Rowley woke as the ship’s healer finished her work, seeing a bit of a yellow glow around the other witch’s hands.

  “Status!” Rowley barked!

  Zindo reported, “The docking bay is a mess, all of the fighters are scrap, the engines have been destroyed and our quarry has escaped. Meanwhile, we’re still spinning in space, because the aft water tanks are leaking. The engineers are trying to pump the water to other tanks, as we speak, but that will take at least an hour. I’m told it will take another two to null out our spin, using only the gas thrusters. By then, I believe our prey will be out of range, ma'am. I’m sorry.”

  Rowley screamed and pounded a fist into the floor!

  “And with my axe broken, that leaves me no other choice.” She grumbled to herself.

  Rowley was helped to her feet by Zindo, who gave her a shoulder to lean on, while she moved to and sat on her throne.

  She took a long moment to compose herself and consider the words she might use.

  When she was ready, she concentrated on an image of the queen of all pirates, who ruled with an iron fist. She hated that ancient witch with a burning passion, but if she didn’t obey standing orders, Rowley was likely to be killed, but that would be no reprieve; the Dead Queen was famed for her use of necromancy and was even more infamous for the way she punished failed lieutenants: zombification, with mind and magic talent intact. In such a state, it would be impossible to disobey the Queen. It was said to be an agonizing existence, as attested by the fact the Queen’s zombies moaned all the time, at least when they were out of earshot of their master. Rowley shuddered as she considered the possibility of being forced to endure her own body rotting away, feeling the pain of being slowly eaten by invisible germs.

  With a clear picture of the ancient witch in mind, Rowley whispered some words in the witch’s tongue: ‘bone’, ‘carry’ and ‘sound’, followed by a twist to link the word ‘distance’.

  “I beg forgiveness for contacting you directly, my Queen,” Rowley spoke in the best sucking-up-to-the-boss voice she could manage, “but I was defeated in battle by three sisters, two of which are particularly powerful witches, potentially strong enough to serve your purposes.”

  The Queen’s voice was calm and measured, betraying nothing, “Where are you?”

  “Taneas orbit. I was using the old ‘remote empire’ con.”

  “It’s a little unseasonable to give that one a go.” The Queen spoke with suspicion, “Are you telling me it actually worked, without Taneas properly aligned? Tell me how.”

  “The youngest of the sisters is a latent Newt Witch the order hasn’t noticed yet and she’s been flaunting her ability to chart direct courses. That’s what caught my eye, in the first place.”

  “Interesting. Were you looking for that ancient book again?” The Queen snorted, stifling a laugh.

  Rowley frowned and sighed, “Yes, my Queen.”

  “Ah, to be young again, and so very foolish!” The Queen snapped, “You dream of magic secrets powerful enough that you could kill me once and for all, but I know better, because it was once mine; I was the young and foolish Newt Witch that listened to it and stole it from the order.”

  “Really?” Rowley was shocked, “If it doesn’t contain magic, then what’s inside?”

  “Science.” The old witch chuckled, “More than you could ever fathom, probably more than you could ever understand. You would make a poor owner for the book, but if you’re of use to me, I may just give it to you. After all, I’ve already gleaned everything I could from it and you aren’t even half as smart as I am.”

  “Thank you, my Queen!” Rowley’s teeth ground together as a result of the infuriating arrogance of her master, though she hoped the sound wouldn’t pass through the spell linking them together.

  “I’ll be there momentarily.”

  “What? How?”

  The sound of the old witch spitting carried through the bone transduction spell, before the undead witch answered, “A little magic and a little science.”

  Amelia stood on the underside of Starwitch, unnerved by the sight of so much emptiness, with relatively few layers of material between herself and the void. It was her first spacewalk and while her custom pressure suit made her feel stylish, she didn’t like the weightless feeling, nor the sense of imminent danger. There was a rope tied securely around her waist, just in case, though her magnetic boots allowed her to walk.

  “You okay out there?” There was deep concern in the voice of Iris, as delivered through bone transduction, “You’re breathing pretty heavy.”

  “This is scary.” Amelia spoke honestly, “I know exactly how dangerous what I’m doing is. I know it would take only one little hole in this suit and I’d be dead. The worst part is, I’ve never really tested it. In fact, I hoped I’d never need it. I only made our pressure suits for emergencies.”

  “You’ll be fine. You’re an amazing engineer.”

  “I’ll get to work now.” Amelia informed her sister as she turned to face the lower mast.

  It was in bad shape. With the internal cables broken, it was hanging free and bent at an odd angle. If the attack had been just one foot further out, the cables wouldn’t have been hit, but the pirates had gotten lucky.

  It didn’t get any better from there, however: during acceleration, it had clearly slammed back into the hollow built into the hull for it, as indicated by scratches from the impact, because with the cables broken, it was more free to slide on its mount to either side. By the look of things, it had bounced off the edge of its hollow enough times that it caught, bent and tore the mast open a little wider, leaving a rather distressingly jagged bit pointing toward the hull.

  Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  Amelia stepped away from the mast and noted an area where that jagged bit had punched a hole in the outer hull. The relatively thin steel of one of the water tanks was just visible through the hole and they were lucky it hadn’t gone any deeper. The tank even had scratches on it.

  She reported, “This is worse than I thought, because there’s a small hole in the hull. I’m going to have to patch it before I do anything else. After that, I’ll have to cut the damaged section of the mast out, but that’s going to require me to do all the repairs out here.”

  “Why?”

  “The masts are too long to fit them inside, since I made them all from one-piece pipes, for the sake of strength.”

  “Okay.”

  Amelia walked back to the main door of the ship and used her tie-line to climb back into the entry bay, which they were using as an airlock. She selected a small sheet of steel of the same thickness as the hull. Using a saw linked to a steam engine she’d designed specifically for use in an airless environment, Amelia cut it to the right size, then bent it to fit the curvature of the mast hollow.

  When she was ready, she tied an extra rope to the ladder on the floor of the room, then tied it to the one holding her, because she was going to need something to keep the mast from wandering off. She grabbed a piece of chalk and the bit of metal she’d just shaped, clipping them both into the tool loops built into her suit along the waistline, before heading back outside.

  Crossing from the top of the ship to the bottom was a chore, but she was able to use the mast, which was just ahead of the door, as an extra hand hold to get herself around the peaked side of the ship, eventually able to swing a boot around to the bottom, where the magnet in the heel kept her from losing contact as she moved the other leg over. After that, it was just a matter of lightly pushing off the mast, allowing her heels to keep her in contact as she swung around, which was just as terrifying as the first time.

  She crouched and held the new bit of steel over the hole, using it to mark the outline with chalk, followed by putting them both away again.

  “Tell Marta I need a clean cut along the lines I just marked with the chalk.” Amelia requested.

  The bizarre sound of the spell traveled through Amelia’s boots and up her body, until it reached her ears as a muffled chunking sound, very like cutting thin steel with a set of snips, but deeper. The end result was a very neatly cut line in the hull along the chalk marks, which outlined the hole.

  “The spell-core sure is useful.” Iris commented.

  “True enough.”

  Amelia pulled a hammer, hooked the clawed end into the hole in the steel and gave it a yank. The damaged steel bit came free and slipped off her hammer, flying off into space.

  “Whoops. I just lost the bit we cut out. I’d been planning to keep that, for study.”

  “I’ll get Marta to catch it.”

  Amelia smiled as the floating bit of metal stopped and neatly flew around the ship, into the main hatch.

  “Thanks.”

  Amelia slotted the new section of hull in place, then requested, “Okay, the new bit is ready for the repair sequence.”

  It was fascinating to watch, but the edges of both the hull and the new bit heated, until they flowed together, only to immediately cool again, followed by a repair spell that erased the welding marks.

  “Tell Marta: excellent work.” Amelia complimented.

  “Will do.”

  Amelia turned back to the mast and examined it for a time. Inside the intact half, the cables were visible, with frayed ends of them at either side of the hole. Using a ruler to measure, she marked a very precise pair of lines around the mast with the chalk, one above the broken section and one below.

  Putting her tools away, Amelia grabbed hold of the section of the mast above the portion that was about to be cut and requested, “Tell Marta to cut the chalk line furthest out.”

  The sound was louder, because it came both through Amelia’s feet and hands. Amelia struggled against the mass of the mast, as she carefully lifted it up. The sound of the cables scraping the inside of the mast was rather loud and continuous as she got it free, then took a tentative step back.

  “I need Marta to steady the mast as I tie it off.” She requested.

  “Okay.”

  The mast suddenly stopped drifting and Amelia worked to untie the second rope.

  Amelia’s attention wandered as she sensed an incredible surge of magic, beyond anything she’d ever sensed before, but just as she imagined it was coming to a close, it reached new heights, rising beyond a mere spell, into the realm of space-twisting power of an unimaginable magnitude!

  “Holy-” Iris cursed, “What is that?”

  Amelia barely managed to speak, “Spatial magic and lots of it!”

  She felt overwhelmed by an entire ocean of magic flooding her senses and turned her head toward the source, which seemed to be near Taneas. As the magic reached an even higher crescendo and rose beyond Amelia’s ability to even sense it, there was a tremendous flash that caused her to lift her hands, to block the light! Despite the fact she’d closed her eyes, she was able to see the outline of both her gloves and bones!

  Then, just as suddenly as it began, it was over and she opened her eyes. The glass ship was a little spec, only barely visible, but beside it was a giant block of granite, in a rectangular shape, which must have been the size of an entire mountain!

  “Do you see that?” Iris demanded.

  Amelia spoke with great fear, “I do!”

  The mountain moved with disturbing acceleration for a such a massive hunk of rock, neatly scooping up the glittering form of the glass ship as it moved, much like that big ship had been poised to scoop up Starwitch. After that, the monolith turned and apparently began growing larger as it accelerated toward Amelia’s ship!

  She glanced at the floating mast and performed some quick calculations that resulted in a terrible realization: she needed at least twenty minutes to reattach the mast, but that mountain would reach them in five. Unfortunately, no one was in the pilot’s seat, because it had been depressurized along with the entry bay.

  “I’m coming back aboard!” Amelia announced as she laid hold of her tie line and used it to haul herself back to the door as fast as possible, “Get ready to run and tell Marta to enhance the engines the moment I get us moving!” Amelia reached the door and hauled herself in, coming to a rolling stop in the artificial gravity of the interior, “In fact, I want both of you to get your hands on the spell-core. Drop all the background spells and give me everything you can from both the core and your own magic! I’ll do the same from my end!”

  Amelia got to her feet and struggled against the magnets in her boots as she stepped into the witchpit and sat down.

  “Won’t that much magic blow us to kingdom come?”

  As she strapped herself in, Amelia grumbled, “Probably, but I doubt that monolith is friendly and if a ship that large can pull off a spatial translocation spell, I don’t want to be anywhere near it when it reaches attack range!”

  “Good point!”

  “Here we go!” Amelia shouted and slammed the throttle all the way forward!

  The acceleration pressed her into her seat, then the gravity and air spells ended and Amelia felt a tremendous amount of magic snap back to the opposite end of the interior of the ship, followed by immediately flowing sideways, into the engines. That new spell was primarily designed to heat water and steam, but Amelia sensed a separate spell designed to protect the metal of the ship by artificially increasing its melting point. The end result was a second kick of acceleration, far beyond the boost Marta had given the ship during the brief battle with Captain Rowley, which reminded her of the rocket boosters on the war wagon, because her mouth opened of its own accord!

  Amelia growled ‘heat’, ‘water’ and ‘steam’ in the witch’s tongue, concentrating on an image of the long pipes of the engines, giving Starwitch another small kick of acceleration!