Stephen Hunt - The Court of the Air

Wildrake thrust out with no warning, his steel springing off the commodore’s sword.

‘Not bad for a fat man, eh?’ said the commodore. ‘The royal fleet wasn’t fussy, we couldn’t afford to be, could we? Our boats took crew from all over. You remember, don’t you?’

Wildrake stamped down and feinted, following through with a slashing cut, but the commodore turned it with hardly a movement. It was the kind of spare duelling style that would serve a fighter well in the confined corridors of a submarine vessel.

‘Concorzia, the Catosian League, the Holy Kikkosico Empire of — all those different fighting styles, you pick up a little bit here, a little bit there.’

Wildrake moved his sword from side to side, trying to batter his way through the commodore’s guard with his superior strength.

‘I would say the Court’s duelling masters were heavily influenced by the east.’

Wildrake switched the sabre to his left hand and darted in, the ring of steel unheard except by the prone form of Prince Alpheus.

‘One cut, one kill,’ said the commodore. ‘Fast, deadly, versatile. Everything they admire out Thar way. You’re good, Jamie.’

‘Shut up!’ shouted Wildrake. ‘Stop talking and fight me!’

‘Be careful of what you wish for, lad.’ The commodore’s sword nipped out and Wildrake caught and turned it, but not before Black nicked the corner of the wolftaker’s shirtsleeve, a line of red blood traced across the white silk.

‘You should have kept your jacket for protection, Jamie,’ said Black. ‘But I can see why you chose to throw it away. Commonshare uniforms have never been popular in Jackals and it’s the poor that are going to be wearing them in Middlesteel now, after the looters have stripped the corpses of all your friends — and the uniforms have been dyed a decent Jackelian green and brown by the ladies down Handsome Lane.’

Wildrake thrust forward, feinting, changing sword hand from left to right then slicing out at the commodore’s arm, drawing blood in a mirror of the submariner’s strike.

‘A duke’s blood looks the same as mine,’ spat Wildrake, circling the commodore slowly.

‘So they trained you to fight as a secret lefty,’ coughed the commodore, giving ground by a couple of steps. ‘They’re a sharp crew, alright, your clever friends above the clouds. Still dreaming Kirkhill’s visions after all these years.’

Wildrake snarled, flipping the sabre between his hands. ‘Sharp enough to take you, Samson Dark.’

Wildrake stamped forward, sending a flurry of muddy snow spraying over the commodore’s trousers, the clatter of steel floating hollow in the silence of the twilight battlefield. Black curved his opponent’s blade away twice, diverting the agent’s thrusts with small turns. There was a dull ache in the commodore’s arm, the pain of having to hold the weight of the sabre telling now. Wildrake’s unnatural shine-stimulated muscles gave him the edge in a contest of endurance. The popinjay probably spent hours in front of a mirror holding a sword out straight, relishing the pain of the weight. Admiring himself.

‘Just how much would parliament pay for Prince Alpheus’s return?’ wheezed the commodore, swaying his sword defensively.

Wildrake grinned. ‘Trying to buy time to recover, fat man? You should have spent less time feeding your face in the pantry and more time down the muscle pits.’

‘I should have, Jamie. I should have. But maybe the old pirate in me wonders how much I could get for the boy’s head.’

Wildrake tried to cut under the commodore’s guard. Black barely managed to parry the attack. It was like being battered by a windmill. Relentless vigour without end. Only his defensive fighting style was keeping him alive.

‘Sell out one of your own? No, duke. I don’t think you’re ready for that. You are a sentimentalist, pining for an age that was buried by history long before either of us was born.’

The commodore stamped left but swung right, slipping his blade beneath Wildrake’s sabre, trapping it, then with a deft twist spinning the weapon out of the wolftaker’s hand and onto the ground. The blade impaled itself in the snow and stood there quivering.

‘I should give you the same chance you gave the fleet when you blew us out to the RAN’s airships,’ said the commodore. ‘But maybe I am a sentimentalist, Jamie.’ He stepped back and bowed slightly, pointing to the fallen sword with the tip of his sabre.

Wildrake shook his head and grinned ferociously, retrieving his blade without taking his eyes off the commodore. ‘You have to be joking! Dark, you are a piece of work and no mistake. You never would have made a wolftaker in a thousand years.’

‘You’re as cold as your friends, Jamie. The Court and the Commonshare both. You never understood; that piece of metal in your hand is only as good as the heart of the man behind it. You’ve got the moves and you’ve got the sinews, but they couldn’t give you the heart. You’re just a weapon, Jamie, a shiny sabre all bent out of shape and dirty from the hands of the bludgers and assassins who have used you.’

‘And you’re a relic, Dark. The last of the royal privateers. The last of a dead age. They should stuff you and put you in the museum back in Middlesteel next to one of the old monarchs.’

‘That they haven’t is not for want of trying. You broke my heart, Jamie, when I found out it was you that was the Court’s man on the boats, that it was you that blew on the fleet. You would have made a fine fleet-man if we could have fixed your soul — one of the best.’

Wildrake roared and thrust forward, but the submariner turned sideways and with a — snap — snap — snap — Commodore Black parried past Wildrake’s cuts using short controlled butterfly strokes that almost seemed too slight to be effective. But with each snap of metal Black pressed his sabre a little closer until — almost gently — he pushed the blade into the turncoat’s chest, sliding it right through Wildrake’s heart. ‘For old time’s sake, Jamie, for old time’s sake.’

Wildrake looked at the blade impaled into his body with incredulity. ‘I am tight — my muscles — so tight — your body — so flabby.’

Black shoved Wildrake off his sabre with his boot. ‘You’re all piss and wind, Jamie.’

Wildrake collapsed, falling on the snow, watching dis believingly as the commodore staggered back and lifted up the prone form of Prince Alpheus.

Black pointed to the smoke of the battlefield rising behind them. ‘You’re one of us, Jamie. A Jackelian with the blood of kings running through your veins. Why did you do it?’

‘I just got tired — old man. Of the dirt and the pain. The Court was too weak. The Commonshare had what is required to change things. I could have — made — our country perfect.’

‘We’re a blessed weak people, Jamie, for a perfect idea. Well now, it looks like I’ve saved the Court the trouble of hunting you down, so I think I shall take the lad as my payment and be saying my goodbyes to you.’

‘They will — find — you.’

Black winked before he limped away, hauling the prince behind him. ‘You killed Samson Dark, remember? And poor old Blacky, well, he is a hero of the war of 1596 — fought alongside the First Guardian at Rivermarsh, so he did. You killed Samson Dark and now I have returned the favour. I believe that rounds things out nicely.’

When the wolftakers found Wildrake’s body, the bloody message of accusation against Samson Dark that he had written in the snow had long since melted away into the meadow grass.

Molly was not sure how long she had been standing on the downs of Rivermarsh when she realized the melting snow was soaking her feet. Despite the fall of night it was warmer now than it had been earlier, the seasons of Jackals returning to normal. Her body felt strange, as if she was not sure where she began and the Hexmachina ended. The land seemed part of her still.