His Majesty's Dragon t-1

by Naomi Novik

  “And all this is around Cherbourg, not Calais, though the distance is greater, and our fleet is closer by. I cannot account for it, but Gardner is quite right; I am damned sure he means mischief, and he cannot very well do it until his fleet is here.” Abruptly he stood and walked straight from the office; unsure whether to take this as a dismissal, Laurence followed him through the headquarters and outside, to the clearing where Lily was lying in her recovery.

  Captain Harcourt was sitting by Lily’s head, stroking her foreleg, over and over; Choiseul was with her and reading quietly to them both. Lily’s eyes were still dull with pain, but in a more encouraging sign, she had evidently just eaten whole food at last, for there was a great heap of cracked bones still being cleared away by the ground crew.

  Choiseul put down his book and said a quiet word to Harcourt, then came to them. “She is almost asleep; I beg you not to stir her,” he said, very softly.

  Lenton nodded and beckoned him and Laurence both further away. “How does she progress?” he asked.

  “Very well, sir, according to the surgeons; they say she heals as quickly as could be hoped,” Choiseul said. “Catherine has not left her side.”

  “Good, good,” Lenton said. “Three weeks, then, if their original estimate holds true. Well, gentlemen, I have changed my mind; I am going to send Temeraire out on patrol every day during her recovery, rather than giving him and Praecursoris turn and turn about. You do not need the experience, Choiseul, and Temeraire does; you will have to keep Praecursoris exercised independently.”

  Choiseul bowed, with no hint of dissatisfaction, if he felt any. “I am happy to serve in any way I can, sir; you need merely direct me.”

  Lenton nodded. “Well, and for now, stay with Harcourt as much as ever you can; I am sure you know what it is to have a wounded beast,” he said. Choiseul rejoined her by the now-sleeping Lily, and Lenton led Laurence away again, scowling in private thought. “Laurence,” he said, “while you patrol, I want you to try and run formation maneuvers with Nitidus and Dulcia; I know you have not been trained to small-formation work, but Warren and Chenery can help you there. I want him able to lead a pair of light-combatants in a fight independently, if need be.”

  “Very good, sir,” Laurence said, a little startled; he wanted badly to ask for some explanation, and repressed his curiosity with some difficulty.

  They came to the clearing where Excidium was just falling asleep; Captain Roland was speaking with her ground crewmen and inspecting a piece of the harness. She nodded to them both and came away with them; they walked back together towards the headquarters.

  “Roland, can you do without Auctoritas and Crescendium?” Lenton asked abruptly.

  She lifted an eyebrow at him. “If I have to, of course,” she said. “What’s this about?”

  Lenton did not seem to object to being so directly queried. “We must begin to think about sending Excidium to Cadiz once Lily is flying well,” he said. “I am not going to have the kingdom lost for want of one dragon in the right place; we can hold out against aerial raids a long time here, with the help of the Channel Fleet and the shore batteries, and that fleet must not be allowed to escape.”

  If Lenton did choose to send Excidium and his formation away, their absence would leave the Channel vulnerable to aerial attack; yet if the French and Spanish fleet escaped Cadiz and came north, to join with the ships in port at Brest and Calais, perhaps even a single day of so overwhelming an advantage would be enough for Napoleon to ferry over his invasion force.

  Laurence did not envy Lenton the decision; without knowing whether Bonaparte’s aerial divisions were halfway to Cadiz overland or still along the Austrian border, the choice could only be half guess. Yet it would have to be made, if only through inaction, and Lenton was clearly prepared instead to take the risk.

  Now Lenton’s design with regard to Temeraire’s orders was clear: the admiral wanted the flexibility of having a second formation on hand, even if a small and imperfectly trained one. Laurence thought that he recalled that Auctoritas and Crescendium were middle-weight combat dragons, part of Excidium’s supporting forces; perhaps Lenton intended to match them with Temeraire, to make a maneuverable strike force of the three of them.

  “Trying to out-guess Bonaparte; the thought makes my blood run cold,” Captain Roland said, echoing Laurence’s sentiments. “But we will be ready to go whenever you want to send us; I will fly maneuvers without Auctor and Cressy as time allows.”

  “Good, see to it,” Lenton said, as they climbed the stairs to the foyer. “I will leave you now; I have another ten dispatches to read yet, more’s the pity. Goodnight, gentlemen.”

  “Goodnight, Lenton,” Roland said, and stretched out with a yawn when he was gone. “Ah well, formation flying would be deadly boring without a change-about every so often, any road. What do you say to some supper?”

  They had some soup and toasted bread, and a nice Stilton after, with port, and once again settled in Roland’s room for some piquet. After a few hands, and some idle conversation, she said, with the first note of diffidence he had ever heard from her, “Laurence, may I make so bold—”

  The question made him stare, as she had never before hesitated to forge ahead on any subject whatsoever. “Certainly,” he said, trying to imagine what she could possibly mean to ask him. Abruptly he was aware of his surroundings: the large and rumpled bed, less than ten steps away; the open throat of her dressing-gown, for which she had exchanged her coat and breeches, behind a screen, when they first came into the room. He looked down at his cards, his face heating; his hands trembled a little.

  “If you have any reluctance, I beg you to tell me at once,” she added.

  “No,” Laurence said at once, “I would be very happy to oblige you. I am sure,” he added belatedly, as he realized she had not yet asked.

  “You are very kind,” she said, and a wide flash of a smile crossed her face, lopsidedly, the right side of her mouth turning up more than the scarred left. Then she went on, “And I would be very grateful if you would tell me, with real honesty, what you think of Emily’s work, and of her inclination for the life.”

  He was hard-pressed not to turn crimson at his mistaken assumption, even as she added, “I know it is a wretched thing to ask you to speak ill of her to me, but I have seen what comes of relying too heavily upon the line of succession, without good training. If you have any cause to doubt her suitability, I beg you to tell me now, while there still may be time to repair the fault.”

  Her anxiety was very plain now, and thinking of Rankin and his disgraceful treatment of Levitas, Laurence could well understand it; sympathy enabled him to recover from his self-inflicted embarrassment. “I have seen the consequences of what you describe as well,” he said, quick to reassure her. “I promise you I would speak frankly if I saw any such signs; indeed, I should never have taken her on as a runner if I were not entirely convinced of her reliability, and her dedication to her duty. She is too young for certainty, of course, but I think her very promising.”

  Roland blew out a breath gustily and sat back in her chair, letting her hand of cards drop as she stopped even pretending to be paying them attention. “Lord, how you relieve me,” she said. “I hoped, of course, but I find I cannot trust myself on the subject.” She laughed with relief, and went to her bureau for a new bottle of wine.

  Laurence held out his glass for her to fill. “To Emily’s success,” he proposed, and they drank; then she reached out, took the glass from his hand, and kissed him. He had indeed been wholly mistaken; on this matter, she proved not at all tentative.

  Chapter 11

  L AURENCE COULD NOT help wincing at the haphazard way in which Jane threw her things out of the wardrobe and into heaps upon the bed. “May I help you?” he asked finally, out of desperation, and took possession of her baggage. “No, I beg you, permit me the liberty; you may consider your flight path as I do this,” he said.

  “Thank you, Laurence, that is very kin
d of you.” She sat down with her maps instead. “It will be a straightforward flight, I hope,” she went on, scribbling calculations and moving the small bits of wood which she was using to represent the scattered dragon transport ships that would provide Excidium and his formation with resting places on their way to Cadiz. “So long as the weather holds, less than two weeks should see us there.” With so much urgent need, the dragons would not be going by a single transport, but rather would fly from one transport to another, attempting to predict their locations based on the current and the wind.

  Laurence nodded, though a little grimly; they were only a day shy of October, and there was every likelihood at this time of year that the weather would not hold. Then she would be faced with the dangerous choice of trying to find a transport that might easily have been blown off-course, or seeking shelter inland in the face of Spanish artillery. Presuming, of course, that the formation was not itself brought down by a storm: dragons were from time to time cast down by lightning or heavy winds, and if flung into a heavy ocean, they could easily drown with all their crew.

  But there was no choice. Lily had recovered with great speed over the intervening weeks; she had led the formation through a full patrol only yesterday, and landed without pain or stiffness. Lenton had looked her over, spoken a few words with her and Captain Harcourt, and gone straightaway to give Jane her orders for Cadiz. Laurence had been expecting as much, of course, but he could not help feeling concern, both for the dragons going and for those remaining behind.

  “There, that will do,” she said, finishing her chart and throwing down her pen; he looked up from the baggage in surprise: he had fallen into a brown study and packed mechanically, without marking what he did; now he realized that he had been silent for nearly twenty minutes together, and that he had one of her stays in his hands. He hastily dropped it atop the neatly packed things in her small case, and closed the lid.

  The sunlight was beginning to come in at the window; their time was gone. “There, Laurence, do not look so glum; I have made the flight to Gibraltar a dozen times,” she said, coming to kiss him soundly. “You will have a worse time of it here, I am afraid; they will undoubtedly try some mischief once they know we are gone.”

  “I have every confidence in you,” Laurence said, ringing the bell for the servants. “I only hope we have not misjudged.” It was as much as he would say critical of Lenton, particularly on a subject where he could not be unbiased. Yet he felt that even if he had not had a personal objection to make to placing Excidium and his formation in danger, he would still have been concerned by the lack of further intelligence.

  Volly had arrived three days before with a report full of fresh negatives. A handful of French dragons had arrived in Cadiz: enough to keep Mortiferus from forcing out the fleet, but not a tenth of the dragons which had been stationed along the Rhine. And in cause for more concern, even though nearly every light and quick dragon not wholly involved in dispatch service had been pressed into scouting and spying, they still knew nothing more of Bonaparte’s work across the Channel.

  He walked with her to Excidium’s clearing and saw her aboard; it was strange, for he felt as though he ought to feel more. He would have put a bullet in his brains sooner than let Edith go to face danger while he remained behind himself, yet he could say his adieus to Roland without much more of a pang than in bidding farewell to any other comrade. She blew him a friendly kiss from atop Excidium’s back, once her crew were all aboard. “I will see you in a few months, I am sure, or sooner if we can chase the Frogs out of harbor,” she called down. “Fair winds, and mind you don’t let Emily run wild.”

  He raised a hand to her. “Godspeed,” he called, and stood watching as the enormous wings carried Excidium up, the other dragons of his formation rising to join him, until they had all dwindled out of sight to the south.

  Although they kept a wary eye on the Channel skies, the first weeks after Excidium’s departure were quiet. No raids came, and Lenton was of the opinion that the French still thought Excidium was in residence, and were correspondingly reluctant to make any venture. “The longer we can keep them thinking it, the better,” he said to the assembled captains after another uneventful patrol. “Aside from the benefit to us, just as well if they don’t realize another formation is nearing their precious fleet at Cadiz.”

  They all took a great measure of comfort from the news of Excidium’s safe arrival, which Volly brought almost two weeks to the day from his departure. “They’d already begun when I left,” Captain James told the other captains the next day, taking a hurried breakfast before setting out on his return journey. “You could hear the Spaniards howling for miles: their merchantmen are as quick to fall apart under dragon-spray as any ship-of-the-line, and their shops and houses as well. I expect they’ll fire on the Frenchmen themselves if Villeneuve doesn’t come out soon, alliance or not.”

  The atmosphere grew lighter after this encouraging news, and Lenton cut their patrol a little short and granted them all liberty for celebration, a welcome respite to men who had been working at a frenetic pace. The more energetic went into town; most seized a little sleep, as did the weary dragons.

  Laurence took the opportunity to enjoy a quiet evening’s reading with Temeraire; they stayed together late into the night, reading by the light of the lanterns. Laurence woke out of a light doze some time after the moon had risen: Temeraire’s head was dark against the illuminated sky, and he was looking searchingly to the north of their clearing. “Is something the matter?” Laurence asked him. Sitting up, he could hear a faint noise, strange and high.

  Even as they listened, the sound stopped. “Laurence, that was Lily, I think,” Temeraire said, his ruff standing up stiffly.

  Laurence slid down at once. “Stay here; I will return as quickly as I may,” he said, and Temeraire nodded without ever looking away.

  The paths through the covert were largely deserted and unlit: Excidium’s formation gone, all the light dragons out on scouting duty, and the night cold enough to send even the most dedicated crews into the barracks buildings. The ground had frozen three days before; it was packed and hard enough for his heels to drum hollowly upon it as he walked.

  Lily’s clearing was empty; a faint murmur of noise from the barracks, whose lit windows he could see distantly, through the trees, and no one about the buildings. Lily herself was crouched motionless, her yellow eyes red-rimmed and staring, and she was clawing the ground silently. Low voices, and the sound of crying; Laurence wondered if he was intruding untimely, but Lily’s evident distress decided him: he walked into the clearing, calling in a strong voice, “Harcourt? Are you there?”

  “No further” came Choiseul’s voice, low and sharp: Laurence came around Lily’s head and halted in dreadful surprise: Choiseul was holding Harcourt by the arm, and there was an expression of complete despair on his face. “Make no sound, Laurence,” he said; there was a sword in his hand, and behind him on the ground Laurence could see a young midwingman stretched out, dark bloodstains spreading over the back of his coat. “No sound at all.”

  “For God’s sake, what do you think you are about?” Laurence said. “Harcourt, is it well with you?”

  “He has killed Wilpoys,” she said thickly; she was wavering where she stood, and as the torchlight came on her face he could see a bruise already darkening across half her forehead. “Laurence, never mind about me, you must go and fetch help; he means to do Lily a mischief.”

  “No, never, never,” Choiseul said. “I mean no harm to her or you, Catherine, I swear it. But I will not be answerable if you interfere, Laurence; do nothing.” He raised the sword; blood gleamed on its edge, not far from Harcourt’s neck, and Lily made the thin eerie noise again, a high-pitched whining that grated against the ear. Choiseul was pale, his face taking on a greenish cast in the light, and he looked desperate enough to do anything; Laurence kept his position, hoping for a better moment.

  Choiseul stood staring at him a moment longer, until
satisfied Laurence did not mean to go, and then said, “We will go all of us together to Praecursoris; Lily, you will stay here, and follow when you see us go aloft: I promise you no harm will come to Catherine so long as you obey.”

  “Oh, you miserable, cowhearted traitor dog,” Harcourt said, “do you think I am going to go to France with you, and lick Bonaparte’s boots? How long have you been planning this?” She struggled to pull away from him, even staggering as she was, but Choiseul shook her and she nearly fell.

  Lily snarled, half-rising, her wings mantling: Laurence could see the black acid glistening at the edges of her bone spurs. “Catherine!” she hissed, the sound distorted through her clenched teeth.

  “Silence, enough,” Choiseul said, pulling Harcourt up and close to his body, pinning her arms: the sword still held steady in his other hand, Laurence’s eyes always upon it, waiting for a chance. “You will follow, Lily; you will do as I have said. We are going now; march, at once, monsieur, there.” He gestured with the sword. Laurence did not turn around, but stepped backwards, and once beneath the shadow of the trees he moved more slowly still, so that Choiseul came unknowingly closer than he meant to do.

  A moment of wild grappling: then they all three went to the ground in a heap, the sword flying and Harcourt caught between them. They struck the ground heavily, but Choiseul was beneath, and for a moment Laurence had the advantage; he was forced to sacrifice it to roll Harcourt free and out of harm’s way, and Choiseul struck him across the face as soon as she was clear, throwing him off.

  They rolled about on the ground, battering at each other awkwardly, both trying to reach for the sword even as they struggled. Choiseul was powerfully built and taller, and though Laurence had a far greater experience of close combat, the Frenchman’s weight began to tell as they wrestled. Lily was roaring out loud now, voices calling in the distance, and despair gave Choiseul a burst of strength: he drove a fist into Laurence’s stomach and lunged for the sword while Laurence curled gasping about the pain.