Safehold 10 Through Fiery Trials

by David Weber

  And if I didn’t, the Skipper is so going to rip me a new one, he thought as he watched the raft edging towards the crosshair. I really don’t want—

  The raft reached the crosshair, he yanked the big handle, and HMAS Bryntyn Hahlys leapt upward.

  * * *

  “Yes!” Sir Bruhstair Ahbaht said as the airship surged suddenly higher as its weight was abruptly reduced by a ton and a half.

  Its altitude was down to three thousand feet when it dropped. From that height, it took the six plunging objects fourteen seconds to complete their fall. They were painted white, which made them easy to see against the dark gray sky, and they’d dropped nose-first from the individual cells in which they’d been stored. Each of them weighed five hundred pounds, about the same as one of Crag Reach’s ten-inch shells, but they were both longer and thinner, and they’d been fitted with stabilizing vanes, like the fletching of some squat, bullet-shaped arrow.

  He hadn’t been prepared for the whistling sound they made, although he should have been. He’d heard more than enough shells rumble overhead as they reached the end of their journey, after all. But somehow—

  His thought broke off as the projectiles—the Office of Aeronautics had christened them “aerobombs,” although he was confident that would be shortened simply to “bomb” with indecent haste—struck. They came down in a line that crossed the target raft at an angle, following the base course of the airship. The first two landed short and the last one landed long, but the other three “aerobombs” smashed directly into the raft. He heard the crashing thuds even over the sounds of a ship underway, and his eyebrows rose. That was a higher percentage of hits than he would have been willing to predict. On the other hand, the airship had been supposed to drop from six thousand feet, not three.

  Yes, she was. On the other hand, she only dropped six of the damned things. Full load, even with maximum fuel on board, and she could carry four times that many. And—

  “That’s a lot better than I expected, Sir Bruhstair,” Captain Brahdryk said.

  “Better than I expected, too,” Ahbaht acknowledged. “On the other hand, they dropped lower than planned and we weren’t doing a thing to make their job any harder.” He shrugged. “Steaming at fifteen knots in a straight line without even trying to dodge isn’t the sort of thing someone who knew what was coming would be likely to do.”

  “No,” Brahdryk acknowledged. “On the other hand, they only had six aerobombs on board. On actual operations, they’d have a lot more,” he continued, speaking Ahbaht’s own thoughts out loud. “And they’d hit the deck, not the belt.”

  “Yes, they would.” Ahbaht nodded, because that was a very good point.

  Even at extreme range, shells fired at a ship came in on low trajectories, because there was a practical limit to the range at which one ship could hit another. In theory, Crag Reach’s guns could have reached a target at fourteen thousand yards, but no gunnery officer could actually hit another ship at an eight-mile range. Her best realistic range couldn’t exceed much over five or six thousand yards, and that meant virtually all hits would be on the sides of their targets, and that any shell which did hit a ship’s decks would strike at a shallow angle and tend to skip like a stone thrown across a pond.

  Obviously, therefore, a ship’s side had to be heavily armored, and her decks … didn’t. Which was good, since a ship had so much more deck area than side area. Crag Reach was almost five hundred feet long, with a beam of eighty feet. Her citadel—the portion of her hull protected by armor—was just over three hundred feet long and her armored belt was approximately fifteen feet deep. That meant both belts combined contained 9,000 square feet of armor. Her armored deck was just over seventy-six feet wide, however, which gave it an area of 23,100 square feet. That meant each inch of deck armor cost well over two and half times as much tonnage as an inch of side armor, so no designer wanted to add any more of it than he had to. Cutting half an inch off the deck armor let him increase the side armor—the armor that would actually be threatened—by almost an inch and half.

  But an “aerobomb” would arrive on a very steep—indeed, on a vertical—trajectory. It would strike at a direct right angle and deliver all of its force to the deck, not skip across it.

  “How does the drop speed compare to our guns’ muzzle velocity, Sir?” Brahdryk asked.

  “From the height they actually dropped at, I don’t know,” Bruhstair confessed with a shrug. “According to what I was told when I discussed the exercise with Admiral Cupyr and Commodore Makadoo, if they’d dropped from their intended altitude, the ‘aerobombs’ would’ve been traveling at between a fifth and a quarter of a ten-inch’s muzzle velocity.”

  “Ouch.”

  “I agree, given that we’ve only got about two inches of deck armor.”

  Brahdryk nodded. Crag Reach’s main belt was better than three times that thick.

  “And there’s not any reason they couldn’t make the damned things bigger,” Bruhstair continued. “Commodore Makadoo was kind enough to share the numbers with me. A five-hundred-pound aerobomb falling from five thousand feet would have about the same impact energy as a shell from one of our eight-inch guns. Of course, the eight-inchers don’t hold a candle to what the ten-inch can hand out, but that’s still impressive. And if they dropped a thousand-pound aerobomb, it would have twice the impact energy. For that matter, they’re playing around with a two-thousand-pound monster.” Brahdryk’s eyes widened, and Bruhstair didn’t blame him. “If they dropped one of those things from five thousand feet, it would hit with about five times the eight-inch shell’s force. And it would be delivered directly to the deck.”

  “Shan-wei,” Brahdryk murmured, and Bruhstair shrugged.

  “Frankly, I don’t expect the chance of scoring a hit from that high to be very good under actual combat conditions, but any hits that do land—especially if they weigh a ton apiece and they’re filled with Composition D—are likely to be … I suppose ‘devastating’ would be a pretty good choice of words. And, theoretically, I don’t see any reason they couldn’t build one of the things to weigh as much as two or even three tons. The Duchairns can carry almost seven tons at maximum range. If they cut back on the range, they can increase that a bit, but at full load, her fuel only weighs about seven thousand pounds, so there’s the trade-off. But they’re already projecting that the next class of airship will be even bigger with an even bigger capacity. So say they get it up to ten tons and load one of them up with five two-ton aerobombs?” He shook his head. “Even a five-hundred-pounder would punch through our deck armor. A two-ton aerobomb would punch through the deck like an awl and keep going straight out the keel!”

  Brahdryk shook his head, his expression almost numb, and Bruhstair smiled with very little humor.

  “So I suppose you can see why Duke Rock Point and Their Majesties think it would be a really good idea to not let anyone else figure out what we’re up to … or how to do it to us.”

  MARCH YEAR OF GOD 913

  .I.

  HMS Seeker, Hannah Bay, and Ducal Palace, City of Carmyn, Grand Duchy of Zebediah, Empire of Charis.

  “Permission to come on the bridge, Captain?” the wiry young man asked.

  Commander Edwyrd Chermyn looked over his shoulder as HMS Seeker, a Falcon-class cruiser of the Imperial Charisian Navy, steamed steadily down the center of the passage between Grass Island and Dolphin Island. The sun was high overhead, heating the decks like an oven, and the banner of Seeker’s funnel smoke hung heavy in the air. Even the seabirds and wyverns, wheeling around the cruiser in winged kind’s perpetual optimism that something tasty would turn up in her wake, seemed heavy and sodden with the heat.

  Hannah Bay without a wind was the closest approximation to hell Commander Chermyn ever hoped to experience, even for a boy from Old Charis.

  It was also the approach to the place he called home.

  “Permission granted, Your Highness,” he said now, and Daivyn Daikyn stepped out onto the bridge
wing beside him.

  “How much longer, Edwyrd?” Daivyn asked, taking off his broad-brimmed hat long enough to fan himself and then hurriedly putting it back on as the sun beat down on the crown of his unprotected head.

  “We’re making a good fifteen knots, so call it just under eight hours,” Chermyn said, and smiled quizzically. “About the same length of time it takes every time you ask me that.”

  “I’ve only made this trip with you three times before,” Daivyn shot back with a grin, “and this is the first time I’ve made it on a ship you commanded. I figured you might be less … stodgy than some of your earlier captains and open the taps a bit.”

  “‘Open the taps’ is an unbecoming piece of engine room slang which a properly reared ruling prince shouldn’t know,” Chermyn said severely.

  “Maybe not a ‘properly reared’ ruling prince, but what, precisely, does that have to do with me?” Daivyn inquired.

  “I know Irys and Hektor did their very best with you.” Chermyn shook his head. “All that effort for nothing!”

  “Absolutely!” Daivyn agreed enthusiastically. “Don’t forget, I had Cayleb’s example, too.”

  “True,” Chermyn conceded.

  “Well, there you are.” Daivyn shrugged. “And, having established that I’m a less-than-proper prince, I can use whatever unbecoming slang I want.”

  “Until Irys hears you doing it, you mean?”

  “Of course I do. You think I’m dumb enough to use it when she’s around?”

  Daivyn grinned infectiously, and Chermyn shook his head. That smile could charm anyone—probably even a Zebediahan, assuming the Zebediahan in question didn’t shoot before he saw it—and Chermyn was still astonished at times to realize it was totally sincere. The prince would be twenty-eight years old in four months, but he’d never lost that bubbling zest for life, which was really remarkable when one considered that he’d been orphaned when he was only eight and spent the next two years knowing his own life hung from a thread. He’d been too young to fully understand the reasons for that, but he’d always been an intelligent, observant child. He might not have understood why Zhaspahr Clyntahn considered his assassination at “Charisian” hands a useful tool, but he’d been far from blind to the peril in which he stood. Surely that had to have left a mark, left the bitterness of that fear in its wake.

  Yet it hadn’t. Somehow, it hadn’t. There were dark spots in there, Chermyn knew, but they were very tiny.

  “Speaking of ‘dumb,’” the commander said now, “might I ask where Tobys is? Since, after all, we are going to be arriving in Carmyn this afternoon and I’m sure Father would like to keep you alive.”

  “Don’t be such a pessimist!” Daivyn scolded. “Nobody’s even shot at me once in Carmyn on the last three visits.”

  “Always a first time,” Chermyn replied, “and this is the first time Frahncheska’s been home in almost five years. I’ve seen her once—no, twice—in all that time, and I’d really hate for her homecoming to be spoiled by a state funeral.”

  He smiled, but there was more than a trace of seriousness in his voice. The House of Daikyn was not universally beloved in Zebediah, and for very good cause. Those causes had nothing at all to do with Daivyn, but embittered people seldom relied upon anything so pallid as logic or reason.

  “I understand what you’re saying,” Daivyn acknowledged, but he also shook his head. “And I can’t blame some of them for wanting my head, Edwyrd, but I honestly don’t think anyone’s likely to try taking it. Still, I promise—Tobys has given me the lecture, I’ve listened, and I won’t be going anywhere without your father’s permission and half a battalion or so of bodyguards.” He grimaced. “Makes it a little hard to roam the markets incognito.”

  “That’s sort of the point,” Chermyn replied. “And while I wouldn’t want you to get a swelled head or anything, I’m fond of you myself. Not to mention the fact that if I let anything happen to you, Irys and Hektor will have my head.”

  “Nonsense. They’d blame me for it. Besides, Tobys will flatten me and drag me home over his shoulder if he thinks I’m doing anything I shouldn’t. No respect for authority at all, that man!”

  Chermyn snorted. Lieutenant Tobys Raimair had headed Prince Daivyn’s personal guard for the last seventeen years, and he probably would “flatten” his prince in an instant if he thought Daivyn was in danger. In fact, according to reports, he’d done something very like that during Daivyn’s and Irys’ escape from Delferahk.

  “I don’t think it’s ‘authority’ he has any trouble respecting,” the commander said.

  “I think that was probably an insult,” Daivyn said suspiciously.

  “Nonsense! I have plenty of respect for authority, too.”

  * * *

  Frahncheska Chermyn watched the sleek cruiser slide smoothly alongside the stone quay without benefit of tugs. Mooring lines went ashore, dropped over bollards, and windlasses took up tension, nuzzling Seeker more firmly against the fender-protected pilings. The smells of the harbor were stronger than usual in the hot, windless late afternoon, and her nostrils flared. Not all of those smells were pleasant, but they were familiar and comforting.

  “He did that well,” her Aunt Mathylda—known on formal occasions as Her Grace, Mathylda, Grand Duchess of Zebediah—observed with maternal pride. She was a slender, silver-haired woman with wise brown eyes that laughed a lot. She was also the only mother Frahncheska had ever truly known.

  “Of course he did it well!” she replied. “He wouldn’t dare not do it well knowing you were standing here watching.”

  “I am fierce, aren’t I?” Mathylda said reflectively.

  “Oh, horribly so,” Frahncheska reassured her.

  “You’re always such a comfort to me, dear. None of the boys ever understood me half as well as you did!” Mathylda gave her a quick hug. “That’s why I missed you so much.”

  “Well, I’m home now.” Frahncheska hugged her back. “I loved Tellesberg, and I’m going to miss the College, but the truth is, I’m happier here, heat and all.”

  “Only because you were so young when we were first stationed here. You never had a chance to learn what a reasonable climate was like, poor baby,” Mathylda said, and Frahncheska shook her head.

  Mathylda Chermyn had been born about as commonly as anyone could, and no one had warned her she might one day become a grand duchess with almost eight million subjects. To this day, even after eighteen years in the Ducal Palace, she still thought of herself as the wife of a Marine first and a ruler’s consort second. Or third. That had never kept her from doing her job, though, and Frahncheska was pretty sure she clung to the memory of that Marine’s wife to help herself remember her humble origins when she dealt with all those other common-born subjects for whom she’d become responsible.

  And that was one reason, among many, that the people of Zebediah loved her. Of course, if anyone ever mentioned that to Aunt Mathylda, she simply pointed out—rather tartly—that Zebedia would have been prepared to love anyone who replaced Tohmys Symmyns. Which, as far as Frahncheska could determine, was also true.

  She shook her head at the thought as the brow ran out from the wharf to Seeker’s side. The cruiser towered over the three naval schooners anchored farther out into the harbor. There were fewer sailing vessels left in commission every year, and Frahncheska knew her cousin Edwyrd felt a certain nostalgic regret for that. She supposed she should have, too—schooners were certainly prettier than steamships—but four years at the Royal College had thoroughly infected her with the Charisian drive for innovation and ever-increasing efficiency. More than that, she’d studied with Doctor Wyllys. She understood what the Imperial Charisian Navy’s new oil-fired boilers meant for cruising ranges, and so she knew the endurance which had given those schooners their additional lease on life in naval service was about to become far less relevant.

  She truly was glad to be back, though. Carmyn was little more than a large town compared to Tellesberg, and it was un
deniably provincial, but it was also the place she would always think of as home.

  “Looks like Daivyn’s about to disembark,” Mathylda observed, watching the uniformed guardsmen coming to attention at the landward end of the brow.

  “Yes,” Frahncheska half sighed, shaking her head. Mathylda looked at her, and she grimaced. “I just hate it that we have to worry so much about someone wanting to hurt him, Aunt Mathylda. It’s just so … so stupid.”

  “Frahncheska, not even your uncle runs around Carmyn without bodyguards. He won’t let you or me do it, either. Do you really expect him to let anything happen to Daivyn on our watch?”

  “It’s not quite the same, Aunt Mathylda,” Frahncheska pointed out, looking at the pair of guardsmen who’d accompanied them down to dockside. “We have two bodyguards; by my count, Daivyn has eleven, even before you add Tobys and Sergeant Wahltahrs to the mix. That’s an awful lot of guards to drag around everywhere he goes.”

  “Better to inconvenience him than let him go home dead,” Mathylda said a bit acerbically, but then she smiled. “I’m sure he’ll be happy to know such a lovely young lady sympathizes with his plight, though.”