I was worried that I wouldn’t sleep that night, but my brain halted to a stop like the gears of large factory machines after a work week of faithful and strenuous turning. I didn’t wrestle with sleepless thoughts, I didn’t dream, I’m not even sure I moved during the night.

When I awake, it is because Eva is pouncing all over me for breakfast, and the sun has drenched my curtains and is starting to soak through. I jolt upright, blinking hard to boot up my thoughts, and I remember that Cyrus is supposed to be here this morning. He hadn’t told me a time, but judging by the sun and Eva’s insistence that she’s definitely going to die soon without sustenance, we are edging closer to the end of the morning. I prepare myself to have to go back to the docks and find- and apologize to- Cyrus Kayo.

I smell coffee. Aisling must be awake. Maybe she has him waiting in the tavern or my office.

I wrap myself in a long purple robe and braid my hair loosely over my shoulder. There is no sense in trying to get anything done- be it crime solving or simply getting dressed- without coffee or crickets. Eva and I make our way out to the kitchen to get one of each.

I stop in my open doorway, trying to reconcile the scene before me with my muddled mind:

Cyrus Kayo sits at my dining table, a cup of coffee and a misshapen pile of papers in front of him, studying my crime wall closely. He looks very out of place at my table, like a homemade doll inside a store bought dollhouse. I am only ever used to seeing Aisling sitting there, with perhaps a friend of hers or a gentleman caller. Cyrus, whom I’m beginning to suspect looks uncomfortable in any chair, is alone, and Aisling is nowhere to be seen.

Cyrus pivots slightly to look at me. “So you think I did all this?”

I’m still trying to process why Cyrus is in my house and where Aisling could possibly be, when one of the questions is answered for me.

“Sweet sufferin’ Mary!” She shrieks. “There’s a man in our house, Em!” Ash shouts again, with little regard to my proximity to her.

“I know, Ash.”

She jumps, apparently having just realize I’m right next to her.

“Did both of you have a rough night?”

“Did you break into our house?” I ask, cautiously making my way to the kitchen.

“I did not.” I narrow my eyes at Cyrus, urging him to explain. “I did not, in the sense that I didn’t break anything to get in.”

This is too much for me to take in at this particular moment, so I put a hand up to stop him from speaking. Once Eva’s cricket popsicle is in a dish and she is settled, I begin to make more coffee when I realize that Cyrus has made enough for everyone. How considerate. Aisling and I, still a bit wary, grab our respective mugs and take our seats at the table. Ash brings a kitchen knife with her- I’m assuming for protection.

“Okay, now explain.”

Cyrus puts a device on the table that is the size and shape of a pocket knife. Aisling responds by pulling her kitchen knife closer to her. Evaki takes a break from her cricket ice lolly to sniff the device, and then goes back to her breakfast.

“What is it?”

“It’s a lockpick. Evie made it.”

“Who’s Evie?” Ash asks.

“His Quartermaster.” She nods. “How does it work? And also, why did you use it on our home?”

He picks it up and holds it a little closer to us. It’s got two solid sides with rounded edges, and little glass windows to see the intricate insides, which look almost like clockwork. He presses a button and the delicate insides begin to whir and turn, pushing a little metal rod out of the top. It vibrates slightly. He presses the button again, and another little rod comes out right next to it, also vibrating.

“You keep pushing the button until the keys are able to shake the pins inside the lock open, or something like that.”

“Interesting,” Ash replies, with great and practiced sarcasm. “Now why did you use it to get into our house?”

Cyrus looks apologetic. “I had managed to shake the tail that the company has on me, and you ladies were not answering your door. I didn’t want to get found or draw a scene, so I figured this was important enough to break in. I mean…” He smiles sheepishly. “Enter discreetly. I’m truly sorry. I did not mean to make you feel unsafe. I would never do it if the circumstances weren’t extenuating.”

Ash and I look to each other skeptically.

“Should we forgive him?” She asks.

“I think possibly. Or perhaps I shall reserve my judgment until after I’ve seen the information he’s brought me.” I take a long sip of coffee- more bitter than I tend to prefer- and stare at Cyrus.

He nudges his coffee cup to the side and pulls his papers in front of him.

“I wish I could’ve gotten something more…solid for you. But we aren’t given inventory lists or dockets. We’re only given locations and times. The crew an’ I shut up the ship tight last night and we all wrote down everything we could remember about the organization we’re employed with.”

He pauses, but Aisling and I offer no follow up questions. We simply look on quietly, giving him his platform to speak.

Cyrus clears his throat. “Uh, well, we’ve had ten long runs for them, and eight shorter runs to Eastern Europe. The man on the dock today, he’s the only person we’ve ever had actual contact with- though I’ve seen him talking to others, and he’s not the person that follows us. He told us his name is Marcellus. He was the first person to contact us, he gave us the contract to sign and brought us the ship. He was nice, at first, like he genuinely needed our help and was grateful for it. Now he acts like he owns us.”

Cyrus hands me a piece of paper with the name Marcellus scrawled in large letters at the top, and small bits of information- a description, various conversation tidbits, even general clothing- written in different handwriting underneath it. I pin this paper up next to Cyrus’ name on the wall, Company side.

“Where do you go on your long runs?” I ask as I study the paper.

“America,” he answers, and I detect a bit of shame in his voice. There is some hesitation before he continues. “We’ve mainly gone to Wilmington and Charleston, but we were directed to the Savannah port once.”

I turn from my wall to cast a quizzical glare at Cyrus. “Wait…” Cyrus looks away from me. “But that would mean-”

“Yeah, it does. We haven’t had a choice, Emilia.”

“What does it mean?” Aisling asks, sitting forward in her chair.

I gesture to Cyrus for him to tell her.

“Those, uh…” Cyrus presses his lips together tight before proceeding. “Those are Confederate ports. Whatever and whoever we were transporting, it was going to the CSA.”

It has been five years since the American Civil War came to a ceasefire agreement. The Confederates were allowed to keep their morals and ideals in the new country that they created- the Confederate States of America- but they were, in effect, cut off from the rest of the world, as most countries either didn’t want to trade with a land that clung to slavery, or there was just no benefit to them. According to newspapers, many areas in the CSA were industrializing, trading cotton and tobacco plantations for factories that their slaves and poor whites now worked, in an attempt to seem more appealing to countries they could have trade agreements with.

The now very poor former United States of America had broken up into many territories that were slowly becoming countries. Apparently they gave the Native population a large parcel of land in exchange for their help during the Civil War, and the Mormons are vying for a chunk of land as well. The latest word is that President Garfield is trying to unite all the territories north of the CSA- including New France- into an American Union.

England had been considering taking back the land and the people that were once theirs, however the latest word is that they are waiting for the American Union idea to fail before they do so.

Cyrus having a route to the Confederate ports is appalling, but interesting, because, as far as I knew, they hadn’t found anyone willing to trade with them yet and were barely surviving as a country. Whoever Cyrus is working for has found some use for the CSA, which simply makes my puzzle larger, in fact, twice as large as it was before.

“How could you?!” Aisling shouts at him.

“We had no choice!” Cyrus defends himself.

“Everyone has a choice!”

“You think I wanted to do this? Me?” He gestures to himself, seemingly to point out his own skin color. “If it had been guns or some kind of weapon, maybe we would’ve done something, but nothing we were shipping seemed important!”

“You had a choice. You could’ve taken your ship and run, gone to…anywhere, and just disappeared! Even England, with all her sins, condemned the CSA, and here you are…helping them.”

“They know everything about us.” Cyrus doesn’t shout this, but he says it so assertively that it silences Aisling. “They know about my sister and her family in Liberia. They know where Evie’s grandmother lives in China. Rhys’ entire family lives in London and they gave him a list of their addresses. After we signed that contract and they handed over the Cloudsong, they handed us a little leather notebook and each page had our names on it, and all our surviving family members and their locations. We’re required to keep the book on the ship at all times. They check every time we dock.”

Aisling is quiet, probably trying to reconcile her own values with this new information. But something about this assertion catches my attention.

“It’s a book full of information? And the information is accurate?”

Cyrus furrows his brow. “Yes, why?”

“It’s not just an implied threat? The papers don’t say something like ‘Cyrus, you have a sister and a mother’?”

“No. There are names and locations in the book, for every single one of our family members. Why does that matter?”

“That information would take more than just a trip to the records office. And assuming each of the other contracted ships have the same kind of book, that would be countless countries covered.” I stare at the wall, and then back at Cyrus, thinking. He can apparently see it on my face, so he stays quiet. “When you’re in America, who do you deal with at the ports?”

Cyrus shrugs almost dismissively. “Some Confederate soldier. Always in uniform, but he never says his name or even talks to us. It’s the same bloke every time.”

I tap my fingers against my own leg, bursting with nervous energy. My eyes bounce over my wall of information, but it’s really just so they have something to do while my gears turn. Eventually I grab another piece of paper and write a list on it:

England CSA Liberia China

It’s tacked up on the wall, Company side.

“Any other countries where your crew’s families have been threatened?”

“Wales, Scotland, and Western America, Dakota.”

I write those down on my list.

“And you said you’ve done trips to Eastern Europe; Where exactly?”

“Only one place, Moscow.”

I write down Russia without really thinking about it, but then I stop. “Russia? Why Russia?”

Cyrus shuffles through his papers until he finds one with Moscow scribbled across the top. “We never picked up any cargo from Russia, only people.”

I’m about to write that down, but I’m not exactly sure what to write, so I just sit back down at the table. “People…Who…” Again, I’m not sure exactly what I’m trying to ask, so I gather my thoughts. “How about you just tell me about your cargo in general?”

Cyrus slides the paper towards us and we both look at it. “We would take small but heavy crates from here to Moscow. Some of them would be unloaded, and then people would come on. The rest of the crates would go with the people, and we would take them all to the CSA. The people would get out, the crates would be unloaded, and big crates would be loaded on, all to be brought back here.”

“Did you ever bring people back from America?”

“Sometimes, but never the same people, and we never took them back to Moscow.”

“Okay, well I think it’s a safe assumption that the other ships were doing similar transport, and they made sure you would never see the same people twice. Who were the people you were transporting?”

“We weren’t allowed to talk to them, only if they talked to us, and even then we weren’t allowed to ask them questions. Most of them were very stoic, in the Russky tradition, but a few were nice. We all got the impression that they were some sort of academics, and a few of them were definitely religious leaders or zealots.”

“What’s this bit about?” Aisling points to the words ‘Creepy Man’ underlined on the page.

“Oh, that fellow. He wasn’t creepy so much as…unsettling. But Catori didn’t like him at all, my first mate. She kept an eye on him the whole trip.”

“What was unsettling about him?” I ask.

“I can’t give you something specific. Mostly just his…aura, I guess. He was dressed like a monk or a priest maybe, long robes, but we had seen that before. He was tall, about my height, but very thin, and had a long scraggly beard. He didn’t speak at all, nobody saw him eat for the entire trip, and Sky and Simeon swear they never saw him blink. He just sat on the floor of the cargo bay, sometimes kind of…humming. We couldn’t get him out of the ship fast enough.”

Aisling and I just stare at Cyrus, unsure of what to do with that information.

“Okay,” I say after a few seconds, “so small cargo is taken to Russia from England, and is presumably traded for… people. Just men?”

“No, there’s been a few women. But they were just like the others, Doctors or something. They weren’t there against their will.”

“That we know of, but let’s assume that you had a good read on the situation.” Cyrus rolls his eyes. “So small cargo is taken to Russia, and traded for people of assumed high status and intellect. They are taken to the Confederate States of America, and traded for large cargo. Am I on the right track here?”

“So far, that is exactly the situation, yes.”

“And you haven’t gotten a look at any of the cargo at all?”

“We’ve seen bits and pieces of machine parts that didn’t seem like they would fit in a crate, all coming back to England. We’ve described ‘em on these pages. But we can’t get into a crate; They’re strapped up and have some sort of tamper evident seal on ‘em.”

“But you’re on that ship for a while, right? Alone with the crates.”

“If we don’t have passengers, yeah, four to five days, depending on wind.”

“And can any of you draw?”

“What? Why?”

“I need you to see inside those crates, and I need you to draw what you see so I can see them.”

“That’s dangerous, Emilia. I told you they know where all our families live. That’s more than a veiled threat!”

“Yes, but you have a lot of time to figure out how to open and close those crates without leaving a trace. Just do it…carefully.”

“You’re asking quite a bit.”

“I know I am, and if I could do it myself, I would. But this is important.”

“How? How does this relate to Sky? And how does it relate to that other case you were working on. If you’re going to ask my crew to put so much on the line, it’s time for you to share some information,” he replies sternly.

“Fair enough.” I tap the table, trying to decide how much information I should actually share with him. Aisling nudges my foot under the table and I look at her. She gives me a ‘don’t trust this guy completely’ face. I raise my eyebrows quickly at her, in acknowledgment. “Last week I had an affair case. I was following this guy who kept disappearing on his wife at nights. I followed him to this strange underground tavern, where he met with a man. I don’t know his name, but he was tall, creepy, sickly looking…” I point to the page on the wall that says-

“The Sallow Man,” Cyrus reads.

“Exactly. He’s one of those faces you don’t forget, very easy to describe. Anyway, he gave my mark a job, and despite my client telling me there was no reason to follow up because she was just happy her husband was bringing money in again, it didn’t sit right with me; The Sallow Man and the way he talked about the business… I just didn’t like it. So I followed him, the husband, and he led me straight to your ship.”

“Odd coincidence, but what does this have to do with Sky?”

“I’m getting there.” Now I stand, so I can walk him through my wall. “Yesterday me and a contact I have in the police station went through all the boroughs surrounding Kenningate to see how many missing people there were. Not only is there a higher than average amount of missing people, a large percentage of them are pregnant women.” I smack the paper that has all the boroughs on it. “I’ll get more complete information on this later. After that, we followed up with a couple who actually witnessed a young pregnant woman being kidnapped. The person they described nicking her?”

“The Sallow Man,” Cyrus repeats, as I smack that piece of paper.

“Exactly. And that’s our connection between the two cases. And the very next thing I’m going to do is explore that connection to make sure it’s real.”

“But you can’t really do that unless you actually see this exact same man, I don’t know, abducting people. Until then, it could just be some other pale creepy bloke.”

Unfortunately, he’s right. I don’t really have a plan besides try and catch him in the act- though at the rate people are going missing, that might not be too difficult.

“I could probably help with that,” Ash chimes in, and we both look to her. “I can draw. I’m excellent at it. Emilia, you just describe to me what the Sallow Man looks like and I’ll draw him until it looks accurate. Then you can show the drawing to people and see if they’ve seen him.”

“That could be a lot of really tedious work, Ash. Are you sure?”

“Yes, definitely. If it could help find missing women, and somehow hurt the CSA… I want to help anyway I can.”

“Well it would definitely help.”

“Great, we’ll work on it today.”

I nod and smile a thank you at her.

“And you, do you ship out today?”

“Yes ma’am. No trip to Moscow this time. Just straight to America with some small crates they already loaded.”

“Then your job is to gather as much information as possible. Get into those crates, talk to people, even that Confederate soldier, see if you can find anything out. Discreetly.”

Cyrus nods. “I might have Simeon do that particular task, but we will do our best.”

“And my job is to follow up on these missing people, and see what I can find out about who is renting the spaces at the Kenningate docks. I think I’m going to need a bigger wall, Ash.”

She smiles sarcastically at me. “I’ll see what I can do about getting you a bigger wall,” she rolls her eyes.

Evaki sounds off an alarm chirp. She has grown bored of our conversation and is eating her ice lolly at the window. Something outside has made her wary. Aisling goes to look.

“Wow, someone really cannot wait until the Sparrow opens.”

I follow her to the window and see a young man, probably late teens, in a brown tweed suit and cap overtop a shaved head. He’s standing on the walkway across the street from our house, looking up and down the street impatiently.

“Do you recognize him?” I ask Aisling.

“Yeah, he was in the Sparrow the other night, the night you and your crew were there, Cyrus. I remember him because he’s got such a child’s face, I thought he might be one.”

Cyrus stands quickly, almost knocking his- our- chair over. He joins us at the window, which is now officially too crowded, and looks out to see the kid.

“That’s my tail.”

“Him? He’s a child, a baby. They have a baby following you?!”

Cyrus smirks. “Not every time. It’s a different person every time, but we’ve gotten pretty good at sussing them out. Well, how am I going to get out of here now?”

I shrug. “I’ll walk you out.”

“What?”

“He was in the tavern following you two nights ago, so he saw us kiss. I’m assuming you’ve visited women in ports before?”

“Well, yeah, but…”

“He’s probably just old enough to make his own guesses as to what you’ve been doing in here. I’ll walk you out, in my robe, you give me a good sailor’s kiss goodbye, it’s a great cover.”

“Aren’t you concerned about what the neighbors will think?”

Aisling and I chuckle.

“We’re two women that run a tavern. I have a secret office in the back alley that people come in and out of all times of the day. I think the neighbors have already made up their minds about what kind of ladies we are. Do you have any other ideas as to why you might be visiting a woman’s home in the early morning before you ship out? You’ve been here just long enough to-”

“Alright, I get it. It’s a good plan.”

“My, you are quite squeamish for an airship captain,” Aisling mocks.

“Perhaps I’m just a gentleman.” He looks very uncomfortable. It’s almost endearing.

“Say it isn’t so,” I smirk at him. “Come on, it’s time to try your hand at acting.”

“Goodbye, Cyrus. See you soon,” Ash smiles and winks at him, presumably trying to make him even more uncomfortable.

“Bye Aisling.”

Cyrus follows me down our stairs and out the door to our home, which is in the back alley, next to the fairly obscure door to my office, which simply looks like the back door to the tavern. Once we’re outside, I loop my arm around his and we begin walking slowly through the alley to the front of the house.

“Can I ask you something?” Cyrus says as we meander.

“Of course.”

“I understand how divisive the CSA is, believe me, but your friend got very upset. Is she just extremely empathetic or does she have some personal tie to the Americas?”

“That’s an astute observation.”

“Thank you.”

I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Ash’s parents were very young when they had her, and very poor. They had basically nothing, and wanted to give her a better life. Once she was weaned, they left her with her mom’s parents in Sootdrift- where we grew up- and they went to America under indentured servitude. Their plan was to work, hard, for seven years and then their employer was going to give them a small plot of land with a little house on it, which was infinitely more than they had in Ireland, and then the grandparents and Aisling would join them and they would all live a better life in the New World.”

“And then the war came,” Cyrus guessed.

“Yes, the war came. Their servitude was in South Carolina, and in the sixth year the war started. Rich men started the war, but they were making the poor men fight for them. Aisling’s father didn’t want to fight, I’m assuming moral objections, and so the army burned the house down with them still inside. Ash wants nothing to do with America, and even less to do with the CSA, as you can imagine.”

Cyrus nods. “I wish I would’ve done things differently. If I could go back and not take that contract-”

“There’s no sense in wondering about something like that. We all have regrets that we can’t do anything about. But you’re doing things differently now. You’re a spy, and we’re going to figure out what these people are up to and topple them. Hopefully hurt the CSA in the process.”

He smiles down at me and sighs. “I just wanted to fly. I wanted to own my time and my ship, and keep my crew safe, and spend time in the sky.”

“You’re quite the romantic, aren’t you?”

We have finally made it to the front of the alley, and the young man following Cyrus is still there. Out of the corner of my eye, I can see his gaze lands on us. I imagine he is overcome with relief. Cyrus sees him as well, stops, and pivots to face me.

“You’ve got me all figure out, Emilia,” he puts a hand on my face. “I’m a romantic, gentleman airship captain with delicate sensitivities.” I can’t help but laugh, and Cyrus pulls me in- up?- for a deep and breathy kiss.

“Now, can I ask you something?” I say once he lets me go. “While I ask, you should play with my hair.” Cyrus nods and brushes a strand of hair behind my ear. “Do you have…a card, or a bit of stationary or something with your employer’s…I guess, brand on it? I believe it’s a swan and a spear.”

Cyrus looks at me quizzically. Perhaps he was expecting a question of a more personal nature, considering our intimate situation. He has no idea how personal this question is to me. “I’m uh…I’m sure we had a card or something from them at some point, but I don’t remember the particulars of any sort of brand.”

My eyes light up. “Do you still have the card?”

“I honestly don’t know. I don’t remember throwing it away. I could look for it, if you would like.”

“Yes, please do, thank you.”

“Why?” He looks a bit skeptical. Perhaps I showed my hand a bit too much there, displayed more eagerness than necessary. I put a hand on his waist.

“Oh, just trying to get the whole picture. The Sallow Man, he had a card with that picture on it, and it could be a good lead if I could get a good look at it.”

Cyrus nods; Apparently this answer was sufficient. “Okay, I’ll ask my crew about it, see if we can find it.” I smile a thank you. “I should go, but I’ll be back in three weeks, and hopefully we’ll have more information for each other.”

“Hopefully. I’m going to do my absolute best for Sky, I promise.”

“Thank you.” He gives me a goodbye kiss, longer than the last, and when he lets go it feels like I’ve been dropped a few inches. I usually have to steady myself from the passion of a kiss, not the physical fall afterwards. “Be safe, Emilia.”

“You as well, and your crew.”