Blood and Steam (The Tinkerer's Daughter) Read online

  My eyes widened as I saw him. “Tinker, get inside!” I said in a desperate panic. “Hide!”

  He stepped forward, brandishing the weapon. “Get behind me!”

  He raised the gun over my head and fired. I had just enough time to duck and cover my ears. Tinker twisted sideways from the recoil as he fired, and I felt the concussion of the blast go all the way through my body. Tinker steadied himself and began to reload. I glanced up the street and saw one of the sentinels standing still, his body tilted at an awkward angle. Then I saw the liquid running down his armor and realized it was a mixture of oil and blood. Tinker had killed him.

  Behind the dead sentinel, many more were coming. I leapt up the stairs and grabbed Tinker by the arm. “Hurry!” I shouted. “We’ve got to get out of here.”

  He shrugged me off, locking another charge into the chamber of his weapon. “Get behind me, Breeze! Go out the back.”

  I narrowed my eyebrows, staring at him. “Tinker?” I said, my voice cracking slightly.

  “Hurry up now,” he said. “Get down to the water. They won’t follow in the water. Go, Breeze!”

  Tears stained my eyes as I stared at him. “Tinker, I’m not Breeze. I’m River.”

  He stared at me for a moment and then a sly smile broke out across his face. He nodded at me and said, “Go on, child. GO!”

  The whole world crashed down around me. Tears streamed down my cheeks. I no longer felt the pain of my bruised bones or the laceration in my thigh. I didn’t feel the grated skin of my palms or the blisters on my arm. I only felt my heart breaking inside of me.

  I stared at him confused, wondering. Did he know what he was doing? What was going on in the old man’s mind? He must have known he couldn’t survive a fight with the sentinels. What he was doing was insane. It didn’t make any sense.

  Tinker impatiently shoved me backwards through the doorway. As I stumbled inside, he let loose another round. “Come on, then!” I heard him shouting. “Come get your medicine, you filthy Vangars!”

  Suddenly, it all became profoundly clear. Tinker didn’t want me to save him. All that he wanted was for me to escape. He wanted me to get away, so that I might come back some other day and exact our revenge. He was placing all of his hopes in me, the same way that he had in my mother before she died in the Wastelands.

  I knew then that there was nothing I could do for Tinker. He had chosen to sacrifice everything to give me that chance to escape. I owed it to him to survive. I owed it to him to come back and hunt down those sentinels one by one.

  I turned and ran through the upper room of our shanty, knocking over furniture, leaping into the narrow staircase that led down into Tinker’s workshop. I paused on the stairs to grab the spring-powered revolver that I had inherited from my mother. It was resting on the small bookshelf like an old knick-knack. I snatched it up and shoved it into my belt.

  I flew down to the lower level, racing toward the back door that led out onto the docks. Halfway through the shop, I stopped cold in my tracks.

  Tinker’s workshop was a long, narrow room, like a tunnel. I was standing next to the bench on the outside wall covered with tools and odds and ends -Tinker’s usual assortment of junk- but that wasn’t what caught my attention. It was something else: it was the thick dust-covered canvas resting directly adjacent to the workbench. Or rather, it was the thing under the canvas. It was the Boneshaker.

  Hurriedly, I yanked the canvas off and knelt down, opening the fuel inlet from the tank. Tinker’s boneshaker didn’t run on steam or springs like most of his inventions. This version, the only one he had ever built, used an engine from one of the Vangars’ larger gyroplanes.

  The boneshaker was something Tinker had called a “mechanical horse” when he designed it. It wasn’t so much that it looked like a horse, but rather the fact that it was long and thin, as opposed to the common wide-bodied steamwagons and similar vehicles. The boneshaker was something different. It was a simple steel frame resting on two wheels, with a handlebar to steer and a seat just big enough for one person. Tinker had designed it to be fast. It was supposed to be a quick and economical way to get from one place to another, a vehicle for the poor.

  Of course, that was all before Tinker had lost his senses. Soon after finishing the boneshaker, Tinker lost interest in his work. Sadly, the thing had been sitting under the canvas in his shop ever since.

  I hastily checked the pipe connections and blew the dust off the carburetor. Satisfied that everything was in place, I sat astride the boneshaker and kicked the engine over. It rolled the first time without promise. I kicked again, this time rewarded with a small chugging noise. The third time was a charm. I kicked, and the engine came to life. A cloud of sooty black smoke puffed out the tailpipe.

  Smiling, I kicked the thing into gear and revved up the throttle. A moment too late, I realized I hadn’t bothered to actually open the back door before going through it. The rotten old wood exploded as I hit it, shattering around me as I burst through the doorway. I went roaring down the dock, shaking off the shards of wood, ignoring the slivers in my knuckles and shoulders.

  As I bounced down the uneven surface of the dock, I noticed a jarring pain moving up and down my entire body. I suddenly remembered why we had decided to call the vehicle a boneshaker. It didn’t have any suspension. It vibrated like a hammer beneath me, rattling the teeth right out of my head.

  Over the roar of the engine, I heard the explosions of Tinker’s blunderbuss in front of our shanty, and the loud bursts of the sentinels return fire. I hit the brakes and spun in a half circle, craning my neck for a clear view. For a split second everything seemed to go quiet. Tinker had retreated into the shanty. The sentinels followed him inside.

  Three seconds later, the shanty exploded. There was a massive wallop and a fireball rolled up into the air, riding a cloud of smoke that mushroomed out in a broad circle. All of Dockside shook, and the sound of the explosion echoed back and forth across the city. For a moment, the flames lit up the night sky and the entire city turned bright red. I stared with my jaw hanging open as bits and pieces of burning wood started raining down.

  Bystanders began to gather along the docks to stare at the hole where our shanty used to be, stamping out the fires before they spread to the buildings nearby. It took a moment for me to realize that the sentinels were gone. Tinker had tricked them into following him inside before setting off the massive explosion. He’d done it on purpose.

  Tears flooded my vision. I couldn’t help but think of my father. He had done the same thing to save my mother. He had sacrificed himself, dive-bombing a Vangar dragon ship with his gyro to help her escape. And now, Tinker…

  Two fathers had been taken from me by the Vangars. My blood-father so many years before, and now my adopted father. Both sacrificed themselves to save me. I wiped the tears from my cheeks, my lips curling with rage. Under my breath, I swore that I wouldn’t rest until every Vangar was dead. I didn’t care how long it took or what I had to do, I would pay them back for what they had done.

  I gunned the throttle and disappeared into the night, my blood boiling for revenge.

  Chapter 3

  With Tinker gone, my thoughts immediately turned to Kale. He was the closest thing I had to family, the only person who might know what I should do. I left Dockside and roared up the city streets, making my way back to the area where I’d last seen him.

  I don’t know what I was thinking. I wasn’t in my right frame of mind or I would have known how unsafe this was -that the sentinels were still on the lookout for me. I was in shock and I wasn’t thinking clearly. After several minutes of searching the area where we’d split up, I rounded a corner and saw half a dozen Sentinels marching up the street. I hit the brakes, skidding sideways. My chest tightened as I recognized Kale’s limp body hanging over one of the sentinel’s shoulders.

  Hearing the boneshaker’s engine, the sentinels all turned at once. Four of them immediately came at me. I gunned the throttle, fishtailing b
ack and forth as I took off in the opposite direction.

  I flew through the streets of Avenston, not entirely sure of where I was going. It was clear to me now that I shouldn’t try to contact anyone I knew. Going to the other members of the resistance would place them in too much danger. I had to do something else. I had to think of somewhere else to go. And I had to find a way to help Kale.

  The boneshaker bounced along the cobblestones, jarring my body painfully. I gripped the handlebar with all my strength, weaving through the streets. I knew all the dark alleyways and the narrow winding tunnels. I had used them all at some time or other. It only took a glance over my shoulder to tell me that the usual tricks weren’t going to work this time. If anything, I seemed to have picked up a few more sentinels along the way.

  Their speed surprised me. I had never seen sentinels move so fast. I supposed that was because I had always been on foot when they chased me, and they couldn’t run at top speed through the narrow streets and alleys where I led them. On the boneshaker, things were different. Now they had to run to catch up. I had never seen them run before.

  As I drifted around a sharp corner and began climbing back into the Hillcrest District, I realized the sentinels were driving me into a corner. Hillcrest pushes up against the north wall of the city. Being next to the palace, it’s the most protected place in the city. The wall presses into a sharp corner at the western edge of the palace. Beyond it is a straight drop several hundred feet to the rocky shoreline. If I kept going in that direction, I’d be trapped.

  I hit the brakes and spun around, barreling back down the hill. I hit the brakes again as I reached the corner, sliding sideways into the turn. I hit a loose cobblestone as I rounded the corner and the boneshaker nearly went out from under me. As I struggled to regain control, a sentinel flew around the corner at top speed, nearly plowing into me.

  The sentinel didn’t seem to recognize me at first. He was running so fast that he took me as an obstacle. He leapt into the air, trying to avoid a crash. As I skidded sideways, inches from the ground, the sentinel flew over me. For one surreal moment, I looked up and saw the Vangar’s face looking back at me from inside his helmet. His eyes widened with recognition and he twisted, trying to reach out for me.

  I ducked, gunning the throttle, and came upright just as the sentinel hit the ground. Twisted as he was, the sentinel didn’t have a chance. He landed on his side and bounced backwards across the street, slamming into the building on the corner. I heard the crash and turned my head back to see a cloud of dust billowing up around his still form. I laughed. The fool had knocked himself unconscious.

  It didn’t take long for the other sentinels to figure out I had backtracked on them. I caught glimpses of them running along parallel streets and racing around corners behind me. My little maneuver had bought me some time, but not much. I still couldn’t shake them.

  Suddenly, I knew what I needed to do. I had to leave the city. There were too many sentinels chasing me, and they were determined to catch me at any cost. They wouldn’t give up this time. Not unless I gave them a good reason. Getting out of the city was the only thing I could think of.

  I took a sharp right and headed for Main Street. The long, straight boulevard leads right through downtown and out the city gates.

  I turned onto Main and opened the throttle with the sentinels just a second behind me. The boneshaker took off like a rocket. It was all I could do just to hang on. The carburetor made a loud whooshing noise as it sucked in air and fuel, and I felt the front end of the boneshaker lift off the ground. I leaned forward, hoping my weight would keep the front wheel down. The machine threatened to pull out from underneath me as it accelerated. I could only hang on for dear life.

  Buildings flew by in a blur, gas lamps flashing against the shadows of alleys and side streets. Tears streamed down my cheeks and I blinked rapidly, trying to keep my vision clear. I could barely breathe from the force of the wind against my face.

  As the boneshaker approached top speed, the front end settled down. To my relief, I felt myself regaining control. Then I noticed something unexpected: the boneshaker wasn’t shaking anymore. I was flying across the cobblestones so fast that they had become like a flat surface. The ride had completely smoothed out.

  A triumphant shout escaped my lips. Then a bug smacked me in the middle of the forehead and exploded like a firecracker. I wiped if off with a grimace, ignoring the sharp pain, and twisted around to get a look at the sentinels. I saw something I had never seen before. They had dropped down on all fours and were running like wild dogs, coming straight down Main in great leaps and bounds. Every time they landed, cobblestones shattered and exploded out around them. I had hardly gained an inch on them.

  I concentrated on driving as I flew through the city gates and across the drawbridge. The boneshaker bounced unsteadily as I traversed the uneven terrain, then it smoothed out again as I reached the open road. I revved up the throttle confidently. Now I knew what the boneshaker could do.

  I had never been outside the city before, but I knew that the stone road built by my ancestors stretched all the way to the ruins of Anora. I was willing to go that far if I had to. I just hoped my fuel would outlast the sentinels’.

  I felt an odd sensation in my gut as I left my familiar surroundings. I was fearful at first, heading into that vast unknown territory. The tall buildings and crooked streets of Avenston had always been my home. I didn’t know how I would survive without them. I saw the landscape open up around me and the sky stretching from horizon to horizon in a way that I’d never seen before. The Blackrock Mountains were sharp angular shadows stretching skyward across the horizon, and the stars… The Stars!

  Gradually, mile by mile, the thick black smoke of the city thinned out and gave way to the jeweled heavens. For the first time in my life, I saw the flashing stars and the silvery moon, clear and bright in all their splendor. The sight was like something out of a poem or a painting. It was breathtaking.

  I noticed that the air outside the city was clean and sharp, heavy with the scent of sage and earth and some other sweetness that I didn’t recognize. The plains stretched out tirelessly in every direction, offering themselves up to me with the promise that I could ride forever. I threw my gaze back and forth along the endless miles of wild grain, tempted to steer off the road just to see what it was like.

  Unfortunately, that was a risk I couldn’t take. The sentinels were still there, determined and tireless, unrelenting in their pursuit. I couldn’t do anything that might give them an advantage. I couldn’t even release the throttle long enough to shake out the cramps in my hand. For the moment, it seemed we were evenly matched. It was a race now to see whose fuel would last the longest.

  An hour passed in this manner, and then another. The brass gauge on the side of the fuel tank warned me that I was perilously low on fuel, but I had been unable shake the sentinels in all that time. A quick glance over my shoulder told me that they were still there, great black shadows bounding along the plains behind me like giant wolves, a steady cloud of dust rising in their wake.

  Up ahead in the distance I could see the ruins of Anora, dark sections of stone walls thrusting up out of the earth, unnatural and alone, jagged edges cutting against the horizon. I saw the tortured remains of buildings, their burned timbers stretching skyward, roofs and walls collapsing in upon themselves.

  I had heard many stories about Anora. The frontier city had once been second only in splendor to the capital city of Avenston. Those were the days of kings and nobles, a time of order and a renaissance of human understanding and growth. Remembering Tinker’s stories made it even stranger to see what had happened to this once-great city.

  As Anora goes, so goes the kingdom, I thought. Under the rule of the Vangars, Astatia had fallen into ruin. With the exception of Avenston, they had destroyed all of the great cities. Smaller towns and villages had been abandoned, most of them burned to the ground as the Vangars terrorized the countryside. Anora had b
een the defenders’ last hope. I had heard the story of its demise a thousand times. It was different seeing it in person, though. It was haunting. It was as if the remains of those old buildings were tombstones, and they cast long shadows over the graves of not only the people who had once lived there, but the entire civilization.

  Somewhat cynically, I realized that it might make a great place to hide. The sentinels were powerful, but they didn’t have superhuman senses. They couldn’t chase me down in the dark and sniff me out like a dog, and they didn’t have backup here like they had in Avenston. Anora looked like it might be exactly what I needed.

  I sped toward the city, my eyes scanning the area past the tall wooden beams that once housed the city gates, searching for a good place to vanish. I saw the remains of a few tall buildings scattered here and there, and I wondered if they had any strength left in their old timbers. However tempting the shelter might look, I didn’t want the sentinels pulling a building down on top of my head.

  Suddenly, the ground vanished beneath me. I tumbled forward, stars and darkness flashing through my vision. The boneshaker streaked away from me in the darkness, the engine roaring like a caged animal. I vaguely remember a sense of weightlessness, and the world spiraling away as I fell, and then something solid struck me in the head. I lost consciousness and the cold, painful darkness swallowed me up.

  I didn’t dream. I woke feeling like my entire body had been crushed by some giant machine. When my eyes fluttered open, I found myself staring up at a large timber beam. The scent of earth and moss mingled in my nostrils and I groaned as a wave of pain washed over me. I reached for my head. It felt like it was being crushed in a vice.