“What?” said Nuthea.

“I told you to keep your voice down," said Sagar. "We lost a few men in the battle with the Imperials. My engineer was one of them. He was near the fuel line after it got hit, trying to repair it. Another cannonball hit him direct. We lost two others as well. The crew are a bit cut up about it, so that’s another reason I don’t want them to know about the damage we’ve taken. Their morale needs looking after. So now you know. I’m landing, princess, because not only do we need to fix the fuel line, but we need to find somebody to do it too...”

Nuthea seemed to have no response to that. Instead, she bit her bottom lip and looked away from Sagar, out at the growing lights of the port town, the same way as the crew.

“Do you always pilot your own ship?” Ryn asked.

“Course not, pup. I have my crew to do that. But it’s good for the captain to take the helm from time to time. It reminds them that I still know how. It reminds them that I’m the best airship pilot this side of the Sundering Sea. Now shut up; I need to concentrate. We’re coming in to land.”

As they had been speaking the firefly-lights of the port-town had been growing steadily brighter. Now Ryn could see that one cluster of them was arranged in a large circle, which he guessed must be an airship dock.

Sure enough, Sagar guided Wanderlust down towards this circle. As they approached, some of the other fireflies became lights in the windows of buildings. The structures of the town were many and packed in closely together.

In fact, Ryn realised, the port wasn’t a town at all, but a city.

All of a sudden he felt very small.

Eventually, the circle of fireflies they were flying towards became a collection of huge naptha beacons, giant flames burning in glass containers, like a ring of enormous lanterns. In the space they encircled, parked on the grey earth, were about a dozen other airships.

Sagar piloted his blimp-bourne ship over a large space on the airfield, slowing her as he went. Then he flicked a switch on the control panel of the console that protruded out of the floor next to the ship’s wheel.

The whole ship dropped slowly to the ground. They landed with a gentle crunch of earth, the purr of the turbines wound down, and the ship was still.

Little dots had been starting to move towards them in the naptha light as they were coming in to land. Now Ryn saw that the dots were people, who were now rushing up to the side of the ship.

“Fresh dates!” called out the first man who made it to Wanderlust’s side, carrying a box slung round his neck by a cord. “Refresh yourself after a long voyage!”

“Draught ale!” cried another, carrying a tankard in each of his hands, sloshing liquid. “Free sample! Only the best at the Traveller’s Rest!”

“Get your cheese, right here! Recently made, prime quality, cheese on a stick! I’ve got soft cheese, hard cheese, stinky cheese, blue cheese! Get it all here!”

Some of Sagar’s crew called out their orders and threw down pennies for them, or jumped down to the ground and started to haggle.

“Out of the way, you vermin!” a gruff voice called out over the haggling. “I told you to wait until they’ve paid their landing fee before you approach! You’re lucky I even let you on this airfield!”

These words had been spoken by an extremely fat man dressed in black leather, the folds of his belly leaking out from under his jacket and over the top of his trousers. He wore huge, thick goggles under his dirty grey hair and messy beard. The naptha light glinted off his left leg oddly. It was made of metal, and he moved awkwardly on it.

The airfield vendors completely ignored him, and went on selling and haggling over their goods with the newly arrived sailors, but he didn’t address them further. “Sagar!” he called out. “Get your sorry arse down here and pay me your landing fee!”

“Wait here,” Sagar said to Ryn and Nuthea with a pointed look from his un-covered eye. He walked to the side of the ship’s deck and climbed over, down some hand-holds built into the side of the ship, to the ground.

Nuthea went after him.

Why does she need to go too? Ryn thought.

Her gold-crowned head popped up above the side of the ship for a moment.

“Aren’t you coming?”

He shrugged, and followed her.

On the ground, Sagar and the man were already arguing.

“Fifty gold pieces?” said Sagar. “It was twenty-five last time, Roldo!”

The man spat on the ground. “Yeah, well I heard you took down an Imperial Skyship yesterday. News travels fast, pretty boy. And these are uncertain times. Rumour is tensions are building with Morekemia as things are,”--Nuthea’s back stiffened a little at that--“and I need to look out for myself. Fifty gold pieces. It’s not like you’ve got any other choices. And you’ve already landed the damn thing.”

“Rrrr, fine,” said Sagar quietly, and fished in his own leather jacket for the coins before handing them over.

“Pleasure doing business with you,” said Roldo, stashing the money away in an inside pocket with a brown-toothed smile. “Why’re you back so soon, anyway, Sagar?” He leant his head back to look at the hull of Wanderlust. “And what exactly have you been up to, anyhow? Your ship looks pretty beaten up.”

“None of your damn business,” said Sagar, batting the airfield owner’s question away with a wave of his hand. He still spoke quietly. “Listen to me, Roldo, I need to ask you something. I’m down an engineer and I need to recruit one, fast. Where’s the best place I can find myself an engineer in Ast these days?”

Roldo’s magnified eyes narrowed inside his goggles.

“Why should I tell you?”

Nuthea spoke up. “Because we have something that needs fixing, why else?”

Sagar turned his head, as if noticing her for the first time. “Hey, butt out, princess, I’m busy here. Go and wait on the ship.”

“That’s extremely rude of you,” Nuthea replied. She didn’t move.

Sagar sighed, then grabbed Roldo’s scraggly beard and yanked him closer, looking him right in the face.

“You tell me, lard-tub, because I’m asking, and because I just gave you fifty gold pieces to park my ship on this little scrap of dirt.” He let go.

“Alright, alright!” said Roldo, rubbing his chin. He spat again. “Gods, there’s no need to get all whiny about it.” He tapped his lips in thought. “There’s a brilliant young engineer currently working as a freelancer, name of ‘Elrann Luccavich’. In fact, Elrann’s been down here lately servicing some of the ships of the other miserable bastards who’ve landed in Ast.”

“Where can I find him?”

Roldo grinned. “Now?”

“Now.”

“Usually in the Traveler’s Rest. Like I said, ask for Elrann. Not easy to miss.”

“Why?”

“Elrann has purple hair. Zerlanese.”

“That’s all I needed to know.” As he turned, Sagar flicked another single gold piece spinning into the air. Roldo’s hand shot out and he snatched it, then pocketed it with a lick of his hairy lips.

Sagar climbed back up on board the ship without another word. Ryn waited for Nuthea to go next, then furrowed his brow at her when she didn’t.

“You really can be quite slow-witted, can’t you?” she said. “You go first.”

“Why?”

“I’m not having you looking up my dress.”

“Oh!” Ryn said, a hot blush rising in his cheeks. “Sorry!” The thought hadn’t even crossed his mind, but now it did and he blushed even hotter.

Up on the maindeck Sagar addressed his crew as they stood round him.

“Listen, men,” he bellowed. “I’m worn out from all our plundering so I’m going to go ashore and refresh myself for the evening at an inn.”

“Waheyyyy!” said one of the pirates, and others joined in.

“We all know what that means!”

Some of them made obscene gestures. Ryn grinned, then looked at Nuthea. Her expression could have curdled milk. He dropped his grin and tried to frown disapprovingly.

Sagar held up his hands for quiet. “Yeah, yeah. I’ll also be sure to register our takedown of the Imperial Ship at the local guild tomorrow. Then it’s off to Manolia to collect still more bounty! Arrr!”

“Arrrr!” cheered the crew in unison, jubilant.

“Look after Wanderlust while I’m gone. You can go ashore too, but I want a skeleton crew of at least ten on board at all times, and everyone back by noon tomorrow. Carrick is in charge until I return. Got it?”

“Aye, Captain!” the men chanted.

“Good. Now get lost!”

The crew dispersed, and Sagar watched them go with a satisfied smile on his face.

“Where is this ‘Traveller’s Rest’ then?” said Nuthea.

Sagar blinked, like he’d been yanked out of a daydream. “Why the hell do you need to know?”

“We’re coming with you.”

The pirate shook his head. “No. You bleeding well are not.”

“Yes we are.”

“Why in the seven hells do you think you need to come?”

“I’m coming to make sure that you hire an engineer as quickly and efficiently as you can without getting...distracted. I told you, I need to make sure that we can make it to Manolia as quickly as possible.”

Sagar closed his eyes for a moment and rubbed his forehead. “Rrrr.” But he already had the look of a defeated man. “Fine.” He looked up again, now at Ryn. “But why do you need to come too, pup? Why are you even still sticking around at all? You’re not trying to get back to Manolia, are you? You can get off here. You can go anywhere you want. Why are you still here?”

Ryn opened his mouth and said…

...nothing. He didn’t have a reply to that. In fact, he realised, he hadn’t really thought about why he was still here at all. He had been acting automatically, still too traumatised and dealing with the destruction of his hometown and the death of his mother and father to think much for himself. All he knew was that he wanted to find the Imperial General who had killed his parents and take revenge on him. But he had no idea where to start looking.

If anyone was going to be able to help him find him, though, it was Nuthea, he realised. She seemed to know a lot about the world, and the Empire. Plus, she had elemental projection powers, like he did. Maybe she would be able to help him in developing his newfound skill so that he could find and kill General Vorr.

And she was beautiful, even if he did over-use that word...

In the time it took for him to think these things, Sagar and Nuthea had walked off to go and look for an engineer.

“Hey, wait for me!” Ryn called as he ran after them.