“So… what do we do now…?” Nev mumbled unintelligibly, using two fingers to daintily keep the hood pulled down over her eyes while at the same time making a valiant effort to stuff half a roll into her mouth in one go.
“Try to find a way off this stinking island, obviously…” Godfrey growled, pouring some water from a large jug into a ceramic cup. “Although how’s another question altogether. Garbutt’s already checked with three different harbour masters and no one’s being allowed to leave. There’s thousands of soldiers here – none of the locals are even sure how many – and apparently they’ve been here for weeks yet nobody’s heard a word about it anywhere else. The Southern Oster doesn’t take sides – usually – but they need to know if Harald’s planning a surprise attack on Huon… no telling who might get caught up in that. Comes back to the question of how to get away from here, though…”
“Head south to Redhead or Stressleck…?” Lester suggested, sitting back in his chair with a noticeably full stomach, having already polished off both his rolls. “Maybe we can bargain or steal a boat down there and make for Taas: only thirty miles’ sailing…”
“Maybe…” Godfrey mused, not entirely convinced. “Another thirty miles overland first to get there, though… no easy walk, and then no guarantee there’ll even be a boat waitin’ for us.” He shrugged in vague resignation. “Not sure I can think of anything better though, tell you the truth: I don’t think any of the ships here will be leaving any time soon and even when they do weigh anchor, where they’re goin’ may not be safe…”
“Not likely to be much chance of getting away from here, anyway…” Lester pointed out, clearly thinking hard on the matter as Godfrey took a drink from his mug and Nev searched for a relatively clean piece of her cloak – one that wouldn’t be readily visible afterward – to wipe some left over gravy from her face. “Maybe we should head back to the docks and find somewhere to hole up: keep an eye on who or what turns up. If nothing presents itself, maybe we can head south for Stressleck after dark…”
“Sounds as good as anything I can come up with,” Godfrey conceded. “What do you think…?” He added, including Nev in the conversation for the first time and catching her completely by surprise.
“Um… sounds okay, I guess…” she stammered, thinking quickly. “I don’t fancy a thirty mile walk either: I’m happy to look for other options…”
“Guess we’re in agreement, then…” Godfrey nodded, the decision made in his mind. “Been a while since I was here last but I remember there bein’ a small storehouse at the western end of town that boat crews used to go to for a few hours’ rest: there was a ladder up to the roof and they had a few benches set up so you could sit and have a smoke… watch the world go by, if that took yer fancy. I think I saw the same building there when we docked… if that roof’s still vacant, might be a good spot to rest up and keep watch over proceedings.”
“How close are we likely to get with these things?” Nev asked, drawing the flimsy shore pass from a jacket pocket and holding the crumpled paper up for all to see. “They made it clear no one was s’posed to go near the port unless they were coming back to their own ship.”
“There’s a few tracks running below the ridgelines to the west of the town we can use that should keep us out of mischief for most of the way…” Godfrey suggested, working more on memory than any solid intel, then conceded: “but we’ll need to be careful, yes. It’s well away from the tavern at least, so there’s not much likelihood of running into any wandering Blackwatch… just the regular patrols we’ll need to look out for…”
“And that’s good because why?” Nev asked with eyebrow raised, raising a mug of her own.
“Not something to be taken lightly…” he admitted with a wry grin “…but better that than a score of drunken, lecherous morons – also known as soldiers – who’re actually out looking for a fight rather than just following orders. Now… if we’re all done stuffing our faces…?”
“I was hungry, okay?” She shot back, instantly self-conscious.
“I don’t believe I named any names…” Godfrey shot back, that cheeky glint in his eye again as Lester snorted with laughter and almost sprayed a mouthful of water over the table. “Shall we be off, then?”
The storehouse was as Godfrey had remembered, although the area – a few hundred metres back from the nearest pier – seemed to have fallen into disrepair since he’d last visited. There were blackened scorch marks at one corner of the building from a previous fire and the ladder at the rear that led up to the roof was rusted and loose enough to make the climb a nervous one. The roof itself was little better, with piles of collected leaves and debris in the corners and a large hole toward the centre, exposed beams showing beneath the rotted planking where it had collapsed into the darkened space below.
There were no other tall structures nearby, lowering the risk of being spotted from below, but Godfrey was taking no chances, making sure they all kept to a low crouch as they carefully negotiated their way across the creaking roof toward the front of the building. A low wall roughly a metre high ran around the entire perimeter of the structure, providing more than enough cover for all three of them to sit in reasonable comfort with their backs up against the brickwork.
As the others settled in he produced a pair of brass binoculars from his rucksack. They were quite small, folded flat into a pancake-like casing, and when deployed were little more than a two matching pairs of lenses held in an open frame with a focussing mechanism mounted between. They provided low magnification only, although in return they were also compact and easily concealable.
“Ships are still coming in,” he observed softly, taking in the scenes below on the docks. “Warships now, too… now, that’s strange…” he frowned, silent for a moment as he watched something unusual unfold below. “Here, Toady…” he continued, offering Lester the glasses. “What d’you make of this, down by the near end of the pier there…”
“Whaddya got…?” Lester muttered, taking the offered binoculars and raising them to stare down at the port below.
A sleek galleass lay moored at the near end of the closest pier, its ram bow adorned with a carved eagle figurehead and ornamental shields mounted along its sides in a decorative display. Troops of soldiers were clustered about the wharf, working hard as they broke open a pile of crates identical to those that had accompanied the trio on their voyage aboard Sea Skimmer.
The smaller, cube-like crates had been broken open to reveal pairs of large, wooden-spoked wagon wheels, which the men below – engineers, Godfrey was assuming – moved with large pivots and lifting ropes to attach to long, wooden frames mounting even longer cylindrical tubes that appeared to be forged from some kind of metal. Lester had never seen the like before – he assumed Godfrey hadn’t either from his earlier comments – yet based on the manner in which those men assembled and manoeuvred the strange units, the boy instinctively felt that he was looking at something dangerous.
“Gonna sound silly, but it… It kinda looks like a weapon…” he muttered, not sure what to make of his own statement.
“Thinkin’ the same meself…” Godfrey admitted, feeling just as foolish. “Dunno if this makes sense, but they look too damned simple to be anything else…”
“What are we talking about…?” Nev asked, as interested as anyone could be when there was literally nothing else to do save join in the conversation.
“Take a look…” the boy suggested, handing the glasses over.
It took Nev a moment before she was able to master the strange layout of the glasses, accustom herself to their operation, and then turn her vision toward the ship below. As her eyes took in what was happening, she instantly released a short, soft gasp of surprise.
“Oh, my God… those are cannon…!” She exclaimed, amazed that she actually recognised something in that world that made sense. “Cannon, Godfrey! The guns I was telling you about earlier…”
“You mean like that ‘shotgun’…?” H
e asked sharply, recalling the discussion. “So they are some kind of weapon! Are they dangerous?”
“I can’t believe I’m having this conversation,” she muttered as an aside, finding it difficult to accept there was even a need to explain what cannon were. “It’s a gun… a huge gun that fires either cannonballs or exploding shells over really long distances…”
“How long…?”
“What do you have at the moment for ranged weapons… catapults or something like that?”
“Aye, catapults,” Godfrey nodded, not happy about where the conversation was going. “Catapults and trebuchets…”
“Not sure what range trebuchets have but I’m gonna assume they’re about the same as catapults,” Nev shrugged, knowing a little about military technology from a historical standpoint but never having had a great interest in it. “Not sure how big those guns are down there,” she added, “but they’ll probably fire a solid iron ball a lot further and a lot faster than any catapult! Those things can blast through castle walls! They were the reason that they stopped building castles in my world!”
So… those things…” Godfrey repeated slowly, trying to keep the disbelief out of his tone “… can fire an iron ball hard enough to punch holes in solid stone?”
“Yup… out to – oh, I dunno – maybe a mile… maybe more. Weapons were never my strong point…”
“Hard to believe something could do that… but… seein’ as you’re the only one who has a clue what these things are, and all o’ them down there seem to think they’re important, I guess there must be somethin’ in what y’r sayin’…”
“Westy, there’s – like – ten o’ those ‘cannon’ down there already…” Lester observed, able to count the assembled weapons easily as Nev handed the binoculars back.
“If they’re the same crates we brought on the ship with us,” Godfrey pointed out bluntly, “there could be hundreds of ‘em!”
“That’s Rapier down there!” Lester called out suddenly in surprise, still looking through the glasses. “I swear: I can see the name on her prow!
“Gimme…!” Godfrey demanded instantly, taking them from him and checking for himself. “I do believe you’re right, Master Boniface…” he declared eventually, having studied the vessel hard for a good few moments. “Prince Baal’s own transport… s’posed to be the fastest ship in the whole Huon war fleet…”
“Aren’t Huon supposed to be the Blackwatch’s enemies…?” Nev asked thoughtfully.
“You have been listening,” Godfrey observed with a dry smile, turning to face her and placing the binoculars down on the top of the wall, “…and that definitely raises questions about what Rapier is doing here, taking on a load of these so-called ‘cannon’…”
“All of this info has to rub off eventually,” she shrugged with a grin of her own, sliding into a seated position once more with her back to the wall. Taking out her phone on a whim, she decided to take a few panoramic shots, then zoomed in on the cannon being loaded and recorded perhaps thirty seconds of grainy, magnified footage as engineers fussed over their assembly. They watched for a few moments more until the activity down below became repetitive enough to lose their interest and all three instead turned and settled into as comfortable a seating position as they could manage below that low wall.
“Not much we can do about it right now, I guess…” Godfrey conceded, stifling a yawn that was partly exhaustion and partly full stomach and craning his neck to stare up at the sky. “Be a good idea to get some sleep while we can. Looks to be around mid-afternoon, so a few hours yet before dusk – best we’ve had some rest if we’re forced to set off on that bloody march south tonight. Someone probably oughta keep a lookout though…” he added, glancing at each in turn as if seeking agreement… or volunteers.
“I’ll take watch,” Lester shrugged, earning himself a nod of thanks and approval. “Only a few hours ‘til sunset anyway… no problem…”
“Good lad…” Godfrey declared with a grin, slapping him on the shoulder. “Wake me if you see anything interesting, right?”
“‘Course I will…”
Godfrey laid his pack down on the roof a metre or two away, using the strapped bedroll as a makeshift pillow. It wasn’t anywhere near as comfortable that way, but Nev could see the logic in keeping everything secure and ready for a quick getaway if necessary. She did the same, finding her own space and laying down with her folded clothes stuffed inside one end of her duffel bag as cushioning. Fortunately it was a cloudy day that was warm enough to be pleasant without a blazing sun shining down in their faces. Godfrey – like any soldier worth his salt – was already snoozing by the time she’d laid her head down, and Nev smiled faintly to herself at the sight: with so much going on, she was amazed anyone could sleep at all.
That idea, along with her own consciousness, lasted all of five minutes.
Left to his own devices, Lester looked about for a moment and fixed his eyes on a small pile of old crates and building materials piled up in the roof’s opposite corner. Tiptoeing over as carefully as he was able, he picked out a suitable box and carried it back to his original position. Using it as a makeshift seat, he was able to look out over the lip of the roof wall and take in everything that was happening down below. Every now and then he would take up the binoculars and sweep his eyes across the port, making sure there was nothing of any particular interest going on that Godfrey should know about.
It was almost sunset by the time Nev woke, rising slowly and stretching the sleep out of her mind and body before kneeling down beside Lester and gazing out across the port with him, the pair sharing a silent nod of acknowledgement.
“Nothing happening…?” She asked conversationally, not sure she’d know what she was looking at if something was going on.
“Boring as…” he shrugged in return. “Ships come… ships go… back to the start again…”
“Should we wake him?”
“Nahh, give him a bit longer…” the boy replied with a grin. “Too early to head off yet… he might as well get as much rest as he can.”
“Fair enough…”
They settled into a comfortable silence, Lester maintaining his watch on the docks as Nev turned and gazed up at the nearby hills that seemed to tower dramatically over the western edge of the port. She could see smoke from what looked like a signal fire or beacon burning at the northern end overlooking the bay, and the flicker of torchlights here and there as people – presumably soldiers – moved about on the summit.
Still scanning the ships below with the field glasses at that moment and completely unnoticed by Nev, Lester suddenly stiffened with shock and surprise, his entire body turning ice cold. He’d turned his attention back to Rapier, this time panning forward of the bow, where he’d noticed a small group of men clustered near the near end of the pier. At least three of the men were dressed in the black robes of Brotherhood officials, and as one of them turned toward him, Lester realised with a combination of rage and fear that the man’s face was terribly familiar.
“I – uh – I need to take a leak…” he announced bluntly, no emotion in his words as he placed the binoculars, on the wall, rose from his kneeling position and immediately made for the ladder at the rear of the, slinging his crossbow over one shoulder as he skirted around the hole in the centre of the roof.
“Well… thanks for sharing, I guess…” Nev blinked, surprised that she was actually surprised he’d come out with such a statement. In another moment he was gone, disappearing down the ladder at an urgent pace.
“Where’s the Toad got to…?” Godfrey asked a few moments later, only mildly startling Nev as he too rose from his sleeping position and joined her at the wall.
“…Said he needed to relieve himself…” she explained with a grimace, not at all comfortable with discussing other people’s bathroom habits.
“Hope he doesn’t hang about too long down there…” Godfrey muttered softly, taking up the abandoned binoculars and beginning his own survei
llance, looking for anything that might serve as a possible way off the island. “Too many patrols out and about…”
He was still staring down intently at the port below when he noticed unexpected movement off to the left of the docks where tall stacks of crates and sacks of goods were piled up in the gathering darkness, waiting for a suitable ship to become available. His eyes picked out a small, furtive figure moving quickly among those crates, darting from shadow to shadow with the unmistakeable shape of an oversized crossbow across his back.
“What the…!” He muttered with a deep frown, his tone alerting Nev, who also turned to stare down in the same direction. “What the hell does he think he’s doing…?”
“I did wonder what was taking him so long…” she admitted with a grimace, having initially imagined the boy might’ve decided he needed more than a simple pee break “…but I didn’t want to ask…”
The hair rose on the back of Godfrey’s neck then as he scanned back toward Rapier, wondering what could possibly have dragged Lester away so foolishly without a single word.
“Dragonfall take me…!” He breathed, horror in his voice as his gaze fell on the same small group of men down on the pier, and he too recognised one of them.
“What… what is it…?” Nev asked nervously, not at all liking the fear in his voice.
“For the love of The Crystal, it’s Silas… Silas…!”
“Who’s ‘Silas’, for goodness’ sake?”
“He’s the priest…” Godfrey explained, his voice hollow with shock. “The Quisitor who executed Lester’s sister…!”
“Oh… no…!” She moaned softly, her heart sinking with the news. “He’s going to do something really stupid, isn’t he…!”
“Not if I can stop him first…” he declared, leaping to his feet with his rucksack already in hand and bolting for the ladder, not caring a whit for who might’ve heard or seen him.
Dragonfire Page 24
