Page 100 of Ship of Smoke and Steel

I get to my feet, clutching my stomach, and stagger to the door. Meroe stares after me, her face a mask.

That night, I climb the long stairs up to the deck, trudging around the spiral until my legs burn. The dredwurm’s eye is a weight in my pocket.

Why did I do that? For a moment I’d been so certain. I’d thought—

What? That Meroe would appreciate being suddenly slobbered on? Blessed’s balls, Isoka, how would you feel if some strange woman started kissing you without so much as asking?

And now I’d knocked the whole thing into the Rot.

I just hope—oh, Blessed, I hope so hard it makes my chest hurt—that she doesn’t do anything stupid before I get back.

And the Captain had better hope, for his own sake, that he has some good answers.

Another three turns to the top.

I could have hinted: So, Meroe, did you have crushes on any stableboys back at the palace? Or … Something like that, but not stupid.

Jack had said … but Jack is a little bit crazy.

Rot, rot, rot. Focus, Isoka.

I reach the top, and get my bearings. There’s no one waiting to guide me, but the Captain’s tower looms overhead, a black slice cut out of the starscape. The breeze of Soliton’s passage ruffles my hair—longer, now, than I usually let it get—and flaps my shirt against the still-tender skin of my back.

A single light is burning in the empty space where the Council held its audience. The Scholar waits between the two silent angels, cane in one hand and lantern in the other. His spectacles are circles of darkness obscuring his face.

“You’re late,” he says.

“It’s been a long day,” I say. “If someone else is offering you a dredwurm’s eye, you’re welcome to deal with them instead.”

He grins. “Zarun and the others have found no sign of the dredwurm’s passage today. They are … unhappy.”

“Then let’s get this over with.”

He nods. I glance up at the angels, but they’re dark, with no sign of a faceted gem, blue or red. For a moment I try to twist into the strange state of mind that let me pull at the gray energy, but I don’t have the concentration for it, and it only makes my head hurt. I scowl, and hurry after the Scholar.

We take a roundabout approach to the tower, walking a circuitous path across the deck of the ship and cutting through the shadows of several rusted-out structures. The Scholar’s cane taps out a steady rhythm, so I don’t bother trying to move quietly.

“Your … energy. What you call the Eddica Well.”

He looks over his shoulder. “You still don’t believe me, I take it?”

“I believe that it exists. I just don’t think you’ve got the whole story.” I hesitate. “If the spirits of the dead are powering the ship, can we speak to them?”

“No,” he says. “Eddica taps the energy of the dead. Not their minds, not their essence. Those are gone.”

I want to tell him he’s wrong, just to wipe the smug look off his face. But something tells me I’m better off keeping a few cards to myself.

We’ll see what the Captain has to say first.

Finally, we make our approach to the Captain’s tower, from the side instead of straight on. It’s longer than it is wide, and canted slightly backward, like an oval pipe plunged at an angle into Soliton’s stern. There’s a small doorway here, covered by a scrap-metal door. A canvas shelter stands beside it.

“This is normally the guardpost,” the Scholar says. “Fortunately, arranging the rotations is among my duties. I doubt anyone will notice the lapse.”

“What about the angel?”

He nods, fishes in his pocket, and presents me with a small silver necklace, the kind of thing that you might buy for a sweetheart if you were moderately well-off and cloyingly sentimental. I frown at it.

“That is the key to the tower?”