The Wind Merchant (41 page)

After a brief argument, the Elder released Elias, and the two men continued on with Carter to a circular waiting room reminiscent of Hal’s study to await further instructions.

“What was this weapon they put her in?” Ras asked.

“We salvaged it from an Outsider ship during The Clockwork War,” Carter said. “It siphons off the overload, filling a container within a cannon ball.”

“And when the cannon ball strikes, the container breaks, releasing the weapon?” Elias asked.

“That is my understanding of it,” Carter said. A small grin played across his lips as he looked at Ras.

“What could be entertaining at a time like this?” Ras asked.

“I’m sorry,” Carter said, removing the smile, “It’s just…you’re The Reclaimer. It’s been so long that people have stopped believing you exist.”

An announcement blared over the loudspeakers.

“Fleet Commander Archer survived,” Carter said. “His escape shuttle just arrived.”

Within minutes, a full entourage of large, walking machines entered the now cramped room. They removed their helmets.

“The Reclaimer is an Outsider?” Archer said, looking down at Ras.

“Where is she?” Ras asked. “We can discuss my height later.”

“She?” Archer asked, looking up to Carter.

“The Conduit, sir,” Carter said, “The Reclaimer brought her into Illoria after rescuing me from a band of Outsiders.”

“How did they get in?” Archer asked.

“According to the Conduit—” Carter began.

“She has a name!” Ras said. “And if you don’t tell me where she is, you can forget about any help.”

Archer stopped, paused to recompose himself, then turned to stare down Ras while still addressing Carter, now in Illorian.

Carter responded in kind, prompting Archer to roar in anger. “The Children’s Pass? Napier is mocking us with more spies!”

“I’m not a spy,” Ras said.

“Nobody in the last century has entered through The Children’s Pass if they haven’t been sent by Halcyon Napier,” Archer said. “Don’t lie to me. That turncoat sent you, didn’t he?”

“Sir?” Carter asked. “In briefly speaking with the girl, it sounded like she might be one of the lost children.”

Archer paused for a moment, eyeing Ras, then Elias.

“I’m just here to find Callie,” Ras said. “Please tell me where she is.”

“We couldn’t have freed her from the weapon even if we wanted to,” Archer said. “The overload would have encompassed our entire fleet, and Time would have been lost to the Outsiders.”

“What stands between them and the Time Origin?” Elias asked.

“If The Reclaimer continues to be petulant, nothing,” Archer said. “I must say I expected more.”

Ras didn’t care about Archer’s expectations; he just wanted to find Callie. “That weapon caused her to overload, yes?” he asked.

Archer nodded.

“If the weapon contains the frozen time around her, then nothing could break into that, right?” Ras asked.

Elias stepped up next to his son. “She would be safe inside, even if there was a crushing force.”

“Even if she is still alive, this is all pointless if the Outsiders harness Time the way Napier taught them to harness Energy,” Archer said. “You must reclaim Caelum.”

“Cae-what?” Ras asked.

“Our capital city,” Carter said, “the one we’re flying above.”

“The vast majority of the Elder military is contained within its radius,” Archer said. “Freeing them is the only way a proper defense can be mounted against such a force.”

“What would happen if the Outsiders controlled Time?” Elias asked.

Archer scoffed. “The world would tear itself apart,” he said. “Illoria has been ravaged enough by the disproportionate concentration of Time within its borders, but it doesn’t take much imagination to see what would happen if half of the world moved faster than the other half.” He huffed. “The vain pursuit of immortality will kill us all.”

“Do I have your word that if I reclaim Caelum, your war will go no further than with these Outsiders?” Ras asked.

“That will be up to the Council,” Archer said.

It would have to do. “Fine. If you want me to save the world, you’re taking me to the wreckage.”

Narrowing his eyes, Archer spoke in a soft but gruff voice. “You ransom the world for a girl,” he said. “I hope she’s worth it.”

Carter’s fighter quickly brought Ras and Elias back to
The Brass Fox
. Ras reasoned that an Elder fighter returning to the battle would arouse more trouble than a beaten up wind merchant vessel that could have easily passed as a recently acquired member of Bravo Company.

“If it’s all the same, I’d like to come with you,” Carter said, his voice tinny through his helmet as they stood next to
The Brass Fox
’s gangplank.

“What if someone spots you?” Ras asked.

“If that ship is crumpled all around her, I wouldn’t mind a little extra muscle,” Elias said, patting one of Carter’s metal arms.
 

“Maybe it’d be best to ride in the hold until we get there,” Ras said.

Ras lowered the bay door, and Carter’s boots crunched through the thick shards of the collection tank.

With a little coaxing at Ras’ hands,
The Brass Fox
took off. The fuel gauge showed they were running on fumes, so he eased on the throttle.

“Hey, son?” Elias asked, leaning against the bridge railing.

“Yeah?”

“You’ve got an Elder in your hold,” Elias said with a tired smile. “Isn’t that a children’s limerick?”

“Not one I know about.”

“I think I remember your grandfather singing something along those lines when he thought nobody was around,” Elias said.

“What makes you bring it up?”

“I don’t know,” Elias said. “I just lost ten years with you. I was supposed to tell you little stories like that about my dad, I think.”

Ras took a deep breath, letting the foreign wind tussle his hair and fill his lungs. “I missed you.”

“I’m sorry about that,” Elias said. “I know it couldn’t have been easy.”

“You were just trying to help.”

Elias pursed his lips and gave a slow nod.

“Dad, I have a question.”

“Shoot.”

“Did you make a deal with Foster Helios before or after you found Hal?” Ras asked.

“Are you wondering whose side I’m on?”

“I guess it doesn’t matter—”

“No, it matters, Ras. It matters very much,” Elias said. His eyes hardened; the look frightened Ras. “But I guess either way, I may have made a deal with a devil.”

The thin lines of smoke ahead grew in the daylight along the parched ground strewn with airship pieces, giving the air an acrid stench. Above, The Collective and Bravo Company intermingled, stranded in Time.

“I’m not seeing any movement,” Elias said, holding a hand to his brow and leaning over the edge of the ship.

“Maybe they’ve left,” Ras said, craning his neck. “I know I wouldn’t want to fly around invisible traps.”

They passed the first pieces of burning fuselage, broken biplane wings, and cannons embedded in the cracked dirt until they reached the Elder command ship, pancaked under its own weight.

“Carter,” Ras called out, “we could use your expertise about now.”

“Cartography?” he yelled up from the hold.

Ras pulled
The Brass Fox
into a lazy circle around the half-ship, then set the airship down next to the side of the command vessel that the beam had blown away. Ras hoped Callie wasn’t on the half of the ship that was missing.

The bay door opened and Carter immediately got to work, harnessing the power of his mechanical suit to clear the larger pieces of debris from the flagship.

Soon the three men were walking in the dark of the belly of the upside-down vessel. Carter twisted a part of his suit’s left forearm and brought a light to bear.

“Carter, you mentioned you thought Callie was one of the lost children,” Ras said. “What did you mean by that?”

“She said you came through the Children’s Pass,” Carter said, “and she’s obviously Illorian if she’s a Conduit. It would also explain her not knowing our language.”

“She’s always dreamed about that white train,” Ras said, before stopping his gait. “How old would that make her?”

The metal body’s shrug looked almost comical. “It depends on how old she was when she left the train, but she’d be older than the great war. I suppose that would put her somewhere a little over a century old.”

“What do you think?” Ras asked, picking back up on the pace.

“I’ve never seen a true Conduit before,” Carter said. “It would make sense if she was from a previous generation, and even more sense that she was adopted and placed somewhere far away from the Time Origin after being stuck in dense Time for so long.” Sparks flared occasionally, periodically illuminating the corridor as they approached the door at its end. “We’re almost there.” With a few lumbering kicks, Carter burst through to the other side, which was flooded in light. The main deck of the bridge lie ruined.

At the end of the room, a sphere hung from a collection of loose pipes and wires. A purple glow emanated from its lone porthole.

“Callie!” Ras said, pushing past Carter in a frantic dash that disregarded the mangled metal and broken glass littering the bridge’s domed ceiling. He was soon wading knee-deep in a sea of sharp pain.

Carter walked forward, crushing the debris under his boots, and eventually collected Ras, carrying him to the other side of the room.

Through the porthole in the sphere, Ras could see an upside-down Callie, mid-scream. Once past the dome, Ras dashed to the sphere, feeling it over. “How do we open it?”

“I doubt any of the controls in here work,” Carter said.

“I guess bashing it open is out of the question,” Ras mused.

“Can you reclaim her from a distance?” Carter asked.

“I have to be right next to her,” Ras said. “Hold on. I have an idea.” He placed himself against the wall of the sphere and pointed to the porthole. “Punch it.”

Carter reared back and threw his fist into the porthole, shattering the glass and knocking the sphere off its pipes and wires.

Before the orb could roll, Ras slid himself into the new opening and looked at the inverted Callie. He placed his weight against the wall, walking the ball around until Callie turned upright.

Although restrained, Callie arched her back away from the gurney.

Ras undid the clasps on her wrists and waist before placing his arms underneath her. “I got you, I got you,” he said.

The purple glow faded from her eyes and she collapsed into Ras’ arms. He carefully placed her back down on the gurney, then slid his arms out from underneath her frail body, wiping away some matted hair.

The weapon had robbed what little color she had possessed.

“Hi,” Callie said, wrapping her arms around him tightly before falling back down to the gurney and closing her eyes.

“Hi,” Ras said. He looked down at the woman he loved, taking in every detail from the new freckles on her face to the chipped pale blue fingernail polish on her delicate hands. “Calista Tourbillon, I love you. I’ve loved you since the moment I met you, and I’m a fool for not telling you sooner.”

“Hmm, that’s nice,” Callie said as unconsciousness took her.

Ras sighed. “Nice timing, Ras,” he chided. Placing his arms under her knees and back, he then carried her out of the sphere and back to
The Brass Fox.

Ras brought Callie to the bed, gently placed her among the sheets, and tucked her in. Sitting on the floor next to the bed, he held her hand as he watched her sleep.

Elias was standing in the doorway; Ras wasn’t sure how long he’d been there. “After all you two have been through, you’re going to need as much rest as possible if you’re making a run into Caelum tomorrow. I’ll get the jetcycle primed.”

“You’ll need the gun under the console to re-engage the engine,” Ras said. He watched his father leave, then looked around the wrecked room and amused himself with the idea of returning to
Verdant
and offering the ship back to Tibbs in its current state.

A world with Tibbs in it felt like a lifetime ago. Still holding Callie’s hand in his, Ras rested his head against his father’s balled up coat. Everything was falling apart around him, but he still held hope for a world with Callie Tourbillon in it.

Light poured through the cannonball holes in the wall, crawling across the floor and up the wall as the day ebbed into evening. Ras fought the urge to nod off. He couldn’t separate himself from Callie so soon after finding her. Fear crept into his mind that he would awake with some new threat stealing her away, and he wanted to delay that possible reality for as long as he could.

He would just rest his eyes, though. Just for a moment.

Ras awoke to the sensation of hair being brushed out of his face. His legs were asleep, an unpleasantness which was compounded by the pins-and-needles sensation of someone sitting on them.

He opened his eyes to a view of Callie. Her face was close to his and still as beautiful as ever. Her smile was tired, but she looked as vibrant as one could after enduring her time in the weapon. “I don’t think there’s a better feeling than waking up without a headache after going to bed with one.”

Ras smiled, using his right hand to rub his eyes, and Callie caught his wrist, inspecting the typewriter key bracelet.

“You got my gift.”

“Dixie told me about it when the Elders took you,” Ras said. “Why’d you do that to your typewriter?”

“After your dad’s letter, I thought it was important for you to remember your best quality.”

“So, ‘good at falling’ had duplicate letters?”

“Basically,” she said, laughing like chimes long absent from Ras’ ears. “Sometimes people just need a reminder that someone else sees their good qualities.” She looked down, then back at Ras. “It’s why I don’t worry anymore when I overload. It hurts, but before I know it you’re right there.”

“Callie, how much do you remember before you fell asleep in the sphere?” Ras asked.

“It’s all I dreamed about.”

“Good, saves me time,” Ras said. Before she could say anything, he had her in his arms, pulling her in close for the kiss he had waited the entirety of his life for. She reciprocated immediately, drowning out the rest of the world. The pain, past, present, and future didn’t matter. This moment was theirs and was well worth everything Ras had gone through to get there, and he couldn’t imagine anything that would make it not worth it.