by A. C. Cobble
“He’s too low,” muttered Oliver, watching Brach’s command vessel as it coasted one hundred yards above the harbor and then the village.
The airship slowed to walking speed as its shadow passed over the village and crept up the ramp to the Company’s compound. The gate hung open where the natives must have left after overrunning the place. There was no movement.
“Frozen hell, he’s too low!” snapped Oliver.
“There’s nothing there, Duke,” said Sam, studying the huts in the village. “They’ve fled into the jungle or maybe even escaped off the island. What would they accomplish by staying within that compound other than making an easy target for bombardment?”
Gripping the hilt of his broadsword, Oliver scowled but had no response. Something wasn’t right, but all he had was a feeling. If they signaled Brach, what would he even tell the man? Be cautious? He’d voiced that half-a-dozen times before they had boarded the airships and set sail for Imbon. The admiral knew it, but he had his orders from the king. No matter what, Brach was going to put men down on the island, and they were going to clear it out for resettlement. It would have been easier had the Imbonese lined up on the shore, but even if Brach had to hunt them one by one through the jungle, he wasn’t going back to Enhover until he’d done it.
“What’d they do with the lizards?” wondered Oliver, half-expecting the giant beasts to come bursting out of the governor’s mansion, snapping their teeth at Brach’s airship.
“Look at that,” said Sam, pointing to the center of the compound where the dirt yard was just coming into view. “Looks like a burial mound to me. Do you think they’d bury a lizard?”
Oliver frowned. It did look like a burial mound. For lizards, though? Perhaps they’d buried the dead Company men there to avoid sickness. It wasn’t uncommon for illnesses to breakout and spread quickly on the small islands in the tropics. He wasn’t a physician, but leaving dead bodies out in the open on a contained landmass did not seem wise.
“It could—”
The mound exploded.
Thunderous rumbles burst from the center of the compound, and a giant plume of fire and smoke rose toward Brach’s airship. Brown dirt and black iron bounced off the hull of the airship, shattering some of the boards on the keel and rocking the vessel like it was in the midst of a severe summer storm. A man, screaming in terror, fell from the side of the airship into the billowing dust and fire below. The airship jerked higher, water trailing like blood as they emptied the bilge, dumping the water that must have been soaking their levitating stones so they could swoop in low.
“They were ready,” murmured Ainsley, watching the action ahead of them. “Someone had a hand on the emergency lever.”
One hundred fifty, two hundred, three hundred yards higher, the airship rose and then slowed and hung steady. A rain of broken wood, dirt, and iron fell from the bottom to vanish into the dust below. From what Oliver could see of the aft side of the airship, quite a few planks had taken heavy damage, and several were missing. At least one man was killed when the violence of the impact knocked him overboard. Other men were scrambling about in a panic, but Oliver saw no additional casualties. The tender bodies of the crew had been protected from the blast by the hull of the vessel.
“Integrity of the stones and the superstructure around them looks good,” murmured Ainsley, lowering a spyglass and slapping it against her palm. She shouted back to Pettybone. “Signal a report to ‘em about what we can see. Brach and his captain are probably sweating, wondering what the underside looks like.”
Pettybone turned to the Cloud Serpent’s flag man, and the young sailor began raising and lowering his flags in a swift pattern, communicating with Brach’s airship, Enhover’s Slayer, though Oliver wasn’t sure anyone would bother to look back at them.
In the compound, the smoke and dust drifted away, and a few individuals could be seen racing out of buildings and then running down the ramp into the village.
“A trap,” muttered Oliver, watching the fleeing natives.
“Clever,” acknowledge Sam, her eyes darting between the damaged airship and the perpetrators, “though it didn’t do much.”
To punctuate her statement, Enhover’s Slayer rolled their first barrel of red saltpetre munitions over the edge. The thing fell straight down and landed in the huge crater in the center of the courtyard below them. It burst, sending flame and balls of screaming lead pelting into the wood around it. The artillery men on Enhover’s Slayer adjusted their aim, and buildings in the compound began to explode. Concussive blasts, like drums on parade day, rocked the midday air.
Oliver watched as Brach’s sailors strategically began to demolish the Company’s compound, placing barrels where they could blow open walls and then a second barrage to shred anything remaining inside with flying lead.
“Signal them to conserve their munitions,” instructed Oliver. “There’s no one alive down there.”
Ainsley nodded and relayed the orders.
Several more barrels dropped from Enhover’s Slayer before the bombardment stilled. It was evident that Brach had ordered the barrage as retaliation for the blast against his airship, but like Oliver, he knew that no one would be stupid enough to trigger the trap and then wait in the compound for the response. Even if they’d taken down the Slayer, the three other airships could easily mop up anyone caught in the open.
“They meant to bring the thing down and failed,” mused Oliver. “Had they been successful, what would they have done?”
Sam frowned at him.
He pointed at the line of jungle near the compound. “Captain Ainsley, take us a little closer. My guess is that there’s a couple hundred natives crouched in waiting to rush out and scramble over the Slayer had they managed to down her.”
Nodding, Ainsley adjusted course, but before they got close, one of the airships on Brach’s flank must have had the same thought, and suddenly, the starboard bank of their cannon erupted into life.
Between the thumps of the cannon blasts and the whistling of the heavy balls of iron flying through the air, Oliver heard screams of pain and panic. As he’d guessed, the natives were clustered along the tree line of the jungle, and they hadn’t fled when they should have after their initial trap failed.
The second flanking vessel turned, and soon, they began a fusillade as well, the two airships punching giant holes in the jungle canopy. Broken trees, torn leaves, and smashed bodies. Through the holes in the jungle, Oliver could see flashes of movement as people fled deeper into the trees.
Admiral Brach, his airship back under control after the attack, drifted overhead, letting the other two airships blast the edge of the foliage with cannon. Brach appeared to be tracking the progress of the natives’ flight.
“Hells,” muttered Oliver.
“What?” asked Sam.
“He’s going to drop on them.”
“That’s what we’re here for,” she said, placing a hand on his arm.
He shook his head. “No, I mean… Yes, I don’t want to see this, but all of those people look to be running in the same direction, don’t they? They’re going somewhere. It’s a small island. In a few turns of the clock, we could know where they’re headed.”
They, and the people below, did not get a turn of the clock. Brach waited until the stream of humanity began to cross a narrow creek, and then his men started to drop their bombs again.
The barrels rolled over the edges of the airship and fell into the open space below, exploding on impact, launching buckets of lead pellets into anyone within twenty yards of each blast.
Snipers on the airship shouldered rifles and began taking cracks at those who crossed above or below the airship’s range. Over and over, Oliver heard the sharp retorts of the firearms and the thunderous concussions of the barrel bombs.
Behind them, the first flanking airship maintained its assault on the edge of the jungle, slowly moving inland, creeping deeper with its hail of cannon fire. The second airship drifted acro
ss the jungle, periodically rolling barrels where the crew must have seen clusters of people running from the cannon, afraid to cross the barrier which Enhover’s Slayer maintained along the creek.
For the rest of the day, Enhover’s airships fired cannon and dropped bombs. By nightfall, a square league of jungle was completely devastated. It looked like the trampled grass of the lawn after one of Philip’s galas, though instead of dropped and broken wine flutes, it was bodies Oliver could see peeking from underneath downed trees.
He couldn’t estimate how many natives had been killed in the action, but by the time the sun touched the horizon, the cracks of the firearms had grown rare. The snipers saw nothing below worth shooting.
Knowing that on the morrow, they would lower the marines to continue the campaign through the jungle, Oliver couldn’t decide how he felt about the annihilation. He hated to see the bloodshed, but the next day, Enhover’s people, his people, would be at risk.
He needed a drink.
His boots thumped onto the ground, the packed sand softened by ash fallen from fires set during the uprising and the retaliation the day before. A quarter league from them was the village of Imbon and the Company compound that oversaw it. Both areas were crawling with blue-coated royal marines.
Oliver held a hand up to his brow, blocking the sun from his eyes, and looked at the verdant mountain that rose behind the settlement. The top of that mountain was belching a steady stream of thick, white smoke. The ash beneath his boots wasn’t just from the conflicts of man, he realized. The mountain itself was discharging a thin layer of the stuff all across the island.
“Duke Wellesley,” said a well-dressed royal marine officer, walking briskly to join them.
“Commander Ostrander,” acknowledged Oliver.
The commander nodded to Oliver and then doffed his hat and bowed to Sam and Captain Ainsley. “I recognize you both, do I not?”
“My captain, Catherine Ainsley, and my priestess, Sam,” introduced Oliver.
Ostrander wiped the back of his hand across his sweaty brow and settled his hat back on top of his powered wig.
“A bit hot in the tropics for that, is it not?” questioned Oliver.
“Admiral Brach’s a traditionalist,” explained the commander. “You should see him at officer’s supper each evening. Full suits and wigs for all of us. You’ll never find a smarter dressed group eating beans, salted pork, and stale ship’s biscuits. That man’s back couldn’t be straighter if you rammed a flagpole up his arse.” He glanced at the two women. “Apologies.”
“They’ve done worse,” said Oliver, gesturing for the commander to lead them toward the village.
“We’ve done what?” asked Sam, raising an eyebrow.
“I didn’t mean it like that,” muttered Oliver. “I meant you’ve said worse in front of me… fouler language.”
Sam shrugged. “I thought you were speaking of that time I rammed a ship’s mast up a man’s arse.”
“Hells,” muttered Oliver, turning from her.
“You boys are cute,” said Captain Ainsley, clapping Oliver and Commander Ostrander on the shoulders. “Come on. I think I know the way.”
She started off toward the village, and Ostrander hurried to walk beside her.
Sam fell in next to Oliver and playfully elbowed him in the ribcage. She whispered, “He reminds me of you the first time we met.”
Oliver tried to ignore her.
“Looks like they’ve run Enhover’s flag back up the pole at the compound,” Sam called ahead to Ostrander.
The commander’s stride lengthened, but he didn’t turn.
Despite the grim work they were embarking on, Oliver couldn’t stop a smile. He still admonished Sam, “Let’s be serious. I can’t imagine any of the natives have stuck around in the village or the compound after that bombardment, but I couldn’t have imagined those lizards attacking, either. I’m certain we haven’t seen the last surprise from Imbon.”
They huddled around a table, a canvass tent hanging listlessly above them. The flaps had been pulled wide open and tied back, but the marines had erected the tent on the beach down near the surf where it was protected by sharp ridges of jungle rising on either side. The wind barely stirred the air beneath the canvass.
Across the table from Oliver, Admiral Brach slapped the back of his neck.
“Will these bugs be plaguing us constantly?” questioned Commander Ostrander, scratching at an angry red bump on his hand.
“There are some herbs the natives grind down to oil. They rub it on their skin, and it’s quite effective,” replied Oliver. “It smells funny, but I found it was worth it. Of course, I don’t expect we’ll find many natives who are willing to share which herbs they use to create the mixture. Perhaps one of the shipboard physicians is an herbalist? They could scout the Company’s herb gardens and see if they can find something. The best solution, though, is to find somewhere with a constant breeze. If we can clear the compound, that would suit. Or you could sleep aboard the airships. I don’t relish the idea of getting hauled up and down every time I want to talk to someone, though. Aside from relocating camp to higher ground, my best piece of advice, Commander, is to close the tent flaps when you retire and sleep in your sleeves and trousers.”
The man grunted, and Oliver saw Admiral Brach glancing at the raised tent flaps. Lowering the flaps would stave off some of the insects, but during the day, it wasn’t worth blocking the little bit of wind that reached them. Worse, though, would be meeting outside of the tent where the tropical sun blazed like forge fire. During his travels, Oliver had found that the middle of the day in the tropics was best for a cool, stiff drink followed by a nap in the shade. Unfortunately, they had work to be about.
“Right here, this depression is where the artifacts were recovered,” said Oliver, stabbing a finger down onto the map on the table. “There are warehouses and a small pier over here for loading spices. These lines, those are the largest plantations. Here, at the base of the mountain, that’s where the Company found a series of caves that Towerson began using for spice storage. The caves are quite deep. If I was afraid of fire from above, inside there is where I’d hide. The only other structures that could conceivably hide so many people are the warehouses. If they’re not gathered in either of those places, I’m afraid they’ve scattered in the jungle, and we’ve got some work ahead of us.”
Brach, rubbing his chin, suggested, “We could send half the men through the jungle and transport the other half down here to the plantations. They could both close in and meet at the caverns. That way, if they’re in there, they won’t have a chance to escape.”
“That’s a rough trek through the jungle,” warned Oliver. “Hot, humid, and little in the way of pathways. At least, few that you’re likely to be able to locate.”
“You didn’t map them?” wondered Ostrander.
“The jungle will grow over a footpath in two or three cycles of the moon,” explained Oliver. “The natives’ traffic patterns changed seasonally, depending on where they were finding the easiest sources of sustenance. When we arrived, there weren’t any permanent paths, just temporary tracks that might disappear by the time my ink was dry. Instead of trying to maintain roads through the undergrowth, Towerson found it much easier to sail around. Even on a small ketch, the journey isn’t more than a few turns of the clock. Hacking your way through the foliage will take two or three days.”
“Hells,” muttered Ostrander.
“The coast belonged to the Company,” explained Oliver, “the interior to the natives.”
“It must be done,” commanded Admiral Brach. “If we don’t move through the jungle, we can’t assure it’s clear of the enemy. We’ll do it for the Crown.”
“For the Crown,” responded Commander Ostrander grimly
Oliver decided he’d recommend the man for a promotion if they both returned to Enhover hale. Competent, loyal, and, unlike Brach, a realist. The empire needed more men like Brendan Ostrander.
/> “Don’t suppose you fancy leading the way?” the commander asked, turning to Oliver.
Oliver shook his head. “I’m planning to go up here, to the pond we found that started this mess. Cleaning out this island for resettlement is all well and good, but I want to understand how this began.”
Admiral Brach grunted but did not voice his disagreement. He was the senior military official, but Oliver was a son of the king.
Frowning, Oliver studied the map. Brach understood the mission, but he hadn’t been fully briefed on the rest of it. He didn’t know that the pool had hidden a trove of artifacts, and it was study of those artifacts that led to the release of a reaver in Southundon, the deaths of dozens, and the loss of the Church’s library. There was more to accomplish in Imbon than simply spilling the blood of all its people.
Finally, Brach mustered the courage to ask, “Do you think splitting from the war parties and traipsing through the jungle alone is wise, Oliver? I’d rather not compromise the effectiveness of our forces by spreading too thin.”
Oliver waved a hand to placate the man. “I’m not asking for an escort, Brach. I’ll have a contingent from the Cloud Serpent, and I think that will be sufficient.”
“Not if you run into serious resistance,” warned Ostrander. “In this foliage, even if we hear combat, no one will be able to come to your aid quickly.”
“The Cloud Serpent will provide overhead support and a platform for rescue if we need it,” assured Oliver. “And there won’t be much traipsing. I’m not looking to dig out nests of rebels. I’ll be finding the shortest route to this pool. We’ll drop in the closest spot we can find an opening in the canopy and do a quick hike in and out. We should have time to catch up to your forces before the engagement begins at the caverns.”
The two military man eyed each other, and Brach remarked, “If something happens, your father will kill me.”
“I’m not asking, Admiral,” mentioned Oliver.
