by Naomi Novik
—and the coat itself was an aviator’s green.
The first order of business was plainly to get the ship afloat again: a ship sitting on rocks was of no use to anyone. “But shan’t the ocean get in, once those are underwater?” Lily said, her head tilted to examine the gaping holes where the rocks had pierced the hull and yet stood within, keeping the Potentate fixed upon the shoals.
“Oh! by no means,” Temeraire said. “They will patch it, with some timber and oakum, I believe; or perhaps with something else, it makes not a particle of difference. That is not our affair: that is for the sailors to worry about.”
He spoke with impatience, which he was aware Lily did not deserve, but he could not quite help himself. It was so very hard to stay here, especially when he was forced to overhear the officers, who insisted on speaking to one another in the certainty of Laurence’s death; even Granby, of whom Temeraire would have expected better, had only said to Hammond, “For Heaven’s sake, Hammond, let him think as he likes. It will take him dreadfully, when he does believe it.”
“Well, I am not going to believe it, so there,” Temeraire said, to himself; but it certainly did not improve his already-great anxiety to be away, searching for Laurence; and neither did Churki sitting there like a great unhelpful lump and wagging her head seriously and saying, “This is what comes of putting all your heart in just one person! Hammond, I should have mentioned before, I hope you are thinking of marriage, and do not fear that I am inclined to be unreasonable. As long as she is young enough to have a great many children, I will be very pleased, whatever your choice.”
Temeraire snorted: Churki might be considerably older, and very experienced from her service with the Incan army, but what did she know of it, anyway. He was quite done considering her opinion as particularly worthwhile; at least, on this subject.
But he very badly wished to go look for Laurence, anyway: and after all, there was no egg yet; there might not be an egg for days, and until there was an egg, it was none of his business but Iskierka’s, whatever she might say. And he would have gone, indeed—if only he could have persuaded himself that this explanation would hold the least weight with Laurence.
But Temeraire could just see himself trying to tell Laurence that he had left an egg on a ship swinging about on some rocks, with no-one to look after it but Iskierka. And not just any egg, but his very own egg and Iskierka’s: a Celestial and Kazilik cross, which Granby had said that very afternoon, to Captain Blaise, was likely worth more than the crown jewels of Britain—Temeraire had never seen these, but he was sure they must be impressive—and they must have a great deal of straw and a warm room set aside for it, if he pleased.
“But the ship is not in any real danger, at present,” Temeraire argued, to an imagined Laurence, “and after all if it did sink, we are close enough to fly to shore. And it is not only Iskierka to watch over it: there are Maximus and Lily, too, who would not let anything happen to the egg; and the rest of our formation, and Kulingile and Churki, besides. Really it would be extraordinary if anything should go wrong—”
But the vision of Laurence was unpersuaded, and only looked at him with gentle reproof: it was not their responsibility; it was his, and not to be pushed off onto someone else. Temeraire’s ruff drooped as he lost the argument with himself once again.
“Anyway,” he said to Lily now, out loud, with apology in his tone, “I am sure they will manage that part of the business perfectly well: so pray let us think how we are to get her off the rocks, instead.”
He had hoped, at first, that they might simply be able to lift the ship with all of them working together, but the ship’s master Mr. Ness had categorically made this impossible as a matter of weight. When he had worked the figures large enough to see clearly, Temeraire had been forced to admit as much: why on earth anyone had put five hundred tons of pig iron and another four hundred of shingle at the very bottom of the Potentate’s hold was quite a mystery to him, and he could not in the least work out how she stayed afloat ordinarily, but lifting her straight up by even an inch would certainly be beyond their power.
“If only we might rig a pulley!” he added again, but his best ingenuity had failed at contriving any way to establish a pulley in mid-air, above the ship, out in the middle of the ocean. “Or a lever—”
“Well, what about a lever?” Maximus said, gingerly sitting back on his haunches on the shoals, giving over his own attempts to inspect the holes: the ocean was too rough to see them from any distance. “That is only a stick, put underneath and pushed, ain’t it?” and Temeraire paused. He had been stopped, by the size of the ship, but perhaps—
“Where the devil are we to get a lever big enough to move her?” Mr. Ness called down at them, in exasperation. “Why, it should have to be taller than Babel.”
“We do not want one lever,” Temeraire said, with a sudden burst of inspiration. “We want three: one for me, and Maximus, and Kulingile, all to push on at once; and we will get trees from the shore to make them.”
Laurence would have given a great deal for a pair of boots. He contented himself, in the meantime, by working out a way of lacing the sandals more closely to his feet with the unraveled remnants of his woolen stockings, braided to make thin ropes. The coat he made into a bundle with his trousers: at least in the native clothing, he hoped he would not be utterly conspicuous at a glance, when he had tied a rag over his hair.
The bundle he left in the corner of the room when the servants came with the evening meal, and despite the reawakening of his sense of taste, he forced himself to eat even the fermented fish with its sour, vinegared rice; he could not anticipate another meal, any time soon. When it was cleared away, and the noises of the house began to die away along with the light filtering in through the rice-paper walls, Laurence debated with himself the merits of going after the sword. All practicality argued against it. He could not be sure the sword would yet be in Kaneko’s office, nor that the chamber would be unguarded; if he did retrieve it, the blade should then have to be concealed somehow, or draw unwanted attention. A sword wrapped in a bundle of clothing would be of little use if he were confronted unexpectedly by a few pursuers; and only if he were taken so might he hope to escape.
“Well,” Laurence said, standing, “I may as well have a look: if it does not come easy to hand, I may always withdraw.” He felt awkward, uneasy in the decision: irrational, when so many sensible arguments stood against it. He could not have said why; some inarticulate feeling only revolted. He did not want to leave the sword.
He mentally told himself to wake at four bells of the middle watch, and slept until the deep of the night, rousing from another strange and unpleasant dream: great chains tangled around his wrists, dragging him through deep water. He took his bundle, slung over a shoulder by his belt, and stepped cautiously out into the hallway: the soft matting did not betray him as he walked, barefoot to keep the slap of the sandals from making any noise.
The walls were a faint luminescent grey, paler than their frames. He kept the very tips of his fingers lightly against the surface of the paper, guiding his steps through the dark. There was a yellow glow of lantern-light somewhere on his right—outside the house, he thought; within, all the rooms were dark. He came to Kaneko’s office, and the door slid soundlessly open on its track. He thought at first he had mistaken the room: the desk was gone, and the room entirely bare at first glance. Then Laurence saw the furniture had all been tidied away against the walls, and the writing-desk stood atop a low chest.
He carefully lifted down the desk, and opening the lid found the blade wrapped in a soft silk cloth, which he left behind. He put the sword inside his bundle of clothing, pulling out folds to conceal it from hilt to tip, and restored the chest and desk to their places. He was comforted to have the sword again, and yet distressed for being so: too much as though he could not trust himself, his own feelings, to be as they ought.
Slipping back into the hallway, he looked for a way out, and followed a br
eath of air to the entryway: a very indifferent sentry drowsed in a corner, and Laurence was past him and had a foot in the gardens when a great roaring came from above, a sound at once familiar and bone-rattling, though he had not heard it since the battle of the Nile: a dragon, overhead, and the lights of all the house flared at his back.
“Buggering mad, the lot of you,” Mr. Ness had said, rudely, but Temeraire had with some exasperation demanded a better suggestion of him and, failing to receive any, had nodded firmly.
“Then we shall at least try,” he said, “and if it does not work, then I suppose you must begin to take out all that ballast and throw it into the ocean, along with the cannon, until we can lift the ship; and while you do that, Iskierka will go to the shore to be safe, and the other dragons will stay with her and the egg, and I will go and find Laurence. You will stay with the egg?” he appealed, turning his head.
“Of course we will,” Maximus said stoutly, and Lily added, “All of us: except Nitidus will go with you, to carry messages back and forth,” an excellent notion. Temeraire was quite sure no-one would give any trouble to Iskierka and Lily and Maximus.
“Anyway,” Lily said, “perhaps it needn’t come to that, and I am quite ready to be off these rocks: let us go by all means and fetch some trees.”
But they were unable to leave immediately: “I want to come, too!” Kulingile called down, in protest. Certainly Temeraire could not stay, but Maximus stood on seniority and refused to stay behind, either, which bode fair to make a quarrel; and meanwhile Hammond began bleating of the necessity to avoid being seen. Well, Temeraire did not mean to go in blowing on trumpets, but after all, they did need to take away several large trees, and he supposed someone might notice: that would not be his fault.
“We had better come along, then, Hammond; and all your crews, also,” Churki said.
Hammond, taken aback, said, “Certainly not—a martial presence, nothing more undesirable—”
But Churki shook her head censoriously at him. “If there are dragons here, they will certainly assume we are here to take their people away if they do not see we have any of our own. And if there are men, they will want men to talk to: that is only the natural order of things, and all the more so if they are like these peculiar sailors you have here on this vessel, who are afraid of dragons.”
Hammond paused, doubtful; Temeraire could see the sense in what Churki said, but he did not mean to countenance the delay involved in getting all the crews aboard. He only had a scant few officers himself, but Lily and her formation-dragons had their full crews, and even the aviators could not easily go clambering aboard from the precarious surface which the ship presently offered.
“The captains shall come with us,” Temeraire said, “and Ferris shall come with me, which will make a sensible number of men, and not any sort of threatening number; and,” to Kulingile, “this time Maximus shall go, and if we cannot get the boat off, then next time, you shall: that is surely only fair. And,” he added, very handsomely in his opinion, “I will take the lines when we come back to give you a rest before we lever her off, even though it will not be my turn yet.”
“I do not need a rest,” Kulingile said disconsolately. “This is not very difficult: it is only tiresome, and I want something better to eat, which you are sure to get when you are on land.”
“Oh!” Iskierka said, raising up her head from the dragondeck, where she had lain down again, ignoring Granby and Maximus’s surgeon Gaiters clambering about her hindquarters, consulting in low voices, “a cow! You shall bring me back a cow, Temeraire; do not forget it.”
“Wherever am I to find a cow, which is not someone’s property?” Temeraire said in exasperation, and Hammond at once began to speak again—likely the discussion should have been another hour, but Temeraire realized his mistake and said quickly, “but we will bring you both back something good to eat, if we should find anything without anyone seeing us, or objecting: we will save you the very best of what we find, you have my promise.”
“Well, that is fair,” Kulingile said, mollified, and Temeraire put out a foreleg on the dragondeck for Ferris, who hesitated only a moment before climbing into his grasp, and then launched them before anyone else could object further, or make any more unreasonable demands.
Ferris was very quiet, when he had got astride Temeraire’s neck and buckled himself on, while they hovered waiting for the other dragons to take up their captains and come aloft—Temeraire was careful to keep out of ear-shot of the deck. “Are you quite well, Ferris?” Temeraire said, craning about his head.
Ferris hesitated; he looked a great deal better lately, Temeraire had even before now noticed and approved: he could not help but congratulate himself for it, and see in it evidence that he was not a careless guardian of his crew, despite all their trials amongst the Inca and since.
Certainly Ferris was happier than when he had first come back to them in New South Wales; he was not so weary-looking, and the ruddy blotches which had marred his face then had cleared. He looked nearer his four-and-twenty than he had, and if he did not wear a green coat—Temeraire did not understand why Hammond had not straightened out that matter yet—at least the coat which he did wear, brown, was neat and trim and with silver buttons; and he took excellent care of his linen, which was properly white.
“You ought have taken Forthing,” Ferris said abruptly.
“Oh, Forthing,” Temeraire said, with a flick of his ruff. “Whyever for? I do not see why I ought to be giving Forthing any special notice: he is very well, I suppose, for ordinary work.”
“He is an officer of the Corps,” Ferris said, “and I—I am not; he is your first lieutenant.”
“You were, before him,” Temeraire said, “except for Granby; whom I cannot ask to come away from Iskierka under the circumstances. I do not take any notice of what some silly court-martial may have said, Ferris: I hope you do not think I do, and you ought not, either. Why, they declared Laurence should be put to death; you cannot imagine their judgment holds any water with me, or anyone of sense.”
Ferris was silent, and then he said, “You wouldn’t be taking Forthing up, no matter what, I suppose.”
“Taking him up?” Temeraire said. “I am perfectly happy for him to ride, when the rest of the crew do,” although this was not entirely true: with as much opportunity as Ferris had been given, during their brief stay in Brazil, Forthing had not bothered to repair any of his wardrobe but what had outright holes in it; his green coat was faded almost to grey, his neckcloth a disgrace, and his trousers frayed at hem and seams. It was an embarrassment, and all Temeraire’s hinting had gone unheeded entirely.
“No, I mean,” Ferris said, hesitated, and said, “if Captain Laurence—if we should not—”
Temeraire was still quite puzzled a moment; then he understood, and indignation swelled his breast. “I should not take that slovenly third-rate—piker for my captain if he were the last person to be had on the earth,” he said, heatedly. “Oh! Him, to succeed Laurence: I should like to see it! If the Admiralty should dare to propose it, I should go to Whitehall and bring the Navy Offices down about their ears.
“Anyway,” he added, in the teeth of his own anxiety, “I am sure Laurence will look after himself very well, until we can come get him: oh! Why are they taking so very long about getting aloft?”
The flight was not a long one, the coast rising ahead of them as they flew, the waters still depthless blue-black beneath. Dulcia and Nitidus sped on ahead in spite of Hammond’s cries of protest, but they circled back to meet the rest of them shortly before they all came over the coast: they had seen a few small fishing-boats, they reported, and a great many large half-drowned rice fields, with the beginnings of green shoots.
“But nothing very nice to eat,” Nitidus said sadly. “Why, I did not even see a sheep, or a goat.”
“Thank Heaven,” Temeraire could overhear Hammond say, foolishly: it would have been nice to know sheep might be had, even if they could not easily
be got.
Captain Warren fetched Nitidus a buffet to the shoulder, and raised his speaking-trumpet to call over from his back, as they fell back into formation, “More to the point, there’s a bay straightaway three points to the north, with pine-trees as handsome as you could like.”
The bay was isolate, the glossy black water’s surface broken with a great many lumpy protruding rocks which likely made it inconvenient for fishing-boats, and showed no signs of use except a low stone wall which did not seem to have any purpose at all; it only ran along the shore in either direction. Hammond let himself down from Churki’s back clumsily but with haste the instant they had landed, and hurried to inspect: it was overgrown with a carpet of pale short green grass. “I see no sign of any other sort of traffic,” he said, with great relief, when he had straightened up, “so now pray let us get the trees and be away: at once, at once. I shall account all arrears of Fortune paid off, if only we should escape without notice.”
Lily cocked her head, considering, and said, “I suppose we should like them to fall inwards: stand back, all of you, if you please.”
“And to the north,” Captain Harcourt added, from her back, looking at the narrow wind-socks which stood up from Lily’s harness at various points. “Sing out when you are all safe away.”
Temeraire waited until Hammond with the rest of the company was moving, hastily, out of any chance of Lily’s acid spattering, and then announced, “I will go aloft, and see if I can make out anything more of the countryside: I should not like to disappoint Iskierka.”
In point of fact, he was quite willing to disappoint Iskierka if there were no cows to be had; but so long as they were here on land, Temeraire did not see any reason not to have a look around for Laurence. “Of course we are not likely to see him,” he added to Ferris, over his shoulder, as he flew quickly away before he might have to hear Hammond shouting protests after him, “but if only we should happen to, how convenient that would be: even Hammond could not complain, then. And even if we do not, we will have saved some time, later; we will not have to search here again. We will not go far, we will only go along the coast—”