“I’m neither a creature of air nor ocean, miss, but of earth.” He swung an arm to encompass the cemetery with its wide field of headstones, crypts and mournful angels. “My place is here.”
Despite his best efforts, something of his regret must have colored his words. Lenore’s pitying gaze turned his stomach. He steered the conversation back to her. “And you, miss? Would you like to see the world from an airship gondola?”
Her expression lightened, but his delight in the change was short-lived. “I would, and I may yet have the chance. I’ve requested a post on the Pollux, serving under Captain Widderschynnes.” She grinned, unaware of Nathaniel’s growing horror. “I’ll know in a few days if I have a place.”
Nathaniel stared at her, no longer seeing a woman clothed in black under an equally dark umbrella silvered with rain, but the gunnery deck of the Pollux slippery with ice and blood.
“Sir, what troubles you?”
He blinked, refocusing on Lenore’s pale features and the puzzlement clouding her expression. He shook his head. “I beg your pardon, miss. I’m more familiar with the ships than I am with their captains.” A lie as white as his hair. “But Widderschynnes is well-known.”
Lenore’s shoulders straightened even more with pride, as if the accolades were hers instead of Nettie’s. “She is a fine skyrunner captain—the best in the fleet, I daresay.”
He couldn’t agree more, and the second he laid eyes on Nettie Widderschynnes again, he’d wring her neck like a Christmas goose. What was she thinking to even consider allowing Lenore on a battleship?
Rain fell harder, and Lenore huddled tighter under her umbrella. “Forgive me. I’ve trapped you out here for a good soaking.”
Nathaniel shrugged. “As I mentioned earlier, miss, it’s merely rain. I’m in no danger.” He gestured toward the cemetery entrance. “You, however, could catch your death out here. Allow me to escort you to the gates and hail transport.”
Her soft laughter almost blunted the terror riding him at the thought of her on the Pollux. Almost. “You’re very kind, but as we’ve both witnessed, you...intimidate most people. I think a driver would whip the poor horse to a faster pace if he saw you and abandon me to my fate.” She held up a gloved hand to thwart any argument. “You may accompany me to the gate and wait there if you wish until I’ve caught a hackney or omnibus. Agreed?”
He nodded, and they started toward Highgate’s grand entrance. Twice he gripped her elbow to keep her from slipping on the wet lanes. Her arm rested delicate and warm in his too-brief grip. What would she do were he to take her in his arms, not as Nathaniel Gordon, but as the deathless Guardian, armored and strange?
God, he missed her.
She bid him goodbye at the gate. “Until next time, sir, should I see you again when I visit my father.”
“Safe journey, miss.” Come back to me, Lenore. I’ll be waiting. The words flowed through his mind and remained tightly behind his teeth. He doffed an imaginary topper at her and bowed.
His ordinary action somehow startled her. Badly. She gasped, her eyes wide beneath her bonnet. The umbrella shook above her, and the cloth of her glove stretched tight across her knuckles where she clutched the handle in a death grip.
“Miss Kenward?” he inquired and almost reached for her. He dropped his hand at the last moment, fingers twitching with the desire to touch her.
Lenore blinked and shook her head before offering him a rueful half smile. “Forgive me. I remembered...” She shook her head a second time as if to clear her thoughts. Nathaniel wondered at the sudden glossiness in her eyes: tears.
They exchanged farewells a second time before parting; he to linger in the gate’s shadow and keep watch, she to stand at the edge of the road.
She’d been right that he intimidated others, but any driver attempting to bypass Lenore as she stood in the rain waiting for a ride would have found himself suddenly off his high seat and on his backside in a puddle while Nathaniel himself took her home. Fortunately, for all involved, an empty omnibus halted a few minutes later, for which he was grateful, and carried her away from him.
He waited until he no longer heard the clop of hooves on cobblestone before setting off eastward to the Bishopsgate station. His reputation as a vigilant, lethal Guardian served him well. Resurrectionists hesitated to rob Highgate of its newly buried citizens during daylight, and Nathaniel didn’t think they’d try again anytime soon—at least not now when he abandoned his post to seek the person who once commanded his most devout loyalty.
The streets were almost empty of people. Most who hadn’t found shelter indoors huddled in doorways, and none accosted him. He avoided the main roads, keeping to side lanes and squalid alleyways ankle-deep in water. If any saw him pass, they said nothing, wishing no acquaintance with an apparition possessing eyes that resembled gateways to Hell.
Nathaniel made quick time to the train station, unencumbered by crowds. The station itself offered numerous places for him to blend or disappear, concealed by shadows and a Guardian’s unique talent for being overlooked by even the most observant gazes.
He avoided the passenger trains. Stowing away was easiest on the freight lines run by freight guards instead of the more eagle-eyed conductor guards. He hid in an empty car on a freight bound for Maldon and its vast mooring field of airships, tapping his foot impatiently and cursing his former captain under his breath the entire journey. The trip took a little more than an hour, and he was off the train and out of the station before anyone noted his presence.
Maldon’s airfield stretched over a flat of land next to a farmer’s fields, but this one’s crop flew instead of fed. At least a dozen airships of every size and design rocked gently at their tall mooring masts. Nathaniel paused for a moment to admire them. The sweet ache of recollection filled him. These majestic lasses had occupied his dreams since he was a boy and caused the rift between him and his family. He never regretted his course of action—to serve in the fleet instead of on the family estate—even when he fell from the Pollux’s deck and into the Atlantic’s frigid depths.
The ache grew when he spotted his previous mistress docked at her mast tower. He knew every inch of her as intimately as he did Lenore’s own supple frame and loved both with equal ferocity. The ship’s thin metal envelope sparkled in the wet gloom, beckoning him to stroke her once more with an affectionate hand.