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  CAPTAIN ANDREW’S FLYING CHRISTMAS

  Housemaid Linet Fenna would rather be an air pirate than a servant. When she finds the ladder to an airship dangling outside her garret window on Christmas Eve, 1892, she ascends to the skies above London on her late father’s flagship dirigible, the Christmas. The new captain is someone she never expected to see again, a dangerous, sexy foe. Is the Fenna family nemesis offering Linet her heart’s desire or a dastardly trap?

  Captain Andrew’s motivations are as foggy as the coal-soaked sky. Prime Minister Gladstone’s Blockaders, a horde of automen and a teenage girl named Hatchet want Linet to fail in her quest to discover what happened to her missing family, but she is determined to have a happy Christmas.

  What others are saying about Captain Andrew’s Flying Christmas

  "5 Stars! Steampunk adventure at its finest." - Shoshanna Evers

  “CAPTAIN ANDREW'S FLYING CHRISTMAS is my favorite type of holiday offering: short, sweet, and noncaloric!” – E.M. Flynn

  Captain Andrew’s Flying Christmas

  By Heather Hiestand

  Copyright Heather Hiestand 2011

  Smashwords Edition

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

  CAPTAIN ANDREW’S FLYING CHRISTMAS

  COPYRIGHT 2011 by Heather Hiestand

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission of the author or Coffee on Sundays Press except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

  Contact Information: [email protected]

  Cover Art by Delle Jacobs

  Coffee on Sundays Press

  Visit us at http://www.coffeeonsundays.info

  Publishing History

  First Smashwords Edition, 2011

  ISBN 978-1-4661-7489-4

  Published in the United States of America

  DEDICATION

  For Andy

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  Thank you to Viola Estrella, Mary Jo and David Hiestand and Elizabeth Flynn for editing this story. Thank you to Delle Jacobs for the inspirational cover. Thank you to Andy for listening to this story when I first imagined it. Thank you to Leander for the library time.

  CHAPTER ONE

  London, December 24, 1892

  Linet Fenna shivered in her attic bedroom as she stared out the open window. Downstairs, all was merry and bright with evergreen branches, mistletoe and handmade garlands festooning trees and mantles. Under the eaves here, wind blew through a crack in the undecorated wall and rustled in the chimneys above.

  A fever had made the first housemaid take to bed just after breakfast and Linet, the second housemaid, had been run ragged all day by her demanding mistress and her ever-arriving family. Now, finally done with work, she just wanted to stare at the stars and dream.

  “Close the window,” Ann-Marie said, coughing from her iron bedstead in the darkest corner of the room.

  “In a minute.” Linet took one last breath of chilly air and had her hand on the sill when she heard a metallic chugging in the distance. The sound came from outside, and wasn’t likely to be Father Christmas.

  The automen who secured England for Prime Minister Gladstone had yet to master the skies. Linet had once known the world above the streets well, as daughter of the famed smuggler Rhys Fenna. Some had called him a sky pirate, and his neck had been broken on a gibbet three Boxing Days ago. She had become a maid of all work to support herself in the aftermath of his death. This position in a larger home had seemed a blessing at first until she realized she’d moved into a house owned by an automen manufacturer. The factory, only steps away, belched smoke and steam into the air at all hours, and it kept the brass fist of authority ever alive in her mind.

  As Ann-Marie coughed behind her, Linet pulled at the tight high collar of her black dress and leaned forward into the open window, looking for the source of the sound. She darted back a step instinctively when something pinged against the glass above her head. A bird? Surely none were about at this late hour.

  When she looked up, the astonishing sight took her back three years. No wonder she’d heard chugging. “A ladder?” she whispered.

  “What?” Ann-Marie croaked.

  “Nothing, go to sleep.” Linet hurried to the washstand by the sick girl’s bed and blew out the candle. “There, that’s better. You need to rest. I can’t manage alone with all these guests.”

  “Do you want to go to sleep so soon?”

  “Of course. That will make Father Christmas come all the sooner.” She felt the girl’s forehead. Not dangerously hot, thankfully.

  “He doesn’t come for the likes of us,” Ann-Marie muttered. A rustling told Linet she had turned over.

  Linet dashed back to the window. Yes, a rope ladder, just like the ones she’d climbed thousands of times to her father’s dirigible, the Christmas, dangled outside, a little lower now. Ladders had been the staircases of her life until she was seventeen, carrying her from earth to sky, larceny to freedom.

  Who had found her? Her father had enemies, to be sure, but no enemy would be visiting her on Christmas Eve. No one from her old life had crossed her path in all this time. Perhaps her sister Terrwyn had finally reappeared?

  She reached through the window and grabbed the ladder, then frowned. That knot with a gash on the left side looked familiar. One run was painted red, the next, green. Her gaze rose, unbelieving.

  The Christmas tossed gently, grandly, merrily, on the wind, the green and red-striped balloon over the deck radiating holiday cheer. She watched the propellers turn for a minute, dumbfounded. It must be Terrwyn. How had she assumed command? Linet had thought the airship gone forever, melted down or torn apart with a brass fist. The last time she’d seen the Christmas a dozen Blockaders were flying it toward their fortress along the southern coast. The authorities would have no reason to take it into London to look for her. She’d broken no laws since the night she left her father’s house.

  With hope overriding caution, she grasped the first rung then climbed onto the windowsill to begin her ascent. No one above could hear her over the engine, so she’d have to go up to discover who was on deck. Hand over hand she climbed, smelling the familiar odors of tar and paint. Winter winds buffeted her, stinging her eyes, bringing forth tears. These tears certainly were not the result of memories of this same ladder, the family now scattered or dead that had once been waiting at the top. No, she had a forest beast’s tough hide after all this time.

  The breeze pushed her against the hull with a sudden show of force. A thick oak splinter caught at the Oxford shirting of her dress, tearing a vent in her sleeve. She winced as it scratched her skin. The Christmas needed maintenance.

  When she reached the railing, she discovered the familiar forest green paint cracked and weathered. The entire hull needed a good touch-up, but of course the crew who knew the airship well had been dispersed, at least those who hadn’t been hanged with her father. Damn that Shakespear Andrew. He
r father’s greatest friend and rival had become his murderer, when he’d given the Blockaders the location of her father’s hideaway in Hastings near the Stade.

  She’d never known what turned a friendly rivalry into betrayal, or why Captain Andrew had chosen December to betray him, the cruelest deception of all against his holiday-loving friend.

  When she saw the familiar blue-black hair of Captain Andrew appear above the railing, she nearly lost her grip on the ladder. Was this vision or reality? She blinked but the image of the man didn’t waver. Her first instinct was a friendly greeting. Until that horrible December he’d always treated her kindly, and she hadn’t seen him since. Now though, he was a deadly enemy. What she wouldn’t give for a dagger in her teeth to prove the point.

  As she gripped the ladder, unsure whether to go up or head down, the dastardly man’s mouth widened into a smile above his Van Dyke beard. A full set of white choppers saluted her. Her lips pulled back in a wild grimace as her stomach clenched.

  Wait, that couldn’t be Andrew. He had lost an eyetooth in a pub brawl in Calais. Her sweaty palms slipped on the hemp before she tightened her fingers.

  The man doffed his felted green tricorn hat, a mockery of an admiral’s hat with a holly badge on one side.

  “Who are you?” Her chilled fingers had gone white from the force she used to grasp the rope. She blew on them, staring at the apparition above her.

  “Captain Andrew the younger, Miss Fenna.”

  Once he said it, she realized how young this Captain Andrew was. “Elmo? The last time I saw you, blood was running down your nose and your arms were covered with scabs.”

  He cleared his throat. “That’s Erasmus. Always a brawler.”

  She’d never liked the meaty boy a couple years older than she, but he’d grown as handsome as his father now. “Three years has changed you.”

  “It has been a long time,” he agreed. He reached a strong, tanned hand toward her. The sleeves of his green wool coat were banded with red embroidery.

  “That’s my father’s coat.” Sick horror curdled her belly. What game was this, and on Christmas Eve of all nights?

  “It is the uniform of the Christmas’s captain. Now, come, Miss Fenna. We must be on our way.” His tone was brisk.

  “I’m not going anywhere with you, you blackguard. How dare you command my father’s airship!”

  Andrew’s nostrils flared. “He’s swallowed the anchor, and I’ve come by the airship honestly enough.”

  She sneered. “Honesty and the name ‘Andrew’ are not compatible, you swine. How can you fly Rhys Fenna’s airship? No broker would treat with an Andrew in a Fenna ship, whether it was this dirigible or some old dinghy we fished in as children. Everyone knows who betrayed my father.”

  The ladder swung sharply as a gust of wind caught it. Andrew leaned down, his warm fingers brushing hers. She heard a groaning noise and a whoosh under her feet. Thinking the hull might be splintering, she looked down to calculate her distance to the attic window and saw smoke and light nearby. Cannons boomed, the sound coming from the roof of the Guterman Automen Factory! They must think a pirate attack was imminent.

  “We’re under fire!” Andrew dove over the side. “Grab my legs, boys!”

  Her heart caught in her throat at the sight of his bravado. She leaned into the ladder so he could drop past her to open the sticky cannon porthole below. Just as easily, though, he could miss and fall to his death.

  His downward dive stopped quickly as unseen crewmen secured his legs. He dangled over the side inches above her head. As she clutched the ladder, his hands found her arms and gripped tightly, digging her cuffs into the flesh above her wrists. Linet jerked back instinctively until her body vee’d off the ladder. He pulled her up while she still held on tightly. The airship shook as a barrage of bullets battered it.

  “Let go!” He shouted as his hands slipped on the cotton cloth of her dress. The fabric at one shoulder began to rip. The urge to survive loosed one hand from the hemp but her other hand tangled in the ladder, twisted now from the swaying. Her shoulder seam tore. She dangled at an angle, trapped between Andrew’s tight grip and the ladder.

  “Hatchet!” he screamed.

  A pig-tailed boy ran forward and slammed a sharp blade against the rope. Three cuts and one side freed, then he began on the other.

  A harsh whir from below had Linet’s skirt and apron gusting.

  “That was cannon shot, Captain,” called a man from the rigging. “More lights coming on in the automen factory.”

  “Hold your fire,” Andrew ordered, a tight grin on his face despite being upside-down on the side of the Christmas with shots firing at him.

  “Bastard!” she shrieked. “You Andrew men love battle like a babe loves its mother’s milk!”

  “A bastard would let you go,” he said.

  She heard one last chop above and suddenly, excruciatingly, all her weight suspended from one arm.

  “Move quickly, men!” Andrew cried.

  She felt herself inching up the hull, scraping more paint away with her nose as the men pulled their captain over the railing. As the airship swayed, Andrew’s face came within inches of hers. She could see sweat beading around his thick black brows. His startlingly sea blue gaze met hers. Damn, but he was a bloody handsome devil.

  And a devil he was. With one last groan he pulled her into the craft, and then staggered back. She collapsed in a heap with her skirts around her waist, just in front of his booted calves.

  The boy covered his mouth with his hand and chortled. He’d tucked the hatchet into his belt. With startled recognition, Linet realized the boy was a girl when she saw how her shirt pressed against small breasts.

  Blackness threatened to overtake Linet’s vision, but she fought back her swoon. Corsets had no place on the Christmas but she was dressed for land, her red flannel petticoat and drawers exposed for all the crew to see.

  “Captain?” asked the girl.

  How the mighty Andrew clan had fallen. Once they’d commanded a crew of near giants and now they used children for their misdeeds.

  “Hard to starboard,” the captain called. “Man the engines!”

  As his men obeyed, he dashed to the bow and pulled out a spyglass. “Guess old Guterman doesn’t want to lose his housemaid.”

  “Those guns are for you, not me,” Linet snapped, rolling onto her stomach. “Have you taken to smuggling using this airship? It’s famous. How stupid can you be? Especially when no one will buy from you.”

  His teeth flashed in the lantern light illuminating the airship. “Would you have come aboard any other airship, Linet?”

  “You don’t have permission to use my name,” she snarled.

  He snapped his spyglass closed and moved back toward her, his steps as elegant as any London gentleman’s. “My, you have become a proper London miss. Last I saw you, I recall, you were as refined as a Hottentot.”

  She bared her teeth, proving his point.

  He chuckled. “Glad to see some things haven’t changed. Although your legs are a lot shapelier.”

  With a huff, Linet pushed down her petticoat and skirt, then stood. Her body swayed with the moving airship, still rocked by the occasional cannonball. The girl opened a silver flask and sipped at it before offering it to Linet. She took a gulp of the potent brandy inside. It warmed her insides immediately, while sharpening her queasiness. Her body knew it had been three years since she’d danced through the skies, but she couldn’t help being ecstatic as they left the factory behind. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and tossed the flask in the captain’s direction. It flashed in the glow of lanterns in the rigging. Or so she thought.

  Andrew snatched the flask out of the air and swore.

  “Blockade airship above!” called a man from high on a ratline.

  Amber light beamed over the Christmas. Linet ran to the starboard railing. She glanced up but couldn’t get a clear vision of what was over them.

  “Christmas
ahoy!” came the cry from above.

  Both airships were travelling at top speed through the night sky. Linet could see the dark water of the Thames approaching.

  “We have ten cannons trained on you,” boomed the announcement from above. “Land at the Blockade Yard or we’ll blow you to bits.”

  “Coal at the ready,” the Captain whispered to the girl.

  She ran lightly down the deck. Linet followed her, recognizing what Andrew had planned. She would help because she didn’t want this beautiful airship to be destroyed, and she knew Andrew wouldn’t surrender. No air captain would. The Blockaders could not be allowed to have dominion over the skies.

  “Vent above!” he called.

  Men climbed the ratlines like monkeys, pulling open tarp-covered vents and opening the valves over the gas cells. The Christmas seemed to hang in the air.

  “Engine down!”

  At the stern now, Linet grabbed a basket of coal and climbed a ladder behind the girl. As men above them covered burners, she poured her bucket into the chute when the girl had emptied hers, then they each grabbed a side of the ladder and slid down. Linet’s old calluses had never faded thanks to the hard work of being a maid, and for the first time she was grateful her life had never been soft.

  The airship rocked and began to descend. As Linet filled her basket and followed the girl again, she saw Andrew gently turning the wheel, steering the airship out from underneath the Blockade airship. Did he really think they wouldn’t notice? At least the other airship was smaller than the Christmas. She only saw six men on the ratlines around the balloon, whereas at least ten men and boys were on her father’s airship.