Romulus Buckle & the Engines of War

by Richard Ellis Preston Jr.

  Buckle was, for a moment, cloistered in ease, a man leading a different kind of life.

  The man on the upper bunk moaned, and Buckle glanced up. It was Cornelius Valentine, the boilerman, heavily sedated, his right leg splinted and wrapped. Valentine was an old salt of the saltiest variety, older than much of the crew at the age of thirty-one, and a bit of a brawler and a barracks-room lawyer. Valentine had always been standoffish, always instinctively suspicious of officers. Buckle did not know him particularly well. The surgeons would most likely have to amputate the mangled leg, and Valentine was the kind of man whose life was his zeppelin—it would ruin him to be retired from the air corps.

  The sick bay door sounded with a gentle rap, followed by the squeak of hinges. Sabrina slipped in, easing the hatch shut behind her.

  “How is she, Romulus?” Sabrina asked.

  “Reported to be resting well,” Buckle whispered. “Nightingale says she is holding her own, despite the terrific bloodletting.”

  Sabrina gazed at Max. “Aye,” she said under her breath. “Sabertooths—now there’s a nasty beastie to meet up with in the dark.”

  Max was still secured in her bunk—it was a necessary precaution in winter weather, but the leather straps suddenly bothered Buckle. He considered removing them, but thought better of it. “How are things on deck?” he asked.

  “We are running at five hundred,” Sabrina answered. “Heading southeast as the crow flies. The damaged stern girder sections are jacketed, propped, and holding. Patches to skin and bags are holding.”

  “Very good,” Buckle replied. His voice sounded distant to him, as if somebody else had spoken.

  “Considering we just had tea with a Bloodfreezer and a kraken, I would say the launch got off lightly.”

  “Casualties?”

  “Four lost—all missing,” Sabrina said softly. “Martin Robinson, signalman; Hector Hudson, skinner; Carmen Steinway, skinner; and Henry Stuart, mechanic. Leaves us with eighteen souls aboard.”

  Buckle nodded. He had not seen what happened to Stuart. Good people. He knew the names. He knew them all. Zeppelineering was not for the faint of heart.

  “Aye,” Sabrina whispered, then carried on. “Injuries are a range of scrapes and bruises. The worst are Valentine, with his leg, and Faraday—a badly twisted left arm, though not broken. He lambasted Nightingale when she tried to sling it. Refuses to leave his post either way.”

  Buckle turned back to Max, resting his chin on his forearms again. He heard the fabric on Sabrina’s arms rustle, felt her hands touch the collar of his shirt and pull the blood-crusted linen back.

  “Oh, Romulus…” Sabrina sighed, both sympathetic and annoyed. “Why didn’t you have Nightingale take care of this?”

  “Forgot about it, really,” Buckle said.

  “Bollocks,” Sabrina grunted through pursed lips. She turned to the washing basin and poured water into it from the decanter. Buckle heard the soft wind of a gauze roll unwrapped, the gravelly squeak of an iodine bottle unscrewed. “A kraken sucker latches on to the back of your neck, tears away a pancake of your hide, and it doesn’t hurt like the blue blazes?” she huffed.

  Buckle actually had forgotten about the wound, or at least, he had decided to ignore it. But now it hurt, hurt like hell, hurt like double hell. And Sabrina was about to dump iodine all over it.

  Sabrina tugged the back of his shirt collar. “Unbutton the top of your shirt,” she said. Buckle unbuttoned. She tugged again. He heard her huff again. “Sit up straight and put down your arms, will you?”

  “Look, Sabrina—”

  “Either lower your arms or I’ll cut the shirt off you, Captain,” Sabrina said.

  Buckle sat up straight. Sabrina drew the loose collar back and dabbed the wad of wet gauze around the wound.

  “The blood is frozen and dried,” Sabrina said. “I lack nurse Nightingale’s tenderness, but you’ll get what you get.”

  Buckle winced as Sabrina wiped harder, the gauze feeling like sandpaper. He heard the clink of the iodine bottle and the gurgle of the liquid as she upended it against a bandage. His nostrils caught the brassy bite of the iodine.

  “Here we go,” Sabrina said. “Don’t make a fuss.”

  Sabrina planted the iodine-soaked bandage on the wound. It felt as if it was covered in burning oil. Buckle refused to tighten up, refused to wince or shrug, but he did smile, it stung so badly.

  “Mercy me, that has got to hurt,” Sabrina mused. “This is one pretty rip. And a perfect circle, mind you.”

  “If I did not know you better, my dear erstwhile navigator,” Buckle said, “I might suspect that you are somewhat enjoying my discomfort.”

  “Hold still, sir, please,” Sabrina said as she scissored tape and secured the bandage into place.

  “Of course, Doctor,” Buckle said.

  “I would like to say, sir, thank you for saving my skin out there on the roof today. I was certain I would be going over the side with the kraken.”

  “Mister Darcy informed me that you were the one who cut me down from the tentacle gallows I was in, so I would say were are quite even—in saving one another’s skins, that is.”

  “Perhaps,” Sabrina said.

  Sabrina tucked Buckle’s collar up over the bandage. He heard the deck board creak as she stepped back. “You should let Surgeon Fogg look at that when we get home. Either way, it is going to be one odd, round scar.”

  Buckle stood up, turning to face Sabrina in the cramped space of the cabin. “Thank you,” Buckle said, buttoning up the top of his shirt. “I appreciate your concern, Doctor Serafim.”

  Sabrina nodded with a little smile. It was difficult to tell under her red ringlets, but Buckle thought her cheeks had taken on a hint of a blush. She had looked good up on the roof, swinging the axe and pistol, her fiery red hair loose around her pith helmet and goggles. “You should really just throw that shirt away,” Sabrina whispered. “It being ruined with blood and kraken offal and whatnot.”

  “That I shall do.”

  “I have been told that there is a new bottle of Irish Standard’s left alone in the captain’s cabin, sir,” Sabrina noted with a wry smile.

  “And who told you that, Lieutenant?”

  “Why, a little bird, Captain,” Sabrina replied, grinning, her green eyes bluish in the yellow lantern light, and sparkling.

  NEW FRIENDS

  BLISTERS WERE RISING ON BUCKLE’S hands, the result of frantically wielding an axe into ice and kraken for nearly an hour. He peered at the raised red-and-white bubbles on his palms and fingers as he strode along the main passageway of the Arabella, scrutinizing the painful marks with the stoicism of a man who had just escaped death and now felt vaguely surprised at having suffered a hurt so small.

  Ducking under a buglight on a thick wooden peg, Buckle shoved open the captain’s door and stepped into a cabin barely a hair greater in length and width than the mole’s den of a sick bay he had just left behind. There was just enough room for a bunk, a logbook desk, and a small table and chair. A fat, green glass bottle with the red-and-black label of Standard’s Irish Rum rested on the table, along with half a dozen glass tumblers. The crew had already received a double ration of rum after the kraken fight, drained from Orkney barrels neat, not watered down, as usual.

  The cabin smelled of lacquer—something had been recently varnished, and the gleaming logbook desk was the culprit. Buckle took hold of the desk, scraping its feet across the wood planking and using it to prop the door open to let the chamber air out. He collected the rum bottle and laid out the six glass tumblers in a line, then twisted the cork. The blisters on his fingers stung. His neck burned. His forearm ached. The three-week-old steampiper sword cut on his forearm still grumbled with pain. Blue blazes, he was well thumped. The cork, squeaking in the neck of the bottle, popped free.

  The ponderous, sugary fragrance of the rum birthed a memory, a terrible memory descending from nowhere, unannounced, and he was unprepared for it. He saw his best fri
end, Sebastian Mitty, looking at him from the burning deck of the Zanzibar, the armed trader’s decks collapsing, the hydrogen cells about to explode—a dead man looking out at him from the soft-edged realm of memory.

  Buckle shoved the vision away. He did not wish to see the Zanzibar incinerate again, as she had done only once in the world, but a thousand times in his mind thereafter. The Imperial raid had been successful. The Pneumatic Zeppelin had been taken as a Crankshaft prize—as Buckle’s prize. And Sebastian Mitty had lost his life. Such had been the deal that Lady Fortune cut. Such had been the price.

  Pouring the honey-colored rum into the first tumbler, Buckle let it rise until it hugged the brim. When he raised the glass, the lukewarm alcohol sloshed out over his fingers. To Sebastian Mitty. He drained the glass and poured another. To the dead. He drained the glass and poured another. To the living. He drained the glass.

  Buckle lowered the tumbler to the table with a deliberate movement, placing the glass between two wet rings of slopped rum, and filled it to overflowing again. He took a deep breath, still annoyed by the stink of the lacquer, despite the harsh reek of burning coal seeping in from the passageway.

  A fist rapped on the door. Buckle turned to see the Windermere leaning in. “I have the updated damage reports, Captain,” Windermere said with a smile. “And I believe you have the good rum.”

  “Ah, so I do. Come in, come in, Master of the Launch. These are your quarters, after all.”

  Windermere ducked under the lintel and stepped to the table. “Not when you are aboard, sir. But I must admit to a desperately bruised ego regarding the matter—a stiff whack of Standard’s would go a long way to speeding my recovery, sir.”

  “Here you are, wounded duck,” Buckle said, passing the overflowing tumbler to Windermere.

  “Thank you, Captain,” Windermere said, holding the glass between thumb and forefinger to avoid letting the rum dribble from his fingers to the sleeve. In comparison, Buckle noticed, his own cuff was soaked with rum.

  “How are we doing?” Buckle asked.

  “Well, much better than we probably could ever have hoped, considering what we have been through.”

  “All so not very specific, Lieutenant,” Buckle said with a false gruffness, the alcohol making him playful.

  “No, sir. My apologies, sir. Ah, propulsion, engine, and flight systems are all good. The upper rudder fin is bent—the freaking kraken sat on it—but helm can handle it. The stern superstructure had to be triple propped, but the fixes are holding even at best speed. The increased drag is limping us a bit, but we should make it home by midafternoon, barring any further encounters with Bloodfreezers and krakens.”

  “Very good,” Buckle said, raising his glass. “You handled the airship artfully in the storm, Mister Windermere. Well done.”

  Windermere shot his glass up quickly enough to splatter the deck with rum, an excited motion, then paused and tapped the lip of his glass against Buckle’s. “Thank you, sir. I shall pass your compliments on to the crew.”

  “To the crew, living and dead,” Buckle toasted.

  “To the crew, living and dead, aye,” Windermere repeated.

  Buckle swallowed the rum—it was going down quite easily now, and when it started getting too easy he usually chose to stop.

  “Ah, Standard’s Irish,” Windermere enthused, holding his glass up to the light to admire a trickle of the honey-brown alcohol pooling in the base. “Lovely.”

  Buckle slid the bottle to Windermere. “Help yourself to more of the ‘lovely,’ Lieutenant.”

  Windermere nodded as he plunked his glass down beside the bottle. “Perhaps in a moment. Thank you, Captain. I am not much of a drinker, I am afraid. Lightweight.”

  “Aye, a good predicament, however. The grog is nothing but a troublemaker,” Buckle said, grabbing the bottle to pour another glass, which he threw back.

  “How is First Officer Max doing? I have not yet had time to look in on her, I am afraid.”

  “Tough as Martians are, I am not so sure,” Buckle replied. “Honestly, I think if it were either you or I who had absorbed such ravages, we would be sewn up in canvas sacks with pennies on our eyes by now. I think she shall make it.”

  “I would not bet against her, sir.”

  “Nor I,” Buckle replied. He did not know Windermere well. Though of similar age, Andrew Windermere had been a sickly child, often excused from school and outdoor events, so Buckle had not grown up with him, as he had so many of the others. Later in life, when Windermere had recovered his haleness, they had always been posted to different training classes and airships. But upon Windermere’s recent transfer to the Pneumatic Zeppelin, Buckle had immediately liked the lieutenant—liked his warmth, his genuineness and above all else, his ability.

  Buckle took the silver phoenix emblem from his pocket and laid it on the table, right in the middle of a puddle of rum.

  Windermere squinted at the insignia. He picked it up and rotated it back and forth between his fingers. “A Founders phoenix, sir?”

  “A uniform pip. Freshly ripped from the collar of a dead zeppelin officer, frozen solid on the mountain.”

  “I see,” Windermere said, looking Buckle in the eye. “So you found the mystery airship.”

  “It would appear so.”

  “And it was the Founders.”

  “Aye, though well disguised as Imperial.”

  Windermere placed the phoenix on the table, positioning it clear of the gleaming grog pools. “Shall this set us to war?”

  “I would say we were already at war, whether we knew it or not.”

  Windermere nodded slowly.

  “We all know that Balthazar and the council have been hearing rumors, reports that the Founders are on the move, gearing up for something big,” Buckle said.

  Sabrina entered, rapping her knuckles across the wood as she strode in. “How posh, gentlemen,” she said, with a gleam in her green eyes. “I see you found the Standard’s.”

  “Well on our way to knocking it off, Lieutenant,” Windermere replied, tapping the brim of his hat to Sabrina.

  “Well, while you are at it, please pour me a snort,” Sabrina said.

  Windermere slid a new glass forward and poured.

  “We have news.” Sabrina unrolled a hastily scribbled note and handed it to Buckle. “The lamp station at the Pondecherry outpost relayed this signal from home. The clan ambassadors are already arriving at the Punchbowl. Balthazar requests the Arabella return home at best speed.”

  Buckle nodded, refolding the cold paper and handing it back to Sabrina.

  “He wants you to be there, sir,” Sabrina said.

  “He wants all of us there,” Buckle replied.

  “One more for each of us,” Buckle said as Windermere handed Sabrina a nicely topped glass. Windermere quickly swamped the two already sticky tumblers and handed one to Buckle.

  “If I may, Lieutenants, let us raise a glass to the Crankshaft clan and a new alliance,” Buckle said.

  “To the Crankshaft clan and a new alliance,” Sabrina and Windermere answered.

  All three shots of rum were swallowed, and the glasses thumped on the table. Buckle cleared his throat and stuck the Founders phoenix back in his pocket. “Keep us at best speed. Bang-up job, mates. I shall be on the bridge presently.”

  “Aye, Captain!” Sabrina and Windermere replied in unison and strode out, Sabrina in the lead. They passed Ilsa Gallagher, whom Buckle realized had been waiting patiently with a handful of papers out in the corridor, wearing mismatched boots because the kraken had stolen one.

  “Ah, Miss Gallagher. Come in,” Buckle said.

  Ilsa stepped into the cabin. She wore her dense but tight-fitting leather skinner’s jacket, resplendent with hooks, pockets, and strappings, her hair loose about her shoulders. The skin on her face was flushed, her eyelids heavy, her lips slightly parted, and she eyed him with the soft certainty of a hawk.

  “You have the cordage numbers, I see,” Buckle said.
He suspected what was coming and, though he was exhausted, he was of no mind to prevent it. Ilsa occupied a soft spot in Buckle’s heart; she was a good salt, an excellent rigger, tough, pleasant, fearless, extra pretty because she did not fuss about her appearance, and she had shared his bed with him occasionally over the stretch of the previous year. Theirs was a friendly, playful association, but not a romantic one: after their first night together, Ilsa had gently informed him that she could never love an airship captain, and Buckle had easily accepted her caveat, loose and unencumbering as it was.

  Ilsa stepped closer, tossing the papers on the rum-splotched table and grabbing the bottle to take a long swig.

  “Would you like a drink?” Buckle asked.

  Ilsa kicked the hatch shut with a backward thrust of her boot. “The ratlines are fine, Captain,” she whispered, snapping open a button at the throat of her collar, exposing a tiny patch of lily-white skin. “But I need tending to.”

  THE DEVIL’S PUNCHBOWL

  SABRINA LIFTED HER HEAD FROM the eyepiece of the Arabella’s navigator’s telescope and scanned the wide, snowy plain of the Antelope Valley as it led them southeast toward the Devil’s Punchbowl, a Crankshaft stronghold. Formerly a pirate’s den, it was built into a sprawling formation of massive sandstone rocks that erupted from the slope lands just below the San Gabriel Mountains. The flat stomach of the valley was beginning to undulate with gentle rises and shallows, the whiteness of its snows streaked by the dirty lines of the wagon roads that followed the cracked asphalt of the old highways underneath. Ragged black bunches of frozen Joshua trees and junipers passed thicker and thicker.

  Sabrina resumed looking through the telescope eyepiece, ratcheting the viewfinder dial, rolling it around to its longest focal length, and the world sprang forward in a tight tunnel with the Punchbowl magnified in the middle. She could see the sentry towers with their red-and-white flags.