other end.
A minute later the other ropes were all hoisted away, but the line attached to her pilot's rig was given more slack. It looped down almost out of sight, a quarter mile of rope, it looked like. Then the airship's idling engines sprang to life again.
The huge shadow pulled back against the wind, so that the sun broke out from behind its nose, half blinding Deryn. The airship dropped then, venting hydrogen with a sound like rushing water, steadily descending till the officers in the bridge windows were dead even with her, only twenty yards away.
One smiled and gave a crisp salute, and Deryn returned it.
The Leviathan dropped still farther, and the Huxley whined a bit when one huge eye drew level with them.
"Don't you give me any more bother," Deryn murmured. She was watching keenly, noting how the airship's huge harness wrapped around its body, holding the gondolas in place. The straps were connected by a network of ropes, like the rigging of a sailing ship. Strange six-legged beasties climbed alongside the crewmen in the ropes, snuffling the airbeast's skin.
Those had to be the hydrogen sniffers she'd read about, searching the membrane for leaks.
When the Leviathan's vast silver expanse slipped beneath her, Deryn saw that the other end of her rope was now attached to a winch on the creature's spine.
So "dorsal" was just Service-speak for "backside."
The winch was small and aluminum, made as light as possible, like everything on an airship. Two men cranked it, drawing up the slack quickly enough. Soon Deryn and her nervous Huxley were descending toward the Leviathan's silver back.
A few minutes later a half dozen crewmen grabbed the tentacles of the medusa and hauled it down. Deryn found herself released from the pilot's rig, stumbling with numbed legs onto the squishy surface of the Leviathan's inflated skin.
"Welcome aboard, Mr. Sharp," said the young officer in charge.
Deryn tried to stand up straight, but pain shot down her spine. She wriggled her toes inside Jaspert's boots, trying to erase the pins and needles in her feet.
"Thank you, sir," she managed.
"You all right there?" the officer asked.
"Aye, sir. Just a bit numb in my, um, dorsal areas."
The officer laughed. "Long flight, eh?"
"Aye, sir. A bit." She sheepishly returned his salute.
He was smiling, at least. All the crewmen looked rather jolly as they checked over the medusa. Deryn supposed it wasn't often they were called upon to rescue recruits from the sky.
A man in a coxswain's uniform clapped her on the back. "Your Huxley's in good shape after a storm like that. You must have a way with the beasties, Mr. Sharp."
"Thank you, sir," she said. The men at the winch were running the Huxley back up, towing it in the Leviathan's wake.
"Not many middies spend half their first day aloft," the officer said.
"I'm not a middy exactly, sir. Haven't taken the tests yet." Deryn glanced longingly around the topside, praying they would let her explore the ship while they took her back to the Scrubs. She'd be ready to walk again in just a few more minutes... .
The coxswain laughed. "Solving a few aeronautics problems shouldn't be too hard after free-ballooning in a Huxley. And with this trouble brewing, I expect the Service will be looking for a few more lads."
Deryn frowned. "Trouble, sir?"
The officer nodded. "Ah, yes. I suppose you haven't heard. Some Austrian duke and duchess got themselves killed last night. There may be a bit of a ruckus on the Continent."
She blinked. "I'm sorry, sir. I don't understand."
The officer shrugged. "Not sure what it's got to do with Britain myself, but we've been put on alert. Now that we've got you sorted, we're headed straight over to France, in case the Clankers try to start something." He smiled. "I expect you'll be with us a few days. Hope that isn't a bother."
Deryn's eyes widened. As sensation returned to her legs, she could feel the rumble of the engines in the air-beast's skin. From the spine of the Leviathan, its silver flanks sloping away into oblivion, the sky was huge in all directions.
A few days, the man had said - a hundred more hours in this perfect sky. Deryn saluted again, trying to hide her grin.
"No, sir. No bother at all."
NINE
Alek awoke to the chatter of Morse code.
Wood creaked as he stirred, and a damp smell filled his nose. Dust swirled in shafts of sunlight streaming through the half-rotten walls. He sat up and blinked, staring at the hay covering his clothes.
Prince Aleksandar