Chris Wooding - Retribution Falls

But the heavy guns of the pirate craft would start up soon, blasting at the fleet, and a tiny craft like his would be dashed to pieces in the shellfire.

The safest thing to do was attack.

He heard Pinn whoop in his ear, and cursed him for his absurd courage. He could already picture that moron racing ahead of the pack, desperate for the first kill, heedless of the danger. He was the kind that would evade death for ever, simply because he didn’t realise it was there. The fearless always survived. It was one of the great unfairnesses of life, in Harkins’ opinion.

Well, he was damned if he’d let Pinn mock him for being the last one into the battle. The thought of that chubby-cheeked face screwed up in laughter made his blood boil. He hit the throttle and plunged out of the flotilla, pursuing the Navy Windblades into the fray.

The pirate fighters were a motley of different models from different workshops, representing the last thirty years of aviation technology. They came on like a cloud of flies, without discipline or any hint of a formation. The Navy fighters were tighter, punching towards them like an arrow. Harkins slipped in near the back.

The Firecrow’s engines roared, encompassing him in sound. The craft shook and trembled. Through the windglass bubble on its nose, Harkins could see the vile colours of the marsh blurring beneath him. Two Windblades hung on his wings, their pilots wearing identical Navy-grey helmets, their attention focused on the attack. Harkins swallowed and hunched forward, his finger hovering over the trigger.

The two sides met as the Navy frigates released another salvo, pounding the town of Retribution Falls, pulverising those pirate craft which were too slow to react to the surprise attack. Suddenly the world was full of explosions and machine guns, and Harkins yelled in fear as he opened up on the enemy.

The Windblades spread out, spiralling and rolling as they approached. Harkins jinked left to avoid a lashing of tracer fire, picked his target and sent a long burst back towards them. He aimed where he thought the craft was going, rather than where it was, and his guess was accurate. The pilot flew right through the deadly hail of gunfire. The windglass of the cockpit shattered and the pilot jerked as he was shot through with bullets. The craft tipped into a long, lazy dive towards destruction.

The pirates and Navy fighters broke upon each other like waves onto rocks, spuming in all directions as they scattered. The battle became a mass of individual dogfights.

Harkins threw the Firecrow into a steep climb, raking his guns across the underside of an old Westingley Scout. It corkscrewed out of control and slammed into the tail of another pirate craft as he soared upward. Something thundered past his wing, missing a collision by less than a metre. Dizzy with fear-driven adrenaline, he paid it no mind. He levelled out, letting the G-force off a bit before coming around and on to the tail of a rickety Cloudskimmer.

Pinn screamed with joy in his ear. Harkins gave a scream of a different kind, and pressed down on his guns.

‘Time to go,’ said Frey, as the first scattered volleys of return fire from the pirate frigates came smashing into the Navy fleet. He vented aerium and dropped the Ketty Jay down beneath the keels of the larger aircraft, then hit the thrusters and sped towards the town.

The pirate frigates had begun to wake up now, shedding their anchor-chains and gliding into action, their gun-crews finally in position. Frey had hung back to hide as best he could among the heavy craft, but like Harkins, he knew it would be suicide to stay once the big guns got going. Besides, he’d done his job. He’d led them here. That was enough to earn his pardon, assuming they intended to give it to him.

Now he had a purpose of his own, and it didn’t involve getting tangled up in a squabble between the Navy and Orkmund’s pirate gang.

Retribution Falls was a mess. Whole areas were flattened as the dwellings, never built for strength, fell apart from the concussion of a single shell. As he watched, one of the platforms at the far end of the town tipped and fell, its gridwork of scaffolding blasted away on one side. Buildings crumbled into landslides of brick, sweeping people with them as they went. Bodies were mangled and ground to bits as an entire district collapsed into the marsh.

Frey heard Malvery start up on the autocannon, blasting away at a pirate fighter as it screamed overhead. He ignored it, steered away from the main conflict and angled the Ketty Jay towards the platform he wanted. The quality of architecture there was the highest in the town, and Frey was pleased to see it had suffered only superficial damage.

That was good, since he planned to land there.

‘You sure you want to do this, Cap’n?’ Jez asked doubtfully, peering through the windglass. Large sections of Retribution Falls had been wrecked. Plumes of smoke billowed from their ruins. ‘There’s no telling how long it’ll be before someone shells the shit out of that platform, too.’

Frey was anything but sure. ‘They’re concentrating fire on the pirate frigates now,’ he said, mostly to convince himself. ‘The town itself isn’t a threat.’ Malvery cheered in triumph from the cupola. Frey assumed he’d made a hit.

‘Your call, Cap’n,’ she said. ‘But we can get out of this now if we want to.’

‘I hear you, Jez,’ he said. But he was committed in his heart now. He couldn’t turn back.

At least this time he’d consulted his crew. He’d outlined his plan and asked them if they wanted to be part of it. Nobody was being forced; nobody was being duped. He wasn’t going to order anyone into this.

Some were reluctant. Some thought it would be better to cut their losses. They weren’t keen on the risk. But in the end, all of them agreed. Because they trusted him. Because he was their captain.

Frey took the Ketty Jay closer to the platform. Jez leaned over his shoulder and pointed. ‘There’s the square.’

‘Malvery!’ he yelled. ‘Get out of the cupola and get ready!’

Jez picked up her rifle from beneath the navigator’s station as Frey brought the Ketty Jay down in the square. Those few people who were nearby went running as she came in to land, hard and heavy because Frey was too nervous to be careful. She bumped down with a jolt that made Jez stagger.

Frey sat there for a moment. Overhead, shells exploded and pirate fighters weaved through the sky. He should just take off again. He didn’t have to do this. Maybe this was just history repeating, another all-or-nothing hand of Rake that might win him everything or lose it all, when he should have just laid down his cards and walked away with what he had.

You’ve got a craft, a crew, and the whole world to explore. Nobody’s your master. Now that’s not so bad, is it? If you’re lucky, the Coalition will pardon you when all this is done. Drave may be a mean bastard but he doesn’t seem like a liar. You’ll be free.

Whether Drave would honour his word or not was a moot point. He wasn’t sticking around to see. As soon as he’d done what he came here to do, he planned to run. The Navy would be tied up here for a while. Let them pardon him in his absence.

But first, there was the small matter of fifty thousand ducats. Fifty thousand ducats that had been promised him by the brass-eyed whispermonger Quail. Fifty thousand ducats that he felt he’d damn well earned by now.

This was their chance to be rich. To leave the rogue’s life behind and allow themselves a bit of comfort. Equal shares for them all, because everyone had done their part.

He looked out of the cockpit at the barricade surrounding Orkmund’s stronghold. The square they’d landed in lay right in front of it. A few days ago, they’d stood here to hear the great pirate speak. Somewhere inside that building was a red chest with a silver wolf clasp that he’d first seen being loaded onto the Moment of Silence when he visited Amalicia Thade at the Awakener hermitage.