"That's not right," Alek says, pointing at a detail on the sketchbook page. "It connects up here."
Deryn squints, then decides he knows better than she. "There?"
He nods, and she rubs out her mistake, then draws the line afresh. She loves and hates these Clanker engines. She loves them because they're so fiendishly difficult to draw – all their bits and gears fitting together so cleverly. And she hates them… well, for the same reason.
"How's that?" she says, angling the book so he can see it better.
"Perfect," he says, with honest admiration. "You're very good."
"Thanks," she says, with honest gratitude. She knows she's a fair hand (she's bragged about it often enough), but hearing him say it… She casts around for something to say that'll distract from the blush on her cheeks. Luckily, a memory leaps out at her, and she quickly rifles through the pages, searching for another drawing. "I did one of your walker, back on the glacier. D'you want to see it?"
"Of course," he says. He leans forward, eager, and she passes the sketchbook to him. He looks at the drawing of his poor lost walker for a long moment, carefully and critically.
She feels the need to say, "I was in a bit of a rush."
"No," he says, still staring at the sketch. His voice has a little hitch to it. "It's – I like it the way it is."
Boys. If she didn't know better, she might be inclined to think he's more brokenhearted over abandoning the Stormwalker than he is over the death of his parents.
Before she can ask for the book back, he flips forward a few pages, past all the studies of engine parts and such, and lands on – of course – the one sketch she didn't particularly want him to see.
He frowns. "Is this… is this your sister?"
She freezes. It's a self-portrait, only it's clearly Deryn, not Dylan: her hair is long, the way it used to be, and done up properly; and just for a lark, she drew herself wearing one of the fashion-plate dresses in the ladies' journals that her aunt always coos over. There's enough ruffles to drown in, and that hat looks like it might pounce on and devour an innocent passerby at any second.
She forces a smile – probably looks a mad fool – and says, recklessly, the first thing that comes to mind: "I thought it looked like me in a dress."
Alek grins at her, evidently taking her words as a jest. "It's not that bad! I think she looks… rather pretty, actually."
Deryn sees an idle sketch of a skinny girl in a dress that doesn't suit her, but her heart lifts and flutters and spins at the thought: He thinks I'm pretty.
She wants to ask, Really? Would you step out with a girl like that, even if she's daft and dresses like a boy half the time? Your Highness, will you look at her twice when you're surrounded by princesses?
She wants to say, That's me, and I think I'd like to kiss you.
But she can't.
She takes the sketchbook back and closes it so neither of them can see the picture anymore.
"I never thought so," she says, trying her best to sound like Jaspert. It's true enough, though, and she has proof now to support her opinion; if she was pretty, she wouldn't make a very convincing boy, would she?
"Well, I suppose you wouldn't," Alek says, "her being your sister."
She blinks at him.
"I suppose not," she says. She looks at the sketchbook in her hands.
And wonders.
