Stephen Hunt - From the Deep of the Dark

‘The Court’s greatest secret,’ said Sadly. ‘The only place other than Jackals where a significant vein of the gas has been found. But then we had to lift our aerial city somehow, and the Kingdom’s got its own supply of airship gas sealed too tight for us to tap on a regular basis.’

‘But what about the wicked molten rain, lad?’ said the commodore, astonished he wasn’t facing a live volcano. ‘I’ve anchored seventy miles off this coast and watched magma coming down thick enough to leave a Jackelian ironclad more full of holes than a lump of blessed cheese?’

Sadly pointed to a crown of massive pipes encased in machinery circling the rim of the crater. ‘Your rocks are real enough, but they’re heated in furnaces here and then catapulted out under hyper-pressure. Our lava launchers have got a lot more accurate over the centuries since we landed here. For anyone that survives a bombardment from those, the island’s coastline has concealed dirt-gas flues to choke would-be trespassers.’

‘Bob my soul, but I knew there was something on the island worthy of the efforts you’ve made to discourage visitors,’ said Daunt.

‘You should consider yourself fortunate,’ said Sadly. ‘You may be the first people in history outside our ranks to see this place.’

Charlotte held onto the railing in the cabin as their cable car passed through a forest of girders, elevator belts, hoists, piping, gantries, walkways and ladders suspended across the crater’s heart. Something of such colossal value as celgas was always enough to pique her interest, but stealing bulky airship gas cylinders wasn’t a proposition worth pursuing. That was the beauty of jewels and rare paintings, their portability and resale value. It was just unfortunate the buyers of King Jude’s sceptre only wanted the piece to unleash a horde of starving demons on the world. That was one situation where having the money wouldn’t help.

Coming across the gantries marched steammen — the human-milled variety, rather than citizens of the Steamman Free State. They were a polished copper colour, hulking things seven feet tall with a single rotating transaction-engine drum turning in the middle of each chest. On their back they had twin stacks behind each shoulder blade. Their head units resembled a cuirassier’s helmet, each with three camera-like eyes giving their skulls an insectoid appearance. Some had two arms, but many had multiple limbs — four, five, six or more arms, or tools and cutting equipment serving as appendages.

Sadly noticed where Charlotte was looking. ‘We’ve always relied on automatics on the island. Locals are happy to help out with most things, but they don’t like coming inside the volcano. Old superstitions die hard.’

‘All those years in your gaff,’ said Dick Tull, the bitterness in his voice evident. ‘Me eating that slop you served and taking whatever scraps and tip-offs you tossed my way — and all that time you had all of this behind you.’

Sadly didn’t appear even slightly embarrassed by the subterfuge. ‘A lot more than this, once, Mister Tull. And again, soon. The Court’s far subtler than the sea-bishops. A nudge here, a nudge there, and softly softly catchy monkey. We’ve always operated on the principle that you receive a much easier ride in the great game if your opponent doesn’t realize there’s an opponent sitting in the chair opposite the board.’

‘So it’s true then?’ said Daunt. ‘The Court has a predictive model of society running on its transaction-engines. You really believe you can shape the world’s events to a single plan?’

‘You and your inquisition friends,’ said Sadly, only half a sneer. ‘It would be truer to say we’ve got a backup of the original model running now, says I. What with all that bother during the invasion. The accuracy of the new model will be up to snuff by the time the next Court of the Air is refloated.’

‘You detected the infiltration of the Kingdom off the back of transaction-engine analysis?’ Dick asked, not bothering to hide his surprise.

‘Punch card artists are good for a lot more than working out how much has been paid in taxes and who’s shelled out enough to become a duke this year,’ said Sadly.

The State Protection Board officer looked grey and tired. ‘I’ve got to get out of this bloody game, I really have. I used to think I understood how it operated, how things were done. Instead…’ his voice trailed off.

‘We’re on the same side, really,’ said Sadly. ‘It’s just the Court’s in for the long haul, the long view.’

‘That you are,’ said the commodore. ‘But this government rascal and the likes of poor old Blacky, we haven’t got enough years left apiece to play along, nor the energy remaining to care for the cleverness and cunning wheezes you’ve got turning on your thinking machines’ drums.’

‘I rather think your people have lost sight of the human perspective, good agent,’ said Daunt. ‘For all you’ve tried to do here, protecting the Kingdom, our future’s pivoted on the fate of young Damson Shades and the actions of myself, Boxiron, the commodore and-’

Sadly interrupted. ‘But then, the Court’s not the only one with a plan, eh?’ He looked at Charlotte. Still, Elizica passed no comment to Charlotte. ‘And there’s a thin line between assistance and meddling when it comes to the Court’s calculations.’

Daunt winked at Charlotte. ‘I wonder what side of the line we will be judged as occupying?’

‘So do I,’ sighed Sadly. ‘Like I said before, we’re not the organisation we used to be. Half our lot were listed as dead and missing after the Army of Shadows’ invasion, with the vacancies left filled by greenhorns, agents bought out of retirement and support staff.’

They docked with a large building built into the opposite side of the crater. The commodore was the second to step out of the cable car, following Charlotte. ‘The mill’s been shut down, the labourers laid off, but the clerks in the counting house are still shuffling around their blessed pieces of paper, is it?’

‘We’re in a better state than that,’ said Sadly, but something in the way he said it made Charlotte think that the old u-boat man might be closer to the mark than the agent would prefer.

Sadly led them into the building, through a nest of corridors and stairs, until the smooth rock face of the mountainous volcano replaced the metal walls of the building. Guards in close-fitting leather uniforms checked them before admitting the party any further into the complex. They carried strange-looking rifles with bulbous stocks that caught the commodore’s attention. Sadly explained that they were gas-rifles, capable of firing steel darts at enormous velocities from the rotating drums above their forestock without the need to break the rifle and insert a fresh charge after each shot. They could no doubt maintain a murderously fast rate of fire. Not quite as bulky as airship gas cylinders, Charlotte had a few acquaintances back in Middlesteel’s criminal underworld that would pay a small fortune to acquire such a weapon. But how to get it off the Isla Furia without getting caught?

There was a chlorine smell about the corridors they passed through. The scent sparked a memory of the public bathing rooms back in the capital — residue from the centuries of celgas mining operations, perhaps. Led into a large chamber, Charlotte saw they were left in front of a raised floor and a series of chairs, behind which curved one of the clear almost magically transparent view screens displaying the smoking vista of the Fire Sea beyond. Only one of the chairs was occupied, a balding man with two patches of wispy white hair clinging behind large ears, staring down on them over a pair of hexagonally framed spectacles. Charlotte had seen enough colleagues sent down in front of the middle court back home to know what this chamber was meant to signify. He cut a lonely figure up on the raised floor, a magistrate with most of his stenographers and court officials missing.