by David Weber
Cayleb nodded more emphatically than before, and Delthak smiled thinly.
“Yet, at least,” he added, and the emperor stopped nodding with a glare.
AUGUST YEAR OF GOD 912
.I.
HMS Crag Reach and HMAS Bryntyn Hahlys, Charis Sea.
“There she comes, Sir,” Captain Brahdryk said quietly. Admiral Sir Bruhstair Ahbaht looked up, and the much taller captain raised a hand and pointed. “There, Sir. About thirty degrees off the larboard bow. And only an hour or so behind schedule. Not bad given the weather.”
Ahbaht followed the pointing finger, then nodded.
“Got it, Captain,” he said, then shook his head. “My eyes aren’t as young as they used to be. Then again, neither is any of the rest of me.”
“You seem to be doing just fine to me, Sir,” Brahdryk said dryly. “Especially judging by the spades tournament.”
“So I count trump. When you get to be my age you have to, because you sure aren’t going to just remember what’s been played!”
Ahbaht grinned, and it was Brahdryk’s turn to shake his head.
Sir Bruhstair commanded the Imperial Charisian Navy’s Fifth Fleet, homeported on Eraystor Bay and often referred to as “Home Fleet.” Duke Rock Point hadn’t exactly picked his fleet commanders—and especially Home Fleet’s commander—by plucking names randomly from a hat, and despite Bruhstair’s easy-going sense of humor, he was a very, very smart fellow. He’d also built a remarkable record during the Jihad, and the Navy’s grapevine assigned him quite a few psychic talents. According to those who had served with him, those talents included the ability to read cards’ faces from their backs. Sir Bruhstair had been aboard Crag Reach for less than a five-day in preparation for today’s exercise, but nothing Brahdryk had seen from his own spades games with the admiral challenged that particular rumor.
“I’ll try to remember how aged and infirm you’re getting the next time you trounce me, Sir.”
“It’s a senior officer’s duty to teach his juniors to cope with adversity, Captain.” Bruhstair patted his forearm with a fatherly air.
“And some of them do it better than others, Sir,” Brahdryk replied.
Bruhstair chuckled, but neither of them had looked away from the gray shape blending out of the overcast while they spoke. Frankly, the admiral—like Brahdryk, judging from what the captain had said—had had his doubts about whether or not the airship would even be able to find them, given the weather.
Crag Reach was four hundred miles north of Rock Shoal Bay, almost equidistant between Sea Dragon Point and Tairayl Island. That put the armored cruiser pretty close to the center of the Charis Sea, but the Charis Sea wasn’t all that huge. She was only about a hundred and sixty miles from the closest land, which was far enough to keep her out of the normal shipping lanes for the duration of the exercise, but that shouldn’t normally have made her a challenge for an airship to locate. Visibility wasn’t good, however. It had been coming and going all day, and Lieutenant Commander Klymynt, Crag Reach’s navigator, estimated the cloud base had dropped to no more than twenty-five hundred feet. That limited the airship’s ceiling and thus its visual range, and the occasional bouts of mist rolling across the sea’s surface didn’t make things any better.
But finding ships at sea is one of the things they’re trained to do, he reminded himself, raising his double-glass and turning the focusing wheel to sharpen the image. And they’re getting damned good at it.
There were times when Bruhstair Ahbaht wondered where—or if—the headlong changes were finally going to slow.
Or at least stop accelerating.
“They’re signaling, Sir,” another voice said, and Ahbaht lowered the double-glass to glance over his shoulder at Lieutenant Ohtys Chandlyr, Crag Reach’s signals officer. As the youthful lieutenant spoke, he was peering through a much more powerful double-glass swivel-mounted on the bridge wing railing, at the tiny, bright point of light blinking from the approaching airship, and Ahbaht wondered if the airship’s crew felt as nervous about that as he would have.
Crag Reach was equipped with the latest and most powerful version of the Imperial Charisian Navy’s new calcium “searchlights,” and the torrent of brilliance they poured out was almost incredible. They did it, however, by directing a gas jet of combined hydrogen and oxygen onto a calcium “candle” to heat it to an enormously high temperature at which it radiated a blindingly white light. The candle was backed by a brilliantly polished mirror and had a focusing lens, both designed by Doctor Frymyn at the Royal College, that projected an almost solid-looking beam of light. The big fifty-inch lights could pick a small boat out of the darkest night—assuming otherwise clear visibility—at ranges of up to two miles, but first the searchlight crew had to know it was there. As a means of finding things in the dark, the searchlight still came in a distant second behind illuminating rockets or the recently developed “star shell” which could be fired from a ship’s artillery.
The much smaller twenty-five-inch lights, however, had proved incredibly useful as a means of communication. Unlike signal flags, which could be used only in daylight, the signal lamps could be seen even in darkness. They also burned through mist—to some extent, at any rate—and were much more reliable and brighter than the heliographs previously in use. That didn’t mean the heliograph had suddenly become obsolete, but one simply couldn’t count on having the sun available—or in the right spot—when one needed it. Hence the “calcium lights.”
But the new lights produced an enormous amount of heat, and an airship was one vast bag of highly flammable hydrogen. The prospect of blinking away with a calcium light in such close proximity to that potential explosion was enough to make anyone think twice. Although, he supposed, at least an airship had an effectively unlimited supply of hydrogen.
The important thing from his perspective, however, was that the new signal lamps meant an airship could communicate with another airship, the ground, or a warship like Crag Reach from much greater distances. The light could be seen—and read—from as much as twenty or thirty miles, even in daylight, although that was under ideal conditions. If the airship was between its intended recipient and the sun, the greater brightness of the sun tended to “white out” everything else, and haze, rain, or cloud knocked back visual range severely. But it was still better than anything anyone had ever had before, and vastly superior to the message capsules that went up and down the tethers of a warship’s kite balloon.
And that promised a revolution in naval operations.
At their normal altitude of eighteen hundred feet, kite balloons already extended a ship’s visual horizon from barely ten miles to almost sixty. For an airship at nine thousand feet, the visual horizon was over a hundred and sixteen miles, which gave it a scouting “bubble” almost two hundred and fifty miles across. That was in perfect weather, which was seldom obtained, but the boost in sighting distances was huge under any circumstances.
Previous trials had clearly demonstrated the scouting potential of an airship. With the latest version of the Delthak Works’ Praigyrs, an airship could attain a maximum speed of almost seventy miles per hour in still air. That was three times the best speed the fastest steamer could maintain which meant it could search well ahead of any fleet or squadron and cover the distance back to it far more rapidly than any surface vessel possibly could. For that matter, squadrons of them operating together to form signal chains, as light scouting vessels had done for decades, could relay messages over enormous distances at incredible speeds. And that meant any fleet commander who could deploy a screen—a scouting line—of airships was far less likely to find himself suddenly surprised by an enemy’s appearance.
The way one Sir Bruhstair Ahbaht had found himself surprised in Hahskyn Bay.
His jaw tightened with the remembered pain of what had happened to his squadron there, but it was an old and familiar anguish. His double-glass never wavered as he watched the blinking light, easy to pick out against the gray
envelope of the airship’s gasbag.
“Bryntyn Hahlys reports ready to proceed with the exercise, Admiral,” Chandlyr said.
“Then I suppose we should be about it,” Ahbaht said. “Please signal Lieutenant Zhasyn to commence at his discretion, Lieutenant.”
“Aye, aye, Sir,” Chandlyr replied, and Ahbaht heard the signal lamp’s shutters clatter with the rapid, staccato, syncopated rhythm of the lieutenant’s skilled hand.
He thought about the airship’s name as he listened. Bryntyn Hahlys, one of the Imperial Navy’s first aeronauts, had performed brilliantly at the Battle of Gorath. Although he’d been only a petty officer at the time, he’d clearly had an illustrious career in front of him. But that promise had never been fulfilled, courtesy of a climbing accident in Chisholm’s Iron Spine Mountains which, unfortunately, had provided the Imperial Charisian Air Force with yet another name for one of its airships. And the irony of that name was particularly bitter, considering who’d been named to head the Admiralty’s Office of Aeronautics.
Now Hahlys’ namesake altered course, sweeping majestically around to approach Crag Reach from astern, and Ahbaht moved farther out on the bridge wing to keep the airship in sight. Fortunately, the wind pushed Crag Reach’s funnel smoke to starboard, clearing the range as the airship moved closer.
The admiral lowered the double-glass for a moment, looking aft at the large, flat raft, following in the armored cruiser’s wake at the far end of the towing hawser. He could have wished that hawser was a little longer, but at least there were no actual explosives involved in today’s experiment. And the exercise parameters called for the airship to make its final approach at an angle, cutting across well astern of Crag Reach.
And it’s worked just fine in all the tests ashore, he reminded himself. No point borrowing trouble by assuming the worst before it actually happens, Bruhstair!
* * *
Lieutenant Markys Zhasyn stood with his hands clasped behind him, looking down through the windscreen at the toy boat below, and tried not to worry. It wasn’t the easiest thing he’d ever done because, technically, the Imperial Charisian Air Force “belonged” to the Navy. That was something of a sore point for some Air Force officers, although Zhasyn wasn’t one of them.
Mostly.
He understood why the Navy—for painfully obvious reasons—was, and always would be, the senior service for the Charisian Empire, and much as he loved Hahlys, and however “airship crazy” he might be, the Air Force wasn’t, and never would be. Airship design had advanced incredibly in just the last few years, but nothing could change the fact that they were fragile and weather-limited in ways surface vessels weren’t. Yet despite that, their operational “model” was clearly far closer to the Navy’s than it was to any army, so it was inevitable that the Admiralty had staked its claim early. And at least they’d created the Office of Aeronautics, headed by the Seventh Sea Lord. It might seem a little odd for airmen to answer to a sea lord, but it meant they were represented at the apex of the Navy’s command structure. And while the officer who currently held that position was a mere commodore—and the youngest of the sea lords, to boot—he was also the most highly decorated aeronaut in Charisian service. Commodore Makadoo had piloted HMS Gwylym Manthyr’s kite balloon during the Battle of Gorath Bay and he’d spent the next four years working directly with Delthak Enterprises in the design process which had led directly to the Duchess of Delthak. Indeed, he’d left the Delthak engineering team only to assume command of the Duchess as Charis’ first airship commander, and he was the one who’d written the training syllabus for all the other airship COs … including Markys Zhasyn. He’d clearly “paid his dues” on the technical side, as well as in combat, and he was also one of the officers who’d advocated most strongly for the creation of the Air Force.
That had been a tough fight, but they’d won it in the end—mostly. Air Force officers were still naval officers, but the Admiralty had ruled that the Air Force itself had to be commanded by someone who wore an aeronaut’s wyvern wings on his chest. Someone who understood the operational realities and limitations of airships. Rear Admiral Aizak Cupyr had been a later convert than Makadoo, but he was as fiercely dedicated to the air as anyone in Charisian uniform, and under his command, the Air Force had been granted the same status as the Navy’s six numbered fleets.
Yet there were plenty of Navy officers who didn’t think the aeronauts deserved their special status, and that was what had Zhasyn worried as his command bored steadily through the air towards Crag Reach.
From everything Zhasyn had heard, Sir Bruhstair Ahbaht wasn’t one of the people who wanted to strangle the Air Force in its crib. Not only that, Admiral Cupyr had served under him as a junior ship commander at Hahskyn Bay and again at Shipworm Island, which would probably incline him to actively support the Air Force. But if Bryntyn Hahlys managed to screw up today those other officers would shake their heads sadly while pointing out that they’d always known those newfangled airships were bound to come to a bad end. And, alas, Lieutenant Zhasyn’s sad failure demonstrated precisely why it was a terrible idea to give the airmen so much independence.
Just getting here had been an adventure, given visibility conditions. And the rain. Fortunately, it wasn’t raining here, and they’d encountered none of the violent thunderstorms that could swat an airship like a bug, only easier. They had run into quite a bit of rain, however, and he’d had to drop a lot of ballast to compensate for the weight of the rain which had coated the gas bag. Now that the active rain had ceased and the bag was drying, he’d been forced to vent more hydrogen than he really liked to keep from going too high and losing sight of the sea in the clouds. Of course, that particular problem was going to pretty much fix itself shortly, and—
“Fifteen minutes, Skipper,” Lieutenant Mytchail, Hahlys’ executive officer, said quietly from beside him.
“I know.” Zhasyn nodded, then glanced at Mytchail. “Please don’t embarrass us in front of the Admiral, Lohgyn!”
“Um, excuse me, Skipper, but isn’t that pretty much up to Inzioh?”
Lieutenant Inzioh Bryttyn was Bryntyn Hahlys’ navigator, which—through a process of logic Zhasyn didn’t fully understand—had put him in charge of the critical aspect of today’s exercise.
“And I’ve already discussed this with Inzioh,” Zhasyn said, nodding again. “Now I’m discussing it with you, in the hallowed naval tradition of pointing out that the executive officer is responsible for everything that happens aboard his ship. And that shit flows downhill.”
“Oh! I see.” Mytchail’s lips twitched and he looked away. “I’ll just go keep an eye on him and encourage him, why don’t I?”
“I think that would be a wonderful idea,” Zhasyn agreed, and watched Mytchail head aft. Then he looked at the altitude coxswain at the elevator controls.
“Something amuses you?” he asked mildly.
“Oh, no, Sir!” the petty officer replied quickly, banishing what had certainly looked like a grin.
“Good,” Zhasyn said, and turned his attention back to the steadily growing toy below.
* * *
“Do you really think this is going to work, Sir?” Brahdryk asked in a thoughtful tone as he and Ahbaht watched the airship turn from a tiny model, no bigger than a man’s hand, into an enormous behemoth, fully as large as—if far, far lighter than—Crag Reach, herself.
Ahbaht looked at him, and the captain shrugged.
“I mean, even if the trial works perfectly, do you really think it’ll be practical under operational circumstances?”
“That’s an excellent question,” Ahbaht acknowledged after a moment. “And the answer is that no one knows. I don’t think there’s any question about airships’ reconnaissance value, but this is a bit different. I’m pretty sure it should work—assuming it’s practical at all—the first time or two. After that?” He shrugged. “A lot will depend on how low they have to come in, and a lot more will depend on what sort of weapons someone els
e comes up with to shoot them down.” His eyes darkened. “We saw plenty of inventiveness like that out of the other side during the Jihad.”
“That’s what I was thinking, really,” Brahdryk said. “I think some people tend to get all caught up with how inventive Duke Delthak’s and Baron Seamount’s people were and forget how … ingenious people like Thirsk and Lynkyn were. And let’s not even get started on Zhwaigair!”
“Well, at least we’ll know shortly whether or not it’s practical under ideal conditions,” Ahbaht said philosophically.
* * *
“Steady!” Inzioh Bryttyn said loudly into the voice pipe. “That’s perfect!”
“Aye, aye, Sir,” the petty officer on the rudder wheel replied, and Bryttyn turned back to the eyepiece.
The sight was a simple device, provided by the Royal College and the Office of Aeronautics’ own engineers. Unfortunately, it had to be mounted in the airship’s very nose, well away from her bridge, and its accuracy depended on its ability to correctly estimate both Bryntyn Hahlys’ altitude and her speed over the sea beneath her and set those values on the sight’s adjusting knobs. Crosswind would be a factor, as well, although not a very great one, given the relatively modest altitude at which the weather had forced them to approach. And at least the wave pattern, combined with Crag Reach’s flag and her funnel smoke, gave him a crude yardstick of wind conditions at sea level.
The airship was equipped with an “altimeter,” a closed, mercury-filled tube—rather like a barometer, in many ways—which calculated height by measuring air pressure. It wasn’t perfectly accurate, but it was generally adequate when it came to determining altitude. Speed was trickier. Bryntyn Hahlys was provided with what Doctor Vyrnyr from the Royal College had dubbed a “pitot tube,” similar to the one which had been developed for the earlier steamships, but more accurate, which allowed Bryttyn to be confident of the airship’s speed through the air about it. Speed over the ground was trickier, given the chance of headwinds, tailwinds, or crosswinds … or all three in combination! That was why Bryntyn Hahlys had also been given a rangefinder which—in theory, at least—should have let him take timed ranges on Crag Reach as they approached. The rate at which the range decreased would have allowed him to judge their speed with acceptable accuracy. Unfortunately, visibility had been too poor for that until after they’d turned onto their final approach. That left him too little time for the series of ranges he would have required, so he’d just have to hope he’d estimated it correctly.