The Plague of Swords

by Miles Cameron

  Master Giorgos was looking east under his hand.

  “The Elbow is visible from the top,” he said. The Elbow was the promontory of Iberia, out-thrust into the sea. Galle and the Eagle’s Head were equidistant, the one to the north, the other to the south, two days’ sail on a good wind.

  Gabriel nodded. “And the Galles?”

  “Alexei can see two or three round ships out to the north,” he said. “And the Joseph of Arimethea is signaling.”

  “Fighting?” Gabriel asked.

  “Hove to,” Giannis said. “And he thought he saw something under us.”

  Gabriel leaned over the side, aware that it was wasted effort. “Very well. We are not defenceless. Rig the gonnes.”

  Master Giannis looked aft. “Already done.”

  Gabriel bowed and went down the steps and into the cabin. There, Anne, now in an overgown of Blanche’s, and Toby, in a shirt, began to dress and arm him. He got wool hose, despite the heat on deck, and a linen doublet under his fur-lined and collared jupon. Thigh-high boots.

  Mortirmir came in without knocking.

  “I’m going to try our little trick,” he said.

  Gabriel nodded. “Be my guest,” he said.

  Mortirmir went aft, into the little passageway by the coach, and reappeared outside the stern windows under the overhang of the griffon’s box. He had to stoop. He leaned over the side and dropped something that looked like a heavy spear with a silk rope attached, and then another.

  He put a dozen of the javelins into a leather bucket and went out the door.

  Time passed. Gabriel’s heart was thudding in his chest and there was no reason.

  The cabin door opened and Blanche appeared, in a damp shift. “Master Giannis says that there’s a dozen or more ships all hove to,” she said. “And that something huge is well beneath us.” Her voice was steady, except that on the word huge it quavered.

  “Tell Master Giannis that whales are friendly,” he said.

  She blew him a kiss.

  He took his helmet and gauntlets. He was shaking, and he knew it was just fear of getting the griffon aloft, of all the things to be afraid of.

  “Best get armed,” he said kindly.

  His squire and page nodded.

  He ran up the quarterdeck ladder, giant spurs threatening to tangle his feet every step. Spurs and ships were not friends.

  Ariosto was very glad to see him, and the great head with its mad eyes came around and he was head-butted.

  We are flying. Right now.

  Love you! Great!

  The griffon was very cramped in its cabin, which smelled very strongly of old griffon dung, a nasty business.

  Somewhere, a winch began to wind, and the heavy back wall of the cabin cracked open, revealing the calm sea aft, and the long pole that rose and fell with the ship’s motion, like a horizontal mast.

  Ariosto writhed and hopped onto the pole before the back walls were fully open, and immediately spread his wings and gave a great cry of happiness. The mage wind caught under his wings, and he leapt away in a turning flash of muscular grace and vanished over Gabriel’s head.

  Both of us! Gabriel said.

  I know, brother. But I need a stretch.

  Men were leaning down from the eighth deck. Morgon Mortirmir leaned down. “Problems?” he asked.

  Gabriel shook his head. “No,” he said.

  “I have a contact, deep beneath us,” Morgon said. “Thirty paces long. That’s all I can say.” He shrugged. “Except that it is alive, as you and I are alive.”

  Gabriel nodded. “Release a bird,” he said. “Tell Du Corse I’m coming over.”

  Ariosto appeared, far astern, coming out of a long curve, and he matched speed with the ship and came down on the perch as neatly as a bird landing on a pole. The sailors had raised most of the roof of his cabin so that he could hop straight back in, and Toby and Gabriel began immediately saddling the great animal. His wings were in the way everywhere, and the lion end seemed unsuited to the sea, and his most recent dung smelled strongly of fish.

  But they got his tack on, and Morgon’s bucket of javelins. Today, Gabriel had his ghiaverina, also in a leather case, and a bow.

  Too heavy?

  Lighter than grain. We fight?

  Maybe.

  He checked the buckles on the complex, tripartite girth one more time.

  You could just mount here, instead of on the perch, Ariosto said.

  It seemed like a good idea.

  He got his feet in the stirrups and got the belt across his heavy saddle, through the keeper on his cote, and it clicked home...

  Ariosto was facing astern. He took one long, dainty step with a taloned forefoot onto the perch—and leapt into the air, twisting his body through half a circle and very nearly catapulting his beloved rider into the depths. As it was, Gabriel’s entire weight hung by the thread of his waist belt for several terrified beats of his heart, and he was lying far out over the crupper, as if a better jouster had almost unhorsed him.

  But they were rising on Morgon’s mage wind, moving straight astern and almost directly above the ship.

  Gabriel got himself erect.

  Stop screaming, Ariosto said.

  Gabriel got his visor down, and the world became silent and tranquil, and his heart rate began to slow. They were still rising, well above the topmasts now, and when he turned his head over his right shoulder, he could now see the Gallish fleet to the north. There were twenty ships there, including almost every heavy ship out of Harndon.

  He got into his memory palace and found Morgon waiting for him. The young Alban had a mirror on the floor by Pru’s pedestal, and there, in the dark mirror, swam a great shape.

  “The master mariner assures me this is a great whale,” Mortirmir said. “It is almost directly beneath our ship. I can only say that it is very agitated.”

  Gabriel noted the golden shield waiting where he’d left it. He began to prepare other workings, and he made them in the shape of jewelry and bedecked Prudentia with earrings, a pair of rings, a brooch. It was all symbolism, anyway.

  When he was done preparing defences, he built some spears. Morgon faded in and out, reporting very little.

  Gabriel emerged into the real to find that they’d come two-thirds of the way to the Gallish fleet, and they were both very high and moving very fast. It was a beautiful day, and the rollers of the calm sea were now a near perfect carpet of sun-dazzle.

  At this height, the twenty ships lying under bare poles close to the Iberian coast were clearly embattled. Several ships had been totally destroyed; the sea was littered with wood, and a great spear-pointed tail emerged from the water near another and struck the ship a heavy blow. At this altitude, the blow was silent and appeared to do no damage.

  Ready, brother? Gabriel asked. Now we fight.

  Who? Ariosto asked.

  The serpents.

  Oh. I don’t swim so well, the ships look easier to attack.

  Serpents. Please dive.

  Here we go!

  Ariosto folded his wings.

  Gabriel took the Lord’s name in vain.

  They fell, if an arrow shot from a bow could be said to fall.

  I need to pass just over that one...the one on the surface...

  Which one? Ariosto asked.

  In fact, as they dove, Gabriel could see three sea monsters.

  Gabriel pulled very slightly on the right rein until Ariosto lined up his dive with the triangular head just emerging from the water.

  That one, he said, realizing that they both had a great deal to learn about fighting from the air.

  Ariosto’s wings came up, cupping the air and slowing them. Gabriel thought that they were going to hit the water and the speed of their approach astounded him, and he prepared his working...

  ...and missed his moment, and they were turning west over a sea littered with wreckage.

  “Damn it!” he said out loud. Ariosto had clawed the sea monster’s head beneath his
booted feet and he’d almost lost his lunch in terror, and the great griffon had skimmed away having left bloody furrows over the sea monster’s eyes. Gabriel looked behind him, and the thing was thrashing in the sea and men were dying.

  I know you said not to attack...

  No, that was beautiful. I wasn’t ready. It was all too fast.

  You want me slower?

  No, I want me faster, Gabriel muttered inside his head.

  They rolled to the right and he saw another serpent, this one ripping along the surface, racing up on one of the Alban ships.

  This one.

  Got her.

  Ariosto’s turn became tighter and Gabriel got into his palace and took one of the spears in each figurative hand. To Morgon’s slightly insubstantial figure, he said, “I hope we have this right.”

  “Du Corse received our bird. That’s all I know,” Morgon said.

  Gabriel emerged to a shallower dive. The serpent was a hundred paces aft of an Alban round ship, moving fast enough that its head-up posture left a huge wake. As Gabriel watched, the head lowered to smash a ship’s stern.

  Match speed, Gabriel asked.

  Easy.

  The wings fluttered and they seemed to halt in the air.

  Gabriel tossed his first working from fifty feet above. It struck the broad, scaled, armoured back in a burst of red light and blew a foot-wide hole into the thing’s body, exposing the spine.

  The whole serpent rolled and the head shot up out of the water. Ariosto responded perfectly, like an eagle flowing around trees in the woods, and his foretalons and hind claws raked the head casually as he passed, wings vertical, body slewed out and Gabriel horizontal, but this time, Gabriel had the presence of mind to lob his second spear of red light at the head from almost arm’s length.

  And then they were gone. Ariosto was climbing, his wings straining for every inch of altitude as the head thrashed beneath them.

  You hit hard, brother, Ariosto sang out. Gabriel had the curious feeling that the griffon viewed him as the junior partner.

  Perhaps he was, at that.

  Then they were turning, running south across the grain of the battle. Below them were eighteen surviving ships, and there were Eeeague on some of the decks. On others, ballistae were rigged, loosing bolts into the sea or at serpents, but they scored few hits.

  The ships closest to Ariosto were cheering, though.

  Gabriel got a glance back over his shoulder. There, on the surface, was the monster he’d struck. It had blood pouring from it, staining the seawater red-brown at its head and midspine. It lay half afloat, half submerged, and a sperm whale struck it in the head as he watched, dealing it a heavy blow so that more of its body sank. Its counterblow was feeble and the sperm whale danced aside, and then Gabriel was turning again and he saw a second serpent, a long and sinuous shape, rising swiftly.

  That’s one, Ariosto said. No idea we’re up here.

  Gabriel was surprised at the catlike cruelty and joy in his mount’s tone. “Here we go,” he said out loud.

  This is fun. Why didn’t you tell me we’d kill things together? Pause. By the way, I’m hungry.

  This time, Ariosto turned in lazy circles descending, and Gabriel watched the water as the opaque shadow rose from the depths and became more clearly defined.

  Something is happening here, Morgon said.

  Gabriel looked south. His squadron of three great ships was closing, but still six miles of water lay between them. The Joseph of Arimethea was closest, but was hovering, her sails backing and filling, awaiting her consorts.

  Our whale is gone. It went down. Something is lingering just at the edge of my perception.

  Gabriel was attempting to keep part of his consciousness in the real and part in the aethereal, without much success.

  Bide, he muttered to Morgon.

  The triangular head was almost distinct. He had his ghiaverina in his hand, and his last red spear.

  It was going to broach. He had half expected it.

  It knows we’re here, he said to Ariosto.

  They snap-rolled to the right.

  The head broke the water in a titanic explosion of water and its mouth opened, row on row of slightly crooked, spiky teeth running away into its gullet like an organic cavern. Its breath reeked of fish and ocean and rot and its tongue reached...

  Gabriel moved with Ariosto into a left bank, wings vertical, and he felt it coming and didn’t fight it, trusting the force of the turn to pin him to his saddle. He loosed his red bolt as the head, faster than he’d imagined, tracked them and closed, the tongue reaching...

  His spear of light struck inside the cavity of its mouth against the roof and burst...

  The head staggered...

  The tongue snapped like a whip and Gabriel’s left hand shot out and the ghiaverina cut through the tongue and up, and Ariosto seemed to wriggle in the air as the jaws closed, and the last eight inches of the ghiaverina passed through the outstretched upper jaw without slowing them in a spray of red-brown blood.

  The head began to fall away.

  The broaching had run out of energy.

  But Ariosto’s dive was still full of power and he followed the falling head, talons raking the eyes as they plummeted, turning, a blow from the ghiaverina to the back of the head and then the head hit the sea and the rising water tore at them—they were upside down—all airspeed lost—and then the lionlike back legs touched down on the rising coil of the serpent’s midsection and gave a galvanic leap, and the magnificent wings beat, and they were aloft again.

  Gabriel reached into the basket at his side and drew forth one of Morgon’s javelins and waited for Ariosto to turn. Already they were working better together...already the great griffon could read the change in his weight and move under him. Ariosto turned as the serpent gained control of its length. It lay just below the surface, and Gabriel threw a javelin and missed.

  But Ariosto turned as the head came up, giving him a second throw even as the first vanished in a thousand fathoms.

  He leaned out and dropped the javelin, using Ariosto’s speed in the air to give it impetus, and it penetrated the scales and sank to the middle of the shaft.

  Get out of here, he told his mount.

  The serpent dove, the head dropping and the body following in a single, smooth bending like a bow, and watching it was eerie.

  Ariosto’s wings swept out, up and down.

  Tired, brother.

  Me too.

  I wanted to kill that one.

  I think we have. Watch.

  Gabriel, safe in a climb, went into his palace and waved at the insubstantial Morgon. “I got one. Number two. Number one was a miss.”

  Morgon played with the strings on his fingers.

  * * *

  On the quarterdeck of the Sant Graal, Morgon Mortirmir stood watching the water without expression. The waist was full of archers and men-at-arms, and the crews of the two gonnes, tubes loaded by specially trained men and women with the silver-grey powder that burned, stood by them with lit matches.

  Michael was watching Mortirmir while trying to urge the great ship through the water with his armoured hips.

  Suddenly Mortirmir’s eyes focused. The magister smiled. He raised a hand and snapped his fingers.

  * * *

  Ariosto leveled off and the Red Knight looked down into the sea.

  Something happened.

  He could not have said that he felt it, or heard it, or merely sensed the passage of power in the aethereal but he knew the moment.

  Four hundred fathoms under Ariosto’s feet, the javelin served as a conduit, and Morgon Mortirmir’s fireball burst forth like a wicked bloom in the icy depths.

  Gabriel passed over the water and began to throw fire into the Eeeague, whose sixfold living pods were climbing a Gallish great ship. His fire drove a pod back into the water and Ariosto turned and Gabriel had the satisfaction of seeing a man in Du Corse’s arms wave, and then Ariosto’s wingbeats slowed.
>
  Very tired now.

  Go for the ship, brother, Gabriel said.

  They turned lazily, just above mast height. Gabriel could see, off to the west, a great slick of blood rising to the surface, a funnel of the stuff in the water, and sharks were coming in—an incredible tide of sharks, hundreds, perhaps thousands of them. From three hundred feet they were like flies attracted to dung, like ravens on a more natural battlefield, except that as the broken half of the serpent rose, uncontrolled, to the surface, eyes blasted from its head, ripped in half and still somehow alive, the sharks hurled themselves at it in an insane fury, driven mad by the great rising helix of blood in the water.

  Ariosto shrieked in appreciation. And you thought you’d eat me, you son of a bitch, the griffon said, or something very like. Meat. Prey animal. Weakling. Mine!

  And as the tired wings carried them south, something else came rising on the sea—another serpentine shape, this, too, with a triangular head. But it was not a beast, but an appendage, and one tentacle writhed home around the serpent’s neck and then another, and the vast titan began to be dragged down.

  What in all the spheres was that? Ariosto moaned.

  Oh God, Gabriel thought. His sense of scale had just received yet another kick in the head and he was trying to think of a sane world where there were trees and deer and perhaps giant beaver or something normal. I guess that’s a Kraal.

  Aaaiiieee! Ariosto moaned again.

  Far out over the water, they flew, and the tired griffon nonetheless rose, because he feared the water.

  But nothing interrupted their return flight.

  This could be rough, Ariosto said. I’m really tired. Hungry.

  Love you! Gabriel said.

  In his memory palace, he found Mortirmir.

  “Turn the Sant Graal into the wind,” he asked.

  “On the way. How was my fireball?” the young man asked.

  “Everything that could be asked. Scratch one sea monster.”

  “Very gratifying,” Mortirmir said. “Here we go. Ready about.”

  Under Ariosto’s talons the round ship, aided by mage wind, began to turn west into the wind. She turned well, and Ariosto coasted west on an updraft that gave him several minutes of much-needed rest.