wet. His tears had smeared the ink.

David sat Annika next to Olaf, took the stool beside Paolo’s. Gently, he rested his hand on the older man’s shoulder. “Paolo? Are you well?”

“Of course I’m well!” Paolo snapped the response. “Why wouldn’t I be well? It is the boy who is gone.”

Taken aback by the sudden change, Annika looked to Källa. She shook her head, lifted her hands.

“The boy?” David tried again. “Olaf is here.”

“Not him. The other. Lorenzo.” The anger suddenly dropped away, leaving his face lined, his eyes confused and tired. “He took the suit.”

“Why?”

“He’s going to go. Going to go.” He tossed his arms up in the air, then buried his face in his hands. “The calculations weren’t done. The trajectory is false.”

“Paolo.” Källa came forward, her eyes wide. “Do you mean the capsule? He’s going in the capsule?”

“Yes, yes. He’s set the charges.” He faced her, frowning, as David abruptly stood and started for Annika. “Is the airship ready, then?”

Källa scooped up Olaf. “Are we supposed to be leaving?”

“The guards will come to take us to the airship at six,” Paolo said. “He said the moon will rise on the di Fiore name.”

Oh, blast. It was just after six now. Lorenzo had probably timed it so they’d have time to reach the ship…but not wait so long that they wouldn’t see the launch.

“Källa,” Annika said. “We have to take the balloons.”

“Yes. I’ll be right back for Paolo. We need our coats.”

“We need our packs, too.” Face stark with tension, David stopped in front of her. “Ideas for boots?”

She thought desperately. “I don’t know.”

“I do.”

He reached down, hauled off his right boot. His foot wasn’t what she expected—like a thick cotton stocking. She took the boot.

“Don’t put it on yet.” He stripped off the padding, revealing skeletal steel similar to his hand. A metallic clank sounded when he set his foot down again. “This keeps it from sliding around inside. It’ll do the same for you.”

And keep her feet warmer, too. Cozy. She pulled on the second one, her heart filled to bursting. “Thank you.”

“I’d only expose my naked feet for you,” he said, smiling slightly. “Now, go for our packs. I’ll help Källa bring Paolo.”

She nodded. The boots rose past her knees, but it wouldn’t matter, unless she wanted to crouch. Right now, she needed to run.

Or stomp. Her feet felt heavy, huge. She took a lamp, made her way as quickly as possible back to their chamber. She stuffed everything she could find into their packs, ripped the blankets from the bed, clomped back out to the clearing.

Källa and Paolo were outside, watching David climb up the laboratory’s snow-covered roof.

“Do you see him?” her sister called.

“Not Lorenzo!” David called back. “But the other troll is there!”

He was looking toward the capsule tower, Annika realized. She
joined Källa, who carried Olaf in a sling across her chest, and a pack across her back. She gave Annika two gas-filtering masks.

“Paolo wants to get him,” she said softly.

Annika looked at her in dismay. In two-seater balloons, with no idea when the explosive charges would blow? “I don’t think—”

“He’s my son.” Paolo’s voice quavered. “And the final calculations weren’t made.”

Beneath her feet, a deep rumble suddenly shook the ice. Annika staggered. On the roof, tiny balls of snow rolled down sloped sides. David started down.

The entire laboratory dropped, ice cracking like a cannon shot. Stumbling forward, Annika screamed his name. David took a running leap. He cleared the sudden sheer edge with inches to spare, landing hard in the snow. His legs seemed to buckle, but then he was up again, catching her hand.

“Go!”

They raced across the clearing. Tunnels collapsed with heavy thumps of snow. The cracking of ice sounded like a battlefield. The ground beneath her feet dropped, and she clung to David, terror stopping her heart, but they didn’t fall away into a new crevasse—the entire clearing dropped with them. Ahead of her, Källa pulled Paolo up from his knees. Her sister reached the balloons, glanced back at Annika.

Two balloons, only one with an engine. With an older man and a child with her, there was no question which one Källa should take. Annika pointed, heard the buzzing of the small engine from the other balloon as she climbed into her own seat. She began to pedal, waiting while David helped settle Olaf into Paolo’s arms. As soon as he was in, she released the tether—even if the ice dropped to the center of the Earth, they wouldn’t fall with it now. She saw Källa engage her propellers, pedaled harder, David joining her. Annika lifted the altitude flaps, and they rose slowly into the air. Källa met her eyes, then banked south. Toward the tower.

Blast it. If Lorenzo wanted to escape, he had a troll.

Annika shook her head, but pulled the rudder to the left and began turning south. More crevasses had opened all along the glacier, she saw. Steam poured through the fissures, and even over the propellers and the cracking ice, she heard the whistling of the pressurized steam escaping through tight cracks. The tower rose ahead.

Annika peered across the distance. “The capsule’s gone!”

“It dropped into the borehole just before the first blast!” David called back.

And must be still in there, plugging the hole. No steam rose beneath the tower yet. Annika’s heart galloped in her chest. “What happens if it doesn’t launch?”

“Then he roasts—Good God and da Vinci!”

A burst of steam erupted beneath the tower. The capsule streaked upward, moonlight glinting against steel and leaving a wisp of steam from its tail.

And was gone. So fast.

Her mouth dropped open, and she met David’s astonished gaze. From the other balloon came Paolo’s whoops and shouts, Källa’s wild laughter.

Unbelievable. It had worked.

Annika leaned forward, searching the sky. Except for the moon and stars, only darkness. “Can you still see him?”

But David wasn’t looking up. He was looking farther south, past the tower, where a column of smoke had begun pouring from the ice, lit from below by a beautiful orange light. The volcano, erupting.

Lorenzo had woken the witch.

“Källa!” David shouted to her sister. “Stay out of that ash! Go north, into the wind, then around to Vik!”

Alarm tightening her face, Källa nodded. Below them, the rumbling beneath the ice grew louder. Thunderous
crack
s split the air. Pedaling as hard as she could, Annika threw the rudder full over. Terror slicked her back in cold sweat.

David shouted again as they turned north. “Use your masks!”

Källa nodded again, reached for the engine lever. Annika saw her sister hesitate, glancing first at Olaf, then over at their balloon.

Stupid.
“Full steam!” Annika yelled at her. “Don’t wait for us! We’ll be behind you!”

She stole another look at the eruption before they headed full north. The column of ash and smoke had already thickened, a dark cloud building over it like the cap of a mushroom. The orange glow seemed to be spreading, lighting the billowing steam that rolled ahead in its wake.

They just had to outrace that.

She faced forward again, legs pumping. How quickly could they fly? They didn’t seem to be moving much faster than a troll, but when she glanced behind again, they were almost a mile from the camp. Not slow—but the ash cloud had already doubled in size.

A few minutes later, pale flakes began falling around them like snow.

“Your mask!” David called over the whir of the propellers, the rumbling and cracking below.

She pushed down her scarf, buckled the straps behind her head, pulled on her hat again. The mask covered her from forehead to below her chin. The sound of her breathing seemed loud in her ears. A metallic odor tinged every breath, left the same taste on her tongue. Ash fell faster. She could barely see Källa far ahead of them, the glacier below.

A shock of white light suddenly lit the dark. Lightning. David gripped her hand. She couldn’t see his face, only the dark glass and round, protruding filters of his mask.