Heart of Iron (Heart of Iron #1)(18)

“We have tea?”

“Not for troublemakers.” She glared at him. “Any sign of hostility?”

“Not yet—”

A spark ignited from the pinprick of a ship. The whorl of white light drew closer. Warnings flashed across the starshield.

INCOMING PROJECTILE.

“Ak’va,” he cursed, and flicked off the autopilot, pulling up the helm from below the console. He swiped away the warnings, opening up the intercom to the ship. “All hands, brace!”

The white-hot missile spiraled closer. He spilled the sails and drew them back into the sides of the ship, banking the ship left as hard as he could. The missile screamed past them like a streak of white and exploded. The blowback knocked the ship toward Eros, rattling the old girl like a tin can full of nails. He quickly steered it out of the gravitational pull of the planet.

Captain Siege leaned over his chair and pressed the intercom button again. “Stations!” she snapped. “Riggs, give me a damage report when you get down to the hull.”

“Aye,” came the staticky voice of Riggs a few seconds later.

“Jax, get us out of here.”

“Where?” His fingers skimmed along the controls as he tried to check for internal damage, but the blast had just knocked the dust off the rafters. “We can’t outrun that thing. We’re a rowboat compared to an Artem-1S—”

“Aren’t you the best pilot in the kingdom?”

His mouth went dry. “I . . . of course I am.”

But there was no way to outrun a solar schooner. Those ships were faster, with better maneuverability than any other ship in kingdom space. But they were also heavy.

And the Dossier, one of the oldest ships still using solar sails, was very lightweight. Well, he had an idea, at least.

INCOMING PROJECTILE, the starshield read again.

Ana anchored herself in the doorway. “Jax,” she warbled, “Jax, it’s about to—”

At the last possible moment, he slammed down on the controls. The ship dove toward the blue-green expanse of Eros. A few thousand yards behind, the missile exploded, knocking the Dossier lower into the atmosphere. Its wings glowed a brilliant orange, friction against the sky.

If he rode too close to the mesosphere, gravity would drag them in, burning their sails, and all they could ask for then was a soft landing in the Biteryi Sea.

But I know this ship.

He could use Eros’s gravitational pull to slingshot around the planet and launch them out into space. The Royal Guard couldn’t keep up once gravity took them, and they’d lose the Dossier’s signal in the magnetic field of the planet. He just had to stay in the thermosphere and not hit any satellites. Easy.

So easy he could do it blindfolded.

. . . Not that he would want to try at the moment.

The taste of excitement—like the moment before you plummet off a cliff—was sharp on his tongue.

A series of small holo-screens lining the console, reading off altitude and speed, deepened to a frantic red. He kept an eye on them as the lights flickered. Space and atmosphere swirled around them, so loud it roared.

Just keep her steady, he coaxed himself, as the ship began to shake violently.

The cockpit was silent as the ship crested against the dark side of the planet, taken by the pull of gravity. Behind them, viewed from a small video feed in the corner of the starshield, was the glint of the Artem-1S following in close proximity. He could almost see the pilot in the cockpit, the solar thrusters on its wingtips flaring as bright as stars.

Come on, he thought frantically, give up already.

The Dossier’s altitude dropped lower, and lower, and lower until—

The Artem-1S veered up, deflecting into space again so it wouldn’t be dragged into Eros. Good, just as he thought it would.

The Dossier went lower.

The power flickered and sent them into darkness. The starshield melted into oranges and golds, flames tingeing the corners of the ship’s shield like a sunrise. No readings, no data, no warnings.

Nothing.

He tightened his sweaty grip around the controls, reminded of how this was like the skysailer. How he almost hadn’t gotten that under control, either.

But he had.

He concentrated on the feeling of the ship moving through space—the stars spiraling around them, turning, turning. He was never lost in the stars—he always knew where he was. And it made him a damn good pilot.

Concentrate. He waited for the sun to rise across the horizon. Waited for that spark of light. Only his breath kept him company. Inhale, exhale.

The Captain gripped the back of his chair harder.

Inhale.

Exhale.

All this trouble because of some coordinates and a stupid Ironblood? Great Dark take him, he would’ve spaced the idiot by now.

Inhale—

Light broke across the horizon.

The ship moaned, roared, cried. The planets aligned in the distance—the Holy Conjunction—looking barely more than bright stars to the naked eye. And ahead in the distance glinted Nevaeh, a silver bud about to bloom.

Now.

With a thunderous pop, the Dossier’s sails snapped to full mast, catching the solar winds.

The ship groaned, cables straining against the sails, lighting the solar core belowdecks. Powering it. The starshield came back to life with a burst of blue light.

The Dossier shot out of the gravitational pull of Eros and into the stars. The crew cheered from their stations across the ship, but he didn’t celebrate yet.