The Kraken King Read online

  He and Meeng had scoured the nearby coast trying to locate the marauders’ camp. The ironship’s commander had been searching the seas. Neither had found any sign of them.

  This wasn’t the camp. But answers might be found below.

  “Only two?” The few survivors of the attacks had reported more than a dozen flyers. The two men on the beach were either scouting or waiting.

  “Twelve more have already gone.” Taka pointed to the horizon. “A half hour past.”

  West. Ariq searched the sky again. The flyers were already out of sight.

  And the ironship was headed the same direction. Commander Saito must have spotted the marauders and moved in pursuit.

  If the flyers were after an airship, Saito wouldn’t catch them in time. The machines were quick and maneuverable, with a dried-jellyfish balloon shaped like a bullet. They weren’t as fast or as silent as living jellyfish, but those balloons were difficult to keep unless they were always piloted over the water. These smaller flyers could travel over land as well as the sea.

  But they didn’t have a long range. “Did you see where they came from?”

  “From the south. But over land or ocean, I don’t know,” Taka said. “They arrived under the cover of dark.”

  Concealing their movements by traveling at night. Ariq had often done the same when he’d led rebel warriors against the Golden Empire’s forces. He glanced at Meeng, who was peering over the cliff. “How best to climb down and surprise them?”

  “There will be no surprise unless you are a boilerworm or a kraken.”

  Attacking the marauders from beneath the sand or dragging them into the ocean. Neither was an option.

  Without the advantage of surprise, attempting to take one of the men alive posed too great a risk. He and Taka would have to go in shooting, and keep firing until the two men couldn’t shoot back.

  And there were twelve other men on flyers who might have answers. Ariq just needed to follow them west—and stop them from destroying another airship.

  If it wasn’t already too late.

  ***

  So far, the journey had been as eventful as Zenobia had predicted—and not nearly as eventful as she had hoped. After years of writing about her brother’s adventures, she’d been looking forward to a little adventure of her own. She’d wanted to fly over the zombie-infested lands of Europe and Africa, which she’d described in dozens of stories but had never seen for herself. She’d wanted to glimpse the terrors of the deep and the sky, which Archimedes had fought and escaped so many times.

  It seemed he never stepped out the door without encountering some danger. Whereas Archimedes flung himself at every peril, however, Zenobia intended to observe it from a safe distance.

  But the airship’s route had taken them along the west coast of Africa and around the southern tip of the continent before heading into the Western Ocean, and she’d only observed water, instead. Beautiful waters, dull waters, rough and calm, in every possible shade of blue and green and gray. She’d spent hours leaning over the rail, searching for a megalodon’s razor-sharp fin slicing through the ocean’s surface or a kraken’s massive armored body and endless tentacles. Her eyes had watered from staring into the bright sky, hoping for a glimpse of New Eden’s balloon city. But aside from a bit of excitement when a pod of sperm whales passed below the airship, there was little that she’d done on this trip that she couldn’t have done more comfortably at home.

  And at home, she wouldn’t have had to share a cabin with her friend.

  She’d accepted Helene’s invitation too quickly. She’d never imagined that she’d like the other woman much better when the Atlantic Ocean was between them, or that she would have preferred the letters they regularly exchanged to conversations in person.

  How could she have expected it? As girls, they’d been as close as sisters. With similar brown hair and easily tanned skin, they’d even been mistaken for sisters from time to time, and Zenobia had used any excuse to visit Helene’s home. Now sharing quarters with her old friend was like being wrapped in wet wool. Though not a small cabin—with a sitting area, a bed for two, and space enough in the wardrobe to hang a week’s worth of dresses for each—when Zenobia sat at the writing desk and Helene settled down to read, the room felt very tiny, indeed.

  “Oh, my. Listen to this, Geraldine!”

  “One moment,” Zenobia responded without lifting her head. A villain had let loose a pair of zombies aboard her heroine’s airship; in the water below, monstrous sharks circled a lifeboat filled with her crew. Zenobia had just thought of a brilliant quip to accompany Lady Lynx’s leap into action, but she was still a sentence away.

  “Geraldine, you must listen!” A rustle of cotton and the creak of wood said that Helene had risen from her chair. “We might jeopardize my husband’s position if we don’t take care!”

  Blast it all. She couldn’t avoid the interruption now. Zenobia scribbled the quip in the corner of the page and looked up.

  Helene stood beside her table, cradling a leather-bound volume in both hands. She’d braced the bottom of the heavy tome against her breasts, the pages open to the middle of the book.

  Using her breasts as a shelf was the most practical thing Helene had done all day.

  Zenobia opened her mouth to respond, then realized they weren’t alone. In the sitting area, her guard occupied the seat beside Helene’s abandoned one. Mara was stabbing a needle through a hem, and the lace cap over her black hair fluttered as she shook her head.

  Zenobia hadn’t even noticed that Mara had entered the cabin—which was yet another reason she needed the mercenary around while she was writing. It wouldn’t do at all for a pirate to prance up behind her and snatch her from her chair.

  On this voyage, however, Mara had been offering protection of another sort. She’d provided a buffer against Helene’s constant chatter, allowing Zenobia opportunity to work.

  Though, to be fair, Helene didn’t know that Zenobia wrote more than letters. To Helene, she wasn’t Zenobia Fox, the author of popular serial adventures and the oft-kidnapped sister to one of the wealthiest men who’d ever flung himself into danger. She was only Geraldine Gunther-Baptiste, who’d lived in the house next door to Helene until fourteen years before, when Geraldine’s mother had died. Since then, Zenobia’s letters to her friend had concealed much and lied often.

  Which meant that Zenobia hadn’t been a very good friend at all. She should try to be a better one. She owed that to Helene, who had been at Zenobia’s side through the worst of days—and a minor interruption did not count as the worst of anything.

  Determinedly, she pushed aside her irritation. “What does your book say?”

  “That we must bow upon meeting a Nipponese man and upon taking our leave.”

  Why did that warrant such urgency? Women and men curtsied and bowed everywhere. Half the people in the Americas and what was left of Europe bobbed up and down with regularity.

  Perplexed, Zenobia glanced at the title. Dancing Through the Red Wall: A Ladies’ Handbook of Nipponese Traditions and Customs.

  Zenobia couldn’t conceive why such a handbook would only be for ladies, but she wasn’t surprised to see it in Helene’s possession. Her friend had taken her role as an ambassador’s wife to heart, applying herself to learning as much of the language and the history as she could during their journey.

  Much of the information Helene had shared was fascinating, but Zenobia was skeptical of its accuracy. For centuries, almost from the date that the residents of the far-eastern islands had fled from the Mongol Horde and settled in northeastern Australia, Nippon’s borders had been closed to foreigners. Only recently had the empire begun to loosen those restrictions—probably not enough time for the author of the handbook to gain a comprehensive understanding of traditions and customs.

  After all, Zenobia had lived in Fladstrand for ten years, and she still sometimes felt like the odd duck. She didn’t expect to feel any different in the Red City, handbook or n
ot.

  “What sort of bow?”

  Turning the book around, Helene tapped her finger alongside a drawing of a man bending over at the waist so far that his forehead was almost level with his feet.

  She was supposed to fold herself in half? “That’s not physically possible.”

  “It’s important,” Helene stressed, though when she glanced down at the figure, a little crease formed between her brows, as if she were also wondering how to attain the position without toppling over. “Failing to bow is a slap against his honor—and a man who is dishonored will kill himself.”

  “If someone doesn’t bow?” At Helene’s solemn nod, Zenobia stared at her in disbelief. This had to be utter nonsense. “Will he do it at that very moment?”

  “Yes.” Helene pinched the first fifty or sixty pages of the book between her fingers. “All of this explains how critical it is not to insult a man’s honor.”

  How unfortunate for any men who crossed paths with Zenobia, then. She sometimes gave offense when she didn’t mean to—though when she did give offense, she usually meant to. Upon reaching the Red City, however, she might inadvertently leave a trail of corpses in her wake.

  “That custom favors women, I think,” Zenobia said. “If a husband strays or if he proves a disappointment, the wife only has to refrain from bowing and she is quickly free of him.”

  Two spots of color appeared on Helene’s cheeks. “It is not well done to mock their customs. And I would never have imagined that you would make light of losing a husband.”

  And it was fortunate that women weren’t so ready to kill themselves when offended, or Zenobia would be short one friend. But she bit her tongue. Helene desperately wanted to prove herself an asset to her husband, and she had more to lose when they arrived at the Red City than Zenobia did.

  But Zenobia couldn’t imagine that Helene would be an asset if she made a habit of greeting men with her bottom in the air and her head between her feet.

  She glanced at Mara. The other woman met her eyes and shook her head. So the book was nonsense. Several times, the mercenary had corrected Zenobia’s pronunciation of the Nipponese phrases Helene had taught her, but doing the same for her friend might have invited too many questions about how and where Mara had acquired her knowledge.

  The woman whom Helene knew as Geraldine could have no reason to keep two mercenaries in her employ. So on this journey, Mara posed as Zenobia’s lady’s maid—a role that didn’t sit easily. Zenobia’s brown hair had never looked more terrible than it had under Mara’s care, and her needle had tortured the hem of Zenobia’s favorite dress beyond repair. More than once, Helene had quietly suggested that Mara was unsuited to the position.

  More than once, Mara had quietly suggested stuffing a gag into Helene’s mouth until they reached the Red City.

  But although Mara was the sort who took pleasure in gagging people—or shooting them, if they attempted to kidnap Zenobia—she had a heart full of love for two things: her husband and money. If offered a bonus, Mara would help Helene.

  Zenobia raised her brows. Mara sighed before nodding.

  “Helene,” Zenobia said gently. The other woman’s color was still high and her mouth pressed into a thin line. “Mara worked within the Nipponese enclave in the Ivory Market for many years. She might be able to point to anything in your book that might have been exaggerated or misunderstood.”

  “In an enclave?”

  With a sweep of her blue skirt, Helene turned to study Mara, and in that moment Zenobia disliked her friend very much. The examination wasn’t the sort one person gave another when taking their measure. Instead, Helene looked upon Mara as if she were an unusual insect.

  Helene’s head tilted. “I thought you were Horde. Your eyes are slanted, so you are obviously from the Asian continent.”

  “My family fled the Golden Empire—what you call the Horde—before I was born, ma’am. We settled in the enclave with people from all regions of the empire.” Mara smiled sweetly and jabbed her needle through pale green cotton—nowhere near the hem. “Just as people in other enclaves fled their nations. Yet many of us retained our customs and languages.”

  “But the Ivory Market is in Africa,” Helene said, hefting the book. “This author lived in the Red City for more than a year. Much closer, you must agree, and the people he observed more genuinely Nipponese.”

  “If you say, ma’am,” Mara responded easily, and Zenobia decided to double that month’s pay.

  “And there is much the author was able to observe that a girl could not. He tells us how the women are kept hidden away, silenced and meek. Like maids, I suppose.” Helene sighed. “It’s unfortunate that all of those honorable women should live in such a way.”

  The needle stabbed through another virgin stretch of cotton. “I suppose that to avoid offending men who are accustomed to meek women, you would also have to be very quiet. Ma’am.”

  “Yes.” With a thoughtful frown, Helene stroked her fingers down the book’s spine. “Or perhaps my example will open their eyes to a more modern view of women and their roles.”

  Oh, dear. Mara’s sweet smile had begun to look more like a tiger’s, and Zenobia had never wished so hard for a kidnapping. The four times she’d been taken for ransom had not been so horrible, in retrospect. She’d been fed and treated with care. The pirates had only wanted money, and they wouldn’t have received a single coin if she was harmed. The hostility brewing in this cabin seemed far more dangerous.

  Then Helene set the book aside, as if signaling that she was finished with the topic for now, and Zenobia breathed again.

  She glanced down at her page. The scribble in the corner had been a brilliant quip, she remembered. Lady Lynx had been going to draw her gun and say . . . what?

  She couldn’t remember. And she couldn’t read the scribble.

  Blast. She dipped her pen and scratched out the useless note. It had been a foolish thought, anyway. Lady Lynx wouldn’t quip. She would simply shoot, and coldly watch the villain fall dead.

  Zenobia sometimes wished that she could be as ruthless.

  “Are you well?” Helene softly touched her shoulder before sinking onto the nearby bed. “You look quite fierce.”

  “I’m frustrating myself, trying to think of a suitable word to describe the waters in this part of the ocean,” Zenobia lied. “What color would you call it?”

  “‘Blue,’” Helene offered. “You are penning another letter? It seems to me that there is only the horrid food and the rumbling of the engines to remark upon. And the seagulls. Never has there been such incessant cawing, or so much reason to wear a bonnet. It’s astonishing that you have so much to say.”

  Zenobia hadn’t had much to say at all—and had only managed to complete two chapters in the weeks aboard the airship. Perhaps she’d have made more progress if she hadn’t been writing by hand, but the clacking of her typesetting machine gave Helene headaches.

  “Are you writing to your brother again?”

  Though she loved Archimedes, Zenobia couldn’t pretend such fondness that she would write him every day. “This is to Grandmother Inkslinger.”

  Another lie, on top of an older one. Several years before, she’d described her living situation to Helene, and it had been simpler to claim she had been briefly married and widowed than to try convincing her friend that it was perfectly proper for a young woman to live alone. In Zenobia’s experience, admitting to spinsterhood only resulted in good-intentioned attempts to steer men in her direction. But a widow’s independence was rarely questioned.

  The lie served her well during this trip, too. She hadn’t wanted to travel as Zenobia Fox and make herself a target for every pirate and fortune hunter. Yet her maiden name, Gunther-Baptiste, might have brought as much attention in this part of the world. Her brother had smuggled weapons for Horde rebels under that name, until he’d run afoul of a powerful general. Archimedes had changed his name then; Zenobia had done the same, fearing that any assassins would come fo
r him through her.

  Archimedes had recently paid his debt to the general, but Zenobia didn’t want to take the chance that someone who hadn’t heard the price on her brother’s head had been lifted might recognize her name. So she traveled as Geraldine Inkslinger, instead.

  “It’s wonderful that you still correspond with your late husband’s family.” A wistful note softened Helen’s voice. “You must have gotten on very well with them.”

  “Not at all. I continue writing to them so that they feel obligated to respond, even though they must hate that obligation.” Which was another lie. If Zenobia had possessed a dead husband and resentful relatives, however, she would have taken great pleasure in making it true. She glanced up with a smile, but it faded as she took in Helene’s pale face and compressed mouth. “Are you well?”

  Swallowing hard, Helene managed a sickly nod. Her hand pressed to her stomach. “It is the swaying again.”

  Perhaps. The motion of an airship did make some passengers nauseous.

  So did pregnancy.

  Helene had not yet confided whether she was, and her petite figure did not yet show evidence of it. But pregnancy would explain why she had arrived at Zenobia’s home so unexpectedly, without companions or a single word in advance, and why she’d wanted to immediately travel to Australia. She had been separated from her husband for the better part of a year. If Helene was with child, either Basile Auger had astonishing ejaculatory capabilities, impregnating her from halfway around the world, or she’d lain with another man.

  Zenobia had never met Helene’s husband and she didn’t know his temperament. She didn’t know whether the worry and strain she often glimpsed on Helene’s face came from the guilt of betrayal or fear of his reaction. But many years before, Helene had offered her support when Zenobia’s mother had worn the same worried look—worry that had become terror when her father returned home. So Zenobia would help her friend now, until she was certain Helene had nothing to fear. If that meant staying with her until the baby was born, she would. And if it meant using every resource she possessed to help Helene escape, she would.