Naomi Novik - Crucible of Gold

With few alternatives, Galloway showed him into the stern cabin, and shut the door on his interested crew; Laurence knew, of course, that if not every ear on the ship would be pressed directly to the door, they would still hear the conversation repeated soon enough. “Sir,” he said, “I hope you will pardon my forthrightness, but I would address your hesitation at once: I am restored to the list as of 11 November in the last year. But my personal circumstances are of little importance. There are two French transports in Rio: we mean to cut them out, and we have ten dragons to do it with; but I have only two hundred men for prize-crew, and not an officer among them.”

Temeraire hovered impatiently, until the pontoon-deck had been tied down at last: it was not very large, and he had to let himself down very cautiously with his belly quite full of air to keep from swamping it entirely. “There; that will do,” he said, swinging his head round to the ship’s railing: a line of staring sailors backed hurriedly away, except for one young officer who blanched but kept his place.

“Thank you: although pray secure that third line a bit better; that knot is very ugly and is sure to slip in a moment: it would not be in the least pleasant to have this come apart beneath me, and I suppose I should have to pull on the ship to get out of the water again. How many of you do you suppose will come with us?” he asked, unable to resist inquiry.

He did not receive any answer but stammers until Laurence came out with the captain, who looked very displeased, but nevertheless gave orders for forty men to embark, and four of his officers. For the officers, Laurence had Gerry sling over some carabiners and spare harness, and Temeraire put them one after another onto his back, beginning with the third lieutenant, Creed, and ending with a midshipman of fifteen named Wren. The men reluctantly climbed into a makeshift sack upon the deck, which Temeraire himself drew up and stuffed into his belly-netting, where the sailors might climb out of it with some awkwardness but reasonable security.

Forty men more! Temeraire thought triumphantly as he lifted away. Though of course these new recruits should soon go into service aboard the transports, and would thus pass from his purview, the sheer number seemed quite an achievement however transitory; and anyway perhaps they would not be able to take the transports, in which case they might remain with the other sailors as a part of his extended crew, after all.

So he was perfectly satisfied, when he came to camp and let them off; and having eaten an excellent meal of roasted cattle stuffed with the sweet ripe banana fruit he fell asleep until roused unceremoniously several hours later by a shove. “Ow,” he said, opening one eye, “whatever is that for?”

“This is no time to be sleeping,” Iskierka said. “Get up and help me stop this nonsense: they mean to go take those ships without us.”

“I am sure you have just misunderstood,” Temeraire said, sitting up yawning. “Lily and Maximus would not—”

“Not them ,” Iskierka said impatiently. “Granby and Laurence!”

Midshipman Wren sat in the front of the boat softly mouthing the time; the sound did not reach the stern where Laurence sat, and the oars dipped silent into the water and rose out again smooth, scattering only a few drops over the waves in their swift arcs before they dived again. Lieutenant Creed sat in the stern of the boat immediately to port, his thin face just visible by its pallor of excitement. He could not fail of being made post for this, of course, if they succeeded: a boy of twenty, to take into charge a transport; the sort of leap of fortune men dreamed of in the Navy.

Or, as O’Dea had gloomily observed on their embarkation, “As like we will end by feeding all the monstrous serpents of the deep, Captain.” Laurence glanced to starboard: Granby’s boat there, rather a tub, which had been acquired from a fisherman down the coast and laden with a heap of chainmail; past him Harcourt’s boat. Laurence had made a vague gesture at trying to dissuade her coming; but they were cramming aboard every last man down to those who could only dubiously lay claim to the name—even young Sipho, clutching the signal-rocket intently—and she scornfully disdained the attempt. When he turned away subsequently, Roland’s eye had met his with a martial light; so there he had not even tried, but contented himself with assigning her to take charge of the second of the boats assigned to lay on the chainmail: at least she would not be on deck until the end.

Their flotilla in miniature crept mouse-softly across the harbor towards the towering bulk of the transports: the Polonaise and the Maréchal . For illumination they had only the moonlight above and the bonfire in the city behind them where the Tswana had gathered for their usual nightly conclave: its noise carried louder over the water than the noise of the other boats, and the glare, Laurence hoped, would dazzle the eyes of the look-outs.

As they drew nearer, Lieutenant Creed looked over at Laurence and nodded, and his boat split away towards the Maréchal , drawing half-a-dozen of the others along in its train. They had drawn alongside the Polonaise , and Laurence opened up his glass and looked: the officer of the watch was down near the stern beside the wheel, the hands on deck made sleeping humps amid the cannon on the quarterdeck, and the lookout in the near crow’s nest yawned against his arm: a ship in harbor, at peace.

Laurence nodded to Seaman Ewyll, waiting in the prow: a sturdy if stolid young man, who flung up the rope with its grappling-hook. It clanged against the rail as it seized on, and they all held still, waiting; not a breath misted the air.

The alarm was not called. Ewyll swarmed up the knotted rope, another five tied at his waist, and he flung them down quickly to the other boats: by the time Laurence made the deck, there were two dozen men already aboard the empty dragondeck, crouching low beside bales and casks, and the seven Frenchmen who had been sleeping on the deck were trussed like roasts with rags stuffed into their mouths. Ewyll and Wren were climbing into the foremast rigging after the suspended bags of the caltrops, with Captain Little and Captain Chenery gone directly after them, easy in the rigging from long mid-air experience aboard their dragons.

Laurence leaned over the side: Granby waved up from his boat, which having sent off half her men now rowed away around the other side of the Polonaise , where she faced the Maréchal , and began the critical work: they flung up ropes to men on deck to be looped over the railing, and began to draw up the chainmail netting, pillaged from the dragons’ equipage, to lie over the portholes of her guns. Laurence turned away, and leading the assembled men soft across the dragondeck halted near the stairs leading to the main deck: a man lay snoring wet and thickly beneath them, mouth hanging slackly open.

Mayhew looked at him; Laurence nodded; Mayhew and another sailor, Todd, slipped barefoot down to the main deck and around back of the stairs, and Mayhew stopped the snoring man’s mouth, pinning him down by the throat with his other hand. Laurence, looking through the steps, could see the Frenchman’s wide starting eyes ringed with white as he struggled against Mayhew’s broad hand; Todd lashed his arms to his body with rope and tied him at ankles and knees, swiftly, and they shoved him behind a stanchion and cleared the way.

Laurence crept down to the main deck, nearly on his toes, glad of the thin battered wreck of his boots. He counted off eight of the men for the fore ladderway, now almost directly before them and unattended. They seized one of the water-barrels and wrestled it on top to block the way, and hovered by it with their pistols and their knives and their cutlasses, whatever weapons they had contrived to conceal about their bodies.