“What are you two up to?”
“This is brilliant, Sophronia. Did you know this boy knows proper streetside fisticuffs?” Sidheag’s dour face was animated with delight.
“Does he?” Streetside, but he lives in the air?
“Dirty fighting. It’s capital! Look at this!”
Soap ducked in under Sidheag’s swing and kicked her ankle.
Sophronia was shocked. One is not meant to ever kick during a fight! It isn’t gentlemanly, isn’t proper, isn’t done! “Soap, that’s unscrupulous!”
Soap stopped and turned to grin at her. “Yes, miss, but it works.”
While he was distracted, Sidheag poked him in the side with her pole.
Soap let out a woof and doubled over.
Sidheag came up next to him, and after he managed to straighten, threw a companionable arm around his soot-covered shoulders. She was more relaxed than Sophronia had ever seen her. “It makes sense. Why should we fight like gentlemen? After all, as you keep reminding me, Sophronia, we aren’t gentlemen. We aren’t even soldiers. We’re supposed to be intelligencers. We should learn to fight dirty. We should learn to fight any way we can.”
Sophronia tried to put her doubts aside and be sensible. It was more difficult than she thought. “That’s reasonable, I suppose. But kicking?”
“Well, miss, not to be rude, but you ladies aren’t sooties or soldiers. You don’t have much in the way of arm muscle. You ought to be kicking more; you’ve got more power in your legs, don’t ya? And you’re usually wearing them sharp-toed boots.”
Sophronia nodded. “Good point. But we’re also wearing lots of skirts.”
“Could get special boots made with metal reinforcements and attachments,” said Sidheag.
“Sidheag Maccon, did I just hear you mention designing a fashion accessory?” Sophronia made her tone all-over appalled, but she was thinking, Vieve could do something along those lines.
Sidheag grinned. Another one of those genuine smiles that made her look, if not pretty, at least less plain. It crinkled up her remarkable caramel eyes and softened her normally harsh features. Sophronia, at that moment, decided that the idea to bring Sidheag among the sooties was a resounding success.
But then a looming shadow appeared above them and said, “What’s this, what’s this?”
“Greaser—scatter!” yelled Soap.
Sophronia and Sidheag did as directed, running hard alongside the sooties down and around the back of one of the coal piles and squeezing into a crevice.
Soap, who was a noble idiot, intercepted the greaser.
“He isn’t going to get booted off school grounds for this, is he?” Sophronia asked, her heart sinking.
“What, Soap? For stopping and engaging in some mock swordplay?” One of the other sooties scoffed.
“So long as they didn’t mark you ladies as Uptops, the most he’ll get is an ear-boxing,” added another.
“Greasers like him. He keeps us all in line, and he works harder than any two of us put together,” explained the first.
Sophronia and Sidheag both let out sighs of relief.
Sidheag turned to her. “This is fun!”
“Finishing school’s not all bad, now, is it?”
“It’s not fair. I’m your first friend here! Why is it you persist in skulking off with Sidheag all the time?” Dimity was clearly trying not to whine.
“I hardly persist; we only go off once a week or so.”
“And you two keep giggling together about things.”
“I do not giggle without purpose. Lady Linette says you should never misapply a giggle. And Sidheag never giggles at all.”
“Well, it’s definitely not fair.” Dimity was perched on the edge of her bed, looking down at her feet sadly.
“She’s been helping me with fighting techniques.”
“I could use extra fight training.”
“Dimity, you don’t even want to learn. You told me you decided to entirely give over that subject. That you really only wanted to be a lady.”
Dimity sighed. “I suppose you’re right.”
Bumbersnoot, who was snuffling around the bed frame looking optimistically for a stray lump of coal or perhaps a small spider he might incinerate, came waddling over.
Dimity patted him on the head, and he blew a little blast of smoke out one ear.
Sophronia nibbled a fingertip in thought. “I tell you what—how about you help me with etiquette in court and ball settings? You’re much better at remembering the order of precedence than I.”
Dimity brightened.
Which was how Dimity and Sophronia ended up doing extra practice in the evenings. After some initial reticence, Sidheag joined them. Dimity managed to recover from her jealousy and, as a result, attacked the Scottish girl with her customary rapid-chatter teasing, which prodded Sidheag out of her awkward ways. In exchange, Sidheag started showing Dimity some of the easier knife tricks. No blood, of course. Nothing further was said about mysterious late-night jaunts.
“I don’t feel like I’m really contributing to our little study group,” Sophronia said to Dimity one night before they went to sleep.
“Don’t be silly, Sophronia; you’re the best of any of us.”
Sophronia could feel herself blushing. “I’m not!”
“ ’Course you are. We simply haven’t covered your subject yet in classes.”
“Oh, really, and what’s that?”
“You see opportunities. And you learn things and combine them in ways the rest of us don’t.”
Sophronia contemplated this. “I do?”
“I wager you’ve made a million connections in that brain of yours that I’ve never even considered. You say things to teachers that I know you’ve never told me. You’ve gone places on this airship I don’t even know exist. Then again, you aren’t always the most ladylike about it.”
Sophronia remained silent.
“For example, your two best petticoats are missing. They vanished the night of the play.”
“You noticed that?” How embarrassing. If Dimity noticed my lack of proper foundation garments, why, anyone else might have as well—Monique, or Professor Braithwope!
“I always notice clothing. I can’t imagine you sat around all evening in this room alone that night, either.”
“But…!”
Dimity lay back on her pillow and sounded self-satisfied. “I know you think I’m only paying attention to the etiquette side of our training, but I can’t help picking up other stuff up along the way. I may want to be a lady, but I’m learning how to be an intelligencer whether I like it or not. And you are my closest friend.”
“So you spy on me?”
Sophronia could only just make out the movement of a shrug under Dimity’s covers. “I’m not Monique. I’m not going to use it against you.”
“She hasn’t done anything to me directly since she turned me in.”
“I know. Doesn’t that worry you?”
“Yes. I think she’s still trying to get a message off the ship. Luckily, she’s as stymied as I am.” Sophronia felt, rather fancifully, that they were lost forever, floating in the mist. Time had taken on an atmospheric quality.
“Do you think she knows that we know?”
“I certainly hope not.”
The two girls went silent.
Finally Sophronia said, “You really do care about clothing and fashion, don’t you, Dimity?”
“Very much. It’s important—even Lady Linette says it’s a method of manipulation. You can dictate what people think of you simply by wearing the right gloves, not to mention jewelry.”
Sophronia was lost in remembering that second flywaymen battle. “What would you say of a man who went floating in fine evening dress and a top hat with a green ribbon about it?”
“Run,” Dimity answered instantly. Her voice, normally full of bright fun and mockery, had taken on a completely sober tone.
“Why?”
“I don’t know about you, Sophronia, but I’m certainly not ready to meet a Pickleman face-to-face. Not yet.”
“Ah, of course. And what, exactly, is a Pickleman?”
“You don’t know?”
“How would I?”
“Oh, I’m sorry. I keep forgetting you’re a covert recruit. You seem to be so very much one of us.”
“That’s kind of you to say.”
“Careful—wouldn’t want Monique finding out you like it here. She’ll make it her business to get you turned out. Anyway, Picklemen are sort of in charge of all kinds of important things. Not exactly legally, and rarely nicely. They like to collect money and power. That’s pretty much all I know. Oh, and their leader is called the Great Chutney.”
Sophronia’s eyebrows arched. “Well, if you say so.”
Dimity sat up, looking worried. “Do you think Monique might be working for them?”
“No, they’re clearly backing the flywaymen, or employing them. And remember, Monique refused to cooperate. If she were working with them, why the theatrics in the road? Why not just hand over the prototype? Why hide it at my house?”
“So if she’s not working for them and she’s not working for our school, who is she working for?”
“Herself? Her family? I don’t know—the vampires, maybe? Even the werewolves. Or perhaps one of the teachers is a traitor. We already know she has one of them defending her.”
Dimity looked nervous. “Are you sure we should be involving ourselves? Isn’t this something for the adults to sort out?”
Sophronia gave an evil little grin. “I’m thinking of it as training. Besides, if the prototype is at my house, I am involved. Monique involved me.”
Dimity only nodded. “I still don’t like how quiet she’s been. We should be on our guard.”
“Agreed.”
Dimity’s warning came none too soon, for having finally given up on trying to send a message, Monique turned her unwelcome attention once more to being a plonker.
Sophronia was minding her own business and running late to luncheon, as was her custom. She’d yet to learn the advantage of punctuality. As she told Sister Mattie the third time she was late to household potions and poisons, nothing interesting happened until after an event commenced. Her natural tardiness was compounded by the fact that she was trying to find time for all her classes; extra work in fan languages and how to plan a five-course meal; visits to sooties; and practicing with Sidheag and Dimity when no one was watching. There never seemed to be enough time.
So she was late to the dining hall, dashing in through the door, when someone stuck out one booted foot and she went flying.
Luckily, they’d learned some tumbling. Sophronia went head over heels, landing in a crouch on one knee with the other bent in what might be considered a mockery of a full court bow. It could have been graceful, except she tore her hem as she tried to rise, tripped to the side, and crashed into an unsuspecting older girl.
By that point, the entire school had turned to watch her, and a wave of giggles rippled through the hall.