An eerie silence blanketed the ship as the engine went quiet. They could hear the engines of the other ships. It was so quiet they could probably hear the thunder of his own frantic heart. Steven crept toward the bridge where Hattie looked as if she literally held her breath. Finally, the sound of the engines disappeared. He breathed a sigh of relief that made his entire body shudder.

"What now?" Steven whispered from the doorway.

"Being downed air pirates in Deseret isn't a good thing," Hattie whispered back. "We get out, survey the damage, and pray we get ourselves back in the sky before the MoBatts spot us."

"What about the Vixen's Revenge?" James asked from the gunning station, a trickle of blood leaking from his lower lip.

Hattie shook her head slowly. "We pray they got away and get into safe airs.p.a.ce with no further problems."

They stood in front of the small craft, the sun rising above them. Certainly, the wilds of Deseret Territory were beautiful, with the snow-crested rocks and mountains. Never had he seen such colors, at least not in this realm.

"What's the damage?" Hattie asked Hittie.

The corners of Hittie's lips turned down, the deep and disturbing frown seeming to permeate throughout her entire wiry form. "Fortuna smiled on us ... sort of. It's purely structural. They missed the engines. But how in Hades are we going to fix a broken tail and the breeches in the hull? If we can even find the tail."

The schooner was made of wood and metal. Hmmm ... Ignoring everyone, Steven placed his hands on the bullet-riddled hull. Yes ... that could work. What about the tail? Moving over to the tail section, he examined it. If they could find the rest he just might be able to reattach it.

"Captain, if we repair the tail and the holes in the ship we could get to San Francisco?" A plan formed in Steven's mind. Getting to Rahel before the rescue ladies alerted Dr. Heinz was still priority-and they couldn't do that grounded in enemy territory.

"We could ... in theory," Hattie replied slowly, nodding as if doing so made the words more true. Certainly they wouldn't last long if they couldn't get airborne.

"Good," Steven replied. "Why don't you two find the rest of the tail? James and I will start on the repairs." The sisters stood there, blinking as if he'd spoken in tongues.

Hittie's arms crossed over her ample chest. Skepticism etched every inch of her face. "You mean you can repair the ship?"

"I think so." He looked at James. "Right, James?"

James' forehead furrowed, clearly not understanding what he meant. "Um, sure."

"That gives me so much confidence," Hittie huffed.

"Noli's an ace engineer and I've been her chief a.s.sistant since we were children, I've learned a few things over the years." Hopefully that would be explanation enough. "I can't make any promises, but we have just as much reason to get back up in the air as you."

Hattie toyed with the ends of her braid which had come unpinned at some point. "True ... " She looked to her sister. "We don't have anything to lose."

"You wreck my ship I wreck your face," Hittie spat. "Let's see if we can find the tail." The two sisters retreated in the direction they'd fled from.

James came up beside him, eyes dancing with amus.e.m.e.nt. "What exactly is your plan?"

Despite the bone-chilling cold, Steven rolled up his sleeves so he could work. "We're earth court. The ship is made of wood."

"Are you mad?" James hissed, eyes going wide. "We're not supposed to use magic unsupervised in this realm."

Steven laughed. Now James wanted to be sensible? "Right, like you've ever paid attention to that. We've been using a tracking spell, remember?"

"That's different. You want to use magic to repair someone else's ship? While they're here?" His voice rose in pitch, cracking a little, eyes widening, and cheeks flushing.

"James, if we don't get there when the Vixen's Revenge does, we won't get Rahel, which means we won't get the automaton, which means we're back at square one and we're running out of time." He met his brother's eyes. "If you have a better idea I'd love to hear it."

"You look and sound so much like father right now." A smile tugged at James' lips.

Terror seized Steven's chest as his hand went to his forehead. "I do? I'm so sorry."

James chuckled and shook his head. "Better you than me. All right, let's see what we can do ... I'm not really good at this sort of magic."

Steven put his hands over the breech in the hull nearest him. "Let's give it a go."

"Sure. I'll take the other side, you take this one?" James jerked his head toward the other side of the little ship.

"Sounds good." Steven's attentions returned to the hull in front of him. The bullet holes were mostly superficial. It was the hull breaches he needed to repair so they could get airborne. Time to survey the damage. Magic tingled through his fingertips as he probed the breech and gently manipulated the wood to close the fissures. It was a slow, tedious process. He kept needing to stop and stamp to warm himself and blow on his hands. Finally, the breach closed and he breathed an icy sigh of relief. One down, one more to go ... on this side. Then the tail.

When he'd finished both he found James peering at him, cheeks red from the cold. He whistled. "That's nice work, too nice."

"What do you mean too nice?" His fingers traced the breech as he scowled at his brother. "You can't even tell."

"Exactly. They won't believe we plugged it if it looks perfect. Here, look at mine."

James grabbed his arm and led him to the other side. Obvious repair lines marked where he'd merged the wood.

"I didn't even mean it, but then I'm not as good as you."

"It's patience you lack, not talent," Steven replied. "But I see what you mean, that's a good idea." The idea of marring his beautiful handiwork still made his belly churn.

"Really?" James brightened so much Steven wanted to put out his hands to warm them.

"Yes. Let me fix it. Why don't you see how many bullets you can pull out of the hull and repair what you need to. Hopefully the women will return soon-with the tail." They'd have to find some way to get the women out of eye-shot so that they could repair the tail, which would be a similar process.

Steven returned to his side of the hull and carefully, artfully, made his perfect work look marred-like James, but more deliberate. He'd just finished when he heard the sound of female voices and something being dragged.

His heart leapt. If they could get up in the air soon they might still be able to arrive in San Francisco around the same time the Vixen's Revenge did-and get Rahel.

"Need some help?" he called, running to join them, James on his heels.

"t.i.tties on a fish, it's cold out here," Hittie called back, breath coming out frozen.

They joined the women and took the heavy tail section from them and dragged it back to the ship. The battered tail piece was worse for wear, part of it broken, but better than nothing.

"You two did this?" Hittie stared at the hull in disbelief, jaw hanging open as if she didn't quite understand what she looked at.

"You have to admit, they did an ace job." Hattie flashed James a comely look.

James gave her a large grin. "We do what we can. You have to admit, it is cold enough to freeze the b.a.l.l.s off a bra.s.s monkey out here."

Steven scowled at his brother's vulgar language.

He ignored him. "I know being women doesn't mean you automatically know how to cook-but we can't cook at all. Steven burns water. Anyway, maybe you could make us all some coffee and we'll get this fixed so we can get back up in the sky?"

"You don't have to ask me twice." Hittie stamped and blew on her hands. She turned to her sister. "Coming, Hattie?"

Hattie shot James another long look, this one through veiled lashes. "Are you sure we can't be of a.s.sistance?"

"We're fine-something warm to drink would be the best help of all," James replied.

The way James said that sounded almost ... naughty and Steven looked away.

"Suit yourself, we'll return." With a final wistful look, Hattie followed Hittie into the little ship.

Well, that was elegant. Certainly he'd never get away with saying anything like that. Hittie would probably smack him. Hard. With a loaded pistol.

"Help me?" Steven asked his brother. "This is a two man job. One to hold, one to fix."

"I'll hold," James volunteered.

"Good."

James held the tail and Steven worked to fuse it to the back of the ship. This proved much harder and the end result wasn't nearly as neat as his repairs-but again, the imperfections were probably for the better. Being sound mattered more than appearance anyhow.

Above him an automobile engine sputtered.

Hittie and Hattie ran out of the ship, pistols drawn as the shadow of a flying car, a Dragon model by the looks of it, flew over them. Unlike Noli's bat-winged, bugged-eyed Pixy, this flying car looked more the beast. Giant leather wings, twice the size of the Pixy's and shaped like dragon wings, flapped. The loud sound sliced through the cold and quiet air. The car was an odd shade of green; the shape of the hood reminiscent of a dragon's head, complete with large headlamps for eyes.

"Do we signal them for help?" James hissed.

"We don't know if they're friend or foe," Hattie warned, pistol still drawn.

Something felt wrong. Deseret was large, the spa.r.s.e population cl.u.s.tered, leaving vast stretches of open land. They'd taken care to avoid civilization.

The rat-tat-tat of a gatling gun had everyone ducking behind the ship for cover.

"h.e.l.ls bells," Hattie hissed, firing her pistol at the Dragon.

"That's not a patrol ship-no one, not the MoBatts, not the air patrol, not the military uses flying cars as attack vehicles." Hattie fired again, using the tale of the ship as a blind.

James ducked behind the ship as the flying car buzzed them, sending out another spew of metal bullets as they clanked against rocks, dirt, and the hull of the ship they'd just repaired.

"I say, you'd think they're trying to kill us," James hissed.

Gulping, Steven looked up at the three leering men in the Dragon careening through the sky like a drunken wood faery. The men all reminded him of Igan-ruffians who liked ha.s.sling others for sport.

"I can't tell from here, but they could be," he muttered to his brother as the sisters continued to fire at the Dragon.

"Wait, what are you talking about?" James paled.

"I think we've got ourselves more helpers, what did you think they were?" Steven winced as another stream of bullets flew past. At this moment he didn't dare use magic. Not yet.

"Come out, come out where ever you are," one of the men called.

James' eyes widened. "Flying figs, you mean they actually want to kill us? But outright killing us is against quest rules."

"Since when has she ever played by the rules?" The words tasted bitter in his mouth.

"Why aren't you leaving?" Hattie cried, firing more. "Oh h.e.l.ls bells, I'm out." Her empty pistol made clicking noises.

"Dance for us," one man leered.

"Could we go back inside and take off?" Steven called to the ladies. An airship was faster than a flying car...right?

"I think we should try to get back onto the ship, if at least to use our gatling gun," Hittie called back.

James huddled next to him. "I think we need to use magic to crash it," he whispered. "Do you know a spell to make the engine seize?"

"Why would I know that?" It was difficult not to roll his eyes in annoyance.

"Um, because you always help Noli."

"I never used magic to help her fix things, not even once." He was quite proud of that-learning to blend in seamlessly with the mortals and not use his magic unless it was part of his lessons or at his father or Quinn's direction.

James made a face of disgust. "There's no time to be a fussy old bodger. We need to do something. Are you going to do it or am I?"

"I'll do it," Steven huffed as the spray of bullets crept closer. Of all the idiotic things. Then again, what choice did they have? Not that he knew what to do.

Closing his eyes, he muttered a few choice words under his breath. Magic tingled up his hand as he felt the air around him charge making the hairs on his arms stand on end.

Taking a deep breath, he opened his eyes, releasing the pent-up pure magic at the flying car. The invisible bolt of magical energy zipped through the air, searing the Dragon in half as easily as he might cut a loaf of bread. Screams from the vehicle bounced off the rocks as the front half and the back half fell from the ground in different directions.

"Let's get out of here," Steven called as the Dragon crashed, the screams and curses of the men curdling the air, which still p.r.i.c.kled with lingering magic.

Hattie stood there, frozen, mouth handing open.

"Good one, Captain Subtle," James hissed.

He hadn't known what else to do.

"You're right." Hittie gritted her jaw. "Come on, Hattie, let's get out of here." She looked back at the wreckage and shook her head. "I don't want to be here when they get to us."

If they lived.

Fear gripped him, rooting him to the spot. He could have killed those men. But they had been trying to kill him. Also, hopefully they were Fae and not human.

Either way, he couldn't let them hurt Hittie and Hattie.

"Think later." James shoved him toward the airship.

They got inside. Hittie fired up the engines and Hattie took off into the sky, leaving their a.s.sailants behind.

"What happened back there?" Hattie's voice went soft, eyes on the currently empty sky.

Steven's heart sank as he crowded onto the tiny bridge. How did he explain what he did? "Deseret has pockets of aether. Aether has been known to do strange things."