Page 10 of Stalk the Sky

Pip froze at the entrance of the corridor for a moment. How many female pilots had there been? There had been two female mechanics, and she had seen quite a few females among the pilots. Were there enough rooms here for everyone? Was she going to have to share?

Forcing herself to move, Pip checked the first doors on either side. The door on the left led to the lavatory while the door on the right was to the showers, some of which were already claimed with their curtains drawn closed and water running.

Pip let that door fall closed, then gathered herself to knock on the next door in the row.

A door three down to the left opened, and a female elf with long brown hair and brown eyes stuck her head out. She glanced around, then gestured to Pip as a smile lit her face. “Pippak, right? You are in here with me.”

A roommate. Not the worst thing ever, as long as she wasn’t the snooty sort.

Pip made her way down the corridor, then stepped into the room. It was sparse with two stone-posted beds—little better than cots, really—with ropes strung between the stone frame to hold up the thin mattress. A narrow wooden cupboard was set against the wall at the foot of each bed.

The brown-haired elf plopped onto the bed on the left. “I am Aylia Daemaer.” Instead of a more traditional elven greeting involving fingertips touched to forehead and lips, the elf stuck out her hand for an Escarlish handshake.

Pip shook her hand. “Pippak Detmuk-Inawenys. But you can call me Pip.” If they were going to be roommates for as long as they were both stationed at Dar Goranth, the nickname was probably the easiest, even if she didn’t know Aylia well yet.

“Ooh, a nickname!” Aylia’s grin widened further. “I find the human concept of nicknames so fascinating. Do dwarves usually have nicknames too?”

“It isn’t as common as among humans, but not unheard of either.” Pip set her pack on the bed, then opened the cupboard.

There were a few hooks for her things, then some shelves at both the top and the bottom. She wouldn’t be able to reach the top shelves, unless she stood on the bottom shelves or reached from the bed, so she wouldn’t put much there if she could help it.

She hung up her spare set of coveralls, then glanced over her shoulder at Aylia. The elf seemed fairly straightforward, so Pip was just going to ask rather than beat around the bush in a more elven manner. “You don’t mind sharing a room with a half-dwarf?”

Aylia’s grin didn’t falter. “Not at all. I volunteered to share with you. I figured you would be more fun than sharing with some of the others.” She glanced at the closed door, leaned forward, and lowered her voice. “A few of the others come from noble families. The ones in room eight are especially snooty. I would avoid them if I were you.”

“Thanks for the warning.” Pip stashed the rest of her clothes onto the bottom shelves.

It wasn’t too surprising that a few of the elven pilots had the typical snooty elf attitude, especially when it came to elven nobility. There was a small but vocal minority who was still pushing King Weylind to ensure that his children married pure elves, given that all of King Weylind’s siblings had not married elves.

Not that such a prejudicial attitude was confined to the elves. There was an element among the trolls who wanted Prince Rhohen to marry a pure troll to strengthen his bloodline after it had been “tainted” by Queen Melantha’s elven blood.

The humans of Escarland were less concerned about that and more worried about what would happen to their monarchy if the heir to the throne married a longer-lived race and suddenly a monarch would live unexpectedly longer than was the norm for a human. They were already dealing with the ramifications of King Averett’s extra-long reign due to him being an elf friend.

But while the other races certainly held discriminatory attitudes, the elven nobility—with their need to be superior in everything—had seemingly gone out of their way to perfect their prejudices to the point it wasn’t just an attitude but a foundational character trait.

“No problem.” Aylia waved airily.

Pip climbed onto the bottom shelf, stretched as high as she could reach, and delicately placed the carved wooden train her brother Mak had made for her on the top shelf where she would see it every time she opened the locker. The little train had, thankfully, survived the attack on Fort Linder unscathed.

She added her bag and closed the locker, her throat unexpectedly tight. She never thought she’d miss Chelsea and the other flirtatious nurses, secretaries, and telephone operators at Fort Linder. But they had shown unexpected depths during the attack, rushing to their stations and doing their jobs with just as much bravery as anyone else on base.

Here, she had a corridor filled with prissy elves for companions. Command over Flight B’s mechanics. Not even any aeroplanes for her to maintain just yet.

This stint at Dar Goranth would be more of a challenge than she’d expected.

Chapter

Four

Fieran stepped into the cavernous space that served as the officer’s mess hall. Just like on the airship, the two mess halls were set on either side of the kitchens so that one industrial kitchen complex could serve both.

The officer’s mess was on the outside of the mountain so that a bank of small, slitted windows let in light and glimpses of the airships hovering over the harbor. The poor enlisted men simply got a cavern with no windows.

Fieran joined the line for food behind Tiny and Stickyfingers, with Merrik and Lije behind him. Pretty Face had wandered off to who knew where. He’d wander back once he got hungry enough.

The food the brawny troll men and women working in the kitchens slapped on Fieran’s tray seemed edible enough. Far more edible than the food often served at Fort Linder, at any rate. Some kind of fish, a side of veggies, and a potato. Simple but hearty.

As the island’s location meant that all food except fish had to be imported, they would probably be eating a lot of fish while stationed here.

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