Shadow Road Page 8

  If it happened again, the quarterdeck would be empty at precisely fifteen clicks after the sixth bell.

  I hoped.

  There was nothing else for it. I had to get into the captain's cabin, and tonight was the night. The moon was hiding behind a bank of clouds. The shadows were dark as pitch.

  Mistress Floratina would have thrown a histrionic fit if she knew the most useful thing I learned at Kingsford Academy was how to pull off a night raid. All I had to do now was convince myself that it was a simple jaunt across the river to steal an Honors trophy from Amercy School for Young Ladies. That was all. Just a prank. What eagle-eyed captain? Arramy who?

  I was going to be fine.

  Twenty clicks after the Sixth Bell

  "Studying again, Arri?"

  "Aye, sir!"

  "Keep that up and you'll have my job."

  Light laughter. "I'm not aiming for your job, sir. Penweather's will do fine."

  I jerked upright, eyes flying to the door. He couldn't have finished eating that quickly. I hadn't been in his cabin for more than a minute, but there was no mistaking the captain's low voice, or those decisive footsteps. I was about to be caught red-handed.

  Frantic, I stuffed the binder back into its hiding spot, whirled, and took two strides away from NaVarre's greatdesk. That was as far as I got before the latch lifted, the door swung open, and Captain Arramy came ducking under the low header of the frame.

  It took barely half a second for him to see me. He couldn't exactly miss me. I was standing right there in the middle of the room, frozen mid-flight like a startled hare.

  We stared at each other.

  Then the captain came all the way in, his expression weary and long-suffering as he propped the door open with his shoulder. He glanced into the map room to make sure Arri was still there for propriety's sake, then turned his attention on me again. "What are you doing, Miss Westerby?"

  Say something! Deflect! Deflect! I pasted a bright smile on my face. "Looking for you."

  He raised one eyebrow.

  "I want to... to thank you. Personally. For saving our lives!" I was still smiling as I edged sideways around him, trying to angle myself so I could squeeze through the doorway – only to find the opening blocked by his arm.

  My heart stopped.

  The captain's voice was a deep, dark rasp above my ear. "You're lying."

  I dragged in a breath and looked up.

  That pale-ice gaze met mine and held, cold and impassive as frozen stone, showing no hint of mercy.

  It was too late. I could see him reading my face like a book, and he had already caught the unconscious flicker of guilt and the telltale twist of panic. Still, I tried to stick to my story. There wasn't anything else I could do. "I don't know what you're talking about."

  "Oh, I doubt that, Miss Westerby."

  The way he said it, deliberately emphasizing that false last name, made me go dizzy. All at once the room seemed very small, the air too thin. He knew. The certainty sank into my bones, turning them to lead. He knew I was lying about my name. He really was part of this. I blinked, my vision blurring as I imagined being 'accidentally' shoved overboard with a ballast stone tied to my feet.

  Then captain Arramy bent to put his face a scant inch from mine, our noses nearly touching. "I don't know what sort of game you're playing, or why you were in NaVarre's cabin, and I don't really care. That's your business. The Travel Bureau can sort that out, and good riddance, but let me make this one thing perfectly clear. In future, you will stay out of my cabin. You will find no special favors here. Do you understand?"

  Stunned, I gaped up at him, unable to look away. His words cut right through me, digging deep into a vulnerable place I wasn't aware I had, even though relief came rolling right along with it. It might have been insulting, but the only thing he was accusing me of was being a loose woman. He might have figured out that I wasn't Miss Westerby, but that didn't mean he knew I was Miss Warring.

  I firmed my chin. "Thank you for your candor, sir." I turned to face the doorway with as much dignity as I could muster. "I assure you that was the farthest thing from my mind."

  For a long, tense moment he kept his hand on the doorframe, barring my exit. I could feel that chilly glare burning into my scalp. Then he let me pass, calling loudly to Midshipman Arri, "Master Arriankaredes, escort Miss... Westerby... back to the women's quarters. Then come back and explain to me how in blazes she got past you!"

  ~~~

  Sollensekreik: (soll.enz.krike), a round, stringed Lodesian instrument that is used primarily for percussion. The sound is harsh and rustic rather than melodic.

  14. Cry, Birds

  22nd of Uirra

  The next two days passed without incident. At all. Of any sort. Not even a cloud showed up to mar the sky, and the wind was ridiculously kind. Nature did not deign to give me any extra time to figure out my mess.

  We reached Lordstown shortly after noon, and the captain came ducking down into the hold to inform us that we would be able to leave as soon as the Harbor Master had given his approval.

  A few of the women began packing up their things, glad to be leaving cramped, crowded quarters for solid ground. They talked of eating meals that didn't involve salt-pork or hard biscuits.

  Many were doing much the same as I, though, sitting idly on their cots, simply existing while the world spun by around them, with nothing to pack and no one to go home to.

  They were lost in their grief.

  I was lost in other things.

  If I hadn't been on the Galvania, all those people would still be alive. How could I keep on living, now, when so many others were dead? How was that fair? Some of the women were mourning children, but I was still there, breathing anyway. Living anyway. Surviving anyway.

  I couldn't even get rid of those stupid papers.

  What good was I to anybody?

  There was no answer, only questions continuously coiling through my head.

  An hour after we arrived, we were still waiting to leave. Whatever anticipation some of the girls still felt vanished when one of the Midshipmen finally came down to inform us that the Travel Bureau was closed for repairs, and we were to stay aboard until they could find accommodations for us.

  There was a stir when one of the women heard Captain Arramy come back aboard. That wasn't as difficult as it might have seemed, even from below decks. He had a distinctively long, firm stride, as if he did not merely walk but rolled the world around beneath his feet, and the officer's cabins were located directly over the rear half of the women's quarters in the hold. We knew he was in the map room long before Midshipman Arriankaredes came down again, this time to tell us we would not be going ashore that day. We had been rerouted to the Travel Bureau Holding Center in Porte D'Exalle.

  His news was met with frustrated groans.

  I sat on my cot while the girls slowly began unpacking. I wasn't paying any attention. Instead, I was turning over Arri's announcement, puzzled. We really should have been removed to a civilian boat for transport. Even if the Ang was to be commissioned into the Navy, the Navy wasn't tasked with civilian travel. Rescue, yes. Port to port, no.

  Odd.

  But, odd or not, it wasn't as if any of us could have done anything about it. Whatever the Lordstown Civil Port Authority was doing, we were all bits of collateral stuck under the wheels of bureaucracy. We had to go wherever they wanted us so they could process us back into the system.

  23rd of Uirra

  We left Lordstown on the evening tide and sailed southeast, veering around the point of the Endevan Peninsula. Another two days went by smoothly, and we made good time, coursing ahead of a brisk landward wind. By the third day we had already passed the halfway point, and the other girls had begun talking about what they would do when they finally got home.

  It was almost peaceful. There was nothing to do, nowhere we had to be. There was plenty of food, even fresh fruit. We were allowed to stretch our legs on the deck during the day, slept
in relative safety at night, drifting in a sort of silent limbo as we sat about waiting for life to start again. I didn't even bother trying to get the binder. I figured I might as well just enjoy the extra little bit of time before we reached civilization and all my lies caught up with me.

  ~~~

  This morning began the same as all the others. Breakfast at dawn, then back down into the hold till the Marines were finished with their physical drills. I was lying on my cot, staring at the ceiling and drifting, listless and faded and empty, when the monotony was torn apart.

  One of the lookouts shouted something, his voice strident.

  The Erristos, our Navy escort, had opened her gun ports.

  That was followed by Mannemarra questioning why she would do such a thing, and the captain's low, bass growl giving orders to a flagman to signal that the other captain should stand down.

  Then came a clear, strident, "Sir! She's preparing to fire!" and everything began moving much too quickly.

  Midshipmen Pierce and Arriankaredes threw themselves down the stairs from the main deck, sliding on the handrails instead of using the risers. Surprised, we all watched as they began grabbing up every available scrap of loose bedding, piling it up along the wall between our little section of the hold and the galley, making a sort of fortification out of it.

  A child's voice broke the confusion that gripped the rest of us. "Momma, what's that sound? Did a bird get hurt?"

  The child's mother peered at her daughter. "What sound, luv? I don't hear... anything..."

  Her voice trailed off as what could only be described as a 'hurt bird' reached us: a weird, unearthly wail that rose steadily in pitch and volume.

  Pierse abruptly stopped what he was doing to look at Arriankaredes, his face slack with disbelief. "They're using incendiaries."

  We all stared at each other. Then Mrs. Turragan shoved a little girl toward the blanket fortress. "Children and those with infants behind the beds!" she barked. "The rest of you get down as low as you can and keep your arms over your head!"

  We obeyed without question, scrambling to find some sort of shelter as that 'hurt bird' wail grew so loud that it was all any of us could hear. At the last second, though, there was no impact. The round screamed over the deck and detonated with a muffled whump somewhere in the water off to starboard.

  In the stunned hush that followed, one of the girls asked, "Why are they firin' at us?"

  "It must be a mistake," Arriankaredes blurted, his words meant to reassure while his strained, boyish voice only betrayed his fear.

  "We don't know why the Eristos fired on us," Pierse said grimly, folding up a cot. "But she did. Please, just stay here and keep calm until Captain Arramy has had a chance to —” he stopped speaking and looked up at the porthole.

  "Not again," a young mother gasped as that awful wounded-bird wail cut through the air.

  "Pierse! Arri! I need you in the rigging!" The captain's rough shout sent both the Midshipmen scrambling to shove the last of the bedding onto the pile. Then they were gone, vaulting back up the ladder.

  The next instant the whole ship careened heavily to port.

  The Eristos hadn't missed that time. The shells hit forward on the port side, rocking the Ang into the waves, sending everyone in the hold cowering as the ship groaned and dust rained down on us from the planking over our heads.

  All of the younger children started crying.

  Laffa began cackling wildly.

  One woman, who had allowed a girl with a small baby to take her place behind the blanket fort, started singing a lullaby to her little boy on the other side, her soprano reedy as she fought her own fear in order to calm his.

  The captain's voice sounded from the main hold, where the largest guns were housed. He was barking orders at someone named Raggan, who was out of sight beyond our makeshift privacy curtain, but I could see the captain clearly from where I sat. He had removed the oiled-leather muzzle cover on one of NaVarre's legendary long guns and was prepping the inside of the barrel with an oiled cloth.

  Whoever Raggan was, he was doing something with fire. A red-orange glow flickered to life in the main hold, backlighting the captain's shoulders and gilding his silvery hair as he took hold of the hoist wheel and brought the cannon barrel upward. He raised the thing to a steep angle, then held it there with nothing more than his own strength so Raggan could kick the stop-chock into the hoist gears.

  Raggan hurried down the length of the cannon to drop a cotton-wrapped bale of explosive down the open maw of the barrel. Then he grabbed a bundle of rags from a box on the wall while the captain bent and hefted a forty-pound cannonball from a pile on the floor, shouldering it carefully into the cannon. Raggan immediately sent the rag wadding down the barrel after the ball, and the captain rammed everything into place with a padded rod. Both men worked fluidly with each other, the efficiency of their actions betraying the fact that they had performed those steps many times.

  Somewhere out on the water, the Eristos fired off another round.

  The woman next to me leaned closer to ask, almost as if she were discussing the weather, "Why is the whole world trying to kill us?"

  My thoughts immediately flew to the captain's cabin and the hidden papers. I wanted to be sick. I closed my eyes, ground my teeth, and pressed myself against a rolled-up blanket as that 'wounded bird' wail grew to a piercing shriek.

  "Brace! Brace! Br —”

  The captain's shout was drowned out by the percussion of another exploding round, so loud and close it reverberated through my bones.

  This one struck squarely amidships. The armored plating held, but a gun port cover came flying inward, turning end over end in a rapid blur before embedding in the opposite wall with a thunk.

  I blinked slowly. The woman next to me was screaming, her hands clamped over her ears, her eyes screwed tight shut.

  Arramy swore, but went right on working, releasing the hoist stop and dropping the loaded cannon back into its recoil frame. He locked it in while Raggan primed the smolder. Then they each grabbed a guide rope and yanked the monster up its sliding rail, shoving the muzzle through the gun port, using it to ram the cover open from the inside.

  "Hold her steady!" the captain shouted up the stairs, then bent over the back end of the cannon to sight down the barrel.

  Raggan got out of the way as the captain worked the aiming winch, bringing the nose of the gun up a degree, then another, his jaw ticking as he stared through the gun port, waiting for something I couldn't see. Then he stepped neatly aside and slammed the firing lever forward, connecting the smolder with the quick fuse in the canon.

  A deafening boom echoed through the ship and the gun plowed backward, hitting the heavy wooden piling at the end of its rails with a thud that shook the floor. A cloud of acrid smoke came drifting in through the open gun port, and the burnt-metal reek of spent powder coated the back of my tongue.

  Neither of the men paused to find out whether they had hit anything. They were already unlocking the cannon housing and raising the still-smoking barrel, rapidly preparing the cannon for its next round.

  "Good strike, sir!" Arriankaredes called down the stairs.

  "Bring her two degrees to port!" Captain Arramy bellowed back without looking away from the glowing ball of heated slug iron he was tonging out of the fire barrel Raggan had set up.

  "Aye sir!" Arri scrambled away from the stairs to relay that order to the man at the helm.

  A moment later the Ang began swinging to the left, just as that awful, tell-tale wail announced a new volley from the other ship.

  Again, the captain and Raggan rammed the shot home, stacked and locked the cannon, yanked it back up the rails to the gun port, and took aim, even as the scream of the incoming shells rose to an unbearable pitch.

  Everyone cowered again, bracing for an impact, those last few seconds measured in vicious heartbeats.

  15. Keep Fighting

  23rd of Uirra, Continued

  It was impossible
to tell which happened first, the captain firing off another shot, or the incoming rounds striking the main deck.

  For one terrible split-second the very air seemed to be expanding, sucking itself out of my lungs. Then everything fell back to earth in thick, dead silence.

  I opened my eyes, my vision blurring as I brought my head up. Things had gone slow and quiet, movements appearing in languid bits and pieces. Everything was muted except for a high, thin ringing in my ears.

  There was a brand-new hole in the ceiling at the far end of the women's quarters, and a shaft of afternoon sunlight poured through it, piercing the pall of smoke and dust. The makeshift privacy curtains were gone, and the rope that had been holding it up trailed from the walls like a smoldering streamer. Bits of burning canvas drifted gently down from above like fiery snow.

  It was almost pretty.

  Dazed, I blinked, then looked at the girl next to me. She was sobbing, her mouth moving, forming the same words over and over.

  All I heard was that single-note whine.

  My heart began beating again, one throb, then another, pounding too hard. I blinked again. Tried to breathe only to find I had forgotten how. Tried again, and again, until I finally pulled in a sip of air.

  Reality began catching up with time, sounds realigning with events.

  The girl next to me was saying, "This'll all be over soon, it's just a bad dream, this'll all be over soon, it's just a bad dream." Her voice sounded faraway and indistinct, as if it were working its way through a thick layer of wool.

  I touched my ears, then shook my head, trying to rid myself of that weird, tinny hiss that overrode everything else. It didn't go away, although as I flexed my jaw, I could hear a woman crying.

  The girl next to me was fine. She was terrified, but she wasn't the one screaming. That was coming from somewhere off to my right.

  I was able to move. I didn't think beyond that fact. I stood up and willed my feet to carry me in the direction the screams seemed to be coming from. My limbs were clumsy, my movements sluggish and disjointed, as if I were sleepwalking. I stumbled and wavered as I picked my way between shattered lengths of decking that littered the floor like kindling.