Steamsworn (Steamborn Series Book 3) (22 page)

“I suppose we are about to find out.” Smith took the bomb from Jacob and frowned. “It is too large to fit in the standard barrel. “We will need to unfold them in order to launch the bombs.”

“Unfold what?” Alice asked. “The cannon?”

“Only the barrel,” Smith said, as though that made any more sense. “Here.” He placed his thumb on a ribbed catch near the muzzle. “And here.” When he squeezed the two catches, the barrel folded down into a narrow imperfect U-shape, leaving space for a larger projectile.

With the launch mechanism exposed, Smith slid the bomb down the channel, squinted at its placement, and nodded. “It is not a bad fit. Not as ideal as an enclosed chamber, but good nonetheless.

Alice grunted, squeezed her barrel, and then fumbled the cannon when the barrel opened with a snap.

“I’ll slow down,” Mary said. “Keep us away from the sun so you can fire a test shot.”

“We could fly into them from the sun,” Smith said. “They would be blind to the attack.”

“We’re not going after them with the cannons and chainguns yet. I want you to fire a test shot without any hint of where we are. Samuel and Drakkar need to be ready to fire if things go bad.” Mary reached up and tapped on the horn. “You two hear that.”

“Aye, Captain,” came the synchronized response.

Jacob leaned forward when Mary pulled one of the floor levers. The Skysworn slowed and leaned to the left, circling the fleet of warships below.

“Come up from behind,” Smith said. “We will try the left of the V. Jacob, Alice, come with me.”

“Where?” Alice asked.

“We are going out onto the deck to see if these cannons have enough range.”

Jacob stared at one of the bombs in his hands. The thought of attacking one of those airborne monstrosities with such a small weapon seemed futile, if not downright insane. He crammed the thought into the back of his mind and remembered the devastation one bomb had caused during the Fall of Ancora. The bombs would work.

They had to.

T
he cannon jumped
as the tensioners were freed and the cables shot forward, sending the bomb whistling into the void between the Skysworn and the nearest of Ballern’s warships.

Smith cursed when the bomb didn’t travel so much as half the distance. “That is why I did not prime the bomb, Jacob.”

Jacob watched the orb fall, vanishing into the green and brown patterns etched across the desert below. “But what if it had been a good shot?”

“Then I would have been very happy. If it had missed, as it did?”

Alice leaned on the railing, tugging on her safety line. “It would have detonated too far off the ship to do any damage. Then they’d know we were above them.”

“Yes,” Smith said. “It is still only a matter of time before they spot us. We are mostly hidden here, from the nearest ships, but there are platforms all around the gas chambers, and the warships on the far side of the V will notice us soon enough.”

Jacob looked out across the mass of destroyers and shivered. The largest cannons were at least as long as the Skysworn itself. If the Porcupines shouldn’t have been able to fly, what did that say about Ballern’s destroyers? What did it say about the mind that built them?

It was then that Jacob realized they were keeping pace with the destroyers, and the Skysworn barely felt like it was moving. Mary could position them almost anywhere without the ships being able to respond quickly with the larger cannons. “We can drop the bombs onto the ships.”

“What?” Smith asked, glancing at Jacob.

“Yes!” Alice said. “Get higher.” She pointed toward the clouds gathering above them.

Smith rapidly tapped his palm on the Skysworn’s railing and then nodded. “Cabin, now.”

It was a quick jog back to the pilot’s cabin. Smith stopped only to grab the crate of explosives before he pushed the door open and they all stepped inside.

Mary was talking into the horn. “Keep the cannon focused on the second destroyer from the apex. Clip the front of the gas chambers if you have to. Its position will cause the most confusion.” She glanced up when the hatch slammed closed.

“Get above them and slightly ahead,” Smith said as he began gathering up bombs.

“They could see our shadow in that position,” Mary said.

Smith nodded. “It is possible, but not before we rain fire upon them.”

Mary’s eyes widened. She stared at the tinker as he stuffed his pockets full of bombs that contained enough power to level a city block. “You can’t hit the decks from there, but the gas chambers …

“We can make them target practice for the Porcupines, and then we can get the hell out of here.”

“Hold on.” Mary pulled back on two levers, and Jacob had learned enough by now to lean against the back wall. The Skysworn titled at a forty-five degree angle and drifted ahead of the rear ship. “Did you catch that Samuel? Drakkar?”

“We’re bombing them from above?” Samuel asked.

“Yes,” Mary said. “Same strategy. While Smith and the kids hit the rear of the V, I want you to focus on the second ship’s gas chambers.”

“It will be done.” Drakkar’s voice was calm and focused, and it reminded Jacob just how much he liked the guardian.

Jacob stuffed his vest with six of the compound bombs. The cold steel felt good against his fingers, like he was carrying Charles into battle with him one last time.

They were silent as they made their way to the stern. Jacob followed Alice. She had the cannon resting on her shoulder as she ducked past one of the angled supports that held the gas chambers in place.

Jacob gazed down at the massive destroyer when they reached the edge. It was different from this angle. The wide stretches of plating covering the gas chambers glinted in the sunlight. The cannons mounted above seemed impossible, though the Porcupines were no more conventional.

Ballern’s ships flew flags to either side.

“Is that a Ballern flag?” Jacob asked.

“Signal flags,” Smith said. “If you watch them after we drop the first bombs, they will change, either in color or pattern of motion.”

Alice hefted the cannon onto the edge of the railing and tried aiming at the warship. “We’re too close. The bomb is going to roll off the end.”

Smith clicked the button on his collar. “Speed up a little, Mary. We need a better angle.”

“You’re all static, Smith,” Mary said, her voice small and tinny on the receiver. “I heard you, but once we’re moving faster, I’m not going to be able to understand you. You’ll have to get back to the cabin.”

He clicked the transmitter and said, “Understood.”

Jacob felt the Skysworn lurch slightly beneath his feet. It forced him against the railing on the stern as the ship accelerated. He reached down and threw two switches on his leg. A jolt shot through his thigh when a plate slid out either side of his foot, giving him better balance on the moving airship.

Alice tracked the destroyer with her cannon until it was at a milder angle. “Should work.”

Smith took a deep breath. “We are in range of their rear cannons, or very nearly so. We need speed and accuracy, and I truly hope these bombs are as effective as you claim.”

“Charles taught us how to shoot,” Jacob said. He cracked open one of the larger bombs he’d modified with the fuse, clicked the igniter on a Banger, and locked it inside the larger orb before sliding it onto Alice’s cannon. “Ready!”

Smith cursed and loaded his own cannon. About the time he leveled it to aim, Alice pulled the trigger on her own cannon. It jumped in her hands, the release of tension silent in the rushing air on the Skysworn’s deck. The orb sailed in a smooth arc, dropping toward the warship as she pumped the cannon to prime it again.

“Load,” Alice said.

Jacob clicked the igniter on a Burner and locked into one of the larger Firebombs.

Smith launched his first volley. “How long is the fuse? I would have thought—”

The first round detonated as Alice fired her second. The explosion blossomed far below, just to the side of one of the massive cannons. Jacob gaped, his eyes wide at the sheer destruction as the blast tore away armor and ripped a hole into one of the gas chambers that would have been large enough for the Skysworn to dock in.

The shockwave reached them a moment later, a sound that sent Jacob’s mind reeling back to the Fall of Ancora, back to the escape with Charles and the bomb that shattered a wall of Red Death. It was a thunder given deadly purpose.

Smith’s shot mimicked Alice’s, tearing through a watchtower on the port side of the warship. Alice’s Firebomb detonated somewhere inside the hole her first shot had created. A burst of flame as large as the Council Hall tore through the sides of Ballern’s battleship, and it began to list.

“Yes!” Jacob shouted. “I didn’t think it would do
that!
”

“Reload!” Alice shouted back, a grim smile etched across her face. She fired again. The shot arced through the hole in the side of the destroyer.

“Nice shot!” Jacob said. “Your aim is—”

The grenade detonated, and a secondary explosion sent one of the destroyer’s cannons spiraling off in a fiery descent.

Alice laughed and smacked his arm. “Nice work on those bombs!”

The flags across two of the battleships retracted, and bright red flags replaced them, moving in intricate patterns through the air.

“Shit,” Smith said as he slammed the cannon into Jacob’s hands. “It is already primed. Keep firing. I have to get to Mary.” With that, he was gone.

Jacob shuffled up beside Alice, dragging the crate of grenades with him. “Here!” He held out a handful of Burners.

She squeezed his hand and then scooped up the small pile of metal orbs. “All the flags are red now. The cannons!”

Jacob leaned forward to see what she was talking about, and a rush of terror flowed through his limbs. One of the far destroyers was shifting its cannons. They were on a slow arc that would soon find the Skysworn’s path.

“Take out as many as you can,” Alice screamed as she slid another bomb home, aimed, and fired it over the stern.

Jacob did the same. The first destroyer still flew, but it was much lower than the others and falling out of formation. Jacob swung his sights to the next closest warship and fired. The Skysworn lurched, and something like a flaming cannonball streaked past them, a trail of burning ash behind it and a burst of heat that washed over the Skysworn’s deck.

The boom of the destroyer’s cannon echoed through the cloudy sky. Alice lined up another shot and fired. Some part of Jacob’s mind realized how close they’d come to being blown out of the sky, and it sent him scampering for more bombs.

Rhythmic vibrations rattled Jacob’s legs, and Alice froze. She looked up at him and back down at the deck. He waited for the Skysworn to fall out of the clouds, but it didn’t happen.

Alice slid closer to him. “What is that?”

Tiny balls of fiery orange light streaked across the sky toward the furthest ship from beneath the Skysworn.

“It’s the cannons!” Jacob said, his fear of their imminent death abating.

“Keep firing!” Alice shouted back.

*     *     *

Smith pulled the
harness over his shoulders and strapped himself into the jump seat. “Those bombs did more damage than I would have thought possible.”

Mary did not answer. She turned the wheel and pulled two levers in a complicated maneuver that caused the Skysworn to stutter and drift to the port side. Cannon fire streaked past them and the report rocked the ship. Smith knew if they had not moved, they would be rubble on the ground. They passed the second warship and settled over the third, forcing their enemy to recalibrate their cannons yet again.

Mary threw open the horn and shouted “Focus on the far destroyer and
fire!
”

Samuel and Drakkar brought the cannons to life. Smith dropped his harness to the floor and stepped to the porthole. He could feel the vibrations in the Skysworn’s skeleton, and he smiled as the rounds ripped into the starboard side of the destroyer.

Samuel or Drakkar had gotten off a lucky shot, and it blew a watchtower off the side of the warship. They would need about a hundred more lucky shots to bring down one of those beasts.

“They are breaking formation,” Smith said.

The receiver above Mary crackled to life. The voices were faint beside the rattle of gunfire and bombs. “… Skysworn, come in. This is George. I have urgent news. Skysworn …”

Smith stepped up beside Mary and snatched the transmitter off its hook. “This is Smith. We hear you.”

“Thank the gods,” George said. “I am with the leader of the resistance in Dauschen, and you need to know what he knows. Cage, take it.”

Another man’s voice—Smith assumed it was the man George called Cage—sounded over the tinny speakers. “The Butcher plans to burn Dauschen to the ground.”

“Why?” Smith asked. “There are resources there he could use.”

“I mean he intends to kill every citizen and take over the city.”

“Why would he do that?” Smith asked.

“The man has promised Belldorn to Ballern for their help in destroying Bollwerk.”

“Gods,” Mary said, “so he means to divide the Northlands between Ballern and Fel?”