Bree sketched a glyph in the dirt atop the hill and forced power into it, grumbling with the effort of manipulating something not part of herself. It eventually flared into upward-drifting motes of purple light. Just a matter of time now…
An hour later, a steel cable dropped from the sky.
She planted her feet on the small platform at the very bottom, hugged the cable, and spoke a word that quenched the beacon's light.
In response, the cable hauled her into the clouds. She couldn't help but whoop in delight; this had yet to pall for her. Wind whipped at her cloak. Chill mist streaked pass her, darkness engulfed her as the cable passed directly through a cloud, and then she was through the clouds and soaring though the clear, star-dappled night. Above her, she could barely see her destination against the sky: a black shape with a warm glowing light at its center.
It reeled her in, pulling the cable up toward its belly. Doors opened. She waited for them to close again, stepped off the cable platform, and executed a neat little bow to the woman at the winch controls.
"Perfect grab, Nost."
"W-well, it's a calm night, not much turbulence up here… thank you!"
The little redhead locked up the winch controls and beckoned to the hatch leading out of the winch bay.
"C'mon! I woke up the girls when I saw the beacon. We're all waiting for you."
Bree followed her, ducking under the low hatchway. She only regretted the extra height she'd built into herself above her original design in tight spaces, such as below the decks of her very own airship. Which was its own compensation, really.
The rest of her crew was seated around the big circular table in the mess room, which, when the plates were put away, was also the strategy room, the map room, and occasionally the surgery.
Emmerline had her feet up on the table. The curly-haired mage smiled as Bree walked in, then suppressed a yawn. Probably on the day watch.
"Emmerline, get your feet off the table," Nost said with the air of someone not really expecting to be obeyed, and then added, "It's unbecoming of a lady."
"Ugh, Nost, you sound like my governess, or my mother," Emmerline replied, as she tucked her feet under herself in the chair. "Bree, help, I'm being forced to have manners. These two bullied me terribly while you were away."
"You're the representative of the Kingdom's blessed aristocracy, long may they reign," Bree said, packing the traditional toast with as much sarcasm as she could muster. "Aren't you supposed to act like it?"
"Yes, maybe, but not up here! Also, welcome back and all that." She yawned again. "Did you find it?"
"I found it." Bree tapped her left arm. It made a hollow sloshing sound.
"Can we move on, then?" the third crew member asked. "We've been on standby for weeks and there's only so much I can do from up here through a telescope."
"Nice to see you again too, Zai. What's this I hear about you forcing poor Em to have manners? Is it true?"
Zai gestured to Emmerline. "I simply suggested that she would be most useful as an asset if she continues to play the role of a Kingdom noble, which should not be that hard, since she was allegedly born to it."
"Zai," Bree said, "it's also not manners to point at people with a knife."
"She cleans under her fingernails with it," Emmerline interjected.
Nost was horrified. "You clean under your fingernails with an alkalium throwing dagger?"
"It's perfectly safe and non-reactive as long as I don't break the skin— all right, fine. I'll put it away."
The dagger vanished. Bree's crystal eyes tracked much faster than humanly possible, and even she could barely follow Zai's hand as she pocketed it. Dark eyes caught hers, and surprisingly, Zai smiled.
"Welcome back, Bree."
"Thanks. Okay. Time for good news and bad news. The good news is that I have, here and in flasks in my pack, about as much liquid utterfrost as I could safely carry, and Em, it's everything that you predicted and more. The bad news is that on the way back here, at Glacierport, a Crimson Fist hit squad found me. They're using dolls now. So that's exciting."
"Dolls," Nost said flatly.
"Yep. Well, one doll."
"From the fucking Pact?" This from Emmerline.
"Not sure about that. I mean, definitely Pact. She was as haughty and full of herself as any Fist executioner I've had the pleasure of dealing with. But also, the design looked an awful lot like me. So maybe not Pact-built. I don't know."
"Did you beat her?" Zai asked.
"No."
"Why not?"
"Had a civilian with me. Had to break and run."
"Hm," Zai said in response. Then, "Could you have?"
"I don't know," Bree told her. "She was tough. Took a septupled utterfrost construct blade to the chest, knocked her down, but that was about it, didn't more than scratch her enamel. Used at least one spell I don't know by sight and didn't get close enough to feel. Not sure if she cast it, or if it was cast for her."
"She was pretty."
"What? Like me, a bit, but blonde. Shorter. Not by much, though. Red eyes."
"So yes."
"I don't know what to say to that."
"Not much stops you. She did. That's a problem for us."
"I promise it was because I took my best shot given the circumstances and she got right back up! Plus the civilian!"
"Hm." A moment's pause. "Forget I said anything."
"Yeah, it's probably not that. She has a whole crew of hotties up here. I mean, there's me, obviously, and then Nost is extremely fit from all that artificing — don't think I haven't noticed, Nost — and even our pet spook would clean up really nicely, I bet."
"Emmerline!"
"You don't think so, Nost? Like if we put all that long dark hair up, and got her out of those trousers, and maybe took her knives away — okay, I've got to be realistic here, I can tell by that face she's making, so we give her some prettier knives—"
"Emmerline, go to bed."
"Yeah, get some sleep, Em. I'll give you the whole travelogue in the morning."
"I'd have to see the knives," Zai said.
It was good to be back.