Upon a Pale Horse- Raiding the Seven Seas

by Simon Archer

  “That be one thing we loaded up on, back at Tarrant,” Bord said with a broad grin. “I’ve had me boys riggin’ charge sacks all the way here, so we have pre-measured an’ pre-packed powder to speed up our firing.”

  “Do ye mean to move yer whole crew over to The Echo when we leave?” I asked thoughtfully. Bord had fully trained all the men and orcs aboard The Hullbreaker in his innovative techniques for loading and firing her cannons, and we’d done well because of it.

  He looked up at me with that twinkle in his eye again. “Do ye mean to take command o’ her yerself?” he said to turn the question around on me.

  “Ye caught me, old dwarf,” I grunted. “If this ship is half what everyone thinks she is, then she is the one that’ll carry me to face Admiral Layne. Much as I hate to abandon her, The Hullbreaker will be under Jimmy’s command when we sail to the fight an’ ye’ll be my first mate aboard this ironclad.”

  Bord's jaw worked beneath his beard as he chewed over my words.

  Then I continued. “But, until we get back to Insmere, she’s yers to captain. Then, once this fight is done, I’ll hand her back to ye, if ye want. I figure a dwarf captain of a dwarf ship sounds like the right bloody way to go, aye?”

  “Ye have made an old dwarf very happy,” the cannonmaster said after a long moment of sniffling and eye-rubbing. “‘Twill be my honor, Cap’n, to sail in yer service with me own ship!”

  I awkwardly patted him on the shoulder. “And ye honor me,” I said. “Now, will ye show me about?”

  “O’ course, Cap’n,” Bord said, then clapped his hands together. “Follow me.”

  The dwarf led me into the darkness of the armored hull, starting with the cannon deck. Each gun sat at its own trap, with shells and sealed barrels of what I assumed was powder set neatly aside for use. Only a couple of the cannonmaster’s team were at work there, checking the guns and tending the emplacements. They continued to bustle about their business as we passed through. It was a cannon deck like any other, just better protected, with reinforced beams supporting the armored walls.

  I had to duck beneath a beam or two between each pair of cannons until we reached the short stairs up to the wheelhouse. It was separated from the cannons by a heavy bulkhead door that would hopefully serve to block out at least some of the deafening roar the cannons would make in that confined space.

  The wheelhouse was, of course, dominated by a large, ornate ship’s wheel of wood and brass that stood front and center to a set of slitted viewports that allowed the pilot to see the course ahead passably, if not well. Bord showed me how these could be raised and lowered via a mechanical control to allow more visibility at the cost of protection. Next to the wheel, a lever made of steel and brass rose up from the floor. Two circular contraptions rested in a housing in front of the wheel, in easy view of the helmsman.

  I pointed to those things and gave the dwarf a curious look.

  Bord grinned and tapped one. “This be yer speed, Cap’n, in knots, while this,” he tapped the other one, “shows ye the pressure o’ the boilers. We’ve one o’ these down below, but it’ll serve as a warnin’ should yon dial go beyond this line and into the red.”

  Bord indicated the different components as he described them, and I nodded slowly. Apparently, the boilers could explode if their pressure was too high. This was a duty of the engineers below to maintain, but by having that information available to the man at the wheel, it put extra eyes on a possibly dangerous situation.

  “Useful,” I acknowledged. The whole place was stuffy, even in the cold, and it wouldn’t be very pleasing to travel long distances. “What about some way o’ gettin’ the air to move in here?”

  “For long journeys,” Bord said, “ye’d just open her up. All the traps, the shutters here, an’ the various other portals. She’d have good airflow, then. But when ye go into combat, well, that’s when ye have to deal with bad air. Now, there be a way to purge the ship between each broadside, but I’ve not found it yet.”

  “Keep looking,” I told him.

  “O’ course, Cap’n,” he replied with a grin. “Now, let me show ye what gets her goin’.”

  He led me down into the depths of the ship, passing through the berths, which included a half-sized cabin for the captain, and bunks for the crew. I followed without comment until we descended another staircase into the engine room proper. Here, the rest of the dwarves worked on the still heart of The Echo.

  I just stared about while Bord prattled on about the steam engine that the dwarves used to propel and power their ironclads. In laymen’s terms, the furnace heated the water in the boilers and used that to drive a series of pistons that applied power to a crankshaft and gears, which, in turn, caused an underwater set of angled blades to spin and push the ship forward.

  Frankly, I would have preferred a magical explanation, but I suffered through the mechanics of it and probably even learned a little. This ship would definitely be best captained by the cannonmaster once we dealt with Layne and The Pale Horse once and for all.

  “So, what be wrong with it?” I asked at one point when Bord paused for a breath.

  “Worn gears, damaged pipes, an’ a few other things,” he said, then pointed roughly in the direction of the wheelhouse. “Seems the throttle up there ain’t actually connected where it needs to be. Anyone what didn’t know better an’ just tried to fire her up would have one hell of a boiler explosion beneath ‘em right quick.”

  “Intentional?” I wondered.

  “Oh, definitely!” Bord chortled. “Right clever trap, there. Got me started lookin’ for others, too.” Then he leaned in and murmured, “An’ as great a help as Ligeia’s been, I need to get me own eyes on the hull an’ the screws before we steam her out o’ here.”

  “That’s why ye had me spring for the deep-dive suits, aye?”

  “Aye, Cap’n,” he answered. “Still think we can get her goin’ in three days, provided ye magical types can power up the furnace. Fresh water’d be nice, but we can make do with salt if we need to.”

  “The water stone can do that,” I said. It’d still be a sacrifice to lose the best source of freshwater I had on The Hullbreaker, but I wasn’t planning to let Bord keep it or the fire stone once this was done. We’d find another way to keep The Echo steaming. That term sat strangely on my tongue. I wanted to keep calling it sailing, but that wasn’t what this ship did. It steamed.

  Bord finished his exposition about the engine room and led me back upstairs and out. The Echo felt cramped to me, even though I knew she wasn’t. It wasn’t a problem, but I suspected she’d be uncomfortable to operate in combat, with all the hatches battened down. For travel, though, I could see how opening all the ports and doors would air her out. It was a solid design, as I expected from Bord’s folk after hearing all his tales.

  I left him to it and went to collect a little team of my own. Sitting idle wasn’t for me, and there was an island to be explored. There wasn’t much else to do for the three days it would take the cannonmaster to be satisfied the ironclad wouldn’t sink or explode on us, and I was happy to give him that time. Too much rode on the success of this venture, and on the legendary power of the Sea Hammer.

  Hopefully, The Pale Horse still sat in wet dock, unable to sail. Unfortunately, the idea that Layne and his almost unlimited resources didn’t have a contingency plan to get the city-ship moving was nothing more than a pipe dream. That ship would sail, one way or another, and even without magic, it was powerful enough to destroy any fleet that came against it.

  Any fleet but mine, I hoped.

  22

  Five of us ascended the stairs up from the pier. There was me, Mary Night, Jimmy Mocker, Tabitha Binx, and Jenny Nettles. It certainly wasn’t my usual shore crew, but who was I to complain? When I’d asked for volunteers, I’d expected Mary and Tabitha, but then Jimmy and Jenny had proclaimed their desire to explore.

  I left Gol in charge of The Hullbreaker, and we made our way up through a winding passage and
emerged at the top of the cliff from a cleverly concealed stone portal. All around us were evergreens and similar cold-weather plants. Snow crunched beneath our boots as we fanned out and began to make our way down along the steep rise.

  Jimmy occasionally paused and squatted down to inspect something or other on the ground or in the sparse foliage. With his sharpshooting and a few other habits that I’d noticed, I often suspected the man had been a hunter before he went to sea.

  “I doubt anythin’ really lives here,” he said, dusting his hands off on his coat. “At least I don’t see sign o’ anythin’ larger than a seagull.” With both hands on his hips, he arched his back and winced.

  “Any sign o’ fresh water?” I asked.

  “There ought to be,” he replied, “but the trees ain’t much more than scrub, an’ very determined scrub at that. Soil’s little better’n crumbled rock.”

  “Oy!” Jenny called from nearby. “Think I might’ve found somethin’.”

  “What have ye got?” Tabitha asked as we all marched over, shuffling through the crystalline snow and ice that covered the ground.

  “This,” Tabitha’s first mate had moved some debris away from a large stone and revealed some deeply carved, runic writing that seemed to be organized in three rows.

  Mary ran her fingers over the stone after removing one of her gloves. “These must be names,” she opined. “I recognize the letters as being Uondark, but I never learned to read it.”

  Uondark was one of the dwarven languages, I knew that much. It was as uncommon in the world as dwarves had become.

  “The sailors may have settled near here, ye think?” Jimmy asked.

  “I’d wager this be a tombstone,” I suggested. “Ain’t like much could live here without supplies.”

  “True.” Jenny slipped off around a tree to explore more, and Tabitha followed.

  Jimmy and I squatted down and moved fallen limbs and needles away from the carved stone’s base while Mary stood and watched. Her eyes were distant. I could open myself to the spirits, but some sense warned me about it. Something watched us from all around, but that was all it did. I suspected Mary felt it, but I didn’t think any of the others did.

  It wasn’t long before we discovered that the earth before the stone had been turned long ago, then frozen before it fully settled.

  “Do ye think…?” Jimmy started to ask.

  “I expect so,” I replied and stood with a creaking of my knees. “Another time, I might be inclined to dig it up, but this ain’t it.”

  “I do not believe it would be a good idea, my Captain.” Mary slid up next to me and hugged one of my arms. “This is a place of sorrow and regret.”

  “Aye an’ spirits waitin’,” I added. “Ones I ain’t inclined to rile up.”

  “Maybe we collect the others and head back down, then?” Jimmy suggested. He kept looking back at the stone as we moved away in the direction that Tabitha and Jenny had gone.

  Mary stuck close to me, while I let Mocker take the lead. He moved nimbly over the rocks and through the trees, following chattering voices that seemed strangely out of place on this desolate isle.

  All the while, the temptation to look beyond the boundaries of this world enticed me. I wondered what good this power was if I didn’t use it, but could I settle this place? Did it even need to be settled?

  We broke cover and emerged near what could only be an old settlement. Jenny and Tabitha drifted among the ruins. The sense of unquiet dead was less here, much less. There were still presences that wandered about, occasionally setting my hackles on edge.

  “Methinks we found the last o’ the dwarves, Cap’n,” Tabitha called out from behind one of the small, stone huts. They were of a color and shape to blend into the island, likely invisible from the sea approach if anyone could even make a sea approach.

  The rest of us crowded to the doorway of the building and peered inside. Resting on a stone table that sat against one wall was the mummified, frozen corpse of a dwarf. He was clad in tarnished armor and wore a helm adorned in gold and gems.

  “Lord or cap’n, do ye think?” Jimmy asked.

  “Do ye think he’d mind if we took his hat?” Jenny spoke up.

  “Either lord or cap’n,” I rumbled. “An’ we ain’t takin’ his hat. The ironclad’s enough. This place be cursed an’ haunted above, but the cave is free.”

  Tabitha folded her arms and flicked her tail. “At least we might have an idea what happened here, aye?”

  “We do,” Mary said distantly, and I gave her a sidelong glance. The changeling witch’s eyes stared off into the middle distance, unfocused. “They hid the ship away at the cost of their own lives. One by one, the soldiers fell and were buried in the shadow of the big stone. At long last, only the thane remained. He laid the last of his men to rest, then chose this place to die.” My witch looked over at the corpse and then back at the rest of us, her evil eye glimmered faintly in the shadows of the hut. “We have made the right decision in coming here.”

  “None o’ them rest easy,” I said, finally casting my gaze across the veil to see the silent, gathered dwarves. There were enough quiet spirits around us to make up the full complement of The Echo’s crew. Looking them over, I settled my eyes on the shape of the thane, his spirit gazing at me with dark, empty eyes from beneath his golden crown.

  “What binds ye?” I asked suddenly.

  Jimmy and Jenny inched backward a bit but mostly held their ground. Tabitha stepped boldly up beside me and took on of my hands. Mary took the other.

  Without a word, the ancient dwarf pointed off and down towards the ship. A faint whisper ran through the ghostly throng.

  “Echo.”

  “Echo.”

  “Echo.”

  “‘Tis the ship that binds them here,” Mary murmured. “When it leaves--”

  “They’ll all be free,” I finished.

  “Soon ain’t soon enough,” Jenny muttered. “Where in the hell are they? I can’t see ‘em.” She and Jimmy both glared around wide-eyed. Enemies they could see were no problem, but this was pushing their limits.

  “Right,” I said firmly as I blinked my gaze back to the real world. “Let’s head back beneath. There be nothing here for us.”

  “Aye,” Tabitha muttered and spun on her heel, gathering both Jimmy and Jenny as she swept out. I was left with Mary for a long moment as we gazed at the body and its shining helmet.

  “This is one of the thin places,” my witch said softly. “The whole island. I suspect that is why the dead do not rest quietly.”

  “Aye,” I said and reached out to gently take Mary’s arm. “‘Tis why we’ll not stay longer than is needed.”

  She nodded at me and came along easily. We rejoined the others, and all hiked silently back. The light mood that had begun our expedition slowly returned, the further away we got from the village until it seemed as if anyone but Mary and I remembered exactly what happened.

  Once more, we stopped by the stone, and I rested a hand on the surface of the thing. Unlike the rest of the island, it was oddly free of frost and warm to the touch. Suddenly, I knew.

  “Hold up,” I told the others. “That was a bloody test down there. We didn’t take the crown, an’ we left everything in peace. If I’m right, they want to reward us.”

  “What in the hells are ye talkin’ about, Cap’n?” Jimmy demanded. “Who did what with a crown?”

  I just held up my hand for silence. “Mary,” I asked, “can ye feel it?”

  My witch walked over and placed a hand on the stone beside mine. Her eye glimmered, and she looked up at me in surprise. “Aye, my Captain. I can.”

  Tabitha looked at me, then spread out her arms and ushered Jimmy and Jenny back. They all trusted me, that was for certain, but the feline and Mary actually understood a bit more of what went on with me, and how the shaman’s path had affected my thinking and helped me grow. The gut feelings and sense of direction that I’d always had grew stronger as I learned, all I ha
d to do was listen.

  I squatted down with a grunt and curled my fingers under the edge of the rock.

  “What are ye doin’?” Jimmy exclaimed.

  Without answering, I closed my eyes and shifted my grip on the stone until I had it firmly help. It was big, larger than I was, and heavier, but it held a touch of life of its own. I reached out to the elementals of earth and felt strength pour into my limbs. With a sudden roar, I surged to my feet, bringing the stone with me and raising it above my head like a conqueror. Then I cast it aside. The stone crashed heavily to the frozen earth, cracking it and sinking a few inches in.

  That wasn’t what drew our attention, though. In the hollow beneath the rune-carved stone rested the dwarven treasures. Instead of defiling the body of the thane, we’d passed up the crown out of a sense of respect and no small amount of trepidation. The ghosts had witnessed that act and respected us for it. With my sensitivity, they had guided me back to the stone and hinted that I should move it.

  This was no trove of gold and jewels, though. A large chest or trunk of black iron sat in the recess, ice and dirt crusting its dingy surface. Whatever rested in there was what the dwarves truly wanted to keep hidden. They’d given it to me, to us, or at least that was what I felt.

  I reached down, grabbed onto one of the handles, and hauled the heavy thing from its resting place. With a grunt, I dropped it on the ground opposite where I’d put the stone.

  “So, what’s this, then?” Mary smiled faintly.

  “A gift,” I replied, “to speed us on our way.” With that, I took the magical key from its chain around my neck and unlocked the chest.

  Nestled neatly within were an assortment of dwarven weapons and a silver coffer. The weapons were short rifles with heavy barrels and weighted stocks. Short, heavy blades were affixed beneath the barrels.

  “Those are bloody nice,” Jimmy muttered, unable to stop himself from reaching down to grab one. I didn’t bother stopping him as he drew a rifle from the chest and hefted it. “A bit heavier than I’d like, especially with the blades, an’ I’d like to test the accuracy.”