The Destiny of the Dead (The Song of the Tears Book 3) (36 page)

‘Then you’d better work harder.’

‘Any sign that the guards are changing, Aimee?’ Nish
whispered.

‘I’ll tell you if I see them.’

Finally they had the enormous javelard loaded dead-centre
and roped down. Its base was almost as long as the air-sled and half as wide,
and the top was a span and a half high, while the horizontal, crossbow-like
mechanism stuck out over either side.

Flydd began to fit the fuses to the tar balls, and six
troopers lifted them carefully, along with the linked chains, into the leather
firing bucket of the javelard. Once everyone had piled on, Chissmoul took the
controller.

‘Someone’s coming,’ hissed Aimee.

‘Do we wait or go?’ said Nish.

‘Go,’ said Flydd. ‘We don’t want to get in a fight now.’

‘I’ll try to take her up to knee height,’ Chissmoul said
anxiously.

The air-sled shuddered violently, and Nish thought it wasn’t
going to lift at all, but eventually it rose in a series of jerks. Through the
hole cut in the deck he could hear the mechanism rattling.

‘Hoy!’ someone called from the street. ‘What’s going on up
there?’

‘Get going,’ said Flydd, ‘before the bloody thing shakes
itself to pieces.’ He cursed under his breath. ‘At this rate, they’ll hear us
coming half a league away.’

‘Keep still, everyone,’ said Chissmoul. ‘She’s so top-heavy,
she could roll over at any time.’

After offering this comforting thought, she lifted the
air-sled at a shallow angle and it began to shudder across the rooftops. Nish
made out several faces staring up at them, trying to work out what was
happening in the dim light, then they were lost to sight.

‘I’d love to see them explain this to their superior
officers,’ said Nish.

‘We haven’t succeeded yet,’ said Flydd. ‘You’re our only
experienced javelard operator, Nish. Get it ready.’

‘Can I climb onto it, Chissmoul?’ said Nish.

‘As long as you don’t make any sudden movements,’ she said
in a strained tone.

He checked the javelard by feel, making sure that nothing
had slipped out of alignment during loading. The air-sled was shaking more
wildly than before, and he was drenched with sweat. One misstep could cause the
craft to roll, dumping everyone off, and the javelard would tear free and come
down on top of them. How the seneschal would crow then.

Somehow, Chissmoul’s genius kept them in the air, even while
he climbed up and began to wind the huge cranks that tensioned the steel firing
cable. When they were fully wound, he pushed in the safety rods so the javelard
would not go off if jolted.

‘It’s ready.’

They were approaching the seneschal’s mansion from the rear.
Most of the lights around the square had been extinguished, though lanterns
still burned in front of the governor’s palace and the mansion.

‘There’s a barracks right at the back, and after that a
walled garden,’ said Aimee, who was still keeping watch. She was seated on
Chissmoul’s right, looking out from below the javelard’s firing bucket. ‘Then
another high wall, with a lawn between it and the rear of the mansion. Windows
run across the rear but it’ll be difficult to get near them with all those
trees.’

‘Left side, or right?’ said Chissmoul, who sounded
exhausted.

‘The trees are close by on either side. We’ll have to attack
at the front.’

‘I
want
to attack
the front,’ said Flydd. ‘That’s where the staterooms and audience chambers will
be. It’ll be a much more public show, and a bigger insult. Go over the roof,
Pilot.’

The air-sled drifted over the high roof, jerking and
lurching, and out to the centre of the square, where it hovered in the darkness
some distance above the paving stones.

The square was well-lit in front of both palace and mansion
by street lamps reflected downwards, and the mansion had a pair of gigantic
front doors, broad enough to admit the air-sled, though they were closed. There
were bay windows to left and right, equally grand, and Nish could see shadows
moving behind the filmy curtains to the left. Though the stateroom on the right
appeared larger, it was dimly lit and did not appear to be occupied.

‘There’s no one about at this time of night,’ said Flydd,
sounding vexed.

‘The patrolling guards will see us as soon as we move down
into the light,’ said Flangers.

‘I’m not doing this for
their
amusement! Stay at this height, Pilot,’ whispered Flydd. ‘I’m making a slight
change to the plan.’

‘What are you going to do now?’ said Nish, alarmed.

Flydd untied one of the canvas-wrapped tar balls and hefted
it in his arms. ‘I’m waking everyone up; we’ve got to have an audience. Have
you picked your target, Nish?’

What was he up to? ‘Er, yes,’ said Nish. ‘I’m going to aim
at the front doors and smash them down.’

‘If they’re iron-reinforced, they might not break,’ said
Flydd. ‘If our attack isn’t spectacular, we’ve failed.’

‘What if I fire through the right-hand bay window into the
stateroom?’

‘Sounds good. Get ready.’ Taking a flint striker from his
pocket, Flydd snapped it at the fuse of his tar ball, which caught at once,
burning with a fizzing sound and the smell of sulphur. He studied the speed of
burning, counted to five under his breath, then tossed the tar ball over the
side into the centre of the vast square.

The fuse sparked once or twice as the tar ball hit the
paving stones and rolled, but that was all.

‘Damnation,’ said Flydd. ‘Has it gone out, or not?’

‘Fuses are perilous things, in my experience,’ said Flangers.
‘Sometimes they burn fast, sometimes slow. And sometimes you think they’ve gone
out, when they haven’t. Even if you wait five minutes, or ten, it could go off
in your face.’

‘That’s what I’m afraid of,’ said Flydd, ‘but I’ll have to
go down and relight it.’

‘You could throw another tar ball,’ said Aimee.

‘We can’t afford to waste them. If the attack is a fizzer,
all Taranta will be laughing – but at us. Take us over it, Chissmoul.’

Chissmoul, now so exhausted that Aimee was holding her
steady, wobbled the air-sled over the tar ball, about six spans up.

Flydd tied knots at intervals in a line, fixed it to the
side, shinned down and snapped the flint striker at the fuse.

‘Hey, you!’ a man bellowed from the darkness. ‘What do you
think you’re doing?’

It was a guard on the far side of the square. The air-sled
hung above the level of the lanterns and would be just a huge shadow to him,
but Flydd was clearly visible.

‘Get a move on!’ Nish muttered.

Footsteps sounded, running across the square.

‘Put your hands above your head or we’ll shoot,’ the first
guard shouted.

 
TWENTY-FIVE

Flydd kept snapping the flint striker and finally the
fuse began to spark. A crossbow bolt whined above his head, another glanced off
the paving a little to his left. He leapt for the rope and was up to the third
knot when the spark faded again.

‘Blast and botheration!’ Flydd cried. ‘What’s the matter
with the damn fuse?’

‘Probably damp,’ said Flangers.

‘You can’t go down again,’ Nish hissed. ‘The guards are too
close.’

Flydd ignored him, and was sliding down when the spark
reappeared.

‘It’s still burning,’ Nish called. ‘Get up here, quick!’

The air-sled lurched. Was Chissmoul losing control? Nish
could not imagine how she had held the air-sled up this long. This is going to
be a disaster, he thought. Even if we survive, we’ll be a laughing stock. I’ll
be a laughing stock, and I’d sooner die. He meant it, too, for his reputation
meant more to him than his life. And it’ll destroy any chance of bringing the
God-Emperor down. No, we’ve got to succeed, no matter what it takes.

More bolts shot past Flydd and one plucked at the fabric of
his trousers, near the knee.

‘That was a bit too close,’ said Flangers. ‘He’s not
climbing fast enough.’ He grabbed the rope and began heaving Flydd up. Nish
went to him and took part of the load, counting the seconds and praying that
the tar ball would not go off,
yet
.

Flydd came over the side, gasping like a stranded carp. ‘If
the bloody thing doesn’t –’

There was a colossal boom, the air-sled lurched wildly and
hundreds of lumps of burning tar splattered against its metal underside, while
the rest formed a technicolour fountain spraying up into the air all around
them.

One of the guards began to scream and tear at his tunic,
which was ablaze with tar in three places. Another man dragged him away.

The lumps of fallen tar now formed a broad, blazing ring in
the centre of the square, issuing clouds of black smoke. On the other side, the
doors of the governor’s palace were flung wide and there was a roar of,
‘Guards! Guards!’

Lights were being lit all around the square; people rushed
out of front doors and peered through windows. A squad of guards came pounding
up the side of the palace, but stopped at its closed front gates and stared.

Nish could hear someone shouting at them. More roaring came
from the rear of the seneschal’s mansion, presumably from the barracks. Time
was rapidly running out.

‘Get to your post, Nish,’ cried Flydd, ‘and take aim. Pilot,
get to the front of the mansion then bring her down into the light.’

The air-sled wobbled towards the mansion.

‘You haven’t lit the damned fuses,’ Nish snapped as he
scrambled up into the shooter’s seat and turned the aiming wheels. The air-sled
lurched again. Chissmoul seemed to take an eternity to steady it, and Nish knew
she could not last much longer.

Flydd swore, ran for the leather bucket, held the fuses of
the five tar balls together and lit them all at once. ‘Ten,’ he called.

The bay window of the mansion was fixed in Nish’s sights
when the vast double doors were flung wide and half a dozen people ran out onto
the porch, then stopped, staring. The air-sled must have been a hellish sight,
hanging in the air in front of the mansion with the huge javelard fixed on them
at point-blank range, for its keel was peppered with chunks of blazing tar,
their tongues of flame licking up above the four sides, and all was wreathed in
choking black smoke.

‘Nine,’ said Flydd.

‘Guards!’ screeched the seneschal.

His guards came boiling around the side of the mansion, then
stopped.

‘Seven!’ said Flydd.

Nish swung the javelard until it pointed at the doorway, and
the people there scattered. The seneschal’s face collapsed as the sights fixed
on him. Nish was happy to terrorise him but people weren’t his target, no matter
how depraved.

‘Five,’ said Flydd.

‘Take them down!’ cried the seneschal.

The air-sled lurched left, then right. Hold it, Chissmoul,
Nish prayed, adjusting the sights, and it steadied.

‘Three!’

The guards whipped their crossbows up to their shoulders and
aimed at Nish, who was only partly shielded from that angle, but he did not
flinch. He had a job to do.

He aimed the javelard over the seneschal’s head and down the
vast hall where, halfway along, he saw the base of a magnificent staircase.
From this distance he could hit it with his eyes closed.

‘Fire!’

No time to regret the architectural magnificence he was
about to wantonly destroy – Nish fired.

The chain-shot whirled out to its fullest extent and slammed
into the front of the mansion, splintering the open doors and sending chips of
stone in all directions. Several of the guards were knocked down and the rest
were lost behind clouds of blinding dust and flying splinters.

Recoil forced the javelard backwards until its ropes creaked
– Nish had not thought of that. The prow of the air-sled shot up, the
rear tilted down, and for an awful moment he thought it was going to overturn
in the air and land on top of them, splattering everyone like cockroaches. As
he sprang from his seat several crossbow bolts spanged off the metal prow. Had
he succeeded? He could not tell; he’d lost sight of the target.

He was scrambling up to the top of the javelard frame so he
could see, when the stern of the air-sled slammed into the paving stones and
the impact broke the force of the recoil. Nish’s teeth snapped together and he
tasted blood from a bitten tongue.

The right-hand chain had destroyed the bay windows on that
side and disappeared inside. The left-hand chain had demolished the left bay
window, and all the tar balls had broken free. The central tar ball had gone
hurtling down the hall, to explode against the base of the staircase, flinging
burning tar across the open central area of the mansion and setting fire to
everything it touched.

The tar balls that had gone through the demolished bays also
went off, and in an instant the curtains were ablaze and black smoke began to
gush out of the windows. Nothing could save the mansion now.

The people at the front ran for their lives, the seneschal’s
sagging belly flopping up and down. More people were swarming out of the
servants’ quarters at the rear, though they were not in danger.

However, everyone on the air-sled was in peril, for the
impact with the paving had snapped several of the over-strained ropes holding
the javelard, allowing it to slide to the right and unbalancing the air-sled.

‘Get to the left,’ Chissmoul screamed as she fought to keep
the lurching, swaying craft aloft. There was no time to land and right the
javelard, for the guards from the palace were running across the square,
weapons at the ready.

Nish’s militia surged to the left, tilting the craft in that
direction, but now the front of the javelard swung that way, for more of its
ropes had broken. Nish, still perched up top, wasn’t game to move in case he
made things worse.