Drops of Glass: A Tale of Magic in the Great War (The Shards of Lafayette Book 1) by Kenneth A. Baldwin

Author:Kenneth A. Baldwin [Baldwin, Kenneth A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Eburnean Books
Published: 2023-06-02T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 19

Mistakes

Marcus

The drab street stares to see them row on row

On the high tram-tops, singing like the lark.

Too careless-gay for courage, singing they go

Into the dark.

-Katharine Tynan-

I gulped air. Large heaving empty lungfuls. The air would not come, despite how I tried.

Everything was upside down. Not figuratively. The sky was where the ground should be.

I hung in the cockpit just off the airfield at Clairmarais. Around me, the world blurred in disconcerted motion, nothing managed to pull my attention into focus. The engine was off. We may have run out of fuel, I wasn’t sure. The dial read empty. Vaguely, Jane’s voice called to me, like from under a blanket, smothered by a pillow, enveloped by the down of gray clouds.

Jane, who I had nearly gotten killed.

Two hands pulled at my shoulders. I turned and saw her face. Her hair hung toward the ground, brows furrowed, eyes wild. She leaned across the fuselage from her gunner’s bay, crossing the gap that was insurmountable while airborne. Her mouth moved, but the sound came late.

She lived. This was real.

The sortie came back to me in fragments. The storm. The Camel looping up in the renversement. The vrille, corkscrewing down. All but skimming the ground to eliminate our underside as a potential target. The Immelmans. Breaking back and forth. Hearing Jane’s guns go out. The desperate slip slide. And then panic.

The slip slide.

I’d had a shot. He was right in front of my guns not ten feet off.

I didn’t fire. But he did.

The shame pierced my gut like a hot, twisting bayonet. What was wrong with me? I wasn’t cursed. I was broken. I had always been broken. If I’d wanted glory, it was there. If I’d wanted Jane’s safety, it was there. If I wanted to prove that I wasn’t a pathetic, cowardly, disappointment to all around me…

After that, the blue flyer predicted my every maneuver. I couldn’t even remember what I’d done. I had no space to dive. I must have zoom climbed to get some altitude. Yes, leveraged the speed from the vrille.

And the storm. No wonder I was so wet. My hands shook. They were numb. Other hands now grabbed at me. Strong hands, and I was getting out of the plane. Why was I upside down? Why was our plane upside down in the mud?

And Jane? Yes. Somehow, she was already out of the plane, had abandoned her flight suit, blended in among the others trying to help me. Now we all rushed for cover, out of the rain. Propping me up. And then, Oliver was putting a bottle to my lips. It burned. I sputtered and spat, but it jarred me. A stinging liquid slap to the face. I shook my head as the world came into focus again. The sound snapping back like a rubber band. A breath caught traction, brought welcome air. Then another. And another. Each breath working more.

And Jane sat in front of me, holding my hand in both of hers. Her fingers were cold and clammy.

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