The Golden Princess: A Novel of the Change (Change Series) (46 page)

He rough-measured the components with outstretched thumb and little finger, since his were a convenient half-shaku long more or less, and decided they were near optimum in their proportions. Those had to be carefully calculated to transmit the maximum possible amount of the energy stored in the springs.

These weapons could be quickly rerigged to throw either eight-pound steel balls or four-foot javelin-arrows. Some of those had sickle heads to cut rigging or bisect anyone unlucky, and some of the roundshot were of glass filled with incendiary compounds and wrapped in cord that could be soaked in the stuff and set alight just before they were shot.

He traced tubing with his eyes, and grunted with delight—the recoil force was transmitted through cylinders of its own and used to partially recock the loading system, salvaging energy and speeding up the process.

Really very clever.

The Imperial Navy had something similar, but that was much easier with the purely mechanical cocking system his service used. In the bows and right aft at the curved stern of the poop deck were the chasers, single rather larger catapults running on steel tracks set into the decks, so that they could be rapidly traversed to cover a cone before or after the ship. Those had sloping steel shields built on either side of the throwing-trough to protect the crew while they reloaded and aimed.

“Cocking mechanism is . . . pump liquid . . . hydrauric?” he said.

“So desu,”
Feldman said, surprising him a little. “Long-stroke hydraulic bottle jacks from Donaldson Foundry & Machine in Corvallis, twenty-five-ton rating on the broadside pieces and thirty-five for the chasers in bow and stern. Those rocking-pump levers unfold and are clamped behind the piece for action. Forty-five seconds to reload with two hands on the pump, twenty-eight with four. Range is about fifteen hundred yards at maximum elevation with bolt ammunition, a bit more if you shoot on the uproll. More effective and accurate the closer you get, of course.”

Ishikawa grunted again—that was a slightly better rate of fire than the ones he’d used; on the other hand, his threw heavier shot farther and he would bet that they took less maintenance and were more reliable than these.

Then he looked up. The long booms on the masts looked as if it was mainly a fore-and-aft gaff rig, but there were spars for square sails on the main and foremast.

“Sail plan?”

“There we did make changes. It’s a topsail schooner rig now; gaff
mainsails on all three masts, square topsails on the main and fore, jib topsail on the mizzen. That’s a compromise, but everything’s tradeoffs, right?”

“Hai,”
Ishikawa said, when they’d gone back and forth to make sure that
tradeoff
meant
toredoofu. “Honto ni,”
he added for emphasis. “Definitely truth. Anything better one way, not so good the other. Nothing
ichiban
all way.”

This rig would sacrifice a little speed with the wind abaft the beam for more when you were working into the wind plus ability to point closer, and a very little less on a reach for considerably more with a following wind. For a ship that might have to either chase or run in any conceivable wind conditions, not just get from Point A to Point B regularly at least cost and time, it was a very sensible compromise.

Hoses were rigged to the dock. Rumbles came from below as the liquid gushed through them, filling the coated steel tanks below with fresh water.

“Crew?” he said.

With the work of loading going on so fast it was impossible to tell exactly who were part of the ship’s complement and which were dockside workers helping out or shore-based carpenters making last-minute alterations. Neither type wore uniforms, just rough shapeless patched working clothes differing only in detail from their Japanese equivalents.

“You
can
handle her with as few as ten if you’re not in a hurry—schooners are economical that way.”

Ishikawa shrugged agreement. Gaff-rigged fore-and-aft sails like those on the lower parts of the
Tarshish Queen
’s three masts could be raised, lowered and reefed from on deck, with most of the muscle-work done by winches, and they had them. For maximum speed the square topsails on the main and fore would need hands to go up the ratlines and out the spars. Plus there was little point in having catapults without crews.

“For foreign work . . . forty-five at least. That allows eight-hour watches with one on and two off in good weather, plenty of reserve for storms, and enough to help with loading and unloading if there aren’t good harbors. And to fight, of course.”

“Prentry vorunteers?” he asked.

The ones who definitely were sailors looked capable and they didn’t have to be driven to work. They also looked as if they knew what they were doing. At first glance half seemed to be women, but when he counted it was more like one in three or four. He would have thought mixed crews could cause disciplinary problems, especially on long voyages, but presumably the locals knew their business.

I will have to tell General Egawa to caution his men about making assumptions; we want no problems there.

Women in Japan also did things now that hadn’t been customary in the old days—the really old days, not the otherworldly-strange period between Meiji and the Change—because there simply wasn’t any alternative. They helped crew family fishing boats, for instance, if usually not on bigger craft. And ladies of the upper classes did much of the Empire’s routine administrative work.

Feldman nodded. “There are plenty who’ll ship out to do one watch on and two off with a strong chance of a fight, rather than one on and one off, and there’s no run without
some
chance of pirates anyway, even along the coast. And my crew works for a share in the voyage as well as a wage. That can double or triple straight pay rates, if we’re lucky. I get my pick; no first-voyage runaways fresh from the farm for the
Tarshish Queen
. First-rate hands prefer to work with their own kind, too, not spend half their time cuffing and shoving and cursing at plowboys. I could ship half again the number I do without taking anyone I wouldn’t want.”

“Why not more hands?” Ishikawa asked.

“I’m not a government—I can’t pay wages out of taxes.”

“Tradeoff again.”

“Yes. Speaking of which, just exactly how many . . . soldiers . . . am I supposed to pick up? The . . . Sir Guilliame said that wasn’t certain yet, just that there would be a fair number.”

Ishikawa’s face remained impassive. His heart suddenly ached for the crew
he’d
lost. And which he’d recruited, trained, led and fought beside—fisherman’s sons, mostly. He’d known every one of them, their names and natures and families. He took a deep breath and went on stolidly:

“I have eight sailor and self. Besides that,
Heika
 . . . Her Majesty . . .
blings . . . brings thirty-two samurai Imperial Guard, herself, General Egawa, and party of Crown Princess—same number. Pick up twenty-eight more place you know. And six horses.”

He thought Feldman winced slightly, and he sympathized; carrying large animals on a ship was nothing but trouble, and the farther you had to go the worse it was. He’d done it himself, mainly bringing breeding stock to new settlements or remounts to garrisons, and the memory was not a fond one. Pigs were bad enough, but oxen and horses . . . The man nodded stolidly and replied:

“For a voyage of this length, quite doable. The winds are from the northwest consistently this time of year, and the longshore current runs south most of the way.”

“That herp . . . that will
help
,
hai
,” Ishikawa said. “If not storm.”

Feldman laughed. “Oh, storms, of course. It’s summer, but . . .”

Ishikawa had been grave, as was fitting. For a moment they shared a sailor’s smile at the vagaries of the weather
kami
.

The merchant slapped the mizzenmast they stood beside. “We’ve weathered some storms together, this old girl and I.”

Old?
he thought, and remembered the smell of the bilges. He asked: “When built?”

“She’s six years old this spring.”

Ishikawa thought for a moment, then bowed. “This is a fine ship, Feldman-san. Must see sailing, but still . . . fine ship. I will inform the
Jotei
.”

And Egawa,
he thought.

Trusting the Empress to a foreign ship, and a foreign merchantman with a civilian crew at that, had understandably put the general on edge. The voyage here had been bad enough, and that was with an Imperial Navy vessel and picked professional crew. Under an impassive face, the commander of the Imperial Guard was as jumpy as a cat on a salvage-metal roof in summertime.

Feldman returned the gesture, rather clumsily. Ishikawa didn’t think the Montivallans were any better shipwrights than his people, but they had access to some materials that would give them an advantage. Some other things they did differently, though that mostly seemed simply different, not
substantially better or worse, like the catapults. They definitely had
more
in the way of ships even though they were mostly concerned with the land and the interior of this huge continent. Newport alone had as many slipways as the Imperial Navy base at Ryotsu on Sado-ga-shima, and from what he understood there were bigger ports and shipbuilding yards.

“We’re building another to the same draught and plan right now; she’s just about ready to have her sticks mounted and standing rigging put up.”

Feldman pointed to a hull in the fitting-out basin a mile away, under the big A-frame cranes that would slide the masts in.

“From what I’m given to understand, if she’s ready when we get back, a certain sovereign-to-be plans to buy her and transfer her to another sovereign we both know so she can get home when she wants to go. By then you should be familiar with her elder sister here, Ishikawa-san, and ready to take command and sail her.”

Ishikawa came to keenest attention, and felt a cold chill run through his belly. To have a ship again!

“Ichiban,”
he said softly. “Sank . . . thank you very much, Feldman-san.”

“
I’m
not the one giving you the ship, Captain Ishikawa,” Feldman said, chuckling. “My family will be getting her full price, enough to replace her and make up the loss of a season’s trade. But I would like to think she’s in good hands.”

Ishikawa didn’t say aloud that he felt like a cripple without a deck of his own to command, but he thought that the merchant understood it.

“We load tonight,” Ishikawa said instead. “Leave morning tide.”

•   •   •

Droyn and Sir Aleaume settled their contingent in to the ship, more than a score of men-at-arms and spearmen and crossbowmen, all in plain civil garb now. Their equipment was bundled or bagged, the weapons in long canvas sacks, the half-armor for each man wrapped in padding and stuffed into big duffels, even the unmistakable four-foot teardrop shapes of the shields disguised by stacking them pointing in alternate directions and tying them up in sailcloth. The troops were visibly unhappy without their weapons to hand; it would be as bad as walking down the street in your drawers for them.

Órlaith stood at the gangplank and greeted each one by name, a brief word and a nod. When they were all by their gear and sleeping bags below, she stood and caught their eyes. The long low space of the hold was like a shadowed cave, only the glimmer of lights off the water coming through the open portholes. The lashed-down, tarpaulin-covered supplies rose like hillocks behind them, and the light stalls of canvas-covered wicker for the horses they’d pick up later. The air had the inevitable smells of troops in transit, slightly rancid canola oil on leather and metal, old sweat soaked into armor-padding so that it never quite came out, as well as the brackish water and tar and spoiled fish of a working port.

“You were with me when my father the High King fell,” she said, not abruptly but without prologue.

Silence. That had been when he fell . . . and these men hadn’t saved him. They’d won the brief savage battle handily and he’d actually been murdered by a prisoner, but many would still be smarting from the greater failure, and savagely determined to redeem their names.

Even if it wasn’t their fault. Hearts have reasons that heads know not. I feel the same way and I
know
there’s
nothing
I could have done.

“Now we have a chance to begin to avenge him,” she said. “And as well to deal a heavy blow to the whole realm that sent the men who killed him.”

A low grim mutter ran through them. She nodded. “Yes, comrades, I know exactly how you feel. We’re going through the greatest and least known of the dead cities, and then into the wild lands. Those who fall will win honor, and I will not forget them or their kin. Those who return with me . . .”

A smile: “I’m assuming that I
will
return, of course; maybe that’s unreasonable optimism.”

That was a joke between warriors. The tension broke a little in a chuckle, and she went on:

“Those who return with me will stand with pride before the whole of the north-realm. And the whole of the High Kingdom of Montival. This enterprise is of high importance, and of great peril. I will share its hardships and dangers with you, for you are men I trust with my life.”

Another growl, and then a barking cheer: “Órlaith! Órlaith!
Órlaith and Montival!
”

She raised her hand in salute, but swallowed and blinked as she turned away, thanking the darkness. The shout had always been
Artos and Montival
 . . . until now.

The Japanese came aboard in the predawn hush, their weapons and gear in shapeless bundles on their backs. Órlaith had spaced out the movements from the Feldman and Sons warehouse; she wasn’t exactly trying to be completely secret. . . .

But then, I’m not trying not to be, either,
she thought, standing on the poop deck and watching them come up the gangplank.
I would really prefer that some curious, officious twit not burn up the signal net with reports heading for Mom until we’re safely on our way. Better to seek forgiveness . . .