Chapter Eighteen

Prisoner—

In Which Audrey Hides Under the Bed

Air World

Audrey slowly pried the window open, trying to minimize the creak of the wooden frame.

Her first escape plan—climbing out the window and down the mooring rope—had never made it past step one—freeing herself from the handcuffs. She’d spent a fruitless hour trying to pick the lock with a hatpin before the fading light made it hopeless.

Her second plan had begun with her silently dragging the bed a crucial foot closer to the window. Now she could reach the window, but opening it with only one hand was proving troublesome.

Once she raised it a few inches, she jammed her elbow into the opening and Called. “Zephyr! I have a message for you.”

The wind didn’t stir.

Her heartbeat picked up, and she Called again. “Zephyr, heed my voice and answer!”

A soft breeze drifted by her ear. “I cannot. The Phantom has forbidden it.”

Oh, had he? Anger and betrayal burned in her stomach like a lump of undigested meat. “I’m Admiral Harding’s daughter. I’m sure he’s asked you to find me.”

Still air with no hint of a breeze.

“Please, Zephyr,” Audrey said, willing to beg. “You’ve served our family for years.”

Another tickle in her ear. “I’m sorry,” Zephyr whispered. “Your father is powerful, but I dare not cross the Grand Current’s son.”

So Leah had been telling the truth about The Phantom’s father.

Audrey slumped, out of arguments. So much for her second escape attempt. Defeated, she lay down on top of the blankets. She fell asleep trying to concoct a third plan.

Audrey woke in the middle of the night with a pressing need to visit the water closet. Only, of course, the handcuffs prevented her from even leaving the bed. She wondered if the dirigible even had a privy or only chamber pots.

She wasn’t desperate, but neither could she wait until morning. Audrey opened her mouth to call for help, then closed it.

Maybe she should use this as an opportunity to escape. Qeturah/Queenie had the key to her handcuffs, but she was too smart to enter the bedroom without a blunderbuss. Audrey didn’t fancy wrestling her for it; she wasn’t about to risk having a hole blown in her stomach. In order to get the keys and escape, she needed to take Qeturah by surprise.

After a little thinking, she opened the window all the way, jamming a spyglass in the frame to keep it from closing again, then hid herself under the bed.

She worked the shackle as far down on the bed frame as she could and pulled the blanket over it to conceal it. At first glance, it should appear as if she had somehow escaped out the window.

Any sort of search would immediately turn up her pathetic hiding place, but if Qeturah rushed to the window to peer out, Audrey would have a precious moment in which to act.

She judged the chance of success worth the risk.

Wetting her lips, Audrey uttered a short cry and banged her heels on the floor, trying to sound as if she’d fallen. She waited in tense silence.

Footsteps approached, followed by the click of a latch. A man swore—not Qeturah, but Billy. Audrey froze. Funny, Qeturah was the one set on shattering the entire world, but Audrey was much more afraid of Billy.

Heavy boots rushed to the open window, just like she’d planned.

Her paralysis broke. Audrey kicked Billy’s ankles with all the coiled strength of her legs. His feet shot out from under him, and he crashed to the floor. Audrey kicked him again, but only caught his thigh.

He cursed a blue streak and reached under the bed. In moments, he’d pulled her out, spitting and scratching. He wasn’t carrying a blunderbuss, but his face was a mask of anger. Looming over her, he drew back his fist.

Audrey reared up and head-butted him. Her skull connected with his chin. The contact hurt Audrey, but had an even better effect on Billy. He sat back, moaning and clutching his jaw. “You broke ma toof.”

Audrey raised one leg and rammed her boot heel into his forehead as hard as she could. His eyes rolled back in his head, and he slumped to the floor, unconscious.

She was steeling herself to search Billy’s pockets, when The Phantom threw open the door. He grabbed Billy’s shoulder and flung him away from Audrey. “Did he hurt you?” he demanded, voice raw. A deadly tension gripped him, as if he were one step away from killing Billy.

Audrey realized suddenly that her skirts were rucked up and that she’d been squirming on the floor. He was asking if Billy had raped her. “No,” she said shakily. “I, er, hurt him. I was trying to escape.” The words came out somewhat apologetic.

The tension eased from The Phantom’s shoulders. “You should never have been left alone with him.”

Limbs trembling, Audrey picked herself up off the floor. The handcuffs bit into her wrist so she sat on the bed. And stared. He’d come back. Did that mean he’d changed his mind about helping Queenie and come to rescue her, or was he just keeping her safe from Billy?

Either way, she was grateful. “Thank you, Piers,” she said.

The Phantom glided closer and brooded over the bed. When he spoke, his voice rasped. “How did you know?”

Whoops. “I realized you were The Phantom yesterday.” She held her breath. Would he be angry?

“No. Not that. How did you know?”

Audrey blinked. Know what? And then his face unblurred, showing Piers’s features clearly though his skin was still washed out and eerie. Lines of grief carved his forehead and bracketed his mouth. “You found her,” she guessed. “Your mother’s body.” Queenie.

He opened his mouth, then closed it, and shook his head in mute frustration.

Audrey reached out with her free hand and gently pulled him to sit beside her on the dark blue blankets. “I’m so sorry.”

She saw tears in his eyes, and then he faded back into The Phantom, hiding his emotions. “I found her where you said. In an abandoned building next door to the shop’s last mooring. I smelled—” He stopped.

Audrey squeezed his hand. Queen of the Thieves notwithstanding, she could see that he’d loved his mother. Her own throat tightened in response. Lady Bethany must’ve been frantic by now.

“So how did you know?” he asked. “And who is that witch impersonating my mother? You don’t have to whisper,” he added. “She’s gone, flown the coop. Billy was the only bullyboy on guard duty.”

So Audrey told him everything she knew, everything Leah had related to her. “I didn’t really believe her at first. But now? Shattering our world doesn’t seem that far-fetched.” Her father’s bad experiences with his otherself didn’t mean Leah was a liar.

A small silence fell. The Phantom shifted. “I should take you home.”

Audrey didn’t think he should be alone, but he’d take it the wrong way if she said so. “Tell me about her,” she said instead. “Your mother. What was she like?”

“Bold,” he said after a moment. “She said what she thought, straight out, no shilly-shallying. She made her own way, without being dependent on a man, and she was proud of it.”

Proud of being a thief? Of course, she hadn’t been a common criminal, but rather the Queen of Thieves.

And not having a husband or father or brother being the main breadwinner was rare. Audrey thought of Grady’s mother, who was honest and a hard worker—and who couldn’t feed her own children.

“She didn’t like the nobility,” Piers continued. “She called them parasites, but it was her grandest ambition for me to take my place among them. She told me my blood was just as good—better. She taught me to talk right and boxed my ears when I lapsed into lower-tier talk.”

“She did a good job,” Audrey said.

“How can she be gone?”

The look in his eyes was so lost it broke her heart. “I don’t know.”

And then he was holding on to her as if he were drowning, his shoulders heaving with ugly sobs. These tears couldn’t be mopped up with a lace hankie. They soaked her shoulder. Audrey’s own throat ached at his naked pain, and she ran her fingers through his hair. She didn’t know what else to do, how to offer comfort.

She kept thinking about her father and the war and the dreadful specter of his zeppelin going down in a ball of flame.

At last Piers shuddered and lifted his head. “Sorry. You must think me a weakling.”

“No. Not at all. Strength shouldn’t mean being unfeeling.” That was her father’s mistake. “I would think less of you if you didn’t grieve.”

He took a deep breath. “I should get you home.”

Audrey studied him warily. “What are you going to do?”

He didn’t answer. “We can use the front door. I’ll fly you—”

Audrey pressed her fingers to his mouth, stopping him. “What are you going to do? We can’t just let Qeturah shatter the world. We have to stop her.”

He shrugged. “Easy enough. According to you, all I have to do is stay alive.”

“There’s more to her plan than that,” Audrey insisted. “Why would she bother to start a war otherwise? She could’ve killed you with a knife in the back or a drop of poison at any time.”

He started to pace. “I don’t know! I can’t think right now.”

She sympathized, but they didn’t have time for him to come to grips with his grief. War was coming. “Well, you need to think carefully. You’re in a lot of trouble. You didn’t know what Qeturah was planning, but you helped her. You’ll be labeled a traitor, too.”

He shook his head. “No one knows who I am, and I have no intention of stepping into your father’s trap—thanks for the warning, by the way. Unless you’ve changed your mind and are planning to expose Piers Tennyson?” He sounded more curious than offended.

“No,” Audrey said truthfully. “But don’t you want to undo the harm you’ve done? Come with me. We’ll talk to my father together. If you help him, I’m sure he’ll get you a pardon. Maybe even offer you a job.”

“As what? Courier?”

A better idea popped into her head—the perfect solution. “Espionage agent.”

“Spy, you mean,” he scoffed. “Just how is stealing secrets from an enemy more noble than stealing from the rich? Seems the same to me—except an agent of the Crown is paid far less and is more likely to get shot.”

Heated words filled Audrey’s throat. How could he not see that stealing was morally wrong and spying was an honorable duty? But he’d laugh at her if she said any of that.

Her eyes narrowed. “Well, I can see how you’d be daunted. Spying is a much greater challenge than pinching earrings off vain girls.”

“I never said I couldn’t do it,” he said, affronted. “Just that I don’t see the point.”

“The point is to keep you out of jail.” She huffed in exasperation.

“As if a cell could hold me,” he grumbled.

“Wouldn’t you like to have a real title and house?” she asked. “Top-tier instead of low?” She indicated the dirigible with a sweep of her hand.

A tinge of pink flushed his transparent cheeks. “Sipar would pay for my services, too. What do I care who wins? Do you think it makes a jot of difference to the poor whether it’s the Queen or the Siparese Emperor whose arse sits on the throne?”

Her fingers turned cold. “If you really believe that, then you’re a fool. Listen to me: Sipar doesn’t want to take over Donlon. Sipar intends to destroy us. The only reason Donlon exists is our mastery of the Grand Current and the advantage in trade it gives us. Without that, Donlon will die. Sipar would have no reason to support a city so far away, and we don’t produce enough food to supply our population. The rich have gardens, but what do the poor have?”

“Scraps,” he said harshly. “That’s all the poor ever have.”

Audrey ignored the twinge of guilt she felt, reiterating her point. “If Donlon is conquered, the rich will buy new homes and fly away. The poor will stay and starve. That’s the ugly truth.”

“You may be right,” he said after a long silence, “but it doesn’t make me eager to help the nobility. I’ll return you to your father, but that’s it.”

Audrey rattled her handcuffed wrist. “If I could trouble you for the keys?”

Instead of hunting through Billy’s pockets, Piers jimmied the lock open in under a minute. She rubbed her wrist, reluctantly impressed. She supposed thieves practiced that sort of thing.

“Come on.” He stepped over Billy and led the way into the shop. Audrey followed more slowly, less familiar with the dirigible’s layout. By the time she reached the doorway, he stood casually on the bottom step, hanging out over thin air.

Audrey held onto the doorframe. “So what are you going to do?” she asked.

His voice was grim. “Drag my mother’s murderer out of whatever hole she’s hidden herself in and then punish her.”

Perhaps to ward off further argument, he scooped her up in his arms and Called the wind. A wind considerably stronger than Zephyr or even the royal Sirocco answered. Audrey had seen her father call the greater wind Mistral once, but this felt more like Gale.

And yet all the strength was contained, bent to Piers’s will. It held up their doubled weight as solidly as a mattress, and then whisked them to a higher tier.

Despite everything, Audrey clung to Piers’s neck and simply marveled. Shreds of clouds flirted with the moon, and a sprinkling of stars played peekaboo with the horizon. The view of the city stole her breath; it was even better than that from the royal palace at the pinnacle of Donlon, because instead of standing on a balcony, they were part of the night, moving through it.

The fog shrouding the ground below looked white and mysterious instead of poisonous. The houses of the nobility, clinging to the mountain below the palace, were lit like a chandelier.

Floating in his arms felt incredibly romantic, like a princess in a story. She impulsively said, “It’s so beautiful. You’re lucky to have this.”

“My mother always said the same thing.” His voice was flat.

She winced and fell silent.

Fortunately, Audrey soon recognized the twin spires of her own residence. Piers landed a short distance away. “I’ll watch until you’re safe inside,” he said, withdrawn. “Go.”

Audrey took two steps, then returned and gave him a quick kiss. His lips might’ve been invisible, but they felt perfectly solid, warm, and startled. “For rescuing me,” she said simply. “Be careful.”

“Don’t worry, I’m not planning to let her shatter the world.” His voice was brittle.

“That’s not what I meant. I mean, of course I don’t want the world to shatter, but I also don’t want you to get hurt.”

His mouth opened in surprise, and blood rushed to her cheeks. She’d exposed herself by speaking, but she couldn’t regret it. With his mother and Norton dead, he needed to know that someone still cared.

When he didn’t say anything, she started to walk away, but he snatched her hand and drew her back. He caught her up in a fierce embrace and kissed her. All her own words scattered and blew away like ash in the wind. She tasted loneliness and passion in his kiss.

She would have stood there kissing him for hours, but the sound of an approaching pedal car broke them apart. It was just a milkman making morning deliveries, but the sight of a girl embracing thin air was sure to cause consternation.

Audrey lifted her hand in mute farewell, then hurried home. Still in a daze, she rapped the knocker.

“Lady Audrey!” The butler all but tripped over himself expressing how happy he was at her safe return. By the time Audrey glanced over her shoulder, The Phantom had vanished into the starry sky.

“Audrey!” Her mother rushed into the vestibule and enfolded her in a painfully tight hug. Though she wore a night rail and wrapper, Audrey didn’t think she’d been to bed at all. With her hair loose and spectacles on, she looked fragile.

Audrey hugged her back. Her heart ached. “I’m sorry, Mama.”

“I promised God I wouldn’t yell at you, if you’d just come home safely,” her mother murmured.

Audrey choked out a laugh. Saved. “Where’s Father?” she asked, steering her mother into the parlor. They sat together on the rose settee.

Her mother’s lips tightened. “He’s with the Fleet.”

Audrey nodded. She’d expected as much. “Does he know I was kidnapped?”

“He received your note and deigned to drop by and inform me.” Fury vibrated in her voice.

Audrey patted her hand. “It’s all right. I understand. I know he refused to obey their demands.”

“It’s not that,” her mother said. The bags beneath her eyes made her look older than she was, old and bitter. “He refused to even pretend that he might cooperate. He could’ve played for time. Instead, he gave you up for dead as soon as he received the news. I’ll never forgive him for this. Never.”

Since her mother had never forgiven her father for any of his infidelities, Audrey wasn’t surprised.

Audrey ignored the sinking feeling in her own chest. “He thinks he’s being a realist,” she tried to explain, “that believing I could be saved would weaken him.” Her mother had never understood what drove her father: his duty to the Harding name.

From her mother’s set jaw, she didn’t want to understand. “I requested an audience with the queen. She’s a mother. I hoped she might listen.”

A spark ignited in Audrey’s mind. “But you haven’t had the audience yet? What time is it?”

Her mother blinked. “It’s four in the morning. The appointment is at six. Why?”

Audrey made up her mind. “I need to use it. I have information the queen needs to hear.”

Queen Winifrid received Audrey in the throne room. All the gay birthday trappings had been replaced with somber, dark blue velvet befitting their state of war. Even the comfortable cushions on the throne had been stripped away, revealing the fierce carvings underneath: a silver falcon’s head in profile, with a glittering emerald eye. The falcon was a symbol of the Royal family; Audrey’s father had told her once it dated back to their pirate beginnings.

Audrey curtsied. The stiff-rumped herald had gone ahead to explain to the queen that Audrey had arrived in place of Lady Bethany, and now Queen Winifrid was studying her with curiosity.

“Have you come for your boon? I’m exceedingly grateful for the way you protected Prince Hans.” The queen’s neck bent as if her crown were too heavy, but the smile on her round face was kind. Her use of “I” instead of the royal “we” was a sign of favor.

Audrey took a deep breath. “Before I request my boon, I ask that you consider what I have to say and not dismiss my words because of my youth.”

Queen Winifrid’s eyebrows lifted, but she inclined her head graciously. “You have my full attention.”

Audrey had rehearsed beforehand. As succinctly as possible, she related her encounter with The Phantom at the Children’s Ball and how he’d modified the Snowflake Device, how she’d sought out Robert Norton, and how Norton had been murdered. How the scheme originated with Donlon’s Queen of Thieves, not with Sipar. “The Queen of Thieves manipulated both sides into this war. We have to stop it.”

The queen shook her head, sad-eyed. “War is inevitable—”

“No, it’s not!” Audrey burst out, then winced at her own temerity. “Beg pardon, Your Majesty. I—I think that the only thing that makes war inevitable is both sides’ belief that peace is impossible.”

A long silence followed. Audrey began to sweat. Had she gone too far?

“You may be right that war could be averted today, were I willing to grovel,” the queen said quietly, “but it will come. This conflict has been building since before my rule began. In the long term, war is inevitable. And since it is, since the ambassador’s death cannot be reversed, it is to Donlon’s advantage to declare war now. We must prune back the Sipars before they build enough zipships to overwhelm us.”

Audrey said nothing—because the queen was right. Audrey had been deluding herself. She bowed her head. “Your Majesty is wise.”

“You’ve brought Donlon valuable information,” Queen Winifrid said. “Be assured that I will act on it.” Her voice hardened. “I take the attack on my son very seriously. I will see both this Queen of Thieves and this phantom arrested and imprisoned.”

“No!” Audrey burst out, then quickly apologized. “I beg pardon, Your Majesty, but there is still the matter of my boon.”

Queen Winifrid waited, eyebrows lifted.

“I ask amnesty for The Phantom. His mother is the traitor, not him. He didn’t know what the modification would do to the Snowflake Device.” The queen’s face grew colder at the reminder, and Audrey clenched her fists; she was messing this up. She tried again. “The Phantom freed me and is working with Donlon to stop Sipar.” Or rather, to take down Qeturah, who was still out there, scheming to shatter Air World. “He can be a valuable resource to the Crown. Please spare him.”

“By your testimony, he is old enough to know right from wrong. I will not grant him wholesale amnesty. But”—the queen held up a hand to stop Audrey’s protests—“in view of your support, I will give the order that he be captured and go to trial, not shot on sight. That is the best I can do. If there is another boon you wish, you may apply to me again later.”

That’s not enough! Audrey screamed inside. But the queen had already beckoned to her velvet-clad page for the next supplicant. Her audience was over, her chance to make things better gone as irrevocably as a snowflake in the desert.

Dismayed, Audrey curtsied and took her leave.

Her steps slowed as she approached the Harding family pedal car. There was nothing for it but to go home now. Nothing she could do to change the course of the war. Everything would happen miles away and far above the city, while she and her mother huddled together in fear and waited for news.

She hated waiting. Despised being helpless.

She almost wished she’d been born a boy so she could enlist with the Fleet. If she was on the spot, she could intervene if The Phantom and her father clashed. She could identify the Queen of Thieves and foil Qeturah’s plans.

Instead, she’d be trapped here.

No. Everything inside her rebelled at the thought.

Jem took her arm and helped her into the pedal car. “Home, Lady Audrey?”

Determination filled her. “No. Take me to Grady’s.”