Ichor Well Page 10

  “Aye, Cap’n,” came the chorus of replies.

  “You ever been to this place, Cap’n? This place they’re having us meet?” Coop asked.

  “What’d I say about idle talk, Coop?” Mack rumbled.

  “It ain’t idle. I wonder if there’s hills or trees or such like. Or if it’s one of them old towns they took to living in the center of. It’d be useful to know if we’re going to have to find a spot to moor up, and how far we’re liable to be traipsing on foot.”

  “All right, Coop. So it isn’t idle talk. It’s just foolish talk. Of course I haven’t been here before. This is a place secret even to the other fuggers, so you suppose they invited me for tea some evening or another? And if they had, don’t you suppose you’d know, you being on my crew for all these years?”

  “Could’ve been from before…” Coop said quietly.

  “What’s that?” Mack snapped.

  “Just idle talk, Cap’n. I’ll quiet down.”

  The crew filed to the deck and took up positions at the railing. Captain Mack reached into his coat to retrieve his cigar tin. The next of his smokes had nearly been lit when he remembered the mask that would prevent him from enjoying it. He cursed quietly to himself, then tore it in half and loosened his mask enough to shove the wad of soaked tobacco into his cheek. He turned to find his crew faithfully at their stations.

  “None of you ever guided the Wind Breaker through a pass this narrow, have you?”

  “No, Cap’n,” Coop said. “You always take the wheel for narrow bits like this.”

  “Who wants to step up? Learn how to do it?”

  “Why, Cap’n?” Coop asked.

  “Because I’m asking. How do I like the jobs divided up across my crew?”

  “Everybody knows how to do everything, but each crewmember knows his piece best,” Coop said.

  “And my piece is the guiding of the ship, and of the crew. And it seems that’s the one bit I haven’t passed around near as much as I ought to. So someone step up and put your hands to the wheel so you can learn the way to do this part.”

  “Why don’t you do it, Nita?” Lil said.

  “Oh, I don’t know…” Nita said.

  “That might not be the best idea, Lil,” Gunner said. “This would be a poor way to start her education in earnest, since a wrong move could be rather disastrous.”

  “Well seems right then, don’t it? Since Nita’s the one that’d need to fix it if it busted, seems like her being the one to bust it is only fair.”

  “Miss Graus, step up,” Captain Mack said.

  “Captain, I’m not sure—” Nita began.

  “It isn’t up for debate anymore. Step up.”

  The engineer climbed the steps to the helm. The captain stepped back and let her take the wheel.

  “Widen up those legs in case she fights you,” Mack said. “Thanks to your tuning, it don’t happen much anymore, but it happens, and you don’t want her to throw you. You’ll want to take her up just a touch. The valley’s narrower than the fug makes it look.”

  Nita took a hand from the wheel and turned a valve. Above her the mechanism that piped phlogiston in and out of the envelope increased the mixture just a bit more.

  “It’s moving sideways, Captain,” Nita said.

  “Good you spotted it. Not always easy to notice. That’s crosswind. The turbines only handle thrust, yaw, and a bit of pitch. When wind comes from the side, you have to turn a bit to compensate. We run an eight-spoke wheel. A hair less than two spokes starboard for this kind of wind.”

  She adjusted the wheel. Her breathing was shaky.

  “You nervous, Miss Graus? If so, I do believe this would be the first time I’ve seen that particular sight.”

  “It’s just the first time I’ve felt the work of my engineering actually at my fingertips.”

  “It gets to be intoxicating, Miss Graus. These days the only sort of intoxication I can properly enjoy.”

  The ship moved closer to the valley, Nita adjusting the wheel in an attempt to keep it centered.

  “You’ll want to back off the throttle, and mind the pitch change when you do. You don’t want the darkness in the fug to sneak up on you, so get the lights on now.”

  The controls, at least, she didn’t need to be told how to operate. In the course of her refit of the ship to be more easily maintained she’d done a fair amount of work on them and knew just what each of them did and how.

  She held steady as the face of the cliff drew closer.

  “What do you reckon you’ll have to do when you take her into the valley?”

  “Avoid hitting the walls of the valley?” Nita offered.

  “And how best to you reckon you’ll achieve that?”

  Nita watched the valley draw nearer. “I would need to keep it moving straight.”

  He chewed the cigar in his mouth. “True enough.”

  “If I’m missing something, tell me. I just put a polish on those turbines; I’d hate to have to buff out any fresh scrapes or hammer out any dents.”

  “If I wanted to steer the ship myself, I’d have my hands on the wheel.”

  Her eyes darted as they drew near enough for the fug to start to pour onto the deck.

  “… The crosswind!” she realized. “There won’t be any crosswind in the valley.”

  Nita started to straighten the ship, but Captain Mack caught the wheel. “You want to be pivoting as we slide in. Any sooner and you’ll strike the wall in the direction of the wind, any later and you’ll strike the wall toward the wind. How many spokes off center are you?”

  “Um…”

  “That will become valuable information in a moment, Miss Graus.”

  “Two spokes.”

  “Get ready to pull her four spokes to port then, and then two spokes to starboard.”

  Wind whistled across the cliff face as they began to slide inside.

  “Four spokes, Miss Graus.”

  She spun the wheel and the ship began to shift. It seemed to lurch toward the far wall.

  “Two spokes.”

  Nita adjusted the heading just as the momentum of their turn tapered out. The ship continued its slide. Its outermost turbine brushed the valley wall enough to knock some gravel free.

  “Steady as she goes. It widens a bit from here.”

  The engineer took a few more shaky breaths and squinted into the thick purple mist, tinted almost black by the green lights hung beneath the nose of the ship. Once they were clear of where the fug met the clean air, it thinned somewhat, and the fading glow of the sunset completely vanished, filtered out by the blanket of fug through which they traveled.

  “Any other specific orders, Captain?”

  “If you go far wrong, I’ll shout the corrections. Piloting a ship is about the feel, and you won’t get the feel with me shouting in your ear.”

  She gripped the wheel tight and did her best to keep the ship on course. At its narrowest the valley offered five feet of clearance on either side, which sounded like more than enough until the wheel was in one’s hands. It was quite straight, too. Even so, three times the turbines scraped the wall and twice the captain called out a spoke this way or that. A few minutes later the ship slid into the open, no harm for the journey but for a few bright scrapes and a badly shaken engineer.

  “That’ll do it for now, Miss Graus. That’s the worst of flying a ship. Learn to read the wind, read the stars, and read a map and the only thing I’ll have on you is forty years behind the wheel.” He raised his voice. “And as for the rest of you. Shame on you huddling so close. You were liable to upset the balance for Nita and send the whole ship pitching forward.”

  He and Nita turned to find Gunner, Lil, and Coop standing close to the helm, where they had gathered to anxiously watch Nita’s inaugural time behind the wheel. She stepped down, allowing the captain to take the wheel again. When his back was turned, Nita gave Lil a halfhearted shove to the arm.

  “What was that all about, volunteering me like th
at?” Nita whispered, a smirk showing in her eyes and robbing the tone of its teeth.

  “Don’t tell me you never wondered what it was like to fly the Wind Breaker.”

  “Maybe I did, but you didn’t have to toss me into the flames on my first try!”

  “Oh, like that’s not how you go about all your business, Nita. You’re a jump-with-both-feet kind of girl.”

  “Maybe so, but not when other people’s lives hang on it.”

  They each turned to the side of the ship. Though they intended to keep a lookout for ships, there wasn’t anything to see. After early afternoon and continuing until late morning, the fug was little more than an inky void. A ship would be visible, if at all, thanks to the green glow of its lights. If the crew didn’t wish to be seen and thus ran with no lights at all, the best hope they’d have would be the flicker of lights from within. If anyone was going to warn them of approaching ships, then it would be the inspectors. Once again perched in their nests against the belly of the envelope, their bat-like ears were turned to the darkness. Trained to pick out the tapping of the claws of one of their own at more than a mile away, the shudder of a boiler at ten times that distance would be like a stampede.

  “Anyhow,” Lil said, “now you know how to do that. So that’s one more way you’re fit for the crew.”

  “Maybe so, but fair’s fair. When I have to climb up and tend to the turbines for the damage they sustained thanks to your volunteering of me, you’ll be the one doing the tending right along with me.”

  “Aw heck, Nita. It ain’t like nobody but me and Coop is even willing to climb up there with you to hand you wrenches and such anyway. That’s no bother.”

  “No, no. You’ll be the one using the wrenches.”

  “You sure that’s a good idea?”

  “It’s as good an idea as putting me at the helm during that little maneuver.”

  “That’s enough talk,” Captain Mack rumbled. “Eyes and ears open. I’m shutting off the lights and taking us low, so the ship shall require my full attention.”

  #

  In almost complete darkness, with neither landmark nor sky to offer guidance, navigation within the fug was difficult. Finding a meeting place that, crucially, could not be found by anyone else was even more trying. Even with the skill of Captain Mack at the wheel, it took them until nearly midnight before something distinctive enough to be their destination presented itself in the gloom.

  The landscape in this part of the fug was mostly deserted. Though the Wind Breaker’s crew had spent more time unsupervised beneath the fug than any right-minded group should have, they’d spent much of their time too high to see the ground or in the reclaimed husks of precataclysm cities. Open country was something they’d seen only fleetingly. It was eerie and depressing. What a few generations ago would have been a rolling field of emerald grass now appeared as a crunchy dry expanse of black and ashy gray. Trees were gnarled and free of leaves, their bark stained by the fug. The one thing that indicated life at all was a small cottage and a scattering of small steam carts, the sort normally used to ferry goods within a city but retrofitted to carry a half-dozen passengers each.

  Even as standing deadwood, the roots of the trees ran deep, so Lil and Coop used them to moor the Wind Breaker before all but Butch and the inspectors climbed down the ladder. Lil and Coop sported their rifles, as well as whatever smaller weapons could be reasonably concealed beneath their coats. Captain Mack had his usual sidearm hung at his belt. Only Nita was unarmed, instead holding a lantern. Gunner had chosen a different sort of weapon.

  “Gunner,” Nita said, “not that I’m not in awe of your innovative design, but are you certain that thing will even fire?”

  Gunner raised his weapon, which looked like someone had grafted a small wagon wheel to the body of a revolver in place of its usual cylinder.

  “Oh, it will fire. I’ve tested it extensively. What’s more, it will fire thirty-six times before I need to reload,” Gunner said. “And the intimidation factor is not to be ignored.”

  “Yeah, but how long does it take you to reload?” Lil asked.

  “Four minutes. But that is entirely beside the point. By the time I need to reload, all potential assailants in the area will be dead, injured, or wisely seeking cover.”

  “Plus he could probably clock them in the head with that thing. And holding it up is liable to keep that arm good and strong,” Coop observed.

  “You sure you don’t want a gun, Nita?” Lil asked. “I got a little one I keep in my boot I could borrow you.”

  “I’d rather not. I’ve not taken the time to become proficient with them. I’d be as likely to hurt one of you as whoever I was targeting. A good heavy wrench has served me well enough in the past. Also, this being our first proper meeting with the Well Diggers, diplomatically it seems like at least a few of us should be relatively unarmed as a showing of good will.”

  “Or poor judgment,” Gunner said.

  The group crunched along the dry grass until the glow of the lantern fell upon the door of the cabin. It was a curious sight for a building within the fug, as it was new construction rather than a reclaimed property. Well-seasoned wood, standing dead for many years, had been roughly shaped into a sturdy but simple structure with no windows and a door heavy enough to turn away a battering ram.

  Captain Mack stepped up to the door. The muffled sound of murmuring voices through it indicated there was a crowd within. Mack rapped on the door. The subdued voices became silent.

  “Who’s there?” replied a voice within.

  “Who-all do you think is here?” Lil shouted back, her sudden voice causing the whole group to flinch.

  “Lil…” Captain Mack rumbled.

  “What? They invited us, didn’t they? It isn’t like anyone else is liable to be knocking.”

  The door opened. Nita held her lantern high to reveal no less than four people clustered to peer out the door. All faces had the long, pale, gaunt features of fug folk. The foremost among them was Digger.

  “Did you come alone?” he asked.

  “Who would we bring?” Coop asked.

  “Coop…” Captain Mack snapped.

  “It ain’t our fault they’re asking dopey questions, Cap’n,” Lil defended.

  “Until matters specifically concern you,” Gunner said, “I suggest you let the captain conduct the business at hand.”

  “Come inside, quickly,” Digger said.

  He swung the door open and ushered them inside. The interior of the cottage was as plain as the outside. Almost the entire space was taken up by a single room, and with the addition of the Wind Breaker crew, there were nearly twenty people, which was a half-dozen more than the room could comfortably hold.

  When the door was shut again, the Well Diggers and the Wind Breaker crew took a silent moment to measure their counterparts. It was a formidable group. Aside from Digger, there were only two other of the scrawnier type of fug person, what Lil called “white-collar types.” The rest were the taller, somewhat more muscled workers who went by the name “grunts.”

  “I would like to thank you for taking the extreme risk in coming here,” Digger said. “Am I correct in assuming you’d not have done so if you weren’t interested in helping us with our tasks?”

  “Let’s say I’m willing to discuss it further,” Captain Mack said. “And I want to make one thing clear. No secrets of any kind. If we’re to help you, we need to know everything you know. Much as a few pleasantries would be called for, this being our introduction and such, we ain’t fond of long stays in the fug. So for the sake of getting through it quick, I’d like to divide the labor a bit.”

  “Of course, of course,” Digger said. “Your crew is infinitely more expert in such matters. We shall proceed according to your preference.”

  “Fine. Now as I was made to understand it, this job comes in two parts. One involves finding this well of yours and putting up some walls. The other involves liberating and coaxing this chemist to our ca
use. Nita here’ll hear what needs to be said about the building. Whoever knows what’s got to be done, pair up with her and let her know. I’ll do the listening when it comes to the prison break. Who volunteers?”

  Another short silence.

  “Permission to speak, Captain?” Nita asked.

  “Granted.”

  “I’ll admit, I haven’t had the chance to develop an eye for fug person faces, but I do recognize a few of you from my unpleasant time within Skykeep. Do any of you know Donald or Kent, also former inmates at Skykeep?”

  No clear answer came, but the half-heard muttering implied an affirmative.

  “I’m sure they can vouch for the quality of our character.”

  “They have,” barked one man. “Talk you lot up so much I’m through listening. No one could be the way those two describe.”

  “Bludo, please,” Digger scolded.

  “I see. I don’t blame you if you are nervous upon meeting us for the first time. I had my doubts about them when I first met them. And that was before their reputation became quite so remarkable. Maybe things would go a bit more smoothly if you were to ask us a few questions, to set your minds at ease.”

  After a moment, a hand raised.

  “Yes?” Nita asked.

  “You’re the engineer?” asked one of the unfamiliar grunts.

  “Yes.”

  “How’d you learn if not from us?”

  “I’m from Caldera. Engineering is not kept a secret there.”

  Bludo spoke up again. “I don’t believe you are an engineer. And what’s more, I don’t believe what they say about you lot and the dreadnought. I worked on the dreadnought, and seeing as I have the ship you lot came in, it is a load of rubbish to say you took down that beast without a hundred more just like it.”

  “As it happens, sir, I took the ship down personally.”

  “Now I know this is all a load of rubbish.”

  “Would you like me to explain?”