Stephen Hunt - The Kingdom Beyond the Waves

‘I can rest when I’m dead,’ said the sonar man.

‘That fate will come soon enough,’ said Commodore Black. ‘Along with the wicked spectacle the mad prince of this jungle hell is planning for us.’

‘At least the end will be quick,’ said Ironflanks. ‘The five of us pitted weaponless against a kilasaurus max. It will be quick.’

The commodore laid a hand on the steamman’s shoulder. ‘For the love of the Circle, can’t you be telling the prince that you have changed your mind and that he’s a fine fellow who should be letting his new friends go on their way?’

‘You mistake him for one of my kind,’ said Ironflanks. ‘Doublemetal and his siltempters haven’t been part of the Free State for many thousands of years. They worship the foulest of Loas, Lord Two-Tar and his minions, and the Lord of Deactivation has driven all compassion from the siltempters’ boiler hearts for those whose threads are woven alongside their own in the great pattern.’

‘The prince said you escaped from this place once before,’ said T’ricola. ‘Can you not break the cell’s locks and get us out of the pit?’

‘That was an age ago,’ said Ironflanks. ‘And I had help. I was a knight steamman, ranked errant among the Order of the Pathfinder Fist. I led a party of knights here — King Steam had heard rumours that the siltempters had captured one of the last remaining Hexmachina, a wounded and nearly deactivate model. We were to find it and free it. But we had not realized how the jungle had changed the siltempters over the millennia. They had grown into monsters here. They slaughtered us, those who did not run. A few of us survived, tortured while our architecture was violated by the same prince that King Steam had once cast out of Mechancia by his own hand.’

‘But still you escaped,’ said Commodore Black.

‘It was Bronzehall who broke the codes on our lock in the temple’s torture rooms,’ said Ironflanks. ‘He was a sly one, Bronzehall. A knight of the Commando Militant with a hundred ways to demolish any construction, and a thousand more to break into it. He was one of the last of us to die when we were pursued through the jungle by the siltempters, the only steamman other than I not to be recaptured.’

‘What happened to him?’ Billy Snow asked.

‘We had almost reached Rapalaw Junction when the components the prince had violated our architecture with began to change our bodies. When Bronzehall realized how badly he had been afflicted, he could not bear the shame.’

‘A warrior’s death,’ said Veryann.

‘Yes, a warrior’s death. If we had succeeded in bringing back the Hexmachina, then perhaps King Steam would have helped us, instructed the hall of architects at Mechancia to do what they could to restore our bodies to the righteous pattern. As it was, banishment and the isolation of the unclean was to be my reward.’

‘You are still a steamman,’ implored the commodore. ‘Can you not help me break this cunning transaction-engine lock?’

‘Bronzehall could,’ said Ironflanks, ‘but not I, my softbody friend. I wish that I could, but I am as much a part of the jungle now as I am of the metal, which is why Liongeli’s dark realm speaks to me at night and fills my thoughtflow with the whispers of the canopy.’

Commodore Black stared forlornly down towards the bubbling lake of oil. ‘Then I will tease the blessed thing open myself. My genius versus the mocking black boiler hearts of the siltempters. Let us see if Prince Doublemetal is as canny as he thinks he is, the lord of the loons, filing down his rivets like a walking razor and crushing the bones of honest travellers that fall into his clutches.’

‘Let me help you,’ offered Billy Snow.

‘I know machines,’ said T’ricola. ‘I’ll take over from you when you tire.’

The commodore bent down to examine the lock, the sonar man and the chief engineer of the Sprite by his side. It was a race against time. Only a few hours remained until dawn splintered the star-filled night and ushered in their appointment with the thunder lizards in the fighting pit next door.

‘Oh, this is clever,’ said the commodore. ‘This lock is a work of art. The codes on this merciless thing are resetting themselves every few minutes — at random intervals, too, as best as I can see. You come up with a system to crack the lock and the wicked thing changes the game halfway through.’

‘What good will springing the doors do?’ said Ironflanks, pointing to the steaming oil below.

‘We can climb our cell’s tether,’ said Veryann, ‘or swing ourselves cage by cage to the edge.’

‘Let me try, let me try,’ the commodore muttered to himself, making wincing noises and grumbling as the lock matched its cunning with his. T’ricola observed his work while Billy Snow listened to the tumble of the mechanism inside, learning the clicks and clacks that preceded the apparatus resetting itself.

The commodore grew more frustrated, each small victory overturned as the lock altered its state. ‘Oh, you beast. You dark piece of work, built to play with my skill and break my hopes upon the sharp crags of your wicked construction.’ He was distracted by the distant howls from the arena next to their prison pit; a grim reminder of their fate if they failed to break the lock. ‘What are they, now? Blessed wolves howling at the moon, or thunder lizards? Can they not keep quiet? Must I crack this infernal device while listening to their song too.’

‘Their chains are fed with wild energy,’ said Ironflanks. ‘To torture the creatures and goad them into a killing fury before a contest. I saw many of my order sacrificed in such a way the last time I was held here.’

‘Are the odds not unequal enough already?’ moaned the commodore. ‘Poor old Blacky and his brave legs made slow by the years and what meagre crumbs of comfort I was able to salvage while living with my friends in Tock House. Thunder lizards do not need goading to feast on my weary bones … every mortal creature we’ve come across in Liongeli has already been clicking its jaws in fierce anticipation of the walking meal wearing the skipper of the Sprite’s uniform that they’ve found.’

Time was running out beneath their feet, an hour turning into two, then three. When the commodore’s hands were shaking and cramped, T’ricola took over and began to play the system, her bony craynarbian manipulator arms twisting and turning the mechanism with swift decisive strokes where the commodore had instead teased it like a musician playing his instrument. She was still attacking the lock when the cage heaved and began to rise out of the oil pit.

‘No!’ T’ricola cursed. ‘We’re so close. It’s still night, the sun hasn’t even broken the horizon yet.’

‘You would think that toad-faced prince would be a late riser,’ whined the commodore. ‘Soaking himself in the oil of his own people, a nice bath for his wicked steel bones before he takes it into his head to throw us into his deadly arena.’

Yet still their prison rose. Past the cages filled with rotting corpses and the bones of craynarbian tribesmen who had strayed too close to the siltempters’ territory. That was not to be their fate. They had a far more active demise than a slow starvation in the petrol mists awaiting them.

As soon as the package had been slid through the feeding hatch of their cell, the voice of one of their captors — not Robur, this time — came out of the speaking trumpet.

‘Open the box.’

Cornelius unbolted the lid of the crate. What choice did they have? A viewing slit in the cell door opened to ensure he and Septimoth were following instructions. Inside the crate there was a mess of leather straps and buckles and two large gloves, padded and oversized.