by David Weber
The admiral looked down at the canvas envelope, addressed in Captain Styvyn Kharmahdy’s clerk’s handwriting, stitched shut, and secured with a wax seal.
Kharmahdy commanded the Dohlaran shore establishment: not simply the Dohlaran manned batteries protecting the immediate base area, but also its warehouses, dockyards, service craft, powder magazines, sail lofts, and everything else associated with keeping the Squadron in fighting trim. Under other circumstances, he would have been accorded the title of “port admiral” and given the rank to go with it, but Duke Fern had decreed otherwise in this case. Apparently the First Councilor had worried it might offend their Harchongese hosts in Rhaigair. But if Kharmahdy remained a mere captain, he was also a very capable—and levelheaded—sort of fellow. It wasn’t like him to go off into fits of anxiety or panic, but this envelope was far heavier than usual. Obviously, the commodore’s clerk had tucked a handful of musket balls into it before he handed it to the messenger. That was a security measure designed to carry it to the bottom if it strayed out of authorized hands, and Raisahndo’s sense of trepidation sharpened as he wondered why that had seemed necessary.
The most probable answer was that Kharmahdy was relaying a message from Dohlar which had just arrived by coded semaphore or messenger wyvern, and if it was important enough to send by itself rather than waiting for the regular afternoon mail delivery, it was unlikely to contain good news. Which, given what had happened to Earl Thirsk’s family a few months ago—and how it had happened—was more than enough to send his heart down to somewhere in the vicinity of his shoe soles.
Stop procrastinating, he told himself. Sooner or later, you have to open the damned thing!
He exhaled, picked up the cheese knife, and slit the envelope’s stitches. Then he laid the knife down, extracted the single sheet of paper, and unfolded it.
His face tightened, and he made himself reread the brief, concise note a second time.
At least it’s not an announcement that the Earl’s been arrested, Caitahno, he thought. Be grateful for that much! Not that this is any better.
“Well, I suppose I understand why he didn’t use signals.” His tone was dry, but his brown eyes were very dark as he looked up at Kahmelka and extended the message. “No point spreading panic any sooner than we have to. But it would appear the question of the heretics’ intentions has just been answered.”
* * *
“Finger Cape off the starboard bow, Sir,” the lookout called, then bent over the pelorus mounted on HMS Eraystor’s bridge wing and peered through the aperture in the raised sighting vanes. It was another of the plethora of new devices coming out of Charis these days, and he measured the angle carefully against the lubber line before he looked back over his shoulder.
“Seventeen degrees, relative, Sir.”
“Very good,” Zhaikyb Gregori said and turned to the bridge messenger at his elbow.
“My respects to the Captain and Admiral Zhastro,” he said. “Inform them Finger Cape is now visible from the bridge, a point and a half off the starboard bow. I estimate we’ll be abreast the battery there in approximately forty minutes.”
* * *
Captain of Swords Raikow Kaidahn stood in the observation tower atop Battery St. Thermyn, gazing through the tripod-mounted spyglass at the bizarre-looking vessels making their way steadily—and with complete disregard for wind or current—through South Channel into the broad waters of Saram Bay. He’d waited for the last half hour, holding his followup reports to Rhagair until he had something more definite than smoke to report. Now he did, and he wished to hell he didn’t. Or that he could have done something more effective than sending in reports about them, anyway.
Unfortunately for anything he might have done, however, those ships were at least seven miles from his battery’s site on the very tip of the long, thin ribbon of Finger Cape. Known with very little affection to its occupants, who deeply resented being given their current assignment, as “the Finger” (after the hand gesture which expressed much the same meaning it once had on Old Terra), the cape projecting into the channel from Basset Island was over ten miles long, but less than a mile and a half across at its widest, and its highest elevation was little more than forty feet above sea level at high tide. That made things … interesting when heavy weather blew up the channel and sent seas crashing clear across it. In fact, in Raikow Kaidahn’s considered opinion, the Finger was a miserable, waterlogged sandbar at the best of times … which winter in Stene Province wasn’t. Just building a battery on it had required more than a little ingenuity out of the Imperial Harchongese Army’s engineers.
And keeping the damned thing here’s required a hell of a lot more, he thought moodily.
The winter’s storms had not been kind to him or his gunners—they’d had to evacuate the battery twice, and each time repairs had amounted to effectively rebuilding it afterward—and he couldn’t really understand why Lord of Horse Golden Grass had stuck them out here in the first place. They hadn’t even been equipped with any of the new rifled artillery pieces, since the navigable channel between the Finger and Saram Head was almost fourteen miles across. No one was coming into range of Battery St. Thermyn unless he was one hell of a bad navigator or wind and weather gave him no choice. For that matter, the channel was literally impossible to defend at all; there was simply no place to put the guns that might have engaged an intruder.
On the other hand, you’re in a good position to warn Rhaigair they’re coming, aren’t you? Not that they’re being particularly stealthy. For that matter, it’s hard to see how those … smokepots could sneak up on Rhaigair, whether we were sitting out on this Shan-wei-damned sandspit or not!
He sighed, straightened his back, and turned to the anxious-faced young captain of spears at his elbow.
“I make it five of the bastards, Thaidin. I don’t see any topsails tagging along, but I’m sure they’re out there somewhere. I imagine their galleons’ll keep their distance unless the wind shifts to favor them.” His lips twitched under his pencil thin mustache. “Not like these fellows will need them anytime soon.”
Captain of Spears Chinzhou’s face tightened. For a moment, Kaidahn thought the younger man would accuse him of defeatism. Young Chinzhou was a very devout fellow, who spent too much time with the local inquisitors, in Kaidahn’s opinion. After a moment, though, the captain of spears nodded unhappily.
“I suppose not, Sir,” he acknowledged. “May I?”
He gestured at the spyglass, and Kaidahn nodded and stepped back to let him look through it. His shoulders tightened as the image of the smoke-spewing heretic vessels swam into sharper focus, and Kaidahn didn’t blame him. They were huge, easily two or three hundred feet long, and the enormously long guns protruding from their stepped-back, armored superstructures were enough to strike a chill in any heart.
Especially if the possessor of that heart had read the reports of what those same guns had done to the Desnairian fortifications at Geyra Bay.
Chinzhou gazed at them for at least two minutes before he stood back, shaking his head.
“What do you think Admiral Raisahndo will do, Sir?”
“Whatever he can,” Kaidahn said. “I’ve never met him personally, but I understand he’s a brave and determined man, so I have no doubt of that. As to what he can do against something like this—?”
He gestured at the columns of smoke steaming steadily past their position, and Chinzhou nodded somberly.
I know what he damned well ought to do, though, Kaidahn thought. The wind’s fair for all three channels, and unless those heretic bastards have enough of these things to cover all of them, I’d damned well be getting my ships the Shan-wei out of their way. Of course, the heretics probably have some of their armored galleons waiting out to sea, but I’d a hell of a lot rather take my chances with them than face these things inside the bay.
He considered what he’d just thought for a moment, then smiled grimly.
Maybe young Thaidin would’ve had a
point about my “defeatism.” But—any temptation to smile disappeared—in Raisahndo’s shoes, I’d really like to keep at least some of my men alive.
“Well, all we can do is see to it that he’s as well-informed as possible,” he said out loud, and looked at the signalman standing respectfully by the tower rail. “Signal to Admiral Raisahndo, General Cahstnyr, Captain Kharmahdy, and Baron Golden Grass.”
“Yes, Sir,” the signalman replied, pencil poised above his pad.
“‘Have confirmed five—repeat, five—heretic steam ironclads entering Saram Bay. Present position—’ be sure to insert the present time, Chyngdow ‘—approximately seven miles due south of Battery St. Thermyn. Estimated speed ten—repeat, ten—knots.’” He paused a moment, considering whether or not to add something more, then shrugged. “Read that back,” he said.
“Yes, Sir,” the signalman said, and read it back word-for-word.
“Excellent. Get it off immediately.”
“Yes, Sir!”
The signalman bowed in salute and headed for the observation tower’s stairs and the signal mast at the far end of the long, narrow battery. Kaidahn watched him go, then drew a deep breath and turned back to the spyglass.
* * *
“I don’t suppose anyone’s come up with any brilliant ideas in the last couple of hours?” Caitahno Raisahndo asked, smiling with very little humor. Captain of Swords Kaidahn’s message, relayed by the semaphore stations on Basset and Shipworm Island, lay on the chart table aboard HMS Hurricane.
His 60-gun flagship was the lead ship of the most heavily armed class of galleons the Royal Dohlaran Navy had ever built, fitted with the new 6-inch shell-firing smoothbores. That made her one of the most powerful warships in the world … and meant absolutely nothing against the threat steaming towards them.
“I’m afraid not,” Admiral Pawal Hahlynd replied heavily. His armored screw-galleys had been the decisive factor in the Kaudzhu Narrows, but like Hurricane, they were utterly outclassed by the Charisian ships which had demolished the fortifications at Geyra. And these had to be the same ships.
Unless, of course, the bastards have managed to build even more of the Shan-wei-damned things, Raisahndo reminded himself grimly. Don’t forget that delightful possibility.
“Sir,” Commander Kahmelka said in a very careful tone, “the Squadron can’t fight them. I mean, it literally can’t.” He looked at the far more senior officers hiding their thoughts behind faces of stone. “If the Harchongians are right about their speed, not even Admiral Hahlynd’s screw-galleys could hope to maneuver with them. And according to the reports from Geyra, their guns have a range of at least ten thousand yards. With all the courage in the world, our ships would never live to get into our range of them.”
“We can’t just run away, Commander!” Captain Bryntyn Mykylhny said sharply. “And the bastards have to get into the bay in the first place before we start worrying about how we get at them!”
Mykylhny commanded HMS Cyclone, Hurricane’s sister ship, and he’d stepped into a dead man’s shoes to take command of one of Dahrand Rohsail’s divisions at the Kaudzhu Narrows. His promotion to acting commodore had been confirmed by Rohsail as one of his last actions before he went into hospital in Rhaigair, and he’d always been one of Rohsail’s favorites. Raisahndo tried not to hold that against him, reminding himself—again—that however big a pain in the arse Rohsail might be, the supercilious, arrogant, aristocratic son-of-a-bitch had always been one hell of a fighter. And the same was true of Mykylhny … including the arrogant, aristocratic attitude.
“I’m not advocating ‘running away,’ Sir,” Kahmelka said in an even more careful tone. “I’m simply pointing out that if we try to engage them ship-to-ship, we won’t be able to. We’ll be physically unable to, Sir. And, frankly, I don’t think the batteries will keep them out of the inner bay, either.” He shook his head, his expression grim. “I know they’ll give a good account of themselves, but based on the reports from Geyra—and even more on our own analysis of Dreadnought—I don’t think they can hope to get past the heretics’ armor before ships this fast sail right past their muzzles. If they had more elevation, if they could shoot down at their decks, where the armor’s almost certainly thinner, they might be able to inflict some serious damage. But firing directly into their thickest armor?”
He shook his head again.
“They’re coming through, Sir. One way or another, unless we want to assume they won’t have the guts to try, they’ll be off Rhaigair by this time tomorrow.”
He paused, looking around the cabin, but it was obvious no one cared to suggest anything that damned silly where Charisians were concerned. After a moment, he shrugged and continued.
“Under other circumstances, we might do some good by anchoring to help cover the channel exits.” That was, in fact, precisely what the Western Squadron had intended to do in the event of an attack by more conventional opponents. “In this case, I doubt we’d accomplish anything except bringing them into their range of us even sooner. And much as I hate saying this—and, believe me, I do—just one of those ships could easily destroy the entire Squadron … and they have five of them.” He shook his head a third time. “Captain, no one has more respect for the courage and the determination of our officers—and men—than I do. But this isn’t about courage or dedication, or even about devotion to God. It’s about the fact that the Squadron represents sixty percent of the Navy’s entire remaining strength … and that if we stand and fight—try to fight—against the ironclads that destroyed Geyra as a port, we’ll lose it in return for nothing.”
Mykylhny glared at him, and Raisahndo frowned. Kahmelka had been one of Ahlvyn Khapahr’s close friends, and Mykylhny, unfortunately, knew that. He wasn’t quite ready to accuse Kahmelka of guilt by association—Khapahr had had a lot of friends in the Navy, and they couldn’t all have been traitors—but the captain was undeniably … less confident of Khamelka’s fighting spirit than he’d been before Khapahr was unmasked as a Charisian spy.
Personally, Raisahndo wondered if Mykylhny suspected that his admiral’s chief of staff—and his admiral, for that matter—had never believed for a moment that Ahlvyn Khapahr, of all people, could have been a traitor to the flag officer he’d served so long and well. They’d never specifically discussed it, but Raisahndo was fairly positive Kahmelka shared his own suspicions about what Khapahr had really been doing—and the reason someone who’d supposedly been a hired assassin had shot Earl Thirsk in the shoulder, instead of the heart.
And a hell of a lot of good it did in the end, he thought harshly. That bastard Clyntahn still ordered the Earl’s daughters hauled off to Zion. And then the goddamned ship blew up! He shook his head mentally. God knows they—and the Earl—deserved better than that. In fact, I’m pretty damned sure God knows exactly that … whatever that fat fornicator in Zion thinks. And I’m not the only Dohlaran sea officer who thinks that!
He made himself back away from that dangerous thought and focused on Mykylhny, instead.
“I don’t like it either, Captain,” he said quietly, “but Commander Kahmelka’s right.”
A silent sigh seemed to circle the cabin as he said it. Mykylhny’s glare didn’t abate, but it took on a different edge, the edge of a man who knew that what he was hearing wasn’t going to change, however much he might want it to.
“What do you propose we do instead … Sir?” he asked after a moment.
Raisahndo felt a flicker of anger, but he suppressed it. The pause before Mykylhny’s last word hadn’t been one of disrespect, and he knew it. Bitterness and disappointment, yes, but not really disrespect … mostly, anyway.
“From what you’re saying—and I can’t really argue with it, however much I’d like to,” the captain continued, “we’ll never be able to fight these miserable fuckers. In that case, what’s the point in preserving our ships?”
“Well,” Raisahndo was surprised by the almost whimsical edge which crept into his own voice, “I
suppose I could point out that preserving the men who crew those ships would probably be worthwhile.” Mykylhny’s face darkened, and the admiral raised a placating hand. “I know what you meant, Captain, and I’m really not trying to be flippant, but our trained manpower represents a vital military resource. Preserving them for the future service of the Crown and Mother Church, whether that’s afloat or ashore, is a legitimate consideration.”
He held Mykylhny’s eyes steadily, and after a moment, the captain nodded. He even had the grace to look a little abashed.
“More to the point, perhaps,” Raisahndo continued, “while we don’t know how many of these … powered ironclads the heretics have, I think it’s unlikely they have a lot of them. Against their conventional galleons—even their ironclad galleons, like Dreadnought—we’ve demonstrated we have a fighting chance. So unless and until they do have enough of these damned things to be everywhere, our ships are still valuable if only as a threat—a fleet in being, if you will—to inhibit the freedom of action of the heretics’ other ships—their ‘conventional’ warships’, I suppose you’d say.” He grimaced. “I don’t like the thought of becoming as passive as the Desnairians were before the heretics went into the Gulf of Jahras after them, but if that’s the only service we can perform for the Jihad, then we’ll damned well perform it!”
Mykylhny’s frustration was obvious, and more than a few of the other officers in the cabin clearly shared it. But they also nodded in unhappy acknowledgment of the admiral’s point.
“So what will we do, Sir?” Mykylhny’s tone was much less confrontational.
“The outer batteries report light heretic units scouting the channels from outside their range,” Raisandho replied. “We don’t know for certain how many galleons they have out beyond our spotters’ horizon, but they’ve got two passages to cover—North Channel and Basset Channel. I imagine—” he produced a wintry smile “—they probably assume their ironclads have South Channel covered. Although,” he added, “I suppose we might be able to work our way around them overnight. Frankly, though, I doubt we could manage it without being spotted.