At the Sign of Triumph

by David Weber

  He has to know I’d have laid as many sea-bombs as I could to cover the East Gate, and somehow I doubt those sweepers of his can guarantee to clear all of them out of his path! He can’t be going to deliberately take that ship straight into them!

  The very thought had been insane, yet that had been exactly what was happening, and he’d felt himself tightening internally, waiting for the first explosion. But then his eyes had gone wide. She was anchoring—anchoring!—just over eleven thousand yards from East Point … and exactly the same distance from Fishnet. What struck him first was the fact that Sarmouth was anchoring at all, surrendering the mobility which would have made his flagship a far more difficult target. Then he realized Manthyr’s position allowed her gunners to engage with both broadsides at once, from an absolutely stable and unmoving platform, while simultaneously placing her at the very limit of his own range. Just reaching her would require his gunners to use dangerously heavy charges—the kind that led to burst guns and dead and mangled gunners—and even so, their shells would have precious little penetrating power when they got there.

  And then the rest of it struck him.

  She hadn’t just anchored, hadn’t just positioned herself perfectly to engage both batteries simultaneously. No, she’d also anchored when the bombsweepers in front of her had been a mere two hundred yards, less than half a cable, outside his sea-bombs. And Sarmouth hadn’t anchored because anyone had suddenly spotted the sea-bombs or because his sweepers had abruptly brought one to the surface. There’d been no haste, no urgency, to the maneuver. No, he’d anchored with slow, deliberate precision, exactly where he’d intended to anchor from the very beginning. And that meant—

  He knows where they are. The thought ran through Thirsk’s brain. He knows exactly where they are. Shan-wei! Either he’s the luckiest flag officer in the entire world, or else he knows where they are even better than I do!

  An icy shiver went through him. It was entirely possible Charisian spies had watched those sea-bombs being laid. He’d had ample proof of how effortlessly at least one Charisian “spy” could penetrate Gorath undetected. But they could scarcely have found a spot to take detailed bearings on the vessels laying the sea-bombs without someone seeing them. And without those bearings, they couldn’t possibly have provided Sarmouth with information accurate enough for him to accomplish what he’d just done. Even with that kind of information, Thirsk doubted any Dohlaran captain could have duplicated that maneuver.

  He wanted to think it had been only a spectacularly lucky guess on Sarmouth’s part, but then two of the ironclad’s escorting bombsweepers crossed in front of her on opposite courses, dropping buoys over the side, and Thirsk’s jaw clenched as he realized they were deploying floater nets. Floater nets designed to catch any drifting sea-bomb well short of Gwylym Manthyr.

  Obviously Sarmouth did know where they were, and he was taking no chances on one of them breaking loose.

  * * *

  “Handsomely done, Halcom,” Sarmouth congratulated his flag captain.

  “Thank you, My Lord.” Bahrns smiled crookedly, his eyes on the bombsweepers deploying the protective nets. “I hope it won’t offend you if I admit I was a little nervous about the whole thing.”

  “Offend?” Sarmouth chuckled. “No, Halcom. Sanity never offends me. I suppose I was guilty of what His Majesty likes to call a ‘calculated risk’—when he’s the one taking it, at least—but we did have the sweepers out front, you know.”

  “Yes, My Lord, I do.”

  Sarmouth heard the hint of repressiveness in his captain’s tone and chuckled again. But then his expression hardened.

  “Well, here we are, the men’ve had breakfast, and we’ve got the entire day to work with.” He smiled grimly and began fitting the plugs into his ears. “Under the circumstances, I believe we should be about it.”

  * * *

  “You should leave now, My Lord,” a voice said quietly.

  Thirsk turned his head. Stywyrt Baiket stood at his right shoulder, spyglass raised to his eye, and his voice was so low no one could have heard him from more than a very few feet away.

  “I don’t think so,” Thirsk replied, turning his own eyes back to the massive, anchored ironclad.

  The pair of heavy guns fore and aft were rotating to starboard with mechanical smoothness, obviously powered by the same steam that drove the ship’s propellers. Sarmouth had decided which of his two targets deserved their attention first, the earl thought, watching the muzzles turn in his direction.

  “Then you’re wrong, My Lord.”

  Baiket’s voice was even lower, but it had acquired a steely edge, and Thirsk looked at him again. The captain lowered his spyglass to meet his eyes levelly.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” he said. “I know why you’re thinking it. But this is my job now, not yours, and there’s not a man in the entire Navy who doesn’t know how badly we’ll need you going forward. We can’t risk losing you, My Lord. Not when you have so much still to do after the battle.”

  His tone said more than his words, and Thirsk’s heart sank as he realized what the other man was truly saying … and that he was right.

  “You’re not ‘abandoning your post,’ My Lord,” Baiket said almost gently. “You’re making sure you’ll be available for a job only you can do.”

  “You’re right … Shan-wei take it,” Thirsk muttered and clasped Baiket’s shoulder with his good hand. “You’re right. But watch yourself, Stywyrt. I don’t have that many friends left—see to it I don’t lose another one!”

  “Dying’s not on my to-do list, My Lord,” Baiket assured him with a smile. “I’ve got too much to look forward to! This next little bit’s going to be a mite on the … unpleasant side, maybe, but later—!”

  His smile grew broader and much, much colder as their gazes held for a handful of seconds. Then he twitched his head at the observation tower stair.

  “Best you were going now, My Lord. In fact, I’ll go with you as far as the command post. Somehow,” he raised his spyglass for one last glance at the long, slender guns elevating in his direction, “I think it’s going to get a little noisy around here.”

  * * *

  The smoke was thicker than a Fairstock fog, Bishop Executor Wylsynn Lainyr thought grimly.

  There was virtually no wind to disperse it, and it had settled like a curse, growing thicker and thicker while the fires burned. He hadn’t had this much difficulty picking his way through a city’s streets, even after dark, since his last visit home in Hayzor. His carriage’s powerful lamps penetrated no more than a few yards—barely far enough for the coachman to see the heads of his horses—and the pedestrians they passed had wet cloths tied over their mouths and noses.

  Of course, there weren’t many of those pedestrians.

  The streets and avenues of Gorath were deserted, turned into ghostly, smoke-shrouded places abandoned to fear and the night. It wasn’t really dark, though. The roaring flames consuming the Royal Dohlaran Navy’s massive dockyards and warehouses turned the smoke into a glowing cocoon. The short coach trip from Gorath Cathedral to King Rahnyld’s palace had been like a voyage through clouded amber, but it was an amber tinted with the red of the flames, not warm and golden, and it pulsed like the beating of some enormous heart as those flames roared and danced all along the southeastern end of the city.

  There were more flames farther north, where the foundries which had produced the kingdom’s heavy artillery had been reduced to rubble, and the entire city had shivered like a terrified animal when a heretic shell landed directly atop the Navy Arsenal and touched off its main magazine in a stupendous, roaring explosion that had rolled on and on for what had seemed an hour.

  Yet for all of that, the city itself had suffered remarkably little damage. The heretics had blasted their way in through East Gate Channel, demolished the East Point batteries, and swept away the sea-bombs Earl Thirsk and Duke Fern had promised would be so effective. Then they’d advanced on the city itself.r />
  The smaller ironclads had smashed the batteries protecting the waterfront and the Navy Yard, then turned their attention to Gorath’s famous golden walls. They’d obviously come to deliver a message to the city which had delivered their sailors to the Inquisition not once, but twice, and they’d reduced the entire seaward face of its walls to broken and blasted wreckage with shell after methodical shell, fired with the metronome steadiness of a formal salute. And while they were doing that, the enormous ironclad—the ironclad named for the accursed heretic Mother Church had given to the Punishment in Zion itself—had trained its guns on rather different targets. It had anchored again—anchored—in full view of any citizen of Gorath who’d cared to look, and begun the careful, systematic, unhurried destruction of the shipyards, manufactories, foundries, and warehouses which supported the Royal Dohlaran Navy and Army.

  The implications of its obvious and utter contempt for anything Gorath’s defenders could do had been terrifying, but the reach and accuracy of its fire had been even more frightening. Lainyr was no military man. He’d had no idea how the heretics could drop their shells so accurately, with a precision the finest surgeon might have envied, on targets that couldn’t even be seen from Queen Zhakleen Harbor, but he didn’t doubt Captain Gairybahldy’s explanation was correct. It was the balloon. It was the accursed, no doubt demonic, balloon. It hung above the ironclad, watching the fall of its shells, sending down corrections, and the thunderbolts of destruction had marched across their targets with devastating effect.

  And the bastards were careful not to hit the residential areas, Lainyr thought grimly.

  For all the pervasiveness of the smoke, only a handful of shells had landed anywhere near the city’s houses or apartment buildings, and they’d obviously missed their intended targets. The Navy Yard, the manufactories and warehouses, the city’s walls had been demolished by hit after hit, yet it had been painfully obvious the heretics were carefully avoiding civilian casualties.

  And the people of Gorath knew it. They knew the navy which had every reason to hate their kingdom, whose monarchs had declared the basis for those reasons time and again, whose dead sailors had been dropped into Gorath Bay like so much refuse, denied even burial in consecrated ground, and whose living sailors had been delivered to the hideous provisions of the Punishment, were deliberately not killing them. Destroying their city’s manufactories, smashing its walls and its fortifications, yes; killing the civilians of that city, no.

  The word that the heretics—the savage, bloodthirsty heretics the Inquisition had assured them sacrificed babies to Shan-wei and routinely burned Temple Loyalist churches to the ground, generally with their congregations locked up inside them—were trying not to kill them or their families and children had spread rapidly among the capital’s inhabitants. Ahbsahlahn Kharmych’s agents inquisitor had already confirmed that, and Lainyr didn’t want to think about the speculation that restraint was bound to spawn, especially after all the casualties Dohlar had suffered in the service of Mother Church. King Rahnyld’s subjects’ confidence in the Jihad—and in its justification, little though Lainyr liked admitting that—had been crumbling for months. Langhorne only knew what would happen to it now, but the bishop executor didn’t expect it to be good.

  “Five more minutes, Your Eminence.”

  Lainyr turned his head as Captain Gairybahldy leaned from the saddle and spoke through the open carriage window. Like everyone they’d passed, the captain had tied a wet bandanna across his face. It made him look like a highwayman, Lainyr thought. Or like some other sinister criminal, at any rate. That was an image Mother Church’s protectors didn’t need to be projecting just now, and a petty, petulant part of him thought about snapping an order to take it off—and for all of Gairybahldy’s men to do the same.

  But there’s no point, he thought wearily. And how likely is that, really, to add to the … demoralization this city’s already suffered?

  “Thank you, Captain,” he said, courteously, instead, and leaned back in his seat opposite Kharmych and closed his eyes in silent prayer.

  * * *

  Closed windows and doors might keep the worst of the city’s smoke at bay, but the stink of it penetrated even to the heart of the royal palace. Lainyr would have preferred to think it had come in on his own clothing, but the faintest haze was visible in the longer palace corridors, hanging in nebulous halos around the lamps which lit them.

  He followed their guide down the crimson runner and the council chamber doors opened wide at their approach.

  “The Bishop Executor and Father Kharmych, My Lords,” the liveried footman announced, and stood aside as the clerics passed through the doors, followed by Captain Gairybahldy. The men seated at the table—the Duke of Fern, the Duke of Salthar, and Baron Yellowstone—rose as they entered.

  “Your Eminence, Father,” Fern greeted them.

  “Your Grace,” Lainyr replied, but he also paused just inside the doors.

  “Is something wrong, Your Eminence?” Fern inquired.

  “I was about to ask you that,” Lainyr replied. “May I ask where Duke Thorast is? And it was my impression His Majesty intended to be present for the discussion of the capital’s defense.”

  “Duke Thorast has been unavoidably detained, I’m afraid,” Fern replied, gesturing with one hand towards the comfortable chairs waiting for Lainyr and Kharmych. “And His Majesty is currently with the healers.”

  “With the healers?” Lainyr repeated sharply, resuming his progress towards the table. “Was he injured during the attack?!”

  “No, Your Eminence. I assure you, if he had been you would already have heard. No, he’s simply experiencing some difficulty with his breathing because of the smoke. The healers don’t think it’s anything serious, but his personal physician wants to keep an eye on him until they’re positive of that.”

  “I see.” Lainyr extended his ring for Fern to kiss, then settled into his chair, Gairybahldy at his back like an armsman, as the Dohlaran councilors sat back down. “And do we know how long Duke Thorast will be delayed?”

  “For quite some time, I’m afraid, Your Eminence,” another voice said, and Lainyr’s head whipped around.

  He hadn’t heard the well-oiled hinges when the doors opened again behind him. Nor had he heard the boots crossing the thick, expensive carpet. But he recognized that voice, and his eyes flared as he saw the Earl of Thirsk.

  The Admiral wasn’t alone, and the color drained from the bishop executor’s face as he saw Sir Rainos Ahlverez at Thirsk’s left shoulder … and Bishop Staiphan Maik at his right. There was a pistol in Ahlverez’ hand, aimed directly at Captain Gairybahldy’s head, and the general shook his head very slightly when the Guardsman whipped around and his hand started towards his own pistol.

  Gairybahldy froze, standing very still indeed under the blank, cold eye of that pistol muzzle, but Ahbsahlahn Kharmych shot to his feet.

  “What’s the meaning of this?!” the intendant thundered. “What do you think you’re doing?!”

  “I should think that would be clear even to you, Father,” Thirsk replied coolly. “For your information, however, units of the Army and Navy are currently arresting every agent inquisitor in Gorath.” He shrugged slightly at Kharmych’s stunned expression. “We may miss a few, and I’m afraid there may be a little breakage. The officers and sergeants assigned to that duty are mostly survivors of the Army of Shiloh or veterans from the Army of the Seridahn. I’m afraid they’re unlikely to show a great deal of patience if any of your agents offer resistance. For some reason, they aren’t very fond of inquisitors.”

  Kharmych stared at him, frozen, as he and Bishop Staiphan walked around the end of the table to the Duke of Fern’s chair. The bishop’s face was stone, his eyes harder than flint as they met Lainyr’s horrified gaze, and the bishop executor’s frozen heart plummeted as he read the message in that unyielding countenance. Ahlverez stayed where he was as another half-dozen men in Army uniform filtered into the room, ba
yoneted rifles carried at a position of port arms, and Duke Fern rose once again, to stand beside Thirsk and Staiphan Maik.

  “At this moment,” the earl continued, “Sir Rainos’ senior aide, Captain Lattymyr, is at the Cathedral with two platoons of Army of Shiloh veterans. It’s a pity Archbishop Trumahn’s business in Zion has continued to prevent his return, but I’m confident Father Rahndail will be able to direct the Captain to General Rychtyr’s chambers so that the General can accompany Sir Lynkyn back to the Palace. In the meantime,” he smiled thinly and settled into the chair Fern had just vacated, while Bishop Staiphan moved to stand at one shoulder and the first councilor—the former first councilor, Lainyr realized numbly—moved to stand at the other, “I think we should by all means begin that discussion about how to defend this city.

  “And against whom.”

  .IV.

  Royal Palace,

  City of Cherayth,

  and

  Braigyr Head,

  Duchy of Rock Coast,

  Kingdom of Chisholm,

  Empire of Charis;

  and

  Symyn’s Farm,

  Duchy of Thorast,

  Kingdom of Dohlar.

  Rebkah Rohsail sat in the comfortably furnished chamber, staring out the window at the palace gardens, hands folded in her lap, and tried to understand how it could all have gone so wrong.

  It’s as if they knew exactly what we planned the entire time, she thought. They were waiting for us. And that bitch Elahnah—!

  White-hot rage fisted her hands in her lap as that familiar thought went through her once again. She knew now why Elahnah Waistyn hadn’t promised her support. She’d been back over their correspondence a thousand times in her mind, and her teeth ground together as she went through it yet again. She’d read what she’d wanted to see into Elahnah’s letters—she knew that now—but she also knew Elahnah had realized exactly what she was reading into them. That without ever quite committing perjury, the Dowager Duchess of Halbrook Hollow had encouraged her plans without actually committing to support them in any way. That would have been bad enough, a great enough sin against God, but the traitorous bitch hadn’t stopped there. She must have been passing Rebkah’s letters directly to White Crag and Stoneheart, as well!