The Cartographer Complete Series

by A. C. Cobble

  “Are you sure about this?” questioned Captain Ainsley.

  Oliver shrugged. “What else are we going to do?”

  “Fly back to Enhover?”

  He shook his head and tugged on the thick, leather gloves he would use to hold the rope as he descended into the compound. “Can you take us a little lower?”

  “We’ll risk small arms fire from the village if we do,” answered the captain.

  Oliver grunted. “I’ll be risking that anyway.”

  “I’m going with you,” declared Ainsley suddenly.

  “I need you on the ship,” protested Oliver.

  “Pettybone can handle the crew,” replied the captain. “You need someone watching your back.”

  “Very well,” he said. “You’d better arm yourself.”

  Nodding, the captain rushed off to find her weapons, and Oliver peered over the edge of the gunwale.

  One hundred yards below them was the roof of the governor’s mansion. They would drop down on a line and land on the sloped surface. Then, it would be a short walk to the side where they could safely climb to the adjacent barracks roof and into the governor’s window. All rather easy, except the dangling from a rope one hundred yards above a fatal drop. Not to mention the small arms fire that Ainsley was so worried would pepper her airship. It would take a lucky shot to hit them, but men bet large at the tracks and won every day.

  A gust of warm tropical air pressed against the airship, rocking it slightly, causing the dangling rope to dance a sinuous pattern, floating back and forth over the governor’s mansion and the courtyard three stories lower.

  Oliver grimaced.

  Breathing deep to steady himself, he turned to Ainsley as she stomped back on deck. On her hips, she wore a brace of long-barreled pistols, and on her back, she’d strapped two cutlasses. In her knee-high boots were the wooden-handles of two daggers. She’d set a floppy black tri-cornered hat upon her head and a grim expression on her face.

  “What?” she asked. “I just bought this before we left. You don’t like the hat?”

  Shaking his head, Oliver turned back to the rope that stretched out of sight over the edge of the airship. “No, I don’t like hats.”

  “It keeps the sun from your eyes,” she advised as she tugged on her pair of leather gloves. “It’s awkward with a wig, but you don’t wear those either, do you?”

  “I don’t like wigs,” replied Oliver, reflexively running his hand over his hair, checking the knot in the back.

  Ainsley put one tall boot on the gunwale and looked back at him. “You want a pistol or something? If we get into trouble, I’d want a bit more than that broadsword.”

  “I’ve got you,” he said.

  She grinned at him.

  “You ever shoot anything with those pistols?” he wondered, taking his place beside her.

  “I beat a man over the head in the port of Durban with one once,” she claimed. “I would have shot him if my powder had been dry and if I’d had time to load it.”

  “Your pistols are loaded now?” asked Oliver.

  “That they are, m’lord.”

  “Then let’s go.”

  Refusing to look down, Oliver dropped over the side of the airship, his hands clenched around the rope, his legs wrapping it tight. He hung there for a moment, bouncing off the rough, wooden sides of the airship. With his heart pounding and his breath coming fast, he loosened his grip and began to slide down the rope.

  Ainsley, her floppy hat threatening to blow away in the brisk tropical breeze, descended on her own rope beside him.

  “You need to pay me more for this, m’lord,” she called out.

  “Now is not the time, Captain.”

  “We might not get another chance,” she quipped.

  Closing his eyes, Oliver continued to slide, tilting his head as the thick hemp rope dragged along his face, rubbing him raw.

  After what seemed an eternity, he risked opening his eyes and saw they were a mere dozen yards above the roof, near the edge. Overhead, the airship was drifting, taking them past the roof of the mansion and over the courtyard, where their ropes would end two stories above the hard-packed dirt. The crew was working the sweeps, but the breeze had blown the airship sideways. They couldn’t simply row forward and gain Oliver and Ainsley the room they needed.

  “Hurry, Captain,” called Oliver, and with a lurch, he dropped faster, the rope hissing as it sped through his gloved-hands.

  Two yards above the roof and one from the edge of it, he let go. He fell and hit hard, his boots sinking into the tightly woven thatch. He collapsed onto his back, forcing himself away from the edge.

  He saw Ainsley hanging above him, her ridiculous hat flapping in the wind, her pistols and cutlasses swinging wildly as she tried to speed her descent, but she was too late. The airship was drifting, and the end of her rope slipped off the edge of the roof.

  Cursing, Oliver scrambled off his back. On hands and toes, he bear-crawled to the edge of the roof. Gripping a handful of thatch with one hand, he reached out with the other, catching Ainsley’s rope and tugging on it, pulling it toward safety. He flopped over, hauling on the rope to where she could let go and fall beside him.

  “Spirit-forsaken breezes,” muttered the captain after she landed, glaring at her airship above. “Ah, look. Now, they’re getting her turned.”

  The ropes swung loosely as the airship repositioned, the ends dragging along the thatch, right between Oliver and the captain.

  “Always a steady breeze in the tropics,” grumbled Oliver, glaring at the tail of the rope.

  “I know. I-I should have accounted for that,” admitted Ainsley, sitting beside him. “This crew will be good, m’lord. Soon as we—”

  “We made it, Captain,” interjected Oliver, struggling to his feet on the soft surface. “It was close, but we made it. Learn from this and get better.” He looked down at his boots which were sinking into the tightly bound grasses that covered the roof. “This is going to be hell to walk across.”

  “First time the crew has had to drop someone on a roof, I suspect,” she muttered “Next time, maybe you should—”

  “Captain,” warned Oliver.

  “Right. Well, we’re here now, so nothing to do but get on with it.”

  Oliver glanced up where the airship was slowly moving farther away in the warm breeze. Pettybone would turn it and come back, he hoped. For the moment, they were alone in the compound.

  The pair of them traversed across the treacherous roof, leaning into the slope and then finally reaching the end where they were able to climb down onto the steep roof of the adjacent barracks building. It allowed them access to a window in the governor’s mansion covered by a locked shutter.

  Cursing to himself and annoyed to be clambering around in the tropical heat, Oliver kicked the shutter open, only half-disappointed to find no glass behind it. They climbed inside and then exited a small room, walking into in an empty hallway. As they stalked down the corridor, Ainsley’s pistols and cutlasses banged and bounced.

  “Not one for sneaking, are you?” complained Oliver.

  “We arrived in the middle of the day on an airship,” observed the captain, “so, no, I’m not trying to be sneaky.”

  “Well, maybe it will help us find Towerson,” grumbled Oliver, peeking into an open doorway and an empty room.

  They moved along the corridor, finding nothing except bloodstains and broken doors. Ainsley’s clatter led the way. They passed down a stairwell and found the second floor of the building to be just as vacant as the first.

  Then finally, as they descended to the ground floor, an exhausted voice called for them. “Oliver, is that you?”

  He turned and saw Senior Factor Ethan Giles lumbering down the hallway.

  “It is,” replied Oliver. “What happened here?”

  “Sorry I didn’t meet you upstairs,” said the merchant. “When I saw you drop in, I rushed out to the walls to make sure the chaps were looking sharp. Hate to ha
ve to explain to the board of directors that we got Duke Wellesley shot while he was visiting the compound.”

  Oliver raised an eyebrow.

  “Uprising,” explained Giles. “Natives rebelled against us. Luckily, they hit the governor’s mansion first. It gave us in Company House and the royal marines in the barracks time to arm ourselves. The marines accounted themselves well, m’lord, and within a turn of the clock they’d pushed the rebels out the gate and secured the walls of the compound, but there were too many of the bastards for a complete victory. We’re stuck in here, and they’re stuck out there. Been a bit of a standoff for the last week, them waiting us out, hoping we starve I guess, and us hoping an airship like yours would arrive.”

  “Where’s the governor?” questioned Oliver.

  “Ah,” mumbled Giles, shifting his weight on his feet. “When I said it was lucky they struck here first, I meant for the survival of the colony, not as much for Towerson himself. I’m afraid the man was trussed up like a Newday hen and carried out of here when the rebels fled. He was alive four days ago, for what that’s worth.”

  Oliver grimaced.

  “How many men did you bring?” questioned Giles, eyeing the well-armed Ainsley out of the corner of his eye.

  “Not enough to conduct a war,” said Oliver. “How many men do we have here, and who’s in charge?”

  “Well,” replied Giles, tucking his thumbs behind his belt and drawing himself upright, “I’m in charge at the moment, as everyone more senior is dead or in captivity. We’ve got a score-and-a-half marines who are hale enough to fight, another two-dozen men who aren’t trained for battle but are steady enough to swing a blade or hold a blunderbuss. That’s, what, fifty all told? The men are tired, though, Oliver. They’ve been on twelve turn-shifts for days now, guarding the walls constantly. At any moment, we only got about a score walking patrol. It’s enough we can watch every angle and raise an alarm, but not enough we can hold much longer in this spirit-forsaken heat.”

  “The natives, what have they demanded?”

  “Demanded?” asked the factor.

  “What do they want?” pressed Oliver. “Presumably they attacked and are holding the governor for a reason. Why?”

  “Hell if I know,” muttered Giles. The old merchant shifted, placing a hand on the wooden handle of the blunderbuss at his hip. “We’d finally drained that pond you found and breached what appeared to be a sealed tomb. We emptied it, but it took most of the royal marines to haul the artifacts back to the compound. Bastards caught us that night while the men were worn out and resting.”

  Oliver blinked at the man.

  “What?” questioned Giles.

  “Do you think the events may be related?” asked Oliver. “You find some new wealth on the island and then they attack?”

  “Wealth?” scoffed Giles. “There wasn’t nothing we found in that tomb that was worth the digging, if you ask me. Some figurines — little statues, I mean — and a couple of tablets they’d done some scrawling on. Weird writing, like nothing I’ve ever seen. Might fetch a little sterling from a collector back in Enhover, but that’s hardly worth the freight to get it there. We didn’t find anything of value on a commercial scale. Towerson thought there must be something there, the way the natives were getting agitated about the project, but I went in the chamber myself and there was nothing, just old rubbish. If it was worth anything, why they’d bury it?”

  “These statuettes and tablets, where are they now?” questioned Oliver.

  “Company House,” replied Giles. “You want to take a peek?”

  “Of course I do,” growled Oliver. “The relationship between Company government and the natives has always been strong here. If it changed so suddenly, there was a reason, Giles. It defies imagination to think the reason isn’t what you found up in those hills.”

  “Not what I found,” replied Giles sternly. “What you found.”

  “He was right,” remarked Captain Ainsley.

  Oliver grunted.

  “It’s just rubbish,” she said, gesturing around the room.

  He shook his head but did not respond. Holding the basket-hilt of his broadsword so it didn’t inadvertently swipe any of the figurines, he moved through the room, stooping to study them, barely breathing.

  There were three dozen knee-high wooden statuettes roughly carved into the likenesses of men and women. In other circumstances, he would have guessed they were simple tropical artwork, maybe the work of a single individual who fashioned the shapes to pass the time, but after what he’d seen, and the natives’ reaction to the discovery, he was certain they were more. These were totems. Totems scratched and carved with patterns and runes.

  As Giles described, they looked like nothing Oliver had ever seen before, but the symbols were too uniform to be random markings. No, these totems and the shapes carved into the strange wood were for a specific purpose. Since they’d been discovered within a tomb, he shuddered to think what that purpose might be.

  Finally, after examining each of the figurines, he stood and moved to the tablets. Some were fashioned from hardened clay or stone. He didn’t recognize the writing, but they felt familiar, and he wondered if he’d seen the symbols before. The creeping sense of worry in his gut was turning to dread. Ash-gray clay etched and then fired… There was only one place he’d seen a similar substance. In the markets of the Southlands, stalls were filled with clay objects purported to be from the Darklands.

  “Frozen hell,” muttered Oliver.

  “What?” questioned Ainsley.

  “We’ve got to find out why this stuff was buried way up on the hillside and then flooded,” explained Oliver. “It’s… it’s magical in nature.”

  “How are we going to figure that out?”

  “We’re going to ask the people who buried it,” he replied. “Something Towerson should have done the moment he breached the tomb. We’re going to ask the natives.”

  “This is a bad idea,” warned Giles.

  “I’ve had worse,” claimed Oliver.

  “No doubt,” agreed Giles, “I still think we should float your airship over to the other side of the village and, between the shore guns and the shipboard artillery, reduce this place to nothing but broken sticks and blood.”

  “The governor is down there, isn’t he?” inquired Oliver. “The royal marines will not fire upon a peer.”

  “They will if you tell them to,” insisted the senior factor.

  Oliver shook his head.

  “There,” hissed Captain Ainsley.

  Below them in the village, a small group of men was slinking out of cover and walking up the hard-packed sand and soil incline that led to the compound.

  From a simple bamboo walkway above the compound’s gates, Oliver, Ainsley, and Giles watched the natives approach. Spread out along the top of the wall were clusters of royal marines and Company men clutching what firearms and bladed weapons they’d scrounged from the barracks. Hanging one hundred yards above was the Cloud Serpent. It was a terrible angle if they meant to use the vessel in combat, but it was impossible to miss and hopefully intimidating to anyone approaching for the parlay.

  From the corner of the compound, they’d raised the royal flag signifying House Wellesley and a white one beside it, signaling they were ready to talk. Giles had mused darkly that they would either talk or face an attack.

  It was a risk, Oliver had agreed, but one they had to take. He was certain there was occult significance to the objects they’d found at the bottom of the pool, and he was just as certain it was the reason the natives had revolted. What he didn’t know was why. Why did they attack, were they willing to negotiate, and was there anything left worth negotiating for? Life in the colony would never be the same, and unless Governor Towerson lived, there was little the men and women below could offer to change their fate. When word of the uprising reached Southundon, the Company and Crown would have only one response. The natives had to know that.

  Grim-faced, Oliver waite
d, watching the approach of the delegation.

  “The men are ready?” he asked.

  “Aye,” affirmed Giles. “Every one of them lost someone they knew in the attack. They’re ready.”

  Oliver grunted.

  Below, the delegation paused within shouting distance, but out of range for an accurate shot with a blunderbuss. Of course, that wasn’t saying much. The two pairs of snipers they’d placed at the corners of the compound should have a clear shot, though. Either the natives weren’t aware of the Company’s rifle-bored firearms, or they’d thought to risk it.

  “I am Duke Oliver Wellesley,” called Oliver, wondering suddenly just how far rifle bores had spread. It’d be a difficult angle, but a skilled marksman from below in the village…

  The group on the ramp huddled close together, making themselves a tempting target for the cannon, but if they fired upon them, Oliver knew they’d be no closer to resolving the conflict and no closer to recovering Governor Towerson. The man was likely dead, but if they didn’t find out for sure, the Congress of Lords would have a fit. Even in a Company colony in the midst of an uprising, Enhoverian peers received the treatment their station deserved.

  Interrupting whatever discussion was happening below, Oliver continued, raising his voice and shouting, “You’ve kidnapped the rightful governor of this island. I demand you release him.”

  At that, a large man broke off from the group. Thick, black hair was swept away from his face and coiled into ropes. He was shirtless, displaying finger-thick scars on a prodigious torso. Oliver guessed the man’s rolls of fat hid massive muscles. The man had the look of a warrior, but Imbon hadn’t seen war in over a decade.

  “That’s a hell of a man,” whispered Ainsley appreciatively.

  Oliver frowned at her.

  “Masuu,” said Giles. “He’s a chieftain of sorts.”