October 18, 2011

• Aldreach Harbor

              The skyharbor was a froth of activity.

              The sun had long since set, but Aethelred’s soldiers had rigged flares and torches which cast a harsh red glare across the forest of mooring masts.  And in that forest the defenders of Aldreach labored—now in shadow, now casting long black shadows of their own.  Soldiers lining up into details.  Dockyard workers rolling in barrels of powder.  Artillery swinging up to the ships, danging from cranes.  Aeronauts rappelling down the sides of moored merchant airships, painting their hulls blue and white.

              “But that’s my ship!” a merchant was saying, as he was being forcibly escorted out of the harbor by two green-coated soldiers. “You can’t take it into battle! That’s my ship!”

              Sadler felt a stab of sympathy as she watched the merchant go by.

              What am I doing here? she asked herself.  How did I get mixed up in another soldier’s plot?  Dammit, Frost, how do you keep doing this tome?

              She looked up into the night sky.  The stars seemed dim and pale compared to the harsh red blaze of the flares.  She watched as one star winked out, then another: a shape too clean and round to be one of the night’s scudding clouds: the Goshawk, watching from above,ready to give a warning should the rogue armada appear.  Captain Saedric had boarded after giving his instructions, leaving Sadler in charge of the preparations—something Aethelred would never have authorized.  Sadler suspected that the Fleet captain simply felt more comfortable when on board his own quarterdeck, the might of his heavy frigate under his control, than coordinating and organizing down below.  Sadler felt similarly.  She hated waiting on the ground, earthbound,unable to evade or escape should the worst happen.  It felt like being trapped, being chained.

              “Captain Sadler?” a woman’s clipped voice said behind her.  She turned to see an officer whose green coat almost black in the stark light.  She was short, shorter than Morris, and her face was tilted to peer up at Sadler, as though Sadler was a giant in comparison. Her expression was carefully blank, and her back was as stiff as Pandemonium’s bowsprit.  A little ways behind the officer stood about twenty soldiers, all in parade formation.

              “Yes?”said Sadler warily.

              “We are the detail assigned to the Pilgrim,”said the officer. 

              “Ah,”said Sadler.

              “I am Underofficer Atbrook, and I will be both commander of your detail and your liason to Constable Aethelred.”

              Translation: you will be both my underminer and my babysitter, Sadler thought.  Swiving grassback.  She remembered anew how much she hated working with the military.

              “My troops and I are glad to assist you.  We will oversee the loading of the powder magazine,” said Atbrook.  It was not a request, her tone made clear:she was simply informing Sadler of what she and her troops were about to do.

              Oh, we’re putting a stop to THAT right now.  Sadler turned to face Atbrook square on, her hands clasped behind her back, in the stance she remembered her father taking when he wanted to assert his authority.  “No,”she said, calmly but sharply.  “You and your troops will board Pilgrim and see to your posts.”

              “I—”Atbrook began.

              “You will familiarize yourselves with the position you will be filling.  I want those assigned to gun crews to strip,clean, and re-mount each piece immediately. Those assigned to boarding crew should arm themselves from the weapons locker.  You want pistols and cutlasses, Underofficer, not your clumsy muskets.”

              “I—”Atbrook began again.

              “Mister Adlaem is currently on board,” said Sadler, mercilessly plowing over the officer’s words.  “You will proceed under his supervision, and obey his orders.”  She wondered what Adlaem would think of giving commands to Army troops, and tried not to smile.

              Underofficer Atbrook waited until Sadler finished, cold anger glinting in her blue eyes.  Then she drew herself up and opened her mouth.

              “You are dismissed,” said Sadler.  Then she casually turned her back on Atbrook, looking at one of the field cannons coming in from the fort.  Behind her,she could hear the Underofficer shift uncomfortably, no doubt embarrassed at being treated so by a civilian in front of her troops, no doubt wondering if her orders allowed her to disobey.

              The cannon coming in was towed by a cab, Halle at the wheel, Lae jogging behind.  Sadler walked to meet them.  “Good, good.  Get that over to the Tern, they’ll hoist it up.  Where’s Morris?”

              “He met a friend in the crowd,” said Lae, panting slightly.  “He said he’d meet us up later.”

              “Slacker,”snorted Halle.  He turned the cab and it—and the cannon—rattled away toward the Tern’s mooring mast, Lae trailing after.

              Sadler looked back toward the center of Aldreach. For a moment she thought of going after him.  Just to make sure he was all right, of course.  There was something so innocent and worldshy about the student, and it seemed he could get into all sorts of trouble left alone in a largish city.

              No, that’s wrong, she told herself.  He’s an adult, and he can handle himself.  But all the same…  I’ll give him half an hour.  At least, if we have that long.

              Someone was running toward her: a little midshipman, not yet sixteen years old, one of Saedric’s younger officers. “Captain Sadler, ma’am!” he said, giving her a breathless Fleet salute.  “Preparations on the Culver are finished, ma’am.  We are ready to get under weigh.”

              She tried not to smile at the young officer: he was so earnest.  “Are all your guns loaded? Field carriages modified?”

              “Aye!”

              “Do you have your volunteer crew?  Is your troop detail on board?”

              “Oh,aye!”

              “Full stock of shot, powder and grass pellets? Hull painted like a warship?”

              “Aye, ma’am.”

              “How about your pennant?”

              The midshipman’s face fell.  He had forgotten.

              “What’s your name, Midshipman?”

              “Brigg,ma’am.  Midshipman Renatus Brigg.”

              “Well, Renatus Brigg.”  Sadler pointed down the line of mooring masts, toward the dockyard. “They’ve made three of them already: go and claim yours.  And as soon as that Fleet pennant is flying from your stern, cast off, and take station above with Goshawk.  Do you understand me, Captain Brigg?”

              The smile bloomed on his face, and he barely shouted an “Aye-aye, ma’am,”before tearing away toward the dockyard. Sadler shook her head as she watched him go.  That boy deserves a free life, not one stuffed into a Fleet mold.

              A small mob of three arguers—two volunteers and a soldier—were making their way towards her, clearly with a question to be resolved. Sadler sighed and, with one last wistful glance over her shoulder towards wherever Morris was, turned to meet them.      
  

  Copyright Christopher Russo © 2011.  Plagiarizers will be flogged about the fleet.
  

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