Jeremiah Willstone and the Clockwork Time Machine by Anthony Francis

Author:Anthony Francis
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: BelleBooks, Inc.
Published: 2017-02-20T16:00:00+00:00

31.

The Siege of Room 221

“THEY’RE LISTENING . . . right now?” Georgiana said.

“Laser mike,” he said. “They can hear every word.”

“And you bedded her knowing that?” Georgiana said. “You matahari are weird.”

“Lady Westenhoq, please,” Jeremiah said, her eyes still fixed on Marcus, whose mouth quirked up. She shook her head. “So . . . you did lie about revealing our location,” she said, and a guilty flush spread over Marcus’s face. Interesting. “You naughty boy.”

“Hang that, Jeremiah, who cares if he lied,” Patrick said. “If they’ve been listening, then they know all our plans. We have to go, right now—”

“No,” Jeremiah said firmly. “Harbinger . . . fetch your aerograph.”

“What?” Georgiana said. “We have to flee. We’ll be caught—”

“Perhaps,” Jeremiah said, unslinging her blunderblast. “But I recall Natasha upbraiding me for dashing first and thinking later. Perhaps it’s time I started thinking like a general—and flipped the order. Harbinger, fetch your aerograph and go to the privy. The one behind me. Quick now.”

She positioned herself with a good view of the doors as Patrick darted into the other room, retrieved the aerograph, and lugged it back. Once he was behind her, she stepped backwards, positioning herself outside the privy door.

“Close it. Lock it. And call Birmingham,” Jeremiah ordered. Her voice dropped to a whisper. “Warn him he’s sitting on an asset so valuable that this country is willing to deal with Lord Christopherson, even knowing he’s a danger—”

“They can hear whispers,” Marcus said.

Patrick opened his mouth to speak, then clenched his teeth and slammed the door.

Jeremiah leaned back against the sink, considering.

“What are you doing?” Marcus asked.

“Warning my people,” Jeremiah said.

“That won’t help,” Marcus said.

“Won’t it now?” Jeremiah said. She was willing to end up in a cage if it meant the airship was still free. Then, a little more loudly, she said, “Lord Christopherson is a blackguard. All of us risked our lives getting here. We’re all willing to die to try to stop him. We aren’t your enemies.”

“That really won’t help,” Marcus said. “They will ignore anything you say, anything you do, until they’ve caught you and locked you down. Then, and only then, will they try to sort things out. That’s how it works. That’s the protocol—”

“How perfectly patriarchal,” Georgiana said. “Stern fathers and all—”

“That’s how they wish it will work,” Jeremiah said. “But we won’t roll over. Boy, you’ve—” betrayed us. But then she realized that depended on the premise that he was not a matahari just doing his duty, and instead on the idea that their encounter . . . had been real.

“Skater boy,” Jeremiah said, a little more softly. “Were you telling the truth? Are you not a matahari? When you bedded me tonight—”

Marcus’s eyes bugged. “I swear no one ordered me to be with you. No one even ordered me to follow you. I just went for a burrito, recognized you, and—and took the initiative,” he said. “After that . . . I thought, well, we hit it off.”

“So did I,” Jeremiah said,

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