Voidfarer

by Sean McMullen

  "Did he know of a counter?" I asked.

  "Oh yes, it is very simple. Wet cloth worn over the mouth and nose, and wet gauze worn over the eyes. Moisture makes the lampblack autons explode, and thus spread the lampblack. Otherwise they lose their vitality after a quarter hour and explode anyway, leaving a black smear. If they hit water, they dissolve at once. I wrote out some instructions on using wet cloths to breathe through, then Laron sent out criers with posters telling people to have pails of water and wet cloths within reach at all times."

  A squad of kavelars from the former regent was intercepted at the gates bearing proclamations that the city had already surrendered to the Lupanians. Apparently the summer palace

  had been approached by a tripod tower, and the regent surrendered at once. A baron was with the squad, and he had been appointed governor of the city. They were set upon by the militiamen guarding the gates, stripped of their weapons and armor, and flung into the palace dungeons for interrogation. The baron had said that an attack would come the next day if they were not allowed to report back by morning, using an au-ton bird.

  "Tomorrow is too soon for them to move their human army to Alberin," I said when Lavenci had finished. "A forced march all day would get them to the city gates, but they would be exhausted."

  "The baron said five hundred cavalry are camped about two hours' ride away, in the foothills."

  "No, that is not enough to do more than enforce a surrender. It is the Lupanian tripods that will attack tomorrow. Will we be ready?"

  "Riellen says so."

  "From what I have seen, we'd need another five days to have the recruits steady enough to hold a line. Three days if we worked them exceptionally hard."

  "Commander Halland says if we can destroy or damage one tripod tower, the others always break off to carry it away," said Lavenci hopefully.

  "But come back very cross," I pointed out.

  XXX

  One good aspect of having friends in high places is that one has a great deal of freedom as long as one does not cost them money. Lavenci was busy with reports on the Lupanians, so instead of collapsing in the direction of my bed at once, I took a trip to the palace dungeons. These now contained just a baron and six kavelars. It was not these prisoners who interested me, however. There was a register of prisoners going back several months, and I was given access to this. Within the register was an entry for Pelmore, detailing when he had been admitted, the cell that had contained him, and who had handed him over for execution. There was a signature therewith, and all seemed in order. There were sixteen other entries

  active on that day, and a line had been drawn beneath these before the names of the baron and his kavelars appeared.

  "Any idea what all these mean?" I asked the new keeper, tapping the page.

  'These entries that are not signed off?"

  "Well sir, when I came down here with the Democratic Liberation Forces of the Free Alberinese Incarceration People's Militia, we found, er, this many bodies, all shot through with crossbow bolts. They was palace issue, so I'd reckon that the Oppressive Former Regent Lackey of the Expansionist and Imperialist Lupanian Invaders sent a squad o' c-bows down here to make sure none o' his enemies got liberated by those left in the city after he fled, like. Course—"

  "I understand!" I said sharply, before he could draw breath and continue. "How many prisoners died?"

  "I counted the bodies, just a minute and I'll tell ye." He began to count off on his fingers. Having used up all fingers of both hands, he removed a boot, pulled off a sock, and counted out five toes.

  'That many, sir," he said confidently.

  "Are you very, very sure?"

  "Oh aye, sir, 'cause I didn't have to take off me left boot, but I counted out aH me toes."

  Fifteen, I thought. Yet there were sixteen entries above the line that were not signed off. One prisoner was not accounted for. Perhaps Pelmore had not been the man executed. Perhaps Pelmore was still alive. Perhaps someone had set him free, or at least held him somewhere else. They had then taken out a physically similar prisoner, tied his hands behind his back, and bleached his hair, eyebrows, pubic hair, and even the hair on his arse. I checked the names. Ariosten, that was a Sar-golan name. Many Sargolans had curly black hair, which would bleach well into curly blond hair.

  Next I checked a dozen or so taverns for Ariosten, questioning the vintners and serving maids. At last one girl did remember him. There had been a fight over a lamplight girl, and in that very taproom. He had been arrested and hauled away to the magistrate. When it came to sentencing, there had been some problem about whether he should be hanged or beheaded, according to the girl. That was on account of his nationality.

  "Big fella, he was," she said. "See this beam? When he stood 'neath it, his hair touched the underside."

  The right height, I thought in triumph. Pelmore was also about that height. I returned to the dungeons. All of the guards who had formerly staffed the dungeons had either fled with the regent, died when the Inquisition building had collapsed, or were lying very low in the city. Thus I had nobody to question, but I do not give up so easily.

  "Who maintained the persuasion equipment in here?" I asked the new keeper.

  "Contract smithy."

  :*:

  Within the hour I was interrogating a blacksmith who was very anxious for his work in the torture chambers to be treated with discretion, and was thus exceedingly cooperative.

  "Oh aye, I was working in there on the day," he said reluctantiy.

  "And did you see this man?" I asked, holding up a sketch I had made of Pelmore.

  "Oh aye, nice piccy."

  "What happened to him?"

  "Why, you tortured him, sir."

  "What? Me?" I exclaimed.

  "Aye sir, and the tall, thin fella with you."

  "So... what did I do?"

  "You signed him out for special treatment. You said that the regent had granted you the right to give the felon a bit of a going-over, like, on account of him trying to poison you and all. Very considerate, that Regent Corozan—well, except for him being a counterrevolutionary, oppressive, oligarchical imperialist bloodsucker who—"

  "What else?"

  "Er, well, the guard in charge said I had to go with you, on account of a registered artisan having to be present to ensure proper operation of the persuasion equipment at all times. I went along, but when we reached the chamber door, you gave me a sign-off note for the rest of the day, and I went home. Got the note here."

  The note was in my handwriting! Early on the morning of

  Pelmore's supposed execution, two people had come down to the dungeons, removed him for torturing, then vanished with him. The executioner had then arrived, discovered that Pel-more had escaped, and told the regent. The regent had ordered someone to be made up like Pelmore, gagged and blindfolded, then executed. The glass dragons had then been defeated by the Lupanians, and the regent had decided to flee. He had sent guards down to execute those in the dungeons, presumably because some were his political enemies. The trail seemed to go cold at this point... but not quite.

  Pelmore's rescuers were obviously not in league with the former regent. Thus they had probably not fled with him and his army, and thus were probably still in the city. Pelmore looked like Pelmore, and one of the others looked like me. They would be in hiding ... yet one of them looked like me! Thus he would be confident about being seen as me, when out and about.

  I returned to my quarters in the palace an hour before midnight, to find Lavenci curled up and asleep therein. I did not have the heart to wake her, so after scavenging a pillow and some bedding from nearby rooms, I curled up on the floor beside the bed and I slept as if I were dead. At dawn we were woken by one of the newly formed runner squad, and told that three Lupanian tripod towers were visible several miles away, advancing on the city. XXX

  The full story of the first Battle of Alberin is too well known to need another recounting from me. Wensomer and Yvendel had an ove
rall view, as they had put auton castings on pigeons caught in one of the city squares, and spent the battle looking down at the city through the birds' eyes while reporting what they saw to Laron and Halland. My own story is as good an overview as anyone else got, however, as I was stationed on the tower of the Metrologan temple. My role was to observe and make notes in case the pigeons died. I had a farsight with me. I also had Wallas.

  "Explain to me again why I am up here with you in one of the most exposed parts of the city, when I could be hiding in

  some exceedingly secure, deep, and comfortable cellar," Wallas asked, only his head projecting from my pack. "Backup chronicler," I replied.

  "Lower-Class Revolutionary Brother Inspector Danol, any attack that kills you will kill me, too." "I didn't mean that." "Then what?"

  "You will see what is directly behind me."

  "Use a human."

  "You're a human."

  "I'm a cat!"

  "You're a human cat."

  "But why have chronicles?"

  "Because the Lupanians will annihilate Riellen's Electro-cratic Militia. When that happens, the Metrologans will retreat into hiding and study them. These observations will help with the studies."

  "Was that not the original plan?"

  "Yes, but thanks to Riellen, instead of the citizens fleeing into the mountains to die of hunger, exposure, and a bad case of outlaw attack, the Alberinese have come back here to die of Lupanian occupation."

  "But, but, what about all the arms and training?"

  "Riellen's idea. Worse than useless against Lupanian tripod towers."

  "So what is the plan of defense?"

  "If there is one, nobody has told me— There! The tripod towers are moving again!"

  Four Lupanian fighting towers were on the floodplain. The first three had been standing still for a time, apparently waiting for the fourth to join them, but now they were together, striding confidently for Alberin's walls. There was no Alberinese army standing ready before the city, or even on the walls. One tower raised its heat weapon and fired it, angling the beam over the walls. The roof of a large mansion in the exclusive south sector burst into flames. There was no retaliation from within the city, in fact no reaction whatever. Apparently deciding that the city was cowering in terror, the fighting towers strode onward. Not far from the walls they began hurling the black globes of poison smoke, and these burst and spread

  amid Alberin's streets and buildings. The tripod towers paused at South Gate. One tower blasted the massive wooden gates and crown arches to ashes; then the four of them strode single-file into the narrow streets of the city. Once within the walls, they separated.

  It was now that Halland unleashed his first surprise. A bell began to ring, touching off more bells and gongs, and the ringing spread right across the city. As the ringing spread, thick, black smoke began to rise into the air.

  "Poison smoke, all over!" yowled Wallas. "Where's my wet rag mask?"

  "That's just our own fires, Wallas, they must be trying to spoil the enemy's view."

  The smoke certainly spoiled the Lupanians' vantage from the hoods of their towers. My view was spoiled too, but then I was not trying to seize the city. From this point onward, I can confidently say that the battle was an absolute and unmitigated shambles, yet because it was slightly less of a disaster for Alberin, Riellen was able to claim victory. Through my farsight, I could see a tower in the southwest of the city. It was cut off from its companions by a wall of smoke from around Bargeyards and the River Alber. I saw it stop, use its heat weapon on something ahead of it, then advance. Suddenly it stopped again, its tentacles hanging limp. Some smoke issued from its upper cowl, then dispersed.

  "I think a tripod tower has just been hit by something," I observed for the benefit of Wallas.

  "Is it annoyed?" asked Wallas.

  "See for yourself, and report if it moves."

  I looked away, trying for a moment to scratch my head through my helmet. We later learned that the defense measures of the city left a lot to be desired. Squads armed with slings and pots containing a mixture of hellfire oil and pitch were roaming the city, looking for tripods to attack. At least a dozen buildings that were under construction and surrounded by scaffolding were mistaken for towers in the smoke, attacked, and set afire. The smoke itself came from thousands of pyres of pitch, rags, straw, and green wood, all distributed through the city, to be lit when the cascade of bell ringing began. Some squads attacked

  each other in the confusion, and one group actually set one of our own siege engines afire and killed the crew.

  A tripod was striding over the houses in Bargeyards, advancing to where another tripod was standing. They ululated to each other as if arguing over who had started the fires; then the smoke of the burning city shrouded them from my view. I later learned that a squad of slingfires, as the sling militiamen with jars of burning hellfire oil were called, now chanced upon a tower's foot somewhere in the smoke swirling through Bargeyards. They began to whirl and hurl their jars of burning gunk skyward. At least five of the jars actually struck the top hood and spilled flames over the surface. One of those hit the faceplate.

  The first I knew of it was two towers carrying a third, whose hood was smeared with burning oil, and which was trailing a lot of black smoke. For some reason they ignored the river, which was practically beside them, and made for the harbor.

  "Oi, I see that tower in the south," called Wallas. "It's not moving at all."

  "Keep watching, it may be a trick," I replied.

  "Anything dangerous coming from harborside?"

  "Just watch for dangers from the south."

  The tripod towers waded into the water, continued out until their legs were about two-thirds submerged, then gently dipped the hood of the stricken tower beneath the surface. This extinguished the flames, and the rather badly blackened tripod tower was put back on its feet in the water while the other two towers ululated in vain to contact the fourth. The damaged tower now turned its blackened hood in the direction of Bargeyards and fired its heat weapon, in spite of the fact that the area was already burning. When fighting an enemy that is not technologically advanced, but is nevertheless armed with ponderous but powerful weapons, it is an exceedingly bad idea to stand still for very long. Out on the harbor were two battle galleys, the Megazoid and the Gigazoid, and on their foredecks each had a ballista mounted. When word that the towers were advancing on the city reached the waterfront, every vessel bigger than a rowboat was ordered out to sea, but because the shipping

  channel through the reefs and shoals was narrow, a crush soon developed. Between the floundering deepwater traders and smaller vessels were the two battle galleys. Seeing the enemy in the water, the two insanely brave galleymasters decided that they were legitimate targets, and thus eligible for attack.

  The truly remarkable thing is that the two galleys got relatively close before any of the Lupanians noticed. Finally a tower waved its farsight arm, as the towers do periodically, noticed the approaching galleys ... and had a moment of uncertainty. The Megazoid was on my left, and the Gigazoid on my right, approaching the towers in a pincer movement The tower took a couple of steps, to put itself to seaward of its damaged companion, then cast a black globe at the Gigazoid The globe hit the raised boarding ramp at the bow, bounced off, and landed in the water where it bubbled fiercely. Lavenci said later that the Lupanian in the tower probably just wanted to kill the crewmen, leaving the galley intact for examination. Whatever the case, the Megazoid came on at ramming speed.

  The tower now raised its heat weapon and fired a single, short burst at the Megazoid. It must have passed through the battle galley like a red-hot crossbow bolt hitting a silk battle pennant, but the beam of heat hit the vessel dead center—and thus missed the rowers, who were sitting to either side. It did, however, also strike the ballista that was on the deck behind the raised boarding ramp, setting its store of hellfire oil pots ablaze. Within moments the upper deck of the Megazoid wa
s an inferno. Now the tower turned to the Gigazoid, just as it dropped its landing ramp to expose its own hellfire-oil ballista. As it happened, the ballista crew had been winners of the Port of Alberin Siege Engine Challenge in the medium division for the past three years running, and could hit a ten-foot gate at two hundred yards. The hood of the fighting tower just happened to be about ten feet across. The ballista fired just as the heat weapon's ray hit the Gigazoid. A fifty-pound pot of hellfire oil flew true, and hit the tower squarely in the faceplate. It did not shatter, however. The Lupanians were apparently now using thicker glass. The tower began ululating for help, and the other two towers turned. By now the Gigazoid was burning fiercely and rowers were jumping for their lives, but the momentum of the sleek galley was driving it forward. The undamaged tower fired into the burning mass of the Gigazoid, but this only cut down some of its superstructure and did not diminish its speed. The battle galley collided with the tower, toppling it onto its own burning deck; then the burning mess continued on into the damaged tower.

  The surviving tower now turned to its companions, striding after the burning, sinking mass of warship and towers, grasping for the hoods to rescue its companions. New towers could be built, but Lupanians and handling beasts could not be replaced. To this day I can scarcely believe what I saw next. It was the inferno that the Megazoid had become, with burning hellfire oil streaming out of its scuppers and flames and smoke trailing out over the water. Apparently the flames on the upper deck had not yet reached the rowers below, so that although even the oars were on fire, the galley came on. Back on the quarterdeck men were frantically beating at the flames with leather flails, trying to protect the two or three men at the steersman's pole. With no more than twenty yards between them, the tower noticed the Megazoid, raised the heat weapon, and fired. The beam literally sliced the battle galley down the middle, but the tower had not reckoned with the momentum of the much heavier Megazoid. The wreckage ploughed on and struck the tower, entangling itself in the latticework legs, then dragging it down below the surface as it sank. As I watched, the Gigazoid sank too, taking the other two towers with it.