Copyright

This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, or persons, living or dead, is coincidental.

Copyright © 2013 by Tofa Borregaard

Book design by Alison Impey

Jacket design by Alison Impey

Jacket photography © 2012 Carrie Schechter

Author photo by Vanessa Applegate

All rights reserved. In accordance with the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, the scanning, uploading, and electronic sharing of any part of this book without the permission of the publisher is unlawful piracy and theft of the author’s intellectual property. If you would like to use material from the book (other than for review purposes), prior written permission must be obtained by contacting the publisher at permissions@hbgusa.com. Thank you for your support of the author’s rights.

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First ebook edition: November 2013

ISBN 978-0-316-27839-3

For Trev

Contents

Cover

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

The 1st Test: Dangerous Puddings

The 2nd Test: Results Disorientated

The 3rd Test: Diamonds from Sooties

The 4th Test: Flirting with Conspiracies

The 5th Test: Flirting with Deceit

About the Author

DANGEROUS PUDDINGS

Miss Temminnick. Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott. With me, please, ladies.”

Sophronia glanced up from her household sums. She was glad of the distraction. She was convinced she was miscalculating the purchase of the three most deadly flower arrangements. Does one need four fully grown foxgloves for decorating a dinner table for six guests? Or is it six foxgloves to kill four fully grown guests?

Unfortunately, what Sophronia saw when she looked up did not fill her with confidence. Lady Linette stood at the front of the class wearing an austere expression that clashed with her copious yellow curls and a bonnet covered with drooping silk lilacs. She was wearing a good deal of face paint and a purple-and-jade plaid dress of immense proportions. It was neither her expression nor her location at the front of the class that made Sophronia nervous. It was the fact that she was present in this class, for this was Sister Mathilde Herschel-Teape’s lesson on domestic accounting. Sophronia and her age-group were to go to Lady Linette after tea, for drawing room music and subversive petits fours.

“This decade, Miss Temminnick!”

Dimity was already standing next to Lady Linette. Sophronia’s friend gestured her forward with a hand hidden to one side of her skirt. Ordinarily, it was Dimity daydreaming and Sophronia having to chivy her along.

Sophronia leapt to her feet. “Apologies, Lady Linette. I was so very absorbed. Foxglove quantities can be most illuminating.”

“Very good, Miss Temminnick. An excuse couched in terms of academic interest. Nevertheless, we must be away.”

For most of Sophronia’s six-month sojourn at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s Finishing Academy for Young Ladies of Quality, lessons had never been interrupted. Not even when flywaymen attacked. Young ladies of quality stayed in class in times of strife. Certainly no student had been removed from one teacher’s purview by another teacher. That was quite rude!

Then over the last month, starting with the dratted Monique, every one of Sophronia’s fellows had systematically been taken away by Lady Linette in just such a manner. They returned traumatized and silent. All Sophronia’s skills, many of them learned at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s, had been put to figuring this out. To no avail. Even her particular friends, Sidheag and Agatha, wouldn’t explain what had happened when Lady Linette absconded with them.

Sister Mattie was unperturbed by the interruption, sitting placidly in her mock-religious attire behind a wide desk surrounded by potted plants and bottles of deadly poison (or tea concentrate, one never knew which). Sister Mattie was a bit of a mystery; her preference for a simulated nun’s habit—wide-skirted and to the current fashion, with a wimple partly configured like a bonnet—remained unexplained. The girls saw her as a nice sort of mystery and one of the more benign teachers, so they mostly respected her eccentric choice of dress.

Sophronia’s fellow students were looking on with wide eyes. Sidheag and Agatha tensed sympathetically. Monique and Preshea sat with arms crossed and ill-contained delight on their faces.

Sophronia wended her way through the plush chairs and rolltop writing desks to the front, where she curtsied before Lady Linette. It was a perfectly executed curtsy, not too deep, with a slight tilt to her head but not enough to seem obsequious.

Sister Mattie said kindly, “I shouldn’t worry, Miss Temminnick. I’m certain you’ll do very well.”

“Follow me, please, ladies,” snapped Lady Linette.

“Good luck!” Agatha said quietly. Agatha rarely spoke, so it had to be something serious.

Sophronia sidled up next to Dimity. The hallway was hardly big enough to accommodate two ladies in full day gowns side by side. Their multiple skirts smushed together. Neither minded the wrinkles as they linked arms for comfort. Mademoiselle Geraldine’s Finishing Academy was housed in a massive airship that looked like three dirigibles crammed together. Its corridors twisted and turned in a noodlelike manner. Sometimes the passageways led up stairs or out onto balconies. Most of the time, they simply got darker, lit by gas lamps that looked like upside-down parasols. Whatever attire the corridors had been designed to accommodate, proper lady’s dress was not one of them.

Lady Linette led them toward the upper squeak decks. These open-air decks sat under the massive balloons that kept the academy afloat and adrift over Dartmoor. It was an odd place to be headed at this time of day. Dimity’s hand on Sophronia’s arm tightened.

The two girls swung to flatten themselves against the wall, like a hinged gate, so a maid mechanical could roll past. Its face was a mosaic of gears instead of the metal masks worn by most menials. It had a white pinafore over its conical body and gave the impression of busy superciliousness.

If the students had been alone, the maid would have whistled the alarm upon encountering them, but Dimity and Sophronia were in the company of Lady Linette. All the models, from buttlinger to footmech to clangermaid, had protocols that instructed them to ignore students in the company of teachers. Most of the hallways were laid down with a single track upon which the school’s many servants trundled, performing the myriad of menial tasks needed to keep a ladies’ seminary running smoothly. Sophronia had once seen a footmech model carrying a whole stack of doilies, some of them quite deadly, from Sister Mattie to Professor Lefoux. In her parents’ country estate, such an important task would never have been entrusted to a mechanical, but here steam-powered staff far outnumbered human.

Sophronia had thought, after six months, that she had most of the school mapped. But as they walked from the midship student section, which housed classrooms and sleeping quarters, to the rear recreation area, they entered a place she’d never seen before. While the massive dining hall and exercise facilities above the warehouse and propeller engine areas were familiar to her, Sophronia and Dimity were being taken farther up.

“I didn’t know there were rooms above the dining hall,” said Sophronia to Lady Linette.

Lady Linette was not going to give in to Sophronia’s hunt for information. She ignored the comment and quickened her pace.

Sophronia and Dimity bounced in order to keep up—they had not yet had lessons on rapid walking in full skirts, though both of them were admirable gliders at a more leisurely pace.

This section of the ship smelled of old candle wax, chalk powder, and pickled onions. The mechanical track was not oiled properly and there was dust in the corner grippers. The walls were hung with paintings of disapproving elderly females and framed feats of crochet.

Finally, Lady Linette stopped in front of a door. The sign read ASSESSMENT CHAMBER ONE: ENTER AT RISK. It reminded Sophronia a little of the record room. She didn’t say anything about that, though. The record room infiltrators of several months ago had never been caught. Sophronia wanted to keep it that way.

Underneath the sign someone had scrawled in white paint NO MUFFINS FOR YOU! Underneath that, it said NOR GALOSHES, NEITHER, in what Sophronia knew was not proper grammar.

“Miss Temminnick.” Lady Linette gestured. “If you would?”

Sophronia stepped into the room alone. Lady Linette closed the door behind her.

Sophronia’s attention was entirely taken by the huge mechanical thingamabob in front of her. It looked very like the difference engine she had seen last summer when her family visited the Crystal Palace. This one, however, was not being used for sums. It was rigged and draped with objects—fabric hung at the back, paintings dangled, and a few pots and pans drooped uncertainly to one side.

Sophronia frowned. Didn’t Vieve once describe something like this to me? What did she call it? Oh, yes, an oddgob machine.

Next to the oddgob, positioned to operate a crank, was a mechanical designed to accompany the apparatus.

Sophronia faced both, hands crossed lightly at her waist, a position that Lady Linette encouraged her girls to assume whenever at a loss for action. “The crossed hands denote modesty and religious devotion. The placement draws attention to the narrowness of one’s waist. Bow your head slightly and you can still observe through the lashes, which is becoming. This exposes the back of the neck, an indication of vulnerability.” Sophronia’s shoulders tended to hunch, a habit Mademoiselle Geraldine was trying desperately to break. “We can’t have you tensing up like an orangutan!” she chided. “Do orangutans tense?” Dimity had whispered. Dimity, of course, crossed her hands divinely.

Sophronia worked to relax her shoulders.

Neither the machine nor the mechanical seemed to care, for nothing happened even when her posture was perfect.

Sophronia said, “Good afternoon. I believe you are waiting for me?”

With a puff of steam, the mechanical whirred to life. “Six-month. Review. Debut upmark,” it said, clicking as a metal tape fed through its voice box.

Not knowing what else to do, Sophronia said, “Yes?”

“Begin,” ordered the mechanical, and with that, it reached out one clawlike appendage and began to crank the oddgob.

An oil painting flipped over from the top of the engine and dropped down, dangling from conveyer chains. It depicted a girl in a blue dinner dress, decades out of style, that embarrassing nightgown look. The subject was pretty, with cornflowers in her hair, enjoying an evening gathering.

The mechanical continued cranking, and the painting was jerked away. A hatch opened, and a full tea service on a silver tray rolled forth.

“Serve,” ordered the mechanical.

Sophronia stepped forward, feeling silly. The service was for four. The tea in the pot was cold. She hesitated. Ordinarily, she would have dumped the contents into the receptacle and sent it back with sharp words to the cook. Do I act as I would in real life? Or am I to pretend to serve the tea regardless?

The mechanical was still whirring, indicating that she had only a set amount of time to decide.

Sophronia served. She did as etiquette demanded, pouring her own cup first and then the others. With no one to ask if they wanted sugar or if they would prefer lemon, she only checked to ascertain both were provided. The sugar pot was half full. There were four slices of dry lemon. Like the tea, they had been sitting for some time. She opened the top of the pot and checked the leaf. Top quality. As was the tea set—Wedgwood blue, or a very good imitation. She sniffed the pot, the milk, and the cups. They all smelled as they should, although one of the cups might have boasted a slight lavender odor. There was a plate of three petits fours dusted with sugar. Sophronia poked each gently on the side with a glove-covered fingertip. She was unsurprised to find that one of them was fake, no doubt from Mademoiselle Geraldine’s personal collection. The headmistress had a mad passion for fake pastries. The other two appeared to be real. They both smelled of bitter almond. Sophronia raised up her Depraved Lens of Crispy Magnification, a present on her fifteenth birthday from Dimity’s brother, Pillover. It was essentially a high-powered monocle on a stick, but useful enough to keep at all times hanging from a chatelaine at her waist. The sugar on the top of one of the cakes looked odd.

The tray was whisked away.

Next, a string of dangling hair ribbons paraded before her, pinned like wet hose to a stretch of twine. Sophronia’s dress today was a pale-yellow-and-blue ruffled monstrosity her mother insisted would do, even though it had been worn three seasons already, by three older sisters. Sophronia’s absence from the Temminnick household was combined with an absence from Temminnick expenses. She hadn’t had a new gown in ages. One of the ribbons was cream and blue in a similar shade to her outfit, so Sophronia unclipped it. Because her hair was covered—as it should be—by a respectable bonnet, she tied the ribbon about her neck in the complex knot of a Bunson’s boy. Bunson and Lacroix’s Boys’ Polytechnique was an evil genius training academy, sort of a sibling school to Mademoiselle Geraldine’s. If one thought of those siblings as hostile and estranged.

The ribbons were taken away, and the oddgob machine presented Sophronia with a new selection: a letter opener, a pair of ornate lady’s sewing scissors, a large fan, a crumpet, two handkerchiefs, and some white kid gloves. Sophronia felt she was on firmer ground at last. These were tools of great and fateful weight when applied properly. She chose the scissors and one of the handkerchiefs. The other options were removed.

Next came a slate upon which had been written the phrase SEND HELP IMMEDIATELY. In front of it, on a wooden board, lay a piece of parchment with ink and quill, an embroidery hoop with needle and thread, and a bag of raspberry fizzy sweets. Sophronia chose the sweets, cracked one open with the aid of her scissors, and dumped out the fizz. She used the needle from the embroidery to prick her finger, smeared the blood on the inside of the broken sweet, and popped it back inside the little sack. Then she cut off a bit of the ribbon tied about her neck and used that to secure the bag.

The remaining items disappeared into the oddgob, and the mechanical stopped cranking.

Sophronia stepped back and let out a sigh.

Her stomach rumbled, informing her that a good deal of time had passed. She had been given longer to contemplate each test than she realized. A bang sounded at the door. When she opened it, a maid mechanical sat there, bearing a tray of food. Sophronia took it gratefully, and the maid trundled off without ceremony. Sophronia closed the door with her foot and, in the absence of chairs, balanced the tray precariously on one section of the oddgob.

She assessed the food. Nothing smelled of almonds. Nevertheless, she avoided the leg of mutton in glistening currant jelly sauce and the Bakewell pudding and ate only the plain boiled potatoes and broccoli. Better to assume everything was still a test until Lady Linette returned to tell her otherwise. Sad, because she loved Bakewell. When nothing else happened, Sophronia put the tray down and examined the oddgob while it was not waggling things autocratically in front of her.

It was a fascinating apparatus. She wondered if Vieve knew of its existence at the school. Genevieve Lefoux was a dear friend, a mercurial ten-year-old with a propensity for dressing like a boy and a habit of inventing gadgetry. If Vieve didn’t know of the oddgob, she would want to, and she was certain to ask all sorts of questions. Sophronia took mental notes in anticipation of conversations to come. When tired of that, she used the scissors to extract a small part from the machine. It was a crystalline valve, faceted, and awfully familiar in shape and style. It looked like a smaller version of the prototype Monique had tried to steal last year. This valve appeared to have been only propped in, so Sophronia was certain that removing it would make no difference to the function of the oddgob. When they’d first discovered the prototype valve last year, Vieve had prattled on about point-to-point transmissions. A revelatory breakthrough indeed, since the telegraph machine had recently proved a dismal failure. If this was a new version of that same prototype, Vieve would want to see it.

The door behind Sophronia creaked open, and she hastily stashed the mini-prototype up her sleeve, where the pagoda style allowed for secret pockets.

“Miss Temminnick, have you finished?” Lady Linette asked.

“Isn’t everyone finished at the same time? The oddgob cycle seems to be prescribed,” replied Sophronia.

“Now, now, manners.”

Sophronia curtsied apologetically, although she did feel as if she had been abandoned for longer than necessary.

“I had to assess Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott first. Technically, she was admitted ahead of you. If you’ll recall, you went for tea with Mademoiselle Geraldine before you were formally allowed into the school.”

Sophronia recalled it quite vividly, as a matter of fact. All those fake cakes.

“Now for your report.” Lady Linette removed something round and mechanical from her reticule and shook it violently. Was she mad?

Nothing happened.

“They said it was working. Oh, bother.” Frustrated, Lady Linette marched over to the oddgob and jerked a few cranks and switches on the underside of the mechanical’s carapace. In response, the mechanical turned a smaller, hidden crank at the back, well out of human reach. On the far end of the oddgob, a massive roller ratcheted down, dipped into a pan of ink, and rolled across a series of letters. These then beat down in a sequential blur onto a taut piece of parchment. A large pink blotter rocked back and forth across the finished text.

Sophronia was impressed. She hadn’t noticed that the oddgob contained a printing press.

Something rattled in the machine and then whined.

“Stop that,” said Lady Linette to the oddgob, shaking the mysterious object in her hand at it again.

Oh, dear, perhaps the mini-prototype was vital, thought Sophronia.

The oddgob whined louder and began to shake.

“Stop cranking,” Lady Linette instructed the mechanical, shaking the object harder. “Miss Temminnick, I think we had better make haste.” The teacher gestured for Sophronia to precede her from the room.

Too late, however, for the oddgob exploded with a terrific bang. Hair ribbons fluttered up into the air, the tea service shattered, the fake tea cake bounced like a rubber ball, and ink squirted out from the printing press.

Sophronia and Lady Linette flattened themselves on the floor, heedless of crushed dresses and flipped petticoats.

“My goodness,” said Lady Linette into the resulting silence. “What did you do?” She stood and walked to the oddgob, now tilted to one side as if it had a limp.

“Me? Nothing at all!” insisted Sophronia, sitting up.

Lady Linette tutted as she brushed ink spatter off her well-powdered cheek with a handkerchief. “Where’s the new valve gone?”

“What valve?” Sophronia blinked wide, confused eyes at her.

Lady Linette gave her a long look. “Probably rolled free during the explosion. I told Professor Lefoux it wasn’t tight enough in the cradle. And I said it wouldn’t work properly regardless.” Sophronia didn’t say anything. “I wish we could have tested it on a less valuable machine. Never mind, we’ve got your results.” Lady Linette waved the oddgob’s printed paper.

Sophronia stood and innocently offered her teacher the additional handkerchief she’d acquired during the test. Lady Linette took it absently, then paused, pondering. She did not apply it to the remains of the ink on her face, instead handing it back with a little smile.

“Oh, very good, Miss Temminnick. Very good indeed!” She examined the printed sheet. Closely.

“Let us begin your review. The painting, time period?”

“Eighteen fourteen, by attire,” said Sophronia. “Give or take a year. Evening party.”

“Dress color?”

“Blue on the central subject, green and cream on those in the background.”

“Bonnet style and decoration?”

Trick question! “None of the ladies were wearing hats. The subject had cornflowers in her hair. As I said, it was an evening party.”

Lady Linette arched an eyebrow over her spectacles. “And have you any additional thoughts?”

Sophronia straightened. “A great many.”

“About the painting, Miss Temminnick. Don’t be coy.”

Sophronia forbore mentioning that Lady Linette had said only yesterday that there was always time for coyness in young ladies of quality. “The painting was well executed, but the artist was probably poor.”

Lady Linette looked nonplussed. “Why do you say that?”

“No expensive pigments, like red and gold, were used. Either that, or the painter feared toxicity. He did not sign it. There were approximately twelve people in the image.” Sophronia paused delicately for effect. “And one cat. The wallpaper was striped, and the garden through the window had a Roman feel.”

Lady Linette nodded, dislodging her spectacles. She reseated them on her nose with a sniff of annoyance. Lady Linette always dressed younger than she was. Spectacles, under such circumstances, might be considered a fate worse than knitwear.

“Moving on to the tea service, Miss Temminnick. The tea was cold. Why did you still serve it?”

Sophronia nibbled her lip. It was another habit her teachers were trying to eliminate. “If you must draw attention to the lips, a small lick is superior. It is too academic to nibble” was Lady Linette’s customary admonishment. “It’s all very well to be an intellectual, but one shouldn’t let others see. That’s embarrassing” was Mademoiselle Geraldine’s opinion.

Sophronia stopped nibbling. “I did consider dumping it entirely, but I thought the oddgob indicated I was to be evaluated on the act of serving. Had there been other people present, I would have sent it back.”

“Milk first, the lower-class way?”

“But necessary if the cups were lined with an acid-based poison. The milk would curdle or discolor. Also, one of the cups smelled of lavender.”

Lady Linette said, unguardedly, “It did?”

“Yes. I don’t know of any poisons with that smell, but it might be used to cover over another scent or, of course, it might have been your cup, Lady Linette.”

“My cup?”

“You always smell of lavender.”

“The tea cakes?”

“One was fake. Of the other two, both smelled of bitter almond—one because it was an almond cake, I believe. The other was powdered in cyanide.” Sophronia had been saddened by the cyanide lesson with Sister Mattie. For the rest of her life—unless she learned to bake—almond cake was right out. There was no surefire way to guarantee lack of cyanide in any almond-smelling confection.

“Moving on to the ribbons.”

Sophronia explained, “I selected the one that matched my outfit and tied it in a Bunson’s knot.”

“There’s a piece missing.”

Sophronia grinned. “I must beg your patience in that matter, my lady.”

Her teacher was taken aback but continued. “Why the Bunson’s knot?”

Sophronia parroted a recent article she’d translated from the Parisian fashion papers. Vieve, of all people, had given it to her. Vieve might dress like a newspaper boy, but she took an interest in current styles, particularly hats. This article had delighted the young girl. “It has a pleasing military feel. I read recently that the juxtaposition and power of masculine elements can inspire confidence in the wearer, and the accompanying aura of authority is never a bad thing,” Sophronia paraphrased.

Lady Linette looked impressed. This was not part of any lesson. “And do you feel more confident and authoritative, Miss Temminnick?”

Sophronia touched the ribbon. “Actually, I do.”

Lady Linette nodded. “It would be a good style for you to pursue. I suggest you encourage your mother to have at least one new dress made up with military detailing.” She gave Sophronia a pitying look.

Sophronia blushed. She and Dimity did their best to make over her dresses. But her older ones had such a narrow silhouette, and with skirts getting progressively wider, there wasn’t much they could do. It was impossible to add volume to a dress. And this was a finishing school—everyone noticed such things. Still, if Lady Linette thought more masculine fashions might suit her, perhaps gold tassels and epaulets were in order. Dimity would be over the moon.

Lady Linette interrupted her reverie. “You chose the sewing scissors and one of the handkerchiefs from the next test. Why?”

“We have not completed knife training with Captain Niall, so I wasn’t confident in the letter opener, but I know I can work scissors to my advantage, and it is always good to have an extra handkerchief.”

“Why not the fan or the gloves?”

“White kid is impractical for a lady of covert activities. We have not had any fan training yet.”

“The crumpet?”

“Oh, no, I’m not worthy.”

“Lastly, we had you send a coded message. Give it to me.”

Sophronia presented her with the bag of sweets tied with the bit of ribbon.

Lady Linette nodded her approval. “Ribbon used to indicate character of the sender. Nice touch, Miss Temminnick. You made use of the scissors from the previous selection.” She opened the bag and poured out the contents, including the one carefully broken sweet with the blood inside.

Lady Linette sniffed it and examined the stain. “Show me your hand.”

Sophronia removed one glove to display the finger she had pricked.

“You would have had to set up the code ahead of time. Nevertheless, an innovative method of getting a message across, and virtually untraceable, particularly as your recipient can eat the sweet.” Lady Linette looked down once more at the printed paper, then produced a stick of graphite and made some notes at the bottom.

Sophronia could feel her shoulders tensing and fought to keep them down. Were my choices correct? Do they want the expected route, or is it better if I did something out of the ordinary? Will they send me down? Sophronia was in ever-greater fear that her sojourn at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s might come to a premature end. Only half a year ago she had resisted finishing school with every fiber of her being, until she realized Mademoiselle Geraldine’s offered no ordinary education. Now she dreaded the possibility of returning home to her former life.

Lady Linette said, “Everyone’s results are given together. You will receive your final marks in front of your peers.”

Sophronia’s heart sank. This explained the pale faces of the other girls—anticipated trauma. Agatha, in particular, hated public exposure.

“However, my initial assessment is that your capacities are suited to our institution. You are overly independent. I suggest focused study in social congregation and deportment. Groups, Miss Temminnick, are your weakness. Generally speaking, most lone intelligencers are men, not women. We ladies must learn to manipulate society.”

Sophronia could feel herself flushing. It was a fair assessment, but she did not like criticism. She knew she was good. Better than many of the other girls of her age-group. True, Sidheag could beat her in physical combat, Dimity and Preshea were more ladylike, and Monique was better at social graces, but Sophronia was the best at espionage. Nevertheless, she held her tongue and stared at her hands, forcing herself not to clasp them tightly. Lady Linette had only said that most lone intelligencers were male. Perhaps once in a while there was room for a female.

“Thank you, Miss Temminnick. You are dismissed.”

Sophronia bobbed a curtsy. It was just shy of being too high and too brief and thus rude. But before Lady Linette could comment, Sophronia swept from the room in a manner so grand that no teacher at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s would critique the action.

RESULTS DISORIENTATED

Sophronia found Dimity waiting in the hallway. Her friend’s face was white and her lower lip trembled.

“Oh, Sophronia,” she cried. “Wasn’t that perfectly ghastly?”

She’s getting more and more dramatic, thought Sophronia. Overexposure to Mademoiselle Geraldine. “It certainly was odd.” Sophronia’s gift for understatement was almost as good as Dimity’s gift for overstatement.

“I poured the cold tea,” admitted Dimity. “Did you?”

Sophronia nodded.

“Oh, good, I thought you might. You’re usually right about these things.”

“Not always.”

Dimity was crestfallen. “Oh, dear. Your assessment wasn’t wholly positive?”

“Not by half!”

Dimity brightened. “Really? Neither was mine. That’s good, then. Perhaps I won’t fail.”

“I thought you wanted to be sent down. I thought you wanted to be put into a real finishing school, to become an ordinary lady with a respectable parliamentary husband and no concerns beyond planning the next dinner party.”

“I did. I mean, I do. But Mummy would be so very disappointed, and I would have to leave you. And Sidheag. And Bumbersnoot.”

Sophronia could only agree with Dimity’s logic. “True.”

“Speaking of which, I must talk with you about this letter I received.” Dimity flashed a suspiciously embossed missive.

Sophronia grabbed for it.

Dimity was faster. “No, you can’t see it until we are with the others.”

Sophronia stuck her tongue out but waited obligingly until after luncheon. Due to the presence of Monique and Preshea in the drawing room, Agatha and Sidheag joined Sophronia and Dimity in their private room for a gossip.

Both embarrassed and excited, Dimity produced the letter. “It’s from Lord Dingleproops!”

“Dimity,” objected Agatha, “should you be getting private correspondences from an unattached gentleman friend?”

“No, but this is the first. I didn’t write to him! And it can’t be that bad; our families are acquainted.”

Agatha was properly concerned. “Has he permission to court you?” Agatha Woosmoss was small, round, and redheaded, with a freckled face that wore a perpetual expression of distressed confusion, not unlike that of a damp cat.

Dimity flushed even redder. “No, but I’m certain he would.”

Sidheag was reading the hastily scrawled note. “It’s worse than simply a letter. He wants to meet with you, in private and secretly!”

“Dimity!” Sophronia said. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Dimity was truculent. “Because I knew you’d be all Sophronia-ish about it. That’s why. It’s not that bad, is it? He probably only wants to chat a bit about the weather or something.”

Sidheag, still in possession of the shocking missive, said, “Since it says here that he intends to come to you on this airship, it can’t be that banal.” Sidheag Maccon was an overly tall young woman, almost of an age with Sophronia. She had a long, proud face and a general attitude of indifference to both manners and dress that drove their teachers to distraction.

Sophronia was having none of it. “Dimity, he’d have to steal an airdinghy and then try to find us. I’ve no idea where we are over Dartmoor, do you? I’m sure he doesn’t. Besides, I don’t think Bunson’s has airdinghies. The whole idea is foolhardy.”

Dimity liked Lord Dingleproops rather more than she ought and was disposed to think well of him. “It must be important, then, mustn’t it? Perhaps it’s a declaration!”

“Oh, Dimity, really!” said Agatha.

Sophronia added, “You’re only just fourteen, and he’s what, sixteen?”

Dimity protested, “My birthday was weeks ago!”

Sidheag, the blunt one, said, “He isn’t even holding yet. He can’t declare without his parents’ permission.” Sidheag could be quite crass, the result of having been raised by men, or Scots, or soldiers, or werewolves, or all four. Since she was also Lady Kingair, her crassness would have been an accepted eccentricity—in a much older aristocrat. In a fourteen-year-old, such vulgarity was as odd and uncomfortable as last season’s hat.

Sophronia took the missive out of Sidheag’s hand and examined it. It was under the Earl of Dingleproops’s heading, which gave it a certain weight. But she did wonder what the son was doing with his father’s stationery. Probably using it to write angry letters to poor tradesmen in his father’s name and torture decent young ladies like Dimity.

“He wants to meet with you on the back squeak deck in a week and a half?”

Dimity nodded. “Isn’t that romantic?”

Agatha protested. “You’re not going?”

“Of course I’m going! He will have come all this way.”

“It’ll all end in tears,” foretold Sidheag morosely.

Sophronia said nothing further; Dimity could be awfully stubborn. Privately, Sophronia vowed to follow Dimity. Lord Dingleproops was up to something.

They were made to wait until the end of the week for their test assessments. At long last, after supper, instead of the customary parlor games and card counting, their age-group was separated from the others. Agatha looked like she might faint, or cry, or palpitate, or all three—which would be a real feat. Preshea—small, dark, and unreasonably lovely—looked like she intended to kill someone. But then, Preshea always looked that way. Dimity’s round porcelain face was set. Monique, having been through this before, swept her skirts behind her with an air of determination. Sidheag loped along as though she hadn’t a care in the aether. Sidheag could be irritating like that.

Sophronia wondered how she herself was showing tension. Not at all, to those who did not look at her shoulders. She would have been surprised by how impressed Lady Linette was with this accomplishment. Lady Linette had also been impressed when Sophronia ate only the vegetables from the meal provided after the exam. Sophronia was the only student to have considered that the test might include the meal. Even Monique, who should have known better, had eaten seven bites of her meat and all her pudding.

Lady Linette led them to her own teaching quarters. These were decorated as if a boudoir had procreated with the set of She Stoops to Conquer. There were red curtains, a good deal of gold, and chaise longues instead of chairs. Several fluffy cats with funny scrunched-up faces and possessive attitudes to hassocks lounged about.

Lady Linette left the six girls there.

They sat in expectant silence. Agatha stared at her feet. Sidheag slouched. Both knew better but were regressing into bad habits out of anxiety.

Professor Lefoux entered the room.

An almost audible groan met the appearance of this, the harshest of their teachers.

Professor Lefoux was not so much a battle-ax as a pair of pinking cutters—sharp, toothy, and uneven in temper but very useful. They hadn’t any lessons with her yet. Rumor had it she was deemed too fierce for the younger girls. Tall and bony, with a stiff face and hair scraped back into a bun, she looked mean. She also had a French accent, which hundreds of years of animosity had trained nice young Englishwomen to suspect as evil.

Professor Lefoux did not bother to explain her presence. “Monique de Pelouse, your assessment is not really one of six months, as you have now been in attendance at this school for four years and eight months. Nevertheless, due to your attempted theft of the crystalline valve prototype last year and your regression in status as a result of that failure, you are undergoing public review along with the others of your rank.”

Monique sat silent, her gaze straight forward, her attitude one of superiority rather than penance.

“Your marks are as expected. You are a fair intelligencer but prone to lack of creativity, which could get you killed. You are ladylike but favor overt manipulation, which could get you ostracized. Given your age, it is the recommendation of the staff that you marry with no second attempt at finishing.”

Monique looked, for the first time in Sophronia’s miserable association with the girl, as if she might genuinely cry. Sophronia had seen her fake-cry on several occasions, but never had an honest tear come from those pretty blue eyes. The blonde said, “How could you? Why, I ought to have my father refuse funding. I shall report you to my special friend for this.”

Sophronia perked up. She knew Monique had an advocate on staff, but this was the first time the girl had admitted it publicly.

Professor Lefoux interrupted any further tirade. “Silence, young lady. You are to remain a student here until your coming-out ball and will conduct yourself as such. You will do very well for yourself in society, but it is the formal assessment of this institution that even with retraining, you could not exceed your personality. You are not to be made an agent.”

Am I seeing things, wondered Sophronia, or is that a smile on Professor Lefoux’s face?

Monique rose as though she might storm from the room.

“Sit down, Miss Pelouse!” ordered Professor Lefoux. “You are required to witness all the assessments.”

Monique resumed her seat, almost trembling.

“Preshea Buss.” Preshea’s dark eyes were wide, and her normally crafty face was carefully blank.

“You are adept at social manipulation but too apt to trade on your looks for assistance. You underestimate intelligence, even your own. Improve your execution, or you will be good only for marriage without covert orders.”

Preshea protested, “But I’ve been here less than a year!” She spoke precisely and sharply, as though each word were being murdered by her mouth.

“Which is why we tell you this now.”

“What if I want to get married?” grumbled Preshea under her breath to Agatha.

“I thought that was one of the ways to finish,” Sophronia whispered to Dimity.

“It is, but to be dismissed into marriage without covert orders is dishonorable.”

“Miss Temminnick, Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott, if you would like to include the rest of the class in your discussion?” Professor Lefoux’s ire was turned abruptly on them.

Dimity and Sophronia looked up. “Sorry, Professor,” they singsonged in tandem.

Professor Lefoux glared but clearly wished to continue. “Agatha Woosmoss,” she barked.

Agatha’s bottom lip wobbled.

“Very poor marks indeed. Have you been paying any attention at all in your lessons? You are hereby put on probationary status for six months. You must improve both covert and social aspects of training. Your father is a great patron of our institution, but we cannot play favorites with a weak component.”

Agatha began to cry, fishing about for a handkerchief. As usual, she had misplaced hers. Sophronia passed her a spare, wincing in sympathy.

Professor Lefoux continued. “Sidheag Maccon, Lady Kingair.”

Sidheag looked directly at the teacher, like a soldier facing execution. The girl’s unique yellow eyes were wary.

“You chose all the weapons and showed excellent use of them, even the fan. However, your social skills are middling, and your dress and posture have entirely failed to improve. We understand your background is unusual and that your expectations are different from those of other students. We are sending you into Scottish society, but you will be presented at court eventually. A woman of your rank will need all skills, not only the ones you find interesting. You too are on probation, and your father has been informed of this.”

Sidheag looked more worried than Sophronia had ever seen her. Her so-called father, Lord Maccon, was really her great-great-great-grandfather and Alpha werewolf of the Kingair Castle pack. Sidheag always spoke of him with a fond irreverence. Now Sophronia could tell from her friend’s expression that he could also be fierce.

Professor Lefoux moved on to Dimity. “Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott.”

Dimity’s face was ashen.

“Your marks are fair, although not as we would have hoped given your lineage. Your reluctance to pursue subterfuge does you a disservice when it is rooted in laziness. Your good humor may work in your favor if you can harness it for information gathering and not simply gossip. Concentrate on combat and solo reconnaissance. You must build your character, Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott. Flibbertigibbets are only good if they have a solid foundation.”

Dimity looked humbled but relieved. She clearly had thought she too would be placed on probation.

Professor Lefoux turned to Sophronia.

“Miss Temminnick, you are in receipt of the highest marks we have ever given in a six-month review. Your mind seems designed for espionage. Nevertheless, you veer away from perfect in matters of etiquette. Do not let these marks go to your head; there are many girls at this school who are better than you. Our biggest concern is what you get up to when we are not watching. Because, if nothing else, this test has told us you are probably spying on us, as well as everyone around you.”

All the other girls in the room, even Dimity, turned to stare at Sophronia.

In that moment, Sophronia knew they hated her. And because she was exactly as Professor Lefoux had said, one small part of her wondered if her assessment had been inflated for precisely that reason: to challenge her by pitting her against her fellow students.

“Oh, Sophronia,” hissed Dimity, “couldn’t you have faked it a little?” Dimity hadn’t a vengeful bone in her body, but even she could be manipulated.

Sophronia looked out from under her eyelashes at the others. Agatha was no longer holding back tears. Sidheag wore a small smile of discomfort. Preshea and Monique were openly hostile.

“Good luck,” said Professor Lefoux to them all, almost cheerfully, before walking swiftly from the room.

Everyone began talking in hushed tones. Everyone, that is, except Sophronia. And no one talked to her, just about her.

“Isn’t she Miss High and Snobby now?” hissed Monique.

“Bet she thinks the sun rises out of her tea in the morning,” added Preshea in her sharp, clipped voice.

“Highest marks ever. Isn’t that something? We witnessed history,” said Sidheag, her yellow eyes cold.

“I can’t believe I’m on probation. Papa will kill me,” said Agatha, possibly not exaggerating. One never knew with parents who sent their daughters to Mademoiselle Geraldine’s.

Sophronia tried out tactics in her head. Just now, she had nothing to say that wouldn’t sound falsely modest. Even if she told them her suspicion that she was being set up, she’d sound defensive. She would have to hope that Agatha and Sidheag would figure it out on their own. She felt certain, however, that she could count on Dimity.

Sophronia cocked her head to one side to look at her best friend.

Dimity looked away and said something sympathetic to Agatha.

Sophronia bit her lip and stared at her hands. She had thought Dimity would stay loyal, just a little bit.

The girls continued to ignore her all that day. It made for lonely classes and an uncomfortable evening meal. Sophronia tried not to let it affect her. They should recover from their resentment if she did nothing to aggravate them. But every time she performed a task well or answered a question correctly during lessons, she could feel the dislike. Several days saw no change to this pattern, and even Dimity still wasn’t talking to her, which was particularly awkward, as they shared a bedroom. Sophronia was both annoyed and hurt. She stopped having an appetite at dinner and started filching the occasional roll for later. She even contemplated not following Dimity when the girl crept out of quarters for her assignation with Lord Dingleproops. But since Sophronia figured that the letter was some kind of cruel joke and that the boy wouldn’t show up, she simply couldn’t let her friend walk into heartbreak alone. So when Dimity snuck out of quarters, having changed at bedtime into her best evening dress rather than a nightgown, Sophronia followed.

Dimity used a series of evasion and climbing techniques to get around the ship. She held perfectly still and flattened herself against walls so mechanicals patrolling the hallways slid right by. It made getting around after hours very slow, and there was always a risk of discovery whenever a maid rolled into sight. Dimity was better at it than Sophronia had thought, which made her proud. After all, Sophronia had taught Dimity everything she knew on the subject.

Sophronia stayed out of sight, tracking her friend effortlessly, knowing Dimity was headed to the back squeak deck. Sophronia had it easier. She used a small grappling rope knotted at stages for climbing, her own personal invention. It was undemanding to creep along the same level, but up and down could be a challenge on an airship hull. Sophronia had scavenged rope from the sooties and asked Vieve to build her a hook and the emission hurlie. The hurlie was a kind of turtle-shaped device that clipped to Sophronia’s wrist. Vieve was fond of things that clipped to wrists. Once Sophronia flipped the catch at the turtle’s tail, a spring-loaded release mechanism allowed her to fling the turtle’s shell, with the grapple underneath, and the rope followed behind. Best of all, Sophronia didn’t have to use the ladder from Lady Linette’s balcony every time she wanted to visit the sooties.

Instead of climbing up onto the deck after Dimity, Sophronia continued edging around to the very back of the ship. She reeled in her grappling hook and hung off the side, looking into the skies, hunting for an airdinghy. Above her, the squeak deck was abandoned under its great balloon, except for Dimity. Dimity’s view was obstructed by the smokestacks, mast, and propeller, but Sophronia could see around and between them. The school floated with the breeze, so the air around them felt still and windless.

Hours seemed to pass, and Sophronia was convinced that the letter was a hoax. Then she saw it, coming up from below—an airdinghy. There was someone crewing it, but she could make out nothing from her vantage point but its sail and four balloons.

Above, Dimity’s silhouette came to the rails and looked out, but she could not see what Sophronia saw.

Sophronia wondered how Lord Dingleproops intended to board without setting off any of the school’s alarms. The back was the safest choice, since teachers and staff slept in the forward section and students in the middle, but there were mechanicals everywhere. Several had protocols that had them do nothing but look for shapes in the sky and set off alarms in teachers’ bedrooms when they saw something.

Fearlessly, the airdinghy rose up until it was almost level with Sophronia. She heard Dimity give a glad little cry of welcome. When Sophronia could finally see into the gondola, there were two men, not the one boy Dimity expected. Sophronia had met Lord Dingleproops once at a party; he was a reedy, chinless, redheaded blighter, and while tall and strapping, he was not bulky. Both of these men were bulky. There was certainly something wrong.

As the airdinghy rose higher, Sophronia squinted, trying to make out more of the figures in the dark. Then she realized what was off about them. No top hats. No gentleman would ever meet a lady without appropriate headgear, even if that meeting was a joke. Whoever these men were, they were not noblemen. Plus, Lord Dingleproops was a member of the Pistons, a social club. A Piston’s top hat was his marker, his sign of status; to travel without it was unthinkable.

Sophronia was not prepared to mount a defense, but she didn’t want anything to happen to Dimity. She threw her bread roll from dinner at the men. It hit one in the head but didn’t appear to do any permanent damage, even though it was a very hard roll. The man swore and looked up at her.

Sophronia cursed herself. All she had done was attract their attention, and one of them now pointed a pistol at her. Banking on the fact that he wouldn’t want to fire because of the noise, she wrapped one arm tightly about the railing that was her current anchor and pointed her hurlie at the airdinghy. She ejected the grapple toward one of the four balloons. The grapple sailed over, but on the pull back she felt the barb catch and tear through the fabric.

The airdinghy lurched to one side.

The man guiding the dinghy yelled. The other shot his pistol at Sophronia, who swung out and to one side, avoiding the bullet.

Above them, Dimity said, “What’s going on? Lord Dingleproops, is that you? Was that gunfire? You’ll wake the teachers!”

Sophronia shot her grapple again, catching another one of the balloons and gashing it open. Two ripped balloons was more than the airdinghy could manage, and it began to spin and sink, gaining speed as it went. The men inside were now more concerned with their own safety than with Sophronia or Dimity.

Dimity squeaked in alarm, calling, “Wait, come back!” But her imagined suitor was gone.

Sophronia yelled up to her, “That wasn’t Lord Dingleproops.”

Dimity was annoyed enough to actually speak with her. “Sophronia? What are you doing following me?”

“Keeping you safe.”

“By sabotaging my assignation?”

“I don’t know what they wanted, but they weren’t Pistons. No top hats.”

Clearly, Dimity preferred to believe in her own romantic visions than to see reason. “Oh, Sophronia, he was probably in disguise! Must you ruin everything?”

Sophronia couldn’t think of anything to say. Since she hadn’t determined what the strange men wanted with Dimity, she could hardly argue that she had protected Dimity from some sinister unknown. Perhaps one of them had been Lord Dingleproops, but she doubted it. Lord Dingleproops was the type to disguise himself, certainly, but he would dress up as a jester and still wear his top hat. Those men had been after Dimity, and they weren’t lordlings; Sophronia would stake her reputation on it.

As Sophronia climbed back to quarters, she reflected that perhaps it was best if Dimity didn’t believe that someone was after her, at least for the time being. Sophronia simply would have to keep an eye on her, whether she liked it or not. Of course, the question remained: who were they and what did they want with Dimity?

DIAMONDS FROM SOOTIES

Given that all her female friends were aloof and noncommunicative, Sophronia took refuge in the boiler room. There, fire and smoke turned scurrying workers into creatures of shadow, and boys not much older than Sophronia worked to keep the steam engines running and the airship afloat. Among these sooties, Soap stood out as the tallest, boldest, and shadowiest. Sophronia would have sworn he’d grown a foot in the months she’d known him. She was no petite lady herself, but Soap’s lean, muscled form towered over her, his wide face made all the more handsome by its perpetual smile.

“I hear you did particularly well, miss.” Phineas B. Crow—Soap for short, sootie by profession—attempted to look serious by concentrating on Bumbersnoot, but he couldn’t hide his inherent cheekiness. He also couldn’t hide the fact that he didn’t care one whistle for her high marks.

“Soap, I wish I had access to your sources of information.”

“You do, miss. Through me, a’course!” This comment was accompanied by a flash of glee from his dark eyes. “Here you go, Bumbersnoot.” Sophronia’s mechanimal was snuffling about in black dust, his clockwork tail tick-tocking back and forth in excitement. He expressed his delight at the small bits of coal Soap dropped from above by eating them. Little puffs of smoke made his floppy leather ears flap.

“Didn’t bring Miss Sidheag south with you this time?” Soap prodded gently.

Sophronia gave him a look.

“What, even her? You’d think she’d grog to the fact that you’d been pickled.”

“Not Sidheag. Takes everything at face value, that girl. It’s one of the reasons she didn’t do well.…” Sophronia trailed off, realizing what Soap had said. “Even you figured out I’ve been set up?”

Soap took offense. He stopped feeding Bumbersnoot. “Even me? I’ve been around this here school long enough to pick up a few tricks.”

The mechanimal’s tail slowed to a steady tick-tock, tick-tock.

Sophronia looked at her friend: his buoyant demeanor, his skin so dark it was often difficult to tell where he began and the soot left off. “Are you happy here, Soap?”

“Why, miss, what a question.” Soap’s ready smile faded slightly.

Bumbersnoot, ignored, puffed steam at them, as if to say, What about me? No one asks if I’m happy. You know what would make me happy? More coal. Yoo-hoo, down here. You, with the coal! There was, of course, a pile of coal nearby, but Bumbersnoot wasn’t too bright. He was only a simple mechanimal, with very basic protocols.

“I mean, are you happy as a sootie?”

“Suits me well enough, miss. Decent hours. They let me get away with fooling about a bit. Not a bad life. Both my parents were slaves. Or that’s what I’ve been told. Never knew ’em myself.”

“You’re quite smart, you know?”

Soap raised his eyebrows.

Sophronia took out a little book from her reticule. It was an early primer, meant for young children. She’d been teaching Soap to read lately. They used what bits of time they had and the light from one of the boilers. “I don’t mean book learning, but smart in other ways.”

Soap began to follow where the conversation was headed. “Your school don’t train them like me,” he said, “even if they took boys.”

“Bunson’s?”

“I ain’t got the brain for science, miss. Only other stuff. Naw, leave me here; it’ll do for now.”

“But…”

“Now, miss, just because you ain’t got any projects to work on, don’t be casting them pretty peepers my way.”

“Projects? What do you mean, projects?” Sometimes Sophronia couldn’t understand a word that came out of Soap’s mouth. She got the meaning underneath, mostly. How could she not, when his own “pretty peepers” twinkled at her something terrible? Flirt.

“Miss Sidheag and them others you collect. Them as needs a little help to make it through. Them’s your projects. I ain’t interested. Course, if you wanted to make me somewhat else…” He trailed off and waggled his brows suggestively.

Sophronia cocked her head and lifted the primer. “You sure you aren’t a project?”

“Aw, miss, reading’s one thing, but I can’t be a gentleman, and that seems part and parcel of that secretive work of yours.”

“Doesn’t have to be.”

Soap was not to be persuaded. If Sophronia were to make an intelligencer of him, she’d have to do it without his knowing. “Well, I appreciate your sources; that’s all I’m saying,” she said.

Soap smiled, a flash of white teeth. “Speaking of which…” His eye had been caught by someone coming up behind Sophronia.

She whirled around to see a purposeful newsboy silhouette walking straight across the boiler room, like a delivery lad.

The engineering chamber was a mere hum of activity at night, unlike the crashing cacophony of daytime. Most of the sooties and greasers were asleep, and all of the officers, but the boilers always had to be tended. The flickering orange glow from the burning coal turned the cavernous room into a waltz of light. Sophronia adored it. Sooties trotted about, but none of them moved straight across the open space between boilers—they stopped to feed them. Only one person moved with such directness—Genevieve Lefoux.

“What ho?” said the scamp, dimpling up at them. Vieve was from above stairs; she belonged to Professor Lefoux, as much as she might be said to belong to anyone. But she was rather cat-like about the situation. She never sat for lessons, and went wherever she pleased at whatever hour. Since she liked engines, much of her time was spent in the boiler room.

After the customary pleasantries, Vieve said in a sprightly manner, “Hear my aunt got you good, Sophronia.”

Sophronia cast the primer up at the ceiling in a gesture of appeal to higher powers. “You, too? Isn’t my business secret at all?”

“Well, I might have read the report. You made them allover sticky with the highest six-month marks ever. Good on you, Miss Poofy Skirts.”

“You turning against me, too?”

“Oh, I’m not miffed. Amused you had to go up against the brunt of Aunt’s charms.”

“She’s a dragon, your aunt.”

“Sing that! Now, about—oof!” Vieve stumbled as a sootie hurtled into her, knocking her over.

“Hey!” he yelled as Vieve bounced upright. “Watch it there, runt!”

Sophronia pulled her shoulders back. “You watch it, you turbot!”

The boy snorted at her. “Oh, mighty Uptop, what could you do to me?”

Soap stepped in when it looked like Sophronia might actually launch herself at the boy. “Run along now.”

Strong from shoveling coal most of his life, Soap loomed over the smaller sootie. The boy scuttled off.

Sophronia sputtered. “Why, that turnip! Who does he think he is? Vieve, are you well?”

Vieve dimpled at her. “Don’t concern yourself, miss. I’m not easily damaged.”

Soap said to Sophronia, “Now, miss, don’t go causing a ruckus in my domain, please.”

Sophronia stopped vibrating. “Oh, dear. I am sorry. This thing with everyone angry at me has rather put my nerves on edge.” Sophronia hoped Soap couldn’t see how hurt she was by the ostracism. Soap’s eyes were so direct, she rather thought he might see into her heart better than anyone.

Soap shook his head at her sympathetically. “Still, miss.”

Sophronia agreed with the reprimand. She should have minded her manners, even with a sootie. Especially with a sootie. “Who was that unpleasant creature?” She thought she knew most of the boiler room staff by sight, if not by name.

“Don’t know,” admitted Soap, embarrassed.

“Don’t know? But you know all the sooties!” Soap was like the unofficial mayor of boilers.

“That’s just it. We’ve taken on double numbers this week. Double! Some pretty dubious types, too. Second Assistant Fireman should have checked their characters better, if you ask me. Us old guard been trying to get most of them assigned to forward engine and propeller, but they don’t need that many when we’re drifting. So we’ve got ’em all mucking about here.”

Sophronia looked around. “Have you taken on extra coal, too?”

Soap nodded.

“I didn’t feel us go low to meet the supply train.”

“Early yesterday morning, miss.”

Vieve added, “They brought it in from Bristol special.”

Sophronia said, “I take it you’re thinking what I’m thinking.”

“Someone plans to take this ship on a very long trip.” Soap pulled out a wooden pipe, lit it up with a wick from a nearby boiler, and puffed.

Sophronia wrinkled her nose. Revolting habit. She schooled her expression when he looked at her, but he must have caught her distaste.

He took the pipe out of his mouth, looked at it as though it had done something offensive, and then tapped it out into a coal heap and tucked it away.

And he thinks he’s not a gentleman! Sophronia smiled—a wide grin with no artifice to it.

Soap looked a little overwhelmed by the power of her approval. Sophronia was, as yet, unaware of the effect of her smile on boys.

Vieve watched this back-and-forth with interested green eyes.

Sophronia continued their conversation. “Leaving the moor, do you think?”

Soap nodded. “A certain.”

“What else do you know?” Sophronia asked.

Soap shook his head. “Simply that, miss. I have tried, but them powers upstairs are keeping this one close.”

They both looked to the ten-year-old girl dressed as a boy. Vieve had crouched down to play with Bumbersnoot. She shrugged. “You got more than me. No one’s talked in my hearing.”

“Lady Linette! She didn’t give us our assessments. Perhaps she was called away to deal with this?” Sophronia mused.

“Which direction are we headed now, Soap?” Vieve asked.

Soap wandered over to a hatch in the floor of one corner of the massive room and stuck his head out of it. A few minutes later he returned. Soap always looked as though he didn’t quite have control of his limbs, like a goat. But like a goat, he was sure-footed and powerful, despite appearances.

“Toward Swiffle-on-Exe, I’m thinking.”

Sophronia was impressed. This was a skill she hadn’t known Soap possessed. One stretch of heath looked much the same as another to her.

“Boilers will be needing water?” suggested Vieve. “For the journey?” Swiffle-on-Exe was a riverside town.

“I wonder if Bunson’s has a mission for us?” offered Sophronia. Bunson and Lacroix’s Boys’ Polytechnique was near Swiffle-on-Exe and the primary reason people visited.

“After Monique bungled the prototype retrieval? I doubt it,” muttered Vieve. “Things haven’t been roses between the schools since. Bunson’s won’t forgive Geraldine’s for nearly losing the only working device.”

Sophronia’s instincts took over. “How do you know that?”

“My aunt used to communicate regularly with a professor there.”

“Algonquin Shrimpdittle?”

“Yes, how…?”

“When we infiltrated Bunson’s last year, you used his name to get us past the porter.”

“You remember?” Vieve was impressed.

“It’s what I do.”

“Highest marks ever, right.” Vieve gave Sophronia a suspicious look. “Did you hold back during that test?”

Sophronia avoided her question by asking one in reply. “Did you know about the oddgob?”

Vieve nodded.

“Oh.” Sophronia was disappointed. “And I took such careful mental notes for you. Did you know it had a component part that looked a great deal like the prototype?”

Vieve frowned. “Not possible. Why would the oddgob need a crystalline valve frequensor? That valve is for wireless communication, nothing to do with oddgobbery.”

Sophronia shrugged and fished the item in question out of her reticule. She handed it to Vieve, experiencing some relief at no longer having it on her person. “Here, I stole it for you. Why don’t you tell me what it’s for?”

“Aw, Sophronia, how thoughtful. You brought me a present!” Vieve examined the mini-prototype for a moment. Soap and Sophronia watched her for signs of intrigue. “Amazing they let it fall into your hands, when they made such a fuss over it only last year.”

Sophronia nodded. “Unless it’s no longer a prototype and already in production and distribution. Technology does move awful fast these days.”

Vieve dimpled again. “I know, isn’t it grand?” She pocketed the valve, only then realizing Sophronia had neatly avoided her earlier question. “So, did you hold back during that test?”

“Maybe a little,” Sophronia admitted.

Soap grinned. “That’s my girl.”

Sophronia glared at him. He was getting familiar.

“You are, miss.” He continued to grin.

“I’m my own girl, thank you very much.”

“Sometimes. Sometimes you’re mine, or Miss Dimity’s, or even Vieve’s.”

Vieve was too young to follow this line of reasoning, but she was bound to agree with Soap if the conversation nettled Sophronia.

This one certainly did. In fact, Sophronia was finding it most flustering. She did not like being flustered, and she did not like that it was Soap doing the flustering. She wasn’t quite sure what this meant, so she resorted to orders. “Stop it, Soap.”

“For now, miss. You tell me when you want this conversation to continue.”

“Oh, really!”

But Soap, who certainly could be a gentleman when he tried, left the subject at that and moved the discussion delicately on to the latest boiler room excitement: the sooties had adopted a kitten.

Sophronia visited the boiler room regularly for the next few nights. Things remained uncomfortable in class and chambers. Dimity was barely passing polite, and the other girls ignored Sophronia.

Of course, Bumbersnoot tried his best, but a mechanimal hadn’t much conversation and wasn’t really interested in speculating as to what might be afloat. Sophronia refused to volunteer any information to the others. The possibility of a visit to Swiffle-on-Exe and Bunson’s—which meant young gentlemen—would have her compatriots in ecstasies of delighted anticipation. So Sophronia held on to the news out of spite. She didn’t try to warn Dimity that someone might be after her. Dimity would take it as a pathetic excuse for interference. Without knowing the motive behind that mystery attack, Sophronia had no way to make her case. She’d no idea how lonely such a decision could be. So she escaped to see Soap, and occasionally Vieve, most evenings. It was a risk. She might get caught, but it was better than the pointed silences.

Then one morning at breakfast, Mademoiselle Geraldine made an official announcement.

Mademoiselle Geraldine was a source of amusement to the students. She was, supposedly, the headmistress. She thought her school was a real finishing school and had no idea about the espionage side of things. This was an ongoing covert operation lesson for the students—all the girls had to participate in keeping their headmistress in the dark. She always addressed them at breakfast with such concerns and inanities as might be important were they attending an actual ladies’ seminary. And, upon occasion, she was given something of substance to say by Lady Linette.

Over a light repast of giblet pie, boiled whiting, brawn, cold roast capon, and broiled haddock together with tea, brown bread, and sweet butter—the teachers did not approve of a heavy breakfast—Mademoiselle Geraldine informed them that they were headed to Swiffle-on-Exe for a brief stopover and that they could expect company once they arrived. The headmistress did not look pleased. Mademoiselle Geraldine might boast the rinsed red hair, loud voice, and well-upholstered figure of a former opera singer, but she took deportment seriously. Whoever their passenger was going to be, Mademoiselle Geraldine did not approve.

Accordingly, they arrived at the outskirts of Swiffle-on-Exe the next evening after dark. Instead of taking up their customary mooring point, off a goat path west of town, they went south and put down lines near the banks of the Exe.

The girls were all atwitter over this shift in tradition. Only Sophronia knew it was because they must take on boiler water. When everyone else was asleep, she crept out of quarters. It was dangerously busy in the hallway; the tracks were screaming with maid mechanicals, bustling to and fro carrying extra linens and washbasins. Sophronia had to flatten herself behind doors and inch along the walls at a pace so slow they wouldn’t register her. She decided not to visit the sooties, who would be too busy, and instead headed out onto a midlevel balcony. She leaned over the railing to watch as the airship sank down and nested, nose first, over the river, rustling the willow trees along the bank. Eventually, the front section, which housed the teachers’ residence and engineering, bridged the water.

With a belch of smoke out the stacks and a loud rumbling, a huge articulated metal pipe ejected from the lower front of the hull. Standing on a midlevel deck, Sophronia was in good position to observe under the light of a half-moon.

The pipe was massive. Near its end was a set of four small inflated balloons. These rested atop the river and held the pipe, presumably, at exactly the correct angle. Round steps collapsed out like flower petals as the pipe telescoped down. Sooties in the boiler room must have been cranking up a storm to create suction, for with a slurping noise the pipe shuddered and began to take on water. It looked as though the airship were drinking up the river through a flute.

This task complete, sooties, tiny figures below her, ran down the finger keys of the flute. There were a few joyful whoops and splashes. Mortified, Sophronia realized they were bare. Having left their soot-covered clothes above, they were taking this as a rare opportunity to bathe. The water must have been freezing, but they looked to be having a rollicking good time. Sophronia supposed Soap was among them, but she couldn’t distinguish individuals and wasn’t certain she should. Nevertheless, she was so taken with the spectacle she nearly fell over the railing. There might have been some small part of her that wished for Vieve’s binoculars.

The next morning, the airship was back in its regular visiting position, hovering over a hill west of town. The hodgepodge of buildings and mixed architecture that made up Bunson’s school was in view down the path. Sophronia blushed to think upon what she had seen the night before, and regretted not having Dimity to share it with.

When Sophronia entered the communal parlor wearing a carriage dress because she could not do up the back of her day gowns by herself, Dimity was in huddle with Sidheag. Sophronia walked over to their group with an open expression, but the girls stopped talking and only smiled back. Fake, unfriendly, cutting smiles of the kind Lady Linette had made them perfect over the course of six lessons. Sophronia sighed. Still not forgiven? But I have such interesting things to tell.

Then, before breakfast commenced, Mademoiselle Geraldine made a most shocking announcement, one that clearly distressed her.

“Ladies,” she said. “We will be taking a trip. A great trip.”

A collective gasp met this statement. The girls stopped reaching for crumpets and jam and looked up expectantly.

Sophronia sat back in her seat and looked at Monique out of the corner of her eye. Monique’s genuine surprise suggested she hadn’t known. Monique had an advocate among the teachers, and yet she hadn’t been told? The girl’s expression changed from shock to annoyance. Oh, ho, she thinks she should have been told. Very interesting.

“You knew.” Dimity was giving Sophronia an exasperated look.

Well, at least she’s talking to me. Sophronia nodded.

“Of course she knew! She’s the best, remember? Better than any of us,” Preshea interfered.

Dimity looked away, flushing.

“We are going to…” Mademoiselle Geraldine made an expansive gesture and left a pregnant pause, her stage training in action. “… London!”

Squeals of delight met that. Every girl wanted to go to London, even the ones who had been already. The shopping alone!

Sophronia’s dining table erupted into hushed exclamations.

“Think of it, town in March!”

“Directly before the Season. All the new gloves will be in!”

“I must write to Mummy and Daddy immediately to ask for an increase in my allowance.”

“Will there be balls? Oh, I do hope there will be balls!”

“There must be balls.”

Sophronia nodded to herself. That explained all the extra fuel. But their school never left the moor. The fact that Mademoiselle Geraldine’s was actually a massive airship was supposed to be secret. No one would believe it was a real finishing school if they knew it bobbed about shamelessly midair. Sophronia’s mind jumped to the problem of staying covert. Can we avoid populated areas all the way to London? She ought to be excited. She’d rarely had an opportunity to visit the capital. But what fun could she have in London if all her girlfriends were angry at her? It was hardly as though she and Soap could go tripping about Regent Street cooing over lace tucks.

Mademoiselle Geraldine called for silence. It took a while. “Now, now, ladies. Ladies! There will be plenty of time to talk among yourselves later. It will take us four days to get there. Classes will, of course, continue.” The headmistress took a deep breath, straining her stays alarmingly. “And that is not all!”

The girls quieted in anticipation of more delicious news.

“We will be joined by company on this excursion.” Mademoiselle Geraldine waved at the back of the room. The girls turned in their seats.

The dining hall doors opened and in walked… boys.

Mademoiselle Geraldine’s young ladies did not squeal at this, although it was certainly an even more squeal-worthy moment. Their training took over and not a peep was to be heard. But there was the faint sucking hiss of multiple indrawn breaths, like helium escaping the big balloons.

Again, Dimity turned to Sophronia, as if she could not help herself. “Did you know about this?”

“Dimity!” reprimanded Preshea.

Sophronia had not known, but she wasn’t about to tell Dimity that. She merely tightened her lips.

“Oh, Sophronia!”

There were some ten young men in all and one teacher. The teacher was a boyish-faced blond gentleman, wearing a seriously scholarly expression.

Sophronia recognized a few of the boys. Dimity’s younger brother, Pillover, gave their table a glum nod from under the brim of his oversized bowler. There was the infamous Lord Dingleproops who, outrageously, tipped his hat at them. Dimity blushed and then stuck her nose in the air. Next to Lord Dingleproops walked a pale, dark-haired boy wearing a little kohl about his eyes and possessing a certain sullen restlessness. Sophronia and he had once danced together but had never been properly introduced. She’d had to cut him unkindly at the time, abandoning him alone in the middle of a dance. There had been prototypes and cheese pies to deal with, but he would probably never forgive her.

He caught her staring and held her gaze in a forward manner. Then he lowered long eyelashes, ridiculously long for a boy, and gave her a small smile.

I know that trick. We learned it our first week here. Sophronia lowered her own lashes at him and glared. Some traitorous part of her was thinking, At least he doesn’t resent me for that dance.

The boy’s smile became genuine and he gave her a little nod.

“Great,” muttered Sophronia. “We got us Pistons on board.”

“What’s wrong with Pistons, Miss Know-It-All?” Monique asked, driven to break her silence. “They come from some of the finest families in England.”

“And some of the wealthiest,” added Preshea, emphasizing the t at the end of the word like a bullet.

Agatha said to Dimity, “Imagine Lord Dingleproops tilting his hat at you! After what he did!”

Monique narrowed in on this. “What did he do?”

Dimity said, “Ask Sophronia, why don’t you?”

“Oh, it can’t be that important.”

Mademoiselle Geraldine interrupted further discussion. “Please welcome Mr. Algonquin Shrimpdittle and a selection of the top-ranked students from Bunson and Lacroix’s Boys’ Polytechnique. They will be joining us for the journey to London. I’m convinced you will make them welcome. Don’t fuss; you will get the opportunity to socialize after tea.”

The silence that met that remark practically wobbled with excitement, like aspic jelly.

“The young gentlemen will be joining you for some of your lessons. I expect you all to behave and conduct yourselves like the ladies of qualit-tay I know you are!”

Another thrilled gasp met this. Mademoiselle Geraldine narrowed her eyes at Lady Linette, as though this were all her idea, and continued, “Now, don’t you desire to know why we are headed into London?”

Truth be told, most of the girls had entirely forgotten that there need be a reason. Sophronia was interested to hear what excuse had been given to Mademoiselle Geraldine. Almost as interested as she was in the truth behind their trip. She turned her gaze away from the boys, now lined up at the front of the room. The abominable dark-haired one was staring at her.

“Henri Giffard is scheduled to float, from France, in the very first transcontinental dirigible!”

This was of little consequence. After all, they spent all day every day floating about in an overlarge dirigible. Sophronia waited to be impressed.

“And he has said he will do it in under an hour using aether currents.”

This was met with pure shock. Even some of the boys looked surprised.

Float inside the aetherosphere? Inside the currents that swirled above the air itself? Unheard of!

“Those with the scientific know-how”—Mademoiselle Geraldine gestured at Professors Shrimpdittle and Lefoux—“tell me that he is most likely to succeed due to some exciting new valve technology. It is deemed that such a monumental historical occurrence is worth uprooting our entire establishment to witness in person.”

Sophronia was caught up in the metaphor of uprooting a floating school.

“And now, if you gentlemen will take a seat,” the headmistress continued, gesturing to an unoccupied table laid with a damask tablecloth and fine china, “we can get on to breakfast at last.”

FLIRTING WITH CONSPIRACIES

The first aether-borne dirigible flight, and we get to witness it! Do you realize, if Giffard’s calculations are correct, this could halve float times? Can you believe it? We could get all the way to Scotland in four days! I wonder how he is handling aether-current monitoring. Can you imagine being that high up?”

Sophronia was not as impressed as Vieve thought she should be. “It is still faster by sleeper train.”

“Yes, but this is floating. Floating! Using aether currents! The possibilities are endless. It’s so exciting!” Vieve bounced up and down on Sophronia’s bed.

The young inventor had stopped by for a visit after breakfast. Sophronia had no idea where the scamp ate, but clearly it was within earshot of the assembly.

“As you’re here, do you think you could help me dress?” she asked.

“You’re dressed already,” protested Vieve.

“In something nicer?”

“Not you, too!”

“Well, everyone is putting on her best because of the visitors. I don’t want to be known as that girl in the carriage dress.”

Vieve sighed. “Oh, very well.” The ten-year-old eschewed female clothing herself, but she had the French eye for apparel on others, and opinions to go with it. She mooched over to Sophronia’s wardrobe and selected a dark blue-and-green plaid, two seasons old, with a narrow skirt.

“This one,” she pronounced with all the authority of youth.

“Really?”

“It complements your eyes.”

“If you say so.”

“With the straw shepherdess bonnet.” Vieve was always very assured on the subject of hats. Not to be trifled with.

“Well, you’ll have to help me put it on. Dimity still isn’t speaking to me.”

“More fool, her. You know what’s happening.”

“Not now; everyone is as up on things as I.” This irritated Sophronia.

Vieve dimpled. “Ah, but you’ll never guess what I heard.”

Sophronia brightened. “Oh?”

“One of the teachers is required in London.”

Sophronia was struck, yet again, by how old Vieve always sounded and acted. One would never have guessed from her speech that she was ten. From her actions, occasionally, yes. She did bounce.

“Which one? Your aunt?”

Vieve shrugged.

“Really, Vieve.”

“Now, now, Sophronia, I told you something interesting, didn’t I? I can’t do all the work.” The girl got distracted. “What is Bumbersnoot up to?”

Bumbersnoot had snuffled over to one side of the room and latched onto a froufrou that had fallen into the corner by the bed. He was dragging it out into the center of the floor and not swallowing it into his tiny boiler.

Sophronia looked at her pet. “He wants to come along.”

“What?”

Sophronia indicated the floof in Bumbersnoot’s mouth with her head. Her hands were busy pinning on the shepherdess hat.

Vieve crouched down and gently extracted the bit of cloth from the mechanimal. It turned out to be a complex sort of sling, heavily decorated with lace, ruffles, and tassels. Vieve, being mechanically minded, realized it was designed for Bumbersnoot to wear. It covered most of the mechanimal and made him look like a reticule—if a reticule were to be designed with a metal dog head. If anyone asked, Sophronia was prone to explaining that her handbag was the latest fashion out of Italy, and she couldn’t fathom how a person of taste didn’t also own one.

“Dimity and I made it for him after Petunia’s ball. The idea worked so well there. Everyone thought he was some fancy new accessory. This way I can take him to classes with me. He likes to get out and about on occasion, don’t you, Bumbersnoot?”

Vieve’s eyebrows were raised almost into her dark hair. Bumbersnoot was, technically, illegal. Not only were students of Mademoiselle Geraldine’s not permitted pets, but unregistered mechanimals were forbidden throughout the British Empire.

“Lesson five five four,” said Sophronia. “Sometimes it is best to hide a suspicious item in plain sight.”

“How do you keep him from smoking or steaming unexpectedly?”

Sophronia completed her toilette and turned to look at Bumbersnoot. Vieve had fastened the sling about him using the various ribbons tied into bows. “He has to behave, or he gets brought back to the room. Usually, he’s pretty good. Speaking of which, I’d better get to class.”

“What do you have?”

“Lady Linette’s lesson on hive society.”

“Then there will be boys with you.”

“As opposed to? I thought they were joining us for all our classes.”

Vieve shook her head, green eyes twinkling. “Oh, no, no. Bunson’s doesn’t fraternize with supernaturals.”

“So they won’t be in lessons with Captain Niall or Professor Braithwope?”

Vieve nodded and handed her Bumbersnoot.

“Oh, I don’t know,” hedged Sophronia, “with boys running around. Is it wise to bring him?”

“He wants to go,” insisted Vieve.

Bumbersnoot flapped an ear.

“Very well. Remember, Bumbersnoot, don’t move.” Sophronia slung the mechanimal over her shoulder so that he dangled near her waist, looking for all the world like the oddest and most eccentric bag any lady of means had ever carried.

In class, Dimity, Sidheag, and Agatha noticed the addition of Bumbersnoot to Sophronia’s attire but said nothing. Sophronia only carried the mechanimal when she thought she might need him. Although what defined needing such a ridiculous creature was anyone’s guess. They would assume this was simply another moment when Sophronia knew more than they and intended to show them up.

As if I would do that in front of boys! Sophronia plonked Bumbersnoot down ostentatiously among the other reticules.

Lady Linette’s etiquette class was augmented by four boys, including Lord Dingleproops and his dark-haired friend.

Lady Linette began. “Welcome, ladies and gentlemen. Today’s class is entitled ‘Faking It with Fangs.’ We will go over proper introductions within a hive environment. Please pair off.”

With six girls, Sophronia and Agatha were left out of the first round. Monique made straight for Lord Dingleproops, cutting Dimity off. Preshea chose the dark-haired boy. They made a fetching pair, of a kind in coloring, pleasing proportions, and sulky temperament. Yet, despite Preshea’s uncontested loveliness, the dark-haired boy kept glancing at Sophronia. Which, while complimentary, also gave her an undeniable feeling of smugness. It wasn’t often a boy preferred her over Preshea.

Lady Linette continued, “Queens outrank all other vampires, despite whatever landed title they might hold. Always go to the queen first in any social situation and allow one of her hive-bound vampires to introduce you. After the queen come her hive members, then any roves who may be present. All of these will be men, some landed. Drones—humans indentured to hive or rove—are classed as household staff, with a few exceptions.”

One of the boys said snidely, “Are you purposefully leaving out the fact that drones are also the vampires’ primary food source?”

Lady Linette snapped, “One doesn’t discuss such utilitarian things openly! For today’s practice, the gentlemen will pretend to be hive vampires. Begin!”

Sophronia and Agatha introduced themselves to each other. Agatha was as shy and as nervous as if Sophronia were a real vampire. The mere presence of four young men among them had her aflutter. Poor Agatha was generally overset by anything new, from the advent of a birthday scarf—How to wear it? What to match it with?—to boys wandering willy-nilly into classes.

“So unpredictable,” Agatha whispered.

The scarf, wondered Sophronia, or the boys?

Conversation was allowed to continue for some ten minutes while Lady Linette mingled and made adjustments—to stance, to subject matter, to flirting, to lack of flirting, to eyelash use. She corrected both girls and boys. Sophronia realized, for the first time, that vampires had just as many rules to follow as women in society. Possibly more.

“Pardon me, Lady Linette?”

“Yes, Miss Temminnick?”

“Can rove vampires safely visit a hive? I thought they had to stay in their own territory.”

“Roves can visit for short lengths of time. Think logically, Miss Temminnick. Roves must have an alliance with a vampire queen because only a queen can breed new vampires. Since roves have drones, and drones work for the right to try to become a vampire, they must maintain an alliance with a queen. In exchange for drone metamorphosis, roves perform duties for the queen that the males of her hive cannot. Roves, for example, have much longer tethers and greater mobility.”

Sophronia decided tether length was something to bother Professor Braithwope about. She found the idea of vampire territories intriguing, but there was very little written on the subject. Since vampires perceived tethers as a weakness, this was probably by design. They did love controlling information.

Lady Linette clapped her hands. “Rotate, please. Lady Kingair and Miss Plumleigh-Teignmott, you pair out for this round.”

Preshea made her way to Lord Dingleproops. The young man was clearly charmed by the girl’s precise petty prettiness. Dimity looked disgruntled—she had her embossed missive clutched in one hand and clearly wished to ask Lord Dingleproops about it.

The dark-haired boy made his way across the room to Sophronia, despite the fact that Monique had moved to intercept him. He avoided her with consummate adroitness.

“We meet again, Miss Temminnick.”

“To be perfectly correct, sir, we have never properly met at all.”

He gave a little half smile. “Of course, one must always be correct.”

“Oh, haven’t you heard, sir?” Monique said. “Sophronia is always correct.”

“Is that your given name, Sophronia? Pretty.”

“Sophronia Temminnick. And it most certainly isn’t pretty. It’s a mouthful. Now, shall we do this properly? Lady Linette is watching.”

“Whatever you like, Ria.”

“Miss Temminnick to you,” hissed Sophronia.

The boy smiled wider. His eyes were a very nice shade of blue. “No, I prefer Ria.” He grasped her hand. His thumb made its way inside the top of her glove to caress her wrist. Scandalous.

Sophronia jerked away. “Stop that.” Her heart was racing. Undoubtedly in anger.

Lady Linette was upon them. “Show me.”

The dark-haired boy—I still don’t know his name, pox upon him—stopped smiling and made a very neat bow to Sophronia, as though he were encountering her at a hive house door.

Lady Linette did not look inspired.

Sophronia executed a near-perfect curtsy in reply, perhaps a little brief.

Lady Linette called her out. “Why so curt, Miss Temminnick?”

“We haven’t been introduced. I wouldn’t want him to get ideas.”

“You wish to discourage the hive? Did I say we were practicing ways to dissuade a vampire’s interest?”

“You did not direct us to focus on encouragement or dissuading.”

“Very well, proceed.”

The dark-haired boy said, “How do you do? My name is Mersey, Felix Mersey.”

Lady Linette interrupted him. “Family names only, young man. What kind of lady do you take her for?”

Felix smiled that quirky half smile. “The best kind, of course.”

Lady Linette was shocked. “Mr. Mersey!”

Lord Dingleproops said, from where he partnered a self-satisfied Preshea, “Actually, my lady, he’s a Golborne.”

Lady Linette was impressed. “Son of the viscount?”

The four boys in the class laughed.

Felix Mersey said softly, “Golborne is a duchy, my lady.”

“And Felix here is the eldest,” added Lord Dingleproops.

Lady Linette looked even more impressed, for that meant that Mersey was a landed title, his father’s second holding.

Sophronia narrowed her eyes. Heir to a duke, is he? No wonder he’s so arrogant. The entirety of Monique’s attention swung in their direction. Felix Mersey outranked everyone else in the room. Monique’s two years older than him, at the very least. She should be looking for someone her own age!

“We call him Felix. Doesn’t hold with titles, do you, Viscount?”

“A luxury only the titled can afford, I’m sure,” said Sophronia.

“Don’t worry, Ria,” a molasses voice whispered near her ear. “You will call me Felix, regardless.”

A fan snapped down between them. “None of that! No vampire would ever be so intimate!” Lady Linette did not hold with obvious flirting. Flirting, yes, but not obvious flirting.

Felix said, pertly, “I object to having to portray a vampire. It is beneath me.”

Lady Linette rolled her eyes and clapped for everyone’s attention. “Now, gentlemen, I understand that Bunson’s predisposition is against any contact with vampires, but the fact is they pervade high society, and you will have to fraternize with them eventually. It is always better to be prepared. And what better way to understand the enemy than to pretend to be one?”

This mollified Felix. Sophronia wondered at the strength of his dislike. With Professor Braithwope, who was a dear, as her primary model, Sophronia was rather more in favor of vampires than against. She’d been raised relatively progressive. She didn’t think her father had any business dealings with vampires or werewolves, but she was tolerably certain he wouldn’t be against such a thing.

“How do you do, Lord Mersey?”

“It is a very great pleasure to make your acquaintance at last, Miss Temminnick. Amusing reticule you have.” Felix gestured to where Bumbersnoot sat, discarded among the other accessories on Lady Linette’s mantelpiece.

“Oh, yes, indeed. A gift from a friend, Italian design. How do you feel about the weather? One might expect rain soon, might one not?”

Lady Linette interrupted, “Weather is only safe with a male vampire. Never discuss the weather with a queen. Since she cannot leave her hive house, this is considered a rude reminder of her loss of freedom. Lord Mersey, how would a vampire respond?”

“Rain, in your glorious presence, Miss Temminnick? I hardly think it should dare.”

Lady Linette interjected. “No, no, too much flattery. Only roves would be so aggressive. Miss Temminnick, a rebuttal, if you would?”

Sophronia said, “And how are you enjoying your sojourn on board our ship?”

Lady Linette said, “Nicely played, except, of course, no vampire except Professor Braithwope floats. We are pretending that Lord Mersey is a hive-bound vampire. Let us say, instead, that you are both visiting Vauxhall Gardens of an evening.”

Felix’s eyes twinkled at her. “I’m finding myself quite enchanted with… gardens, at the moment.”

Sophronia persisted. “Have you ever visited Vauxhall before?”

“Indeed, but I find this a whole new kind of garden experience, now that I have met you.”

Sophronia stepped away from the impossible boy with a glare. “Lady Linette, Lord Mersey is not speaking by the rules. Either for vampires or regular gentlemen.”

“Well, Miss Temminnick, you are using only standard niceties. Examine your subject and tailor your remarks to his taste.”

Given permission, Sophronia took in Felix Golborne, Viscount Mersey, from head to toe. “The mark is of average height and slender build. He is a man of means, but not overly interested in fashion. His hair is a little long. The mark has a slightly sullen expression denoting chronic ennui. Peculiarities include kohl about the eyes, fake gears sewn to the waistcoat, and a top hat with a brass ribbon.” She pointed to the hat where it sat atop an articulated bronze hat rack. “In short, an average hive-bound toff with a few eccentricities.”

Felix looked remarkably nonplussed under this string of observations. “You wound me.”

Lady Linette was delighted. “Note, however, the expense of the haircut? It takes a great deal of money to acquire a look of not having spent any at all. The precise fit and cut of the waistcoat? That is next season’s color. We have here a vampire of more than considerable means. He probably has not only hive backing but his own as well. His eccentricities might lead you to direct the conversation accordingly. Kohl is sourced where?”

Sophronia did not know; cosmetics was not her strong point.

Preshea spoke up. “Oh, me, me!”

“Yes, Miss Buss?”

“Egypt, my lady.”

“Very good, Miss Buss.” Lady Linette turned back to Sophronia. “What might you gather from that?”

“He has business concerns overseas, is possibly a collector of antiquities, or thinks his eyes are so pretty they must be exaggerated, which, given the length of his eyelashes, seems a waste of kohl.”

Lord Dingleproops let out a guffaw. “Got you there, Felix!”

Lady Linette finally realized Sophronia’s antics had distracted the entire class. “Ladies and gentlemen, please return to your own encounters! Sophronia, proceed with your discourse, applying our new information.”

Sophronia sighed and faced Felix. “My lord, are you interested in ancient Egypt?”

“I’m interested in the fact that you noticed the length of my eyelashes.”

Sophronia gritted her teeth. “Does your hive have historic ties to exotic lands?”

Felix’s intense focus on Sophronia was momentarily distracted by the mantelpiece behind her. “Speaking of exotic, your reticule seems to have moved of its own accord.”

Felix was not the only one to have noticed. One of Lady Linette’s cats was a full fluff ball of bristling offense, staring up at Bumbersnoot.

Sophronia hurried over. In the guise of retrieving her shawl, she gave Bumbersnoot an impressive whispered lecture on sitting still. The mechanimal crouched down with a small steam puff of slowing gears. The cat took further offense and hid under a sofa.

“What, for aether’s sake, is wrong with Artemisia?” asked Lady Linette, distracted by her cat’s behavior.

Felix followed Sophronia and leaned in to whisper, “Italian design, did you say? I must see about getting my mother one. Then again, if all the best households have one, she may already be blessed.”

Luckily, shortly after that, they were required to switch partners. Then the class got thoroughly distracted by the spectacle of Dimity Plumleigh-Teignmott, normally a placid young lady, positively bristling at a surprised Lord Dingleproops. Their vampire-meets-maiden conversation was full of hissed undercurrents. Sophronia observed that when Dimity flashed her letter at the young man, he shook his head violently, not understanding her ire. He was either a very good actor or had no involvement in the fiasco on the squeak deck. Sophronia was relieved that she had interfered and set the airdinghy falling. But if Lord Dingleproops wasn’t embroiled, who was? The flywaymen? The Picklemen? How did they get hold of the stationery? And the question still remained, why Dimity?

Sophronia tried to approach her friend after class with her concerns. “Dimity, about that letter…”

Dimity, practically in tears, only brushed by and scuttled off as fast as she could, trailing a worried-looking Agatha and Sidheag in her wake.

Felix, thought Sophronia as she made ready for supper that evening, is liable to be a problem. Despite all due attention to deportment, she could not help thinking of him as Felix, even while addressing him as Lord Mersey. They shared several lessons—including tea and delusions with Mademoiselle Geraldine and portion allotment, puddings, and preemptive poisonings with Sister Mattie. He would keep flirting, despite more tempting prospects like Monique and Preshea, who practically hurled themselves in his direction. I wonder if I should warn him about Preshea. She does so desperately want to murder her first husband. Sophronia had no idea why Felix was so intent upon her. She had not yet received lessons in seduction, or she might have understood the appeal of sharp confidence, a topping figure, and green eyes. All Sophronia’s intellect was directed at something other than attracting male companionship. These things combined to make her particularly appealing to gentlemen. Soap could have told her that.

The boys were permitted to take supper with the girls, distributed among the tables. Lord Mersey, Lord Dingleproops, and Mr. Plumleigh-Teignmott sat with Sophronia’s group because they were the youngest of the gentlemen visitors. Pillover was the youngest of all, at thirteen, and was distressed at having been singled out for special treatment.

“I’m not that good a student,” he confided in Sophronia. “This trip was supposed to be a reward for top evil geniuses. I’ve no idea why Professor Shrimpdittle chose me. It could be because I’m the only one with a sibling on board. What is going on with you and Dimity, by the by? My sister is a raging pain but not the type to snub a friend.”

Sophronia winced. “Set up, I’m afraid. Some kind of test.”

Pillover nodded. “Ah, well, she’ll come around eventually.”

“I certainly hope so. It’s terribly boring without her constant gossip.”

“Really? I don’t miss it at all. You are an odd duck.”

The supper was served—broiled salmon, hashed mutton, potatoes, parsnips, and baked apple pudding. The young men had passable table manners, but conversation was stilted at best, with the young ladies either flirting or nervously silent at the prospect of using the wrong fork.

Despite his best efforts, Felix was not sitting on Sophronia’s left. She sat isolated at the end of the table next to Preshea, who turned to speak with Lord Dingleproops. Pillover was a godsend, sitting across the way, although he would shovel mutton into his maw as if sheep were soon to be obsolete.

“I must say,” he commented between bites, “you eat better at this school than we do.”

“And in greater style, I imagine.”

Pillover looked at the tablecloth and flower centerpiece as though he had not noticed them before, which he probably hadn’t. “Rather.”

“We are training to handle such things for the rest of our lives. You are training to be evil geniuses. Table settings and the like are regarded, I am sure, as beneath you.”

“You are disposed to see this as careless?” wondered Pillover.

“Some things are more important than they seem. Note, for example, that by having larger flowers in taller vases, you can prevent people from conversing across the table, thus confining them to their dinner partners. Wider arrangements with cascading ferns, and you might even pass notes or objects to a dining companion without anyone the wiser.”

Pillover looked uninterested. Sophronia switched topics.

“I think someone is after Dimity.”

“Well, despite what she claims about that silly letter, it isn’t Lord Dingleproops. I can tell you that.” Pillover appeared to be aware of the situation.

“Have you had any odd encounters?”

Pillover started. “Me? Who would be after me?”

“Well, who would be after your sister?”

“It must be some kind of lark. Or mistake. I wouldn’t put it past the Pistons.”

Sophronia detailed the events on the squeak deck.

Pillover shook his head. “Can’t be Pistons, not that. Even they don’t have access to an airdinghy. No, I think you’re right that someone else wants my sister.”

“But who?”

Pillover was remarkably unconcerned. “Isn’t that your job?”

“Have you missed the part where she’s not speaking to me?”

Pillover had once been made to wear Sophronia’s petticoats in pursuit of information and safety. This gave him an inflated opinion of her abilities. “You’ll manage.”

“You’ll give it some thought, please?” Sophronia pressed. “I’m a little worried.”

“Well, she is my sister,” Pillover reluctantly agreed.

The meal proceeded, and Sophronia and Pillover conversed civilly, in a manner quite in keeping with training, until the tables were cleared and the cards brought forth.

Given their new numbers, the girls were told that round games were to be played so the entire table might participate. Monique declared that they would play loo and dealt without waiting for a consensus. Since loo was best played with seven, Sophronia, without being asked, and Pillover, who cared not one jot, sat out.

They watched the others play for a while. Felix kept glancing up over his cards at Sophronia.

Finally, she asked Pillover, in a low voice, “What is it with Lord Mersey?”

Pillover’s face darkened, and he shifted in his seat as though it were uncomfortable. “Golborne’s a famously conservative family. Too much money, not enough new blood.”

“Ah, anti-integration?” Sophronia prodded. Some of the aristocrats had fought hard against allowing the supernatural any part of government. That had happened centuries ago, but aristocrats and vampires had long memories.

“Worse. Picklemen.”

Sophronia stared at Felix. “Really?”

Pillover, whose family was quite progressive, answered sarcastically, “Can’t have monsters taking over the government, can we? We’re food to them. You know the propaganda. Fear supernatural creatures! Forget the fact that they won us an empire.”

Sophronia had come around to appreciating both the werewolf Captain Niall and the vampire Professor Braithwope as much as one could appreciate teachers. Even if Captain Niall had once accidentally tried to eat her. So she considered herself mostly progressive.

Her attention was diverted by a small, polite cough.

“Vieve?”

“Good evening,” said the scamp, from near her elbow.

Pillover nodded at her. They’d met before, during the incident with the petticoats.

“Listen, Sophronia, Soap says there’s something you might want to see tonight when we leave the moor. And I know I want to. I’ll be by with the obstructor later, so you won’t need to climb.” She didn’t wait for Sophronia’s agreement and rabbited off.

“Did you understand any of that?” Pillover asked, in a tone of voice that said he didn’t really care.

“You mean to say, you didn’t?”

“Nor was I meant to. Are you going out this evening, then?”

“Possibly.”

Pillover looked down the table to where Felix was once more staring in their direction. The viscount seemed distressed by the amount of attention Sophronia was bestowing upon Pillover. Since Pillover was customarily the victim of the Pistons’ pranks, he was morosely pleased to be getting under the boy’s skin.

“You want any company?”

“Oh, no, thank you.”

“I wasn’t thinking of myself.”

Sophronia gave him a crafty smile. “Has no one officially warned you boys about Geraldine’s alarms?”

Pillover looked as cagey as a round boy with an obvious stash of apple fritters could. “Nope. I know from Dimity, of course.”

“In that case, you might mention to Lord Mersey that I’m planning a jaunt later tonight.”

Pillover smiled for the first time in their acquaintance. “I might do that.”

FLIRTING WITH DECEIT

With the sun firmly down and card games satisfactorily completed, the students went to their next classes. The boys had lessons in mechanics and machinations with Professors Shrimpdittle and Lefoux. The girls, all forty-five of them, trooped down to a lower deck to disembark using the glass platform lift. They had their weekly lesson with Captain Niall. There was a palpable waft of excitement, not to mention perfume, as the werewolf was most every young lady’s favorite teacher. He was also, by far, the handsomest.

Sophronia liked him, too, even though she knew the floppy, easygoing military man was a sham. In his werewolf guise, he’d tried to kill her and savaged her best horsehair petticoat instead. He’d been moon-mad at the time, but she’d never quite forgiven the lapse, nor the loss of the petticoat. Like a proper gentleman, the good captain never made mention of the undergarment murder.

The girls stood on the moor. The glass lift turned into a gaslight for evening fighting lessons. Captain Niall strode toward them—a dashing soldier with a beaver-skin top hat tied to his head and a leather greatcoat buttoned from collar to hem. He had a loose way of walking, as if he had temporary, and not very good, control over someone else’s legs.

“Ladies, today we leave off knife fighting and move on to the most useful of all skills.” The werewolf paused dramatically. The young ladies about him inhaled in anticipation.

“Running away,” said Captain Niall with a flourish.

The faces about him were crestfallen; running away was hardly a romantic pursuit. Except when one was running to Gretna Green.

“Now, there are many ways and means to run. Today we will cover escape within a confined area—the fine art of dodging.”

He divided them into groups, naming some rabbits and others wolves. The wolves were each given a short wooden spoon that had been dipped in red gooseberry jelly. They had to tap the bodice of a rabbit to eliminate her from the game. This added incentive for the rabbits to dodge, given that their dresses were about to be covered in jelly. Wolves could only chase assigned rabbits, and rabbits could not work together. Apart from that, they were free to be as creative as they liked.

Sophronia, Sidheag, and Preshea were the rabbits to Monique, Dimity, and Agatha’s wolves. Sophronia was pleased with this arrangement. She was good at running away and saw nothing morally reprehensible in it. She promptly scampered off to a nearby copse and climbed a tree to watch the proceedings.

A game of chaotic tag commenced, with the werewolf teacher moving so quickly among the students he was difficult to see. He yelled instructions and called out rabbits as dead. It soon became clear why Captain Niall had chosen this particular hill. It was littered with obstacles—shrubs, long grasses, the copse of trees, and an occasional boulder.

The game went on for some half an hour until all the rabbits had died and only Sophronia was left. When she was finally found, the wolves refused on principle to climb after her.

“Rabbits can’t climb trees,” objected Monique.

Captain Niall ignored this and gestured Sophronia down. “Ladies, what did Miss Temminnick do correctly?”

“There she goes again,” sniffed Preshea.

Everyone was silent.

Sophronia jumped down. Monique instantly whacked her with her spoon. A great gob of gooseberry stained the front of Sophronia’s dress, and her collarbone stung.

“Ouch,” she objected.

Finally, one of the older girls answered Captain Niall. “She hid?”

“Exactly! If one is hidden, one does not need to run. However, Miss Temminnick, that was not part of the lesson. So, let’s see you try again in a five-minute fray.” He pointed to three older girls Sophronia knew only by sight. “You’re the wolves. Begin!”

All three charged Sophronia, holding out their jelly-covered spoons. Sophronia dove to one side and broke sharply outside of spoon range. She hiked up her skirts, leapt over a shrub, and made for the high ground. One of the wolves got her dress caught in the shrub and tripped, falling to the side. The two others followed. Sophronia dashed to a boulder, scrabbling for the top.

The wolves did not coordinate or they would have had her easily. Instead, they each came after her alone. Sophronia kicked, which was considered quite shocking in a gentlewoman, but with her skirts hiked it gave her enough reach to stay out of spoon range. It was so unexpected the first wolf fell backward down the hill, her gooseberry jelly never even touching Sophronia’s leg.

Sophronia managed to push the last wolf away as the older girl went for her bodice. The wolf almost managed, but Sophronia twisted at the last minute and then, with a tremendous heave, leapt forward over her fallen opponent to land down the hill on the opposite side. She skidded around and took refuge behind a very spiky bush.

Sophronia was panting from the exertion, but still alive. She had a brief moment of elation, and then a wolf came to flush her out. Should have named this game fox and hound, thought Sophronia, bending double to avoid the jelly-covered spoon and charging her enemy headfirst. Surprised by a frontal attack, the other girl fell backward into a prickly briar.

Captain Niall called time.

“Interesting, Miss Temminnick. Ladies, what do you think?” He turned to the row of watching students.

“She showed her legs by hiking her skirts.”

“She kicked!”

“She charged with her head! Like a bull.”

“It was all very embarrassing.”

Sophronia stood at Captain Niall’s side and crossed her arms, panting. Certainly, she had conducted herself like neither a lady nor a rabbit, but Captain Niall hadn’t given them any particular rules about conduct, except to survive. She had survived, hadn’t she?

Captain Niall appeared to agree. “Miss Temminnick sought the high ground, a strategic choice if you know the number of opponents. Remember, however, that if there is a chance of reinforcements, the high ground exposes you to projectiles. Now, ladies, please jelly up your spoons and switch roles. Those who were rabbits are now wolves.”

Sophronia saw Dimity lick her spoon surreptitiously before passing it on. Dimity was awfully fond of gooseberries.

So it went, switching back and forth, rearranging rabbits versus wolves, until all were exhausted. By the end, everyone, even Sophronia, had died several jelly deaths. Dimity enacted a dramatic Shakespearean soliloquy at the combined spooning of Agatha and Preshea to a round of polite applause.

After two strenuous hours, with the girls all sore in the calf and blistered in the toe, the captain called a halt. They lined up to be lifted, in groups of five, aboard the airship. Sophronia was pushed to the back because she was being given the cold shoulder by nearly everyone. Sidheag, however, was hanging back intentionally, edging toward Captain Niall.

Sophronia faded into the darkness, pretending to have dropped her reticule.

“Sir, may I ask a word of advice?” Sidheag curtsied, bending her head too far forward.

“About the game, Lady Kingair?” Captain Niall gestured for her to rise.

“No, sir, it is a matter of pack. Things are unsettled in Kingair. I think he may be losing control.”

“He is one of the strongest Alphas in England.” Captain Niall smiled as though alluding to a shared joke. “There are some who would say even the queen’s own werewolf would lose three out of five challenges to your grandfather.”

“It’s not his strength I question; it’s the behavior of the rest of the pack.”

“They are Scottish.”

“But never have they been this angry.”

“Perhaps it’s the Giffard dirigible run. If there is even the possibility he could open the aetherosphere up to vampires, even if it’s only roves…” Captain Niall trailed off.

Sidheag filled in the rest. “Then werewolves have a right to be worried.”

Sophronia puzzled over this. It must have something to do with tethers. Currently, one of the greatest checks on vampire power was the fact that it was limited to specific territories. The more powerful the vampire, the more confined the territory. Werewolves, on the other hand, had a greater range, since their tether was to other members of the pack, rather than an exact location. This was how England had won an empire abroad; packs could fight in armies. Is there something about this dirigible flight that could change that dynamic? That’s far more significant than Vieve’s claims of shorter travel times. Vampires could be as mobile as werewolves if they tethered to aetherosphere-going dirigibles, possibly more so.

“I’ve always wondered why Professor Braithwope was the only floating vampire,” said Sidheag.

“He’s a bit of an experiment.”

Considering the vampire teacher’s silly mustache, Sophronia thought, Not only in that way. Are the vampires hoping to experiment further with Giffard’s new technology? Is someone trying to stop them? Vampires, to Sophronia, were mainly a concept rather than a practice—she hadn’t much experience with them. But she found the concept more palatable when she knew there were limits to their supernatural abilities. The werewolves, she must assume from this conversation, felt the same.

Sidheag said, “Do we consider the professor a successful experiment?”

Captain Niall touched the tall girl affectionately on one shoulder. “You know I can’t tell you that.”

“Of course.” Sidheag pressed one long finger to her mouth. Then, glancing around, she said, “Oh, dear, it looks like I’m the last.” The glass platform waited for her, so low Sidheag need only step up onto it.

“Not entirely. Miss Temminnick?” Captain Niall turned into the darkness to where Sophronia skulked.

She moved forward, not at all ashamed. This was, after all, what they were trained for. “Did you smell me or hear me?”

“Both. Even you cannot quiet your own heartbeat. And, as you have been told before, perfume will always work against you with the supernatural, unless you have scattered it everywhere.”

Sidheag, at least, seemed gratifyingly surprised to see her.

“What did you hear?” she hissed as Sophronia stepped up onto the platform next to her.

“Enough.”

“That’s personal pack business!”

“And I won’t mention any of it if you tell me everything you know about this possible vampire plot.”

“I can’t be seen talking to you.” The platform rose slowly toward the underbelly of the airship. At the same time, the massive craft lifted higher into the sky.

“Then you had better do it fast.”

“Has anyone ever told you you’re awful contrary, Sophronia?”

“Frequently. Now explain.”

“It seems the werewolves think the vampires are trying to master aetherosphere travel for themselves. There are rumors Giffard’s been funded by vampire backers. Even though he’s French.”

Sophronia’s mind whirled at the implications. “Is our school floating to town to support or fight this possibility?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“How do our visiting boys figure into this?”

Sidheag shrugged. “Bunson’s is pro Picklemen.”

Sophronia nodded. “And the Picklemen will want to control any aetherosphere travel for themselves.” She was thinking about the prototype kerfuffle at her sister’s ball. Both the government and the Picklemen had been after the technology then. “No wonder we are floating to town.”

“You think there’s going to be some kind of contest for control?” Sidheag nibbled her lips. The werewolves, as a rule, were uninterested in advancements in science that did not pertain to munitions. Sidheag had not been raised to think in terms of patent control or manipulation of technological discoveries.

Sophronia said, “I’m not sure what I think yet, but that seems likely.”

It was far easier to get around the ship with Vieve. Sophronia didn’t have to climb the exterior to avoid patrolling mechanicals. Vieve had an invention of her own devising, the obstructor, which froze a mechanical in its tracks long enough for two girls to slide around it.

They sped through the central student section and then into the forbidden section. Dangling red tassels all around demarcated the highly restricted forward segment of the ship, which included the teachers’ quarters, the record room, and… the boiler room. Everything was going smoothly, even the most dangerous part: passing the doors of slumbering teachers.

Then a loud whistle reverberated through the airship, picked up and repeated by every mechanical within range. They hadn’t had to use the obstructor for two hallways, so it couldn’t have been their fault. The alarm was triggered by some other miscreants out after hours.

The two girls squeezed behind a massive marble bust of Pan and a once-underdressed nymph in the corner. The nymph had been clothed in skirts and a lace hat, to make her more the thing. This meant there was plenty of room for concealment. Just in time, too, for doors to teachers’ rooms popped open and heads stuck out.

“Is there no peace for the naked?” Sister Mattie wore a bed cap of sensible white lace.

“I think you mean peace for the wicked,” corrected Lady Linette, wrapped in a voluminous silk robe of apple green trimmed in black velvet. Her hair was loose and flowing, her face free of paint. She looked lovely and fresh.

“Why would that apply?” asked Sister Mattie, before closing her door on both the problem and the noise.

“What’s going on?” The headmistress voiced that query, her rinsed red hair crowned by a great pink floof of crochet.

“I shouldn’t worry, Geraldine. It’s probably our young gentlemen guests.”

“I warned you no good would come of having boys on board!”

“Might have told that to me, mum, whot?” joked Professor Braithwope, shimmering out of his room fully clothed and dapper. His mustache was a fluffy caterpillar of curiosity, perched and ready to inquire, dragging the vampire along behind it on the investigation.

“Oh, Professor,” simpered Mademoiselle Geraldine, “you don’t count. You’re a gentleman, not a boy, and qualit-tay to boot.”

The vampire looked around the hallway, noting no mechanicals or culprits who might have set the alarm. He was the only one dressed, his boots mirror shiny and his trousers cut to perfection. Sophronia wondered how such a nobby little man could manage to fade to the background so often. It was a real skill.

“Where’s the revolution?”

“Student quarters, I suspect. One of the boys. Our girls know better than to risk it at night. Or they know how to avoid setting off alarms.” Sophronia could have sworn Lady Linette glanced in their direction.

The vampire nodded. “I’ll see to it, being as I’m all gussied up and proper for public consumption. Plus, put a bit of fear into those monkeys, wrath of a vampire, whot?”

“A most excellent notion, Professor.”

Sophronia, forgetting her own first encounter with the vampire, suppressed a giggle at the very idea of Professor Braithwope, with his quizzical mustache and undersized frame, putting the fear into anyone—except perhaps the fear of growing the wrong facial hair.

The alarm, painfully loud, continued. There was no maid nearby to receive shutdown protocols. Professor Braithwope hurried off, and the other teachers disappeared into their rooms, presumably to hide from the noise.

Sophronia and Vieve continued on their way, reassured that attention was directed elsewhere.

“What was that about?” Vieve wondered.

“Viscount Mersey might have taken something Pillover said after dinner as encouragement.”

“Sophronia, you didn’t plant ideas in that poor nobleman’s head? You are a naughty girl.”

“Where’s your aunt? I didn’t see her just now.”

“Down in the laboratory with Shrimpdittle, I think. They’re working on something together, despite bad blood over the prototype.”

“Is that the real reason the boys are on board, as cover for this project?”

“Possibly.”

“Vieve,” said Sophronia slowly, “how would vampires handle floating through the aetherosphere?”

“I’ve no idea. Ah, here we are.”

When entering the engineering chamber from the proper door, rather than the outside hatch, they came in from above onto a wide landing with the whole of the massive room spread out before them. Sophronia loved the view. It was so impressive, with multiple boilers flaming and smoking, engines and machines moving and sparking, sooties running between massive mounds of coal. Usually, two-thirds of the sooties slept during evening shift, but tonight everyone was awake. A full complement of supervisors stood guard—firemen, greasers, engineers, and coal runners. Something is definitely afoot. Or should one say “a soot”?

Sophronia and Vieve, unnoticed, made their way down the spiral staircase and through the crowds to the far corner of the room, ending up behind the coal pile that had long since become their regular meeting spot.

Soap was waiting, fairly vibrating with anticipation.

“What took you so long?”

“Someone set off the alarm.”

“Not you two? Never you two.” Soap’s faith was endearing.

“Course not. Sophronia set up a patsy to take the fall.”

Soap swung to look at her.

Sophronia smiled slyly. “What can I say? Boys need lessons sometimes.”

Soap arched an eyebrow at her.

“Not you, Soap. You’re not a real boy. But Felix is being difficult.”

“Felix, is it?” Soap did not look pleased.

“Lord Mersey, I mean,” Sophronia corrected herself.

Soap looked even less pleased.

Sophronia didn’t quite understand where she’d gone wrong. Soap was usually such a good-natured chap. She changed the subject. “So, what’s the surprise?”

Soap brightened. “We’re going undercover for the next three days. Weather not being obliging.”

“What do you mean? It’s been lovely for March.”

“Just so. We can’t go sailing to London all visible. So they brought out the steam machine. We’re going to white!”

“Well, that explains all the extra water that tube took on.”

“You saw that?” Soap looked away from Sophronia. “What else did you see?”

Sophronia tried to look more mysterious than embarrassed.

Vieve was not interested in innuendo—a new machine was about to be cranked up! “I’ve heard about it but never seen it in action.”

“I’ve only helped do it twice before,” said Soap. “Come watch.” He led them to sit atop a pile of coal. “Don’t interfere!” He shook a finger at Vieve.

The sooties wheeled out a massive apparatus, one that usually huddled at the back of the room. They arranged it to sit straddling the distribution hatch—a massive opening used to bring in coal and shovel out ash.

The contraption was hooked up to boilers and attached to a complex series of metal tubes, springs, and gears, the range of which charmed Vieve.

“Oh my goodness, is that an electrosplit goopslimer port? I do believe it is. And is that a Thrushbotham pip-monger swizzle sprocket? Oh, two swizzle sprockets!” Vieve was practically squeaking in excitement.

The machine was cranked up and began to puff.

Never before had Sophronia seen such a massive amount of steam at once. The boiler room filled with hot white moisture. All her curls fell flat—Mademoiselle Geraldine would be so upset.

There was a great deal of yelling and some crashing, and then the sooties had the device corked up. All the steam, one must presume, was now flowing outside the ship.

Soap sauntered over, hands deep in his pockets. The soot on his face was clumped and spotty from the steam, and he looked inordinately pleased with himself.

“Wanna see?”

“Of course!” said Sophronia and Vieve in unison.

Soap helped Sophronia down, and she was shocked by how large and strong his hand was. He led the way over to the small hatch Sophronia used on her solo visits.

They stuck their heads out and saw… nothing. Only white.

“We are our own cloud! Ingenious.” Sophronia was impressed. “And it will hold day or night, despite temperature shifts?”

“Of course!” Soap took this questioning as doubt of his own actions and integrity. “Designed by Professor Lefoux, this was! She don’t make mistakes, that one. Except bringing this bit of trouble on board.” Soap pulled off Vieve’s cap and ruffled her hair.

Vieve swatted him.

Sophronia nodded. “Thank you, Soap. This has been most entertaining. But we should be getting on.” She was profoundly relieved. At least for a while Dimity will be safe from attack. No one will be able to find her.

Soap looked surprised; normally Sophronia lingered. “You should? Right, then.” He led them back to the staircase. Vieve scampered up, but before Sophronia could follow, Soap touched her arm. “Who is this Felix chap?”

“Just an impossible boy. I shouldn’t let him bother you.”

“You need me to teach him any lessons? A little boxing ’round the ears?”

“That’s very kind, Soap, but I can fight my own battles.”

“I don’t like you fraternizing with boys. Ain’t normal.”

Sophronia quirked her head in amusement. “No? And here I was thinking that’s how society worked. Might as well learn the way of it.”

“Oh, you believe so?” Soap leaned in. Even though she stood on the first step, the sootie towered over her. He smelled of wet coal and engine oil. It must be quite strong, as it seemed to be affecting her breathing. He leaned in, his normally cheerful face quite serious. “I could teach you a bit.”

He was so close, Sophronia thought for one delusional moment that he intended to actually kiss her on the mouth! Imagine that? Soap! Instead he reached for her arm, the exposed piece between glove and sleeve where his filthy hand would not soil her dress. He raised it to his face and kissed her just there, his lips impossibly soft.

Sophronia froze. But I don’t think of Soap like that was her first reaction, and then she felt a tiny bit of annoyance. Why would he want to complicate our friendship? And then caution. It’s up to me to ensure he doesn’t.

She recovered her powers of movement and extracted her arm gently. She decided to take his overture as a jest, a mockery of polite society, and laugh it off. “Oh, Soap, you are silly.”

Jaunty Soap was instantly back. “See what I mean? I can teach you.”

“Very gallant,” Sophronia said, smiling and backing up, almost tripping over the next step up. Look at me, made clumsy by a sootie! “It’s not exactly the lesson I need, however.”

“I’m thinking it’s the same kind of lesson this Felix is after.”

Feeling she had entirely lost control of the conversation, Sophronia did as Captain Niall had so recently instructed; she ran away.

When Sophronia caught up to Vieve, the girl was trotting purposefully down the hall, obstructor at the ready. It was proving unnecessary, as the mechanicals had all been diverted elsewhere. Probably to monitor the boys.

“Can we swing by your aunt’s classroom on our way back?”

“Need something?” Vieve’s mind ever jumped to supplies.

“No. Didn’t you say your aunt and the visiting professor were holed up there?”

“You want to see what they are up to?” Vieve changed course and headed toward the teaching area outside the tassel zone, rather than across to the student residences.

You have reached the end of this Free Preview, but the story doesn’t end here…

Curtsies & Conspiracies

Coming November 5th 2013.

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New York Times bestselling author Gail Carriger writes to cope with being raised in obscurity by an expatriate Brit and an incurable curmudgeon. She survived her early years by reading most of her local library and memorizing Greek battles. Eventually she escaped small-town life and inadvertently acquired several degrees of Higher Learning. In pursuit of further finishing, Ms. Carriger traveled the historic cities of Europe, subsisting entirely on biscuits secreted in her handbag. The Finishing School series is Gail’s first foray into young adult fiction. In it, she travels back to a time before the Parasol Protectorate, explaining the mysteries of this steampunk world and visiting a few old friends. Gail now resides in the Colonies, where she is surrounded by fantastic shoes and insists on tea imported from London.

Etiquette & Espionage, the first book in the Finishing School series, is available now, however books are sold.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright

Dedication

Table of Contents

The 1st Test: Dangerous Puddings

The 2nd Test: Results Disorientated

The 3rd Test: Diamonds from Sooties

The 4th Test: Flirting with Conspiracies

The 5th Test: Flirting with Deceit

About the Author