Iron Seas 03 - Riveted

Iceland. Perhaps two hundred in Smoke Cove. You estimated fifty more at the camp. That is too many left unaccounted for. Maybe some are working on the drill that Fridasdottor mentioned to me, but perhaps more are in Höfn. He’s locked up half this island; I have to assume that he’s tried to take the other half, too.”
    Annika nodded, her eyes shadowed as she met David’s gaze. Resolve set her expression. “My people can help.”
    Everyone looked to her. Heart pounding, David reached for her clenched fist. “Let me do this, Annika.”
    “No.”
    Vashon frowned. “Where are they?”
    She evaded. “We have more trolls. More machines like the one outside.”
    The room had become deathly quiet. Without expression, Vashon studied Annika’s face. David could all but see the captain thinking of witches and trolls, and reconciling those stories with the odd stoker who’d boarded her ship four years ago.
    Finally, the captain nodded. “How long will it take?”
    “Usually only three or four days, but I’ve never crossed during the winter. It might be slower, take twice as long. Add another day if I have to backtrack. After I’ve reached them, we’ll need a fewdays to prepare, then the same amount of time coming back. At most three weeks, if I have trouble traveling over the highlands. If I’m gone more than a month…I’m not coming back.”
    “In a month, I’ll be taking the few boats left and raiding that rail camp myself,” Vashon said. “What will you need?”
    “The coal bunker is almost full. We’ll leave half here for heating—I know a few places to restock on the way. The surturbrand doesn’t run as hot, but it’ll push her. There are a few potatoes and pieces of bread left in our packs from Phatéon ’s galley, enough to last those three or four days, so we won’t have to take any from the stores.” She met David’s gaze again. “I need someone to help me see during the nights, so that I’m not bound by the short daylight hours.”
    “Also, so that he can’t give himself up,” Lucia said, her fingers tightening on his.
    “Yes,” Annika said. “And so di Fiore can’t take him.”
    So it wasn’t his decision, then. That was all right. David liked their choice better.
    “All right,” Vashon said, and her gaze found the first mate standing behind Lucia. “James, please help Fridasdottor secure everything that she needs. Quickly, now. Mr. Kentewess, I hate to push you out the door, but I expect di Fiore to return tomorrow, and we’ll need to erase the tracks from the machine.”
    David stood. Just arrived, and quickly leaving again. “Of course.”
    He met Annika’s eyes for a brief moment, then she was away with James, half of the aviators following her. Wearing an expression of deep satisfaction, Dooley rose to his feet.
    “And that’ll do for me. I’ll be looking forward to seeing di Fiore’s face when a few more of those machines walk through his camp.”
    David would look forward to it, too. He had to completely grasp that it would happen, first. He and Annika were traveling to Hannasvik.
    Lucia touched his arm. “If you can spare a moment, David, Mr. Goltzius wants to have a word with you and Mr. Dooley together.”
    He’d spare it. A narrow wooden stair led to a small bedchamber. An oil lamp burned low, casting golden light across the bed. Goltzius lay with blankets tucked under his arms. Bandages swathed his neck and forearms, the back of his hands. Maria Madalena Neves sat on the high-backed chair beside him. Whatever care she’d been providing, it didn’t appear to be the gentle sort. The look she gave Dooley could have cut through ice, and thinned to a razor when David followed him in.
    “We won’t tire him, senhorita,” Dooley said. “Or upset him.”
    She exhaled sharply through her nose—exasperation, disdain, and a warning all in one breath. David was impressed. With a sweep of her skirts, she left. He glanced back at the Dutchman, who was laughing.
    “I would tell you that she’s not at all like that, but it’s only half true. She is when we’re not alone, but when we are, she’s really quite something.”
    Remembering the softness he’d seen while she’d walked the deck with her nurse, David believed it. Maria Madalena might let her guard down for brief moments, or when she was with the man who’d rescued the woman she loved, but the rest of the time, David suspected that the haughtiness was as much a part of her as the gentleness