Free Steemjammer: Through the Verltgaat by John Eubank

be right back,” Giselle soothed, wishing she’d sounded more confident.
    Unable to bear the thought of losing her brother, the little girl leaped through the world hole.
    Giselle gasped. “Angelica!” But it was too late. Her young cousin quickly moved out of her field of view.
     
    ***
     
    On the other side, Angelica found herself standing in a large, corroded old iron boiler. The only light came from the softly glowing verltgaat. Noticing an open hatch, she climbed onto a stone tiled floor in the middle of a huge, dark room. The silhouettes of large machines towered over her, and she noticed a stack of huge iron gears leaning against a pillar – one almost thirty feet in diameter.
    “Will?” she whispered.
    “What are you doing here?” he said, and she followed his voice until she found him by a wall.
    “Is he here?”
    “Dad? No, but there’s this.”
    She gasped as he cracked opened a curtain and revealed an amazing view. They stood in a large building on the third or fourth floor, and she saw a canal and a wooded park surrounded by a wall, bathed in bright sunlight. Beyond that stretched a city made of colorful stone and brick buildings.
    “This must be New Amsterdam,” he whispered.
    The place buzzed with activity. The canal teemed with barges and houseboats towed by funny little brightly colored steam boats that reminded them of the ones Giselle lived in. On a distant street they could make out odd bicycles with enormous front wheels, fanciful trolleys, and strangely shaped cars and trucks powered by steam. The hazy sky, stained by countless smokestacks, was dotted with several airships and a lime green hot air balloon.
    “It’s amazing,” Angelica whispered with awe.
    They heard a noise. A door opened in the far wall, and someone holding an oil lantern looked in. Thin light flooded the chamber. Letting the curtain fall shut, Will and Angelica saw they had no chance to make it back to the boiler unseen, so they hid behind a nearby crate.
    “Another bloody junk room,” they heard a gravelly voice mutter with a thick English accent.
    “Sh!” said a young voice. “This is the sort of place I might find it, ‘hidden in plain sight.’” His accent was also English but refined, with a nasal tone. “Watch the hall.”
    As the sphere of dim lantern light moved slowly through the room, Will and Angelica risked peering over the crate. They could make out a row of giant locomotives, steam shovels, tractors, and other contraptions.
    Briefly they got a look at the person searching. Tall and slender, he appeared to be Will’s age and wore a stylish, dark leather coat stitched from strips of various kinds of exotic skins. Pale skinned with brown eyes and black hair, he had a somewhat shocking streak of bone-white hair in the front.
    Called a white forelock, it grew from a widow’s peak at the top of his forehead and was combed to the side. Something about it startled them – plus the intense look on the young man’s face. Will wondered if he was a Rasmussen.
    The lantern glow moved closer and closer to the old rusted boiler. They could see a faint glow from the verltgaat coming out of the open hatch on their side. A few more steps and the boy wouldn’t help but notice it.
    “Bram,” whispered the gravelly voice from the doorway.
    Will and Angelica could see the outline of a large man there. He signaled with his hand, which meant that someone was coming down the hall. Bram hooded the lantern, plunging the room into darkness.
    Sensing their moment, Will and Angelica made their way quickly towards the faint glow of the boiler hatch. He brushed against something, and it fell with a loud clang .
    “Who’s there?” the young man hissed.
    They went faster.
    Hearing footsteps but unable to see, Bram couldn’t hide the fear in his voice. “Show yourself!” He became defiant. “I warn you, my family’s very powerful!”
    Will helped his sister through the hatch and scurried in after her. Finding