Captain Santiago, Keel Master Ordo, Vincent, Isabelle, and two of her ladies, Valérie and Darcy, were crammed into the wedge of space alongside the aetherkeel. Jean-Claude’s heart started beating again at the sight of her.
Santiago curled his mustaches, smiling beatifically, while his keel master held forth on the device itself. “… without it, the ship could do nothing but float helplessly downwind. We would have nothing to push against; we could not tack into the wind.”
“I see.” Isabelle raised her voice to be heard over the machine’s insectlike razz. “It’s very impressive. I … uh. Would it be possible…” Judging by Isabelle’s pasted-on smile, she was having trouble with her tongue again. No time for that now.
“Mon capitaine!” Jean-Claude shouldered past the ladies. “Forgive my intrusion, Highness. Captain Santiago, you have an intruder on board.”
“Intruder?” the captain asked. “A stowaway, you mean?”
“I mean an intruder. There is a mirror in the hold with its cover torn away from the inside. There is, or was, an uninvited Glasswalker somewhere aboard this ship.”
Isabelle frowned. “All of my mirrors are scored, which is a crime in Aragoth, so I didn’t bring them.”
Captain Santiago scowled. “The ship will be searched.” He bobbed his head at Isabelle as he shouldered by. “Highness, excuse me.”
Isabelle turned to Jean-Claude. “Did you smash the mirror?”
Jean-Claude stiffened, mortified by this oversight. “I didn’t think of it.”
Vincent said, “Highness, we must get you to a launch.”
As much as Jean-Claude hated to admit it, that was a good idea—get her off the ship.
“Come!” Vincent said. He took Isabelle by the arm. The whole flock scurried out of the keel run and down the stairs. They bunched up on the lower gun deck, where two crewmen flung open trapdoors to reveal the launch cradled under the ship.
A dreadful bell rang somewhere above. Ordo’s head snapped up. “?Fuego!” He charged from the room, toppling handmaids like so many squealing ninepins.
Fire! It was a skyship’s deadliest enemy.
“Load up!” Jean-Claude bellowed.
“Marie!” Isabelle cried, looking around frantically for the bloodhollow.
“I’ll find her,” Jean-Claude said. “Go!” Jean-Claude seized Vincent by his bejeweled collar. “Get her off the ship! Make sure she stays there!”
“I don’t take orders—” Vincent shouted, but Jean-Claude had already scrambled to the ladder well. From the hatch above came a blast of white heat and the crackle of flames.
Sailors screamed. Over the roar of the fire, Santiago bellowed, “?A su vez a estribor! ?Salto! ?Salto!”
The ship shuddered and groaned, like a beast in pain, and began to roll, nosing down. Flaming splinters rained through the hatch. Jean-Claude climbed—floated—through the hatch above, just in time to see an unfamiliar figure dart into the hold where the mirror was. The Glasswalker, trying to escape!
Jean-Claude caromed off a wall, just managed to hook the doorframe, and swung himself into the hold. Thin smoke filled the space and alchemical lanterns bobbed crazily at the ends of their chains.
Gravity came back redoubled. Jean-Claude slammed into the sloping deck and slid down it along the cramped corridor between the stacks of Isabelle’s luggage. There was the mirror with its flapping cover and a dim figure stepping slowly into it, as if pressing through a doorway filled with mud.
“Halt!” Jean-Claude pushed himself to his feet and rushed the figure, drawing his main gauche as he went.
The saboteur’s head turned. He had a lean face and a high-bridged nose. A long red scar ran down the right side of his face, leaping from brow to cheek. His eyes, orbs of pure silver, flashed in alarm. His mustache and goatee were ragged, his teeth white, and he was dressed in a monkish habit singed down one side. He slithered into the mirror, his face and torso sinking into its silvery surface. Only his right arm remained in the real world, gripping the frame for leverage, and the silver of the mirror flowed toward his hand like oil up a wick.
Mon dieu! Jean-Claude grabbed the trailing hand and jabbed his main gauche through the espejismo’s wrist. The man behind the mirror thrashed, his mouth open in a silent scream.
Jean-Claude hauled on the arm and snarled, “Come back here.” The Glasswalker inched toward Jean-Claude—it was like trying to haul an ox out of a mud pit—but the silvery sheen continued to creep up the saboteur’s arm.
The ship tilted backward and all the stowage groaned against the ropes.
A plume of smoke, a jet of fire, and a deafening bang erupted behind Jean-Claude. Hot sparks sizzled into his cheek, and the mirror shattered into a thousand pieces. The espejismo’s hand dissolved into a silvery mist, and Jean-Claude stumbled backward into a tightly lashed stack of crates.
Vincent stepped through the cloud of gun smoke, slowly lowering his pistol.
“Breaker’s hell,” Jean-Claude shouted so he could hear himself over the ringing in his ears. “You idiot. I told you to guard Isabelle!”
“I don’t take orders from you!” Vincent replied, shouting just as loudly. “My men have her on the launch, and I knew you would be no match for a sorcerer.”
Jean-Claude gestured to the shattered mirror. “I had him in hand. We needed to question him! And you shot him.”
“He was slipping away. He would have dissolved from your grasp or dragged you in with him.”
The ship lurched. Jean-Claude’s weight went from normal to double as the ship began to rise, crushing him to the deck.
*
Isabelle’s heart had stopped hammering, but her face was still cold and damp when she returned from the launch to the Santa Anna. The main deck resembled a forest in the fog. Shards of shattered glass and blackened splinters covered the deck. The crew swarmed hither and thither, scuttling shadows amongst singed ropes and scorched sails. Thanks to Captain Santiago’s inspired dive through a rain cloud, the fire had been extinguished, but how badly had the ship been damaged?
Jean-Claude appeared out of the smoke and she rushed to him, throwing both arms around him in a hug. “Saints be praised!” Then she pushed off. “Did you find Marie?”
“Not yet,” Jean-Claude said. “I ran into the Glasswalker; nearly captured him too, but Vincent cleverly stopped me.”
“You had no chance,” Vincent said, appearing beside him, red-faced with anger.
“Stop,” Isabelle said. “Both of you. Please.”
To her amazement, both of them went quiet.