“Wait for the order!” Mr. Hirst called above the roar. He pointed at the signal patch on the airship’s membrane. It was made of cuttlefish skin, the master engineer had explained, connected by fabricated nervous tissue to receptors down on the bridge. When the ship’s officers placed colored paper on the sensors, the signal patch would mimic the hue exactly, like a camouflaged creature in the wild. Brilliant red meant full speed ahead, purple meant half power, and blue meant quarter speed, with other shades in between.
But with these untried engines, Alek doubted that his notion of “half speed” would be the same as Klopp’s. It might take days to get the balance right, and the Germans would be here in minutes.
The ground ropes were flailing as riggers cut them loose, and Alek felt another lurch beneath his feet. The cold wind was tugging at the ship now, the great beast skidding sideways along the glacier.
“Quarter speed!” Hirst yelled. The signal patch had turned dark blue.
Alek slowly pushed the foot pedal down. The propeller engaged. It spun lazily for a moment, and then gears meshed and caught, the blades disappearing into a blur.
Soon the propeller was drawing an icy wind across the uncovered pod. He ducked lower, pulling his coat tight. What would full speed feel like?
“Down a notch,” Hirst cried.
Alek looked at the signal patch, which had turned paler. He eased the saunter back a bit, careful not to stall the engine.
“Hear that?” Hoffman said in the relative quiet. “Klopp’s engine.”
Alek listened hard—and made out a distant roar. While his own engine idled, Klopp’s was going strong, pushing them into a gradual left turn.
“It’s working!” he cried, amazed that the Stormwalker’s engines could move something so vast through the sky.
“But why are we turning east?” Hoffman asked. “Isn’t the frigate coming from that way?”
Alek translated the question for Mr. Hirst.
“It might be that the captain wants to build up speed down the valley. We’re a bit heavy, thanks to your engines, and forward motion gives the ship lift.” Hirst hooked a thumb over his shoulder. “Or it might be that he’s spotted those blighters back there… .”
Alek turned, peering through the blur of propeller blades. Behind them a fleet of airships was rising over the mountains—Kondors, Predator interceptors, and a giant Albatross assault ship dangling gliders from its gondola. A vast aerial attack, timed to descend just as the Herkules and its scouts arrived from Austria.
The master engineer leaned back on the struts, lazily resting a foot on the main joint. He slipped his goggles on and said, “I hope these noisy contraptions of yours are ready.”
“I hope so too.” Alek adjusted his own goggles and turned back to the controls. The Leviathan’s nose swung slowly eastward, till finally the airship was aimed down the length of the valley.
“FULL THROTTLE.”
The signal patch turned bright red.
Alek didn’t wait for Hirst’s command. He pushed the saunter forward hard. A sputter erupted for a moment in the tangle of gears and pistons. But then the engine roared back to life, the propeller spinning into a shimmer of sunlight.
“Check your bearings!” Hirst yelled over the noise.
Alek saw what the man meant—the airship was veering to starboard, his engine pushing harder than Klopp’s. The black teeth of the mountains loomed ahead.
He pulled the saunter back a bit, but a moment later the ship was swinging too far the other way. Klopp must have also seen the turn and pushed his own engine to compensate.
Alek growled with frustration. It was like two men trying to pilot a walker, each with control of one leg.
Mr. Hirst laughed and shouted, “Don’t worry, lad. The airbeast has the idea now.”
Alek squinted against the icy headwind. Stretched out beside him the creature’s flank had come alive. Waves traveled down its length, like a field of grass rippling in a strong wind.
“What’s happening?”
“They’re called cilia. Like tiny oars stirring the air. The beast will steady us, even if your Clanker engines can’t.”
Alek swallowed, unable to take his gaze from the undulating surface of the airbeast. Working on the engines, he’d tried to think of the airship as a vast machine. Now it had become a living creature again.
Somehow the tiny cilia were guiding them down the valley. It was like riding a horse, Alek supposed. You could tell it where to go, but it chose where its own footsteps fell.
Hoffman nudged his shoulder. “Say farewell to our happy home, young master.”
Alek looked to his left. The castle was shooting past beside them. Provisions for ten years, and he’d spent all of two nights there… .
But it was much too close—the castle walls were almost level with the engine. Below Alek the dangling drop lines were still dragging along the snow. And they were headed straight toward the frigate and its scouts.
“We’re not climbing!”
“Looks like we’re carrying an extra half ton or so,” Hirst shouted. “The boffins can’t have been this wrong! Are you certain these engines aren’t heavier than you told us?”
“Impossible! Master Klopp knows the exact weight of every piece of the Stormwalker.”
“Well, something’s holding us down!” Hirst yelled.
Alek saw flickers of light before them—more ballast spilling from the forward tanks. Then something solid spun past below.
“God’s wounds!” Hoffman swore. “That was a chair!”
“What’s going on?” Alek yelled at Hirst.
The master engineer watched another chair flutter toward the ground. “They’ve sounded a ballast alert. Everything we can spare, over the side.” He pointed ahead. “And there’s why!”
Alek squinted against the icy wind. A white haze was rising in the distance. Metal limbs flashed in the sunlight, churning up a cloud of snow.
The Herkules was hurtling up the valley toward them. At this altitude the Leviathan’s bridge would crash straight into its gun deck.
Alek’s instinct was to pull back on the saunter. But the signal patch was still red. Losing speed meant losing lift, which would only make things worse. And turning about would take them into the guns of the pursuing zeppelins.
Hoffman grasped his arm, leaning in close and muttering in fast German, “This may be the wildcount’s fault.”
“What do you mean?” Alek asked. He’d hardly seen Volger since their argument the day before. The count had sourly agreed to the plan, but hadn’t helped at all with the engines. He’d spent the day hiking to and fro from the wrecked Stormwalker, transferring the wireless set and spare parts to their new cabins in the Leviathan.
“We were moving things to your cabin, sir. Twice he had me wrap up a gold bar in your clothes. And heavy they were too.”
Alek closed his eyes. What had Volger been thinking? Every bar of gold weighed twenty kilograms. A dozen hidden bars would be like having three stowaways aboard!
“Take the controls!” he cried.
THIRTY-EIGHT
The struts leading to the airship were vibrating like piano strings, pulsing in time with the engine. The metal shivered in his hands, and Alek held tight against the icy winds, climbing quickly past the startled master engineer.
“Where are you going?” the man shouted.
Alek didn’t answer, his gaze fixed on the ground slipping past below. He couldn’t see how Dylan scrambled about on those ropes so casually. The leather safety harnesses the Darwinists wore hardly seemed thick enough to hold a man’s weight. Of course, they were probably made of fabricated leather, but that was only more unnerving.