Fields of Iron: A steampunk adventure novel Read online

  She eyeballed the sun, which hovered in a reddened cloud about an hour above the horizon.

  “The Navapai village west of Santa Fe, Mr. McTavish … via the border. I think we have time for a look-see at the Royal Kingdom before the sun goes down, and we’ll have information to share with Alaia’s people when we get there.”

  “The Royal Kingdom’s border?” Ian’s brows creased in concern. “Are you sure, with so much weight aboard? I can feel already that we’re not nearly as nimble in the air as usual.”

  “Just a look, Ian. We won’t fly anywhere near their air space, but we’ll be high enough that even twenty miles off, we can get the lie of the land. I want to know if there are troops massing, or suspicious-looking roads being built.”

  “With respect, dear, I do not think it safe.”

  “Noted.” She touched her husband’s cheek and smiled into his worried eyes. “But Swan is capable. She was built for this, remember? She’s a military transport and the fastest thing in these skies, you know, outside of the Ranger ships in Santa Fe. The Californios will barely have time to register that we’re not a cloud before we’ll wheel on our propellers and run.”

  After a moment, he firmed his lips and gave a curt nod. “I shall take the watch, then.”

  Her heart swelled with love for this man, who would express his opinion and then, when it was acknowledged, not insist on taking the helm from her. He might outrank her in more than one way, but on this deck, the helm was hers and he would not challenge her authority in front of her crew.

  “Set a westerly course, Mr. McTavish,” she said. “Let’s float in, have a look, and then hightail it out of there on a direct course for Alaia’s moorage. I have a hankering for some of her cooking tonight.”

  “Aye, Captain.”

  Swan flew as though she were heavily pregnant, swimming through the clouds and proving just a bit reluctant to obey her helm. Alice had never burdened her with so much, not even when there were landaus and building materials aboard. No wonder the mechanicals had gone west on a train—even the transatlantic passenger ships would have had a slow voyage with such a cargo.

  Still, Alice and her loaded ship adjusted to each other quickly, and it was not long before the great Rio de Sangre Colorado de Christo came into view below, a silver ribbon in a serrated scarlet and umber and gold landscape. Wider she became, and even from a thousand feet above they could see the sheer rush and volume of water she carried to the sea far away.

  “That range of mountains is the border, Captain,” Jake said, one finger resting on the chart. “No airships may fly beyond it.”

  “I don’t mean to fly beyond it—just up to it. Enough to take a peek over it and see what we can see.”

  Ian made a noise in his throat that he quickly converted to a cough. He had said his say and wouldn’t repeat himself, but she knew what lay on his mind.

  “It will be all right,” she said to her crew, though no one was arguing outright. “Just one look, and then we’ll go. Follow the river, but stay at this altitude. With our weight, I don’t want to get caught in an updraft or a sheer.”

  The automaton intelligence system accordingly adjusted the vanes so that they rose a little higher, and soon the river formed a broad reach through a notch in the mountains.

  Ian leaned into the view, as though unaware there was glass between him and the panorama below. “Why, they’re damming the river. How is it the Texicans can be unaware of this?”

  From the helm, Alice craned to see. No wonder the miles of river backed up behind the dam seemed so wide, so crushingly powerful. She wasn’t sure if there were towns and villages along the cliffs, but there were certainly crossings that boasted inns and honkytonks. Were they going to be inundated when the water rose high enough?

  But Ian’s sharp eyes had seen something more. “Look, out where the country flattens and the river has carved channels. Those are military tents, if I’m not mistaken.”

  When it came to soldiering, Ian was very rarely mistaken.

  “This doesn’t look good,” she murmured. “I wish the Texicans could see this—they’d be a little less confident about their friends to the west.”

  “Captain!” Jake said suddenly. “We’re over the border. We must make our turn now, without a moment to lose.”

  Alice spun the helm and Swan lumbered into a northerly turn. But whether the winds were against her or she simply took longer to execute, they were already drifting farther into the Royal Kingdom’s air space. Its religious government had made it abundantly plain over the last century that dirigibles and airships were the devil’s work, and felt no compunction about shooting them out of the sky if only to prove that flying in the face of God was worthy of death.

  “Alice, we need more speed,” Ian said tersely. “The winds are southerly—I suggest an immediate turn with them, not against them.”

  “But the mountains curve away here.” Alice hauled on the helm, but Swan could only give her so much. Each second allowed her to make way a little, but not enough. “We’ll be over the border faster, and we’re halfway through our turn now.”

  “They are bringing a great machine to bear,” he reported. “Great Caesar’s ghost, did that monster Meriwether-Astor make another telescoping cannon for these people?”

  “Like the one that nearly brought down the Prince of Wales’s ship?” Jake’s finger moved with despairing slowness on his chart.

  “Exactly. Alice—”

  Come on, darling. Just a little bit more. I know we loaded you with more than you’re used to, but you can do it.

  With a screech like a stooping hawk, a projectile flashed past the gondola, sparks trailing aft.

  “A rocket torpedo!” Ian exclaimed. “It is a cannon—and they’ll have adjusted their trajectory. Can you not get anything more out of these engines?”

  Her beloved Daimlers were the best in the world. “Ian, take the helm!”

  Alice flung herself down the corridor to the engine room, where Benny Stringfellow was shoveling coal into the boilers like a man possessed. She snatched up a wrench and had the covers off seconds later, but before she could so much as adjust a single bolt, her beautiful ship shuddered.

  The bottom fell out of her stomach.

  “Ian!” she shrieked into the trumpet. “Are we hit?”

  “Aye,” came a tinny shout. “Straight through the fuselage. We’re going down.”

  Alice threw the engine covers back on and bolted them down, then ran back to the navigation gondola. “On which side of the border?” she gasped.

  Jake’s finger, thank all the angels, rested on the eastern slopes of the mountains. “Best find a security line, Captain,” he said grimly. “It’s a long slow glide, but in this godforsaken country and with our weight, we’re not going to find a soft landing.”

  Chapter 6

  “Dearly beloved, we are gathered together here in the sight of God, and in the face of this congregation, to join together this man and this woman in holy matrimony.”

  Padre Emilio did not speak very much English, but he read it fairly well, so between them, Gloria and Captain Stan had written out as much of the marriage service as either of them could remember. Gloria’s portion had been much larger than that of her fiancé; a consequence, she supposed, of her having actually attended a number of weddings instead of galloping about the landscape being an outlaw. She found herself giving in to the temptation to change just a few details of the vows on the theory that no would know the difference. So unbeknownst to either the good cleric or her imminent husband, obey became cherish and was subsequently sworn to upon the thick, illuminated Bible with no one the wiser.

  “I, Stanford Fremont the third, take thee, Gloria Diana—” He stopped, her hand in his and a heavy gold ring poised at the end of her finger.

  “Senor?” the padre inquired. He was about Gloria’s height, and very fit, if the tanned feet and muscular shoulders under the rough brown robe were any indication. He had the hands of a man
who traveled hard and worked harder when he was needed by the members of his parish, despite his age. His brown gaze below bushy white brows lay upon the captain expectantly.

  Around them, the simple wooden pews in the tiny adobe church of Santa Croce were filled by the witches and the members of the Colorado Queen’s crew, none of whom had yet recovered from the news last night that their captain was to be married, nor from the celebration that had followed.

  It was very quiet. Somewhere in the rafters, a dove fluttered and cooed, calling its mate.

  The captain, meanwhile, stared down at her in some perplexity. “Who am I marrying, exactly?” he whispered over their joined hands.

  “That is my real name,” she whispered back. “You can’t expect me to enter into a legal contract under a false one.”

  “No,” he said after a slight hesitation. “Of course not.”

  For one dreadful moment, she thought he would not go on, that she was to relive the wedding scene in Jane Eyre. But no, with a clearing of his throat, he picked up where he left off. “…take thee, Gloria Diana Meriwether-Astor, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better or for worse, for richer or for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love, honor, and cherish, until death us do part.”

  The heavy, chased ring that had probably been stolen from some Californio grandee slid onto her finger, and then it was her turn.

  At least now she knew his name. It sounded vaguely familiar, but she couldn’t for the life of her think why. Perhaps she had read it in a book, for it was rather fanciful.

  “By the power vested in me by God and His holy kingdom of Spain and the Californias, I now pronounce you husband and wife together.” The padre heaved a breath, as though the worst of it was over. He glanced down at the paper that lay on the Bible. “You may now kiss your bride.”

  Oh, dear. Gloria had hoped he might overlook this part. But it was quite clear that Captain Stan—Stanford—good heavens, she was never going to be able to call him Stanford with a straight face—would not. He was leaning toward her. His face was solemn, but his eyes danced, as though he knew perfectly well that at the ripe old age of twenty-three she had never been kissed. He was quite enjoying the prospect of being her first in front of the whole congregation.

  Ella, standing behind her holding her bouquet of hastily gathered bougainvillea, made a sound suspiciously like a sob.

  Oh, dear.

  Feeling horribly guilty, and overwhelmed, and a little bit angry that she was being forced by her own wretched principles to marry someone she hardly knew, Gloria tilted up her face and allowed the captain to lift her small blue eye veil. He folded it back carefully on the black straw tricorne covered in musty velvet flowers that someone had unearthed from one of the trunks. She had a fleeting moment to regret the loss of the Burano lace veil, when—

  Her eyes slid shut as his lips met hers softly. When he straightened, it was only with the greatest presence of mind that she managed to remember to breathe.

  The padre said something rapidly in the Californio tongue that ended with “el Capitan y Senora Fremont.”

  With his tug on her hand, Gloria understood what she was to do next. She and her new husband knelt before the simple plank table covered in an altar cloth thickly embroidered in the same patterns the witches favored on their blouses, and received the padre’s prayer and blessing. When they rose, he guided them into a tiny niche of an anteroom, where an imposing document lay on a small table with a book.

  He indicated that they should sign the latter, clearly the parish register. Gloria Diana Meriwether-Astor, she wrote for the last time. Really, it was rather a relief. Such an unwieldy name. Spinster, of Philadelphia. The twenty-seventh day of February, 1895.

  The captain wrote his name and profession, and dated the document. By the time he had done so, the padre had filled in their names on the illuminated certificate, which actually bore gold leaf. The old man signed it, dated it, and then melted a bit of wax under the candle flame. Red drops fell on the bottom next to his signature, and in a moment he pressed his gold ring into the wax.

  Marriage was clearly a very serious business in these parts.

  Captain Stan spoke with him in rapid sentences, pressing a few silver coins into his hand. With a smile that seemed to warm Gloria from the inside out, the padre cupped her cheek and said something softly. She smiled back, and could not help the tears welling in her eyes.

  He was so kind, and she felt as though she was duping him somehow—allowing him to perform this simple, beautiful ceremony because she planned to pull off a political coup.

  As he led them back to the altar, she took the captain’s arm and whispered, “What did he say to me?”

  Into her ear he replied, “He said that you were beautiful, would have beautiful children, and wished you every blessing under heaven.”

  And so it was that Gloria turned from the altar a married woman on her husband’s arm, with tears of guilt and chagrin trickling down her cheeks.

  Ella burst into tears, too, and buried her face in the bougainvillea, completely forgetting she was supposed to return the bouquet to the bride.

  The recessional had no music save the dove, and as the wedding party and guests spilled out into the dusty square, Gloria saw that a few of the children had gathered near the door to throw pink and purple petals on the happy couple.

  For their sake, she smiled and tossed pennies … and wondered how on earth she would ever explain this to Claire and Alice.

  If she ever saw either of them again.

  There was no wedding breakfast, for there was too much to be done before the noon train departed. Gloria felt nothing but relief. The thought of nodding and smiling and presiding over a table while Ella tried not to cry and the ship’s crew became increasingly drunk again was simply not to be borne.

  Instead, she and the witches returned to the Colorado Queen, which was moored on the edge of the tiny village at a rickety dock, to pack food into Gloria’s trunk for the journey.

  The fact that she had a trunk seemed miraculous. What had happened to the one she’d brought aboard Swan all those weeks ago, when she’d set out so bravely with Alice and Evan and Captain Hollys and Jake? Where were they all now?

  “Mother Mary,” she said suddenly, straightening, “is it possible to send a letter from here?”

  “Depends where you want it to go.” The older woman handed her a packet wrapped in oiled paper that must contain dried meat of some kind. Best not to inquire exactly what. “If you’re sending a letter to the Viceroy letting him know you’re coming, that’s simple enough. They’ll take it on the train. But if you’re writing to anyone east of here, well …”

  “Padre Emilio goes as far as Santa Fe.” Ella had scrubbed her face and was bravely carrying on as though they were about to go on a shopping trip and nobody had been to church the hour before. “He takes letters all the time from place to place along his route. Of course, folks who can read and write are pretty much only on the ranchos.”

  “Santa Fe would be fine,” Gloria said. “I expect if I enclose the money for a pigeon, he would see it sent?”

  “A pigeon, now?” Mother Mary eyed her. “Has a ways to go, does it?”

  It did indeed. Gloria asked directions to the captain’s—er, her husband’s quarters, and soon found herself in the stern, in a relatively spacious cubicle that looked as though its primary purpose was not sleep, but gambling, if the card table was any indication. But no, here was a desk that folded down out of a cupboard, along with the items she sought.

  Dear Alice,

  I have no idea if you and our friends are alive or dead, but I am sending this care of Swan in the event she, at least, has survived.

  I am well, and this morning I was married to Captain Stanford Fremont III, who pilots a riverboat on the Rio de Sangre Colorado de Christo and appears to be my only means of reaching San Francisco de Asis, the capital. I am determined still to stop this war, and will attempt to speak to the Viceroy h
imself. I will not bore you with my opinions of a country that treats women like chattel at best, but suffice it to say that if there had been any other way, I would have taken it. I am alone and without means, and the captain at least is willing to help, if only for his own amusement.

  I pray that you are alive. I know nothing of Evan, so must only conclude that he died at the Battle of Resolution after so bravely trying to protect me. Please convey my love to Claire if you ever see her again. Her friendship and yours have been the greatest gifts of my life.

  Bless you,

  Gloria Meriwether-Astor Fremont

  It was not a very coherent letter, but then, she did not know if anyone would ever read it. She folded it up and looked fruitlessly for an envelope, but the captain’s supplies did not extend that far. In the end she took from her hat a rusty ribbon that might once have been blue, and tied it closed with that.

  “They told me I might find you here.”

  Gloria jumped as though she had been caught doing something she oughtn’t, and turned as Captain Stan closed the door behind him. “I hope you don’t mind,” she said a little breathlessly.

  “I have just promised to share all my worldly goods with you.” He gazed about and spread his hands as if to indicate the ship. “This, I am afraid, is the extent of them.”

  “Then I am getting the better end of the bargain by far.” She stood, smoothing her musty skirts with one hand, the letter in the other. “For all my worldly goods fill one trunk—and that is mostly food for our journey.”

  “We’ll be glad of it. But I am sure there is more to you than that,” he said easily.

  What did he mean? Was he remarking upon the resources of her mind and determination? Or …

  For the first time, another of the many consequences of her hasty wedding was borne in upon her. For was it not the law that all she possessed now belonged to her husband? If she ever saw Philadelphia again, would he become the president of the Meriwether-Astor Munitions Works? And the master of the fine house on Washington Avenue? Would he even want to go to Philadelphia?