The Black Lung Captain - Chris Wooding [22]
None of that mattered to Harkins, though. He wasn’t fussy. All that mattered was that she was kind to him. No doubt it was pity that motivated her, and nothing more, but a man like Harkins would take what he could get. Pity was a start. Perhaps, if he was just a little braver …
No. It was no good. What woman could respect a man who was bullied by a cat?
Maybe you just need to stand up to him. You are about twenty times his size, after all.
He burned with shame as he remembered the incident in the corridor. That cat. That damned cat.
If he wanted to be brave for Jez, he’d have to see about that cat.
PINN, FOR HIS PART, shared none of the concerns of his fellow outflier. The idea of worrying about something that far in the future was alien to him. He only ever thought one step ahead, if that. He didn’t really do consequences.
He didn’t have any real idea what to expect of Kurg, but that didn’t matter. Despite his near total lack of knowledge, he was confident he could handle it. The prospect of adventure, fame, and riches appealed to him greatly. Artis Pinn, adventurer! Perhaps they’d make some pulp novels of his exploits, the way they did about the Century Knights. Pinn had never read any of them—he never read anything—but their covers looked exciting.
He let his mind drift as he sat in the cockpit of the Skylance, the sea below him, empty sky ahead. The roar of the thrusters, steady and unwavering, lulled him into a daze.
He pictured himself as the subject of a novel, his likeness on the cover. He was standing atop the corpse of some monster, pistol in hand, native wench hanging off his arm. He had no indication of what the native wenches might actually look like, and his imagination was too stunted to guess, so he settled on a Vardic woman wearing very few clothes and mentally darkened her skin to match Silo’s umber tones. Yes, that would do nicely.
He’d heard many stories about the strange and savage land of Kurg, and he believed them all. Tales of tribes of elegant seductresses and of warrior women that sought strong men to mate with. What kind of exotic ladies might he find there? Surely they’d be fascinated by his foreign ways and amazing aircraft. They’d be fighting to get into bed with him.
Not that he’d sleep with any of them, of course. He’d resist their charms, and it would make them want him all the more. They’d be impressed by his utter devotion to his sweetheart, Lisinda, who waited for him back home.
Of course, his devotion would only last so long. In the end he’d give in. His body’s needs were scarcely his fault. Any man worth calling a man had masculine urges too strong to control. The important thing was that his love was for Lisinda alone. It wasn’t cheating if the women didn’t mean anything.
He looked at the small, framed ferrotype of Lisinda, hanging from his dash. What was she doing now, he wondered? Was she thinking of him even now, as he was of her? He traced her face with a fond finger.
Five years since he’d seen her. Five years since the eighteen-year-old Pinn left her to make his fortune. Five years she’d been waiting for him. At least, he assumed that was what she was doing. After all, she’d told him she loved him and, her being a woman, that meant forever. Women didn’t say that shit lightly.
Five years. That was devotion for you. What a lucky man he was.
It wouldn’t be some down-and-out pilot she ended up marrying. It would be a hero. The kind they put on the cover of adventure novels.
Artis Pinn. Hero. He liked the sound of that.
“It won’t be long, my love,” he said to the ferrotype. “Soon I’ll be rich, and everyone will know my name. Then I’ll come back, just like I promised. You only deserve the best.”
“You only deserve the best,” mimicked Harkins in a soppy voice. Frey howled with laughter.