Dragon Blood, Books 1-3 by Lindsay Buroker

Author:Lindsay Buroker [Buroker, Lindsay]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2014-12-23T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

The lights of the capital came into view on the dark horizon, the bright pinpoints close and dense in the miles around the harbor, then growing more sparse as they traveled into the hills beyond. Heavy clouds had gathered in the sky overhead, but the rain—or maybe it would be snow here in Iskandia—hadn’t started yet. Winds already batted at the dirigible, and Cas had to keep a hand on the controls to stay on course.

At the northern end of the harbor, atop Pinnacle Rock, the lighthouse sent its beam seaward. The craft had already passed the lookout towers miles out in the surf, where men were stationed to give advance warning if enemy steamers or airships appeared on the horizon. No alarms had gone up, not at the approach of an Iskandian freighter.

On the butte at the southern end of the harbor, gas lamps burned along the runway and all around the hangars of the airbase. For weeks, Cas had dreamed of seeing home again, but approaching it in a stolen vessel, with Captain Slaughter rubbing his hands and smiling as they grew nearer... that hadn’t been part of the dream.

Her stomach twisted with anxiety as she eyed the controls beneath her fingers, contemplating a crash for the five hundredth time. She hadn’t seen Tolemek since the captain relayed the story of their past. She had hoped he might do something and that she wouldn’t feel compelled to crash the dirigible, but he hadn’t sent so much as a note all afternoon. Of course, Slaughter hadn’t left the navigation area for more than a minute, either. He was watching her carefully, his gun in his lap. It had been there since the truth serum had worn off, a moment she had sensed by the hard, cold stare he turned upon her. As if she were the one to have fed him the stuff. Maybe he thought she had.

She tried not to watch that gun. She would die if she crashed the ship, anyway, she told herself. What did it matter if he was thinking of shooting her? That would simply ensure the vessel’s plummet into the ocean, unless these log-heads could dock a dirigible on their own. Granted, she hoped to survive a crash, inflicting most of the damage to the captain’s side of the ship. Surviving a bullet to the head was a trickier matter.

“Take us to Air Pier Two,” Slaughter said. “It looks quiet there.”

Though she had other things on her mind, it bothered Cas that he was familiar with the harbor.

She adjusted their course slightly. She had already lowered their altitude, and the roar of the waves was audible over the soft rumble of the propellers in the back. By design, their route would take them in past Pinnacle Rock and the lighthouse. It was visible to the left side of their viewing window. She didn’t angle them too close to it, not yet.

An irritating bleep sounded on a panel to Slaughter’s left. Technically, he was in the co-pilot’s seat, even if he had yet to touch a control.

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