Storming

Forty-Seven

AS SOON AS Jael and Walter were free, they got Hitch’s shoulder wound packed and bandaged. It hurt like the devil’s ugly face, but it wasn’t bleeding too much and he still had pretty good flexion. At least Zlo had missed hitting anything too important, like arteries and tendons.

As best he could with one and a half arms, he snugged the ropes around the guard’s wrists. Then he gave the kid’s head an extra bonk on the floor—just because. The guard’s eyes rolled white again, and he moaned against the gag—Taos’s gag—stuffed in his mouth.

Schturming fishtailed in the wind, and the floor slanted even more.

Hitch groaned and stood up. “Now let’s get out of here. And I do mean now.” He looked at Jael. “How do we get to the wheelhouse?”

She had buttressed herself with one hand on the chart table and the other on Walter’s shoulder. “It is on next level up. There are stairs in engines room.” She eyed him, her face crimped with pain. “What are you going to do?”

He clamped his bad arm against his stomach and extended the other one, herding her and Walter toward the door. “I’m going to find Zlo. Then I’m going to find his knife. And then I’m going to stick his knife right in his black heart.”

“But ship, it is crashing. We have to exit.”

“Also part of the plan.”

They hustled down the corridors, following Jael’s directions. She kept them mostly to the back routes, clear of the traffic. And there was plenty of traffic.

Every juncture they passed was crowded with men, running and shouting. Heavy boots clomped against the canted floor. Lights flickered through the doorways and cast mutating shadows across the floors. In the distance, a klaxon blared.

A faint breeze blew through the hallways, carrying a whiff of smoke. A fire under a gas bag. Just what they all needed.

“They are evacuating,” Jael whispered. “With elevators.”

Hitch looked down to where he was supporting her in the crook of his good arm. “They’re not even going to try to fix the engines?”

She lifted a shoulder. “We have damaged maybe more than we thought. Or they are too afraid of fire.”

“Well, that’s something.”

Whether it was a good something or a bad something remained to be seen. He firmed his mouth. At least if they all had to die in a fireball, they’d take the infernal ship with them.

Walter trotted along at his side. He peered up at him. “Are we… evacuating?”

“You bet your buttons, kiddo.”

They passed the observation balcony where he and Jael had gotten trapped earlier. At the end of the corridor, he raised the bar from the entrance to the cargo bay, then eased open the door. The room lay in darkness. The big doors to the storm had been closed, and without the propellers thunking away in the engine room beyond, the only sounds filtering in were the muffled shouts of Zlo’s crew.

“All right, c’mon,” he said.

He hauled Jael through the door and halfway across the room, all the way to the Jenny—which Zlo, fortunately, hadn’t had the foresight to chuck overboard. In fact, somebody had cleared the boxes away from it enough to turn it around, and then they’d tied it down so it hadn’t gotten tossed around when the dirigible swerved. Looked like they thought they’d found themselves a prize.

He pushed Jael on ahead. “Go on to the engines. I’ll meet you there.”

She knit her brows, but staggered on anyway.

He turned to Walter and knelt to eye level. “Everybody’s got a part in this plan, you hear me?”

Walter nodded, tight-lipped.

“I need you to keep Taos here while Jael and I take care of a few things. If Jael comes back and tells you to, I want you to help her start up the plane, like I showed you the other day, okay? You remember where all the switches are?”

Walter frowned, but he nodded again.

“Of course you do.” Hitch’s heart bumped up into his throat. He opened his mouth to say more, but there was way yonder too much. He helped Walter into the rear cockpit. Then he directed Taos into the front.

If something went wrong and he couldn’t get back to them before the fire spread too far, Jael would never get the doors open by herself. So he took five precious seconds to heave them open, one-handed. Rain-flecked wind swirled in.

When he turned back, Walter was watching him. The boy had his face all scrunched up and his head cocked to the side, like he used to do when he was trying to ask a question.

Hitch headed for the engine room and reached to touch Walter’s head as he passed.

“Wait.” Walter swiveled in the cockpit. “Aren’t you going to come back?”

Hitch stopped and looked over his shoulder. “You just wait there. I’ll be back as soon as I can.” Then he started walking.

This time, the only way to come back was to leave.

Jael had already made it into the engine room. She huddled over the dawsedometer and its steady hum, clicking away at the buttons.

Hitch hustled toward her, looking around as he came. Wonder of wonders, nobody else was here. If she was right about the evacuation, they could be flying an empty ship now, for all they knew.

The ceiling creaked. Footsteps? Or the wind?

She looked up at him, mouth tight. “_Yakor_—my pendant—it is gone. Zlo must have taken it.”

“But you don’t need it to shut it off, right?”

“No.” Still, a muscle in her jaw twitched. She’d fought a long time to keep that thing from Zlo. Had to rankle a little to know he’d gotten it in the end, even if maybe it didn’t matter anymore.

“How long will it take to shut down?” he asked.

“It is all the way on this time. It takes ten minuti, maybe more.”

“As soon as you get that thing off, you hurry on back to Walter. I’ll join you as soon as I can. Then we’re all going home.” He headed on past her, toward the spiraling metal stairs that would lead him to the upper levels. If Zlo was still up there, they’d do this the hard and final way. If not, at least maybe he could give a shot to figuring out how to maneuver Schturming for a survivable landing.

“Hitch.”

He stopped at the bottom of the stairs and looked back.

She leaned one trembling hand against the dawsedometer. This close to the machine had to be murder for her. In the lamp-lit darkness, her pupils looked huge, her eyes almost all black.

She shook her head. “Hitch, I do not think this is good plan. We should go, all of us now. Let Zlo crash.”

“And if he doesn’t crash? Or if he crashes this thing on top of a house with a family and kids in it?” He dug down deep and found his cockiest grin. It felt a little false, even to him. “It’s going to be okay.” He stared at her. “Jael…”

Now or never.

He walked back to her. “I just want you to know…”

She tilted her head all the way back to look up at him.

“I just want you to know I could never have done this without you—any of it.” He touched the back of his hand to her face. “You’re the most incredibly brave person I’ve ever met.”

The corner of her mouth crooked up. “That was my thought for you.”

He let his hand slide down off her chin. “Stay alive, okay?”

Her breath shuddered. “You too, Hitch Hitchcock.”

He turned away.

He ran up the stairs, three at a time, then all the way down the empty corridor to the bow and up another flight of spiral stairs.

The wheelhouse lay in a flickering half-darkness, lit only by lanterns secured near the ceiling. He stopped five steps from the top, with his head still below the railing. He peered around the corner.

Big paned windows lined both walls, looking out onto more observation balconies. The room tapered to a point, where another window, half again as tall as the others, revealed the night ahead of them. The sky looked maybe a hair less black than the last time he’d seen it, but lightning glimmered, building up inside the clouds, no doubt on the remaining juice of the powering-down dawsedometer. They’d been up here for hours. Surely, the time had to be getting along about sunrise.

Beneath the front window, the ship’s wheel spun drunkenly. No one manned the helm.

Maybe Zlo really had abandoned ship. The man was no fool. But if he left now, it would mean he’d given up on his dreams. Schturming was the only life Zlo knew, and the dawsedometer was the best resource he’d ever have. If he let the ship crash, he’d lose both in one fell swoop. And judging from that gleam he’d had in his eye, he wanted both a little too much to let go.

Hitch climbed another couple of steps and looked over the railing.

Behind the spinning wheel, a small shadow moved. Golden eyes gleamed. Feathers ruffled.

The bird. Maksim. Would Zlo have left him behind?

A blast of wind clouted the ship, and the wheel whirled to starboard. The whole ship banked.

If Schturming flipped too far over, that certainly couldn’t be good. And if she decided to tilt bow-ward, the Jenny was likely to fall right out of the bay and take Walter and Taos with her.

Hitch looked around once more, then stepped all the way up into the wheelhouse.

He made it two strides toward the wheel.

From behind, an arm closed around him. Hot air whooshed against the back of his neck, and a sticky blade creased his throat.

He thrust himself backward and threw his arms wide, trying to break the bear hug. His torn shoulder flared pain. No good.

The hot breath panted harder. “Ti vonuchaya zhaba, you are crashing my ship! For that, I will kill you twice.”

Hitch hammered his good elbow back and found ribs.

Zlo woofed an exhale. His grip loosened.

Hitch thrust his elbow back again and twisted, both to lever more power into the blow and to squirm free.

Even as Zlo lost his balance and spun away backwards, he stabbed Hitch.

The tip of the blade bit into the buttoned-up front of Hitch’s jacket. It tore through leather, past his shirt, and sliced a thin line of fire all the way across his stomach.

Instinctively, he doubled over and clamped his arm over it. Just as fast, he yanked the arm away to get a look. Underneath his torn clothes, blood seeped out of a long gash. Not too deep. Mostly, the blade had just chewed through skin. It hadn’t punctured past muscle into the important stuff. But that didn’t stop his heart from revving.

He looked up and glared. “Stop stabbin’ me!”

Zlo had tripped face first into the stairwell railing and opened up his nosebleed again. He came up snorting blood and shaking his head, probably to clear his vision.

The ship lurched, stern down this time. More lightning gathered in the clouds outside, flickering ominously. Thunder bellowed, so loud Hitch could practically feel it against his skin.

Zlo fell back and skidded down the floor—right to Hitch.

Hitch caught one of Zlo’s arms and spun him around. He hammered his fist into Zlo’s nose. Bone, blood, and cartilage squished around like a crawdad under a boot. Probably, the nose had busted back when Hitch had kicked him in the face. But like Earl was always telling him, it paid to make sure a job got done right.

This man pitched women off his deck into the night, kidnapped little boys, and whipped dogs. So help him God, Hitch didn’t need a knife to finish this filth. He’d do it with his bare hand.

He hit Zlo again—and again.

Zlo swayed back and forth and barely kept his feet. His eyes rolled around wildly. He opened his mouth and burbled out a desperate yowl.

“Yeah, scream.” Hitch clenched his teeth. “Maybe God’ll hear you.”

With a screech and a flurry of wings, the eagle dove across the room, straight for Hitch’s face.

He shot his arm up just in time. The talons skipped off his forearm, and the bird gouged at him with its beak.

Using both hands, Zlo wrenched Hitch’s grip loose from his shirt.

Hitch punched Maksim square in the body.

With a squawk, the bird hit the deck, wings spread.

Zlo staggered backwards. Blood slicked his lips and chin, and his eye sockets were already starting to swell. He held the knife out one-handed, wobbling it all over the place. “You are fool.” With his other hand, he scrabbled inside his vest.

Hitch eyed the knife. “Probably.” The dawsedometer thrummed up through the soles of his feet. It was fainter now, but Jael still hadn’t gotten it quite turned off.

“I never had argument with you.” With every word, blood spattered from Zlo’s mouth. “You are like me—like all of us here in Schturming. You fly. The sky belongs to you. You could have flown away from all of this. I would have let you go.”

“You weren’t what kept me here.”

The ship lurched crazily again. It rolled to starboard, and the floor under Hitch’s feet turned into a steep incline skidding him toward Zlo.

With a yell, Zlo yanked Jael’s pendant from inside his vest. He turned for the window, for the lightning.

The crazy idiot. What was he trying to do? Pull in the lightning? Yes, of course, he was. Just as Jael had done: Zlo would pull in the lightning. But it wouldn’t hit him. However it was the yakor worked, it would protect Zlo while Hitch got fried.

Adrenaline surged. Hitch managed to yank his bad arm up high enough to just barely smack away Zlo’s knife. With his other hand, he grabbed at the pendant. He pitched himself forward, and his weight hit Zlo full in the body. They slid down the floor, straight for the windows.

He buried his face in the crook of Zlo’s collar, and then they plowed through the glass. If nothing else, maybe the pendant would protect both of them. Cold wind slashed his hair. Rain and specks of ice splattered the back of his neck. Then just as suddenly, the ship rocked the other way.

The balcony railing smashed against Zlo’s legs. He toppled over backwards.

Hitch hung onto the pendant.

It ripped from Zlo’s hand, and with a shriek, Zlo plummeted over the railing.

Hitch barely let go of Zlo in time. He slammed into the railing himself and caught it with both hands. His elbows locked, straining to keep his weight back long enough.

Within the blue-black cloud, the glow of the lightning swelled. All around him, the air turned to electricity. The hairs on his neck and arms stood on end. The smell of the blood on his arms turned to burnt copper.

He loosed a yell from his own throat and hurled the pendant out into the storm. He hit the deck, hands over his head.

With a great clap, the lightning burst out. From the corner of his eye, he could see its blinding flash spear straight toward the pendant.

Beneath it, Zlo pinwheeled, screaming, into the darkness. The lightning ricocheted off the pendant in an umbrella of energy, shot toward Zlo, and cracked into him.

No more scream.

Beneath Hitch’s feet, the floor finished straightening out. Still on his knees, he tilted back from the railing and rammed into the windowsill behind him. His whole body was shaking like it was in an earthquake. Everything smelled like burnt rain, but he was alive. He made himself turn around.

He’d done it. Zlo was dead. They’d won.

Behind him, warning sirens shrieked. The ship bucked and started to dive.

Death by gutting was no longer a threat. Time to focus on death by fireball.

He scrambled over the jagged glass in the window frame and ran for the wheel.

The view through the bow window showed the clouds breaking up. A faraway rim of scarlet lined the horizon and glinted against the raindrops spotting the glass.

He gripped the wheel and tried to steady it. The ship fought him, and she had a whole lot more weight to argue with than the Jenny’d ever had. The biceps of his good arm swelled with the strain. His wounded arm hung heavy and numb, pretty near useless.

He leaned to the other side, trying to see the ground. “C’mon, give me a reference point.”

Another skein of clouds melted away. Lights gleamed through the murk below. City lights.

“Oh, gravy.”

Schturming was headed straight toward town, and she was maybe only a thousand feet in the air.

No matter which direction he pointed her, she’d never completely clear the town in time to prevent casualties. And as for getting her back up, it was a good bet the crew hadn’t paused to fix the gas stoppage before they’d all so thoughtfully evacuated.

The best anybody could do now was to pilot her where she’d do the least damage.

Sure appeared that anybody was him.

He looked around for the speaking pipe. It hung off the ceiling, about a foot from his mouth. He filled his lungs. “Jael!” Please let her hear him. He shouted her name again. Then once more. “Jae—”

“Hitch!” Her voice, tinny through the pipe, echoed back. “We are crashing! What is happening? Where is Zlo?”

“Zlo’s dead, so never mind him. And you’re right, we are crashing. I need you to climb in the Jenny with Walter and take him out of here. You got that?”

“What? No! We cannot fly. You are only one who can pilot!” Her exhale whuffed through the pipe. “I am not leaving you, Hitch. Do not be crazy, not now!”

“Jael, this ship will crash. You have to get Walter out of here. If I’m going to do this, then I need to know the two of you are safe. He can fly the Jenny, I know he can. It’s not that hard, and he’s a natural. You’ll just have to handle the rudder for him.”

“He is little boy!”

“He can do it. Help him. You’ve got a better chance of surviving in the plane than you will up here!”

“Hitch—” Her voice caught.

He could almost see her expression, halfway between crying and wanting to punch him in the face.

“You need to live,” she said. “You wanted to start again. You wanted to be there for Walter. You cannot do that if you are dead.”

“I am starting again.” He looked out the window, his one good hand planted on the wheel. “This is my start.”