A Mighty Fortress

by David Weber

  I may hate the bastard, but the bloody- minded son- of- a-bitch is in the right place right now!

  Rohsail staggered as a section of rail five feet to his left disintegrated. Something slammed into his shoulder with brutal force, nearly knocking him to his knees, and he heard shrieks from the waist of the ship, where the bulk of the broadside had gone home. His right hand clutched convulsively at the undamaged rail in front of him, keeping him on his feet somehow, and he turned forward.

  His left shoulder felt broken, his arm dangling uselessly at his side, but there was no sign of blood, and a corner of his brain wondered what had hit him. There was no time to worry about that, however, and he stumbled forward to lean on the poop deck rail, staring toward the bow.

  Most of the enemy’s fire had gone in low, punching into Grand Vicar Mahrys’ gundeck. From the screams, it must have inflicted Shan- wei’s own lot of casualties, he thought, then reminded himself not to assume the worst. A wounded man’s shrieks could be loud enough for two or three, after all.

  But at least some of those round shot had plowed across the upper deck. Unlike Charisian ships, Grand Vicar Mahrys mounted no guns on her forecastle, but she did mount ten on the upper deck in the waist, five in either broadside.

  Now there were only two in action to starboard.

  Rohsail’s jaw tightened. One of the three silenced twelve- pounders was permanently disabled, dismounted by a direct hit; the other two appeared to be intact, but most of the sixteen men who’d manned them were down, either dead or wounded. Of the forty men who’d crewed all five pieces, no more than a dozen were on their feet, and they were all busy dragging dead and wounded crewmates away from the still ser viceable guns.

  Grand Vicar Mahryswas barely a hundred and sixty feet long, yet billowing smoke—most of it rolling down from the enemy’s guns, now—made it difficult to pick out details forward of the waist. From what he could see, though, at least another half dozen or so seamen and soldiers serving as shipboard infantry were down, as well. And that was only the upper deck; there was no telling how many men had been killed or wounded on the gundeck.

  Yet, despite the screams and the blood, Rohsail’s other gunners were still in action. They were firing in dependently now, as quickly as each crew could reload, without the disciplined unanimity of controlled broadsides. The cannon’s thunder was a hellish cacophony, an almost uninterrupted succession of bellowing discharges. Accuracy had to be suffering as each gun captain fired blindly into the smoke at what ever he thought was the appropriate point in the ship’s roll, but they were firing, and even through the bedlam, he heard shouts—of encouragement from officers and petty officers, and of defiance from sailors and soldiers.

  He looked up. There were holes in several sails, severed sheets and halyards blew on the wind here and there, and at least four or five dead men sprawled over the edge of the maintop where they’d been marked down by the spitefully cracking rifles of Charisian Marines. Nothing critical seemed to have carried away, though, and even as he watched, topmen were swarming through the rigging, heedless of round shot and bullets alike, to repair the ship’s running rigging.

  They’d never be anything but common- born scum, Rohsail thought—all too many of them the sweepings of Gorath’s gutters. Yet as he watched them dragging dead and wounded messmates towards the center of the deck, making repairs in the teeth of the Charisian fire, tossing broken bits of railing and fallen blocks off the breeches of their guns, reloading and firing again and again, he felt a fierce stab of pride in them.

  “Lay it to them, lads!” he heard himself shouting. “Lay it to them!”

  Captain Stywyrt swore under his breath, restraining a most un captainly temptation to pound a fist on the binnacle, as the fury of the artillery exchange mounted. From his own position, astern and still up to windward, he could seeDart’s and Shield’s masts clearly as their course folded together with the Dohlarans. They were in action with three of the five Dohlaran galleons now, and the fourth enemy ship was about to pile in.

  So far, all of Dart’s and Shield’s rigging seemed intact; both ships were still under control, and unlike the Dohlarans, still firing controlled broadsides. That told Stywyrt a great deal. Despite the fury of the engagement, despite the fact that they were about to find themselves fighting at two- to- one odds, both Pawal and Aiwain were still firing broadsides, rather than going to in de pen dent fire. He suspected each of them was also engaging only a single enemy ship, as well, preferring to methodically smash one target at a time rather than split their fire between two targets and inflict lighter damage on both. That took cool nerves, since it meant at least one of their opponents was left undisturbed, her gunners free to load and fire without worrying about round shot or grapeshot screaming into their own faces. By the same token, it gave them a far better chance of completely disabling one of their foes relatively quickly.

  He turned his own attention to the last galleon in the Dohlaran line. She seemed to be smaller than the others, little larger than his own undersized Squall. Despite that, though, her captain was crowding on more sail as Stywyrt watched, resetting his courses to get more speed. Obviously, he intended to pile onto Dart and Shield as quickly as possible.

  More gutsy and determined than smart,Stywyrt thought. Dart and Shield are both faster than any of them are. He may be able to overtake them with his courses set, but he’s only going to cramp their own formation once he gets there. He certainly won’t be able to get up to windward of Zhon and Harys what ever he does! In fact, he’ll have to haul out of line or run into one of his own consorts!

  It was a mistake, although as mistakes went, it was preferable to a lot of others. At least that other captain was determined to get into action, rather than hold back to avoid it, and that said unpleasant things about the degree to which the Royal Dohlaran Navy’s morale must have recovered since Rock Point and Crag Reach.

  Well, we’ll just have to see what we cando about that, won’t we, Ahrnahld? he thought grimly.

  Captain Raisahndo was in no position to see what Captain Mahrtyn Zhermain’s Prince of Dohlar was doing. The dense smoke made that impossible from deck level, and the men aloft, including those detailed as lookouts, were (understandably) more focused on the Charisian ships alongside than on their own consorts. If Raisahndo had been able to watch Prince of Dohlar’s maneuvers, however, he would have fully endorsed Ahrnahld Stywyrt’s analysis of Zhermain’s actions. At the same time, little though he would have liked what Zhermain was doing, he would also have agreed with Stywyrt that too much aggressiveness was a far better problem to have than too much timidity.

  Just at the moment, however, Raisahndo had rather more pressing things to worry about. The leading Charisian galleon was slowly closing the range, despite Raisahndo’s own turn away, and her fire was both unpleasantly heavy and dismayingly accurate. The steady, measured bellow of her guns—obviously still firing in controlled broadsides—was like the rhythmic concussion of some giant’s spiked boots, tramping relentlessly across Rakurai’s decks. He was confident he was scoring more hits of his own, now that the range had dropped, but Charisian round shot were beating in Rakurai’s bulwarks and side like the remorseless blows of that same giant’s club.

  A half dozen of Rakurai’s guns—a quarter of her entire larboard battery—were out of action now, and the pile of bodies along the centerline of the deck was growing thicker. Wounded men were being dragged below to the healers and surgeons, making it hard to form any detailed estimate, but Raisahndo suspected that he’d taken at least forty or fifty casualties. That was almost one in eight of his entire company, yet the crew—experienced seamen and pressed landsmen alike—stood steadily to their guns, firing back as quickly as they could reload.

  The Charisian continued to fire low, smashing broadside after broadside into Rakurai’s hull, slaughtering her crewmen steadily, while the marksmen in Dart’s tops fired across at their Dohlaran counterparts or down into the smoke below. At least a few Charisian
shot had gone high, though, and Rakurai’s deck was littered with fallen blocks and lengths of cordage. Raisahndo had seen two or three men felled by those heavy, plunging blocks, and he castigated himself for not having thought of the protective rope nets he’d observed aboard the Charisian galleons before fire was opened. Obviously, they’d been rigged above the enemy’s decks to catch debris—and bodies—falling from overhead, and he made a mental note to suggest that Dohlar adopt the same practice in his report to Earl Thirsk.

  Of course, first he had to get back to make that report.

  Zhon Pawal’s head jerked up as something cracked thunderously overhead. For a moment, he didn’t know what it had been, but then his eyes widened as he saw the entire main topmast beginning to topple.

  Oh, shit, he heard a mental voice say almost calmly, and then he was dodging as the wreckage began to plummet.

  “Yes!”

  Captain Ahndair Krahl of HMS Bedard realized the voice shouting that single word was his own. It probably wasn’t a properly heroic thing for the captain of a king’s ship to be doing, but at the moment, he didn’t much care. His gun crews had been pounding away at the lead Charisian for what seemed like hours, what ever his lying pocket watch said, without any apparent effect. He hadn’t even been able to convince the bastard to divert any of his fire to Bedard. Instead, the enemy had continued to hammer mercilessly at Rakurai. Krahl couldn’t see the flagship clearly, but he could see Raisahndo’s sails becoming more and more tattered, and, difficult as it was to form any accurate judgment in such a bedlam, it sounded to him as if Rakurai’s fire had begun to drop.

  Now he watched his target’s main topmast, topgallant, and royal pitch slowly to larboard like some falling forest giant. The mizzen royal went with it, and for a moment, he hoped the foremast might go, as well. He was disappointed in that, but the Charisian galleon seemed to stagger as over half her set canvas went thundering over the side.

  Now what, you bastards? he thought.

  Dartslowed precipitously with the abrupt loss of power. Captain Pawal was astounded that the fore royal and topgallant didn’t go, as well, but he felt the sudden drag of the wreckage landing in the water alongside, still tethered to the ship by shrouds and stays, only too clearly. The overhead nettings—still more or less intact, although they’d snapped like cobwebs where the butt of the main topmast had fallen across the larboard bulwark—were littered with broken wood, fallen blocks, and long snakes of cordage.

  Somehow, the men on the wheel managed to maintain control, and axes and even cutlasses were flashing amid the tangled- snake chaos of fallen rigging as the bosun and his mates led parties of seamen to cut away the wreckage. Until they could, though, almost half of Dart’s larboard guns were blocked by the debris lying across their ports. That was bad enough, but the lost speed meant the Dohlarans would begin drawing ahead. They were going to be able to bring all five of their ships into action against the head of Pawal’s own line.

  He’d lost his speaking trumpet in the scramble to avoid the plummeting wreckage, so he cupped his hands around his mouth in an improvised substitute.

  “Master Daikhar!”

  Dart’s first lieutenant managed to hear him despite the tumult, and Pawal pointed urgently at the suddenly stubby- looking mainmast.

  “Get the course on her!” he shouted.

  Daikhar looked at him for a moment, then nodded in obvious understanding. The course wasn’t part of the ship’s normal fighting sail. It was too big, too cumbersome, and too close to the upper deck when it was set. The loss of the main topsail and topgallant sail had to be compensated for somehow, though, and the first lieutenant started dragging men out of the damage control parties and off of the disengaged guns and starting them aloft.

  Pawal left him to it, turning his own attention back to the enemy, and his jaw tightened as he saw the Dohlaran sails beginning to move ahead, exactly as he’d feared.

  Harys Aiwain swore vigorously as Dart slowed. He had no choice but to reduce sail himself if he was going to keep station on the flagship. Part of him wanted to overtake Dart, instead, and get around in front of her. But if he did, his own guns would be masked by Dart’s hull as he passed along her disengaged side, preventing him from firing a shot until he’d cleared Pawal’s ship.

  His mind worked feverishly, considering alternatives. At the moment, he didn’t know whether or not the Dohlarans meant to push the engagement fully home. If they wanted to break off, satisfied they’d protected their convoy, the damage to Dart’s rigging offered them the perfect opportunity to do just that. If, on the other hand, they wanted to stay and fight it out, that same damage would give them a pronounced maneuvering advantage.

  There was no doubt in Aiwain’s mind what a Charisian squadron would do, but Dohlarans weren’t Charisians. They might decide to content themselves with the knowledge that they’d already done far better against Charisian war galleons than anyone else had managed, and the convoy—currently under attack by Flash and Mace— was their primary responsibility.

  Best stay where we are and pound their trailers as hard as we can, he decided, but he also beckoned one of his midshipmen to his side.

  “Get forward, Master Walkyr,” he told the white- faced twelve- year- old flatly. “I want you at the fore topgallant crosstrees. You watch the flagship—don’t take your eyes off her! If she alters course or you see one of these bastards working around ahead of her, you get your arse back down here and tell me! Got it?”

  “Aye, aye, Sir!” the youngster replied, and went scampering off through the smoke and the thunder.

  Ahndair Krahl’s ship crept steadily farther forward, running broadside- to-broadside with the bigger, more powerful, but lamed Charisian galleon. Round shot hammered back and forth, and despite her damage aloft and the growing number of shot holes Krahl could see in her bulwarks and side, the Charisian was still giving as good as she got.

  And her guns were still heavier than anything he had, a point driven home as a Charisian round shot crashed through Bedard’s side, killing a dozen men and shattering the carriage of one of her gundeck twenty- five- pounders.

  He looked aft, to where Grand Vicar Mahrys was finally beginning to draw clear of her duel with the second Charisian. Krahl was no fonder of Sir Dahrand Rohsail than Rohsail was of him. Despite that, he had to admit the arrogant, aristocratic prick was no slouch. Grand Vicar Mahrys had taken a severe hammering from her opponent’s more powerful artillery. Krahl wasn’t positive, but he thought he could actually see blood trickling from the scuppers of Rohsail’s ship. Despite that, her guns were still in action, and as he watched, they switched targets and began pounding the leading Charisian along with Bedard while Mahrdai Saigahn’s Guardsman took up the second Charisian’s challenge.

  Ahrnahld Stywyrt made himself stand motionless, hands clasped behind him, face expressionless, as the Dohlarans crowded in on Shield and Dart. The smoke was so dense now that he could see only the upper masts of the enemy galleons, but it was obvious what was happening. With Dart slowed and Shield trapped behind her, the lead Dohlaran galleon was forging steadily ahead of the two Charisian ships. It wouldn’t be long before she was in a position to swing farther to the west, trying to head the Dohlaran line, possibly even get into a position to rake Dart from ahead.

  And I’mstill not in a position to engage!

  He glared up at his own sails, then made his decision. “Shake out the topsail reefs, Master Mahldyn!” he said crisply. “And after that, we’ll have the royals on her, if you please.”

  Oh, you bastard, Zhon Pawal thought grimly.

  Dart’s deck was heaped with dead and wounded. The wreckage of masts, sails, and spars had been cleared away and the ship was under complete command once more, but even with the main course set, she was losing ground to her opponents. The lead Dohlaran was two ship’s lengths ahead of her, and the second ship in the Dohlaran line was starting to range ahead, as well. The third galleon had moved up to batter away at her, although th
at ship seemed to have been pretty well battered herself. Astern, he could hear Shield still in furious action—with the fourth ship in the Dohlaran line, now—and Pawal’s eyes were set and hard as he watched the angle of the first Dohlaran’s masts begin to shift.

  She was making her move to cut across Dart’s course, and he turned to his own helmsmen.

  “Bring her two points to starboard!” he ordered.

  “Sir! Sir!”

  Harys Aiwain turned towards the high- pitched voice. Midshipman Walkyr ran towards him, barely even hesitating as a seaman staggered back. Both of the wounded man’s hands flew up to clutch at the blood- splashed ruin where his face had been, and he fell to the deck directly in front of Walkyr. The boy simply hurtled over the body and slid to a stop, gasping for breath.

  “What?” Aiwain demanded. “Sir,” Walkyr panted, “Dart’s altering to starboard! About two points, I think! And . . . and I couldn’t see for sure, but I think it’s because the enemy’s trying to get round in front of her!”

  “Good lad!”

  Aiwain slapped the boy on the back, then wheeled to his helmsmen.

  “Three points to starboard!” he snapped, then raised his speaking trumpet.

  “Hands aloft! Shake out the reefs and prepare to loose courses!”

  Dartswung to starboard, altering course to take the wind on her starboard beam, as Rakurai tried to get around in front of her. Dart was turning inside the smaller ship, giving her a shorter distance to travel, but Rakurai was considerably faster now, and the duel between them redoubled in ferocity. Bedard, keeping station on Rakurai, continued to fire furiously, pounding away at Dart’s quarter, and Pawal was devoutly grateful that the Dohlarans’ accuracy matched neither their discipline nor their determination.