by Jay Lake
By the second day, he insisted on walking. Though his pace was poor and his ankles ached abominably, he had no desire to be carried by Boaz across the bottom of Africa like some great, mewling child.
The Brass did not argue. Instead, he outlined what was to come. “We must transit westwards the distance of fifty or sixty miles through this dense jungle scape,” he said, “before we may set our faces south and cross the Mitémélé in any hope of secrecy. From there we shall essay the lower reaches of the Wall. There we might hope to continue east with more rapidity and safety than ever we shall find in this rusting misery.”
Rusting misery. Stinking misery was more like it, but he had no desire to argue. “Aye,” he muttered, “Chinee on the water and in the air. The Englishman’s highway is not safe ’til Her Imperial Majesty sends more to sweep them Asiatic leavings off our doorstep. Meanwhile your plan of making for the Horn is better than walking up the fever coast of the Bight of Benin.”
“And so we shall proceed.” Boaz glanced at al-Wazir’s feet. “You shall set our pace, sir.”
The first parts of the journey were a confusion of vines and mud and doublings back around obstacle after obstacle while avoiding open stretches. By the second day they had the water on their right, but jungle followed the river inland. Al-Wazir supposed this was a blessing, as it shielded them from the airships he twice more heard pass overhead.
“I cannot conjecture whether they hunt for us,” Boaz told him that evening. Al-Wazir ate some sour fruit the Brass had found, and tried to ignore his desire for a fire, even in the night’s heat. “But there is a hunt aloft nonetheless. We should not be caught within their wily snares.”
“Where’s the Royal Navy in all this?”
“Neither of us can say.”
So on they walked.
After they crossed the Mitémélé, they angled south and east toward the rising bulk of the Wall. Al-Wazir saw smoke to the west. It might be Ottweill’s camp, but he could not find the desire to investigate. All he could do to rescue the men who remained there was press on. He tried not to think about the distance to Mogadishu. Boaz seemed to have methods to move quickly upon the Wall, perhaps in the brass cars the girl had mentioned.
Anything would be better than this damnable jungle.
A Chinese airship found them the next day as they crossed a meadow of waist-high grasses teeming with snakes. Busy looking down, al-Wazir realized their peril only when a rattling crack of small-arms fire got his attention.
It was about a thousand feet above them, trailing their position by a quarter mile. He’d have had the heads of his men for wasting ammunition at that range. Two on foot were not going to escape the attentions of an airship. They could afford to be patient up there.
“Fools.”
“We must proceed,” Boaz said. “There are larger rocks for shelter ahead.”
“Until they land a shore party to flush us out.”
“If so, we shall take what steps we may. But there is no purpose in standing here and waiting to be struck down.”
“Aye. Ye have the right of that.”
Several more volleys were fired as they crossed the open ground, ignoring the danger in favor of quickly making time. Nothing came close to hitting, though al-Wazir felt the familiar prickle of mixed fear and thrill at being the object of such a hunt. Every time Bassett had ever fought, he’d had the same sensation.
He’d just never experienced it in combination with the certainty of defeat.
They crouched behind a pair of boulders that formed a vee-shaped gap, like a stone lean-to. “Do ye suppose the Chinee are in the mood for prisoners?”
Spear in hand, Boaz looked over a rim of the rock. “I am in no position to speculate on such, but I rather imagine not. Their behavior of the past few days would seem to indicate frustration.”
“ ’Tis a bloody pain landing men from an airship when you’ve got no mooring,” al-Wazir offered. His ribs ached abominably.
Boaz shifted, improving his view. “Indeed, one might suppose so, but still they are letting down lines.”
Al-Wazir sighed. “We have no guns, we have no knives, and I’m not fit to rassle a sheep. If it were in me to surrender, I’d raise me drawers on a stick and call it done.”
“Abide,” said Boaz. “Another moment always comes, bringing another opportunity.”
“Aye, opportunity it is, ye great, daft bugger.”
“We are not taken yet, and we have not begun to fight.”
“Indeed, lad, indeed. You’d have made a fine tar.”
He rested in the deep shade of the rocks awhile, as Boaz continued to peer out of their shelter.
“Are you yet able to discharge a firearm?” the Brass asked a while later.
“Aye,” muttered al-Wazir. “Would that I had one.” He was trying to decide if he owed any apologies to God.
“I have formed a plan.”
The chief had never suffered from a poverty of imagination, but he would be snookered before he could see how Boaz thought to find a way out of this situation. “Excellent. And what plan would that be?”
“I surmise that the Chinese are hunting you with murderous intent. To the best of my knowledge, they have had no commerce with Ophir up on the Wall. My countenance will likely be of a surprising nature to them. I shall advance upon the party even now being landed by their catenary ropes and seek parley. They are more likely to take me aboard their airship, especially since executing me in the moment is not a meritorious strategy. Unlike you, I cannot be killed by a single well-placed shot.”
“Aye. And so ye’d be prisoner aboard yon Chinee airship and I’d be here alone with me busted rib.” He chuckled, trying not to laugh. “ ’Tis not so troublesome to see what benefit this brings me, but I cannae ken why ye should be so intent on it yourself.”
“I shall give to you my spear.” Boaz unslung his weapon and began adjusting the rings set into the shaft just behind the wedge-shaped point. “This is a capital offense in Ophir, to pass such a spear to a native of any sort, but we are not in Ophir now. You shall take aim at the Chinese airship. When the opportune moment presents itself, you shall fire the bolt into the gasbag. Continue firing until the lightning spear is exhausted. With even a minim of luck, we shall see the gasbag ignited.”
He handed the spear to al-Wazir, who took it gingerly. These weapons had spouted lightning in the night outside the palisades of Ottweill’s camp. He was not so keen to hold one now, for all that it might be a miracle of science from the Wall and worth a pretty penny in London. “Dull-witted sailor that I am, even I can point out several flaws in your plan.”
“I possess the strength of four or five of your fellows,” Boaz said. “I was able to carry you across difficult terrain. They may bind me or guard me, but it is not unreasonable to assume that I shall be able to break away and find the tiller. I will drive the airship southward and down, so it passes over your position at the lowest altitude possible. Then you will fire upon it.”
“While a hundred angry Chinee swarm you, just before a bag of hydrogen explodes above your head.” Al-Wazir sat up, gripping the spear more tightly. “And why should you do such a fool thing?”
“I want to see her again.” Boaz’ voice was quiet. “On my own, I shall never find her. Preserving your life is my sole opportunity.”
“Best be going, then,” said al-Wazir, who knew a suicide mission when he heard one.
Boaz slid around through the rocks and out into the sunlight. A moment later, al-Wazir heard the Brass’ voice hailing loudly.
He examined the spear, toying with the three machined rings just below the head. He was unwilling to accidentally eliminate whatever adjustments the Brass had made.
Shouting and the meaty thump of fisticuffs echoed from outside. Boaz was distracting them. He resisted the urge to peek. Let them worry about the Brass. If the airship began to move, he would take his shot. If not, he would wish the brass man farewell and seek a comfortable place to hide, eithe
r to heal or to die.
A few minutes later, small-arms fire rattled again. Al-Wazir took that as his cue and painfully pulled himself up to look.
The airship still swung in the wind, keeping station under low engine idle a quarter mile distant and about two hundred feet up. The ropes trailed down, two men ascending in bosun’s chairs, when the engines began to growl loudly. Al-Wazir watched in amazed delight as the nose of the airship wobbled, then dipped hard. She began to make headway toward him and the Wall beyond.
He braced the lightning spear, wondering where and how to grab it to fire. Al-Wazir ran his hands up and down the shaft, feeling for a catch or trigger.
He realized he should have asked for more instruction.
The airship wobbled and began to turn across the wind. Al-Wazir realized that if she made that cut, she’d pass no closer than she was right now. He stood and braced himself as the nose swung the other way. Two men tumbled off. The chaos on the deck was audible now.
He’d faced those Brass in combat, and knew how fearsome they were as hand-to-hand fighters. It was hard to imagine what the Chinese captain was about, not to simply have the crew rush the poop and bodily overpower Boaz.
The ship dipped again and the engines suddenly howled. She was almost overhead now. He aimed, fingers on the lowest ring below the spear head in a desperate guess. Twitch, nothing. Turn, nothing.
A pressure caused a bolt of lightning to vomit from the tip, blinding al-Wazir for a moment. When squinting, tear-filled sight returned, he saw part of the gasbag smoldering. Smoke trailing from the port rail amidships.
There was shouting from somewhere nearby on the ground—the last few sailors, chasing their ship and now realizing he must be here.
One thing at a time, al-Wazir told himself. Once he killed them all, God would know His own.
Another shot, this time with his eyes closed at the last moment. He opened them to see a burning man falling almost directly toward him. The wailing scream ended with a wet thump and the mixed smell of blood and shit just on the other side of his sheltering rock.
The airship was almost past. Third time, third time. He aimed once more, fired, and kept his eyes closed for a three count.
Just after he muttered “two,” there was a noise too large to really be heard. A pressing wave of dry heat washed over him. Al-Wazir opened his eyes and slid to the top of the rock to gun down whoever was approaching. He tried not to think about the burning hull about to drop upon his head, or wonder where Boaz had gotten to and how the Brass had even intended to survive.
Three sailors were just past arm’s length. Al-Wazir streamed the lightning at them, cutting them in smoldering halves even as a chunk of smoking hull the size of a barge smashed down upon them. He dropped and rolled back into the deepest shadow of the rock shelter, waiting for the rest of the fire to rain from the sky.
He was not disappointed.
Al-Wazir unfolded his arms from atop his head and crawled back up to look over the lip of the rock. Shards of burning gasbag lay all over the meadow.
Keeping the spear close to hand, he shuffled out into the smoking field to look for his friend and rescuer. Boaz was facedown, partially wrapped in rope. Al-Wazir poked him gently, then carefully sat next to the brass man. He managed to turn Boaz over. The metal eyes were blank, the head unmoving, but the Brass seemed intact. There were a number of dents and scorches, and he had all his limbs. Nothing was obviously loose.
Al-Wazir tugged at Boaz’ shoulders. “Have they knocked your head in, you bloody oaf?”
There was no answer.
He sat there awhile, realizing he had no hope of dragging Boaz back to the rock shelter. Instead al-Wazir struggled to his feet to gather enough scrap to build a little fire. It was not so difficult to light, with all the punky wreckage around still showing ash and coal.
The Chinese, he left dead where they lay. He was injured, and had no shovel besides. And since the Asiatic bastards had tried twice to kill him, al-Wazir did not feel moved to spare them any grace now.
Instead he watched the stars come out and tried to keep warm and occasionally touched Boaz for luck.
“It is not meant to be so,” Boaz said, around midnight.
Al-Wazir startled awake. He hadn’t been asleep, not exactly, but drifting in a painful doze. He rubbed grit from his eyes and looked at the Brass carefully. “You live?”
“I exist, at the least.” Boaz sat up with a groan of stressed metal. “I have been better.”
“There’s plenty who will be looking to see what went a-booming into flame this afternoon. If you can find your way to walking, we ought to be moving on.”
“And you?” Boaz asked.
“And me.”
Like a pair of crippled lovers, they continued to follow the path that had led them into this meadow, climbing toward the base of the Wall. They had to pass around another hulking section of the Chinese airship, but then there seemed to be no more enemies save the dark of night, fatigue, and the injuries both already bore.
They walked, and walked farther. There was nothing else to do.
CHILDRESS
She stared at Admiral Shang, wondering exactly what he meant by the question about Poinsard. Lacking other wisdom, she settled on directness. “I am present in her stead.”
Leung translated.
“Agreements were made,” Shang replied in English.
“I shall abide by them.” She had no idea what that might mean, but Childress knew she had to maintain control of the conversation or she was lost. “The Golden Bridge at Chersonesus Aurea is a grave danger to the Celestial Kingdom, and indeed, all of Northern Earth. I have been sent in the place of the Mask Poinsard to deliver wisdom she was unwilling to face in her turn.”
More translation, followed by another series of questions and response. The captain turned to her. “I am to congratulate you on your promotion. The admiral is familiar with that theory of succession and is impressed that a foreign woman has the face to follow through.”
Childress felt a surge of desperation. To thank him now was to further compound the lie, dig herself in where she already had not meant to pass. But she had no choice. She was committed.
“I will not gainsay your conclusions, Admiral Shang. I am here now. The Mask Poinsard is not. I would scarce have made the long and toilsome journey merely to present you with platitudes.”
There, she thought, let him unravel that. From Leung’s vaguely sour expression, she realized the captain was not pleased either. Childress gave the admiral the small smile she normally reserved for wayward students and too-forward tradesmen.
“The admiral apologizes for any misperception,” Leung said. “He inquires as to your concerns about the Golden Bridge.”
Another gate passed, another brick in the wall of lies. She shook off the guilt. It was time to recapitulate her conversation with Leung. “The Southern Earth is a dark and magical place,” Childress began.
When she was done with her discourse, Childress stepped back a pace. The admiral nodded absently. He then began a lengthy, low-voiced conversation with Leung, the two of them ignoring her. Childress wandered over to the nearest window to look down upon the bustle of life in Tainan.
The street before the Beiyang Admiralty was no different from what she’d seen on the way over from Five Lucky Winds. This time, though, she had the luxury of observing from a fixed point. She was also in nearly full possession of her sense of nerve. The life of the Tainan docks was spread before her—fruit-sellers, men with the little metal ovens on poles, dogs lounging in the shadows, firecracker-sellers and bicycle-peddlers and hurrying students and sailors and brash women and quiet servants.
The place was less and less different from the New Haven waterfront every time she looked at it. How had she found Tainan so foreign? Even the Chinese seemed normal to her, to the degree that when she saw a tall European in a white linen suit approaching the admiralty building, he looked very strange indeed.
She whirled
, looking at Leung in hopes of warning him that something critical might be afoot. The captain and the admiral both glanced over at her sudden movement.
“Someone comes,” Childress said. “A tall man, of my people.”
Shang just nodded. Leung seemed surprised, then cast a narrow-eyed glance at his admiral. “What have you done?” he asked in English.
Admiral Shang stepped around his desk and sat without answering. He waved Leung to the wall behind him, in the place where an adjutant might stand at his shoulder. Childress stayed by the window, her link to the world of the Chinese. She wondered when she had become afraid of people of her own race.
The visitor was shown in moments later. He was a tall man, with hair even whiter than Shang’s, but pale eyes that belied albinism. His skin was faintly flushed with the effort of his recent walk. A brass-tipped cane of some dark wood dangled in one hand.
This man was unmistakably European. Not some sport like Shang, nor a member of a strange race.
Shang spoke in Chinese, from which Childress caught only the interrogative. The tall man nodded, answering likewise.
“She has come in the place of the Mask Poinsard,” Leung said into the stretching silence.
“The world is strange, and brings stranger gifts to us all.” This time the tall European nodded to Childress. “I am William of Ghent.”
The sorcerer! She was found out! There was nothing for it but to play her hand bold as brass, as would a student caught after curfew. She could hope her forwardness would be rewarded. Childress was confident that meek humility never could be.
“I am Emily McHenry Childress, Mask of the avebianco, come in place of the Mask Poinsard to speak against the project at the Wall.” Something plucked at her memory. “You are dead, I have been told. On good authority.” The highest, in fact, as it was this man’s supposed death for which her own sacrifice to the Silent Order was penance.
“I would like to say those reports have been exaggerated, but like so many rumors, there is in fact a sad kernel of truth.” His expression was almost mournful. “If my passing has given you difficulty, I am at a loss for suitable apologies. I cannot say that I recall our ever meeting before.”