Her Sky Cowboy Part 32

She turned and saw Tucker lagging behind, jaw clenched in dogged determination, complexion ashen. Blooming h.e.l.l, she'd been running full-out and he'd been hot on her heels. Until now. "Your wound!" How could she have forgotten?

"I'm fine." He caught up in three long strides. "Just don't get out of my sight. How can I protect you if...Oh, Christ. Never mind." Irritated, though she wasn't sure why, he glanced around. "Sure you're going the right way?"

"Yes," she said, moving on at a slower pace. "I've studied maps. I recognize landmarks. I know where the cave is, the secret workshop. I just don't know how to access the secret chamber." She stopped at a stone marker. "Cava Sarti is that way." She turned in the opposite direction. "So our cave is just over here. I'm surprised we haven't spotted more tourists." In fact, she hadn't spied another soul. "I was under the impression that, given its history, Mount Ceceri was a popular destination."

"Typically is," Tucker said, glancing up at the ominous sky. "Weather scared everyone off, I suspect. Looks like a d.a.m.ned cyclone is gearing up."

Just then b.a.l.l.s of hail rained down, a.s.saulting them like icy minicannonb.a.l.l.s.

"Crikey," Amelia complained. "Ouch!"

Tucker grasped her arm. "Take cover."

"No, wait! There!" Her heart pounded as she moved toward the last landmark. "The vine-covered wall. That's the entrance."

They both tore at the ancient twisted vines as b.a.l.l.s of ice continued to pound.

"Nothing but stone!" Tucker yelled over the wind and hail.

"Keep looking!" It had to be here. Her fingers ached and her palms stung as sharp twigs and burrs poked and scratched. Then, without warning, a portion of the wall swung open and Amelia careened face-first into a dark, musty cave.

Tucker followed and pulled her to her feet. "You okay?"

"Spectacular." After the motor chase, the full-out run over rocky hillside, being a.s.saulted by hail, and now this...every muscle ached. Her head throbbed and her hands stung. She couldn't imagine how Tucker felt, what with the gunshot wound. "What about you?"

"Ducky."

Amelia's lip quirked. The irritation she'd felt toward Tucker had evaporated the moment they'd made haste and fallen into this cave. This moment she burst with antic.i.p.ation and wonder. She spun in a circle. "Can't see a thing."

"Hold on."

A beam of light burst forth.

Amelia gawked at the tubular device in Tucker's palm. "What is it?"

"An electric torch. Compliments of Mod technology. Bought it on the black market." He dipped back into his coat. "Here's one for you." He thumbed a switch and pa.s.sed her the flameless torch.

She squinted into the lit end. Some sort of lens and bulb. "Astounding. I must know how it works."

"I love that you must know, and I'll be happy to explain. Some other time." He flashed the beam across the dirt floor and stone walls. "Workshop, huh?"

No shelves. No tools. No tables. No evidence of a workshop at all. "Long deserted, I suppose." She flashed her own torch about. "Not what I expected."

"Maybe this is the wrong cave."

"No."

"Maybe this is the secret chamber. Well hidden. Difficult access."

"Do you see an ornithopter?" she asked, unable to keep the sarcasm from her voice. "You know, a man-size, wing-flapping device?"

He didn't answer.

She turned to find him staring at one of the walls. "What is it?" she asked whilst he sleeved away dust and grime.

"Markings."

"Like hieroglyphics?" She moved in beside him and flashed her torch on the wall. "Oh."

"Yeah."

Sketches and writing. Calculations and codes. Definitely da Vinci.

"It's as if he used this wall like a blackboard."

Her skin p.r.i.c.kled with excitement. "Can you make out any of the words?"

"Not really. They're pretty faded." He moved along the wall. "Fascinating. This one's almost three-dimensional. More of a carving than a sketch. See the strange indentation here? Looks familiar. A circle filled with clockwork and a cannon shooting...flowers?"

"What?" She fumbled her torch and caught it before it hit the ground, then crowded in next to Tucker. "Where?"

"Here."

She was too short to see it straight on, so he swung his arm around her waist and hoisted her up. She shone her torch next to his. "I don't believe it!"

"What?"

"My astronomical compendium!" She wiggled about, reaching under her coat into her inner vest pocket.

Tucker grunted.

"Your shoulder. Good heavens, put me down." The moment her feet touched down she whipped out her compendium. "Look!"

With both torches now s.h.i.+ning on the back of the gold disk that served as both sundial and compa.s.s, Tucker whistled. "Perfect match. Where'd you get it?"

"Papa. Gave it to me for my tenth birthday. Said it was a family heirloom. You don't suppose Briscoe gave it to him, do you?"

"Your pa never mentioned?"

"No. Just said it was his most prized possession. But he said that about a lot of things. Like the top hat he gave me. He was sentimental that way." She flipped open the compendium. "You can see how old it is. How simple the workings are, but..." She flashed her light along the sketches and calculations on the cave walls. "It couldn't be this old, could it?"

"What if, along with the letter," Tucker said, borrowing the compendium, "Briscoe pa.s.sed along the key to the secret chamber?"

Her lungs seized as he matched up the back of the compendium with the indented carving on the wall and pressed it in like a puzzle piece. "It couldn't be that simple," she rasped.

"Sometimes it is." The wall groaned, dust spit, and the section in front of them gave way.

Anxious and mesmerized, Amelia burst in and..."Arrrrrrgh!"

"What the h.e.l.l?"

"Spiderwebs! In my face and my fingers! Are there spiders in my hair? Get them out! Get them off!"

"Hold still. Jesus." He laughed while sweeping away the silky, creepy webs.

"It's not funny!"

"After all you've been through today, you're terrified of a few teeny spiders? Well, at least I can save you from something. There. Gone. No cobwebs. No spiders. Well, one." Stomp. "None. All clear."

"I hate spiders."

"Obviously."

"Stop laughing."

"Yes, ma'am."

"Let's just roll the ornithopter out of here and...Where is it?" She flashed her torch around the chamber. The teeny, tiny chamber. "No ornithopter could fit in here."

"Unless it was a miniature model."

Amelia squeezed in beside Tucker. There, nestled in a recessed cubby about the height and width of her forearm, was a wooden model of an intricate ornithopter. Her heart danced even as it shattered. "I thought...I dreamed of flying it into London and making a grand entrance."

"It's magnificent."

"Magnificently small."

"Not the size of the instrument that matters. It's what you do with it."

"Good things come in small packages?"

"I was talking about the ornithopter."

"So was I." Smiling to herself, she leaned in as far as she could and shone light over the model. "It reminds me of one of his later sketches. Only...No, it's different. Look at the way the wings...Tucker?" He was no longer beside her. Panicked, she spun around. "Where are you? What are you..." He was standing at the opposing wall, back to her, studying...Oh, no! She rushed over. "Don't touch it! Don't look!"

"It's a codex."

"What?" She didn't want to look. She promised not to look, but she couldn't help herself. A book. Tucker was carefully turning the pages of an ancient book. Leonardo da Vinci had written several codices throughout his life. Their subjects ranged from botany to weaponry to mathematics and flight, to name a very few. Drawing and musings and..."That sketch. It's similar to-"

"Briscoe Darcy's time machine."

"The clockwork propulsion...Oh, Tucker."

"Fascinating."

"Don't read it. Can you read it? You said speaking and reading Italian were two different animals." She squinted at the cramped scrawl. "The writing's backward or upside down, or maybe both. I can't tell. Please say you can't tell." Amelia broke out in a full-body sweat. She eyed the skinny empty cubby in the wall. "Put it back."

"If I went back in time I could change things. Bring back Ida. Save Lily."

"Ida tried to manipulate you. Tried to shoot you. You're not to blame for her death, Tucker. And Lily?" Amelia palmed her forehead. "Lily's alive. You want to return to America for her, remember? I mean...You're talking crazy, Tucker. Is it your shoulder?" She shoved aside the lapel of his leather coat and shone the light on him. "You're bleeding through your bandages. Through your s.h.i.+rt! Blast! Put the codex back. We have to get you to Doc!"

"I'm not crazy, and I'm not delirious," he said, gaze fixed on the pages. "Not saying I want to use this information, but it d.a.m.n well fuels the imagination. Christ almighty, Amelia, it's Leonardo da Vinci's codex on time travel. Aren't you curious?"

"No. Yes. Of course I'm curious. But I don't want to know. I don't want to be tempted. One Darcy already tampered with the natural march of time and look how that turned out. The Peace War. A globe divided into Old Worlders and New Worlders. Mods and Vics. Freaks-an altered race that has no rights."

Tucker raised a brow. "Thought you were a staunch New Worlder committed to saving the world from rack and ruin? Advanced knowledge could go a long way toward creating utopia."

His words slammed into her like an iron hammer, shaking her belief system. She licked her lips and searched her heart and mind. "I've decided flexibility in certain matters is wise and henceforth will determine my actions according to specific circ.u.mstances." Similar to his own belief. "And in this circ.u.mstance-"

"Let sleeping dogs lie." His lip twitched and he shot her a look that said they were in accord. "Grab the ornithopter."

Gloriously relieved, she watched as he slid the codex back into the stone cubby. She grabbed the ornithopter. "Let's get out of here." She zipped back out into the main cave, alarmed by the sounds of the mounting storm. "Make the wall close!"

"I need your compendium."

Ornithopter secured tenderly in one arm, she tossed him the ancient compa.s.s. "Listen."

"Don't hear anything."

"Exactly. The eye of the storm? It must be Dunkirk. Close the chamber. Hurry! He cannot know of the codex. If he wants the ornithopter-"

"No, G.o.ddammit. Wait-"

"I'll distract him. Close the b.l.o.o.d.y chamber!"

"Amelia!"

Committed to saving the world in her own way, she dashed outside...and into the arms of the Scottish Shark of the Skies.

CHAPTER 32.

"This is the invention of historical significance?" Captain Colin Dunkirk frowned at the priceless model now in his unscrupulous possession. "Hardly seems worth the trouble, yeah?"

Tuck smiled up at the b.a.s.t.a.r.d who'd gotten the best of him and Amelia, trussing them good and tight to a cypress tree. "Then why bother?" His shoulder hurt like a mother. His jaw throbbed from being coldc.o.c.ked with the b.u.t.t of a blunderbuss, but by G.o.d, he refused to show vulnerability. Next to him, Amelia trembled with fury or fear. Probably both.

The pirate smiled back and hunkered down to eye level. "Let me list the reasons. One: I dinnae like ya, Gentry. Respect ya, but dinnae like ya. Two: Ya stole the la.s.s away. I like the la.s.s. A lot. Three: Ya set fire to me s.h.i.+p. Revenge is sweet. Four-and most important: Someone's paying me a substantial reward for this little treasure."

"Who?" Amelia blurted.

His smile broadened. "A mutual acquaintance, la.s.s."