Off Armageddon Reef

by David Weber

  What might almost have been a shadow of grudging respect flickered across Thirsk's face. Gorjah, however, only regarded Stonekeep coldly for several seconds. Then the king gestured at the Dohlaran admiral.

  "According to Prince Cayleb," he said, "Haarahld's known our plans for months. His 'failure' to mobilize his reserve galleys, his 'assistance request' under the treaty, were both ruses. In fact, Cayleb must have already sailed by the time Haarahld's messages arrived here in Tranjyr. Both Baron White Ford and Earl Thirsk have confirmed to me that Cayleb couldn't possibly have reached Armageddon Reef when he did unless that were true, so I think we must assume Cayleb knew what he was talking about. Wouldn't you agree, Edymynd?"

  "It certainly sounds that way, Your Majesty," Stonekeep said cautiously. "Of course, as I said, my own familiarity with such matters is limited."

  "I'm sure it is." The king's smile was even thinner than before. "The problem, however, is just how Haarahld came by that information. And according to Cayleb, he got it from us."

  Stonekeep's belly seemed to tie itself into a knot, and he felt sweat breaking out under his kercheef.

  "Your Majesty," he said, after a mouth-drying second or two, "I don't see how that could be possible."

  "I'm sure you don't," Gorjah said.

  "I understand now why you summoned me," the baron said, speaking as calmly as he could, despite the king's tone, "and I also understand why Earl Thirsk is as angry as he appears to be. But I literally don't see how it could be possible."

  "Why not?" Gorjah asked coldly.

  "Because so far as I'm aware, no one outside this council chamber at this very moment, aside from one or two of Baron White Ford's subordinates, knew where the fleets were to rendezvous, or what route they would follow from the rendezvous to Charis. For that matter, I didn't know the route."

  Gorjah's eyes flickered, and Stonekeep permitted himself a tiny sliver of relief. But Thirsk shook his head.

  "Baron Stonekeep," he said, "someone must have known and passed that information on to Charis. As a foreigner here in Tarot, I have no idea who that someone might have been. But the timing indicates that Tarot is the only possible source. No one else could have told them in time for them to get their fleet into position to intercept us."

  "Forgive me, My Lord," Stonekeep replied, "but unless I'm very much mistaken, King Rahnyld and his court knew about this proposed operation long before anyone here in Tarot did."

  "But we didn't know the rendezvous point or the course we were to steer after it until just before our fleet actually departed," Thirsk said. "And there wasn't time for that information to reach Haarahld from Dohlar early enough for him to respond this way."

  "I see." Stonekeep managed to maintain his outward aplomb, but it wasn't easy.

  "As for the exact route we followed after the rendezvous," White Ford said, speaking for the first time, and sounding as if he truly wished he didn't have to, "I'm afraid someone as experienced as Haarahld wouldn't have needed exact information. In fact, we didn't follow the course laid down in our original orders. The one we did follow was dictated by sailing conditions, and Haarahld is fully capable of predicting what changes sea and wind would be likely to force upon us. And of dispatching Cayleb's fleet accordingly."

  "So, you see, Edymynd," Gorjah said, drawing the baron's eyes back to him, "all the available evidence suggests Haarahld did get the information from us."

  Stonekeep might have debated the use of the word "evidence" to describe what they had to go on, but he knew better than to make that point just now.

  "And if he did get it from us," Gorjah continued, "Vicar Zahmsyn and Vicar Zhaspyr are going to be most displeased. And if they're displeased with me, I'm going to be . . . displeased with whoever allowed that to happen."

  He held Stonekeep's eyes levelly, and for once, the baron could think of absolutely nothing to say.

  II

  Royal Palace,

  Eraystor,

  "Your Highness."

  Nahrmahn of Emerald gave a most un-prince-like snort, then sat up in bed. It looked rather like a particularly round narwhale or an Old Earth walrus rising from the depths, and his expression was not happy.

  "I'm sorry to wake you, Your Highness." The night chamberlain's words came out almost in a gabble in response to that expression. "I assure you, I wouldn't have done it if I'd had any choice at all. I know you don't wish to be dist—"

  "Enough," Nahrmahn didn't—quite—snarl, and the man chopped himself off in midsyllable.

  The prince rubbed his eyes, then drew a deep breath and gave the chamberlain a slightly less hostile look.

  "Better," he said. "Now, what is it?"

  "Your Highness, there's an officer here from the dockyard. He says—"

  The night chamberlain broke off for an instant, then visibly steeled himself.

  "Your Highness, there's been a battle. From what the officer says, we lost."

  "Lost?"

  Nahrmahn's irritation disappeared into shock. How could they have lost a battle when they outnumbered their enemy by almost three-to-one?

  "The dockyard officer is waiting for you, Your Highness," the chamberlain said. "He's far better qualified than I am to explain what happened."

  "Bring him," Nahrmahn said harshly, swinging his legs over the edge of the bed.

  "Shall I send for your body servants, first, Your Highness?"

  The chamberlain seemed almost pathetically eager to fasten upon some reassuringly normal routine, but Nahrmahn shook his head angrily.

  "Bring him!" he snapped, and stood, reaching for the robe laid ready beside the bed.

  "Yes, Your Highness!"

  The chamberlain scurried out, and Nahrmahn fastened the robe's sash, then turned to face the bedchamber door, waiting impatiently. Less than two minutes later, the chamberlain returned with a naval officer who looked even less happy than the chamberlain did. The officer wore no sword, and his dagger sheath was empty, but a quick shake of Nahrmahn's head told the guardsman outside his bedchamber door to stay there.

  "Captain Tallmyn, Your Highness," the chamberlain said, as the officer bowed deeply.

  "Leave us," Nahrmahn told the chamberlain, who promptly disappeared like a wisp of smoke in a high wind.

  The door closed behind him, and the naval officer straightened his spine and met Nahrmahn's eyes, although he clearly would have preferred not to.

  "Captain Tallmyn," Nahrmahn said. "And you would be—?"

  "Captain Gervays Tallmyn, Your Highness." Tallmyn had a deep voice, undoubtedly well suited to bawling orders. At the moment there was an echo of shock in its depths, and Nahrmahn's lips tightened as he heard it. "I have the honor to be the assistant commander of the Royal Dockyard here in Eraystor."

  "I see. And what's this about a battle?"

  "At the moment, Your Highness, our information is far from complete," Tallmyn said a bit cautiously, and Nahrmahn nodded impatient understanding of the qualification. "All we really knew so far is that Sea Cloud's returned to port. According to her captain, she's the only survivor of her entire squadron. And—" The captain inhaled, visibly bracing himself. "—she may be the only survivor of our entire fleet."

  Nahrmahn's round face went pale.

  "I don't say she is, Your Highness," Tallmyn said quickly. "I said she may be. At the moment, she's the only ship which has returned, but her captain is obviously badly shaken. It's entirely possible, even probable, that even though he's being as honest as he possibly can, his own experiences are causing him to overestimate our total losses. But"—the captain's voice went lower and darker—"even if they are, there's no question that we've suffered a very serious defeat."

  "How?" Nahrmahn demanded.

  "I'm afraid it's going to be some time before we can really answer that question, Your Highness. However, it appears from Sea Cloud's report that Cayleb and the Charisian galleons have returned. Apparently, they struck our fleet from behind, just at dawn, and their gunfire was even more effecti
ve than Duke Black Water's last reports suggested it might be. Sea Cloud managed to escape to windward, but her captain personally saw at least eleven of our galleys, including every other ship in his own squadron, strike."

  Nahrmahn simply stared at him for several seconds. Then he nodded slowly and walked across to gaze out his bedchamber's window across the palace gardens.

  III

  Tellesberg Cathedral,

  Tellesberg

  King Haarahld VII's body lay in state before the high altar in Tellesberg Cathedral. Six halberd-armed men of the Royal Guard surrounded the bier, gazing rigidly in front of them, the heads of their weapons draped in the black of mourning. By King Cayleb's orders, Sergeant Gahrdaner and Sergeant Haarpar lay on either side of the king they'd died to protect, and Midshipman Hektor Aplyn sat at his dead king's feet, one arm in a snow-white sling, keeping watch over King Haarahld's sword.

  Aplyn was one of only thirty-six survivors of Royal Charis' entire crew. Every one of the survivors had been wounded. Some of them might yet die, despite all the healers could do.

  For four days now, King Haarahld's people had shuffled quietly, reverently, through the enormous cathedral to bid their old king farewell. Many had sobbed, most had wept, and all had been grim faced with grief.

  Yet there'd been little or no despair.

  Merlin Athrawes stood behind King Cayleb, gazing over the young monarch's shoulder as he sat in the royal box with his younger brother and sister, waiting for the funeral mass to begin. Zhan and Zhanayt looked as if they were still trying to comprehend the enormity of their father's death. Cayleb's expression was less stunned and far, far harder.

  And that, Merlin thought as he, too, gazed sadly at Haarahld's body, summed up the mood of most of Charis quite well. The death of their beloved king tempered the Charisians' joy and pride in the victories their navy had won, but nothing could erase their understanding of what those victories meant.

  Nineteen of Haarahld's galleys, a quarter of his entire fleet, had been sunk or so badly damaged that Cayleb had ordered them burned; Dreadnought's bow had been so shattered by the collision with Doomwhale that it had been impossible to keep her afloat; and casualties throughout the galley fleet had been heavy. But as compensation, a hundred and seventeen of Black Water's galleys, most badly damaged, but including thirty-six Chisholmian galleys which had surrendered virtually undamaged, were anchored in Tellesberg's harbor under Charisian colors. Another forty-nine had been sunk in action or burned afterward. Only seventeen—less than ten percent of the fleet Black Water had taken into action—had managed to escape.

  Of the total combined force of over three hundred and fifty warships the Group of Four had assembled for the attack on Charis, less than thirty had escaped destruction or capture. It was, by any measure, the most one-sided naval victory in Safehold's history.

  The Kingdom of Charis' pride in its navy was like a bright, fierce flame, one which burned even more brilliantly against the darkness of its dead king, and Merlin understood that only too well. He wished, with all his molycirc heart, that Haarahld hadn't done it. Wished he himself had reached the aftercastle of Royal Charis even a minute earlier. Wished he'd realized how serious the king's wound had been, or that he'd been able to somehow treat that wound while simultaneously holding the Corisandian boarders at bay.

  But none of those things had happened, and so the king he had come to admire and respect so deeply—had come, without even realizing it, to love—had died behind him in the arms of an eleven-year-old midshipman.

  It was a tragedy made even greater and far more painful because the victory had already been won. If every single ship in Black Water's column had escaped, Darcos Sound would still have been a crushing triumph. And yet . . .

  Merlin stood behind King Cayleb, watching, listening, and he knew that whether or not Darcos Sound would have been a victory anyway was really almost immaterial. The SNARC he'd had monitoring Haarahld had recorded the king's conversation with his flag captain, and he knew the king's death had purchased exactly what Haarahld had flung his life into the scales to buy. The entire Kingdom of Charis knew King Haarahld could have avoided action. It knew he'd chosen to engage at odds of six-to-one rather than turn his back and let those ships escape, and that he'd done it because Charis needed far more in this war than mere victories. Just as it knew his flagship's crew had fought literally to the last man, building a ring of their own bodies about their king. And just as it knew that in the final decision he would ever make, its king had lost his life protecting an eleven-year-old midshipman. Young Aplyn had told Cayleb the last thing his father had ever said. The words had come hard from an officer who was also a boy, trying desperately not to weep, and they had already spread throughout the entire kingdom.

  Charis knew as well as Merlin did that Haarahld hadn't had to meet the enemy head on. That, in many respects, it had been the wrong decision for a king to make. But it had been the right decision for a man to make, and Charis knew that, too . . . just as it would always treasure the last words he had said to an eleven-year-old boy. He had become a martyr and, even more importantly, an example, the yardstick against which his navy would forever be measured, and the legend of HMS Royal Charis' last battle would do nothing but grow with time. Haarahld had provided that legend by showing what he had expected of himself, showing his people the measure to which they must now hold themselves if they would be worthy of their dead king.

  Merlin had no doubt that they would hew to the standard Haarahld had set.

  Nor was that example all Haarahld had left his people, for he'd left them a new king, as well, and the Charisians' pride in him burned as bright as their pride in his father. They knew it was Haarahld who'd planned the Battle of Darcos Sound. The entire campaign had been his strategic concept, and his had been the mind—and courage—which had made it so decisive, even at the cost of his own life. But it was King Cayleb who had won the crushing victories of Rocky Point and the Battle of Crag Reach in the demon-haunted waters off Armageddon Reef, and it was Cayleb whose arrival and ships had made Darcos Sound possible. They were united behind their young monarch as very few kingdoms in human history had ever been.

  And that was a good thing, because they also knew now who had orchestrated the attack upon them.

  Cayleb and Gray Harbor had decided to make that information public, and Merlin thought they'd been right to do so. It wasn't a secret which could be kept for long, anyway, and it was time for the people of Charis to know what their kingdom truly faced. Time for them to know that the rulers of the Church of God Awaiting had decreed their destruction.

  That information was still sinking in, Merlin knew. It would be five-days, probably months, before it sank fully home, but the reaction of Cayleb's subjects to the news was already clear.

  As was Cayleb's.

  King Haarahld's funeral mass would not be celebrated by Bishop Executor Zherald. The bishop executor was currently Cayleb's "guest" in a comfortable palace suite. No bishop in the history of Safehold had ever been arrested or imprisoned by a secular ruler. Technically, that was still true, but no one doubted the reality behind the polite pretense. Just as no one doubted that the true prelate of all Charis was now Bishop Maikel Staynair.

  It would take some time, but Merlin could already hear the echoes of Henry VIII. Whether or not Cayleb would formally assume the position of the Church's head in Charis remained to be seen, but the Charisian Church's separation from the Temple was an accomplished fact which awaited only official ratification.

  It was not a fact which had met with universal approval. Almost a quarter of the kingdom's clergy, including its native Charisians, were outraged and horrified by the very suggestion. So was at least a portion of the general population, but the percentage there was much smaller, so far as Merlin could tell.

  There was quite a lot of fear and concern, not to mention confusion, but the vast majority of Cayleb's subjects had never been especially fond of the corrupt men in Zion. The fact th
at the Council of Vicars had launched an overwhelming attack upon them when they'd done nothing to deserve it had turned that lack of fondness into virulent hatred. The fact that it was actually the Group of Four, and not the entire Council of Vicars, was at best a meaningless, artificial distinction for most of them, nor had Cayleb and Gray Harbor gone out of their way to emphasize it.

  The Safeholdian Reformation which Merlin had hoped to delay until Charis was ready for it was already a fact. There was nothing he could do to undo that, nor would the white-hot anger of Charis and its new monarch have permitted him to, even if he could have.

  And at least for now, the initiative lay firmly in Cayleb's hands. Despite its own losses, the Royal Charisian Navy held uncontested command of the sea, for there was quite literally no other navy in existence.