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There was so about a mechanical construct that did not need a track Sophronia had not realized that until she saw them all assembled before her With theBual at all sensible Now she understood In that hold squatted a shty army

Shaken, Sophronia closed the door and continued with her assess, which, combined with the boiler room, took up the ter levels of the front of the airship She couldn’t easily sneak in there, because the main entrance was at the top, and no doubt the Picklemen would station theh, shedown and around the outside of the airship toward her standard entrance--the sooties’ hatch

There were no sooties waiting to help her inside this tie of flarown to expect and find rather co She made for her favorite coal pile, the one upon which she and Soap had spentand occasionally practicing s, off-duty sooties led with those sent to tap the coal reserves With only a kidnapped skeleton crew, there were no breaks, and the area was abandoned Occasionally, Sophronia could pick out a strange new sound--a loud crack

She peeked out fro the fireboxes Or, to beThey were running their nor the s so under ready punish-tube Pickle the workers He stood arun in the other If any sootie slackened his pace or did anything the Pickle the unfortunate boy across the back

The sooties were gri as hard as they could When the whip flashed, the poor unfortunate would wince and grit his teeth but not cry out They were tough boys who’d started on docks or up chi school was a cushy job by comparison, but that didn’t mean the lads had never before felt the kiss of a whip They siain

Sophronia, on the other hand, had never witnessed such a thing Her parents weren’t ones for harsh punishment, and she’d never visited the plantations of the West Indies, where, ru was commonplace Every time the bullwhip struck, she winced and sed down a cry of syot a second lick, right near the first His shirt went ragged under the blows He stuht Handle’s expression It wasn’t one of meek servitude He was absolutely livid

Whatever else her plans entailed, she had to deteret them out

Sophronia assessed the security Apart from the Pickle the carnage fro right away--plus, she had to obey her training and assess the shipwide situation first But she made the sooties a silent promise to return and free theun in one of the teachers’ rooms The school had an armory, of course, and Sophronia even knehere it was, but she couldn’t get into it There was no entrance without activating a special drawbridge, and only Professor Lefoux and Lady Linette kne to do that

She withdrew, unhappy, from the boiler rooe for Buown had no pockets, and she was running out of means to attach stuff to herself The little mechanimal was fine at theBack out the hatch, she skirted up past the second level so she could continue her sweep of the ship, starting with the teachers’ rooet inside the teachers’ private chambers via their balconies, so she stuck to the outside of the ship At the very front, in the best suite, Mademoiselle Geraldine’s display of fake tea cakes stood solitary vigil The head in, as Made of use

Sister Mattie’s balcony was croith vegetation, and her door was unlocked Theof their teachers, Sister Mattie always felt that if she had done her job properly the students should have access to any poison they wished, not to ood nutrition She was also quite absentetry, with her door triple-locked and booby-trapped Fortunately, both locks and trap were ones Sophronia had dealt with before She picked and disabled them She filched a few smaller deadlier items from each teacher, poison from the one, hooks and a timepiece from the other, ribbons froun or a crossbow No luck

Professor Braithwope’s rooms were empty of both the vahly, but the tiny special crossboas nowhere to be found Probably everything else had been re hie systee Sophronia spent a futile fewto pick the lock, only to have the etting soht have kept at it longer, except she realized her nor seen--was irrelevant under these particular circu trumpet to determine that there was no one inside, and then used Bulass of the balcony door She then upended the chauns at all? What kind of spymasters are these? The best kind, she supposed, to leave no evidence of their true nature in their private quarters

In one corner of Lady Linette’s rooruously surrounded by boudoir-style velvets, sat a large wicker chicken It was heavy, and so inside was mechanized It smelled faintly of brimstone and chalk Sophronia reifted with an exploding wicker chicken from a Bunson’s admirer It would appear that Lady Linette had confiscated it--young ladies weren’t allowed gifts of such nitude The chicken was bulky, but it was also a kind of projectile, and Sophronia was getting desperate So, shifting Buths of curtain cord to strap the deadly bird to her back

Of course, she was nohere near as sneaky looking Nor, for that ible, wearing a wicker chicken But shethat supported the pilot’s bubble She knew from personal experience that it could only fit two men So she simply took it as fact that there were two Picklemen inside and added theh the ship The classroo device filled with acid in Professor Lefoux’s laboratory, which she liberated She also put on the leather pinafore Professor Lefoux used when she waschemicals It was durable and protective, and, h neckline