Marie Brennan: Voyage of the Basilisk

The Yelangese, taking this as proof of Miriam’s presence, had not hesitated to fire, and so the battle was joined.

Battles are not pretty things, but this one was especially ugly. The Puian war fleet had but few guns and no artillery. Aekinitos had ordered his men to drag their cannon up to the promontory, from which they offered what supporting fire they could, but it was very scant. Many of those engaged in the battle had only spears and shark-tooth clubs with which to fight. The agility and speed of their canoes gave them a certain advantage in shallow coastal waters over the Yelangese ships, and their small size and great number meant that although a cannonball might strike one craft, five others would continue onward—but the shots did strike, crushing many warriors and sending them into the sea. Where the canoe fleet reached a ship, men swarmed up on too many sides to repel them all at once, but the casualties were great.

Such was the fruit of the ordinary elements. Both sides, however, had unexpected weapons, and did not hesitate to deploy them.

I have recounted my own ride upon the back of a sea-serpent, and said that the more experienced Keongans are capable of steering the beasts to a limited extent. On that day, in the waters around the archipelago, I saw the truth of it with my own eyes. They do not ride the serpents merely for entertainment, or to prove their virility and strength: they had also been practicing for war.

Half a dozen serpents raged in the waters around the fleet. Two of the seven ships were sinking, I realized, their hulls cracked by the terrible force of the serpents’ water blasts. These had destroyed some canoes as well, for a serpent lashes out when and where it will; the rider can only attempt to direct its head toward the enemy or else into open water. As weapons and as mounts, they are nearly as dangerous to their own side as they are to the opponent. But the psychological effect of them that day cannot be understated. The Yelangese came to the islands expecting to brush past a few dozen canoes, but found themselves facing hundreds, with the great beasts of the sea fighting on their side.

They had a weapon of their own, however, and it rained death from the sky. The other caeliger swooped across the bloodstained waters again and again, too high for even the strongest island warrior to hurl a spear, but low enough for the men in its gondola to shoot accurately into the fracas below. They had begun by picking men off from the canoes, but when the serpents entered the fray, they shifted their efforts to those beasts and the men who controlled them. There had been more serpents before; now two floated dead in the water, and a third rampaged freely, attacking anything in its path.

I had not forgotten Admiral Longstead’s declaration of his resolve to rescue the princess. If she had not been moved, she was on Lahana, and the Battle of Keonga stood in his path. I ran to the quarterdeck, hoping against hope to persuade him not to add his cannon to the weapons aimed at the islanders.

To my surprise, I found him standing quietly, watching the battle with close attention, but giving no orders to join it. “You will not fight?” I asked.

“Let them carve one another up,” he said. “I suspect the Yelangese will win, with that thing in the air, but they will be badly bloodied. Then we will move into range and hail them. They will give way, or if they do not, we will take appropriate steps.”

As little as I wanted him to fire on the Keongans, I found myself almost equally dismayed to hear him say he would stand aside. “You will just sit here and watch men die?”

“Should I risk my own men on their behalf, Mrs. Camherst? I was not sent here to involve myself in a local war. If I could sail past them to reach the princess, I would do so. If they fire upon us, I will answer in kind. But otherwise, I will wait.”

The most infuriating part of it all, then and now, was that Admiral Longstead was right. He could easily have routed the Yelangese if he moved in; they were already beleaguered, and the Scirling ships were both larger and superior in firepower. But why should he do so? We were not so much at odds with Yelang as to risk starting a war with them in this fashion.

And yet it tore my heart to stand there while the battle raged, watching the caeliger slaughter helpless men and beasts from above, and do nothing.

I hate above all else to do nothing.

People have accused me of lying on this point, but I truly do not remember making a decision. I remember thinking only that I must do something . Then I was over the railing and plummeting toward the sea, with Suhail shouting after me.

I hit the water with a great splash and sank deep, but soon kicked back up to the surface. A second splash inundated me; when it receded, Suhail was nearby, dashing the water from his face with a quick shake of his head. “What are you doing ?” he demanded.

“The admiral will not go closer to the battle,” I said breathlessly. “I must find my own conveyance.”

The creature was almost to us. I had seen it approaching before I went over the rail: a sea-serpent, one of those which lost its rider in the battle, perhaps, or else a curious visitor. I struck out for it before Suhail could get more than two words into his description of exactly how mad I was. He was not wrong; but he must claim a share of madness for himself, along with a good helping of chivalric honour—for when he saw what I intended, he did not abandon me to do it alone.

We had learned some lessons from our previous ride. I felt almost competent as we caught our holds with a minimum of trouble; soon we were atop the serpent as before, and together encouraged it to swim in the direction of the battle. This was not difficult, as the blood in the water had attracted its attention. But once there, we faced two challenges, each one alone far greater than the simple task of riding: we must figure out something of value to do, and then find a way to do it.

I thought at first to go for the Yelangese ships, as the other riders were doing. But there were any number of difficulties in doing that: a churning sea of chaos lay between us and those targets; we should have to steer through the canoes, which I did not at all trust our ability to achieve; the Yelangese would be shooting at us the whole way, both from the ships and from the caeliger; and we might do more damage to the side I intended to support. The sea was simply too crowded for me to have any certainty of directing the serpent’s blast in a safe direction—given that I had not practiced for it at all.

Suhail was shouting something at me, but I did not hear it. My gaze had fallen upon the caeliger.

Had ours been functional, we might have used it in the battle, but the puncturing of its bag had released whatever gas the Yelangese were using to create lift, and the engine had taken a wetting besides. I had no way to get at the enemy caeliger, and would not have been much use with a rifle even had I thought to take one from our ship.

But it was possible that someone else—some thing else, I should say—might be able to strike that high.

The caeliger was approaching, completing one pass across the battle and preparing to make a turn. I saw one of the men above notice us. He was too distant to have a good shot, but held his rifle and waited. That, I realized might be my death—or Suhail’s.

“Pull!” I cried to him, and suited action to words, hauling with all my might upon the tendrils we held.

Even our combined strength could not have moved the serpent’s great head. I did not expect it to: I sought instead to vex the creature enough that it would lift its head of its own accord. And so it did, flanks rippling with the motion I knew meant it had drawn in water, preparatory to expelling it. But its head barely crested the waves, which would not be enough at all.