The laughter and the discussion told that the guests were in the second-floor winter garden. It was behind the tall glass doors that opened from the floor’s main entrance hall. Jonathan looked back, understanding they had come upstairs using the servants’ staircase.

  “Veringe has already done his presentation and is basking in the attention. He never gives people time to observe his creations for too long, so the route should be clear.” Josue guided Jonathan towards the wooden doors carved with plant motifs. No one was looking at them as they sneaked through the hall.

  Behind the wooden door was a brightly lit room. The display cases along the walls showed more of Veringe’s collection. In the middle, located below the windows on the roof, was a luxurious set of armchairs arranged around a well-waxed table. An empty serving trolley stood at the end of the table.

  Josue let out a stunned sigh, and Jonathan stared at the sight. Somebody lay behind the table, only the feet were visible. Blood stained the floor, and Thomms stood in the middle of the scene, cleaning her fingers with a napkin. She noticed them.

  “Joanna, is something wrong?” Thomms sounded calm.

  Jonathan closed the door and walked closer. Behind the table, his face towards the floor, was the very dead Captain Veringe. His walking stick lay on the floor. Jonathan looked to the Navigator without demanding an explanation and scanned the room, mapping potential weapons. The door opened again.

  “What…what in the name of the ash-cursed winds has happened here? A murder! There has been a murder!” The newcomer was wearing grey. He was Veringe’s trusted friend and his airship’s navigator, Willem Daas.

  Thomms kept her hands visible and her voice soft. “Calm down, Willem. Don’t make a scene when his spirit still lingers among us.”

  Hurried steps responded to the shouts, and the slightly intoxicated guests flooded the room. Josue tried to hide in the middle of the crowd. Jonathan stood by a cabinet filled with dubiously sexual statues, trying to look harmless.

  “You did it!” Willem said.

  “The voice connector is gone,“ a female voice said.

  “Give it back,” Willem said, standing by Thomms and pointing her threateningly despite the woman being taller than he was.

  Two men wearing the trading company’s colors entered. “Close the doors. No one is allowed to leave.”

  “You, explain yourself and your woman,” Willem said to Thomms.

  Thomms opened the napkin she held and turned it to show both sides. There was some moisture, but the fabric was spotless. “Mister Di splashed some liquor on me, and I went to clean my shirt in the side room,” the navigator said.

  A man in a brown jacket, his cheeks red from alcohol and embarrassment, coughed. “True. But it was an accident, and most fell to the floor.” His shoes sported sticky signs of sugary liquid.

  ”When I went inside, the connector was on the trolley. When I came back, Veringe lay here. I had heard nothing, and I had no time to react when Joanna and…him arrived,” the Navigator explained. Willem and Annike looked at Josue.

  “Joanna was expecting to see the invention. I brought her here. My apologies, it was inconsiderate.” Josue said.

  “Navigator Daas, my apologies. Josue can be impulsive, but he was a friend to the Captain,” Annike said.

  Willem, Annike, and some of the other guests looked at Jonathan in a way that communicated they had made assumptions about the nature of his intentions with Josue.

  “Well then,” Daas said and kneeled by his captain. He gently rolled the body over. Veringe’s shirt was bloodied, and his eyes stared open. There was a single cut on his throat. “Did anyone see him leaving the winter garden?”

  “A guard came to talk to him,” Mister Di said needlessly loudly. He blushed some more.

  “It was not a long time ago. He was talking with Heger,” Annike filled in.

  “That is true,” the man called Heger said. He had long hair and a fashionable suit, and he was drunk. “The guard was a medium-sized man with light brown hair. Had a knife on his belt.”

  “None of my men openly carries a knife in the indoor service.” A man in uniform pushed forward. “You know it as well as I do, Navigator Daas. Lance Corporal, check the area!” A guard left the room.

  “Why kill Veringe? Why take the voice connector?” Willem stood and looked at his captain sadly. Thomms walked to Jonathan and stood by him in silence. The Navigator seemed calm and severe.

  “I cannot let you leave. Please, return to the winter garden while my men secure the area,” Willem said. “You too, Thomms. I don’t like your scarred face, but you didn't do it. At least not alone.” The crowd moved restlessly, hearing the threat in Daas’ words, and Jonathan readied himself to kick off his heeled shoes.

  “The killer had green in his eyes, and he was pale like eaten by the plague. Just like that woman. Thomms, do you sleep with the ash-crawling servants of Old Tarasten?” Heger said, staring Thomms with open menace. ”Come here, Joanna or whatever you bitch are called.”

  “Leave her alone,” Thomms said.

  Josue tried to turn invisible. Jonathan straightened his posture like an insulted woman and, without minding the Navigator’s words, walked to confront Heger. “I am right here, sir. What do you want?”

  “You are an ash-raped half-blood,” the man let the vulgar words drop slowly from his mouth, clearly enjoying the situation. “And Thomms has admitted she is from the planet’s dark side. Everyone knows her kind deals with the Ainadu. You murdered the Captain because of his brilliant work, because you want to keep your secrets safe. Your common boyfriend is skulking somewhere in the shadows, wearing a stolen uniform. He did the dirty work, and you were supposed to take Thomms to safety.”

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  Heger’s words made Mister Di hold the amulet on his neck tightly. “Guard us from the ash,” he muttered.

  “That is untrue,” Thomms said. She walked to Jonathan and set her hands on his shoulders. “I won’t forget your insults, Heger, but in the presence of death, we must restrain our hatred.”

  Jonathan shrugged her hands away, glaring at Heger with open loathing in his pale eyes. Blue and grey shades in the eyes were considered a sign of sickness in the southern countries. Jonathan saw no need to restrain himself; the Navigator herself had asked if he could fight. “You have no evidence. Mister Heger here keeps on insulting me while the murderer runs loose and…”

  Heger hit. It was a quick slash with his right hand, reaching towards Jonathan’s chin. Jonathan made a minimal movement to let the fist pass harmlessly and stepped behind Heger’s arm, placing two hard hits into his armpit.

  “You shit. I’ll make you pay!” Heger said breathlessly.

  ”Heger!” Willem’s voice carried authority that halted the situation. “This is enough. She is right, there is no evidence. Thomms, keep your beast in control.”

  “My apologies,” Thomms muttered and took Jonathan’s arm. She whispered into his ear: “Do not dig us any deeper into the trouble.”

  Guards escorted them back to the winter garden, where various intoxicating substances were available. Thomms kept hold of Jonathan’s arm and prevented him from getting a glass or a cigarette, or anything else. The atmosphere was tense, even explosive, but the presence of the guards kept the emotions in control. Annike found Thomms and Jonathan, who were standing by the windows. She had Josue in tow.

  “A terrible turn of events, Navigator. Are you and your companion well?” Annike asked.

  “Thank you, miss. We are doing quite well. How about you? I understood that the deceased was your friend?” Thomms answered.

  “He was my oldfather. So full of stories from his travels all around the world. But he was still hunting for his great invention. Please, Navigator, tell me if it would have worked?”

  “I am not a technology expert. I have seen some ancient machines come to life, but they have been without a mind. Even if the mechanism works, as it did in the demonstration we saw today, something is broken beyond repair. Replacing the broken mechanical mind with Ainadu’s scrips is an innovation, though.”

  “Where have you seen such machines?” Annike sounded curious and not at all shaken. Josue tried to look keen, but moving the topic towards technology bored him. Josue glimpsed Jonathan, who was under the Navigator’s physical control.

  “There are all kinds of things floating on the seas. There used to be cities, Annike, and the machines that supported them. Now they are dead, just flotsam.”

  “Can’t they be fixed?”

  ”Yes, just like the captain did. The parts will move, there will be lights and sounds, and the controls will operate logically. But when you leave the machine on its own, it falls prey to its internal paradigm. The intelligence they used to have died with the world, and they can’t be fixed.”

  “It is so sad.” Annike sounded like she meant it.

  “No, Annike. It is our ordeal. There is working technology stored in orbit. Our ascension will take us there.”

  Annike looked at the Navigator oddly. Many had been scared into obedience as kids by stories of avengers descending from space. Annike believed humanity’s place was on Watergate’s surface, in the purgatory of their own making.

  An hour after Veringe’s death, Willem returned to the winter garden.

  “Dear guests. My men have found the invention destroyed. They also found another victim. The murderer killed a guard and used his clothing to lure the captain apart from the crowd, as suspected. The coat was found together with the burned remains of the voice connector. I believe the murderer got what he was after and has left the scene. My men are tracking him. I am very sorry for the inconvenience. You are free to leave.”

  ***

  Later, Thomms and Jonathan stood on the patio, waiting for the other guests to leave. Navigator Daas was softly discussing with Thomms, and Jonathan wandered to observe the second-floor library’s open window from the ground level. He saw a clear route to climb both up and downwards. In the flowerbed, hidden by the shadow of a cast-iron bench, were marks where someone had dropped down.

  Jonathan was not surprised to recognize the shoeprint. These shoes were of northern make, and they were of the same size as his shoes. Jonathan covered the tracks and checked that there were no other marks to be found about the intrusion. He hated and evaded his father, but he did possess some loyalties towards his home country, the New Freedom. The southerners seldom used the Ainadu name and instead called the country dismissively the North or the Hot Segment, describing its history and geography.

  Soon, the Navigator and Jonathan were on the return trip to the city. They were sitting inside a small, hired carriage, pedaled by a tired man. Navigator rested her eyes on the city’s silhouette.

  “Was it someone you knew?” Thomms asked.

  Jonathan sighed. He had his suspicions, but no certainty. A man with light brown hair, green eyes, skills with the knife, and a will to murder a skycaptain who had studied the Ainadu could have been any madman. But everything pointed towards his half-brother, including the shoe size.

  “What makes you think I know all the Northern fanatics?” he muttered, thinking about Patrik. “I had nothing to do with it.”

  “I’d like to hear your insight, Jonathan. I don’t blame you for your bloodline.”

  Jonathan’s previous drunkenness had already turned towards despair. “I don’t want the North reaching here. I want to be left alone, away from all that.” The words were out before Jonathan understood what he had said.

  The Navigator was silent for a while before answering: “It was already waiting for your people when you arrived at Watergate. It was imprinted on the planet and people’s minds during the war. They say that you can run all you want, but can’t escape a dragon.”

  “That was quite philosophical.”

  “You are not stupid, young man, although you give a great show on that.”

  “Says a woman who left her responsibilities on the dark seas,” Jonathan slashed back.

  The Navigator chuckled. “I lived a full life under Abyss. I served two generations of my family. Now I’ll have a life for myself, but as you can see, people categorize me because of my looks.”

  “Your tattoos are obvious. I don’t even look like an Ainadu in all this makeup.”

  “Your nose, your eyes, and your accent. The wig won’t hide them. Everyone recognizes your heritage the moment you open your mouth.”

  Jonathan snorted. He had tried to get rid of the accent, but the hard consonants used in the South were difficult to pronounce correctly.

  “It is not a bad thing, boy. We cannot choose where we are born, but it’s up to us to define our lives. But to return to the original subject…I take Verginge was playing with fire, but is the murderer a risk for you or me?”

  Jonathan pressed his hands into tight fists, the painted nails biting his palms. He didn’t want to think about this at all; that was why he had left it all behind. Kids were the only thing that dragged him back North, the kids and their mother, Enidtha. The relationship had been tempestuous and infrequent, but he and Enidtha had always returned to each other, only to drift apart again. She didn’t need him to support the family; if anything, Jonathan thought he was a burden to Enidtha and a horrible dad to the kids.

  Jonathan sighed again and wished for a drink. Anything with alcohol in it. “No, he was after Veringe.” Jonathan could not imagine why the strategej would be after a lone navigator, but he imagined several reasons why Patrik might want to have a word with him.