Medieval Mars: The Anthology (Terraformed Interplanetary Book 1)

by Travis Perry

  “But—” Astrid put out her hand toward the matte black surface. “It’s not hot on the outside.”

  Kahoon drew close. “It’s covered in carbon tile.”

  “I’m sorry, what?”

  “It’s an ancient craft. Like pottery, only thicker and…well, I don’t remember what all Master Basil said is in it, but it keeps the heat directed upward into the envelope instead of roasting us down here.”

  She pointed upward. “The envelope?”

  “Yes.”

  “The bag is dragonhide, but…” she eyed the gleaming silver underside. “What is that? It can’t be steel. It would be too heavy.”

  The skin around Kahoon’s dark eyes crinkled when he smiled. “Very clever. It’s aluminum.”

  “What? Another of Master Basil’s wonders from the Days of Magic?”

  “Indeed. Salvaged, so he tells me, from an ancient dirigible.”

  “I need a dictionary to converse with you lot,” Astrid muttered.

  “Oh, but you know ‘dictionary.’”

  “I was schooled by the elders at the orphanage in Puerto Santa Lucia.”

  “Ah-ha! That explains a lot.”

  “Yes. Govnor Dubois likes his jockeys smart as well as small.” Before he could make a remark, she raised her hand. “I was small, once.”

  “Of course.”

  She walked around the furnace, examining how the funnel connected to the envelope. “Lift? Oh! You make your own thermals. But how does that work if the…no, wait. The hot air rises, but it’s contained by the envelope, so it brings the ship with it.” Her voice faded to a whisper. “That’s brilliant.”

  Kahoon lounged against the gunnel, arms folded, smirking at her. “I knew you’d catch on.”

  “Is Master Basil a lithium smith?”

  “No, he’s an artificer.”

  Another vocabulary word. “Mm-hm.”

  Kahoon laughed. “His wife, Madam Isidora, is a lithium smith, though.”

  “And they work for Govnor Stuart?”

  “Yes, they were her teachers before she became govnor.”

  The bugler blew the signal for the first heat of the distance competition. Astrid ran to the gunnel. She needed no scope to spot Ragnar among the competitors.

  • • •

  Ian drew alongside Astrid and followed her eyes to the field.

  Instead of lining up as before, the birds and dragons were grouped on the field rank and file like troops. Fifteen of them. The master of ceremonies shouted something unintelligible through his horn.

  “What’s happening?” Ian asked.

  “First heat of the distance trials. They’ll run two heats today, and the final tomorrow.” She pointed. “Third row back, on the far left. The big black one. That’s Ragnar.” Her hearty voice, which had been so effusive earlier, now seemed heavy. “He’s mine. After a fashion.”

  “What do you mean by that?”

  “I’m his groom.”

  The horn blew a single bleat, and the animals took off. The dragons leapt into the air with a single burst of energy from massive hind legs. A few of the birds did likewise, including Ragnar, though some waited for the ground to clear and then made an awkward running start. “They didn’t get off well.”

  “Don’t count them out. They start slow, but they save energy soaring and finish well.”

  “Hmm.” He watched silently through the scope until they disappeared into the north. “How long until they return?”

  She didn’t answer. From behind the eyepieces of the binoculars, tears ran down her cheek.

  Lord, help me. What do I say? She knew too much about flight for a mere groom.

  Govnor Dubois likes his jockeys smart.

  Without thinking, he reached toward her face, catching her tears on the back of his fingers.

  Astrid flinched, jerking the binoculars away. She drew back and stared at his hand and then into his eyes. Hers were wide, gray-blue pools of sorrow. He half expected her to say something like how dare you, but she just stared.

  “I’m sorry.” He unfastened a couple of buttons on his coat, fished a handkerchief from the inside pocket, and gave it to her. “You were a flyer.”

  She nodded, taking the handkerchief in long, thin fingers and dabbing at her eyes. “I flew Ragnar in the races three times, and we won twice. That was ages ago.” She gave a rueful chuckle. “Before I got too old and big for the job.”

  Hoping to inspire some of the fire he’d seen in her earlier, he made a show of ogling her backside. “At least you’re big in all the right places.”

  “Captain…” She groaned. The barest blush colored her pale cheeks. Again she looked through the binoculars.

  Kay, different angle. “How long since you’ve flown?” He spread his hands to encompass the ship. “Not counting today.”

  “Pfft. This isn’t flight. You’re tied to the ground.”

  “You’re higher than any of that bunch.” He nodded toward the spectators on the roof of the aerie. “Or even the nobility.”

  “Hmm…True.” She turned her back to the gunnel and leaned against it. “I haven’t raced in almost four cycles, but I still flew the mail for about a cycle and a half after that.”

  Grounded. What a horrible fate. “It must be very hard, seeing them take off, knowing what it’s like.”

  Pinching her lips between her teeth, she nodded, ducking her head. She dabbed at her eyes with the handkerchief.

  “Sorry. Didn’t mean to make it worse.”

  She shook her head. “No harm, Captain. I’m sorry to turn weepy. But it happens on race days. Some of the old flyers won’t even watch. They stay home drinking instead.”

  “But not you?”

  “I couldn’t, even if I wanted to. I’ll be needed when Ragnar returns.”

  “I’m glad you came to see us in the meantime.”

  “How could I not? Even tethered…” Her eyes roved up to the envelope. “This airship is a wonder.”

  Ian fancied that the delight he saw in her eyes mirrored his own. “It is indeed. Would you like to see the bridge?”

  She smiled. “Yes, please.”

  He gestured aft, where the bridge filled the quarterdeck, rimmed all around by the finest windows Master Basil’s glassmakers could fashion.

  • • •

  As she walked across the deck with Captain Kahoon, Astrid turned the binoculars over in her hands. Such wonders, all lost but for the work of such smiths.

  When they reached the quarterdeck, Kahoon opened a glass-paned door and waved her in.

  The bridge was a small room, perhaps three meters across and less than two meters deep. A pedestal on the left held maps and tools. On the right, a smaller desk hid its contents behind a carved rail. He pointed her toward it.

  She walked around the back of it. “Oh. Oh, look at that.” Magnificent. She set the binoculars on the padded window seat behind her.

  The polished oak surface of the desk was angled, like that of a scribe’s carrel. Inset into round, brass-rimmed holes were more instruments than even Govnor Dubois had in his collection at the estate house. She recognized the altimeter and compass—similar to the govnor’s. One was labeled airspeed. Three others were unmarked. Invaluable. Miraculous.

  She trailed her fingers across the glass. “The markings on this altimeter are so crisp—like it’s newly made.”

  “Madam Isidora is very skilled—wait. You didn’t learn about altimeters from the elders at school.”

  “No, from the flight masters right here.” She leaned closer to the panel. In the center of the top row was a dial brown on the bottom and blue on top. She’d seen something like it in one of the flight masters’ books, but couldn’t remember its name.

  Outside, the bugle signaled the next race. For the first time in her life, she didn’t care.

  • • •

  Ian had come all this way with the govnor expecting to see these remarkable races everyone spoke of. But when the horn blew, Astrid seemed uninte
rested. Perhaps Ragnar’s race was the only one she cared about.

  She caressed the instrument panel almost the same way he occasionally did, though probably with a lighter touch. She pointed to one of the instruments. “What’s this?”

  “Attitude indicator. It shows the ship’s tilt relative to the horizon.”

  “Ah!” She looked out the window. “That must make it easier to fly in clouds.”

  “Exactly.”

  She tapped several of the other instruments, asking what each one was for.

  Ian answered her questions, wondering when they’d get back to the races. “When did you have cause to use an altimeter?”

  “Ragnar can fly so high—I’d lose my breath. I wanted to measure it, so Govnor Dubois lent my flight master one”—her fingers brushed the glass again—“not as nice as this one. I took it up as high as Ragnar would go. I almost fainted for want of air. I urged him higher, but he balked and turned back.”

  “How high were you?”

  “Almost eight and a half kims.”

  “Hah! You’d fare well in the Labyrinth, on the far western end of the Valles,” he said. “Some people complain of the elevations there, but it’s only eight kims or so.”

  “Not many birds can handle that height,” she said. “We could only do it for a few minutes.”

  “Yes, just joking, of course.” Though the idea of Astrid returning to Noctis with them was enticing. “Did you get some sort of prize for flying that high?”

  “No, my flight master accused me of lying, and Master Breiner beat me for pushing a bird past reasonable limits.”

  “What? Beat you? How could he?”

  “He’s the head trainer. He has the oversight of the birds and therefore the authority to punish anyone who mistreats them.” She stroked the altimeter again. “Ever since then, I’ve thought…” She shook her head, her blonde braid waving between her shoulder blades. She whispered, “Never mind.”

  He took a step closer. Perhaps closer than decency would allow. But she didn’t shy away. He lowered his voice, too. “Please tell me.”

  She admired the instrument panel a moment longer, then took a deep breath and turned to face him. “Birds and dragons race in sprints, and middle distances, and long distances. The long distance includes an altitude component, but they all fly to the same checkpoint. We don’t have a way to see which animal can fly the highest. Because when you take the altimeter up, there’s no way to prove where it topped out.”

  Ian nodded. “You’d have to take the rider’s word for it.”

  “Exactly, unless there was some way…” Astrid bit her lower lip—a charming gesture—and put her index finger on the arrow of the altimeter. “Some way to make the arrow stick at the highest point.” She sighed. “But even then, you’d have to have enough altimeters for every beast.” She leaned against the console and folded her arms. “Govnor Dubois said it was impossible. There aren’t enough altimeters in all of Mars. And to modify them that way might break them.” She paused. “Could Madam Isidora make such altimeters?”

  “I don’t think so.” He scratched his head, trying to remember if the subject had ever come up. “She always complains about our metalwork not being refined enough.”

  Astrid’s shoulders sank. “Yes, that is always the problem, isn’t it?” She loosened her arms and turned back to the instrument panel, her hands on either side of the console as if embracing it. “Don’t you get frustrated when you can imagine a thing, but there’s no way to build it?”

  Had she read his mind? He opened a drawer of the navigation table and pulled out his notebook. “I do indeed.” He flipped pages of the notebook. “This vessel—lovely as she is—doesn’t fly like a dirigible.”

  “Doesn’t it? I thought you said the parts came from one.”

  “From what was left of one. Which didn’t include the flight controls.”

  “Kay…”

  He pointed to the tiller. “That’s the same sort of tiller as on any sailing ship. And the wings, which we use as sails, are below. So to pilot the ship I have to man the tiller up here and shout commands to Gaspar, who relays them to Olivera and Triston on the mid-deck. That’s not how the ancients would fly a ship.”

  “How would they do it?”

  “With wires and gears. Well, in really advanced craft, like the ones that brought people here, they’d be wireless. But we could manage mechanical controls, if only we could machine the right parts.” He showed her his sketch, which showed a cross-section of the ship with the wing mechanisms connected to a control wheel on the bridge. “But see, to connect the wings to the helm, we’d need camshafts and joints, and they’d all have to be lightweight and machined to high precision.”

  “Didn’t the ancients have lightweight materials? They must’ve had, to fly a ship between the worlds.”

  “Yes, but such things are hard to come by. It took Master Basil ages just to scrounge enough carbon rods to support the envelope. And you know, sometimes, I just…” He clenched his fist. “I wish everything didn’t have to be salvaged from thousand-year-old scrap. I wish we could…” Words failed him.

  “Build our own future.”

  “Yes. Yes. They built these things originally. Why can’t we?”

  “We can. If they could do it, we can. We just need…” her brows furrowed. “I suppose we need the kind of resources they had. Libraries and laboratories and…well, I don’t know what else.”

  He nodded. No one else he’d ever spoken to, other than Govnor Stuart and Isidora and Basil Demetriou, had understood so readily.

  She traced the cams drawn in the notebook. “You really drafted it all, didn’t you? The gears and everything.”

  “Mostly. But with no way to make a prototype…” he shrugged.

  “Yes. It’s too bad. It’s an impressive mechanism.”

  A ribald remark now would just spoil the mood. “Thank you.” Silence hovered there a moment.

  She lifted a corner of the chart. “This is a beautiful map.”

  “Yes, Govnor Stuart spares no expense.” The cartographer had illustrated the contours of the land, as well as marking all the roadways and waterways. Meticulously exquisite work.

  She shifted the onionskin paper on which he’d charted his course. “You’re not going this way.”

  “That’s the way we came. I had planned to go back the same route. You have a better way?”

  “What’s your soaring height? Although I think your stoker called it ‘cruising altitude.’”

  “Hah. Yes.” Clever girl. “About six kims.”

  “Kay. If you leave very early—before the sun is up—then this will do. But if you leave later, once the sun has warmed these ridges”—she pointed out the southern slope of the mesa that separated the govment of Melas from Candor—“then you can catch a thermal and get to altitude more easily.”

  “You used that word before. Thermal. What does it mean?”

  She took a step back, hand on her hip. “Sailors. Didn’t think to consult a flyer before you carried your boat aloft?”

  “Foolish, I know. Educate me.”

  She explained how the sloped ground warmed under the sun at a different rate than level ground, creating updrafts of warm air. “You must have seen birds soaring like that around Capri.”

  “Yes, but I’ve never ridden one of them.”

  “Your loss.”

  “Maybe so, but I’ve a craft big enough for you and your bird, so watch yourself.”

  Her laugh was like a babbling brook of fresh water. He could have drunk it in all day.

  • • •

  “Captain, I’m so sorry.” Astrid gestured over her shoulder toward the window. “You probably want to watch, don’t you?” And her babbling on about altimeters and thermals.

  “Yes, if you don’t mind taking our talk on deck.” He picked up the binoculars and scope, and they walked back out to the port side, where Gaspar and the hands stood watching. A tea tray sat on a collapsible table near
the furnace. “I see Cook brought up tea.” Kahoon stopped at the little table, put down the instruments, and filled a pottery mug from the tin pot.

  “No,” Gaspar said, “Olivera brought up tea.”

  One of the hands, a bantamweight fellow with skin and hair both the same pale shade of brown, lifted his mug.

  “Thank you, then, Olivera.” Kahoon sighed and handed the mug to Astrid. “She refuses to climb a ladder,” he muttered.

  The mug was warm against her fingers. Astrid cradled it under her chin and muttered in return, “If you were her size, you might also.”

  He chuckled, nodding. The last of the tea dribbled into his mug.

  She wondered why he had hired such a surly cook, but asking about it might seem to question his command, so she sipped her tea and kept silent. It was a brisk black tea, perfect for a cool day like this one. She hadn’t had tea since her days as a jockey.

  Cook was a fool to miss the races. Astrid only skipped them because she’d seen them every cycle since she could remember. And they were more of a pain for her than a joy anymore. The bridge of the Phoenix held more wonderment for her than the races now. She checked the sun. Almost directly overhead. The flyers from the first distance heat would be back soon. She put her hand out to Kahoon. “Captain, may I—”

  “Of course.” He put the binoculars in her hand.

  She trained them westward, but saw nothing.

  “What’s happening?” Kahoon asked.

  She turned the glasses to the field. A string of flyers were making their way toward the finish line. “Might be one of the middle-distance events.” A long-beaked gray bird crossed the line first.

  Kahoon leaned closer. “One of yours?”

  “No, that one’s from Candor. Can’t remember her name.”

  He set his mug on the flat top of the gunnel, so she put hers next to it. That let her steady the binoculars with both hands. She narrated the next event as best she could, glancing westward from time to time for a glimpse of Ragnar, or whoever else might be in the lead. Finally, she saw a gray flyer on approach and groaned. “No, not a dragon.”