Stephen Hunt - The Kingdom Beyond the Waves

‘Put the gloves on the lashlite first. Then strap the harness around the lashlite’s wings.’

Cornelius hesitated and a female voice behind the viewing slit barked at them. ‘Do as you are instructed. A rifle ball in the head is your alternative.’

Septimoth held out his arms and Cornelius sheathed his friend’s talons inside the large gloves, then began strapping on the harness.

‘I am insulted,’ said Cornelius. ‘Am I so insignificant that you don’t have a set of manacles for me?’

‘You are just a man,’ said the voice outside the cell. ‘A one-armed freak with your artificial limb deactivated. Your large friend is quite another matter. We don’t want him attempting to fly away, or shredding us to pieces with his formidable-looking talons.’

‘They have the measure of you,’ said Septimoth, his beak twisting into an approximation of a smile as Cornelius worked the harness buckles around his body.

‘Just how tight do you want to be trussed?’

When Septimoth’s wings and talons were made safe, the cell door opened, an officer with a pistol beckoning them into a corridor where more soldiers waited with rifles. They wore the cherry uniforms of the House of Quest’s fencible regiment and their commander was Robur’s so-called ‘daughter’.

‘So, you have joined the family business after all,’ said Cornelius.

‘We could have rescued Robur ourselves,’ said the Catosian, ‘assaulted Darksun Fortress from the air. But such an action would have attracted attention. You were already operating across the border in Quatershift with a high degree of efficiency. Convincing you to rescue Robur from the Commonshare was the obvious choice.’

‘A part you played extremely well,’ said Cornelius. ‘And I do understand why you played me for a dupe. I’m sure the First Committee would have been most curious as to why one of the city-states of the Catosian League had declared war on them just for the sake of kidnapping a single prisoner.’

‘It was not the reaction in Quatershift we were concerned with,’ said the officer. Another cell door opened, a figure weighted down under the armour of a hex suit emerging into the corridor. ‘It was her people …’

‘Damson Beeton!’ Cornelius only just recognized her under the mass of the midnight-black shell, silver sigils traced across every inch of the metal. Whatever sorceries the Court of the Air had taught her, she wouldn’t be practising them in that sheathing, customized to nullify her talents. ‘Sink me, are you all right?’

Her eyes gleamed angrily from underneath her visor. ‘What, apart from being shot full of shellfish toxin, kidnapped, imprisoned, and made to stumble around sweating under enough armour to keep a steamman knight happy?’

‘Yes, apart from that.’

‘Just dandy,’ she spat.

‘Good, because I’m afraid I’m going to have to release you from my service. Moonlighting on my time is a serious offence.’

‘That’s no way to treat an elderly woman,’ said Damson Beeton. She looked at Septimoth, bound tight under the harness with his heavy gloves hanging by his side, then at Cornelius without even a set of manacles. ‘They’ve got the measure of you, then.’

‘Oh, I have it on reliable authority that we are all on the same side,’ said Cornelius.

‘Take these hex plates off me, dearie,’ said the housekeeper, ‘and I’ll show these Catosian dolly-mops whose side I am on.’

‘Enough of your prattle,’ said the Catosian commander. ‘Follow us.’

Cornelius stared at the rifle muzzles pointing at them, then at his friends; a lashlite who couldn’t fly, an old woman who could barely walk under the weight of her mobile prison and himself: a one-armed freak. Perhaps they were going to be displayed as a carnival attraction?

They were guided through long corridors and chambers carved out of the rock. In one of the chambers, stacks of supplies were being loaded into a capsule by the lock of a miniature atmospheric system and Cornelius revised his estimate of the size of the complex. If they needed an airless transport system to move victuals about, the place might go on for miles. He glanced up. Walls of rough granite towered above them, held in place by iron girders and massive mining pins.

‘Ruxley granite,’ said Cornelius. ‘We must be at Ruxley Waters. We’ve made it into your airship works after all.’

Robur’s ‘daughter’ shot him an angry glance.

‘The works’ hangers extend back into the hills,’ said Damson Beeton.

‘I would say they have been excavating a little more than a few aerostat chambers,’ said Cornelius. ‘To see this place, you’d think Quest believed that another coldtime was returning and he was digging himself an underground hold to see out the centuries of winter.’

They climbed a set of stairs that had been carved into the rock, passing dumb waiters carrying up copper cylinders marked with the celgas symbol. There looked to be far more canisters of the strictly controlled celgas than Abraham Quest should have had access to. At the top of the stairs, a window in a narrow corridor looked down on a chamber containing an engineering-frame hung with models of various airships — some based on the Jackelian aerial navy, others blue-sky designs, outlandish shapes of connected hulls with battleship-like under structures. A rotating propeller driven by a compact steam engine was simulating a powerful wind down the length of the test frame.

Damson Beeton turned her head to and fro despite the weight of her hex helmet, drinking in all the sights the airship works had to offer. Stolen celgas. Unauthorized airship designs. Military forces far beyond the company limits allowed to fencible regiments. There was enough evidence down here to see Abraham Quest and his staff take the drop outside Bonegate for the amusement of the Circleday gallows crowd a dozen times over.

The granite walls gave way to narrow wooden corridors, as if they were walking along the inside of a steamship. At one point they had to form into single file to cross a wooden gangway across a cavern, rope nets covering store rooms below, the space being loaded high with sacks and crates by a column of Quest’s workers.

Prods from the fencible soldiers’ rifles kept them moving, apart from a brief halt when a squad of retainers came striding across their path. They all looked of an age in their green uniforms. There was a flicker of inquisitiveness in their eager eyes as they passed by the motley prisoners, but they kept on marching in a disciplined formation.

‘Young,’ noted Septimoth.

‘From his academies, no doubt,’ said Damson Beeton. ‘The homes for street children and urchins that the House of Quest sponsors.’

‘They look more like soldiers than poorhouse sweepings to me,’ said Cornelius.

‘I’m sure their training is superior to that of the army’s regiments,’ said the housekeeper. ‘A better deal than parliament’s silver shilling and the taste of the lash more often than the taste of grog rations.’

‘The cadets are trained by the free company,’ said the Catosian, the pride evident in her tone. ‘At least, in matters pertaining to military instruction. They want for nothing when it comes to honing their bodies and their minds.’

‘Philosopher-kings,’ whispered Cornelius. ‘He has raised an army of philosopher-kings.’

‘I doubt that Quest found much time for tutoring them in philosophy,’ said Septimoth.

‘You are wrong,’ said the officer, watching the last of the column of cadets pass by. ‘Without a perfect mind to drive it, a perfect body is reduced to barely competent muscle. A soldier must understand what is worth dying for and what is worth living for, and the distinction between the two.’