Beneath a Burning Sky (The Dawnhawk Trilogy Book 3) (16 page)

It didn’t take long for the crew to prepare. Lina lined up along the port-side exhaust with the others; Reaver Jane, Farouk, Rastalak, Jahmal, Andrea Holt, Ryan Gae, Nate Wiley, and Natasha, of course, standing fiercely. Michael Hockton and Allen clustered near Lina, while Paine hung back, uncertain. Everyone had cutlasses and fresh muskets. Etarin was at the helm. Butterbeak chirped in excitement at the impending violence, while Runt chirred irritably.

The Glory of Perinault
still closed the distance between them, coming up along the port side. It was smaller than the
Dawnhawk
, more trim. Thick, armored plates covered the gondola, as well as the gasbag itself. Along the hull were an array of propellers, three to a side, smaller than the two great spinning blades whirling at the stern of the vessel. The sigil painted on the gas bag was even more gaudy, up close.

Lina was aghast. How could such an ugly thing move so quickly? She glanced back around her own deck for reassurance. The
Dawnhawk
was the latest of the Mechanist’s airships, fast and strong. Surely they’d pull ahead.

Though when Lina took in the well-patched gas bag, the splintered deck, and the cracked exhaust stack hissing steam, she felt no confidence. The airship was bedraggled and worn down. She needed repairs and refitting. A haphazard curtain of rope dangling down from the top of the gas bag to starboard seemed particularly out of place.

The enemy airship closed in. A thousand meters, then five hundred, then a hundred. Lina lifted a musket, but Natasha hissed at her, at them all; they’d never hit a thing at that range. It would still feel good, though, to fire. She glanced to Michael standing beside her, confidently gripping a musket.
My soldier.
He noticed her watching, smiled bravely, and stood a little straighter. Lina felt butterflies in her stomach, but then she winced. She shouldn’t have been toying with him. Her little test seemed foolish right now.

The airships were parallel now, close enough to see the enemy standing behind the armored sides of the airship gondola. Lina blinked in confusion. The Bluecoat marines she had expected, but spaced evenly along the gunwales were a score of tall men in heavy brazen armor, holding massive, pepperbox muskets.
Who are they? Are those knights? That’s...that’s ridiculous. Who wears plate armor in this day and—

Someone yelled a command over on the other ship. The brass knights raised their weapons in unison, took aim, and fired. Flames blossomed and thunder roared out from the barrels of their overlarge guns, sounding more like cannons than muskets.

Death flew past Lina with a cracking whip-hiss that sent her ducking frantically. Other shots proved more lethal. The gunwales in front of the assembled pirates exploded into jagged shards at the impact of heavy musket balls, clearing the path for their brethren to hammer into the exhaust pipe. Lina watched dimples appear in the skin of the pipe from those shots that pierced it, which then rung about inside as the whole piece ruptured and cracked in front of her eyes. Scalding heat washed over her as steam shot out in great hissing gouts that added a teakettle whistle to the cacophony of the bombardment.

Her ears were ringing, and blood spilled down her face. Something made her cheek stiff. Lina ignored it, praying that whatever wound she’d taken wasn’t too serious. Adrenaline numbed the pain for now. But when had she fallen to her back?
Got to get up. Get up and draw my knives—there isn’t any time—

A branching metal hook flew through the steam and landed on the deck just beside her. An attached rope pulled taut, yanking back to catch on the ruin of the exhaust pipe. Others followed just behind it, running down the length of the ship in front of the beleaguered pirates. The boarding hooks all pulled tight, and Lina shouted a wordless warning as she realized what was coming next.

Light from above dimmed as the
Glory of Perinault
pulled tight against the
Dawnhawk
. The brass knights held the boarding grapnels, and Bluecoat marines stood between them now in odd harnesses; they took smallswords and bayonet-tipped muskets to hand as they leaped aboard the pirate airship.

Lina scrabbled to her feat, drawing both of the daggers at her hips. On her shoulder Runt arched up, hissing violently. She tried to yell another warning as she saw Natasha on her feet with cutlass upraised, her puffy sleeve torn and bloody, long splinters sticking out from her shoulder. Rastalak was snarling, fingers spread in claws, looking for all the world like some monstrous beast. Nate Wiley lay facedown, and Michael Hockton was taking aim with his musket as Allen clutched the spurting stump of a missing finger. Then the Perinese were flying through the steam and there wasn’t time to do anything but fight.

She fell back at the charge of a bull-necked man with a smallsword trailing a rope tether back to the
Glory
from his leather harness. He blinked in confusion as he saw her, expecting something other than a hundred-pound waif with a weird creature on her shoulders. Lina recognized the gift for what it was and threw herself forward. She slashed at his wrist, then aimed for his throat with the other dagger. Runt snapped forward, hissing poisonous spittle at his face. The soldier fell back with an inarticulate cry, only for another to replace him, eyes narrow with determination.

Her new opponent was hampered by his harness and tether but still dangerous. He thrust for her head with his blade, forcing her to bring both daggers up in an X-shaped block. The blow stumbled her backwards. Then he was on her again, hammering his smallsword at her like he was pounding nails.

“I’ve got him!” screamed Allen. The young Mechanist appeared with a long pike he’d found who knew where, goggles down, his wounded hand clumsily wrapped. He jabbed her assailant in the side. The Bluecoat grunted and knocked the pike away, sending the butt of the polearm straight back into Lina’s chest.

Her air whooshed out as she staggered back again. The shine of another Bluecoat’s smallsword flickered in the corner of her eye, and she made to duck away, only to be knocked sprawling as Michael Hockton crashed into her, sword upraised to block the blow she would have easily dodged. Lina lost her grip on a dagger and watched it clatter to the deck. She barely kept ahold of the second.

“I’ll save you,” Michael cried dramatically.

“Stop helping!” Lina reached for her other dagger. Its hilt was in her fingers when Michael stepped on her wrist. She yelled, and he stumbled, falling back into the soldier attacking Allen, forcing the man forward with a scream onto the pike.

She threw her arm up at the melee from where she lay, not quite caring at whom she pointed. “Runt!
Kill!
”

Her pet eeled from her shoulders and took wing, hissing and spitting and filling the air with lurid red light. Hoarse yells and curses rose up over the roar of the battle.

Lina scrabbled out from between the furiously stamping feet and twisting, knotting Bluecoat tethers only to find herself caught in yet another melee. She rose up and swiped at a marine, then dodged past Andrea Holt as the other woman charged into the fight. Lina swung wildly as she ran, taking as many opportunities to attack as she could—until she slammed into the exhaust pipe running along the starboard gunwales and there wasn’t anyone else to hit. Lina breathed great gasping breaths and used the pause to take in the battle before her.

The Perinese boarding action had been successful. Though there were fewer marines than she’d initially expected, their charge had worked perfectly, following just on the heels of the brass knights’ fusillade. Her crewmates had fallen back, allowing even more soldiers to board. Now individual melees raged up and down the deck, the defenders outnumbered two to one. Their only advantage was the mess of Bluecoat boarding tethers that stretched back to the enemy airship, hampering the invaders.

Past the struggle lay the
Glory of Perinault
, masked by a constant spray of steam. Through the cloud she thought she could see the knights. They hadn’t moved at all to join the attack, frozen like statues as they held the boarding grappels tying both ships together. Lina realized that they weren’t knights at all. They weren’t even alive.

Clockwork automata. Like the Brass Horses back in Triskelion. Or some kind of Voornish machine.

A figure leaped out of the steam to the port side of the
Dawnhawk’
s deck. Not a Bluecoat, he landed adroitly to stand with his hands on his hips, pompous and excited and very well dressed in tasteful scarlet and sable. He wore a boarding harness like the rest of the Perinese and was barely older than Lina herself, both thin and handsome. Instead of a smallsword, he wore an honest-to-the-Goddess longsword, like something straight from a penny-tale of knights and dragons.

“Avast, ye scallywags!” he said in a rich, cultured voice. “The day of yer doom be—” He abruptly broke into laughter. “I’m sorry. I always wanted to
say
that, but it sounds so
silly
out loud.” The fellow shook his head and looked about the deck. “Now, what have we...ah!”

He looked to Natasha, who was fighting in the middle of the deck. Putting a hand to the hilt of his longsword, he sauntered in her direction with polite calm, like a spectator at a sporting exhibit.

A soldier collapsed in front of him with Rastalak crouched upon his bloodied chest. The little Draykin looked up, saw the newcomer, and leaped.

The man moved like a serpent. He twisted and ducked, coming back up to catch the little Draykin with the palm of his free hand. Rastalak flew past, slamming against Reaver Jane and big Farouk, who stood back to back against four soldiers.

“My word,” said the newcomer, “there’s all manner of strange beasts aboard this vessel.”

He made a little pirouette behind Natasha, who was noisily sawing open the throat of a soldier with her cutlass. She seemed to see the movement and dropped her toy, twisting to swing her blade in a great, head-chopping arc. The newcomer laughed and stepped away, his longsword leaping from scabbard to hand in a parry like it was a living thing.

His blade flared with soft golden light. The metal positively glowed. When it met Natasha’s cutlass, sparks flew, as if from a blacksmith’s anvil. As she pulled back to strike again, Lina saw the blade was badly chipped.

A Worked blade. Oh no
.

Aetherite magic was uncommon enough. A Worked object was an order of magnitude more rare. To bind a permanent enchantment to a tool that anyone could use was difficult—and costly. Any aetherite willing and able to do so charged dearly for the service. But the results were worth almost any price: blades made of flame or charms that provided unparalleled protection.

Natasha was a skilled and vicious fighter. But the dandy seemed capable as well, and a magic sword put the odds firmly in his favor. Lina took a breath and ducked back into the fight; the captain was going to need her help.

“Natasha Blackheart!” crowed the fellow, cutting at her face. “Captain of the airship
Dawnhawk
and ravager of the Atalian Sea. I’ve read so much about you! It is an honor to finally meet you.”

Natasha parried the blow, more sparks flying. She bound his blade and held it, glaring at him between the cross of their swords. “And who are you, you damned peacock?”

The newcomer gave a nod. “Forgive me. You have the pleasure of speaking with Crown Prince Gwydion, heir apparent to the Kingdom of Perinault.”

Lina faltered as she ducked past another fight.
The Crown Prince? Here? But that’s insane, impossible
.

Natasha apparently came to a different conclusion. Her eyes widened in surprise, and she smiled cruelly. “Well now, if that’s true, you’re worth this trouble and then some. You should have stayed on your ship, peacock! Now I’m going to ransom you for all the gold in the Kingdom while my allies bomb your boats into flotsam!”

Gwydion laughed. “Oh, don’t blame me. I was
bored!
Besides, they’ll deal with it. We’re so completely superior to you silly pirates, after all. I even gave my royal guards the slip for a moment—left them behind to make this a bit more fair.” He looked away, at the
Glory
. “Do you like my airship? It’s
very
modern. Full of all sorts of clever mechanical improvements to this old rattletrap vessel of y—”

Natasha tried to take advantage of his distraction with a vicious cut at his head. The golden blade parried it neatly. “Come now,” he mocked, turning back to face her, “you’re going to have to do better than that. I wield Danlann, the Ruling Blade itself.”

“It’s a pretty thing,” snapped Natasha. “It’ll look perfect on my hip.”

Lina reached the two of them and moved to circle around behind Gwydion. As she watched, Natasha feinted with a sweeping overhand cut that fooled the crown prince. He raised his longsword to parry. Natasha suddenly drew a pistol with her free hand and aimed at his thigh. The plume of gunsmoke obscured Lina’s view, but the whine of a ricochet was all too familiar to her ears. When the smoke cleared Gwydion was standing nonchalantly, an eyebrow raised.

“Really now,” he said. “I’m the heir to the greatest kingdom in the world. Did you think I wouldn’t have all manner of rare and expensive protection at hand?”

Natasha hissed. “A bullet-warding Worked charm?” She looked directly to Lina. “Leave off—you’ll just get in the way. Fengel said you’re clever; go cut that damned armored whale from us!” Then she renewed her attack upon Gwydion with a flurry of blows so furious the prince was forced on the defensive.

Lina fell back. Natasha was right; there wasn’t much she could do against the prince. The question was, could Natasha?

Lina backed away, glancing to the struggle surrounding her. It was going poorly for the defenders. No one was laid out yet, but everyone was wounded. And if those automaton knights came aboard as reinforcements, it would be all over. She had to get the
Glory
separated from the
Dawnhawk,
just as ordered.