The double beat in Cara's chest grew longer as the Aurora took Nate farther from them. She knew the blows he took through their bond before an empty ache settled deep within her. Hours slipped by and she maintained her vigil on the bridge, kept awake by the built in coffee machine. The incessant grinding of beans reminded her of the automatic kitty litter unit in Justine's apartment, but smelled far more welcoming. With her fingers wrapped around a fresh mug of hot java, her gaze scanned the horizon as sunrise bled across the clouds. They left the endless green and white of Russia far behind. Now the Atlantic Ocean passed far below them, an unceasing expanse of deep teal with rough peaks from colliding waves.
The HMRAS airship had the jump on them. The Hellcat lost valuable time; first Loki and Miguel had to pry her free of the larch holding her captive. The duke used a larger bolt on the Hellcat; it took over an hour to cut the fallen conifers holding down the airship. Then the crew had to ensure there was no damage to their airbladder. By the time they rose into the sky, the Aurora had an advantage of nearly three hours. Loki's mood grew worse with each passing minute at the failure of their plan.
Although the Aurora held her lead through the night, the swift Hellcat slowly ate away at the distance between. Cara didn't need the sonar to monitor the distance; the gap between beats in her chest closed, telling her they drew near to Nate. With the rising morning, the time had come to bring them down. Loki swore at the gathering clouds that obscured his view, and the charged atmosphere of an incoming storm wreaked havoc with their instruments.
"We are gaining on them." Long fingers gripped the wheel. He had stayed at the helm all night. The two of them kept each other company as the other crewmen rotated on their set schedule.
"Oh crap." Cara leaned forward, one hand clutching the rail under the window as ice shot down her spine and flowed through her body. Her eyes widened, trying to see what was happening on the airship far in front. A shadow danced amongst the clouds as the enormous military ship dipped low toward the ocean. She placed the mug of coffee on the ledge before it fell from her fingers with the next freezing stab through her gut. She opened herself to the connection with Nate, but found him closed tight to her. Whatever they were doing to him, he was trying to shield her from it. To protect her. Again.
Damned infuriating male.
The other ship was too far ahead to see as they disappeared behind a bank of grey cloud.
Pressure snapped around Cara’s chest like a steel band. The world blurred before her eyes, colours merged and ran together, edges faded into surrounding objects. She fell to her knees and cried out as her lungs constricted. Her body struggled to take a breath when a rush of invisible water ran down her throat and she coughed to dislodge the sensation.
Loki turned from the helm, a crewman stepping up to take over. Kneeling on the floor he grabbed her shoulders. "What is it? What’s happening?"
His touch gave her a physical sensation to concentrate on. She put a hand on the floor for balance and screamed at her brain to breath. Her body panicked and struggled for air even as her brain clutched at logic. She was safe on the Hellcat, air surrounded her, not water she rationalised. It was impossible for her to feel the water, for it to force its way down into her lungs, wasn’t it?
"It’s Nate," she gasped with realisation. "They’re drowning Nate."
She screwed up her eyes and pushed the panic down. She was safe. If she kept drawing even breaths, then Nate would survive. She just had to resist the urge to succumb to the pressure of the ocean, wanting to fill her lungs and drown her alongside Nate.
"Bucket," she cried. "Bring me a bucket."
Miguel kicked into action and disappeared and reappeared mere seconds later with a metal bucket. Cara cradled it between her knees. She had an idea of what to do. It was crazy, but then so was the link they shared.
"Shit," Loki said, worry etched on his face. "They must be long-lining him, that's why they've dropped so low."
She flicked a question with her eyes, unable to spare the breath to talk.
"It's the airship equivalent of keelhauling." His eyes darkened to black, his gaze dropped away to the floor. He didn't need to say the rest. No one survives.
Cara's teeth began to chatter from the freezing water embracing Nate. "I need a blanket, before we both freeze." Her fingers changed to purple as her circulation pulled back to keep her core warm. She took a deep shuddering breath and opened herself fully to Nate.
He couldn't block her out now, too intent on trying to survive with the last remaining breath in his body. Cara travelled along their bond and immersed herself in the rough ocean alongside his thrashing form. A chain was looped around his ankles and then up to his wrists, binding his arms behind his back. He struggled against the steel imprisoning him, trying to work his hands free as the sea water sought to claim him. The weight of the metal wrapped around him and the pull of the airship, held him under.
His lungs burned, his oxygen ran out, and the ocean forced its way between his lips. His instinct to try and take a breath allowed death to pour down his throat. Cara reached out ethereal arms to wrap around him, gentling his struggles, telling him she was there. His flailing lessened and she moved on to concentrate on what was happening in his body. She visualised his lungs full with deadly salt water and transferred the liquid along their bond. She pictured two vessels, one draining as it filled the other.
She tried to gasp for air, but couldn’t. Coughs racked her frame, her fingers curled around the bucket’s edge and opening her eyes on the Hellcat, she vomited the salt water lodged in her lungs.
Loki and Miguel watched wide eyed as she emptied her body of water she had taken from Nate. She kept coughing until she had expelled it all. She took a deep breath of fresh air and along the bond, Nate understood, and calmed. Cara inhaled and inflated his lungs with air and he exhaled in the turbulent ocean.
"I’m breathing for him," she told Loki and Miguel between calm steady breaths. "But you have to rescue him. I don’t know how long I’ll last." At some stage Miguel dropped a fur lined blanket around her shoulders and she pulled it tighter, struggling to keep two bodies warm. Her efforts to breathe for both of them would be for nothing if hypothermia claimed her.
"Shit," Loki swore. "Look after her," he pointed to the crewmen, and then swung his attention to Miguel. "You, weapons pod, you have the best aim. Load the harpoon."
"What do you need me to do?" he asked.
"We'll get close and lower you as far as the chain will allow, you'll get one shot before they see us, so make it count."
Miguel nodded his understanding and ran from the bridge.
Cara leaned back against the wall and closed her eyes, concentrating on breathing, on staying alive. "What's the rest of the plan?" she asked the pirate. She thought chaos would reign on the airship, but Loki held everyone calm. He issued orders in a low, steady tone. The crewmen well trained; they all knew their stations and what was expected of them.
"They are three times the size of us and heavily armed." His gaze roamed the darkening sky. "But airships have one fundamental flaw; you can't fire upward through your air bladder. There's a storm brewing, I'm going to take us high, the clouds will cover us and mess with their instruments. We are going to toss Miguel down close while we spit on the Aurora from above."
Cara closed her eyes again. She focused on breathing in and out and tried to ignore the seductive allure of the ocean, calling to her, serenading her to surrender alongside Nate.
She opened her eyes to find Loki's black gaze on her.
"Is he still…?" He swallowed, the bob of his Adam's apple the only visible sign of his concern for his friend and her.
"Alive? Yes." Her eyes fluttered shut again, visual stimulus too much for her overtaxed brain to handle. Breath in, breath out, Cara commanded her body.
"Will we know if he dies?" The words so softly spoken, she nearly didn't catch them.
"Yes." Her heart lurched at the idea of letting go. "We're connected. If Nate dies, he will take me with him."
Nolton peered over the railing, watching the thick chain spiral through the cloud to the azure ocean below. In one hand he clutched his pocket watch, the second hand taking a leisurely stroll around the face. He had no intention of returning his prisoner to Victoria when it was far more satisfying to use him as fish bait.
"How long shall we give him, sir?" one of the men further down the railing asked. "No one survives more than fifteen minutes of long-lining. Not at this speed."
"He’s been under for thirty minutes, but we’ll give him longer. I don't just want him dead, I want him stone cold with chunks ripped out by sharks. Someone bring me a cup of tea while we wait."
Time edged along. An airman laid out a stripped deckchair and a small table with a pot of tea. Ignoring the frigid temperature, the wind threatening to whisk away the table, and the impending storm, Nolton sat and sipped Earl Grey. Fishing is boring; lord knows what appeal commoners see in the mundane activity. There was nothing to see except the chain dangling over the side of the airship and sinking into the water. A crewman monitored the tension and kept watch, least their bait escape the line.
Never once did Lyon's head show above the waves. Occasionally, a strong man could climb back up the chain, but Nolton had covered that contingency. Lyons hands were chained behind his back. He would have preferred to see his enemy thrash and make feeble and futile attempts to escape the sea’s embrace. Revenge was much more satisfying when you could watch the life drain from the panicked eyes of your foe, but Lyons was unpredictable. He wasn't going to risk his own neck by getting too close. He watched a seagull keep pace with the airship before peeling off, its wings folding back as it plunged to the ocean after sprats.
A cloud parted and a brief spike of sunlight shot along the chain before sinking into the depths. A white trail cut a path on the surface, but nothing could be seen of the object suspended in the watery depths. He glanced at his watch again. A smile crossed his face; no one could survive this long under the water, not without gills. Lyons would have died nearly an hour ago. He wanted to kick the corpse and watch it disappear over the edge of the observation deck to feed the sharks below. Perhaps he would sever one of the hands as a gift for the new widow. It would be a touching gesture on his part to return something of her husband if the fish hadn't already chewed off all his limbs.
"Haul up the body." He jerked his thumb in an upward manner at one of the crewmen and rose from his seat. He snapped his watch shut and returned it to his jacket pocket.
"Haul it up," echoed down the deck. The winch was flung into reverse. A groan sounded from the mechanism as the chain wound skyward and wrapped itself around the barrel. Feet appeared first from the water followed by long legs and a torso. Hands were bound to feet by the chain. His head hung limply. His entire body swayed to the gentle movement of the cable.
Nolton laughed as the body was pulled closer to the airship. Hands reached out to grab the dead man as he neared and the corpse was dropped on to the deck like a landed fish. The chain was unlooped from around his feet and pulled free of his hands. Nolton placed the toe of his boot under Lyons’ chest and rolled him onto his back. He surveyed the sodden corpse, black hair plastering to his face. The thorn in his side removed once and for all.
Only Lyons' chit of a wife knew of his agreement with China, and no one would take the word of a trollop over that of a duke. No one would believe her, not without proof. All he had to do now was seed the evidence of Victoria's illegitimacy and wait for the outbreak of war. Soon the people would carry him to the throne. Once he was king, no one would care how he came to his position, people would be relived to no longer have a mad bastard queen slaughtering their children.
A sneer pulled at his lips. Lyons thought himself unstoppable, how wrong he proved to be. "He who laughs last―"
"Laughs loudest." Nate finished, his eyes snapping open, a wolfish grin on his face.
The crewmen looked on in horror. Several crossed themselves, sure they witnessed the undead rising.
"Why isn’t he d―" Nolton's words turned into a high pitched scream.
A breeze whistled over Nate's head. A harpoon, shot from the pod dangling on a chain below the clouds, passed millimetres from his scalp and the foot long barb buried itself in Nolton’s calf. The head came out the other side; blood flowed from both the entrance and exit wounds. A woosh drowned out the screaming as liquid fire rained on to the Aurora from above.
The flotation bladders were encased in a fine metal mesh, designed to protect from attack. The greater the missile, the more easily it was repelled. A canon ball would bounce off, but if you were close enough, a single pin prick would pierce the reinforcing. Flammable oil was a million pin pricks, reaching through the mesh and stabbing at the bladder.
Above them, obscured by cloud, the sleek pirate ship spat her wrath and spewed burning oil that coated the flotation bladder and licked its way through the protective armour. The airmen looked to one another in astonishment and ran. Fire was a far greater threat to their safety than a talking corpse and they had practiced fire drills.
"One other thing, Nolton, no one touches my wife." Nate wrapped the line attached to the harpoon around his forearm, jumped the railing, and dived over the side of the burning airship. The plunge of his weight snapped the rope downward and Nolton, attached to the other side, was yanked off balance and over the side with Nate. Both bodies hit the ocean below; Nate sliced in cleanly while Nolton landed feet first and pulled sideways by the harpoon in his leg.
The rope started to move skyward, winched upward to the Hellcat, pulling the barb and Nolton's leg with it. He pulled a blade from his boot and began hacking at the rope, threads parting under his desperate attack until he broke free and dropped back, head first, into the water. Nate gave him a wave as he continued to rise.
The HMRAS airship sank toward the ocean, the fire eating holes in her bladder and she leaked valuable gas and altitude. Men readied the lifeboats in case the fire jumped to the ship below. Although she could survive as a water bound boat, their journey would be much slower.
"Fuck!" Nolton screamed at the receding Hellcat as he struck out for his downed airship.
The men winched a sodden and exhausted Nate into the cargo hold of the Hellcat. He placed thankful feet on her wooden deck. In the time honoured fashion of grateful men, he gave and received slaps on the back as the door was swung shut and bolted.
"Who shot the harpoon?" Nate demanded as the excited chatter dropped away.
"Miguel, sir," one of the crewmen answered him. The dangling pod still being winched back into its position and locked against the side of the airship.
Nate rubbed a hand through his dripping hair. "Damn, he’s a good shot. I felt it part my hair."
Loki clattered down the spiral stair case, pointing his finger at Nate's chest. "You know, I have waited for my invite to join you and that delicious hellion in bed. And I am a man of varied tastes. I like a spicy and exotic diet, but this freaky shit going on between the two of you? That crosses a line." He held up his hands in a gesture of surrender. "She's all yours. I don't want things from your body coming back out my nose like I've just seen."
"Finished?" Nate asked. "Where's Cara?" Only a faint echo trickled through his body.
"Upstairs, she's still on the bridge." Loki cast his gaze up and down the supposed corpse. "Given you've been dead for an hour, she looks worse than you do."
A frown pulled at him. "Her arm?"
"Simple flesh wound. She'll be fine. Then the whole you being drowned thing took all her energy."
Nate's lip curled in a smile as he headed for top deck. Rumours of his death and revival would reverberate around London, and enhance his reputation. "How far are we from England?"
"Eight hours."
"Take us to Leicester, Cara's family estate. And contact Jackson, tell him to meet us there. We need to figure out our next move before we charge into London."
He slid open the doors to the bridge. The woman who fought death for him leaned on the window ledge, the blanket still wrapped around her body. A blue tinge encircled her mouth and dark smudges under her eyes marred her pale skin. His name whispered from her lips.
Nate crossed the distance between them, placed one arm under her knees, and swung her into his embrace just as she collapsed from exhaustion.