Free Ardour: An Erotic Steampunk Story by Lucy Wild

Ardour
 
    He came for me
during the night. He always did. I went with him out of the window and down
into the gutters of the city. I always felt nervous down there, even with Jared
by my side. One wrong move and all the fuseguns in the world wouldn’t help me.
    He guided the steamcrate past the
lower floors, concentrating hard as the wind began to buffet us. I glanced in
at the windows as we passed. All those people, all those lives. They were all safe
in their rooms, oblivious to our passing. I wondered how this had happened. Why
did he always call on me when they found one? Just because I’d seen the first
victim didn’t make me an expert as I tried to tell him over and over again.
They never listened.
    We descended past the exhaust
ports of the steamscraper, plunging through the thick white smoke and down into
the gloom below. Another minute and we landed. I stepped off the steamcrate and
looked around for any signs of immediate danger. It was a bitterly cold night
which seemed to have worked in our favour, most of the cutpurses were
sheltering in the gluebars, waiting for the temperatures to rise above
freezing. They were in for a long wait.
    I hate the feel of solid ground
under my feet, it feels wrong somehow. I’d grown up with the gentle rocking and
swaying of the steamscrapers around me and only a fool would set foot in the
gutters after dark. What did that make me? “We better get moving,” Jared said,
pulling the collar of his cloak up around his neck as he strode off between two
crumbling buildings which creaked in the wind as we passed.
    I followed him in silence, my
fingers wrapped round the fusegun in my pocket. It only held one charge, I
hadn’t been able to afford any more but I hoped it would at least be enough to
scare off any of the cutpurses who might brave the darkness if they spotted two
bits of scraper bait amongst them.
    I wrapped my cloak around me as
Jared turned left down an alleyway filled with rotten cabbage leaves and old
newspapers. I glanced down at the remnants of one headline. KILLER STRIKES
AGAIN. BOD-. The rest was torn away but I didn’t need it. I was there.
    I hadn’t meant to come down to
the gutter but I’d had no choice. My neighbour’s kid had got hold of the key to
their steamcrate and had set off on a joyfloat. They were in a panic and had no
idea what to do. I sent a mechapigeon to Jared asking him to meet me in the
gutter but the mecha had sprung a leak and never reached him as I found out
afterwards.
    I’d waited in the gutter at the
only working mooring station for miles, wondering when he’d arrive, fusegun
held at arms length as I called out for the boy. It was no more than a couple
of minutes before I was surrounded by nightowls, seeing a woman as an easy
target. The fusegun was the only thing holding them at bay and they didn’t know
I only had one charge left.
    I heard a scream off to my left
but that was nothing unusual in the gutter. Down here silence was more worrying
than noise. I began to walk, wondering what the hell had happened to Jared. I
was just passing a fleshery when I caught sight of the steamcrate, directly
above my head and wobbling. It was the boy and he was clearly struggling to
control it.
    The nightowls looked up too and I
realised it would be a race to see who got to him first. I lost. I ran after
the steamcrate but they knew the shortcuts far better than a scraper dweller
like me. I was soon panting for breath, not used to the thick air down here on
the surface. I turned a corner and there the crate was, laid on its side
between two towering brick buildings that looked like they might collapse at
any moment. I could see a figure sprawled on the ground, rolling around in
agony and I knew it was the boy. It didn’t occur to me to wonder where the
nightowls had gone until it was too late. I slowed as I approached the figure
but as I reached him I realised it wasn’t the boy. The pieces of the boy were
spread across the cobbles. The