Chapter 8: Lucille

It occurred to her, not for the first time in the last hour, that she might not be the best choice for this assignment.

She was an evaluator, a member of the Bureau of Oversight; the people trusted to keep the city safe from a Crafter's inevitable insanity. And her charge, not even a graduated Crafter, was attempting something that was as insane an idea as anyone had ever had.

Apprentice Gerald Raeth was going to lift hundreds to tons of steel into the air by tethering it to an inferno. Worse, that fireball would be fuelled by the deadly poison that had consumed the entire world. Not technically forbidden, but only because Parliament could not have imagined this insanity. Crafters, and even civilians, have been summarily executed for far, far less.

And she was standing on the ship's deck trying to keep herself from cheering him on.

She rolled her eyes as she followed the newly appointed captain as he finished checking the propeller controls. He was smiling as he slid his hand over the lever controlling the speed for the aft propellers.

"Thrust engages nicely, sir!" one of the engineers shouted from below deck, as the enormous propellers behind the ship slowly turned. "Twenty seconds to wind-up. The clutch isn't even straining, sir."

The sword lent Gerald a great deal of authority, Lucille noted to herself. None of the engineers had referred to Crafter a'Loria's apprentice as 'sir' before. Now, with news of the invasion spreading through the City, they snapped at attention and behaved almost reverently around the appointed Captain of the City's first Airship.

"Good. Thank you, Emery. That should be the last test," Gerald shouted back. She was surprised to learn that he knew the name of every engineer and mechanic who worked on the project. It was less surprising shortly after when she learned that list was fewer than two dozen people. Asides from the retrofit of what used to be a cargo ship, the project had only involved a small handful of engineers.

"Thanks, sir. Because it's a little warm down here," the engineer, Regina Emery, shouted back. The propellers slowly wound to a stop, and Gerald forced himself away from the flight controls.

"Maxwell!" Gerald shouted to the crew attaching the pipe to the bottom of the lift-bag. One of the engineers, an older man with grey in his hair, detached himself from the mechanics he was working with and saluted before approaching.

Gerald grinned and shook the engineer's hand. "Neither of us are military, and if you salute again, I'll go back to calling you 'mister Durgon'," he insisted, as he stepped up to the engineer.

Maxwell grinned a little in response. "Tell you what. Let me call you Captain, and I won't salute. This is your ship. By decree of The Lord Captain of the Wall. You may have to get used to a little deference," he explained.

"He's right," Lucille added. It was something Gerald would need to adjust to, and in a hurry. He was not a Crafter yet, and Tabitha a'Loria was a very large shadow to grow out of. Being deferred to may be entirely new to him.

"It's a reminder, to us and you, of the authority and responsibility you hold," Lucille said.

She smiled, and added, "Captain."

Gerald turned to her and smiled. "Even you? I thought Shadows weren't supposed to take orders from their assignment."

He was right, of course. But he also wasn't supposed to be in a position of authority. Wielding the flame came with privileges under the law, but holding either civil or military office was expressly forbidden. That his commission was granted during his apprenticeship was the only thing holding the paper-thin legality together.

She floundered for an answer, and he smiled at her. It was warm and gentle, not at all the behaviour a Crafter showed their shadow.

"Lieutenant Kendor," Gerald mused to himself, as he looked away from her to examine the lift-bag.

"It sounds appropriate, doesn't it?" Gerald asked her.

"Lieutenant?" Lucille asked, nearly tripping in place. She sputtered, struggling to form words. The implications of his simple question had her mind whirling, and she struggled to keep up as he continued to speak.

"I thought about it a little. You can't do your job unless you can stay reasonably close," Gerald explained. "Also...."

He hesitated and trailed off for a moment. He stared up at the Spire for a moment, and she swore she could feel the fear in his eyes. "I can't deny that I might become a danger to the City. Not with the invasion. You need the authority to command the crew to help stop me if the fire goes sideways. It would be insulting to you if I offered less."

She saw him, suddenly, in the mould his master must have seen years ago. At this moment he enjoyed near absolute autonomy and was well within his rights to leave her behind. Instead, this apprentice had, without being prompted to, put the City above his own life.

She smiled, and said, "I do like the way it sounds, Captain."

He grinned. "Glad to hear it," he turned back to the engineer, and asked, "Would you still like to fly? You've been studying applied aeronautics for the past half-year, which makes you impossible to replace. But I would understand your refusal, since this is no longer a simple test flight."

Maxwell Durgon shook his head. "There's no way I would miss this, Captain."

"Then you're my second officer, and the only other person allowed to touch those controls," Gerald said and held out his hand. Maxwell took it, and they shook firmly. "While we fill the bag, I'd like you to pick out another, say, eight people, to handle the ship's mechanics. In a pinch, the three of us would be enough to fly her, but there's no reason to not have more hands. I'd prefer volunteers."

"Aye, Captain," Maxwell replied. He turned away and stepped below deck. Lucille watched his departure with a satisfied smile. The old engineer lent the people he worked with a sense of calm purposefulness, and carried one of the rarest skill sets in the City. He was a superb choice.

Lucille expected him to watch as the crew began filling the lift-bag with the Gloam, pumping it from where it lay over the river. Instead, he had turned to the side of the ship and peered overboard.

"What are you looking for?" Lucille asked.

"Soldiers. We should bring a squad with us," Gerald said, before he casually hopped over the side and onto the construction scaffolding.

Lucille smiled, as she watched him follow the ladders down. She waited until he was out of sight, then vaulted over the rails and let herself fall the nearly three stories. She hit the ground rolling and threw herself to her feet before she stopped.

Her charge was watching from the ladder, wide-eyed. She grinned at him and waved.

He was muttering to himself as he took the last ladder down, and joined her on the ground.

"Doesn't that hurt?" he asked, as he approached.

She only shrugged in response. Taking a three-storey fall was part of the training curriculum in her Bureau, and the exams have killed more than a few careless recruits. She had done the fall so many times she had lost count, and the motions were as natural to her now as walking.

Gerald turned away from her and stepped up to a soldier, a squad sergeant with well-brushed hair and a well-fed physique. The soldiers kept at Central tended to be under-utilised, usually deployed as event security or maintenance crews. The joke was that the real soldiers were kept as far away from the City as possible.

"Sergeant," Gerald said. Lucille was surprised at how comfortable he sounded in a position of authority. "Where's your squad?"

The sergeant looked at him through eyes barely open and took a long moment before answering. "Keeping the civilians out of the area. What's it to you?"

Gerald strode closer and smiled. "Sorry, sergeant. I didn't catch all of that," Lucille chuckled to herself, as she watched.

Gerald's left hand rested on the cross-guard of his still-sheathed sword, pushing the pommel into prominence. The sergeant glanced at the sword, his eyes flickered awake, and his back went rigid.

"No, no, my apologies, Captain! I'm sure I stuttered. My squad is patrolling the area, to keep unauthorised persons away. Did you have new orders, sir?"

"I do," Gerald said, still smiling. "Gather up your squad, and begin loading that ship with small-arms. Salamanders, and every box of ammunition you can get your hands on. Your squad is now the security detail attached to my ship. Be ready to depart in twenty minutes."

The sergeant hesitated, before asking, "Has it been, ah, tested yet? Sir?" he asked.

Gerald raised an eyebrow and frowned. "Soldier, do you really think we would pack you into an untested ship and fly you into battle?"

"Sir!" the sergeant saluted, and Gerald made a passable imitation of it in return. The sergeant turned on his heel and departed at a slow run.

Lucille grinned at him. "You lied."

"Not at all," Gerald insisted, but he returned the grin. "If he had any brains, he would have said 'yes, I expect the military would do exactly that'."

"Semantics, Captain. He still believes your ship is completely safe," Lucille insisted, almost laughing out loud. Unless she was far off her mark, she knew exactly how he would react.

"It is completely safe!" he insisted, indignantly.

"Test-flying a giant steel boat tethered to an inferno at the order of an apprentice Crafter? Into war, no less? What about any of that sounds safe?" Lucille asked.

Gerald grimaced a little. "That does sound bad. If anyone asks about my qualifications, call me the City's senior Airship Captain. Technically true, and it sounds reassuring."

"Of course," Lucille replied.

"Sir!" someone shouted from above, and both of them turned their heads up to look back up at the ship, where a half-dozen engineers were standing at the balcony. The engineers noticed the pair below and pointed further up, where one of the assembly crew tethered to the scaffolding was pointing towards the top-seal on the lift-bag.

"The bag has been filled!" the woman on the scaffolding shouted. Regina Emery, Lucille recalled. She had better get used to remembering names. "Gloam just started pouring out the top!"

Lucille could feel, rather than see Gerald grin. "Good!" he shouted up. "Seal it up, and disassemble the overlay scaffolding. We're taking off in fifteen minutes!"

She smiled and had to force herself to keep from hopping in place with excitement. She glanced up at the ship and dared herself to watch that much steel fly.

She looked back to her charge, who appeared grim and quiet, despite everything happening around him. "Isn't this your life's work about to take off? You don't look nearly happy enough."

"Have you read much?" Gerald asked, and she glared at him until he clarified his question. "I mean about the invasions."

She shook her head. "Honestly, no. I'm beginning to wish I had."

"Every record calls them brutal and horrifying. Even the sugar-coated accounts meant for the public. Every invasion nearly destroyed us. They reached the Channel during the Third; the army cut open an outflow line to keep the Gloam from pouring through Central," Gerald explained, looking up to remember what he had read. "It makes me wish I had been more thorough in the design."

Lucille was confused by the comment and decided to say so. "What do you mean?" she asked.

Gerald paused for a moment, before answering. "I would have added a cargo lift, Valkyrie mounts, some kind of landing gear, and a couple dozen other things to make the ship battle-worthy. As it is, we just get a safe seat to watch the Golems kick the walls in."

It was the irritating guilt that smart people inflicted on themselves, and she wanted to stab Gerald for it. As if he were semi-omniscient and should have prepared an untested Airship for war because he knew it was coming. Lucille shook her head, and asked, "Wouldn't that have taken longer?"

Gerald chuckled to himself and nodded his head. "Point taken. We'll make do. A swivel mount would have been ideal, but every Valkyrie has a wheel-mount. Might be a problem if the ship tips more than five degrees..." he trailed off, muttering to himself.

She rolled her eyes. "Focus, Captain. The ship hasn't left the ground yet."

He grinned at her. "Oh, it will."

He turned to look back up at the ship, and shouted, "Maxwell!"

The stately engineer leaned over the ship's rails. "Captain?"

"Everyone who isn't crew should get off my ship. We're taking on a squad of soldiers, and as many small-arms as they can carry. Once they're aboard, we're taking off," he shouted.

"Yes, sir!" Maxwell replied, with a salute.

Gerald hissed in irritation, as the Engineer stepped out of sight. "He saluted! He said he wouldn't do that," Lucille heard Gerald mumble to himself. She smiled as he ranted under his breath. "Flame-bitten, coals up his ass engineer, lied to my face."

He turned back to her, and grinned, asking, "Do we have a plank for him to walk? No, that's not fair two miles up."

Lucille laughed until the tail-end of his sentence caught up with her. She could barely envision that slab of steel off the ground, but what he was talking about...

"Wait, wait, wait! Two miles up?" she asked.

Gerald smirked, and didn't answer. Her fingers twitched irritably over her knives.

Nearby, eight soldiers began handing boxes of ammunition up to each other on the scaffolding, as the small squad loaded themselves aboard. Gerald moved to assist them, and Lucille ascended the scaffolding from the side, gliding her way up to the deck of the ship. She stepped over to join the engineers, as Maxwell gave them all a short set of instructions.

"Arabel and Preston, I want you both below, watching the mechanics. Make sure the gears stay lubricated and check the reservoirs every half-hour. Let me know immediately if anything even looks like it could break," Maxwell instructed. By seniority and knowledge, he was the obvious choice to command the engineering crew, and it showed in the deference the others offered him.

"Of course, sir," two of them replied.

One of the engineers asked, "But we can't fix any of it out of dry-dock. And we can't refill the reservoirs."

"The Captain is a Crafter," Lucille said. Two of the engineers made room for her, and she stepped into the circle carefully. Maxwell gave her a short nod, before she elaborated. "Welding and reservoirs should be taken to him, when time permits."

"We will, ma'am. Thank you," Maxwell said, a little louder than he needed to. The others didn't say anything, but backs became more rigid, and every other head turned to her.

"One more thing," Lucille added. She drew her knife, to show the pommel of the weapon. The burnished obsidian gleamed in the firelight of the Spire, a shimmer of red against the slick black stone. "In case the worst should happen, and I have to do my duty, I want you all to stay out of the fight. Focus on keeping the ship in the air."

She paused, for a moment, before she finished. "It shouldn't be necessary. I trust him, but..."

"But we're heading to war," Maxwell finished for her. His voice was soft, almost a whisper, but the force of his words made them hard to ignore. Lucille shivered, despite the warmth of the nearby Spire. "Take your stations, and prepare for launch."

Lucille blinked hard. There was steel in his voice, and he had the tone of someone familiar with authority. "Who were you, before?"

He smiled at her in response, with that irritating twinkle in the eyes that smart men seem to be born with. Lucille scowled. "Not you, too. I get enough of that from our captain."

He shrugged. "I was an army engineer. Made senior sergeant before I accepted a posting in the Bureau of Civil Planning."

"I see," Lucille nodded. She thought for a moment, and asked, "Should I have brought that up with the crew?" She added, asking about her recent instructions to the other engineers.

Maxwell pondered for a moment. "Better now than later. This way they can tuck the knowledge away for the appropriate hour," he sighed, and his expression became hard and cold. "But how fond are you of our Captain?"

From his expression and tone, it was clear this wasn't gossip. Lucille thought for a moment, before answering. "I trust his judgement."

"Comforting, until something goes wrong," Maxwell said. Lucille waited for him to continue. Silence often prompted people to speak better than a request. "The thing is, you just lied to the crew for him. You called him a full Crafter. They already know better, but it tells me you're willing to go very far out of your way for him. I'd like to know why."

Lucille nodded and thought for a moment before answering. "I've known about this project for five days. Worked on it for two. And the implications of his success, of ships that can fly above the Gloam..."

She paused, and added, "I want him to succeed."

Maxwell nodded. He seemed satisfied by her answer. The old engineer turned away and shouted an order to the others now capping off the bottom-seal of the lift-bag.

Behind her, a now familiar voice sounded. She cringed ruefully when she heard it. "Are you sure you went to shadow school? Besides taking a three-storey fall like I take a stair, you don't strike me as very observer-like," Gerald asked, laugher in his voice as he spoke.

"Would stabbing you help?" Lucille threatened in response.

"That's more like it," Gerald said. His smile faded a little, and earnestness replaced the humour in his gaze. "Lucille?"

"Yes, Captain?" Lucille replied, instinctively formal. His scrutiny made her surprisingly uncomfortable.

"Thank you," Gerald said, softly.

Lucille smiled, to show the gratitude she felt, but wouldn't express in words. There was a wide gulf between shadow and Crafter. "Just don't drop us. I wasn't trained for a two-mile fall."

Gerald smiled in response as he turned away, and stepped over to address the soldiers as they set their supplies down in a corner. They saluted, almost in unison, and Gerald attempted to imitate it in return. "Set the ammunition in one of the large trunks on deck. Try to improvise a stand for the Salamanders. Anything else should be below deck."

Gerald stepped over to the hatch, in the centre of the deck, and gazed up at it. "Almost," he muttered, and Lucille strained to hear him.

Maxwell stepped forward, and said "Captain? The scaffolding has been cleared. There's nothing holding the ship down. She's ready to fly."

"She?" Lucille asked, raising an eyebrow.

"Old naval custom, ma'am," Maxwell said, formally. "A ship is always the opposite gender of her first Captain."

"It's also customary to name the ship before you fly it," Lucille retorted. "Name it, test it, get Parliamentary approval..."

"She's the Midnight Songbird," Gerald said. He was holding a watch in his hand, but his gaze was fixed on the bow of the ship.

Lucille turned to follow his gaze, where a pair of birds were perched on the railing of the ship, their backs to the crew. The gentle chirping was almost inaudible in the subtle cacophony of human activity, but occasionally a note rose above the din.

"Accommodating superstition, Captain?" Lucille asked, smiling. The birds felt like a good omen, even if it meant nothing by itself.

"It saves me from having to think up a name," Gerald said, with a shrug. "The time, and the first bird I've seen all week."

"Then she should be called the Zero Twenty Three Red-tailed Chickadee," Maxwell added. To her surprise, Lucille laughed almost instantly, doubling over as her stomach stopped trying to keep her upright, and grabbing the railing to steady herself.

Gerald said something she didn't hear as she laughed harder than she had ever remembered laughing. If Gerald had lit the lift-bag and set to ship in the air, she might not have noticed.

"I'm not writing that on the side of my ship," Gerald said when her laughter died down enough that she could hear him. His expression was halfway from a grimace, and halfway to a grin.

"Lieutenant. When you stop giggling, have everyone meet me at the intake hatch," Gerald said, sullenly. He strode away after he spoke, letting his gaze rest on the lift-bag.

As it turned out, Maxwell had already gathered the engineers he had chosen for the ship, and the soldiers were already finished and standing nearby. She waved them over and joined the growing circle that was forming around her charge.

They gathered, and the small spattering of conversation died, leaving the ship dreadfully quiet. It held a long moment, before Gerald broke it and began speaking. "I imagine you've heard already, but Golems have been sighted at the Last Wall. This ship has been commandeered by the Military to render support, in whatever fashion we are able," he explained.

"For the soldiers, I am Gerald Raeth, Captain of City's first Airship, the Midnight Songbird. My shadow, Lucille Kendor, will be serving as my Lieutenant, and second in command," he gestured to her as he spoke, and the soldiers acknowledged the new chain of command. "After her, Maxwell Durgon will serve as helmsman and my second officer. I'll let you all get acquainted once we're up and on our way."

He rolled his shoulders and smiled. "We are on our way to the western Walls, and should arrive within the hour. Once there, we will render whatever assistance we can to the defenders of the wall. Flight crew to your stations. All other hands can wait at the aft section of the deck. Prep for take-off."

The engineers actually cheered, lead by Maxwell, who whooped loudly and threw his hat off the side of the ship. Lucille wondered at their excitement for a moment, before remembering that most of them had been on this project for at least a year. The soldiers appeared agitated but saluted smartly before marching to the back of the ship.

"Lieutenant, would you hold this for a moment?" Gerald asked, and she was surprised to see his sword, unsheathed, in his hand. He held it by the blade, with the pommel pointed towards her.

Her expression prompted Gerald to add, "Lighting this bag is going to be tricky enough, without that distracting me. Would you open the hatch?"

Lucille nodded and took the sword from him, setting it down beside the large lever controlling the bottom hatch for the lift-bag. "Now?" she asked.

He held out his hand, palm up, while he held his other hand into the air above his head. In his hand, the fire flickered and swirled, a swath of bright red light with flames that folded back into itself, until the fires took the shape of a small bird.

Gerald cradled the small fire in his hand for a moment, almost tenderly, before he turned his head to her. "Now, Lieutenant."

She wrenched open the lever, and the hatch slid aside with a sharp rasp of sliding steel. As it opened, the pallid-grey mist slowly trickled out of the hatch, pooling out as if crawling up from a tunnel. The nearby flight crew bolted backwards, and even Lucille wanted to cry out to Gerald, to tell the Captain to get away from those killing mists.

But Gerald only stared at it the way a doctor might look at a cadaver; cold and impassive, utterly at ease. He reached out with his free hand to run his fingers through it, before letting the bird-shaped flame flap its wings and fly up into the Gloam.

In the instant before the small bird vanished into the hatch, when it touched the Gloam seeping from the open hole, it grew as if devouring the grey mist. An explosion swept through the air, the rushing boom throwing back coats and scattering the small layer of dust on the deck. After that instant, the fires vanished into the bag, except for a bright yellow haze coming out from the open hatch.

"Close it!" Gerald said forcefully. Despite the strangeness of what Lucille saw, her charge looked excited, and his walk resembled dance steps as he strode to the controls at the raised aft of the ship. She followed, sparing a glance at the bag, which now seemed to glow between the tendrils of black shadow.

Before they reached the controls, the bag expanded forcefully, straining against its metal frame. Metal groaned as slack chains were drawn taut, and the deck buckled faintly.

The ship heaved, and Lucille felt the deck push against her feet as the ship rose from its platform and took to the air. Besides that sudden shift in her weight, there were no other clues that the airship had left her moorings, as the deck still felt as stable as it did on the ground.

But a quick glance off the side of the deck dispelled that illusion, as the ship rose above the construction scaffolding that had surrounded it.

Further below, the crowds working on the other airship, now numbering in the hundreds, turned from their work to gawk and cheer. Some pointed in disbelief, others threw their hats in the air and clapped.

Gerald left the controls and stepped beside her, waving down to them. "It doesn't feel like we're moving at all, does it?"

Lucille shook head. "No. It's at least as stable as the trains."

Both of their gazes found Tabitha a'Loria, as she stared up impassively at the rising ship. Lucille thought she could see the ghost of a smile on her lips, but couldn't be sure. But she saw as the Crafter point towards the Bore, spin her finger in a spiral, and gesture to the west.

Lucille watched Gerald gave a short salute to his master, fingers to the right eyebrow rather than the military custom of a fist to the chest, before he strode back to the controls. Gerald noticed Lucille's curious gaze, and said, "It's time to see what she can do."

She watched him raise his hand, point towards the bag, and sweep his hand in a circular motion. At once, the haze of light within the lift-bag grew brighter, and the ship surged upwards. A few of the crew stumbled, while Lucille smiled to herself as she bent her knees to accommodate the acceleration.

In less than a minute, the crowd waving goodbye was so far away Lucille could cover them with her hand; the ship was as high as any building she had ever stood on. She glanced around the City's skyline, out of curiosity, and found herself eye-level with the roof of the Agora, the building that housed Parliament.

She whistled to herself and hummed happily as the ship began a slow turn towards the Spire.

She turned to Gerald, and asked, "That hand signal your Master gave you, what was that about?"

"Our route to the wall. We're going to follow the updraft from the Spire until it blows away from the city, roughly two miles up. The winds up there clock in around three hundred miles an hour. We won't quite make that speed, but we should make the Last Wall in the hour," Gerald explained, as he pulled a few levers and wound the side propellers in.

"Why not just ascend?" Lucille asked.

"It's slower. The updraft from the Spire makes the ship almost ninety tons lighter, if I set the sails right. If we corkscrew around it, I can make almost two miles a minute."

"Corkscrew around the Spire?" Lucille exclaimed, finally understanding. Her eyes were wide, and she glanced up the Spire, which now seemed more menacing than it had ever before. "On an untested ship? Are you insane?"

Gerald had the temerity to laugh at her. Burning abyss below, she wanted to hit him.

"Maxwell! Sails out full! Make sure every propeller engages! And have everyone else hang on to something!" Gerald shouted. Maxwell nodded in affirmation and turned to the others to begin unfurling the canvas sails.

He turned back to her, hands still on the wheel, and said, "Believe it or not, I designed the ship with this manoeuvre in mind. She can handle it."

Wide metal beams sprung out along the side of the ship, and long swaths of canvas were pulled out into a sail, stretching on each side of the ship as wide as the lift-bag. As they unfurled the wind caught them, pulled the Midnight Songbird towards the Bore.

The ship drew closer to the Spire, devouring the distance with startling speed. In a few short minutes, the Songbird had crossed an entire district of the City, and was passing directly over the Guildhall.

Gerald wrenched every lever back, and the ship surged forward. Another few seconds put the ship over the last of the buildings, and over the Channel.

The Channel is a mile-wide canal of water that separates the City from the Spire. Patrolled by soldiers and shadows alike, it was built as a safeguard to ensure the Bore could be drowned if needed. For the City's very last hour, since it would not survive without the fires. But the Channel served to keep the curious, and the Crafters, away from the temptation of the endless fires.

"Left sails half!" Gerald shouted from beside her, and the crew furled the sails in slightly, as they came alongside the Bore. So close, the wind howled furiously through the air, and the bow of the ship angled up as the sails caught the updraft.

If Lucille had thought their speed impressive before, it was only a lack of perspective. As soon as the spiralling winds took the sails, the ship was ripped into a torrent of motion, careening through the air with so much force she had to grab the rails with both hands simply to keep her feet. They rushed alongside, and past, the Spire, just as the ship began to turn into it.

The ship began to rumble furiously as it turned into the Spire, and the winds seemed to buffet it from every angle at once. The sails flapped back and forth, metal screeched as it was pulled along, and a few of the soldiers still on deck cowered in place.

Gerald threw the wheel into a spiral, and the propellers on the left side of the ship turned into the Spire, whirling with ferocious speed and halting the sudden turn into the immense column of flame. The ship instead flew forward in a spiral, swinging once in a long loop around, and then again, before Lucille was willing to slacken her death-grip on the rails.

Suddenly, as Gerald swung the controls again, aligning the propellers, the cacophony of noise stopped. The wind caught the sails and pulled the ship along with it. Aside from the endless roar of the Spire, the ship grew quiet. Lucille breathed a sigh of relief and looked to see some of the crew do the same.

As the ship finished its third spin around the Spire, Lucille felt safe enough to let go of the railing her hands were clamped to. She stepped away from the controls and to the far side of the ship, opposite the Spire, where she peered below in newfound wonder.

She realised, in awe of all she saw, that she might be the first person to ever see the City like this.

Small torches dotted the landscape, luminous little red bulbs of light that glowed in their hundreds of thousands across the world. The immense monuments to the City, its crowning achievements of architecture, were little more than toys from this height. The Agora, with an amphitheatre so large that a hundred-thousand people could watch Parliament at work, looked like a tiny model made for a child. Forty storey residential buildings barely rose out of the sea of stone that stretched on, seemingly endless. Even the river, whose bend cradled the oldest section of the City, was so tiny Lucille felt as if she could hop across it.

She looked over as Maxwell approached beside her. As they finished another spiral, he pointed down below. "I live right about there."

She smiled at him, and nodded, as one of the other engineers, looking over the sails, said, "Yes, the senior engineer gets to live in Central, don't rub it in."

Maxwell laughed. "I don't live in Central."

They all took another look down below, as the city grew smaller, and more of the world stretched out before them. "Burn me," the other engineer whispered.

"Another minute until we hit cloud-cover!" Gerald shouted, from the controls.

A few of the soldiers followed Lucille's example to peer out into the night and look at the urban sprawl below. They gawked and pointed to their homes or places they recognised, staring in awe at how small their entire world now appeared.

A few more spins around the Spire, and the ship rose into the grey and black clouds. In moments, the city vanished from sight, and asides from the flickering haze of firelight shining from the lift bag, the world around them was dark.

"Ninety seconds until we pull away from the Spire!" Gerald shouted, from the wheel. Lucille looked over and saw him fish something out of his pocket. At first glance, it appeared to be a pocket watch, except that he could barely grip it in his hand.

She stepped closer to look at the device and noticed half a dozen dials, none of which were a clock.

"It's a relic from before the Gloam," Gerald explained, noticing her observation despite his gaze being fixed on the device. "I don't know what two of the dials do, but the small one at the top-left varies by altitude. I can't explain how, since the Repository won't let me crack it open to look."

She smiled at his frustration, as he gently spun the wheel. The ship turned a little, pointing its nose slightly further away from the orange haze they were orbiting.

"Maxwell! Right sails in!" he shouted, and further on the deck, the old engineer started directing the crew to reel in the sail.

As the sails were furled in, the Songbird lazily turned away from the Spire, as Gerald spun the wheel hard. Thrust from the propellers pushed against the side of the ship and held it rigid, throwing themselves away from the orange firelight until it vanished in a sea of black cloud.

"Sails out full!" Gerald shouted, and both sails were extended out, throwing the ship forward as they caught the wind. Gerald smiled, locked the wheel in place, and stepped away.

Cheers erupted from the crew, and Lucille smiled as she clapped. For the engineers, and Gerald; this was the culmination of years of work that performed, as far as she could tell, flawlessly. She turned to the Captain, and asked, "How could you have known that she could do this?"

Gerald turned to her. "I spent five years of my apprenticeship preparing for this. How the Gloam behaves, how the Spire interacts with the wind, the tensile strength of steel cable, physics and weather patterns, even the Crafting I've studied has been to do this. Give most people that long to prepare for something, and they'll impress," he said. There was no humour in his expression, or in his words.

He turned away from her. "Maxwell, take the wheel!"

The old engineer strode from his post and stepped up to the large wheel, leaving it locked in place. "Just keep it steady for the next half-hour, sir?" he asked.

"Yes. We're heading west at roughly a hundred and forty miles an hour. It should put us near the last wall in forty minutes or so. We'll get our bearings after we fall below the cloud cover.

"Aye, sir," Maxwell responded, and Gerald strode away to survey his ship.

To Lucille's surprise, he strode straight to the soldiers, huddled around the railings near the centre of the ship, holding their coats tightly around themselves to keep the wind off. As they approached, the soldiers stood and saluted. "Captain! Apologies for being rather useless. We weren't trained for anything like this," the corporal said, stepping forward.

"No one was," Gerald replied honestly, and Lucille smirked at the truth of it. "How are your soldiers, Corporal..." he asked, trailing off.

"Corporal Cassidy Lancet, sir. My squad is normally assigned to communications, maintenance, and logistics. Most of us are fit for duty, but I'm afraid specialist Erin lost her stomach a few minutes ago. Managed to make it to the side first."

Lucille smiled at the attempt at humour. The corporal was shivering from more than the cold, but wouldn't willingly admit it to the captain.

"Where's the Sergeant I talked to earlier?" Gerald asked.

"That would be Reggie Calloway, sir. He's below," Cassidy answered. "Didn't take flying very well."

Lucille thought Gerald would inquire further, but instead focused on his own questions. "What kind of maintenance does your squad handle?" Gerald asked.

"Mechanical, mostly."

"Good. Take your squad below deck, I have a project for them. I'd like you to build lanterns, preferably tight-beam lights. Ask any engineers except my helmsman for assistance, and send someone for me if you need anything welded. Brighter is better, blinding is ideal," Gerald said, though his gaze was fixed on the side of the ship.

"Sir!" The small squad of soldiers saluted, before dashing down the stairwell and below deck. Lucille watched Gerald instead of the departing soldiers, and noticed his unusual interest in the copper lines extending from the cold-stone heat sink mounted to the deck. Something about it picked at her memory, like an irritating itch she couldn't quite reach.

"That should keep them busy," Gerald muttered to himself. He seemed irritated, and a little distressed. She glanced over at him, questioningly. He caught her gaze, and filled in the silence. "It keeps them out of my hair while we plan for the next part of this flight."

"Next part?" Lucille asked.

Gerald stepped up to the heat sink, and laid his hand on a long piece of thick, bare copper wire that extended from the cold-stone heat-sink attached to the deck. The cable ran all the way up the side of the ship and terminated at a pad that was designed to contact the bag when a lever was pulled.

For a brief moment, Lucille smiled with pride when she understood what the problem was. The cable served as a conduit to bleed heat from the bag into the cold-stone sink. The line was supposed to be powdered cold-stone trapped in a semi-flexible tube made of rubber.

Then the implications began to sink in, and her stomach felt like lead. Lucille stared at the line and finally understood why Gerald looked distressed.

"The cooling lines weren't installed. Descent is going to be a little complicated," he said grimly, and she swallowed hard and pulled her coat tightly around herself.