A Voyage Through Air

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Canri matched the ship’s manoeuvres with barely a flick of his wings. Flencen and Loarva shot off ahead with astonishing speed, and were soon lost amid the infinite blue.

  THE SEA GLOBE

  On the third day out from Guatigua Taggie saw the olri-gi feeding. They were passing wide of a small isle, no more than a mile wide and covered in a thick coat of trees and bushes, when the three dark shapes suddenly darted away from the Angelhawk.

  As always, the air around the little isle was thick with flocks of birds, like multi-coloured clouds forever shifting about. The olri-gi approached them from the sun, accelerating fast with their wings rippling into a blur of speed. Just as they hit the outer fringes of the birds, their mouths opened wide, and the birds were simply scooped up. The flocks scattered, of course, flapping madly, heading for the safety of the vegetation smothering the isle. The olri-gi spun and turned as if they were performing some elaborate dance, ploughing through the densest congregation of the fleeing birds, gulping them down.

  ‘They must be eating a hundred each,’ Lantic said in fascination. He’d borrowed Captain Rebecca’s small telescope to observe the awesome creatures. Most of the crew were standing on the mid-deck below, watching the same spectacle.

  The bird flocks were now contracting round the isles. The olri-gi performed one last skimming manoeuvre just above the tree tops and streaked away.

  Taggie borrowed the telescope and pointed it aft down the hull until she was looking at the comet. It had grown from a star-point to a small circle. The red light it emitted was strong, and constantly fluctuating. When she lined the telescope up on it, she could see small curving fountains erupting from the surface; none of them lasted for more than a few minutes before blending back into the long hazy tail. She started to wonder how far away it was.

  ‘It looks like it’s chasing us,’ she remarked.

  ‘Let’s hope not,’ Lantic said. ‘We’ve got enough odds stacked against us already.’

  Canri slipped elegantly through the air to manoeuvre close to the Angelhawk. ‘We think there’s a sea globe in the clouds half a day ahead,’ the olri-gi said.

  Captain Rebecca took the telescope from Taggie and scoured the sky above the prow. Vast streamers of white and grey cloud drifted slowly across the sun, meandering into shallow curves that wound round a distant eye-shaped swirl. ‘How big is the sea globe?’ she asked.

  ‘There’s a lot of cloud ahead, so it’ll be a large one,’ Canri replied.

  ‘Can’t we just go round those clouds?’ Taggie asked.

  ‘This wind current will be drawn to the sea globe,’ the captain told her. ‘So we can go the long way round, outside the clouds, but it will add at least a couple of days to our voyage. We’d have to find a decent wind current on the other side as well.’

  Taggie examined the clouds ahead. ‘So what happens if we follow the cloud streamers in and fly over the sea globe?’

  ‘It’s very cloudy on the other side,’ Favian explained. ‘With the sun shining on it all the time, the sea gives off a lot of water vapour. We’ll be flying blind for a while.’

  ‘So, young Queen, how quickly to you want to get to Wynate?’ Captain Rebecca asked.

  Taggie didn’t like the idea of flying blind through this Realm, but she was starting to worry about how long it was taking them to reach Mirlyn’s Gate. The War Emperor would be leading his armies into the Fourth Realm by now; it wouldn’t be long until the first battle began.

  ‘Just how risky is flying above the sea globe?’ she asked the captain.

  ‘Barely any risk, especially with the olri-gi flying scout for us.’

  Taggie saw the expression of dismay cross Maklepine’s face, but then it seemed to be his place in life to worry. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘Let’s take the shortest course we can.’

  After a couple of hours’ sailing the Angelhawk reached the edges of the long streamers of cloud. They began to trace a gentle curve through the air, following the drawn-out tatters of vapour in towards the sea globe.

  ‘Water ho!’ the forward watch called.

  Everyone looked up. There was a large blue-grey sphere far beyond the prow. The sky beyond it boiled with pure white cloud that was rushing away from the sea globe’s sunward side, not that they could see the sun any more. The white cloud was too thick.

  ‘That is one big sea,’ Lantic said, looking up with growing concern at the immense sphere of water. Right at the centre of the darkwards’ surface the water gleamed red under the comet’s escalating light.

  ‘This?’ Captain Rebecca said scornfully. ‘The olri-gi exaggerated, young Prince. Why, I’ve seen some sea globes big enough that it would take a week to fly round them.’

  ‘Taggie.’ Jemima was pulling on Taggie’s sleeve, her face turning an unhealthy white.

  ‘What’s up?’

  ‘I don’t like this. Tell the captain to steer the long way round. Please?’

  ‘What’s there?’ Taggie asked. ‘What can you sight?’

  ‘I don’t know. I just know there’s something bad in that sea.’

  ‘Captain?’ Taggie asked. ‘What lives in the sea globes?’

  ‘Nothing that can hurt us, Blossom Princess, don’t you worry. I know what I’m doing.’ The swirl of stars in her jewelled eye contracted. ‘That is a lot of cloud on the other side, though,’ she admitted. ‘We could be heading into a bit of a storm.’

  Jemima’s sullen expression became a little more satisfied. ‘See?’

  ‘I’ll ask the olri-gi to take a look,’ the captain said. She put her head back, and emitted a high pitched airsong.

  Taggie watched the hulking black triangle of Loarva dwindle away into the thin mist that was building around the Angelhawk. Visibility shrank by the minute as the ship rushed onward. She could see the great curving streamers of foggy cloud they were following start to wind up tightly. As the seething vapour streaked down to the sea globe it grew narrow, turning to a torrent of rain which lashed down on the darkward side.

  Both Sophie and Felix were pressed against the lower deck net, looking aft. ‘That comet is going to come close,’ Sophie told Taggie. ‘We’ve been watching it. It’s heading almost straight for us.’

  Taggie didn’t need to use the telescope any more. To the naked eye, the comet was now a tiny ball whose surface seethed as if it was an agitated living thing. Big jets of glowing pink gas were firing out at random, expanding to tattered puffs that stretched out for miles and miles behind it.

  ‘They never hit sea globes,’ Maklepine told them. ‘We’re in the safest place, trust me.’

  ‘They must hit them occasionally,’ Lantic said stiffly. ‘It’s sheer probability.’

  ‘If they were natural phenomenon, aye,’ the shipsmage said. ‘But you forget, young prince, these are the bodies of angels.’

  Jemima came out of the little cabin she shared with Taggie and Sophie, wearing her armour. Even after a year, it remained oversized for her; she had to roll the sleeves and legs up.

  ‘Are you still worried?’ Felix asked.

  Jemima shrugged. ‘I know something bad is waiting up ahead,’ she said. ‘I can sight that much.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I don’t know. All right?’

  Taggie scoured the sky ahead. The surface of the sea globe was now barely twenty miles away, and so great it was starting to resemble a flat sea just like any of those in the Outer Realm.

  Something rose up from behind the northwards curve of the sea globe, exactly the same colour. A sphere that raced above the surface extremely fast. It was as if the sea globe had a tiny moon.

  ‘What is that?’ Jemima squealed fearfully.

  ‘Jem,’ Taggie said, starting to get annoyed at her little sister’s panic. ‘You need to get a grip.’

  ‘Aye, calm you down, little Princess,’ Captain Rebecca said with a grin. ‘’Tis just a globelet. Most sea globes have a few.’

  ‘Globelet?’ Felix asked.

  ‘Aye. They’re
thrown off by the surface every now and then. Mostly they just evaporate into more cloud, but some fall back with an almighty splash. ’Tis quite a sight.’

  Taggie was watching the globelet in astonishment. It really was like a moon. She tried to work out how big it was; several miles in diameter at least, with its own choppy waves clashing all over it.

  ‘I don’t like it,’ Jemima whined.

  ‘Give it a rest,’ Taggie snapped.

  ‘Here we go!’ Captain Rebecca spun the helm wheel again, altering their course slightly so they were flying parallel to the water, perhaps fifteen miles above it. For the first time, Taggie began to appreciate just how fast they were sailing. The tiny white crested waves below were flashing past.

  Something moved just under the surface, gliding along under the breakers. Something dark grey and large.

  Felix gasped, and scurried down the net to the handrail. ‘Did you see that?’

  ‘Relax, squirrel,’ Captain Rebecca laughed. ‘There are many pods of pearlwhales living in the globe seas of this realm. They can’t fly. You’re perfectly safe. Sweet heavens, for a group anxious to visit Wynate you’re all badly nervy.’

  The Angelhawk spent three hours flying over the water. Her passengers spent the whole time staring down at the surface. They saw more of the great pale shapes of pearlwhales slipping through the depths. And other, smaller creatures that moved quickly. The waves battled each other constantly. Then there were the whirlpools. Huge spinning funnels of water, whose tapering craters reached down twenty or thirty miles to a blackness which hid their true extent. Another globelet came racing round the sea globe, its sunward hemisphere a bright grey-blue while the darkward hemisphere shone a dull scarlet under the light of the expanding comet. Just like the Angelhawk’s sails, Taggie noticed, which shone from the two different lights that now dominated the sky above the sea globe.

  Once, Jemima and Sophie yelled in amazement and the others turned just in time to see a massive geyser of water powering miles up into the air from an exceptionally choppy section of water. The crest began to curve downwards again. Though they could all see several tiny spheres of water break free and hurtle into the distance. Taggie thought that must be how the globelets were created. She didn’t like to think how big one of those geysers would be, nor what caused it.

  ‘What is down there?’ Lantic exclaimed with a frown, clearly considering the same thought.

  ‘Something powerful,’ Lord Colgath said, his deep voice for once subdued with caution.

  Maklepine joined them at the rail, staring down at the turmoil of water far below. ‘Sailors of this Realm claim that the sea globes are the prisons of fallen archangels cast down from the heavens during the war of the gods before our First Times,’ the shipsmage said with a spark of delight in his eye. ‘And that they are held in place only by the weight of water on top of them. Every wave you see, every whirlpool and geyser, is caused by them twisting and turning as they struggle to be free.’ He touched his forehead with his finger, and walked off round the mid-deck.

  ‘Gosh.’ Taggie gulped, and turned back to watch the shrinking geyser again. Her hand went to the bag hanging round her neck, feeling the shape of the dark gate it contained. Just in case . . .

  ‘A fallen archangel,’ Jemima said, pale-faced. Her hands gripped the rail so hard her knuckles were whitening. ‘Taggie, I just want to go home.’

  Taggie put her arm round her little sister, and cuddled her tight. She felt more than a little overwhelmed herself after listening to Maklepine. ‘We will, Jem, very soon now. I promise. But you know we can’t turn back, not now. Still, at least you know what was troubling you.’

  Jemima gave a reluctant nod, and sniffed hard.

  They flew across the sea globe for another twenty minutes. All that time, the red light of the comet grew brighter and brighter aft of the Angelhawk. When Captain Rebecca finally spun the helm wheel again, taking them up away from the waves and whirlpools, it was as if a second sun was shining behind them. A sun that blazed scarlet and sent flickers of crimson shadows across the hull.

  Ahead of the prow, the cloud that rose from the sunward side of the sea globe was like a fluorescent pink wall stretched right across the Realm. The temperature of the air gusting over the deck began to rise again.

  ‘Where’s Loarva got to?’ Felix muttered anxiously as the ship raced towards the cloud. He stuck his tiny damp nose through the net and sniffed hard. ‘She should have been back by now.’

  Captain Rebecca gave him a sharp glance, betraying how she was thinking along similar lines.

  Taggie stared at the unyielding pink mass ahead with growing unease. Cloudbusting was the oldest magic she had; when she was younger she’d often chased rainclouds out of a summer sky. Not that she had the strength to shift anything like this massive barricade of shining vapour. Not in its entirety. But all they needed was a clear passage.

  ‘Go away,’ she told it, and clicked her fingers.

  A blemish appeared in the uniform sheet of pink. Strands of darker cloud slunk up to the surface, and curled round as if someone was stirring them like foam on a coffee cup. The blemish bowed inward and began to expand, like an iris opening.

  All around the deck, the crew began to cheer.

  Captain Rebecca steered them into the centre of the vast tunnel which pushed up through the cloud. The Angelhawk sailed along the immense passage of clear air, with its escort of two olri-gi flapping lazily at her side.

  Everybody on board felt it at the same time as Jemima cried out in shock. It was as if they’d passed through a curtain of magic. Magic which disgustingly licked every part of them and the ship. Even the olri-gi spun in agitation.

  ‘What in the sweet heavens was that?’ Captain Rebecca demanded. The air around the Angelhawk remained perfectly clear, she could see for miles and miles along the tunnel of slow-spinning pink cloud.

  ‘We have been sighted,’ Lord Colgath boomed. The slivers of iridescent colours within his cloak all turned a sickly orange while his head turned from side to side, as if he was trying to find the source of the magic.

  Along both decks the crew were immobile and silent, scouring the blank sky of pink cloud enveloping them.

  ‘It’s her,’ Jemima wailed, staring at the rune stones in her hand.

  ‘Who?’ asked Taggie. ‘Who is it, Jem?’

  ‘The old woman in black. She’s found us.’

  Taggie gave Lantic and Sophie a frantic glance as her charmsward bands started to slip round silently. Sophie was already reaching for her crossbow, while several of Lantic’s rings were starting to glow brightly. The only noise was the wind in the Angelhawk’s sails.

  ‘Oh, Jem, I’m so sorry,’ an aghast Taggie said. ‘It wasn’t the archangel you sensed.’ She could have kicked herself, she’d always suspected who the old woman was working for.

  ‘Ships ho!’ came a cry from the forward watch.

  Taggie craned her neck back to stare up past the prow. Her breath caught in her throat. Five miles ahead of the Angelhawk, three ships were sliding out of the curving pink cloud which lined the side of the tunnel. I’ll bring the clouds back, she told herself, and raised her hand ready to click her fingers.

  Two more ships emerged from the cloud up ahead. With them was a shape she knew was an olri-gi, though not one of their escort.

  Five ships! Sweet Heavens. The War Emperor must be desperate to stop me.

  Taggie could feel spells as powerful as her own being added to her original cloudbuster enchantment, strengthening the tunnel of clear air.

  And there was only one person she knew who had a magic that equalled her own. Katrabeth!

  Another four dark specks appeared, along with several more olri-gi.

  ‘Frigates,’ Captain Rebecca growled, baring her teeth in defiance. ‘So the Highlord has sent his finest against me, has he now? But they’ll be no match for my Angelhawk, you see.’

  Taggie, Lantic, Sophie and Lord Colgath all turned to stare in disbel
ief at the captain.

  ‘What?’ Captain Rebecca challenged. ‘Bring the cloud back, young Queen. We’ll soon outrun them amidst that veil. And they’ll not follow where we go. They wouldn’t dare.’

  Two more frigates sailed out of the cloud.

  Taggie let out a groan of trepidation. ‘It’s not the Highlord,’ she said miserably. ‘It’s the War Emperor who sent them. And they will pursue us all the way to the Hell Realm if they have to.’

  ‘Is the War Emperor here?’ Captain Rebecca sneered. ‘No! He sits in his fine castle drinking wine and lets others do his dirty work. They haven’t the fire for this fight.’

  Canri came gliding in towards the Angelhawk. ‘That is Meaor’s drove with the Highlord’s ships,’ he said. ‘I wasn’t expecting to confront my own kind. Olri-gi do not fight among ourselves.’

  ‘I would not ask you to,’ Taggie said.

  ‘How did they find us?’ Lord Colgath asked. ‘I thought Jemima’s new wardveil was sufficient to shield us from their seers.’

  ‘I expect it was Penelopi,’ Captain Rebecca spat. ‘If the navy commander knew we were heading for Wynate, he’d know we would sail past this sea globe.’

  ‘Damn my father!’ Lantic stormed, thumping his fist down on the rail. ‘Taggie, you know we have to try to break past them.’

  She gave him a melancholy smile, thinking back just a few short weeks to the timid, browbeaten prince who had greeted her that first time in Shatha’hal. And now here he was, ready to take on an entire navy – single-handed by the look of him.

  ‘I can animate the Angelhawk’s firestars,’ Lantic insisted, ‘And you and Lord Colgath can—’

  ‘Yes!’ she held up a hand. ‘I get it. And . . . thank you.’

  Lantic’s smile was one of pure admiration directed at her.

  It was hard for Taggie to look away – but when she did scan the sky ahead there were now eleven ships visible, and seven olri-gi. She took a breath. ‘Captain?’