.
.
.
Just to make sure that you were real
Just to make sure that I can still feel you
- from "Destiny Rules" by Fleetwood Mac
.
.
.
"It wants rest," the ship's doctor says, meaning her knee. Dr. Mészáros is speaking French, which is not his best language, according to him, but Deryn's German isn't up to the conversation, and her Hungarian is nonexistent. "You have torn - ah - not a muscle. A ligament. Yes. This is what I suspect."
Deryn sighs. "Oui, moi aussi."
Speaking French reminds her too much of Calais and Paris and that train ride to Lyon, when assassins were trying to kill them, aye, but she and Alek were becoming friends. And then becoming more than friends.
Too much more, because he's ruined it now.
Although, if she's to be honest, she's done some ruining herself. Cursing at someone is not the best way to decline a proposal.
It's just so unfair. She'd marry him in a heartbeat if he wasn't an emperor.
She sighs again. Maybe she ought to have said that, instead of telling him she'd rather be dead.
The doctor adjusts the clever metal contraption of struts and gears that's serving as a brace for her knee. There's a layer of bandaging between it and her skin, to make it more comfortable; it's a relief, actually, to have something supporting the joint.
No pain. Inconvenient, that, because she can't pretend the ache in her chest has its origins in her knee.
Alek had gawped at her for a moment, and then, imperially offended, had fired back, You can't be serious. No one's that stupid!
So she'd called him something much worse than a Dummkopf, and from there it had turned into a lot of swearing and angry words that had only ceased when the landing party came into earshot. From the wee smirk on that Volger's face, she suspected he'd overheard at least some of it.
And then not a word from Alek all the way across the glacier to the airship. Not even a glance in her direction. As if he'd never met her. As if they hadn't trekked halfway across Europe together. Hadn't – well.
No wonder Flora MacDonald had stuffed Bonnie Prince Charlie into a boat and sent him on his way. Kings aren't worth the trouble.
"Rest and compression for now," Dr. Mészáros tells her. He pats the aluminum frame of the sickbay bed - bolted to the floor, same as on a Darwinist ship, to prevent the wounded from sliding around during combat maneuvers. "Then the surgery when we land."
She looks at her knee. Cutting into it doesn't seem the thing to make it feel better. "It needs surgery?"
The doctor glances over his shoulder, apparently checking to see if the airman posted at the sickbay door is minding them. He's not. He's too busy trying not to let anyone see him yawning. It's late enough that they're coming to the end of first watch, if Austro-Hungarian airships run on the same schedule as British ones, and the young airman is likely looking forward to his bed.
The entire crew is young, including the doctor. The ship's young, too. Shiny metal, glossy paint, crisp edges. She reckons it was built during the war but never saw any fighting.
The doctor lowers his voice despite the lack of eavesdroppers. "At the Sorbonne, they taught a different method, using a fabrication as a… ah, a poultice. It does not require surgery. Frankly, I find it superior."
"You were at the Sorbonne?" Deryn asks, startled that any Clanker would want to attend a Darwinist school, but not startled that he found their medicine superior. That's obvious.
"A few months only," Dr. Mészáros says, demurring. He adjusts his glasses. "The war began, and I must help my country."
The airman at the door yawns again, this time into his hand.
"If His Majesty approves, I will ask a doctor friend in France for this poultice," the doctor says, rising from the chair beside her bed. "You will rest."
"Herr Doktor," she says, nodding. It earns her a tired smile from the doctor before he leaves. The airman barely stifles another yawn as the doctor walks past.
Deryn adjusts her pillow, laces her fingers across her stomach, and shuts her eyes.
Just an injured, exhausted girl. Harmless. Helpless. Crushed to powder by the guilty weight sitting on her heart.
The problem with this king is - he is worth the trouble. And she's the one who bollixed everything up. Scared about her knee, angry about the universe having a laugh at her, and taking it out on him when he was only trying to be honorable.
Apologizing is the right thing to do, and it needs to be soon, before something else goes wrong. But first she has to find him.
That means an escape is in order.
After a minute, she hears the airman shift a chair closer to him and sit down. After another few minutes, she opens her eyes and sees the poor lad has slumped sideways, sound asleep.
Cautiously, she swings her legs off the side of the bed and stands. Dr. Mészáros had removed her boots, but she's better off in her socks anyway if her goal is sneaking about.
Which it is.
She keeps her eyes on the sleeping guard and takes a step; the brace clicks and whirs softly and holds her knee steady. She takes another step, with similar success, and feels more confident.
The doctor had also rolled up her left trouser leg to get the brace on. She manages to tug it down again; the fabric is tight around her knee.
The airman doesn't so much as twitch as she approaches, and asleep he looks all of twelve years old, though of course he's probably the same age she is, or near enough to it.
Deryn limps over to the door and grips the frame to steady herself while she looks both ways down the corridor. Alek and that Volger had kept going after she'd been deposited here, so once she's sure there's no one ready to raise the alarm, she begins making her way towards the bow, hand on the wall for balance. Just in case.
It's strange to be aboard a ship lit by bulbs and not glowworms. The electrical lights are steady but too bright against the darkness outside, and she misses the bioluminescence.
A memory strikes her, of Alek looking at her on the train, eyes dark, hair untidy and nearly black in the pale green wormlight. Breathless. Happy.
She takes a deep breath. Presses onward.
As she's passing the open door to what looks like the officers' mess, there's a noise behind her, and she glances back to see the sleepy airman is very much awake and very much alarmed. He hurries after her, calling out, "Stop!" in German.
Sod it all.
She's tired, she's cold, she's hungry, and her knee is being held together by bloody clockworks. Dealing with this looby is the last thing she wants.
Luckily, it seems she won't have to. A door ahead of her opens, and Volger steps out, followed shortly by Alek.
Every clever thing she meant to say flies right out of her skull.
Alek's bathed. Changed into fresh clothes: a navy blue suit and waistcoat and matching tie, fairly gleaming with money. Shiny black shoes on his feet. Hair orderly. He has his pocket watch in one hand.
His eyes widen as he sees her, and then he disappears behind a blank, imperial mask.
"Hauptmann Sharp," he says. His voice is blank, too.
Still pretending he doesn't know her, then.
She covers the hurt with Dylan's brisk, confident attitude, and stares at a point just over Alek's shoulder. "Your Majesty."
I'm sorry. A different pair of words. Easy enough.
She's not going to say them to a mask, however. He could be apologizing to her, after all, for blindsiding her with a badly-timed, clumsy proposal, then yelling at her when she turned him down.
"Escaped, I see," Volger says, eyeing her. He shifts his attention to the hapless airman and says something dismissive in German; the airman salutes and scuttles off.
"I don't need to be in sickbay," she says, even though it's ridiculous of her to say it when she's leaning on the wall.
Volger scoffs. "Far be it for us to gainsay your medical expertise, Miss Sharp."
Alek tucks his watch into his waistcoat pocket and does up the buttons on his jacket. "I shall be meeting with the captain shortly. You should join us."
"As your air combat advisor." Dylan never cried, and there's no reason for her to start now, simply because an emperor is talking to her like she's below him. She is below him. And she's
going to stand straight as she can and hold her eyes steady.
"Of course," he says. He hasn't looked at her this whole time. "If you'd like to bathe first, you can use my cabin."
Standing next to the two of them, both starched and pressed, makes her feel even itchier and dirtier than before. Common-born, unfeminine, and not rating a turn in the officers' baths.
Chin up. Stare straight ahead. "Thanks, Your Majesty."
"Volger," Alek says, nods at the man - maybe at Deryn - and strides away.
Deryn doesn't watch him go. She turns toward the door he and Volger just exited, saying, "This is the one, then?"
Volger says, "Make yourself at home, Miss Sharp," in a withering tone that she hates to admit she finds impressive.
"Aye, I will," she says in her own scornful tone, limping inside.
It's a cabin on an airship. Smaller than the captain's quarters; large for what it is. The bed's wider than the usual narrow bunk, and the linens are high quality. The porthole has an expensive-looking curtain over it and an aluminum desk and chair beneath it. An upended traveling trunk takes up the rest of the space. Three suits hang inside, with empty hangers showing where Alek's current clothes used to be.
There's a folded newspaper on the desk. She wonders why.
"You came prepared," Deryn says to Volger, lurking behind her. She gestures at the trunk.
"Fortune favors the prepared, as they say." He snaps his fingers, and a man hustles into the cabin, carrying a bucket of steaming water, soap, and a bundle of cloth that must be a washrag and towel.
The man's wearing inconspicuous civilian clothes, not a uniform. She reckons he belongs to Volger. He sets the bucket down by the desk and stacks the soap and cloth on the chair, then disappears again.
"A tired cliche, but an accurate one, particularly in wartime," Volger continues. He clasps his hands behind his back, every inch an old cavalry officer. "Once we ascertained the identity of His Majesty's companion, I had a few things brought along for you, as well."
For some reason, her eyes go to the newspaper again. It's the only thing on the desk, so it must be important. "Companion? Bit more than that. I saved his life."
"Don't play the angel with me, Miss Sharp," Volger says. Eyes narrow. Voice hard. "It's a wasted effort."
His dogsbody returns, now burdened with Deryn's boots, a cane, and a valise. Working for someone as tiresome as Volger must make you good at all sorts of juggling.
The boots and cane are leaned against the bed. Then the man opens the valise and lays out a set of women's clothes on the bed: skirt and jacket in a subdued, dark grey; shirtwaist; stockings; chemise. The skirt and the chemise are both long enough to reach her ankles, tall as she is. The entire outfit is probably worth more than her balloon back home.
"I trust you'll find these satisfactory," Volger says.
Deryn glances at Alek's spare suits, then at the clothes on the bed. She sighs. "Aye, thanks."
Volger gives the man a curt nod, and he slips out of the room as silently as he'd come. "His Majesty is meeting with the captain, the ship's bosun, and the doctor to discuss our next actions. You'll be serving as the liaison between Austria-Hungary and Britain - on paper, at least. One must appear the part."
That's news. Who arranged an official position for her? Not Britain. From Volger's expression, not Austria-Hungary, either. "So I'm to be a proper lady, when the cameras are on me."
Volger's mustache twitches, so she can be aware of the insult. "Indeed."
She makes a long, slow show of looking around the cabin before meeting his gaze square on. "No cameras aboard."
He smiles. It's cool and razor-edged and never comes anywhere near his eyes. "Begin as you mean to go on, Miss Sharp," he says smoothly, moving to the door. He pauses there and adds, "However long that may be."
The door shuts behind him before she can throw anything.
Bastard, she thinks, scowling.
She looks at the bucket of water, still steaming invitingly, and the newspaper on the desk.
She picks up the newspaper.
It's in German, but Die Presse is simple enough to translate. The headline below has the word Kaiser, which she also recognizes.
And the photo of herself is perfectly clear.
She freezes in shock for a moment, staring at herself from a week ago, wearing a borrowed dress to a party she wasn't invited to. Deryn Sharp, the caption says, along with a lot of German blether. She picks out some of the same words from the headline. Engel. Luftschiffe.
Luftschiffe seems familiar. She says it under her breath and is sure of it - it's one of the words Alek taught her. Airship. Or airships, maybe. She's not sure of the written word's pronunciation.
She scans the rest of the article and recognizes a few more words. Leviathan. Eddie Malone.
Of course Eddie sodding Malone's involved.
What's it say, though? She'd kill to know. And why does Alek have it on his desk?
Maybe he likes the photograph. There are five wavy spots around it, where the paper got wet. She matches her hand to the spots. Four fingers and a thumb, maybe fresh from bathing.
She can picture Alek pushing his hand through his hair and then laying his fingertips on the paper. Framing her photograph, like.
That's not the action of someone pretending he doesn't know her. Did he put on the mask just now because he thought she was done with him? The same way she'd put on Dylan?
There's no future in this, she reminds herself. Hope glows in her heart anyway, like a daft little worm that doesn't know when it's been whistled down to darkness.
She gives herself a shake and focuses instead on the important business of washing up. A squick trickier than usual, since she doesn't want to get the brace wet. It might rust.
The soap isn't military-issue. No military in the world would give its troops fine-milled, perfumed soap when iron-hard, crumbling bars are available for so much cheaper. She breathes in the scent it leaves on her skin and wonders if that's what Alek smells like now.
Will she have the chance to find out? Another good question.
Clean and toweled off, she has a stare-down with the clothes awaiting her on the bed.
She picks up the shirtwaist. Pleated silk, with mother-of-pearl buttons. It's a dainty shade of pink that brings to mind her auntie's prize rosebushes, and it's lovely, no question about that. She'll look like a proper lady, wearing it. An advisor and liaison - on paper, at least.
Or.
Her eyes light on a second option - a mad one, a terrible one - and she starts to grin.
Begin as you mean to go on, after all.
.
.
.
The officer who ushers her in to the captain's quarters does it stone-faced, but then, he's had the trip down the corridor to conceal his feelings. The men sitting around the table don't have the luxury of time.
It's a delight, watching their clockworks freeze up as they realize she's wearing one of Alek's spare suits.
The least fancy one, of course. A plain brown, with a matching waistcoat, and a bright red tie. The tie is silk and a bit ostentatious for an airman. Fine for an emperor, of course.
The captain looks appalled, the doctor looks amused, the bosun looks confused.
Volger looks apoplectic.
Alek looks like she's kicked him somewhere soft.
Deryn's delight evaporates, and she squares her shoulders under the urge to apologize for stealing his clothes, in addition to crushing his heart. She shifts the cane to her other hand and snaps off a salute to the room at large. "Hauptmann Sharp, reporting as ordered, sir."
Alek stands, which gets everyone else unstuck, and they stand as well. "Thank you for joining us," he says to her, imperial mask firmly in place once more.
"Your Majesty," she says.
There's a moment where everyone seems to be waiting for something, and then Alek gestures at the chair beside his. He's ceded the head of the table to the captain. "If you will sit here, Hauptmann Sharp, I will translate for you."
"Thoughtful but unnecessary, Your Majesty," Volger says, quick and even. "I can translate for her."
Alek doesn't respond - with words, anyway. He pulls the chair out.
Is he beginning as he means to go on? She hopes so.
She limps over and sits, hooking the cane on the arm of the chair as she does. Belatedly she remembers that a king is always supposed to sit first, but then, so is a lady, and what about an invalid?
Blisters. Too many rules.
Alek sits, and so do the others. He's very close to her, and the way she has to hold her injured knee means it keeps brushing against his. She wonders if he thinks she's doing it on purpose.
In short order, Deryn's been introduced to the captain, Hummel, and the bosun, Kovač. Hummel is polite but doesn't think much of her. Kovač looks like he wants to yell at her, but that's standard in bosuns, so she ignores it.
She's also been served a cup of absolutely delicious coffee, which she sips slowly, savoring its heat and its taste. It's been a long day, and who knows how many hours this meeting will take.
"Volger, please bring her up to speed," Alek says. He has a pen and a book of blank paper in front of him. Something to take notes in, should notes be needed.
Volger obliges, though not without a disdainful twitch of his mustache, and Deryn's head is soon spinning with ministers, princesses, dead princes, archduchesses, and equal marriage. She has to ask for an explanation on that last one.
"Only certain families are considered equal to the imperial house," Volger says, idly toying with his own pen, the way a tigeresque might play with its dinner. "The royalty of other nations, for example, or noble Austrian families with sufficiently illustrious bloodlines. An emperor who enters into anything except an equal marriage will never see his son on the throne."
Deryn hears the insult the bum-rag carefully leaves unspoken.
He'd better be glad she's limping. "What about his daughter?"
"Salic law bars women from the succession," Alek tells her.
"A wise precaution, as women are unfit to rule," Volger adds.
Queen Victoria likely had a few things to say about that, but Deryn only has one question: "Then how can this archduchess take your throne?"
Before Alek can respond, Volger says, dry, "Tradition must sometimes bow to expedience."
Now it's Deryn's turn to carefully not say something. She stares Volger down while she does it. He narrows his eyes in response.
Alek clears his throat and says, "Regardless, we shall be retrieving the archduchess from her mother's estate near Pressburg. The estate has been fortified, and we expect a fight." In German, he asks Captain Hummel something. The captain nods sharply and launches into a long talk - none of which Deryn can understand.
Nothing like being insulted to prod you into action, and this moment seems perfect. She slides Alek's notebook towards herself and filches the pen as well. Quickly, before she can lose her nerve, she writes, I'm sorry. You rattled me.
Lays the pen on the table. Turns the notebook just a bit, so he can see it.
He glances down, then at her, then at Volger across the table - who's studying a map that the captain's laid out - then turns the book a bit farther. She watches him out of the corner of her eye as he reads her note.
The imperial mask never slips. But he picks up the pen and adds something, then turns it back to her.
You rattled me, as well. Forgive me.
Some of the weight lifts off her chest.
Kovač is talking now, pointing at the map and gesturing at the ship. Hummel and Volger are listening closely. Dr. Mészáros is nodding and rapidly taking notes. Even Alek seems to be wholly focused on the discussion, though that's obviously part of the mask.
Forgiven, she writes - although her fingers are practically shaking. I didn't mean most of it.
Alek takes up the pen. Nor I. I know why you refused. You have to fly.
He meets her eyes, and she holds him like that for a long moment, a tightness in her throat and a warmth in her heart. He's known her a week, and he understands her better than her own family does.
Maybe she should marry him.
It must show on her face, because the imperial mask cracks for a moment into something like grief, and he writes, I can't marry you.
Not with his crown being threatened by an equal marriage. She understands. It puts all the weight right back on her chest, but she understands.
Before she can write a reply, there's a noise at the door. The officer who'd shown her in returns, this time with Volger's man. He's bearing a slip of paper and a message to be whispered into the prime minister's ear.
Volger nods and dismisses him, then reads the note.
Without taking her eyes off of Volger, wearing a mask of her own, Deryn finds Alek's hand under the edge of the table. Catches it. Threads her fingers through his.
That look of grief flickers over Alek's face again. But he squeezes her fingers tightly, and doesn't let go.
"News?" he asks.
Bad news, if Volger's expression is any indication. "My agents have confirmed that the archduchess' children are in the custody of their father, Prince Otto. At his townhouse in Vienna." He repeats it in German for the others, who also look grim.
"Pressburg's not near Vienna?" Deryn asks Alek.
He's rubbing his thumb across her knuckles; she's not sure he realizes he's doing it, but it's tying her guts into loops. "Not near enough for our purposes."
Right. They need to swoop in, snatch up the archduchess and her children, and carry them safe away before their enemies know what's happening. Harder to do that when the targets are spread out.
"Otto's siding with the princess, then," she says. "You're certain the archduchess isn't?"
Volger answers that before Alek can. "The archduchess and her husband have filed for divorce. It has been a… fraught union. Scandal on both sides."
So much for the blessing of an equal marriage.
Alek asks Volger a question in German, and that sparks a round of heated discussion among the men.
Deryn slips her hand free of Alek's before they get caught. Instead, she turns to a fresh page in the notebook and draws a small portrait of a fancy lady, labeling it Pressburg. Then she draws three princely lads and labels that Vienna. A wee airship makes the third point of the triangle.
She connects the airship to the fancy lady - obviously, that's the chess piece they most need to capture. It'd be nice if they had troops in Vienna, though if they did, none of this blethering would be necessary.
Then again, she thinks, sitting up straighter, maybe they do have men in position.
She waits for a lull in the discussion before jumping in. "Your Majesty, I have an idea. About fetching the lads."
"There is a girl as well," Alek says, motioning for her to continue, "but please, do explain. We've gotten nowhere with the dilemma."
"Archduchess Marie -"
"Elisabeth Marie," Volger corrects. "Named after her grandmother, our late empress."
Deryn rolls her eyes. "Aye, like I said. She's a socialist."
"Gratifying to know you were paying attention," Volger says, looking down his considerable nose at her. "Correct. She joined the Social Democratic Workers' Party shortly after separating from her husband."
From the way he says it, the politics are more of a scandal than the separation.
Deryn gestures with the pen. "Ask the socialists to help, then. Knock down a prince's door and rescue kidnapped children? Brilliant fun for that sort, aye?"
At least it would be for anarchists. But there had been socialists among the Committee for Union and Progress, too, and they hadn't exactly been the types to sit back and twiddle their thumbs.
Alek says, approvingly, "Clever, Hauptmann Sharp." He quickly translates for the others, who likewise brighten and nod. Hummel in particular eyes her with more respect.
She knew he would. Captains always like her, because she's always the best airman aboard their ships.
Volger, on the other hand, will never like her. He says tartly, "I assume you've heard the adage about getting something for nothing."
She resists the urge to stick her tongue out at the prime minister and instead takes a sip of coffee. To Alek, she says, "Give them something."
"At this point, I have very little to bargain with," Alek says, thoughtful rather than grim.
She takes another drink, watching him over the rim of the cup. "You need to replace half your ministers, hmm?"
"Out of the question," Volger says instantly, which is how she knows it's a brilliant idea.
Also, Alek's practically grinning at her, and he grabs her hand beneath the table again, giving it one quick, hard squeeze before letting go.
"As a major party, they have access to municipal resources, if not parliamentary ones," Alek says to Volger. "That includes walkers and trained -"
Volger cuts him off with a lot of stern words in German. Alek listens, but his jaw has set. When Volger finishes, Alek says, "Make the offer," in a voice that brooks no argument.
Volger stands, bows, and says, "Your Majesty," in a voice that betrays no emotion whatsoever. He leaves.
He's back in an hour or so. By then Mészáros has excused himself to bed, while Deryn is standing, leaning over the maps with Hummel and Kovač, having mostly hashed out a workable plan of attack on Oroszvár Mansion. Alek is standing beside her, still translating, and every now and then his hand comes to rest on the small of her back, staying there long enough to scorch her skin through the layers of cloth.
Fortunately, his arms are safely folded across his chest when Volger reenters. Alek looks up and lifts an eyebrow.
"They accepted," Volger says.
Alek smiles, although it turns into a yawn, which he quickly covers. "In that case, we should follow the doctor's example and get some rest."
Volger apparently repeats this to the captain and bosun, who bow to Alek.
Alek nods to them, collects his notebook and pen, and offers his arm to Deryn. "If you wouldn't mind, Hauptmann Sharp, we must discuss your injury."
Oh, right. The doctor's friend in France. Clever Darwinist medicine, instead of Clanker butchery.
"Not a bit." Deryn takes his arm, mostly to irritate Volger.
It must work, because they exit the captain's quarters with Volger close behind them. "Your Majesty, there is also -"
"Yes, of course," Alek says, pausing at his cabin door. "Blast. Thirty minutes?"
Volger cuts a glance at Deryn. "Fifteen would be preferable. We have rather a lot to review."
"Twenty," Alek says. His grip on Deryn's arm tightens. "We have rather a lot to review, as well."
Volger bows and adds something in German before striding off down the corridor. She feels a touch of satisfaction, watching him go.
"Deryn," Alek says, opening the door and gesturing for her to enter ahead of him.
She was expecting to go back to sickbay, but this is leagues better. Someone left a tray of food on the desk. Plain military fare, it looks like.
"D'you mind -?" she asks, plunking herself down in the chair.
Alek gives her a lopsided smile as he comes into the room, leaving the door open, as is only proper when an unmarried, unrelated girl is in a room with a fellow. "By all means. I know better than to keep you hungry."
Clever lad. She grabs the first thing to hand - some kind of hard biscuit - and starts chewing. "What did you tell the doctor?"
He removes his jacket and hangs it in the trunk. "Oh. That he should abide by your wishes. I assume you'll want the Darwinist method."
She sheds her own jacket - well, it's also his - and drapes it over the back of the chair. "No offense to you Clankers."
From the pocket of his waistcoat, he takes out his watch, consults it, and snaps it closed again. "None at all. I wouldn't choose the surgery, either."
She expects him to say something about the time, especially when he goes to the open door. It looks like a prelude to kicking her out. He stands with his hand on the doorknob for a moment, frowning at nothing in particular. Then he exhales.
And shuts the door.
Her pulse kicks up faster. What's that mean?
"Deryn," he says. "I wanted to discuss more than your knee. I wanted -"
She stands abruptly, not ready to hear it. He's going to say, again, that he can't marry her, or he's going to ask, again, if he can. Bad options all around. She blurts out the first thing that comes to mind: "You can have your suit back."
He's taken aback for a moment before recovering and saying, "It looks better on you. Keep it."
Pleased, she nods at the clothes on the bed. "You can take that in trade, if you like."
The glare he gives her means to be dark, but it collapses into a tired smile. "I'm sure that looks better on you, too."
Talk of ladies' clothes reminds her of the newspaper and its photograph. She limps over and picks it up, holding it so he can see the headline. "I meant to ask - what's this about?"
"Ah," he says. He puts his hands on his hips, the smile growing. "Mr. Malone's atonement. He's declared you 'Britain's Angel of the Airships', and according to Volger, you're wildly popular. There are film serials being made."
She wrinkles her nose and tosses the newspaper down. Malone. Full of clart, as always. And she'd wager he's making money hand over fist with this atonement. She's equally sure the film serials will be awful. "As long as it gets me in the fight again."
"I'd like to see anyone stop you." He pushes a hand through his hair and says, "I am sorry about… earlier. It was… precipitous of me."
Precipitous, aye, that's one way to describe it. It was also, she admits to herself, grand and romantic, if you look at it a certain way. "And arrogant."
He grimaces. "Yes."
"Arrogant of me, too." She glances at the newspaper photograph, the places where he touched it. "What I said…"
"You were right," he says, coming to stand before her. "God's wounds, you're always right. You could be a brilliant empress, but you'd have to break yourself to do it. I can't ask that of you."
She studies him. Those green eyes are serious, and worried - for her, she thinks. Daft. She could go back to Britain and do anything she likes, while he'll be stuck under a crown for the rest of his life. "Why did you ask?"
He kisses her. Fierce and sad and lightning-hot, one hand on her hip and one on her shoulder. She wraps her hand around his tie and tugs him closer, until she can feel the weight of him against her.
He does, in fact, smell like that fancy soap. She smiles against his mouth, and he draws back slightly. Not too far. Just far enough to put an end to the kissing.
Instead he swallows and says, quietly but very, very bravely, "I love you."
She goes still, the better to scream Don't ruin this at herself.
"It's only been a week, I know," he goes on, ears turning red, "but I think I might have loved you before I left that party. And - and nothing can come of it, as I said, it's only - I ought to have told you that. Earlier. It wasn't a very good proposal at all, though in my defense I've never -"
She stops the blether by saying, "I love you, too."
Oh, good. That came out exactly right.
It takes a moment for the words to hit him, and then he smiles, and it's like the sun in a blue summer sky.
This time she kisses him. Fierce and sad, because they've honesty between them now, but he's right. Nothing can come of it, exactly as she's told herself all along.
Her brace is clicking and whirring with every slight shift, which is an unwelcome distraction. She solves the problem by hitching her bum up onto the desk and dragging him forward with her, so that he's standing between her legs.
The walls on an airship are too thin for anything more than kissing, and he's on the clock, anyway. But for the next few minutes, she plans to kiss him until neither of them can see straight.
It won't be tricky. She's already dizzy with the heat of him, the solidity, the surety of his hands on her back, the soft slickness of his tongue against her own.
He's learned a lot about kissing in the last few days.
He draws back, breathing hard. She hooks her uninjured leg around one of his, to hold him in place, but he's not leaving. He's adjusting his angle of attack. Loosening her tie. Undoing the first few buttons on her shirt. Kissing his way down her neck.
She pushes her fingers through his hair and gives it an involuntary tug when he nips at the join of her neck and shoulder. Half-gasping, half-laughing, she says, "Don't start something we can't finish, Dummkopf."
He returns to her mouth for a long, pleasant moment. His sigh, as he pulls away again, turns into a yawn, which turns into a curse. "You're right."
She fusses with his hair, pretending she means to tidy it, when really she only enjoys touching it. "What's so barking important that you have to go?"
"My government's business hasn't stopped simply because I was fleeing for my life," he says, wry. "I have a week's worth of briefings to review."
She makes a face.
"My thoughts exactly. But you should rest, Deryn." He glances around the cabin, but aside from the aluminum chair at the desk, the only other option is still the bed, still decorated with all the clothes she was supposed to wear.
He could, of course, send her to rest in sickbay. He doesn't suggest it, and she's not going to, either.
"Here," he says, sweeping up the clothes in his arms and dumping the whole expensive lot of it onto the chair. "Someone might as well use this bed."
She hops down from the desk, ungraceful as a newly-hatched beastie, and somehow, under the guise of helping to steady her, he manages to very effectively feel her up.
"Oi, you," she says, swatting his hand away but grinning all the while. "What did I just say about starting things?"
"A common failing among royals, I've been told," he says, straight-faced, as she settles onto the bed. He crosses the cabin to turn off the electric light, plunging them into darkness. Moonlight or starlight or even pre-dawn twilight filters around the curtain, giving him enough light to find his way back to the bed. Enough light for her to see him yawning again.
She gets her injured leg stretched out and nearly sighs with relief. The doctor was right; it wants rest. So does Alek. "You should sleep too, ninny."
"An emperor hasn't the luxury." He does, however, sit on the bed beside her. Unties her bootlaces. Gently tugs them off. Yawns hard enough to crack his jaw in half.
"As your air combat advisor," she says, yawning herself, "I advise you to lie down before you fall down, Your Majesty."
"Is this one of your superior Darwinist tactics?"
"Aye, except I think -"
"The bed isn't large enough," he finishes, mouth twitching. "Well, I daresay we have the expertise to manage it."
They do, at that. He removes his shoes and waistcoat while she scoots over, and after a bit of arranging, they're lying on their sides, facing each other, her injured leg held carefully between them.
"I have five minutes at most," he says, his eyes already sliding closed. "I'll be lucky to get that."
"I'm lucky to get you," she says, which gets her a sweet, sad smile.
She could kiss him some more, but that's not what either of them needs. They need to find their balance again, now that they're safe and among allies. Find how they fit together when there's other eyes on them.
She smooths his hair back from his forehead, and he makes a small sound.
"We'll be all right," she says softly. "The two of us. No matter what comes next."
He brushes a kiss against her cheek. "I could abdicate," he whispers, his breath warm on her ear.
She jolts back. "No! Alek, no. Not ever. Certainly not for me."
He regards her, steady and sad. "You would be worth it."
"I'd run a mile if you tried," she retorts. "You're a good emperor. Too good to leave your people in someone else's hands."
He draws a ragged breath. "You're right. It's only..."
She waits.
He presses a hand to his eyes and grimaces, then looks at her again. He's on the verge of tears, she can see, which makes her own eyes start watering. "Will you - will you stay, Deryn?"
"Aye, forever," she says, and her voice hitches on the second word and sod it all, they're both crying. She wipes at her eyes with the heel of her hand, and then she tugs her shirtsleeve down and tries to wipe at his, but he's reaching for her and their hands tangle. She huffs a laugh that turns into more tears.
He puts his arms around her and draws her close, giving her a fine shirt to ruin with her crying, while he's ruining hers with his.
It's not fair. None of it's fair.
But at least they're together.
.
.
.
Note: Erzsi didn't actually join the Social Democratic Workers' Party until 1921. I fudged the timeline because, come on, how could I pass up a socialist royal? The SPÖ remains a major party in Austria.
Prince Otto Weriand of Windisch-Graetz was already engaged to a countess when Erzsi met him in 1900. He got unengaged real quick after an order from Erzsi's doting grandpapa Emperor Franz Joseph. The marriage, not shockingly, was a hot mess, and Erzsi and Otto split in 1918. In a truly impressive display of judicial foot-dragging, their divorce wasn't granted until 1948.
Pressburg is better known today as Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia. Oroszvár is the Hungarian name for Rusovce, where Princess Stéphanie lived after marrying her second husband, Count Elemér Lónyay de Nagy-Lónya. (For the record: it was an unequal marriage.)
