Ghosts of Engines Past

by McMullen, Sean

  “We know your deeds, that's enough,” protested Ward, but the visor was already up.

  The face beneath was lean, pale, finely featured... and familiar.

  “Upon my word, 'tis Sir Gerald!” exclaimed Grace, squinting in the half-light.

  “Sir Gerald was never so pretty,” said Renard. “I am French, I suspected. Only a sister could have played upon his feelings so well.”

  For some moments there was no sound, except for La Hachette's heartbeat.

  “As Mayliene, I was given nothing better than seven years of sympathy,” declared Tordral. “As Tordral I hid my figure under chainmail and my face with a helmet, I gathered you all behind me, and I built La Hachette. Now I fight back. If any will not fight beside a woman, jump and swim, there is still time.”

  “Women, they are fine leaders,” said Renard. “I fought beside Jeanne of Armoises.”

  “And probably tupped her, besides,” said Ward. “I'm with you too, ladyship.”

  “Alone, you might win against half our world, but against the whole of Faerie you need our help,” said Grace.

  For a moment everyone seemed to be glancing to everyone else.

  “Nobody's inclined to jump,” said Ward.

  “The outflow, I see it!” called Renard.

  “Listen one, listen all!” shouted Tordral. “Portals to Faerie are found in boundary places. Where Derwent Water becomes the Derwent River is a boundary place, and this hour of halflight is a boundary time.”

  “The river, it looks narrow indeed,” called Renard.

  “I've measured it, we fit,” replied Tordral. “Remember, within the portal our strength will desert us. Without elvin magic no mortal is proof against this weakness, but we have something better. La Hachette has iron muscles and an iron heart. She will take us through.”

  “To the river, thirty paces!” called Renard.

  “Chaining tiller, sitting ready!” said Tordral.

  Violet fire blazed out around La Hachette as she left Derwent Water. The air around them screamed with a sound that was all at once outrage and terror. Shapes like monstrous, glowing curtains of spiderwebs stretched and tore all around them, and netting spun from luminescence as thick as hawsers ripped apart amid cascades of bright blue and silver sparks.

  “What am I, who hath no eyes yet sees all knowledge?” thundered out of the background of blackness. “Speak the true answer and pass, die if your wits are not equal to my riddle.”

  Clank-clang, hiss, chuff was La Hachette's reply, and although a taloned hand the size of a cottage struck the ship, the fingers burst apart like oak timbers infested with the death-watch beetle. A roar of dismay echoed and died somewhere out of sight. Chill air washed over Ward, air so cold that every breath was like needles of ice in his lungs and nose. He counted the twenty-fifth beat of La Hachette's heart, holding onto hope by clinging to the sounds of the steam impeller. Out on the water, Ward thought he saw Tordral's tiny sufflator boat, marooned in the boundary waters, its steam spent.

  Total darkness replaced the glowing filaments for a time, then luminous water splashed over La Hachette's sides as huge tentacles wrapped themselves around her, only to crumble. Her heart kept beating and the hiss of steam declared that the furnace still burned. Water sprites placed kisses on Ward's lips and caressed his cheeks with their breasts. Trying to enchant me with their beauty, he thought, but enchantment requires time, and they have little time. Ward could see right through their hastily wrought bodies, and those fluttering around the spiral briar above him had the form of fanged bats. He counted the forty seventh heartbeat of the impeller—and suddenly they were through the portal. Even the half-light before dawn now seemed unnaturally bright to Ward.

  “Company, take stations!” ordered Tordral, unchaining the tiller.

  “Stokers, attend the furnace,” said Grace.

  “Bridge full ahead, bridge with archers!” warned Renard.

  “Destroy it, Renard, smash it!” ordered Tordral.

  “Bombard elevation, down, down, down,” said Renard.

  “How did they get here so fast?” cried Ward.

  “The bridge has a garrison, I saw it when I was returned,” replied Renard.

  “And you tell us only now?”

  “You might have jumped.”

  Ward hurriedly assessed their plight. The bridge was a long, elegant arch of interlocking stones. Standing ready upon it were tall, svelte archers, and beside them huge, chunky creatures holding rocks the size of trebuchet balls. Oddly shaped things no bigger than children milled about, all ready with pails of burning oil. Goblins? wondered Ward. Elves, trolls and goblins?

  “We can't pass under the bridge if it stands, Renard,” cried Tordral. “Bring it down!”

  “We cannot decrease the bombard's elevation enough,” replied Renard. “Only at fifteen yards we can fire.”

  “At fifteen yards they could piss on us, French sot!” shouted Ward.

  “You do better, English brother of livestock.”

  “Form up, gonners, archers, full ahead!” shouted Ward, pointing with his sword. “Gonne row, fire!”

  Six gonnes belched dozens of shards of iron at those on the bridge. At two hundred yards they caused no fatalities, but sharp iron in faerie skin burned like acid and caused instant chaos.

  “Gonne row, take reloads!” ordered Ward, and the spent gonnes were swapped for charged. “Gonne row, fire!”

  This time one of the trolls dropped his rock and several of the goblins ran screeching.

  “Archers, fire!” shouted Ward to his four bowmen, as arrows from the elves on the bridge began to strike in and around La Hachette. “Gonne row, down between volleys.”

  Ward had been told of the magical accuracy of elvin bowmen, yet only two arrows were in the deck, and a third had landed in the spiral briar's pot.

  “Archers, fire! Again... Archers, fire! Next time aim! They're barely a hundred yards off. Archers, fire!”

  “Charged gonnes to hand,” cried Meg.

  “Gonne row, stand. Gonne row, fire!”

  This volley broke the morale of the goblins, although a few thought to fling their burning oil into the path of La Hachette as they fled. Five of the trolls remained ready with their rocks. Discipline was no longer quite what it had been among the elves, but most were still crouched and shooting.

  “Archers, fire!” shouted Ward. “Gonne row, down! Meg, hurry the reloads.”

  “Stokers, help with reloads,” cried Grace.

  “Clear behind bombard!” shouted Renard without turning. “If you would live, clear behind bombard! Jon, have you the slow match?”

  “Aye sergeant.”

  “Bombard, fire!”

  The five inch iron ball, fired at fifteen yards, hit the keystone of the bridge. The stone shattered, because it had been chosen for its colouring rather than hardness. Deprived of support, both sides of the long, low, elegant arch collapsed into the river, sending spray and a surge of broken water cascading over La Hachette. She rocked and pitched, but remained afloat.

  “Fire at will!” shouted Ward as they passed between the stumps of the bridge, but those of their enemy who were not by now swimming were fleeing.

  “Yeoman, stand lookout!” ordered Renard, as he and his crew reloaded the bombard.

  Ward went to the bow. Ahead was not the familiar hills, flood plain and fields that lay between Derwent Water and Bassen Water in the humans' world. This broad river flowed into a placid sea that reached to the horizon. To the east, a gleaming bead of the sun's disk announced the end of halflight. Further down the coast were three ships at anchor, and on a forested hillside a quarter mile inland was a palace of delicate, graceful towers, partly enshrouded by morning mists. Every colour, every gleam of light seemed curiously intense.

  The Castellerine

  The Castellerine Lynder looked from the ruined tower of her palace to the sea. Part of one of her ships was visible above the surface, but the other two had reached deeper water before the
y had been sunk. The intruder ship had come to a stop, still pouring black smoke into the air. A gig boat was being rowed ashore.

  “How could something so small do so much damage?” Lynder asked one of her knights.

  “We showered it with arrows, but few struck home, highness,” he replied. “Arrows guided by enchantment lose direction near that thing.”

  “And it destroyed the Wylver Bridge?”

  “With one shot.”

  “And Darvendior?”

  “I spoke with the bridge keeper, Darvendior had not returned from Earthlye when it fell.”

  “In Earthlye he is safe for now, the danger is here! Five thunderbolts to sink three ships. Three more to bring down the Glamoriad Tower at half a mile. Who are these people?”

  The boat reached the shore. Five figures got out and waited.

  “I believe we are expected to go to them,” prompted the knight.

  “Me, a castellerine, pay heed to mortals?”

  “They are victorious mortals, highness.”

  They set off, and as they neared the intruders the castellerine saw that the leader wore chainmail and a domed helmet. The visor had triangular eyeslits.

  “The iron warlock,” said Castellerine Lynder. “I expected Sir Gerald, not his minion.”

  “Lady Mayliene of Ashdale, as it happens,” Tordral replied, raising her visor to reveal a lean, almost elfin face. “Don't bother bowing.”

  “Gerald's sister!”

  “Do pardon the visor,” said Tordral lowering her visor and folding her arms. “My spectacle lenses are built into it.”

  Lynder fought to keep her composure.

  “Answer me three questions, and I shall—”

  “Uh, uh,” said Tordral as she raised her arm. “Ask but a single riddle, and I shall wave. Should I wave, my bombard sergeant will fire upon your palace again. His name is Renard, I believe you know him.”

  “Renard! That filthy swine—”

  “He angered you? How gratifying.”

  “I'll not talk of him,” muttered Lynder, knowing defeat when it was arrayed before her. “Speak your demands.”

  “Fourteen years ago, a stranger of disturbing fairness appeared to me in my very own garden. I called to my brother, but he lay englamoured and helpless. The comely stranger paid me court. I replied that I preferred books to lovers. His amusing little revenge blighted my vision, so that I could see little else but books.”

  Lynder swallowed, then rallied. “Elvin men are proud. Some are cruel besides.”

  “Restore my sight!”

  Being unused to demands, Lynder considered laughter, scorn, a haughty sneer, or a snort of anger. None seemed appropriate, or safe.

  “I cannot,” she admitted.

  “If cannot really means will not—”

  “No no, I cannot, I swear, I cannot. Think on the spiral briar, your company's symbol. A young stem is soft and pliant, it can be bound into a spiral around a pole. Take the pole away months later, and the stem will be turned to wood in the shape of a spiral.”

  “Which cannot be straightened?”

  “Ah... no.”

  “Behind me is a man named Ivain, who was englamoured to love some elfin tease—”

  “He can be restored, only three weeks have past,” babbled the castellerine breathlessly, desperate to tell Tordral any good news. “Take him to my palace. My wizards—”

  “So, it was you.”

  Lynder stared at the ground and bit her lip.

  “Your people built curious machines. Why should I not spy?”

  “Bring your wizards here.”

  “But why?”

  “You would hold Ivain hostage in your palace.”

  “You intend to destroy my palace!”

  “No. I have what I want.”

  “But your sight—”

  “Revenge will suffice in its place. The elfin knight who twisted me is trapped in Earthlye, so—”

  “Darvendior is my brother!” screamed Lynder suddenly.

  “Ah, truth, squeezed from reluctant elvin grapes by the winepress. The longer Darvendior lives in Earthlye, the older he becomes. My eyesight for his immortality, a fair exchange. In seven decades we shall leave, when he is wrinkled, bald, impotent, toothless and drooling—if he lives so long. My brother is stalking him.”

  “I'll rebuild Wylver Bridge.”

  “I also destroyed the Earthlye bridge.”

  “Damn you. Then I'll cross to Earthlye through another portal and—”

  “Try.”

  “I—what do your mean?”

  “Study the rules governing both of our worlds. La Hachette is a creature of air, water, fire and earth. When she chopped through the portal on Derwentwater's edge, she changed the rules of all portals. They no longer work. They will not ever work until she returns to Earthlye.”

  “Impossible.”

  “But true. Your brother made a spiral briar out of me,” said Tordral, tapping her chest. “Now it is his turn to grow twisted.”

  “But you don't understand! Elves cannot have children without—without human lovers. If we perish, none will replace us.”

  “Earthlye will be the better for it. Meantime, La Hachette caries a score of Faerie's victims. Be nice to them, they may help you have babies.”

  The castellerine fought down the urge to be sick.

  “Magic will vanish from Earthlye,” she said, her voice now ragged.

  “So will elves,” replied Tordral. “Good riddance to both.”

  “You cannot fight our entire world.”

  “I already have, and won.”

  Lynder looked out over the water. At this distance La Hachette seemed no more than a small, ugly ship, yet her cargo was a nightmare from which Faerie would not awake for a very long time.

  4. THE ART OF THE DRAGON

  It is 2010. Some people just don't appreciate art, but a two mile long metal dragon with a serious attitude problem can do more than just sneer.

  Many people were quite distressed by this story because they really like art. I do too, but that is not the point. A lot of nice things can be bad for you, like sugar, tobacco, unprotected sex on the first date and easy credit. What would we do if art was shown to have serious health risks?What if art is not meant for grownup civilizations, and something has decided that we really ought to to grow up?

  ~~~

  I was there when the dragon first appeared—and ate the Eiffel Tower. I was standing on the Quai Branly, taking a video of the Tower from beside one of its legs when there was a great gust of wind and the dragon swept into the viewfinder. It began at the top, biting off sections and gulping them down. It made no attempt to attack people, but neither did it make any effort to spare them. Two hundred and ten were crushed beneath its feet and tail, and seventeen were killed by falling pieces of tower. Another ninety were never accounted for, and were presumed eaten.

  I stayed as long as I did through sheer paralysis. My camera was on a tripod, and continued to record while I stood gaping upwards in disbelief as wreckage crashed down all around me. Every so often the dragon would snort clouds of dust into the air, and this settled on me like a fine, black drizzle. I do not remember deciding to run, but having done so I recall thinking that I was doing something incredibly stupid. Surely the dragon would notice me and swat me like an insect, but it did not happen. I eventually stopped when my legs jellied from the exertion, and I fell headlong.

  Forcing myself to look back was not at all easy. Were I to see the Eiffel Tower intact, I would know I was insane. All around me I could hear shouting, however, and the word 'dragon' was being used quite a lot. This made it easier to look back. The thing was eating delicately and methodically, and by now had consumed half of the tower. I looked down at my hands, then rubbed some of the black dust between my fingers. It was gritty, like a very fine abrasive. The dragon continued to munch on the tower as helicopters began to circle. One fired a pair of rockets that exploded against its head. It ignored the attac
k. There were more rockets and explosions, but none had any effect.

  I cringed as the dragon reared up and looked about, but humans did not seem to interest it. As it turned, the tip of its tail swept through the air above me, yet I was crouching almost a mile from where the tower had stood. It crossed the river, followed the road—more or less—then began to eat the Louvre. I tried to stand up, but felt strangely weak. Someone grabbed me beneath my arms and began dragging me back.

  “Monsieur, vous devez aller a l’hopital!”

  Hospital? Only now did I realise that something had gashed my left arm, and that I was losing a lot of blood. I had noticed no pain at all.

  On a television in the hospital's outpatients area I learned that the dragon had gone on to visit Notre Dame Cathedral, the Gardens of Luxembourg, and several other outstandingly beautiful places before flying away. Nobody on camera was talking about the fact that artwork was being eaten. I saw at least a minute of the dragon taken with my own camera. Gradually the picture deteriorated as dust settled on the lens, then the broadcast cut to an interview with one of the helicopter pilots. He was distraught, almost insulted, that the dragon had ignored his attempts to attack it. I asked about my camera, pointing out that a video that I had shot was being shown on the television. A nurse promised to make enquiries. I tried to call my family in London to say I was all right, but the lines were jammed.

  I discharged myself after another half hour. By now people with far worse injuries than mine were being brought in, and I doubted that I was likely to receive any more treatment for many hours. My arm had been sewn up, but they also had ideas about giving me a blood transfusion. Being a hypochondriac, the idea of that had me close to panic. I had to stop to rest after every block, but eventually I reached the Gare du Nord. Even though I was expecting the worst, the trains were still running. I settled into my seat and watched Paris begin to glide past beyond the window, ignoring the other passengers who were exchanging stories about the dragon. Apart from a large number of military helicopters in the air, all seemed normal. Beyond the city, the French farmlands were untouched.