Chronicles of Gilderam: Book One: Sunset (37 page)

“When you said you loved me,” he went on, “after so many years of neglect, of… well, I can’t say I’m sorry enough, Shazahd. I’m so sorry I wasn’t there for you like I should’ve been. I….” Now Mentrat’s eyes began to well up.

“Father…” Shazahd wanted to speak, but she couldn’t say any more.

“You made me realize something,” he said. “I love you, Shazahd. I love you more than anything else in this world, or beyond it. My whole life, the company, this ship… none of it matters. You’re all I have that’s worth anything. And you’re worth everything. I know that now.”

“Did you… the healing ritual?”

“No. I didn’t.
You
healed me, Shazahd.”

“But… the Avladians…?”

Mentrat smiled warmly. “I know that apologies aren’t worth much. So I brought some help instead.”

Shazahd surprised herself by laughing, and hugged her father with all her strength. Owein came toward them, having unlatched himself from the gunner’s seat.

“How did you do this?” he asked, indicating the Avladian warships.

“The Avladians are very loyal to their customers. I happen to be one of their best. And I may have made a few promises on behalf of all Gresadia in exchange,” he said with a wink.

“But how did you get there so fast…?”

“The forest,” he said simply.

“Oh, right…. Magic, I guess?” Mentrat shrugged. “Well,” Owein looked over his shoulder at the sky battle. “Thanks for the help, but we’re headed for war. If you want to stay aboard, you’ll have to be prepared to fight.”

“Master Maeriod, I’ve learned that some things are worth fighting for.” His eyes fell on Shazahd, and he squeezed her hand.

“You got it.” Owein signaled the bridge crew, which had been watching from above, to move out. The
baethes voth
picked up as the ship regained momentum, and Owein strapped himself back into the forward deckgun.

“Shazahd… there’s something I need to tell you. Something you must know.”

“What is it?”

Mentrat subconsciously brought a hand to his heart. He toyed with something underneath his shirt.

“To be honest, I don’t know why I ever kept it from you….” His eyes flew around, as though he were searching for something on the deck.

“Tell me.”

A great
crack
echoed over the trees from the armada. A cutter had just been ripped apart in the air.

“
Mlec
. We don’t have time. Come on, I’ll tell you later.” He led her back into the ship as Owein’s deckgun started firing.

“Pilot,” said Vrei, “prepare for evasive maneuvers.” She whisked herself into the captain’s chair.

“Aye aye.”

“Helm… bring us to attack speed.”

Gilderam
plowed into the fray at a precariously high speed. The bridge crew dodged one swerving airship after another as the humungous, floating vessels rushed past unpredictably.

Gunships dropped from above without warning, schooners careened sideways out of control, and frigates zipped left and right in a violent frenzy of navigation that made collision everyone’s deadliest enemy. The Gresadian formation had been tightly packed, and now the battle was perilously congested. Escape became the foremost thought on every pilot’s mind.

And some had better luck than others.

Owein fired almost at random as they flew past ship after ship after ship in rapid succession.
Gilderam
was sailing faster than anyone, and that made targeting difficult. He put holes in the hulls of several bluejack ships along the way, which was at least partly satisfying, if not entirely useful.

Only the fighters were fast enough to trail
Gilderam
, and a handful of them tenaciously pursued her through the maze of floating wreckage. Levwit laughed out loud, his long hair blowing in the wind, as he blasted them out of the sky.

“
That
one’s for mum,” he shouted to himself as he kicked the pedal, and nailed a fighter right in the nose. The round tore its way through the length of the fuselage, blowing out near the tailfin. He could see the pilot cursing through the cockpit window as the whole thing burst into flames and went down.

“And
that
one’s for dad!”

For his second target, he challenged himself by aiming for the propellers at the end of one of the wings. He sunk a round into the little engine, and it gushed a trail of rich, black smoke before exploding. The one working propeller sent the craft spinning, and it crashed into the side of a passing galleon with a prodigious conflagration.

“I say….” Levwit heard activity behind him. It was Jerahd, loading more shells into the magazine. “Did you see that?” Levwit asked. He had to shout at the top of his lungs to be heard.

“See what?”

“That last shot! It was marvelous!”

“I must’ve missed –”

But then
Gilderam
dipped into a sharp nosedive.

The horizon disappeared, and suddenly all Levwit could see was racing sky. Jerahd cried out behind him, and dropped shells bounced off the deck and spilled into open air behind the ship. Levwit, strapped into his chair, felt the intense gravitational forces straining to rip him free. He craned his neck around to see Jerahd, upside down, hanging onto the ammunition lid with one hand.

“Hang on!” Levwit yelled. “Just hang on!”

The ship, now tipped vertically, drove straight down toward the forest below. Levwit, on the aft gun, was floored by the sight above. They had dived to avoid a head-on collision with one of the mighty, bluesteel-covered battleships. He stared upward at its gleaming underbelly, his jaw slack with awe. He could feel its gigantic, twin engines rumbling in his heart.

Gilderam
smoothly flattened back out to horizontality, and Jerahd’s feet found the deck again.

“I say, way to be quick-witted!” Levwit chirped. “We nearly lost you on that one!”

“Yeah, thanks,” said Jerahd unenthusiastically as he secured the magazine closed. “I think I’ll go and find a place to vomit now,” he said, tottering away.

“Suit yourself,” Levwit called after him as he took aim. “Just make sure you hit one of those bluejack
tetsum
when you do! Aha!”

Boom-boom!

“Starboard, Cavada –
starboard!
”

The entire bridge crew screamed as they watched the flaming hull of a cruiser sail by, mere
entilum
from
Gilderam’s
bowsprit. Cavada, furiously spinning the wheel, barely managed to avoid it at the last second. They felt the cruiser’s fiery prow scrape against
Gilderam’s
engine casing halfway down the ship.

Vrei unwound slowly from her reflexive crouch.

“
Cizeeth
, boy, are you trying to –?!” Something out the window caught her attention. “
Port!
” she cried. “Now! Port! Turn, turn,
turn!
”

They avoided this one with just a little more clearance than the last.

“Sorry,” said Cavada. “Sorry everyone! I’m getting it, I’m getting it!”

Vrei had icy death in her eyes.

“Would you take a look at
that
…” Reeth said. And Vrei forgot all about Cavada for the time being.

A nearby frigate sank out of the way, and opened up a view beyond it of the Imperial flagship,
Vacthor
. The vast fortress hung low near the forest canopy, waiting far behind the fleet. It observed the battle from a safe distance. A few Avladian ships dared to fly close enough to engage her, and earned themselves overwhelming flak from her countless gun decks. 

“That’s
it
…” someone murmured. “The flagship.”

“
Jatha
…” Cavada exclaimed. “She’s enormous!”

“Biggest ship ever built,” said Vrei. They stared at it in reverent silence for a moment, until Vrei’s eyes wandered over to Cavada.

“Are you going to fly us straight to her and say hello?”

“Oh, uh…” he was rattled. “I’m… umm… no. No, probably not.” He spun the wheel, swinging the prow about starboard, and pushed the
Vacthor
from view.

“Good idea.”

Before
Gilderam
pointed him in the other direction, Owein took the opportunity to send a few bullets toward the Empress. He fired as many as he could, arcing the rounds high to give them the best possible range, before the firing pins were hitting air.

“Looks like you’re out of shells,” said a female voice behind him. “Let me help you with that.”

“Shazahd!” he yelled as the magazine flew open. “What did I tell you?!”

“I think you told me to hide below deck,” she said as she stacked the ammunition one shell at a time. “But, as usual, I didn’t listen.”

“You’re going to get yourself killed out here!”

The sky-wide dogfight came to bear in front of Owein. From this vantage point, he could tell that the scant Avladian force was getting roundly pummeled by the Gresadian navy. A great many Imperial vessels were alight with calamitous fires, slowly sinking as their crews struggled to put them out. Most of the armada was doomed, but all three battleships were still operational. Their steel-clad hulls made them invulnerable to fires, which was the Avladians’ primary offensive weapon. And the real powerhouse,
Vacthor
,
had yet to even enter the battle.

“Some of us can’t just sit by and let you boys have all the fun.” He heard the magazine
thwap
close. “There. You’re back in business. Good hunting.”

“Shazahd!” Owein called after her, “Sha–!” but she wasn’t listening. She was already gone around deck. He yanked a lever by his knee, triggering the loading contraption to slide two fresh rounds into the breeches.

“
Mlec
girl,” he said through gritted teeth. “If she lives through this, I’ll kill her….”

“You can fly this?” the man with the ponytail asked again, louder.

“Yeah, that’s what I’ve been saying – I’m a fighter pilot – but I don’t leave without orders!”

“Then you will fly it.” He spoke with a foreign accent.

“Sure, pal. I’ll fly it. As soon as the orders come in.”

The man with ponytail looked out the open hangar door. He saw the green blimp scooting away, just about to re-enter the thickest part of the skirmish.

“We leave now,” he said. “This is your order.”

“Look, I don’t know who you think you are, but my orders only come from –”

In a flash of movement, a crescent dagger appeared at the pilot’s throat.

“Get in,” he said simply.

By now the crowded airspace had stretched itself out, and the extra room allowed the bluejacks to demonstrate their naval superiority. Without a mass of zooming ships to hide in, the Avladians became easy targets for artillery crews. Their numbers quickly dropped, and the dwindling survivors found themselves dealing with an increasing volume of cannon, shell and ballista fire.

They pulled every aerial trick they knew, using their sails to turn, dive, bank, soar, or abruptly stop in midair. Each was a breakneck manipulation of inertia. Their ballasts huffed and sucked like mad, either throwing them into rapid climbs, or dropping them into free-falls – all in the hope of dodging deadly fire. 

Despite their best effort, it was becoming clear that the Avladians alone would not be enough to stop the armada.

Just then, another salvo of Divaran bolts sprang up from the trees. This one, even greater than the last, comprised an unprecedented number of missiles – a dozen or more for every airborne Imperial vessel, sinking or not. The entire forest floor erupted, as though the trees themselves had abandoned their leaves and leapt bodily into the air.

Wondrously, the quarrels sailed harmlessly by Avladian ships and
Gilderam
, coming close but not scratching them.

Bluejack pilots didn’t have enough time to curse before the bolts appeared suddenly in their flight paths. The firmament quaked with the awful crunch of innumerable tree-sized arrows. The sound of dense hardwood smashed to splinters shook every sailor to the bone.

When they opened their eyes again, it was horribly apparent that the splitting wood had not been airship hulls, but had been the bolts themselves. They crunched upon contact with their targets, like the ships were made of solid diamond and not timber. The bolts split and fell away, as though the Gresadian ships were concretely set in the sky rather than merely floating in it.

Transfixed eyes from all around – human and elf alike – watched the impotent weapons return to the forest. None could account for what they had seen.

The aerial combat continued as though nothing had happened.

Owein got a clear view of a gunship close by as
Gilderam
evaded another battleship. He could see the entire deck: a broad, flat circle supported above the craft’s single, enormous balloon. It was covered with weaponry and hurrying crewman.

He let loose on it idly, without even choosing a particular target. His rounds pelted and splintered the deck, dismembered a sailor, and damaged at least one ballista rather decently. This quickly brought him to their attention, and he leveled his sights on a cannon battery when he noticed them taking aim in his direction.

Just as he was about to shoot, a fighter plane flew in his way. It matched
Gilderam’s
speed, perfectly obstructing his view.

“
Mlec
tetsa!
” Owein said to himself as he adjusted his aim to deliver a devastating blow to the small aircraft.

To his surprise, a hatch opened beside the cockpit and a figure in a tight coat and a tricorn crawled out of it. A tall collar covered his face, and a long, black ponytail fluttered behind him.

“
Threithumé
…” Owein muttered. The man climbed onto the wing of the aircraft and ran down it.

“It can’t be!”

Tolora leapt right over the roaring engine at the end of wing and sent himself flying through the air at Owein.

Both barrels went off, but the unstoppable assassin came soaring down between the muzzle flashes, a curved sword held high above his head for a powerful slash.

Owein closed his eyes and crossed his arms over his face. He heard a bright
ring
of steel – a heavy blow – and the sound of a body collapsing onto the deck.

When he opened his eyes again he saw Jerahd perched on top of his gun, straddling the barrels, with sword drawn. They shared the briefest of glances before Jerahd flung himself to the deck after Tolora. Owein listened to the brilliant clashes of sword fighting behind him as he struggled to unfasten his harness.

He hopped out of the gunner’s seat and drew his cutlass. The duelists before him were well underway exchanging blows – as much as with fists and feet as with swords. In their strange yet similar styles, Jerahd and Tolora danced and spun in an improvised choreography all their own. Neither held back, neither relented even for the space of a breath, and neither would back down until the fight was over.

With a manic roar, Owein ran at Tolora. He swung at his back, but his cutlass ran into a sword that appeared from nowhere. He felt a heel connect with his chest and it sent him flying backward.