Trent Jamieson - Night's engines

“We’ll be out of here soon,” Kara Jade said. “Just work through it, and don't mention — oh, no.”

“What?” David turned to her; Kara wasn’t looking in his direction.

He followed her gaze towards the edge of the party. A woman stood there- almost as tall as Margaret, which made her stand out here. There was something oddly familiar about her, and not from Cadell’s memories. David caught her eye, and the woman nodded, before turning her attention back to the bottle she held in her hands. Drift rum of course, dark, glinting like a Cuttleman’s blood. She had to be a pilot, they all were here, and pilots drank nothing else.

“Who is that?” David whispered in Kara’s ear; she stiffened, turned David bodily in the other direction, before he could even protest.

“You don’t want to talk to her,” Kara Jade said.

“Why?” David asked.

“She’s Raven Skye.”

“Raven Skye?”

Kara’s eyes boggled. David felt that he had offended her. “I’m sorry. I don’t mean to-”

“You must’ve heard of her.”

David shook his head.

“What cave have you been living in?”

A deep dark one, David wanted to say, but he didn’t. “Carnival, that’s a cave of a sort, I suppose.”

Kara’s jaw was clenched so tight it looked like she might snap a tooth. “She’s the pilot of the Matilda Ray.”

“What?” Now he had heard of her. “S he’s the pilot of the Tilly Ray?”

Yet again, David could see that he had disappointed her. “Typical groundling, knows a pilot’s Aerokin, but not the pilot. And don’t call the Matilda the Tilly in front of her. She’s a bit odd about it. In fact, I think we should-”

“Ah, Kara!” Raven called out, already walking towards them.

Kara winced.

Raven patted her arm. “What, you weren’t even going to talk to your sister?”

Sister? Now David looked, he could see the resemblance. Though Raven was a good decade or so older, and about a foot taller; she’d pulled her long hair back, revealing a scar that ran from her left ear, all the way down her chin.

The Tilly Ray had been the last ship to leave the Grand Defeat, she’d held the Roil back as the other Aerokin had escaped, and had even managed to pick up more refugees along the way. She’d also been the first Aerokin that Stade had turned away, and the first to land in Hardacre with her wounded. The heroic death of General Bowen and the actions of the Tilly Ray were the most famous incidents of the Grand Defeat.

It had been the Aerokin that had drawn the attention, while the pilot had kept a low profile, avoiding mention in all but the most thorough histories, and David rarely read those.

Raven must have been only Kara’s age when she’d performed her feats, and just as obstinate. David could understand why Kara might find her sister difficult to be around, two such personalities were never going to get along. And now Raven was coming over; wherever she walked, people got out of her way almost as quickly as if she were a Mother of the Sky. The whole party shifted around her like mice around a salivating cat.

Raven looked down at him. “So this is the addict, the one from the Sump?”

“The Sump?” he asked.

“Long story. But take it from me, it isn’t complimentary, addict,” Raven said. David smiled, of course it wouldn’t be; just looking at her he doubted Raven was capable of compliments.

“Raven!” Kara said.

David reached out a hand. “No, it’s true. I had my troubles, but those days are past.”

Raven gave him a tense sort of smile, and cracked her knuckles. “So, if I was to shake you, you’re telling me Carnival wouldn’t come spilling out of your every orifice, pocket, and shoe?”

David realised that everyone in the room was looking at them, at him in particular — the conversation had died down. It was the Carnival that allowed him to lie with such conviction. David lifted his arms. “If you’d like to, but I must warn you, I’m heavier than I look.”

Raven laughed. “I’m sure you are.” She studied him with eyes as dark as thunderheads. “You’re certainly a charmer, so was your father. Don’t look so surprised. I knew many Engineers and Confluents when I still visited Mirrlees, before it started to drown. I was sorry to hear he died.”

“He didn’t die. He was murdered.”

“And I am sorry for that.” She clapped her hands. “Now, what are you drinking?”

They were all a little drunk by the time Mother Graine arrived, alone. She walked straight over to David, ignoring Margaret as she did. Not that Margaret seemed to mind; she was having an animated conversation with another pilot. And she was smiling.

David thought Mother Graine looked harried, weary, as though she had already had a night of drinking. Raven drained her glass the moment Mother Graine appeared. Then Raven slid an arm over her sister’s shoulder, and pulled Kara away.

“There’s something we must talk about,” Raven said, leaving him alone with the Mother of the Sky. His head buzzing with drink, and some rather lewd memories of Cadell's; he felt his cheeks flush.

“Raven is so brave,” Mother Graine said, watching after the pilots. “It is a hard thing to lose your craft, to have it die. Many don’t survive that loss.”

“What? The Matilda Ray is dead? I'd heard-”

“The Matilda was old when Raven took her as pilot. Though she should have had another twenty years in her, she died not long after the Grand Defeat; an infection of the lungs, I believe. Raven hasn’t left Drift since.”

David thought of that, ten years alone. David thought Margaret would know at least a portion of that loneliness. He guessed he did, too. “People are torn from our lives,” he said. “Loves snatched away.”

Mother Graine patted his arm. “We’ve had our share of that, you and I. The dead far outweigh the living in our lives.” She sighed, looked around her pointedly. “I can’t talk here, and there are things that must be said. Things that only you and I can discuss.”

“I agree,” David said. “We need to talk, and you need to let us go. We've a long way to go.”

“Yes, I understand that. The Engine waits and you fear it as much as you desire it.” She touched his arm, and David felt his nerves react in a way that he’d thought was lost to him; or perhaps he had never really known, it seemed so foreign. The Engine wasn't the only thing that he feared and desired.

Mother Graine said, “I understand a lot of things about you. Come with me for a while, I promise people won’t mind, I have a bit of influence here.” She flashed him a smile, and David’s throat tightened, he knew at once, in that moment, he couldn’t deny her anything. Plans for an early night fell away; besides, he doubted she could stop him, or even hurt him.

The strength, Cadell’s strength, bloomed inside him. And he felt at last that he understood the true possibility of their binding.

“Where do you want to go?” he asked her.

They left the Caress together, the reception still going strong, and already beginning to look like it was going to get messy. Out in the night, David couldn't tell if it was cold, but he guessed it had to be. Mist was rising from the lake (a lake in the sky, that still struck him as so wonderfully odd). People gathered around small fires on the outskirts of the city, guards, he guessed, though they did their best to pretend that neither he nor Graine were there. Graine held his hand, and her grip was warm. She didn’t seem to mind the cold.

They walked for about twenty minutes in silence along an increasingly narrow path. The houses thinned out around them, the forest thickened and the stars grew bright. They reached an edge of Stone, and a viewing platform.