by Chuck Dixon
“It’s a race, right?” Dwayne said to Samuel, who had joined him at the rail.
“It is. Njarl wagered with Dalgaard that he would be first from the port and into open sea. The rest place bets as well,” Samuel said.
Dwayne moved sternward along the rail for a better view of the competition. The other ships were closing to narrow the distance as well as block the way of the others. Their sails were belled, and sweeps out and working. Great gouts of foam exploded up the faces of the fearsome prows. Two ships drew too close to one another. Oars struck one another in a tangle and then shattered like matchsticks as the vessels ground along each other’s hull with a terrible sound. Dwayne thought he saw a man spill from aloft into the churning water at the bottom of the momentary gap formed between the towering sides before they slammed together again.
Two more ships struck at an angle, the rigging from their top spars snarling together until one ship leaned hard starboard taking a cross-tie and a jumble of line with it. The result for the damaged ship was a long tear to a mainsail that luffed useless, hanging from its spar like so much laundry.
Through all this, Njarl howled and brayed and shrieked brazen insults to the amusement of his crew who roared with laughter.
“Hope the emperor’s cousin has a sense of humor, the way Njarl’s fucking with him,” Dwayne said.
“These men live by the moment. By the day,” Samuel said. “Not like they have a lot of choice living in a world unloved by God.”
“And where they know that death waits for them over the horizon.”
Njarl’s ship was first to sea and swung about to follow the longboats and barges north to the unfriendly shore and war.
38
Body Count
Shan was first up the ladder with Lee Hammond climbing behind. He looked up through the driving rain to see movement against the lights from the crew shack.
A man was standing at the railing, watching from the deck above them. The hooded figure moved down the rail for a better look. Rather than draw his weapon, Shan waved to the man. The man leaned out farther, calling something lost on the wind. Shan mimed calling back a reply as he climbed toward the man.
The ascent up the ladder was a challenge. The rungs were slippery wet under their bare feet, and the whole platform swung back and forth like a cork. The ladder was sometimes at a ten percent inverted incline, requiring the climbers to hook an arm through the rungs just to maintain their purchase. Shan climbed close enough to hear the shouting man’s voice if not his words. He reached the top and slipped over the rail to see a chubby-faced Chinese in a slicker.
“Are you from Dex-Tan?” the man shouted in Mandarin. Shan saw a handheld radio in the man’s fist. His other hand gripped the rail for support on the heaving deck.
“They thought you might need help in this storm,” Shan shouted back.
The man’s smile faded as his eyes traveled over the plastic-encased rifle strapped to the stranger’s chest. His eyes grew wider at the sight of the bearded white man swinging a leg over the rail. He turned to run. Shan caught a handful of the slicker’s hood and yanked the man back into a chokehold. The radio tumbled to the deck and skimmed along the decking into the sea.
Lee covered them with his rifle as Shan dragged the now-unconscious crewman toward the lights of the metal shed. They killed the lights once they were inside. The wind was rattling the sheet-steel walls as the rain hammered the glass. There was a desk with a comm console that crackled with calls for the man who now lay in a puddle on the floor. A pair of open laptops lit the room with animated weather maps on their screens.
“Xia Gang Tuo Three-One to Dex-Tan Ten-One. Come in D-T ten-one.”
Shan picked up the mike and keyed it. “This is Ten-One. Go ahead.”
“Who is this? Is this Ho?”
“Ho is busy elsewhere.”
“Who am I speaking to?”
Shan turned to Lee, who didn’t speak Mandarin. All he understood were the numbers.
“This is Leong. I am the comm officer.”
“Are you ready for us? Anchors free and lines secure?”
“Yes. Slow speed and come ahead.”
The shed door slammed open. Lee and Shan turned to see a drenched man stumble in on a spray of rain. He wore military boots and a Molle vest with ammo pouches stuffed with magazines. He regarded the two strangers in wet suits, his hands going for the stubby bullpup rifle that hung on a sling under this arm.
Lee dropped him with a double tap high to the chest. The man flopped to the deck, boot soles squeaking on the tiles. Lee finished him with a headshot.
The glass of the shed imploded. Lee and Shan dropped low, both sending fire through the steel sheeting in the general direction they determined the fire had come from.
“Can’t stay here,” Lee called over the wind whistling through the fresh bullet holes. He was lying on his back, slapping a new magazine in place.
“We cannot leave them the radio,” Shan said. The mike was swinging free on its cord. The speakers squawked with calls from the tug, unintelligible in the rising noise of the storm.
More fire from outside. This time drilling down through the roof of the shed. Lee kicked himself across the wet tile, loosing a long burst up through the ceiling. Shan got to a knee and took out the radio and computer array with a half mag. Sparks and plastic shards went flying.
They rolled out a door on the opposite end to a rain-swept deck. Automatic fire sprayed down in their wake. Lee swung his weapon left and right hunting for movement above. A shadow passed between struts. He gave the shadow some lead and fired controlled bursts. The movement stopped, the shooter now concealed or hit. He turned to follow Shan, moving toward the aft section at a run.
A pair of men in yellow Dex-Tan slickers climbed toward them from a lower deck. No weapons in view. Shan met them halfway down the steps, weapon raised. He barked orders at them. They raised splayed hands; eyes crazed with fright. Shan barked again, and they shouted back replies, speaking over one another.
Lee crouched at the head of the stairs, weapon up and scanning the superstructure above.
“What’re they saying?” he called.
“They are crewmen. They were raising the anchors,” Shan shouted back.
“How much security?”
“Five guards.”
One dead. Maybe another dead or wounded. That left three gunmen on board a vessel the length of two football fields.
“We can hunt, or we can hide,” Lee said. He glanced back to Shan, holding a weapon on the two frightened crewmen kneeling on the rolling deck.
Sparks sprayed them, struck off the metal piping above them.
“You hide! I hunt!” Lee shouted. He rolled across the deck to the shelter of a bulkhead. Shan shoved the two crewmen away sternward.
Lee belly crawled backward, elbows and knees, to a hatchway and rolled inside. A narrow catwalk followed the interior wall of the boathouse around three sides. Above them, the carbon steel arches of the massive Tauber Tube were black against the lowering clouds. Staying pressed to the wall and moving from shadow to shadow, he swiveled his head up and down and side to side in search of movement. Eyes sighting over the top of the rifle in his fists.
The guy he waxed back in the shed was armed but not in body armor. No NODs gear either. Chances were these guys, no matter what kind of high-priced talent Harnesh hired, had their edge blunted after months of tedious guard duty. All this time at sea, stationary and waiting for a threat that might never come, might have made them complacent. It was something. But Lee knew better than to count on these guys not being as sharp as him. And they knew this floating shithouse better than he did. He had to at least even the odds before the tug got here.
39
Hammer and Anvil
The broad delta of the Mississippi was protected by a series of fortified islands dotted around the great river’s mouth. These were situated to discourage approach by enemy ships. The angled walls housed batteries of long-rang
e cannons set to create a deadly storm of enfilading fire that could shred any vessel that sailed within range.
The walled Mughal city of Nadikakahaana sat well north of the estuary lakes Pontchartrain and Maurepas, called Padapaanee and Thodapaanee in this time and place. This was more securely situated than New Orleans as well as higher above sea level. And all along the river route were fortresses and earthworks bristling with guns.
The bold plan of the Northmen’s armada was to hammer away at a pair of large forts set on Grand Isle and Mendicant Island. Once those were reduced, they’d be assaulted by ground troops landing in smaller boats. When the forts were taken, the longboats would make their way into Barataria Bay and through the marshy inlets to arrive at the river above the island forts. From there, they would choke off the Mughal’s path to the sea and the forts. The guns along the ramparts would be turned to the sea, leaving the landward walls unprotected. In this way, the forts could be brought down one by one.
That was the plan anyway. And, like most plans, it would not survive the first encounter.
Dwayne was welcomed up onto the command deck of Njarl’s ship. From there, he could see the mortar barges anchored in a half-moon pattern a few miles offshore of the fort at the eastern tip of Grand Isle. Night and day, the huge brass mortars belched five-hundred-pound iron balls and round-shaped stones in long arcs to land in and around the sloped faces of the stone fort. Often the shot was heated in furnaces and soared like comets trailing white smoke. These were launched to ignite fires within the fort’s walls. Four days of shelling and there was still no sign of a blaze in the Mughal position.
And that was when they could see the coastline at all. A thick pall of smoke from the Mughal’s return fire enclosed it most of the time. The Viking barges were at the extreme range of the fort’s long guns. Most shots fell far short; raising gouts of water within the half circle. Their second night in place, a heated mortar round fired from the fort struck a barge abeam; igniting the powder stores. The flat-bottomed vessel erupted in a flare that lit the sea like sunrise. The concussive impact was felt by all watching from the main fleet at anchor miles away on the open water. Encouraged, the defenders picked up the pace of their fire. But after a week of exchanges, they had no further success, their charges falling useless into the sea. All the while, the balls from the mortar barges fell with predictable accuracy to weaken the stone walls of the fort.
Through a telescope, when the wind had cleared the shore of smoke, Dwayne could see that the seaward walls of the fortress were marred by craters. A tower at a corner of the walls was partially collapsed. He thought he could see a wisp of black smoke rising from the fort’s interior. Maybe a heated round found something combustible. Maybe the Mughals and their conscripts were, even now, inside fighting a fire to keep it from spreading.
As epic as the fire and counterfire of the siege were, the most furious fighting was going on across the water inside the ring of fire. Three longboats sailed back and forth within range of the land-based cannon as a screen against Mughal vessels that set out from the shore on sallies against the mortar barges. These longboats were packed with musketeers, and each had a small-bore cannonade mounted in the prow.
Lateen-rigged catches and barks made their way from the sally port of the fortress. They sailed across the water toward the anchored barges. Each small craft bristled with small caliber cannon, the decks crowded with men bearing muskets and bangalores, intent on breaking the chain that was strangling the island fort.
With suicidal zeal, the longboats rowed to intercept these attacks. Scopes were at a premium and, in the early days, Dwayne had to share with others eager to watch the action. The Norsemen were like a Super Bowl crowd, drinking and cheering and shouting oaths. This was party-time Viking style. Dwayne saw men grip the handles of their swords or daggers, eyes locked on the far-off action, wishing they were in the bloody mix.
Dwayne watched as a longboat rammed a bark amidships, shattering the oars to flinders all down the port side. Ramps were dropped, and armed men rushed over the boards to leap into the belly of the enemy vessel. All under the cover of withering musket fire from both vessels. It was a dumb show as seen through the lenses, the battle too far away for the sounds to reach him other than the remote pops of muskets. A creamy fog of gun smoke engulfed the entangled boats now turning in the grip of the current, locked on a shared course that carried them closer to the shore. Eventually, they were well within accurate range of the fort’s cannon.
A ball dropped close to the embattled boats. A second still closer raised a drenching tower of water that spilled over the fight and dispelled the pall of smoke. For a few seconds, Dwayne could see the furious melee clearly. Sunlight flashed off spearpoints and sword blades. Men were packed close on the deck of the smaller bark, raising and lowering weapons. Pointblank fire from muskets and pistols raised a new cloud of yellow smoke that rose up the masts of both boats to conceal them from view.
He raised his eye from the telescope in time to see the jumbled vessels take a direct hit from a round fired from the fort. It dropped somewhere in the packed mass of skirmishers and raised a dome of animate and inanimate debris. The main mast of the longboat collapsed, falling into the water and creating an anchor about which the stricken vessels spun. A second ball dropped directly into the mess and ignited something aboard one or the other of the boats.
The Mughals sacrificed their own crew in an inferno that, in a fiery instant, shredded the longboat and bark to matchwood. All that remained was a mist drifting over broken sections of hull and decking floating atop the foam. The lives of two hundred or more men gone in a heartbeat.
Dwayne looked about him to the grim faces of the Norsemen lining the rails of the quarterdeck, mouths turned down, and eyes ablaze.
Njarl drew his sword and held it over his head, roaring an oath at the sky. The other men joined him, holding blades and rifles aloft and chanting along with their chief. More voices, calling in kind, echoed over the water that separated the other men of war, tenders, and longboats anchored in a ragged line miles in length.
Samuel joined Dwayne at the railing.
“They died well,” Samuel said. “That’s what they’re chanting.”
“Figured it was something like that,” Dwayne said.
Njarl roared for silence, and all aboard quieted down to listen up. He sheathed his sword and spoke loudly enough to be heard over the distant boom of man-made thunder. His words were relayed all along the lower deck so that every man could understand. The big man thumped his chest, and everyone nodded along with his words. Their enthusiasm grew as Njarl pointed off the starboard rail at the fortress enshrouded in smoke. His voice grew louder, more insistent, and the men broke into an answering rumble that rose to a shout.
Caught up in the moment, Dwayne raised a fist in the air with a “Fuck, yeah! Hooah!” Some of the men near him grinned broadly and joined him. He had a band about him pumping fists and mimicking his war cry.
“Hooah! Hooah! Hooah!”
Njarl stood beaming at them, his one remaining eye glassy with tears of joy and pride. He lifted a hand in a broad gesture, and barrels were rolled across the deck to the cheers of all. Taps were hammered in, and mugs appeared from nowhere. The whole crew from oar decks to the topmasts started in on a kick-ass, monumental drunk.
“Why am I getting that feeling that we’ve all just volunteered for something insane?” Dwayne said.
“Because we did. Njarl has told his crew that he is sending a message to Admiral Dalgaard on the flagship. This crew will be the first ashore to assault the fort,” Samuel said.
“And that includes us,” Dwayne said.
As if for confirmation, Njarl crossed the deck to clap a hand on Dwayne’s shoulder. All smiles, he spoke words of encouragement and handed Dwayne a mug brimming with foam.
“You are his good fortune,” Samuel translated. “The day will belong to them because of you.”
“Yeah. That’s fucking great,” D
wayne said, returning Njarl’s feral grin. “But where the hell’s my lucky charm?”
40
Heavy Chop
The skipper of the Xia Gang Tuo had his work cut out for him.
He stood in the dimly lit bridge squinting through the windscreen as the wipers slapped side to side to clear the glass. Behind him, his second stood at the controls. The powerful tug craft plowed through the high chop sending sprays of water flying over the bow walls. The sea pounded the tempered glass of the bridge house at firehose pressure.
Before them, the enormous shape of the Dex-Tan platform towered, yawing back and forth on ten-foot rollers. The aft section was lit like a stage with powerful lamps. The convex “V” of the docking port swayed to port on the current.
“Three degrees port. Engines slow,” he said.
His second called back the order for confirmation.
“Anything from the Dee-Tee?” the skipper asked the man standing braced at the radio.
“Nothing after their last reply.”
“Damn them. This is no time to go silent. Two more degrees, port.” The big box was swinging away from them with the open bow-end as an axis.
A door from the weather deck banged open, and a wet mist blew across the bridge, fogging the windscreens and covering every surface with fine beads of salt spray.
The skipper whirled to roar at the crewman stupid enough to enter the bridge from outside during a squall. Two men had entered and moved toward his radioman and second. An enormous man with red hair. The man was smiling; his lips pulled back to reveal white teeth in his soaked beard. The other was a black man with a long face and narrowed eyes. Both wore wet suits slick with rain and both raised rifles at him and his crew.
