Behemoth Read online

  “Why are they watching us so keenly?” Klopp whispered.

  “They think we’re here to feed them,” Alek said. “Dylan always feeds the bats at night.”

  “You mean they’re hungry?” Klopp asked, his face shiny with sweat in the moonlight.

  “Not to worry. They eat figs,” Alek said, leaving out the part about metal spikes.

  “I’m glad to hear—,” Klopp began, but suddenly a bat fluttered up in front of him. As it shot past his face, his boots slipped from the ratlines.

  Klopp jerked to a halt a moment later, his hands white-knuckled on the ropes, but his large body swung into the side of the airship’s membrane, sending it billowing out in all directions. Around them bats launched into the air, their clicking noises changing into shrieks and calls.

  Alek grabbed for Klopp’s wrist as the man struggled to get his feet back on the ropes. A moment later he was safe, but the disturbance was spreading, bats fluttering outward like ripples in a dark pond.

  We’re done for now, Alek thought.

  The creature on his shoulder perked up, its claws sinking painfully into Alek’s shoulder. A soft clucking noise came from its mouth—the sound the bats had been making a moment before.

  “Keep that beast—,” Volger hissed, but Alek waved him silent.

  All around them the bats were growing quieter. The screeches faded out, the carpet of black shapes settling back onto the airship’s skin.

  The creature went silent and turned its big-eyed gaze upon Alek again.

  He stared back at it. Had the thing, whatever it was, just silenced the fléchette bats?

  Perhaps … by accident. It was some kind of mimic, like the message lizards. And yet the creature had required no training, no mothering at all. Perhaps that was the way with all newborn Darwinist beasts.

  “Keep moving,” Volger whispered, and Alek did.

  The mooring tower stretched into the air before them, but Alek found himself staring downward. In the foggy darkness the ground seemed to be a thousand kilometers below.

  “Does that rope look strong enough?” he asked Hoffman.

  The man knelt to feel the slender cable that stretched across to the tower, perhaps thirty meters away. It seemed too thin to hold a man’s weight, though the Darwinist’s fabricated materials were always stronger than they looked.

  “From what I’ve seen, sir, the heavy cables are all attached to the gondola below. But this must be here for some reason. Pretty useless, if it can’t hold a man’s weight.”

  “I suppose,” Alek said. He could think of other creatures that could use the cable. It might be for message lizards to dart across, or for strafing hawks to roost on.

  Hoffman shrugged a loop of rope from his shoulder. “This line will hold any two of us, along with our gear. We should send someone over carrying one end of it.”

  “I’ll go,” Alek said.

  “Not with your injury, young master,” Klopp said.

  “I’m the lightest of us.” Alek held out his hand. “Give me the rope.”

  Klopp looked at Volger, who nodded and said, “Tie that around his waist, so he doesn’t kill himself.”

  Alek raised an eyebrow, a little surprised that Volger was letting him go first.

  The wildcount read his expression and smiled. “If that cable breaks, we’ll all be stuck here, so it hardly matters who goes first. And you are the lightest, after all.”

  “So my foolhardiness has produced the correct strategy, Count?”

  “Even a stopped clock is right twice a day.”

  Alek didn’t answer, but the creature bristled on his shoulder, as if sensing his annoyance.

  Klopp let out a chuckle as he knelt and tied the heavier rope around Alek’s waist. Soon it was secure, the other end gripped by Bauer, Hoffman, and Klopp in a tug-of-war line.

  “Quickly now,” Volger said.

  Alek nodded and turned away, walking down the slope of the airbeast’s head. The others let the rope out slowly, a gentle pull at his waist. It reminded Alek of when he was ten and his father would let him lean out from castle parapets, keeping a firm hand on his belt. Of course, back then he’d felt much safer.

  The slender cable stretched out ahead, disappearing among the dark struts of the mooring tower. Alek grasped the cable in both hands.

  “I hope you’re not afraid of heights, beastie.”

  The newborn creature just looked at him and blinked.

  “Right, then,” Alek said, and stepped off into the void. He dangled for a moment from his hands, then swung his legs up to wrap them around the cable. Though its claws sank deep into his shoulder, the beastie didn’t make a sound.

  There was one good thing about hanging faceup like this—Alek couldn’t see the dark ground below, only his own hands clenching the rope and the stars above. He pulled himself away from the airship hand over hand, the cable cutting into the backs of his knees as he inched along.

  Halfway across, Alek was breathing hard. His injured rib had begun to throb, and his hands were losing feeling. The night air turned the sweat on his forehead cold. As he inched away from the airship, the rope hanging from his waist grew longer and heavier.

  He imagined the cable snapping, or his fingers slipping. He would fall for an awful moment, but the rope around his waist would swing him back toward the airship, smashing him into its nose—maybe hard enough for the whale itself to awaken and protest.…

  The mooring tower grew closer, but the cable in his aching hands sloped gently upward now, and was harder than ever to climb. The creature began to moan softly, mimicking the wind in the struts of the tower.

  Alek gritted his teeth and pulled himself the last few meters, ignoring his burning muscles. For once he was thankful for the years of Volger’s cruel fencing lessons.

  Finally a metal strut came within reach, and Alek wrapped an arm around it. He hung there for a moment, panting, then hauled himself up onto the cold steel of the tower.

  With shaking fingers he untied the thick rope from around his waist and knotted it to the strut. Now that it stretched all the way back to the airship’s head, the rope seemed to weigh a ton. How had he carried it so far?

  Alek lay on his back and watched as the others prepared to cross, dividing up the satchels of tools and weapons. It was odd to see the Leviathan from this head-on perspective. It made Alek feel insignificant, like some minuscule creature about to be swallowed by a whale.

  But the darkness beyond the airship was vaster still. It was dotted with the fires of the protesters at the airfield gate, and past those, the lights of the city.

  “Constantinople,” he said softly.

  “Mmm, Constantinople,” the creature said.

  Climbing down the tower was simple. A set of metal stairs spiraled through its center, and the five of them descended quickly.

  Or was it six of them now? Suddenly Alek could feel the weight of the fabricated beast riding on his shoulder. The single word it had spoken made the animal heavier somehow, as if its uncanniness were something solid.

  Alek hadn’t told the others, of course. Volger was terrified enough of message lizards. Why provide him with another excuse to get rid of the newborn creature?

  At least it seemed to know when to stay quiet. Since speaking that one word, it hadn’t uttered another sound.

  As they neared the bottom of the stairs, Alek found himself level with the airship’s bridge. Light from worm-lamps shone through the windows, silhouetting two officers on duty inside. But the faint green glow didn’t reach the shadows within the tower.

  The Leviathan’s guards stood at attention in the airship’s hatches. Ground men in red fezzes faced them, the two groups watching each other warily. The rest of the Ottomans were at the airfield gates, keeping an eye on the protesters.

  No one was guarding the base of the mooring tower.

  The moon was climbing, a fat crescent in the sky, and the tower cast a long shadow pointing west, away from the city and the crowds. Vo
lger lead the others along that slender finger of darkness, heading for an empty stretch of fence at the airfield’s edge.

  Alek wondered what would happen if they were spotted now. The Leviathan’s crew had no authority here on Ottoman soil. But he doubted that the Darwinists would let their only engineers slip away without a fight. For that matter, the Ottomans mightn’t take kindly to foreigners trespassing on their airfield.

  All in all, it seemed better to remain unseen.

  Suddenly the newborn creature stood up on its hind legs, its ears twisting back toward the ship. Alek came to a halt and listened. The distant shriek of a command whistle reached his ears.

  “Volger, I think they’ve—”

  A hydrogen sniffer’s howl pierced the night. The sound came from near the engine pod—someone had found the bound and gagged Mr. Hirst.

  “Keep moving,” Volger whispered. “We’re half a kilometer from the fence. They’ll search the ship before they think to look out here.”

  Alek broke into a run, shuddering to think what beasts the Darwinists would send after them. The six-legged sniffer dogs? The awful fléchette bats? Or were there even worse creatures aboard the ship?

  The alarm spread along the long, dark silhouette behind them, the gondola lights flickering from soft green to brilliant white. On Alek’s shoulder the creature softly imitated the sounds of the alert, the barks and cries of the hounds, the shouts and whistles of command.

  “I’m not sure that’s helpful,” he muttered to it.

  “Helpful,” the creature repeated softly.

  A minute later a blinding searchlight lanced out from the ship’s spine. At first it pointed at the airfield gate, but slowly it began to turn, like a lighthouse on a dark ocean.

  So much for the Darwinists letting them slip away.

  “You four go ahead,” Klopp said, his face bright red. “I can’t keep running like this!”

  Alek slowed his pace, taking the man’s heavy tool kit from him. “Nonsense, Klopp. Spreading out just makes it easier for them to spot us.”

  “He’s right,” Volger said. “Stick close together.”

  Alek glanced over his shoulder. The light was swinging toward them, rippling across the grass like a luminous wave.

  “Get down!” he whispered, and the five of them dropped flat to the ground.

  The blinding light flashed past, but didn’t stop on them—it had been aimed too high. The spotlight crew were searching the airfield from the outside in, checking the boundaries first. But Alek doubted Klopp could make it to the fence before the light swung round again.

  The newborn creature’s claws tightened on his shoulder, and it made a new noise in his ear … a sound like fluttering wings.

  Alek glanced back at the ship, his eyes widening. A dark cloud was boiling up from beneath the gondola, thousands of black forms spilling into the air. The tempest of wings climbed through the searchlight’s beam, glittering with the flash of steel talons.

  “Strafing hawks,” Alek breathed. Back on the glacier, he’d seen the hawks in action against German soldiers. And just yesterday he’d seen a crewman sharpening the steel talons they wore, like a razor on a leather strap.

  The birds spread out from the ship, and soon the air above was full of fluttering shapes.

  Alek looked ahead—the fence was only a hundred meters away.

  But a moment later the hawks had begun to circle, a whirlwind of wings and glinting steel forming overhead. Alek stooped his shoulders, waiting for an attack.

  “Just keep running!” Volger cried. “We’re no good to them dead.”

  Alek ran, hoping the man was right.

  As the spinning mass grew larger and larger, the spotlight altered course, heading toward the towering whirlwind of birds. It arrived in seconds, pinning Alek like the stare of a great, blinding eye.

  The howl of hydrogen sniffers reached Alek’s ears again, closer than before. The beast on his shoulder imitated the sound.

  “They’re coming on foot,” Alek said.

  “Go on, Bauer,” Volger shouted. “You’ve got the cutters!”

  Alek followed as the man spurted ahead. The airfield’s edge wasn’t far now; the spotlight streaming past them glinted on the coils of barbed wire.

  When Bauer and Alek reached the fence, Bauer pulled out the bolt cutters and set to work. He snipped at the mesh of wire, slowly opening a way through. But the cries of the beasts behind them were growing louder every second.

  Bauer was halfway done when the others caught up.

  “The forest is heavy this way,” Volger said, pointing at the blackness past the fence. “Run due west until you drop, then find a place to hide.”

  “What about you?” Alek asked.

  “Hoffman and I will hold the breach for as long as we can.”

  “Hold the breach?” Alek said. “With wrenches and a fencing saber? You can’t fight off those beasts!”

  “No, but we can slow them down. And once the Darwinists realize they have an engineer and a translator in hand, they may decide it’s not worth chasing the rest of you. Especially across Ottoman territory.”

  “We’ve thought this out, young master,” Klopp said, panting. “It’s all in the plan!”

  “What plan?” Alek cried, but no one answered. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

  “My apologies, Your Highness.” Volger drew his sword. “But you’ve been a bit loose with our secrets lately.”

  “God’s wounds, Volger! Are you playing the martyr?”

  “If they weren’t right behind us, I’d be going with you. But someone has to hold them here. And between the two of us, Hoffman and I offer them a chance to keep their ship flying, as long as they don’t treat us too roughly.”

  “But I can’t …” Alek swallowed.

  “It’s done, sir,” Bauer said.

  “Go, then,” Volger said, handing his bag to Klopp, who scrambled through the breach. The shadows of hydrogen sniffers and men loomed, made huge by the searchlight.

  “But, Volger.” Alek clenched his fists. “I can’t do this without you! Not any of it!”

  “I’m afraid you must.” Volger saluted with his saber. “Good-bye, Alek. Make your father proud.”

  But my father is dead … and you’re not.

  “Come, sir.” Bauer grabbed his arm. Alek tried to pull away, but the man was bigger and stronger. Alek found himself dragged through the opening in the fence, his jacket nipped at by the wire’s barbs, the creature on his shoulder ducking low and howling like a hydrogen sniffer on the hunt.

  A moment later they were among dark trees, Klopp’s panting ahead of them. Corporal Bauer still pulled him along, apologizing under his breath. The forest soon smothered the battle’s sounds, the searchlight barely glimmering through the leaves. The sniffers’ howls were muted, the strafing hawks forced higher by heavy branches.

  The three of them thrashed deeper into the trees, until everything was swallowed up by blackness. All Alek could see were spots burned into his vision by the searchlight. Behind them the sounds faded abruptly.

  Volger would be negotiating now, offering Hoffman and himself in exchange for the others’ freedom. The Darwinists would have little choice. If they fought their way through the fence, they’d risk killing their last engineer and translator.

  Alek found himself slowing. Count Volger’s plan had worked to perfection.

  Bauer tightened his grip. “Please, sir. We can’t go back.”

  “Of course not.” Alek shook himself free and came to a halt. “But there’s no need to rush, unless we want to give poor old Klopp a heart attack.”

  Klopp didn’t argue. He stood, stooped and panting, his hands on his knees. Alek looked back the way they’d come, listening for sounds of pursuit—nothing. Not even a bird in the sky.

  He was finally free, but he’d never felt more alone.

  Prince Aleksandar knew what his father would have said. It was time for him to take command.

  “Did we drop
anything?”

  Bauer quickly counted the bags. “The wireless set, the tools, the gold bar—we’ve got it all, sir.”

  “The gold …,” Alek said, wondering how much the last of his father’s fortune had slowed them down. He would’ve traded all of it for the extra minutes that Volger’s sacrifice had bought them.

  But this was no time for self-pity, or for wishing that things were different.

  “And there’s this,” Klopp added, pulling a leather scroll case from his jacket. It was marked with the crossed keys of the papal seal. “He said you should carry it from now on.”

  Alek stared at the object. It was a letter from the pope stating that Alek was heir to his father’s titles and estates, despite the wishes of his granduncle, the emperor. One could argue that it made Alek the heir to the throne of Austria-Hungary as well. It was why the Germans were hunting him—he might one day have the power to end this war.

  As Alek’s fingers closed around the case, he realized that he’d always relied on Volger to keep the letter safe. But now he had to carry his own destiny.

  He slid the case into a pocket and buttoned it shut. “Very good, Klopp. Shall I take Volger’s bag for you?”

  “No, young master,” the man panted. “I’ll be fine.”

  Alek held out his hand. “I’m afraid I must insist. You’re slowing us down.”

  Klopp paused. This was the moment when he would normally have glanced at the wildcount for approval, but no longer. He handed the bag over, and Alek grunted as the weight hit him.

  Volger, of course, had been carrying the gold.

  The creature mimicked the grunt, and Alek sighed. Less than an hour old, and already it was becoming tiresome.

  “I hope you learn some new tricks soon,” he muttered, to which the creature blinked its eyes.

  Bauer hoisted the other two bags. “Which way, sir?”

  “You mean Count Volger didn’t provide you with any more secret plans?”

  Bauer looked at Klopp, who shrugged.