Leviathan

TWENTY-TWO

“It’s a zeppelin!” Alek shouted. “They’ve found us!”

The wildcount looked up. “An airship, certainly. But that doesn’t sound like a zeppelin.”

Alek frowned, listening hard. Other noises, tremulous and nonsensical, trickled over the distant hum of engines— squawks, whistles, and squeaks, like a menagerie let loose.

The airship lacked the symmetry of a zeppelin: The front end was larger than the stern, the surface mottled and uneven. Clouds of tiny winged forms fluttered around it, and an unearthly green glow clung to its skin.

Then Alek saw the huge eyes… .

“God’s wounds,” he swore. This wasn’t a machine at all, but a Darwinist creation!

He’d seen monsters before, of course—talking lizards in the fashionable parlors of Prague, a draft animal displayed in a traveling circus—but nothing as gigantic as this. It was like one of his war toys come to life, a thousand times larger and more incredible.

“What are Darwinists doing here?” he said softly.

Volger pointed. “Running from danger, it would seem.”

Alek’s eyes followed the gesture, and he saw the jagged trails of bullet holes down the creature’s flank, flickering with green light. Men swarmed in the rigging that hung from its sides, some wounded, some making repairs. And alongside them climbed things that weren’t men.

As the airship passed, almost overhead, Alek half ducked behind the parapets. But the crew seemed too busy to notice anything below them. The ship slowly turned as it settled into the valley, dropping below the level of the mountains on either side.

“Is that godless thing coming down?” Alek asked.

“They seem to have no choice.”

The vast creature glided away toward the white expanse of glacier—the only place in sight large enough for it to land. Even wounded, it fell as slowly as a feather. Alek held his breath for the long seconds that it remained poised above the snow.

The crash unfolded slowly. White clouds rose up in the skidding airship’s wake, its skin rippling like a flag in the wind. Alek saw men thrown from their perches on its back, but it was too far away for their cries to reach him, even through the cold, clear air. The ship kept sliding away, farther and farther, until its dark outline disappeared behind a shroud of white.

“The highest mountains in Europe, and the war reaches us so quickly.” Count Volger shook his head. “What an age we live in.”

“Do you think they saw us?”

“In all that chaos? I’d think not. And this ruin won’t look like much from a distance, even when the sun comes up.” The wildcount sighed. “But no cooking fires for a while. And we’ll have to set a watch until they leave.”

“What if they don’t leave?” Alek said. “What if they can’t?”

“Then they won’t last long,” Volger said flatly. “There’s nothing to eat on the glacier, no shelter, no fuel for a fire. Just ice.”

Alek turned to stare at Volger. “But we can’t leave shipwrecked men to die!”

“May I remind you that they’re the enemy, Alek? Just because the Germans are hunting us doesn’t make Darwinists our friends. There could be a hundred men aboard that ship! Perhaps enough to take this castle.” Volger’s voice softened as he peered into the sky. “Let’s just hope no rescue comes for them. Aircraft overhead in daylight would be a disaster.”

Alek looked out across the glacier again. The snow thrown up by the crash was settling around the airship, revealing that it lay half on one side, like a beached fish. He wondered if Darwinist creations died from the cold as quickly as natural beasts. Or men.

A hundred of them out there …

He looked down at the stables below—food enough for a small army. And medicine for the wounded, and furs and firewood to keep them warm.

“We can’t sit here and watch them die, Count. Enemies or not.”

“Haven’t you been listening?” Volger cried. “You’re heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary. Your duty is to the empire, not those men out there.”

Alek shook his head. “At the moment there isn’t much I can do for the empire.”

“Not yet. But if you keep yourself alive, soon enough you’ll gain the power to stop this madness. Don’t forget: The emperor is eighty-three, and war is unkind to old men.”

With those last words Volger’s voice broke, and suddenly he looked ancient himself, as if the last five weeks had finally caught up with him. Alek swallowed his answer, remembering what Volger had sacrificed—his home, his rank—to be hunted and hounded, to go sleepless listening to wireless chatter. And with safety finally at hand, this obscene creature had fallen from the sky, threatening to wreck years of planning.

No wonder he wanted to ignore the airbeast dying on the snows a few kilometers away.

“Of course, Volger.” Alek took his arm and led him down from the cold and windy parapet. “We’ll watch and wait.”

“They’ll probably repair that godless beast,” Volger said on the stairs. “And leave us behind without a second glance.”

“No doubt.”

Halfway across the courtyard, Volger brought Alek to a sudden halt, his expression pained. “We’d help them if we could. But this war could leave the whole continent in ruins. You see that, don’t you?”

Alek nodded and led the count into the great hall of the castle, where Bauer was piling wood into the fireplace. Seeing the food laid out and ready to cook, Volger let out a tired sigh and told the other men about the crashed airship—another week without fires, and long, cold watches every night.

But eating in a castle, even a cold one, was still a pleasure after all those meals huddled in the Stormwalker’s iron belly. The storerooms held luxuries that none of them had enjoyed for weeks: smoked fish for dinner, dried fruit and canned peaches for dessert. The wine was excellent, and when Alek offered to take the first watch, the others drank to him deeply.

No one talked about rescuing the airmen. Perhaps the other three assumed that the monstrous creature would fly away again. They hadn’t seen the bullet holes in its flanks, or the men hanging wounded and lifeless in the rigging. Instead they talked like soldiers, discussing how to defend the castle against an aerial attack. Bauer and Klopp argued about whether the Stormwalker’s cannon could elevate high enough to hit an airship.

Alek listened and watched. He’d slept most of the day, taking the controls only after sunset, when Klopp’s old eyes always gave out. It was barely midnight now, and it would be dawn before he needed sleep. But the others were worn down by the day’s journey and the freezing cold.

When they had fallen asleep, Alek made his way quietly up to the parapets.

The airship lay in a dark lump on the glacier’s featureless white. It looked smaller now, as if slowly deflating. No fires or lamps were visible, just the strange glow he’d noticed earlier. Tiny pinpricks of light moved in the wreckage, like green fireflies buzzing about the giant creature’s wounds.

Alek shivered. He’d heard awful stories about the Darwinists’ creations: half-breeds of tigers and wolves, mythological monsters brought to life, animals that spoke and even reasoned like humans, but had no souls. He’d been told that when godless beasts were created, the spirits of demons occupied them—pure evil given flesh.

Of course, he’d also been taught that the emperor was wise and kind, that the Austrian people loved him, and that the Germans were his allies.

Alek descended the tower stairs and crept past the sleeping men into the storerooms. The medicine kits were easy to find, eight satchels marked with red crosses. He took three, but didn’t weigh himself down with any food. That could come later, if the airship really was grounded for good.

Changing into his commoner disguise, Alek ignored the furs, choosing the most ragged leather coat he could find. From the weapons room he took a Steyr automatic pistol and two eight-round clips. Hardly the sort of weapon a Swiss villager would carry, but Volger was right about one thing—this was still a war, and these Darwinists were the enemy.

Finally he chose a pair of snowshoes. Alek wasn’t sure how the contraptions were supposed to help him walk, but Klopp had exalted upon seeing them—something about his mountain campaigns back in the Balkan Wars.

The iron bolt of the castle gate slid silently aside, and the huge door swung open with an easy push. It was so simple to walk out, throwing his hard-won safety to the cold wind. Certainly it felt nobler than hiding here, waiting to inherit an empire.

Half a kilometer out onto the snows Alek realized that he had finally snuck past his old fencing master.

The snowshoes looked absurd, like tennis rackets strapped to his boots. But they worked, keeping his feet from breaking through the brittle surface into the powdery snow beneath. His long, sliding steps carried him quickly back along the Stormwalker’s footprints, until he was far enough away that his tracks weren’t visible from the castle walls.

The smooth, almost featureless glacier was easy going, and in an hour he drew close enough to hear the Darwinists’ shouts as they worked on their wounded airship. He climbed up the valley’s side, until he reached a ledge overlooking the vast shape.

Alek stood at the edge, astonished by what he saw below.

The wreck looked like a corner of hell bubbling up through the snow. Flocks of winged creatures coiled around hollows in the wilting gasbag. Crewmen moved across the great beast’s skin, accompanied by bizarre double-snouted, six-legged dogs that sniffed and pawed at every bullet hole. The green lights he’d seen from the castle covered the creature. They were crawling, like glowing maggots on dead meat.

And the stench! Rotten eggs and cabbage, and a salty smell disturbingly close to the fish he’d had for dinner. Alek wondered for a moment if the Germans were right after all. These godless beasts were an insult to nature itself. Perhaps a war was worth ridding the world of them.

“A VAST FORM STRETCHES OUT.”

And yet he couldn’t take his eyes from the creature. Even lying wounded it looked so powerful, more like something from legend than the work of men.

Four searchlights flared to life, illuminating one flank of the creature. Alek could see now why the beast had rolled sideways during the crash: The gondolas hanging from its underside had escaped being flattened against the snow.

Steeling himself, he climbed down to the glacier, heading toward the unlit side of the creature. Only a few men worked there, though the damage looked just as bad. Drawing nearer, Alek stepped lightly, his snowshoes shushing in the darkness.

As he stole down the length of the airship, the green glow seemed to be bleeding out onto the ice. Surely the beast was dying.

He’d been a fool to think he could help. Perhaps he should just leave the medicines somewhere and slip away… .

A soft moan came from the shadows.

Alek stole closer to the sound, the air growing warm around him. His stomach twisted. This was living heat from the creature’s body! Fighting nausea, he went a few steps nearer, trying not to look at the green lights crawling beneath the creature’s skin.

A young airman lay in the darkness, curled against the beast’s flank. His eyes were closed and his nose bloody.

Alek crouched beside him.

The airman was just a boy, with fine features and sandy hair. The collar of his flight suit was caked with blood, and his face looked deathly pale in the soft green light. He had to have been slumped here on the ice for the hours since the crash, the giant creature’s warmth keeping him alive.

Alek opened one of the medical satchels, fishing through the bottles for smelling salts and rubbing alcohol.

He waved the salts under the boy’s nose.

“Barking spiders!” the boy croaked in a high voice, his eyes fluttering open.

Alek frowned, wondering if he’d heard the words right.

“Are you well?” he ventured in English.

“A bit scrambled in the attic,” the boy said, rubbing his head. He sat up slowly, taking in the scene around them, and his glassy eyes widened. “Blisters! We came down hard, didn’t we? The poor beastie looks a bloody wreck.”

“You’re rather bloody yourself,” Alek said, twisting open the bottle of rubbing alcohol. He dampened a bandage and held it against the boy’s face.

“Ow! Stop that!” The boy pushed the bandage away and sat up straight, his gaze becoming clearer. He looked suspiciously at Alek’s snowshoes. “Who are you, anyway?”

“I’m here to help. I live nearby.”

“Up here? In all this barking snow?”

“Yes.” Alek cleared his throat, wondering what to say. He’d always been hopeless at any sort of lying. “In a village, of sorts.”

The boy narrowed his eyes. “Wait a wee minute—you talk like a Clanker!”

“Well … I suppose I do. We speak a dialect of German in this part of Switzerland.”

The boy stared at him another moment, then sighed and rubbed his head. “Right, you’re Swiss. The crash must’ve knocked me silly. For a squick there I thought you were one of those bum-rags who shot us down.”

Alek raised an eyebrow. “And then landed here so I could tend to your bloody nose?”

“I said it was a wee bit daft,” the boy said, yanking the alcohol-soaked bandage from Alek’s hand. He pressed it against his nose and winced. “But thanks for your trouble. It’s lucky you came along, or my bum would’ve been frostbit to blazes!”

Alek raised an eyebrow, wondering if the boy always talked this way, or if he was still groggy from the crash. Even bloody and bruised, he had an odd sort of swagger, as if he crash-landed in giant airships every day.

“Yes,” Alek said. “A frostbitten bum would’ve been unfortunate.”

The boy smiled. “Give us a lift, would you?”

They grasped hands and pulled each other up, the other boy still unsteady. But when he gained his feet, he bowed triumphantly, pulled off a glove and held out his hand.

“Midshipman Dylan Sharp, at your service.”