Revenge and the Wild(11)

“What are you doing here, Costin? This is a gathering for the mayor,” Nigel said.

Westie had never heard Nigel speak ill of a creature until Costin came along two years ago. He’d called him a home wrecker and tempter. It was because of the brothel. A brothel, human or vampire, brought the riffraff to town.

“I know what this is.” Though Westie couldn’t see Costin’s eyes, she felt them on her. “I too am here to see the mayor, as the ambassador for the vampires.”

“If that’s the case, where are the ambassadors for the other creatures?” Nigel asked. Costin ignored him. “There’s no such thing.”

While Nigel and Costin talked, Westie slipped away with Isabelle and Alistair in tow.

“That was exciting,” Isabelle said, stealing glances at Costin through the crowd Westie had put between them. When they were on the other side of the docks, Isabelle snuck back to the subject of Westie’s party. “Before Costin arrived, you’d said you would think about the party.”

Westie knew she’d said nothing of the kind but didn’t feel like arguing with Isabelle, so she said, “I’ll think about it,” even though she had no intention of allowing a ball in her honor to happen.

Isabelle clapped her hands. “Wonderful. I bet Costin will be invited. I’m going to go find my parents and tell them all about it. I’ll need a new dress!”

“I can’t wait to see it,” Alistair said, taking Isabelle’s hand as if he might kiss it the way Costin had kissed Westie’s, teasing her like he used to tease Westie when they were still close. Westie felt a pinch in her chest at the sight of it.

Isabelle paled and shook him off her. She stumbled on her words. “I . . . I . . . need to go. I’ll see you soon, Westie,” she said before fleeing.

“Finally,” Alistair grumbled.

Westie just stared at him.

“What?” Alistair asked.

“Aren’t you a chatty thing lately.”

He gave her a curious look that shrank his eyes. “What do you mean?”

“I haven’t heard you say but a handful of words to anyone except for Nigel in the last three years, and now you’re suddenly cutting jokes with Isabelle?”

“I talk to all sorts of people.” His eyes brightened. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say you were jealous.”

Westie felt heat creeping up her neck and looked away from him. “Good thing you know better,” she said.

The thunder of engines in the sky cut their conversation short. The airship blotted out the sun, casting a wide shadow over the land. Westie’s mouth hung open. She’d never seen anything like it. Normally balloons and aeroskiffs were the only things moored at the small docks in Rogue City. She’d seen the blueprints for the airships Nigel had invented, but she’d never imagined them being as grand as this one was. It looked like a flying pirate ship, elaborately decorated in gold-and-red trimming. Six engines breathed black smoke into the air. There were three on each side, controlling spiral propellers, much like the ones on the ornithopter in the da Vinci drawings, only on a much larger scale. Beneath the ship were bags that let out small amounts of air for a lazy descent.

Dockworkers rushed to grab the lines and pull the ship to the ground. When two of those workers were lifted up into the air by a gust, Alistair sprinted to help.

James joined Westie after Alistair was gone. He was the only thing more decorated than the airship. He looked like a poodle among a pack of mutts next to the Rogue City populace.

They faced the airship. James tucked his hands into his pockets and lost the straight posture he used around Nigel.

“I apologize for always staring at you,” he said. Westie looked sideways at him. “It’s just I don’t think most girls could pull off having a machine for an arm. It’s not very feminine”—Westie gave him a withering glare, but he seemed not to notice—“and yet it suits you so perfectly. I almost feel like you’re more beautiful with it. Either way . . . you’re extraordinary.” She turned away so he wouldn’t see her blush. “But that’s no excuse. It’s rude of me to stare. I am an *.”

Westie shut her mouth to keep from smiling. For an aristocrat, James sure had a foul mouth. She liked that about him.

“I won’t argue with you on that one,” she said. Nigel had told her to play nice, and she fully meant to, but James said it first, and wasn’t it polite to agree with a guest? Westie sighed. “I’m sorry for snapping at you during supper last night.” She spit out the apology and screwed up her face as if it were earwax on her tongue.

James’s lips split into a grin. “That’s very touching. Thank you.”

She shrugged.

“Why don’t you let me buy you a drink at the tavern tonight? We can start over.”

She took slow breaths as a familiar craving wakened in the pit of her stomach. It had been two years since Westie had had a drink, but every day was a struggle to keep sober. She’d started drinking when she was fourteen, to numb the pain of the nightmares of her past and Alistair’s rejection. It started with just a shot of whiskey in the morning, and then one more before bed to get to sleep. At some point, without her even realizing, her drinking had turned into a habit.

Alcohol had made everything seem more fun, and it disrupted her thoughts of Alistair, so she drank a lot. One night, after she and Isabelle had gone to a barn dance and Westie had woken the next morning nearly drowned after passing out in a pig’s wallowing hole, Nigel made a deal with her. If she continued her school lessons and promised never to take another drink, he would provide her with the weapons and training she needed to hunt the killers of her family, something she’d been begging him to do for some time. She’d made that deal with him and fully intended to keep it.