by Sales, Ian
The Admiral had said no more and Ormuz chose not to pry.
He rose to his feet. Without clothes, he was trapped in the Admiral’s cabin. He was still standing there, naked, as the door opened and one of the Admiral’s footmen stepped into the room.
Showered and dressed, Ormuz followed the footman from the sleeping cabin, along the aft gangway, and into the dining room. On a sideboard sat steaming a dozen plates and tureens. Amongst the odours, he identified a common breakfast fish, spiced eggs, pickled vegetables, fresh bread, and smoked meat cuts of various animals. His stomach immediately rumbled. Ignoring the servant—he would learn his name and thank him later—Ormuz took a plate and began piling it high with a sample of each dish. He could, he decided, get very used to this. Although perhaps not, at a fresh stab of pain from his back, everything. That the Admiral had been wholly in control in bed had been expected, but her fierceness had been a shock. She had pulled, pushed, prodded, clawed, squeezed…
He had the wounds to prove it.
Half an hour later, Ormuz exited the Admiral’s suite and stepped on to the Captain’s Bridge. He crossed to the Admiral, who stood beside the battle-consultant, hands on the lip of its table-top, gazing down at the scene depicted in the glass. He cleared his throat. He had no idea what address to use—the Marquis Varä’s lessons on etiquette had not covered such a situation.
The Admiral saved him from embarrassment. “Ah, Casimir,” she said. Her tone was as commanding, as cold and severe, as it always had been.
“Ma’am,” he acknowledged.
“I trust you slept well.” Her head remained bowed, her gaze fixed on the battle-consultant.
“The soreness,” he replied, feeling mischievous, “will no doubt fade with time.”
For one brief moment, he thought he caught a faint smile on the Admiral’s face. But no, he must have been mistaken. She straightened abruptly.
“All those who will come have done so. It is time we made our move.”
The sudden change of topic—not to mention the choice of words—confused Ormuz for several seconds. He shook his head… and the subject of her remark seemed to click into place. The fleet.
His fleet.
“Tomorrow,” she said, “is soon enough.”
“So I have time to visit Linna and see Sliva off?”
The Admiral looked up at him. “You said your farewells last night,” she pointed out.
“I’d still like to see her off.” He needed time to think, away from the Admiral. There was no doing that aboard Vengeful. Too many reminders. The culture of the warship reflected the Admiral’s personality. Perhaps too he wanted to feel the sky above his head and the earth beneath his feet one last time. A weeks-long journey to Geneza lay ahead of them and there would be no shore leaves during it.
“Very well,” the Admiral said curtly. “The launch is at your disposal. See Major Skaria about an escort.” She turned away, back to the battle-consultant.
He had been dismissed.
What, he wondered, had he begun? Had last night been a mistake? Did the Admiral believe it had been a mistake? There was no reading her at the best of times and his current emotional state only made that more difficult. Hurt by her coldness, he left the Captain’s Bridge, walked around the gallery and stepped onto the lift. As it sank down the conning-tower well, he gazed up at the Captain’s Bridge. The Admiral did not look up, but remained deep in thought, studying the disposition of the fleet.
Winter had laid its heavy hand on the ducal aerodrome and coated everywhere in a thick blanket of snow. Ormuz was grateful: it no longer seemed the same place he had witnessed a massacre. The shape of the surrounding land appeared entirely different. The terminals buildings too were unrecognisable obscured in white.
Beside Ormuz, Varä muttered and blew out a spume of hot breath.
Ormuz turned to him.
“Where is she?” the marquis complained. “I’m freezing.”
Varä was dressed warmly enough, so his complaint was nothing more than churlishness. Understandable, Ormuz supposed: a marquis would not expect to wait on a yeoman.
The two of them stood, with an escort of four marines, before the inspector’s sloop, Lantern. The ship crouched on the apron, a great black avian automaton promising speedy justice. To Chianists, the colour black represented order and integrity. Ormuz no longer followed the Church with any real faith but the symbolism was ingrained deep.
A voice behind him called: “Hello.”
He turned and saw three figures approaching: Finesz, Troop-Sergeant Assaun and Lieutenant-Commander Mubariz. They drew to a halt before him and Finesz flashed a bright grin.
“Brrr,” she said. “Cold reception.” Smiling self-deprecatingly, she added, “Just saying goodbye to Afveni. I don’t think he’s as taken with me as he once was.”
Ormuz had noticed the same on his infrequent visits to Rusko Palace. As winter had arrived and deepened, so his reception at the duke’s palace had grown increasingly frosty. Unhappy from the start, with each passing week Afveni umar Yalosukinen, the Duke of Kunta, seemed to more and more regret his involvement.
“I wish I were coming with you,” Varä remarked wistfully. “It’s been years since I was last on Shuto.”
“Your place is beside Casimir,” Finesz told him. Varä was a knight sinister—he had admitted as much weeks before—and so could not be trusted.
“What are your plans?” Ormuz asked.
“Trying to get Gyome out of the House of Rectitude, for a start. Assuming he hasn’t managed that for himself already.”
Gyome mar Norioko, Baron Kanban, was Finesz’s superior in the Office of the Procurator Imperial.
“Not,” she continued, “that he’ll be exactly happy to see me. After Merenilo was murdered, he ordered me to drop the investigation.” She gave a one-shouldered shrug. “I didn’t. Which was how I latched onto you, Casimir.”
“But when you tell him about the Serpent…”
“I suspect he already knows,” the inspector replied. “His behaviour on Darrus was… odd.”
“But he’s on our side?” put in Varä.
Finesz barked a laugh. “That I couldn’t tell you.” She glanced at Mubariz, who bulked large beside her in a naval greatcoat. “But if I’m with Abad, I should be safe.”
“I will not defend you, Sliva,” Mubariz said.
Finesz laughed again. “See! With a champion like that, what do I need to fear?”
Ormuz was not so sanguine. Throughout the Admiral’s years of mutiny, Mubariz had reported on her every move to the Order of the Imperial Seal. He had been their man. And the Admiral had thrown him off her ship for that very reason. While Ormuz believed the lieutenant-commander to be an honourable man, he was not yet decided on the advisability of Finesz taking Mubariz with her. Her views on the matter were hardly objective.
“We’d better get moving,” Finesz said. To Ormuz, she asked, “Any idea how much longer you’ll be here? Afveni is itching to be rid of the lot of you.”
“All those who are going to answer the Admiral’s call have probably come, so we’re planning our departure for tomorrow.”
“You are?” asked Varä. He glanced quickly at the aerodrome terminal building. The gesture was not lost on Ormuz. The marquis wanted to pass the information to his fellow knights of the Order of the Left Hand. He would not be given the opportunity.
“Be careful, Casimir.”
“Sliva, I’ll be fighting a battle.”
“Well, yes… But don’t take any foolish chances. Without you, all this —” She swung out an arm, indicating all about and above them—“means nothing.”
“I’ll not let Ahasz take the Throne,” Ormuz assured her.
“Neither will I,” she replied.
“You’ll not get the opportunity to arrest him, Sliva. Events have gone too far for that.”
“We’ll see.” She grinned. “Never underestimate the OPI.” To Muba
riz, she added, “We always get our man, don’t we, Abad?”
Ormuz smiled in return. “I’m not. But I think you’re underestimating Ahasz.”
It was time to go. They said their goodbyes. Finesz hugged Ormuz, and pecked him on the cheek. She did the same to Varä and whispered in his ear. Finesz would not plot against him, of that Ormuz was confident. Some private message of well-being, perhaps. He would ask the marquis later. He shook hands with Assaun, although he barely knew the man. He suspected Finesz knew him no better. The troop-sergeant, however, clearly knew the inspector well. Surprisingly, Mubariz proffered Ormuz a bow as to equals. While the lieutenant-commander had never agreed with the Admiral’s mutiny, he seemed to have no such qualms about Ormuz’s arrogation.
Varä and Ormuz watched the three of them climb the ladder into Lantern’s belly. Moments later, the ladder was withdrawn and the hatch swung shut. The sloop’s gas-rockets lit with a hiss and a roar.
“We’d best move back,” Varä said.
Ormuz let himself be led across the apron to Vengeful’s launch. He stood by the boat’s hatch and watched Lantern manoeuvre onto the aerodrome’s runway. For several long minutes, the sloop waited at the runway’s end, while the gas-rockets built up sufficient thrust to take her into the air. Their noise grew loud, the steadily increasing crescendo oddly muted by the snow which lay over everything. Slowly, ponderously, Lantern began to roll forwards. She accelerated, rushing the length of the runway until, at the last possible moment, she left the ground.
Ormuz turned and climbed into the launch. It would be many weeks before he saw Finesz again.
If ever.
CHAPTER SEVEN
Rinharte found Kordelasz and Alus on the troop-deck. She sighed as she approached them. The marine-captain was inspecting the lock on the armoury’s door, while the boat-sergeant offered suggestions. A selection of tools beside them, some damaged—Petty Officer Silnik was not going to be happy about that bent crowbar—indicated the fruitless attempts they had already made. Kordelasz prodded the rods and gears of the lock, but he was no mechanician. Rinharte doubted he knew how the lock worked.
“Any luck?” she asked, amused.
Kordelasz straightened and turned about. “No, damn it,” he replied. “Not even the artificers have seen this type of lock before. We’ve no idea how to open it.”
“Is there any real need to do so?”
“The controls for the clones’ sarcophagi,” Kordelasz said slowly, as if Rinharte were mad.
“We don’t know they’re in there.”
“Then where are they?”
Boat-Sergeant Alus gave a slight nod.
The marine-captain continued, “We’ve searched from one end of this tub to the other, and not found so much as a switch that looks to control those damned coffins.” He swung a fist and thunked the armoury door. “It has to be in here.”
Rinharte crossed her arms, and smiled—not indulgently, she hoped, although it certainly felt that way. “There could well be no controls aboard. We’ve no clues as to the sarcophagi’s purpose, so why should we suppose we understand their workings? Perhaps they’re controlled remotely.”
Kordelasz laughed. “Remotely?” he parroted. “They have to bring another ship alongside in order to wake the clones?”
“Perhaps.” Rinharte shrugged. “Perhaps the controls are aboard a boat. They dock it in Tempest and then wake the clones.”
“No.” Kordelasz stepped away from the door. “It has to be in here,” he insisted. “It makes the most sense.”
“Garrin, nothing about the clones makes sense.”
“Well, yes, all right.” He looked sheepish. “But, but…” He held up a finger as a thought occurred to him. “Ah! The clone that woke up and escaped before we left Linna: were there any strange ships alongside? Was there a strange boat on the boat-deck?” He grinned at Alus. “No,” he said triumphantly. “So the controls must be aboard Tempest!”
Rinharte turned to walk away from the armoury. Kordelasz fell in beside her. Alus brought up the rear. “What would you do if you did find the controls?” she asked. “Wake up the clones?”
“Of course.”
“Why?”
“To find out who they are—what they are.”
She glanced across at him, remembering a conversation of many weeks ago. After teasing him that marines could speak only of martial matters, he had responded that Major of Marines Skaria was something of an armchair-expert on the Lost Flotilla. What, she wondered, was it in the make-up of an Imperial Marine which caused them to latch onto mysteries? All those weeks aboard ships, with little or nothing to do between occasional bouts of bloody combat?
“It matters little, Garrin. We can work around them. Nor do we really have the resources to devote to understanding them.”
Kordelasz barked a laugh. “No resources? How many troopers do we have aboard Tempest? And how many days of travel to our first stop?”
Rinharte conceded the point. “A battalion. And another two days to Kunta, then a fortnight to Obok, and one last week to Geneza.” She glanced across at the Winter Rangers lounging about the tables before the field-kitchen. Some were engaged in dice games, one or two had books or magazines in their hands; most were cleaning arms and equipment.
“I want to know what the clone who escaped was talking about,” Kordelasz said. “What is an Urbat? What did the clone mean when he said he wanted to know more?”
Hands clasped behind her back, Rinharte gave a quiet smile. “It is, I suppose, a harmless enough pastime. Although —” She glanced warningly at the marine-captain—“I’ll not have you endanger the lives of the sleeping clones. They are not to be experimented upon.”
“Fair en —”
“Ma’am!”
Midshipman Maganda ran out of the door to the boat-deck. Coming to a breathless halt before Rinharte and Kordelasz, she gasped out, “Ma’am—Captain—The clones! I’ve just had a report from the bridge: they’ve had to seal the hatch to prevent two clones from gaining entry!”
Rinharte immediately broke into a run. She made for the ladder leading up the forward bulkhead to the upper deck. Taking the steps two at a time, she clambered upwards. Boots sounded behind her.
Ever since the clone had awakened less than one week ago, she had been dreading something similar occurring. She had insisted on guards outside the cabins containing the sarcophagi. Stumbling onto the landing, she turned and ducked through the hatch onto the upper deck.
And came to an immediate halt.
Approaching along the gangway were three figures in blue coveralls. They were not crew. Rinharte knew every rated and petty officer aboard Tempest. These three were identical—a young man of round features and brown hair cut short in an old-fashioned style. One carried a boarding-axe… and Rinharte knew with a falling heart that one of her marines lay dead or injured on the deck above.
“Excuse me.” Kordelasz shouldered past her, drawing his sword as he did so. Rinharte put her hand to her own hilt. She glanced back over her shoulder, saw Alus filling the hatch. He squeezed through and pulled out his boarding-axe. She stepped to one side to allow him to pass. Maganda remained on the landing, peering through at Kordelasz and Alus as they approached the clones.
Maganda abruptly looked up the ladder to the quarter-deck and her hand stole to her sword. She unsheathed it in a smooth motion. The sound of booted feet descending the ladder reached Rinharte. She swore under her breath.
Leaving Kordelasz and Alus to deal with the three clones in the gangway, Rinharte stepped out onto the landing to join the midshipman. Looking up, she saw a further pair of clones coming down from the quarter-deck landing. She yanked out her blade and waited.
When the clones’ booted feet were at the same height as her head, she stabbed. The point of her sword took one in the ankle. He screeched and his leg buckled. She jabbed him a second time, in the torso, as he tumbled forwards. Maganda was busy doing the same t
o the other clone. She pinked him in the thigh, then in the chest. The first clone landed heavily at Rinharte’s feet. He was dead. Taking care not to stab herself, she bent over and man-handled the body across the landing to the head of the ladder. He tumbled down the stairs.
The remaining clone was made of sterner stuff. Ignoring his wounds, he stumbled against Maganda and caught her in a hug. Her arms were trapped at her sides. She writhed and struggled, but could not free herself.
Rinharte moved to help. She tried to pull the clone from the midshipman but he would not shift. Her own sword hampered her attempt to get a good grip. So she lifted it high and brought the pommel down on the back of the clone’s neck. Hard. He immediately fell limp. Maganda unwrapped his arms and pushed him away.
“No!” Rinharte cried. She reached out—
The unconscious clone fell back against the railing. Over-balancing, he tipped over. And hung there. Rinharte winced as the corpse slowly drifted away from the landing, floating serenely sixty feet above the wooden decking.
“Damn it,” she muttered. “We need one to question.”
She turned back to look through the hatch onto the upper-deck. In time to see Alus bury his axe in the head of a clone. It sliced through the man’s brow, between his eyes, bisected his nose and lodged in his lower jaw. As the boat-sergeant worried his axe-blade free, the two halves of the man’s head began to separate. Rinharte shuddered and looked away.
The other two clones in the gangway lay at Kordelasz’s feet. The marine-captain gazed down at them, blood dripping from his sword, an expression of martial glee on his face. He spun about. “This way, man,” he said quickly. “There’ll be more above.”
He broke into a run, heading for the ladder at the far end of the gangway.
“He has a point,” Rinharte remarked, more to herself than to Midshipman Maganda. There were twenty—no, nineteen—clones aboard Tempest. She turned and began to ascend the ladder. Maganda immediately followed her.
From the quarter-deck landing, Rinharte peered forward through the hatch. She saw a pair of marines struggling with twice their number of clones. The marines had not managed to pull out their weapons and were striking out with fists and boots. The clones seemed not to notice the damage inflicted upon them. Doors along the gangway slid open and more bodies appeared. Rinharte spotted Kordelasz and Alus at the far end of the gangway. They went to the marines’ rescue, the marine-captain’s blade flashing and clones falling about him. Alus gave great meaty swings of his boarding-axe, severing arms, legs, burying its blade in heads and chests. Yet clones continued to appear.
