Cousin Da’Niel. Another Detmuk cousin, although he wasn’t Draenelynn’s brother.
Pip waved before she rested a hand on the quivering horse to brace herself.
She was actually going to survive.
The pressure wavesof explosions battered Fieran’s magic and shoved at his gliding aeroplane. Ahead of him, Merrik’s aeroplane jerked and bobbed in the competing air currents, the elevators and ailerons flapping as Merrik fought to keep his biplane steady.
Without their engines propelling them, their momentum wasn’t carrying them away fast enough, especially as they lostair speed trying to keep their aeroplanes steady in the battering. Nor could they turn quickly enough to fly at a right angle to the crash. The airship was crashing down right on top of them.
They needed power and fast. The magical power cell was drained, but Fieran had the magic to power it. Could he refill it on the fly? The magical cells didn’t take that much magic.
He let a trickle of his magic flow down the control column. Finding the engine wiring, he followed it back to where the magical power cell rested.
He tried to ease his magic into it, but the various dampeners and restrictors that kept the magic of the ancient kings controlled now created a barrier between his magic and the power cell. Without being properly loaded and locked into a refilling machine, he would likely blow it up if he tried to forcibly fill it.
Did he have to actually fill the power cell? He could simply send his magic around the wires to power the engine himself, couldn’t he? He’d have to be careful not to burn out the wiring, but he could keep his magic under control.
He let his magic flow the other way, along the wires to flow into the engine. The wires directed his magic around and around, creating magi-magnetism that sent the rotary engine spinning. The more the engine spun, the more it almost seemed to eagerly take in his magic. It wasn’t the greedy, relentless pull of that Mongavarian machine, but it was automatic enough that he didn’t have to concentrate as much on his magic once he had the process going.
With a whir, his propeller whipped the air again. The radio crackled to life, voices bursting in a cacophony in his ears.
He whooped and dove his aeroplane toward Merrik’s. As his aeroplane had power, he overtook Merrik within a second.
Merrik was focused ahead as he struggled with his aeroplane. He flicked a glance at Fieran, then glanced again, his eyes widening.
Fieran swept closer until their aeroplanes were nearly wingtip to wingtip, throttling back so that he was barely more than gliding once again. He stretched out a line of his magic, clamping down on it with a familiarly tight control. Growing up, he’d used his magic in small amounts for something fiddly more often than he’d fully unleashed it.
It was a good thing this was so familiar. A strange, lingering tiredness weighed him down.Thiswas what it felt like to have a significant amount of his magic depleted, even if he still had more.
If he was this drained, how much more were Merrik and Tiny? They’d had that machine drawing from them for a shorter amount of time, but they also didn’t have the magical reserves that he did.
His magic latched on to the protective wiring surrounding Merrik’s aeroplane, eagerly dancing over it as it was designed to do. Fieran had to grit his teeth and shove harder to force his magic to jump from the wire to the aeroplane itself.
Flaming debris clunked against his fuselage. Something larger plummeted straight through Merrik’s left wings, punching holes in both the upper and lower wing. Merrik’s aeroplane bobbled but he kept it from flipping.
A great shadow fell over Fieran’s aeroplane, an intense heat prickling the back of his neck. He didn’t dare glance up to see how close the falling body of the airship was.
His magic found one of Merrik’s machine guns, and he followed the trigger system down to the solenoid, then back toward the engine.
There. He poured more of his magic into Merrik’s engine until it spun, roaring back to life.
As soon as the propeller spun up, Merrik’s aeroplane shot forward. Together, the two of them made a dash for clear skies. All around them, fiery debris fluttered through the air, pieces of metal stabbing downward. Dark smoke clouded the sky, choking with the stench of burning fuel, heated steel, and other things that shouldn’t be burning.
Then Fieran and Merrik burst into a brighter sky, the air clearing around them. With a groan of twisting metal and the whoosh of flames, the dying airship plummeting past them, far too close behind their tails for comfort.
“Status report.” Fieran gripped the control column as he powered both his and Merrik’s aeroplanes farther from the wrecked airship.
“Fieran!” The chorus of voices filled the radio, drowning out anything Merrik or Tiny might have said.
“We couldn’t reach you on the radio!”
“We thought you were caught by the airship!”
“What happened?”
“Is Merrik all right?”
“We’re both fine.” Fieran certainly hoped that was the case. When he glanced at the other aeroplane, Merrik’s face was even paler than usual, his jaw tight. “That machine took the power from our engines, but it’s fine. I’m powering both aeroplanes now. Tiny, Merrik, that machine got a hold of your magic too. How drained are you?”
