Butcher Bird

TWENTY-FOUR Amazing Grace

Spyder awoke sometime around dawn. Lulu was curled up next to him under a blanket on a big love seat. Spyder looked around for Shrike, but she wasn’t anywhere in sight. Water was boiling on the little stove.

He got up carefully, trying not to wake Lulu, and went outside. The steady wind was wet and frigid. Spyder wrapped his arms around himself and went to the bow where Primo and Shrike, in her heavy coat, were talking. As he rounded the corner of the cabin, Spyder saw what the two were talking about. Another airship was hanging twenty or so yards off the port bow. It was shaped like an immense black scorpion. A metal cable was slowly extending from the scorpion ship’s gondola, which hung from the end of the stinger.

“What’s going on?” asked Spyder.

“According to Primo, they’ve been shadowing us all morning,” said Shrike.

“What’s that line they’re sending over here?”

“A communication device,” said Primo. “I believe.”

“You don’t know?”

“It’s similar to devices I’ve seen, but I can’t be sure.”

“In any case, they’ll be tethered to us. I don’t like that,” said Shrike.

“What’s up, Spyder?” came a voice. He turned to see Lulu coming from the cabin.

“The neighbors want to borrow a cup of sugar.”

“Holy shit,” Lulu said, coming up behind him. “Are we happy about this?”

“I don’t think we have any choice,” said Shrike. “Spyder, not that I want you doing anything crazy, but would you go into the cabin and get that demon blade that Madame Cinders gave us?”

“Apollyon’s knife?”

Shrike nodded. “It’s wrapped in a silk scarf. If anything comes off that ship, I want to know we can kill it.”

“We going Texas Chainsaw on the other blimp, too?” asked Lulu. She pointed off to starboard.

“Spyder…?” said Shrike.

“Another ship’s coming out of the clouds,” he said. “A burning heart wrapped in thorns. It looks like a Christian sacred heart.”

“It’s the Seraphic Brotherhood,” said Primo, “pledged to the archangel Michael. They’re warrior priests.”

“Are they approaching us?” asked Shrike.

“No,” said Spyder. “They’re just hanging parallel a mile or two away.”

“There’s others out there, too,” said Lulu.

“She’s right. I can see a half-dozen other ships, but they’re mostly just dots.”

“Get the blade, Spyder,” Shrike said.

He ducked below deck and Lulu followed him.

“Lulu, I want you to stay in here,” said Spyder. He stalked around the cabin looking for the silken bundle.

“I’m no cotillion queen, Spyder. I can take care of myself.”

“Not when you’re coming off junk.”

“I wasn’t that deep in this time.”

On the kitchen counter, he spotted the bundle. “In any case, I’ll feel better knowing you’re safe.” Spyder found a butcher knife on the stove and tossed it to her. “But if anything with more than one head comes through the door, feel free to stick it.”

“That’s pretty much always my policy.”

“That’s my girl.” Spyder grabbed his leather jacket and headed back onto the deck.

“Hey, Spyder!”

“Yeah, Lulu?”

“Your kamikaze girl outside? She’s a sweet slice of honeydew.”

“That she is.”

When Spyder got back to the bow of the ship, the cable that had been spooling from the scorpion had settled onto the port railing, clamping itself in place with a single golden claw. A rotating disc had flipped open at the top of the claw and there was a grainy image of a young man flickering on a small screen before the wheel. The young man’s face was cut through with snowy scan lines. He wore a dark uniform of a severe cut (and marked with numerous medals and campaign ribbons) and a kind of silver ring around his head. To Spyder’s relief, he was clearly human. The young man and Primo were speaking rapidly in a language Spyder didn’t understand.

“Did I miss anything good?” Spyder asked Shrike.

“We’re being offered a bribe,” Shrike whispered. “The young pup doing all the talking is Bel, the crown prince of the Erragal Clan. One of the powerful houses of the Third Sphere.”

“What exactly are we being bribed for?”

“They know where we’re going and what we’re bringing back. They want the book.”

“I’m guessing these aren’t the kind of people Madame Cinders would have over to tell her troubles to.”

“It’s unlikely,” said Shrike. “Did you bring the knife?”

“I’ve got it under my coat.”

“Don’t do anything until I tell you. For now, we’re just playing a diplomacy game. Primo is politely telling the prince thanks, but no thanks.”

“What if he gets mad? Last time I looked there was fuck-all but water under us.”

“Those other airships should keep him in line. The Erragals are powerful, but they wouldn’t want to be seen shooting an unarmed ship from the sky.”

“Pardon me,” said Primo, “but the young prince is becoming very agitated. I don’t think that anyone has every refused an Erragal royal bribe before.”

“Tell him we’re on Hajj. Religious pilgrims can’t accept bribes.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Off to the starboard side of the ship, the sky opened like a sunbeam slicing through a cloudbank. A pale, sexless, beatific face appeared between the ship and the Seraphic Brotherhood’s floating heart. The face was glowing, like a child’s dream of angels, and when it spoke, its voice was like thunder.

“Fuck me,” whispered Spyder.

“I know that sound,” said Shrike. “God’s Army to the rescue.”

“What are you talking about?”

“Listen.”

All Spyder could hear was the echo and rumble of the transparent head hanging in the cold ocean air. The voice and the size of the thing weren’t what was most awful about it; it was the utter blissfulness of its expression. Spyder had seen faces like that before—especially the eyes—when being analyzed by court-appointed psychiatrists and being sentenced by compassionate judges who sent him off to juvenile work camps for his own good. They were the understanding eyes of kindly folk who burned witches alive to save their souls. But when Spyder glanced back to the prince, he saw that Primo had dropped out of the conversation completely.

Lulu emerged from the cabin, clutching the butcher knife to her chest. “Are we dead yet?” she asked.

“Getting there,” said Spyder. He nodded toward Bel’s image. The young prince’s flickering face was creased with anger. He was clearly no longer addressing Primo, but the Seraphic Brotherhood’s ghost representative. The wraith head nodded and calmly answered the young prince’s furious chatter. “The bribers are bitch-slapping each other,” Spyder said.

“Or arguing over who gets to suck our bones,” said Lulu.

“We’ll know soon,” said Shrike.

“Hey, Spyder?”

“What, Lulu?”

“When we were kids, did you ever picture yourself freezing to death while God and a big scorpion tried to decide who was going to eat you?”

“It’s not god, Lulu. It’s just some magic trick,” said Spyder.

Lulu hunched her shoulders and went over to the railing. She gave the angels the finger and began to sing at the top of her lungs, “Onward, Christian soldiers, marching as to war, with the cross of Jesus going on before…”

“Quiet!” Shrike yelled. “Primo, before I push these fools overboard, what’s happening?”

“I believe it’s over, ma’am.”

Spyder looked toward the beatific ghost head. It was fading from the sky. On the bow railing, the prince’s spinning disc was folding itself up and retracting into the cable still hooked to the port railing.

“He’s right,” said Spyder. “Everyone’s packing up and backing off.”

“We were lucky,” said Shrike. “Primo, set the course and come into the cabin with the rest of us.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Come on, Lulu,” said Spyder.

“I don’t think I like that Christian soldiers song anymore,” Lulu said. “I never thought about the words till now. Doesn’t seem very Christian singing about how fun war is.”

“It’s someone’s idea of Christian.”

“Not mine,” said Lulu. “When I die, make ’em play ‘Amazing Grace’ at my funeral, okay?”

“I don’t know that they’re going to have ‘Amazing Grace’ on the jukebox at the strip club.”

“What strip club?”

“The one we’re going to have your funeral at.”

“Cool. Can I come?”