Page 19 of Winds of Death (War of the Alliance #4)
She’d known Fieran would be returning to Fort Defense soon.
He was too integral to the war to remain here a moment longer once he was fully healed.
And by the way he hadn’t flinched when she’d jumped into his arms and he’d held her without trouble, he was healed and definitely strong enough to fly an aeroplane.
Yet she didn’t have orders to return to Fort Defense. Perhaps they would still be coming, now that she had helped solve the synchronization gear problem.
Unless her work with the synchronization gear had proved to the higher-ups that her skills could be put to more use here than at Fort Defense as an aeroplane mechanic. She could find herself separated from Fieran for the rest of the war.
Not just Fieran. But Mak. Her flyboys. The whole squadron. She needed to return to Fort Defense.
“Hey. It’ll be all right.” Fieran grasped her shoulders, rubbing his thumbs over them in a way that sent tingles down her back.
He’d done that before. Did he know how comforting she found the gesture?
He studied her expression as he held her gaze. “You can stay here. I know we wouldn’t see each other as often, but you’d be safe. And you’d be able to work at the AMPC.”
She could stay. It would mean more ice cream nights—and afternoons—with Louise.
Probably more weekends spent with Fieran’s family.
Days here at the AMPC surrounded by magic and mechanics in a way she’d only dreamed about when growing up.
There would be far fewer bombings. Less danger.
No more watching her flyboys fall from the sky.
Perhaps that was a life for someday. But right now, she couldn’t imagine letting Fieran fly into danger without her. She couldn’t abandon her flyboys.
Pip shook her head. “No. I’d like to return to Fort Defense. I can’t abandon the squadron.”
Fieran exhaled a long sigh and pulled her to him, wrapping her in an embrace. “I don’t want you in danger again, but I’ll be glad to have you watching my back.”
She wrapped her arms around his waist and rested her head against his chest. “But will they send me back? What if they think I’m too valuable here?”
“If my family was so keen to meddle to get you here, then they had better meddle to send you back to Fort Defense.” Fieran’s huff stirred her hair.
Very true. After all, she likely wouldn’t have even been here if not for their very appreciated meddling.
She might not return to Fort Defense right away, but hopefully she’d rejoin Fieran sooner rather than later.
Fieran swallowed, his stomach far too knotted, as he faced the airfield outside of Aldon.
Last year, this had merely been a farmer’s field.
But in the past few months, it had been requisitioned by the army, due to its location and overall flat terrain, and turned into a makeshift aerodrome.
Large tents and half-finished structures filled one side of the field while aeroplanes lined up at the end.
Most of the aeroplanes were huge biplanes, their wings stretching for nearly a hundred feet compared with the nearly thirty-foot wingspan of the type of aeroplane Fieran flew—apparently they were calling those fighter aeroplanes now to distinguish from these new bomber aeroplanes.
The bombers had three seats, including one for an onboard mechanic, three engines with two of the engines out on the lower wings, and three machine guns, two forward and one pointing backward.
Cleats for six bombs were attached inside a hollow in the belly of the bomber aeroplane, to be dropped by a lever controlled by the person in the second seat.
That person had a rudimentary bomb sight to attempt to land the bombs on the target.
Piloting those aeroplanes must be something else. They looked like they would fly like unwieldy turtles.
Several of the bomber aeroplanes were already rumbling down the airfield before lifting into the air. More were spinning up, waiting for their turn to take off.
Fieran’s new aeroplane waited behind the bomber aeroplanes.
It had a cowling painted in black and white stripes while the rest of it was a nearly flat gray-blue like the rest of the Alliance aeroplanes, the red, green, and gray circles painted on the wings.
Without the nose art, it seemed rather plain.
On the undersides of the wings, new cleats held spots for four bombs, much smaller than the ones the bomber aeroplanes could carry. The bombs on his new aeroplane would likely be rigged as incendiaries to take out airships, but they could also be anti-personnel bombs to be dropped on ground troops.
Besides the bomb cleats, this aeroplane also had two machine guns built into the nose rather than the single machine gun on his previous aeroplane, making this aeroplane faster, more maneuverable, and more lethal.
Fieran swallowed again as he faced his new Defender. He loved flying. He did.
And yet when he looked at that aeroplane, something inside him shook with the memories of the whirling, spinning, falling, crashing…
No, he couldn’t think of it. He’d survived. He would not fear flying.
“I do not want you to go.” Tryndar’s teary voice brought Fieran back to himself.
He turned around, back to where Pip, Mama, Louise, Ellie, and Tryndar waited next to the roadster that they’d somehow all packed into. It was a sign of how haphazard this airfield was that his family had been allowed onto it so easily.
Tryndar leaned against Mama’s legs, his green eyes big and liquid.
Fieran crouched to put himself eye level with his brother. “I know. But I have to go. I’ll write and call as much as possible, and I will love any pictures you send me.”
Tryndar nodded before he flung himself forward, wrapping his arms around Fieran’s neck.
Fieran hugged him tightly, a lump knotting in his throat to match the one twisting his stomach. As much as he wanted to return to his squadron, this goodbye with his family was almost harder than the one when he’d left for the army.
Probably because he actually knew the dangers now. He’d spent several hours over the past few days writing If I Die letters for each of his family members—and one for Pip—and he’d entrusted those letters to Mama to distribute if the worst should happen.
She’d taken them with that far too solemn look on her face before she’d stowed them in Dacha’s desk, right by a pile of letters in Dacha’s hand. The top one had Mama’s name across it, and if Fieran were to guess, those were Dacha’s If I Die letters.
Somehow, Fieran had never realized that Dacha, too, would have a stack of letters like that. A will. Preparations for what would happen if he were killed in this war.
It had simply never occurred to Fieran that his dacha was anything but invincible any more than it had registered that he wasn’t.
After setting Tryndar down, Fieran hugged Mama, Louise, and Ellie, trying not to let himself think that this could be the last time he hugged them. The last time he saw them. If he crashed again…
He wouldn’t. He would fight to get back to them with all the strength of his magic.
Once he reached Pip, he held out his hand. “Walk me to my aeroplane?”
Pip took his hand, giving him a small smile.
He paused long enough to retrieve the stack of his flight gear from the back seat of the roadster.
He hesitated a moment before he also grabbed his swords.
The rest of his gear had already been passed to a member of the ground crew to load into the second seat of one of the bombers, since only some of the bombers had a second seat gunner.
Then Fieran and Pip strode between the various bombers spinning up. They didn’t speak until they reached Fieran’s new aeroplane.
Pip let go of his hand as she walked around the aeroplane, occasionally patting the side or peering closer at a section of it. “A brand new Soarwing Defender with the latest Dymman engine.”
“I’m going to miss the old one.” Fieran eyed the aeroplane. The canvas covering the fuselage and wings was so taut and painted so glossy that it almost appeared to be sheeted in metal. Not a single scratch or bullet hole.
But this wasn’t the aeroplane he’d flown for so many miles, until the control stick had been worn to his fingers and the seat in the cockpit molded to him.
Yet he’d never fly that aeroplane again. He’d blown that one to bits.
“Me too.” Pip’s eyes never left the new aeroplane, as if she was already itching to open the engine compartment and start wrenching on it. “But this is a beautiful machine.”
Fieran swallowed, set the stack of his flight clothes on the wing, and dug into his pocket for the box he’d stowed there. “Pip, I…I got this for you.”
He held out the brown paper wrapped box, sporting a white ribbon tied in a bow.
Pip took the box, her eyebrows scrunching as if she was puzzled about what he’d get her.
He rocked back and forth from heels to toe and clasped his hands behind his back to hide the fact that he was struggling to keep his magic from twining around his fingers.
Pip slid the bow from the box before she took off the lid. She gasped as she lifted the necklace out of the box. “Fieran, this…it’s…”
It was a deceptively simple necklace. Just a chain with a single pendant dangling from it. Except that the pendant was in the shape of a wrench, and he’d had the jeweler set three gems along the wrench’s handle. A ruby, an emerald, and a diamond. The Alliance colors.
“Are these real ?” Pip gawked, first at the necklace, then at him.
“Uh, yes?” Fieran shrugged and winced. “Is that okay?”
He hadn’t been sure what was the correct price range for the first jewelry gift for a girlfriend. He suspected whatever he considered a normal amount was still on the higher end.
Pip stared at the necklace for another moment before she smiled. “It’s perfect. Linshi.”
She stood on her tiptoes, and he drew her in for a quick kiss. He would have loved to give her a longer kiss, but there were too many people around.
Once he stopped kissing her, he kept an arm around her waist as she unclasped the necklace and quickly put it on. It fell onto her blouse, the gems winking in the sunlight.
The bomber aeroplanes in line before Fieran rolled forward as the aeroplanes before them moved into position to take off next.
“I’m next.” Fieran didn’t want to let her go.
“Then I suppose you should get dressed in your flight gear.” Pip didn’t step away either.
“I should.” Fieran wrapped her in his arms for one last embrace as he pressed a kiss into her hair.
Then he forced himself to let her go and step back. He turned away and busied himself with pulling on his warm flight boots that covered all the way up to his thighs, his flight coat that went to his knees, a flight cap, goggles, and finally his scarf around his neck.
Of course, none of these were his . They were all as new as his aeroplane. This jacket wasn’t the one he’d broken in until it was flexible and comfortable. The boots were still stiff when he moved. The cap wasn’t worn to fit his head just right.
Lastly, he picked up his swords in their sheaths. He probably should have stowed them in his trunk, but he found he couldn’t bring himself to entrust them to one of the other pilots, especially as green as these bomber pilots were.
He met Pip’s gaze as he climbed onto the wing. “I’ll see you at Fort Defense in a few days.”
“I’ll be counting them down.” She backed away from his aeroplane.
As he’d hoped, his family had come through. Orders had come that she was to take the train to Fort Defense with the first batch of new synchronization gears in a few days.
The upper wing crowded closer to the cockpit on this new aeroplane, and Fieran had to bend and maneuver his way into the cockpit more than he had on his old one.
When he settled in, the dimensions weren’t familiar, the scant leather padding beneath his butt not yet broken in.
Even the control column didn’t feel the same, as it had an additional trigger lever for firing the two machine guns mounted side-by-side on the aeroplane’s nose.
No more having to let go to reach the triggers on the guns themselves.
Leather straps were bolted on the inside of the aeroplane, likely to hold an additional rifle or a spyglass for scouting missions. Fieran stowed his swords alongside him and strapped them in place before he reached for the belt to strap himself in.
When he flipped the switches to turn on the engine, it roared to life with a power that vibrated through the whole frame around him. The engine spun up more quickly than his previous aeroplane’s, and the propeller soon beat the air with a humming whir.
When it was his turn to take off, the ground crew removed the wheel chocks and dashed away as his aeroplane rolled forward.
Fieran steered the rolling aeroplane to the end of the airfield.
When he straightened the aeroplane out, he poured on the power.
The aeroplane bumped and bounced over the cropped grass.
He could feel the ridges where the farmer must have plowed the field at one point, and the aeroplane’s wheels automatically followed those ruts down the length of the airfield.
The aeroplane grew light around him, the air firming beneath the wings. His breath caught, and he braced himself to take to the skies once again.
Then it lifted off, and the knots in his stomach eased along with it. He whooped as the aeroplane soared upward, gliding on its shiny wings.
Once he had enough altitude, Fieran looped his aeroplane upside down before he threw it into a corkscrew.
When he came out of that, he swooped lower over where Pip and his family still stood by the roadster, waving at him as they gazed upward.
He flew upside down to wave back. He could see Tryndar, jumping on the back seat, the toy aeroplane Pip made for him in hand, as he waved with both arms.
“Capt. Laesornysh, stop showing off and take up your escort station.” The voice on the radio rang with a disgruntled authority.
He must have been someone on the ground. Likely the aerodrome’s commanding officer since none of the pilots flying the bombers outranked Fieran.
“Yes, sir.” Fieran pulled his aeroplane back to right side up before he pointed the nose toward the swarm of bombers assembled in the sky as they headed for Fort Defense.