Page 27 of Only Cold Depths
According to our tablets, the temperature was on the chilly side, so we both donned long gray cloaks over our regular clothes to keep warm and hide our weapons. I’d used up all my supplies making my disguise on Tropics 44, so Kyrion and I couldn’t change our hair or eye color, and plastipaper noses and scars would probably freeze to our faces. I didn’t like leaving the ship without some sort of disguise, but we didn’t have a choice.
We hoisted our duffel bags onto our shoulders.
“You ready?” Kyrion asked.
“Now or never.” I repeated my quip from earlier, but this time, he didn’t grin back at me.
Kyrion hit a green button on the wall, and the cargo-bay ramp lowered. “Standard operating procedure. If anything feels off, we retreat to the ship and leave.”
We strode down to the ground, and then Kyrion hit some buttons on his tablet, raising the ramp and engaging the ship’s defensive shield.
The wind slapped me in the face, stinging my cheeks and whipping my hair around my shoulders. The air was bitingly cold, with a faint metallic tang that hinted that snow was on the way. Even though Sygnustern was a Temperate planet and it was technically late summer, the mountains were high enough that wintry weather was always a possibility. I shivered and tucked my chin down into the top of my cloak, trying to find some extra warmth.
Several other ships had also landed at the spaceport, and we fell in with a line of people entering the main building. Kyrion and I both pulled out our tablets and showed our fake IDs as we moved from one checkpoint to another. Kyrion was masquerading as Baron Christian Alejandro Rowell Evanston, while I was his wife, Baroness Sophie-Anne Parker Linley Evanston.
I held my breath every time a guard scanned our tablets, but the lights flashed green one after another, and the guards waved us forward with bored looks. I sent a silent thanks to Daichi, who had created the new fake IDs. Daichi’s work was always impeccable, even if he had given me and Kyrion long, outrageous names taken from the romance serials he watched.
We exited the spaceport and stepped into a busy area filled with transports. Most people had their heads down, their eyes fixed on their tablets, as they hurried toward their next destination, but several folks were lined up along a permaglass railing, taking photos and videos of the stunning views of the surrounding mountains.
Kyrion and I headed in that direction. He pulled out his tablet, pretending to take photos while he scanned the crowd, looking for threats. I used my own tablet to plot a route to the rendezvous coordinates.
“We’re supposed to meet Asterin on that mountain.” I pointed at a peak directly opposite this one. “Want to try a bridge? Walking might be quicker than taking a gondola.”
Kyrion peered over the side of the railing. His face took on a slightly greenish tint, his stomach gurgled, and the sticky cobweb in my mind bristled with unease.
My eyebrows lifted in surprise. “Don’t tell me the great Kyrion Caldaren, one of the most notorious killers and feared warriors in all the galaxy, is afraid of heights.”
Kyrion straightened up and peered down his nose at me, morphing into the arrogant Regal lord and deadly Arrow I knew so well. “I amnotafraid of heights. Merely of plummeting to my death from them.”
I laughed and threaded my arm through his. A reluctant grin crooked his lips, and he bent down so that his mouth was close to my ear.
“No matter what happens, I’m glad I’m here with you, Vesper,” Kyrion said in a low, husky voice.
Emotion clogged my throat, and it took me a moment to respond. “Me too.”
Arm in arm, we followed the signs to the nearest gondola station, bought tickets, and climbed on board. Unlike gondolas I had seen on other planets, which were only single cars, this one featured several cars all linked together like a train so passengers could move back and forth between the compartments.
We found some seats in the corner and put our backs to the glass. Several folks eyed us, and my heart rose in my throat, matching the gondola’s slow motion. Had someone recognized us?
Across the aisle, a little girl tugged on her mother’s sleeve. “Mama, why are their clothes so dull?”
“Shhh!” the mother hissed, shooting us an apologetic look. “Remember, we don’t comment on what outsiders wear.”
Dull clothes? Outsiders? I glanced around the gondola car. Everyone was bundled up in thick coats or cloaks, along with hats, scarves, and gloves, but Kyrion and I were the only people dressed in dark, drab gray. Everyone else was sporting the same jewel-toned colors as the permaglass domes that topped the mountains. Intricate patterns were also woven into the bright, cheerful fabrics, everything from snowflakes and icicles to cursive letters to hammers, axes, and other tools. Not patterns—sigils, just like the ones the Regals used to distinguish their Houses.
Kyrion and I had wanted to blend in, but our plain clothes made us stick out.
“So much for going incognito,” he muttered.
I grimaced, but there was nothing we could do. Not wearing the cloaks would make us even more noticeable, given the chilly temperature.
A few more folks stared at us, but most people focused on either their tablets or the amazing views as the gondola quickly, smoothly climbed over to the neighboring mountain.
Fifteen minutes later, the gondola glided into its station, and the doors slid back. Once again, Kyrion and I fell in with the flow of people. Unlike the section in front of the spaceport, which was clearly for travelers, this was part of the actual city of Gewitter. Most folks were walking to their destination, but some zipped by on vehicles that were a cross between hoverbikes and snowmobiles. Several horse-drawn carriages decked out with silver bells jingle-jangled merrily over the cobblestones, with the passengers in the open-air vehicles wrapped up in blankets to ward off the cold.
I checked my tablet. Still no warnings from Asterin, so I called up the rendezvous coordinates again and pointed to the left. “Asterin’s workshop is that way.”
“Let’s go,” Kyrion said, his gaze flicking back and forth, studying everyone around us. “The sooner we get there, the better.”
