“Fuck me,” Lizanne heard one of the sailors say before he choked off into a retch.
Incredibly, one man remained standing amidst the slaughter, a great barrel-chested fellow with the grizzled look of a veteran sergeant. He stood staring down at what remained of one of the proudest regiments in the empire, face expressionless but tears streaming down his craggy cheeks. After a moment he straightened, squared his shoulders and hefted his rifle, then began a slow deliberate advance towards the second line of trenches. Arberus took a rifle from one of the conscripts and shot the man in the head, his body collapsing onto the piled remains of his men.
“A trifle harsh, Major,” Lizanne commented as Arberus lowered the rifle.
“When the Scarlet Legion took Jerravin,” he said, “they chained up all the surviving defenders and made them watch as their wives and daughters were raped and beheaded. Then they doused them in oil and burned them alive. I stood and watched them do it, laughing along with all the other butchers, because that was my role then.” He turned and handed the rifle back to the conscript, the manager he had forced to his feet earlier. “You asked if I had any qualms,” he said to Lizanne. “I trust this stands as sufficient answer.”
CHAPTER 32
Clay
“Madame Bondersil says we should trust her, huh?” Braddon spoke quietly, his gaze lingering on Ethelynne as she sat with Lutharon on the lake-shore. The drake had curled up on the shingle beach come nightfall, tail curving to form a protective barrier around the small woman nestled against his massive chest. Whilst she seemed at ease, the drake’s eyes remained bright in the gloom, his gaze sweeping over them all in continual and wary scrutiny. Upon emerging from the tunnels, Preacher and Braddon had immediately begun to raise their longrifles at the sight of a large male Black standing barely twenty feet away, only lowering them when Clay rushed to stand in their sights. Even then, it had taken some while before the knowledge that he had discovered the fabled personage of Ethelynne Drystone fully sank in.
The Longrifles sat around a makeshift camp in various states of dishevelled hunger, much of their supplies having been lost at the temple. Scriberson seemed the least affected, his fascination with Lutharon apparently banishing any mere physical wants. Firpike, still alive somewhat to Clay’s annoyance, regarded the animal with a mixture of barely controlled fear and naked calculation; the ability to control a drake was worth more than all the gold and knowledge now buried beneath several hundred tons of charred stone.
Predictably, the Contractors were considerably more agitated by Lutharon’s presence, their wary observance the equal of his, and all keeping their weapons close as they huddled around the fire the beast had raised for them at Ethelynne’s request. Their suspicion had only been slightly allayed when Ethelynne treated Foxbine’s leg wound with her stock of Green. The injury had begun to fester in the dank confines of the tunnels but a hefty application and ingestion of Green had done much to start the healing process, though the gunhand was still obliged to lean on Skaggerhill as she walked.
Clay took some solace from the comparative lack of concern displayed by Silverpin. She had clambered out of the tunnel and rushed towards him, crushing herself to him in relief, then drawing back to cast a curious glance at Ethelynne and Lutharon. “It’s complicated,” he had said, which, from the lengthy kiss she then pressed to his lips, seemed explanation enough for the time being.
“So Miss Lethridge tells it,” Clay told Braddon, still a little fog-headed as he was not long out of the trance. “She’s back at Carvenport now.” He glanced over at the others, lowering his voice and deciding some truth would make the lies slip down easier. “The Corvantines have it under siege, Uncle. Sent a whole army from Morsvale to take it. They’re holding out for now, but their cannon are pounding the place day and night.”
Braddon’s gaze abruptly lifted from Ethelynne, eyes widening in concern.
“I asked her to check on Auntie,” Clay assured him. “She said she would.” He paused, watching his uncle fold his arms, face clouded with uncharacteristic indecision. He stayed quiet for a good while, features set in a frown that Clay knew must be masking considerable turmoil. How strong is the White’s pull? he wondered. Enough to make you turn your back on your wife?
“If we start back now,” Braddon said finally, “assuming we can find a means to make it up the Falls, then the river, whatever’s gonna happen will have happened by the time we get there.”
“That’s Madame’s thinking too,” Clay said, hoping his quiet tone concealed his disappointment and the ominous realisation that accompanied it. It’s really got him now. Nothing I say is gonna turn him around. “She says the war can be ended if we find the White. Securing an egg or a live specimen will be enough to make every corporation in the world throw their lot in with Ironship. Corvantines’ll have to come to terms then. So she says, anyways. And Miss Lethridge thinks they can hold out for a good while yet.”
Braddon nodded, his gaze tracking to Skaggerhill then Loriabeth. “Say nothing of this to the others. Piling on another load of worry won’t help anybody. We got us a contract and I aim to fulfil the terms; that’s all they need know for now.” He looked again at Ethelynne and Lutharon. “Why’s she so keen to help us?”
“She ain’t one for revealing her intentions, but I sense she’s got a hankering to see the White again. Spent more than twenty years out here pondering the mysteries of the Interior. The White’s still the biggest one of all. Also,” he added with a grin, “seems she knows a way we can get to the Coppersoles that won’t take the best part of two months trekking through the jungle.”
—
“I found it four years ago,” Ethelynne said as Lutharon’s claws tore away another patch of vegetation from the mound. Come the morning she had led them south along the shore, covering five miles before midday. They halted at a small lagoon fed by a narrow inlet in the shore-line. Lutharon immediately plunged in and began tearing away at what appeared to be a large moss-covered mound in the centre of the lagoon.
“I only found one of the crew,” Ethelynne went on. “Half-dead from a Green bite and delirious. He kept rambling on about salvaging some lost treasure from the lake-bed. There’s an air-pump of some kind on board, so I suspect his companions met their end beneath the depths.”
“Lost treasure?” Firpike asked, a keen glint in his eye.
“Yes,” Ethelynne replied. “Some outlandish tale of a fabulously jewelled ship of ancient origin lurking beneath the waters of the lake. I must say, my own research has uncovered no mention of it, but”—she gave Clay a sidelong glance, a small but mischievous grin on her lips—“the Interior has ever been a magnet for those in search of the unfindable.”
Lutharon tore away another patch of moss, revealing the unmistakable shape of a river-boat hull. A few moments more and the craft was fully revealed. She had a single paddle at the stern and one stunted and multiply holed stack rising from the wheel-house. Clay gauged her size as perhaps a quarter that of the Firejack, but that still left plenty of room to carry them all, provided they could get her engine working.
“She could do with a good sprucing up,” Ethelynne said as Lutharon nudged the heavily besmirched vessel towards the bank. “But she’s been untouched since I found her.”
“Did he say what manner of ship?” Firpike persisted, stepping closer to Ethelynne then promptly stepping back as Lutharon issued a warning rumble.
“The poor fellow expired the night after I found him,” Ethelynne replied. “There are some documents aboard, the captain’s log and such. They held little interest for me, but if you’d care to . . .”
Firpike ran to the bank and leapt aboard without another word. Soon they could hear him rummaging around in the wheel-house.
“River Maiden,” Skaggerhill said, wiping a hand along the hull to reveal the boat’s name-plate. “Her timbers must still be water worthy, otherwise she’d have sunk by no
w. We should still check her over for leaks though.”
“See to the engine first,” Braddon said. “If we can’t get it working, won’t matter how tight the hull is.”
To their surprise the River Maiden proved to have two engines, one a coal-burner, the other a much smaller arrangement of pipes and combustion chamber. “Damned if she isn’t a blood-burner,” Skaggerhill said, crouching to run a hand over the power plant in appreciation.
“Can you make it work?” Braddon asked.
The harvester shrugged and shook his head. “I know a little about boats, and less about engines.”
“If I may?” Scriberson said, stepping forward. Skaggerhill made way for him and the astronomer crouched to run a careful eye over both engines, hands exploring the various components with practised familiarity.
“Done this before?” Clay asked.
“Engineering has always been my secondary passion,” Scriberson replied, grunting a little as he gave a hard twist to the gears connecting the coal-burner to the main drive-shaft. “I was Chairman of the Consolidated Research Amateur Artificers Club. We would hold a contest every year for the most outlandishly pointless kinetic apparatus.” He sighed as the gears refused to budge then lifted the lid on the engine’s exhaust tube to peer inside.
“Too much rust, Captain,” he told Braddon. “It’s seized beyond repair. This beauty, however”—he nodded at the blood-burner—“is a sealed unit and should still run if fed sufficient product. I’ll need to make sure the main shaft will still turn the paddle, however. And the water reservoir will need to be cleaned out and refilled.”
“Get to it,” Braddon told him, nodding at a box in the corner of the engine room. “Looks like the boat’s grease monkey was kind enough to leave his tools behind. Skaggs will help out best he can.” He turned to Clay, nodding at the hatchway. “Let’s see if Miss Drystone will share some of her riches.”
Ethelynne seemed to attach little value to the product she carried and handed over a full vial of Red without demur. “Naturally,” Braddon assured her, “there’ll be a full accounting of expenses when our contract’s fulfilled. You will, of course, receive a full share . . .”
He trailed off as she laughed, covering her mouth and turning away as her mirth continued unabated for several minutes. She laughed for such a long time that Clay found himself worrying over what conclusions his uncle might draw from such a display. “Forgive me, Captain,” she said eventually, having sobered somewhat and wiping tears from her eyes. “It’s just been a good long while since I heard talk of such things, and said with such sincerity too.”
Seeing her mouth twitch in anticipation of another outburst, Clay cut in quickly, “We got other pressing matters. There’s maybe a day’s rations left between all of us. And then there’s the scarcity of ammo.”
“I can help with one,” Ethelynne said, turning and striding towards Lutharon. “But not the other. I’ve had no need of guns in all my days here.” She climbed onto the drake’s back, calling out as he flexed his wings and tensed for the launch, “I’ll be back before nightfall!”
Watching drake and rider climb into the air and glide away over the lake, Braddon shook his head, his features displaying both wonder and wariness. “Mad as a bag of cats, but that beast follows her like a love-lorn hound.”
—
“It starts out rationally enough,” Firpike muttered, perched on the fore-deck with the boat’s log resting on his knees as he pored over the mildewed pages. “But then descends into gibberish a few days before the entries end.”
“That’s truly fascinating,” Clay told him, casting another armful of moss over the side. “How’s about you lend a hand here and do your pondering later?”
“Oh, leave him be,” Loriabeth chided from the prow where she was scraping the worst of the muck from the hawser. “I’m all fired up and curious about this treasure ship, myself. What’s it say about that, Doc?”
“Precious little,” he replied, thumbing back a few pages. “It seems this boat was chartered in Rigger’s Bay by a fellow referred to only as Mr. O. The captain was paid five hundred in exchange notes up front and promised a thirty percent share in whatever treasure was retrieved from the lake. He does give a position for the likely site of the discovery though.” Firpike paused to favour Braddon with a hopeful glance.
“Forget it,” the captain told him. “Though I’ll be happy to drop you off on the way south, Doc.” He turned to Foxbine, sitting on the mid-deck engaged in an inventory of the remaining ammunition. “What’s the count?”
“Twenty-two rifle rounds,” she replied. “Mostly steel-tips, which is good, I guess. And sixty-three of the .48 short, which most suredly ain’t. Plus, Skaggs only has six shotgun shells left. We run into any more trouble, Captain . . .”
“I know,” he said. “Guess we’ll just have to be extra circumspect from now on. Keep thirty of the .48s and parcel out the rest equally between Clay and Lori. Me and Preacher’ll take equal shares of the .52s.”
A sudden shift in the deck made Clay stagger a little, his gaze going to the engine-room hatch from which a low steady hum could be heard. “Seer-damn me if they didn’t fix it,” Foxbine said, starting to rise. Clay paused to help her up and they joined the others in the engine room where a grease-stained Scriberson stood next to the vibrating thermoplasmic engine.
“Lad’s a genius, right enough,” Skaggerhill told Braddon.
“It’s running on kerosene just now,” Scriberson said, tapping the dim glow behind the glass window of the combustion chamber. “It’ll need product to turn the paddle.”
“Your share just went up three points, young man,” Braddon told him. “And I’ll add another three if this thing holds out all the way to the Coppersoles.”
“You still intend to press on?” the astronomer asked. “Not that I’m displeased, the alignment is my life’s work after all. But with so little ammunition, how profitable could this expedition be for you now?”
“Let me worry about that. There’s mining settlements in the mountains, bound to have some ammo to trade. Besides, you and me have a contract.”
—
As promised, Ethelynne returned in the evening as the sun began to dip. Lutharon descended out of the sky to flare his wings and hover over the camp they had established next to the lagoon, opening his claws to drop two enormous fish close to the fire. “That salmon?” Loriabeth wondered, giving one of the fish a dubious poke. “Never seen one so big.”
“Looks like good eating to me, whatever it is,” Skaggerhill said, drawing a knife to start the gutting.
The fish did indeed prove to provide a hearty meal, the flesh only slightly bony and the supply fulsome enough to fill their growling bellies. “Just got fed by a drake,” Skaggerhill said when the meal was done, rubbing his stomach and looking over at Lutharon who had curled up a good distance away. “And I thought this place was done surprising me.” His gaze shifted to Ethelynne sitting on the opposite side of the fire. “I gotta know, miss. How’s it done? All my years on this continent, I ain’t never seen this.”
Ethelynne gave one of the faint smiles Clay had come to recognise meant she had no answer to give and the silence stretched until Preacher spoke up. “It worships her.” His gaze was fixed on Lutharon and had that same focused animation as when he started quoting the Seer. Also, Clay noted his rifle lay unsheathed across his lap. “And you it,” Preacher went on, turning to Ethelynne. “You drank of the drake’s heart, just like the Witch Queen in the mosaic.”
Ethelynne gave a lengthy laugh, seemingly finding almost as much amusement in Preacher as she had Braddon. “She wasn’t a witch,” she replied after a while. “Or a queen for that matter. And you mistake love for worship.”
“‘’Ware the witch,’” Preacher quoted, his stridency increasing by the word. “‘For she will conspire with the drake towards our ruin.’”
/> Ethelynne gave a girlish giggle, as if she were engaged in some delightful game, then replied with a quote of her own. “‘And the sun became a man, and spoke to me in the voice of an eagle commanding that I not eat of any winged beast, for they are all in secret thrall to the drake.’ You appear to put great faith in the words of a man who was patently insane.”
Clay saw the marksman’s hands tense on the stock of his rifle, as did his uncle. “Easy now, Preacher,” he said. “Let’s not offend a lady who’s been so generous with us.”
Preacher continued to stare at Ethelynne, Clay slowly lowering his own hand to the Stinger as he saw the way the man’s fingers twitched on the rifle. Like a drunk wary of reaching for his last drink. The twitching stopped, however, when Lutharon voiced a growl and rose from his resting place to come to Ethelynne’s side. He moved without haste, tail swishing as he rested his great head on her shoulder, closing his eyes as she reached up to scratch his nose. Love, not worship, Clay thought.
Preacher rose to his feet, staring at woman and drake in naked disgust, then abruptly turned about and walked away, pausing at the edge of the fire-light when Braddon spoke up. “If you’re not here come the morning, I understand. But if you are, leave your scripture behind when you step on that boat. I ain’t got the patience for it no more.”
—
Clay soon came to understand that the Krystaline was more a sea than a lake. The surface that seemed so placid from a distance was in fact prone to swells and choppiness when the wind rose, often causing the deck of the shallow-hulled River Maiden to heave at alarming angles. “Pardon,” Skaggerhill called from the wheel-house when Clay and Silverpin came perilously close to tipping over the rail as they crested a particularly large swell. “She takes a bit o’ steering, for sure.”