the journal in her hands and tapped her fingers upon it. “May I look at this for a little while?” she asked him.
John experienced an almost physical ache when the journal was out of his own hands—it was such a precious object, and had been missing for so long—but he swallowed his discomfort and said, “Yes, of course.”
He took Maud’s interest in his mother’s notes as a hopeful sign. John had been thinking about his grandmother’s cabin on Traveler. The airship was still in Hyde Park. The craft’s dangerous engines had to be decommissioned on site before it could be safely moved outside London to be repaired. That work was nearly done, and the move would happen in a few days. While Traveler was being fixed, the inside of the ship would be stripped, including the contents of Maggie’s cabin. There were things in that room John needed, items he didn’t want his cousins—the cousins who were already fighting for control of the family fortune—to find.
He hadn’t wanted to speak of this to the Young Dread. She didn’t like mention of his family or his mother. She wanted him to keep his mind in the present, on his training. But tonight, after seeing those boys, she was different. He watched the careful way she was holding the journal as she looked into the fire. If she was interested in what his mother had written, maybe, he thought, she could be convinced to help him.
“I—I need to go back to Traveler,” he told her before he lost his nerve. “Just for a short visit. But it will have to be soon.”
Maud looked up at him.
“Why?”
“I have my mother’s journal, but there are other things of hers in a bedroom on the ship. I don’t want someone else to take them.”
The Young Dread waited for a better explanation. John tapped a hand nervously against his leg. Maud had been truthful with him, and he’d never lied to her since she’d agreed to train him. He was her student, and he would honor that arrangement as far as he could.
“In her journal my mother was keeping track of the houses that killed our relatives,” he explained quietly.
“What you’ve shown me in the journal says nothing about dead relatives,” Maud responded. “I see only lists of locations and dates.”
“Maybe enemies weren’t the only thing she was writing about, but they’re in there,” he answered. “When you see what’s in my grandmother’s room on Traveler, this will make sense. Whatever else my mother was doing, she was tracking those who had done us harm.”
“You want to gather evidence for revenge?” Her voice was cutting, despite its slow cadence.
“I’ve spoken plainly to you about the promises I’ve made,” he told her, forcing himself to hold her gaze. “While you train me, I will take no action without your permission. But I—I must retrieve these things before they’re lost.”
Maud appeared to weigh his answer in her mind for some time. At last she said, “We can visit the airship.” Then her eyes met his. “Your mother didn’t only want revenge, you know.”
John turned away and said nothing. But his thoughts were clear: You don’t know what my mother wanted.
21 Years Earlier
“What are you doing here?” The girl’s voice carried through the woods.
“What do you think I’m doing here?” a male voice asked.
The Young Dread heard an old cottage door being forced shut, and then there were two sets of footsteps moving through the forest undergrowth.
“Stop following me!”
That was the girl’s voice again, more clear this time, and Maud paused, one foot raised in the air, listening.
The Young Dread had been in the castle ruins on the Scottish estate, practicing alone, wondering where the Middle Dread was that day. She was now moving south, through the thick woods leading downslope to the river, which was where she often hunted for their meals.
“Go away!” the girl said a moment later.
Something in the sound of her voice bothered Maud. She stood balanced on one foot, then after a quick moment of deliberation, she turned around and moved back uphill.
“I want to be alone!” the girl said. She was out of breath, and judging by her footsteps, she was now running.
The Young recognized the voice as belonging to Catherine Renart, one of the apprentices who was shortly to take her oath and become a Seeker. When Maud reached the top of the hill, she saw Catherine moving swiftly through the trees below. She’d obviously been visiting the small group of abandoned