Harry Turtledove - Opening Atlantis

"Good speech, skipper," Ben Jackson said. "I wouldn't've believed anything this side of rum could make those wharf rats hot to fight."

"Put a cannon ball through my mizzen if that's not a bloody good notion," Radcliffe said. If Avalon had plenty of any one thing, it was rum. He arranged to serve it out to the defenders. Maybe Dutch courage would help them fight Dutchmen.

After he'd done all he could outside, he went into Black Hand Fort. Jenny was half glad to see him, half afraid Avalon would fall in the next fifteen minutes-about what he'd expected. Half an hour alone with her in the bedroom and she was all glad to see him…or she pretended to be, which served well enough for now.

But that half hour, and the rest of the time since he and his crewmen came off the Black Hand, gave Ethel the chance to find out what was going on. By the time Red Rodney spoke with his daughter, she knew as much as he did-maybe more. "You lost," she said, nothing but scorn in her voice. "Even with the fireships, you lost. How could you?"

"Not all my fault." Only later did Rodney wonder why he had to justify himself to an eleven-year-old. "I was hoping we could make them turn around, but they wouldn't do it, damn their black souls to hell. They've got a Radcliff in charge of them, too, even if he clips his name."

"He'll clip your neck if he gets the chance," Ethel said. "I knew you should have taken me with you."

"And what could you have done that I didn't, your Worship?" Red Rodney demanded.

"Made sure I killed Will Radcliff, that's what," his daughter replied.

"How, pray tell?"

"Chainshot, barshot, red-hot shot-whatever it took to sink his ship." Ethel had all the Radcliffe stubbornness. Sense? Maybe not. Red-hot shot was almost as dangerous to the ship firing it as it was to the one on the receiving end. You had to be desperate even to think about using it…unless you were eleven. Red Rodney hadn't been desperate enough. All things considered, maybe he should have been.

"So that's Avalon Bay." William Radcliff raised a spyglass to his eye for a closer look. The image was upside down, which didn't bother him, and fringed in red and purple, which did. It seemed much closer than it had to the naked eye, and that was what he really wanted.

Elijah Walton had a spyglass, too. "Not a bad harbor," he said grudgingly.

"No, not a bad one," Radcliff agreed dryly. It was the best harbor he'd ever seen, and he'd seen harbors from Valparaiso to Stamboul. "It's the people holding it now who are bad."

Those people had long guns in the fortress north of the town, guns that outranged anything the fleet carried. And a fortress didn't have to worry about firing red-hot shot the way a ship did. They wouldn't set a fortress of earth and brick on fire the way they would a ship's seasoned timbers.

The northern approach, then, looked bad. So did forcing the channel. His spyglass showed him the galleys patrolling it. Upside down, they looked as if they were about to fall into the sky and spill out all their rowers. He only wished looks didn't deceive here.

Another fortress at the northern edge of Avalon proper also guarded the channel into the bay. The town itself had a sea wall to keep invaders from swarming straight ashore. William didn't think the guns on the sea wall were anywhere close to being as formidable as the ones in the fortresses.

Inside Avalon, forts topped half a dozen hills. He didn't think they mounted big guns, either. Why would they? Little guns throwing canister would be all they needed to hold off attackers.

"What is your plan, Admiral?" Walton asked. Radcliff understood what the Englishman wasn't saying, too. If this goes wrong, it's all your fault-that was what he really meant.

Instead of answering directly, William turned to the signal officer. "Run up marine commanders repair aboard," he said.

"Marine commanders repair aboard," the lieutenant repeated. He waited for Radcliff's confirming nod before adding, "Aye aye, sir."

"Do you think you can get marines over the sea wall?" Walton asked. "Most of it is just a palisade, but even so…"

"I aim to discuss the possibilities with the men who needs must do the actual fighting," William replied. The Englishman fumed, but William didn't worry about that. Walton wasn't going anywhere, not now.

Every ship in the fleet carried marines. They were the marksmen in the fighting tops, and they went ashore when there was need of that. Radcliff wasn't sure how many Dutch marines spoke English, but he didn't worry about that, either. Some of them would, and they could translate for their comrades.

Marcus Radcliffe came up over the Royal Sovereign's rail after most of the other marine officers. As usual, he wore nothing resembling a uniform: only homespun wool trousers and a linen shirt. His sole ornament was a tail plume from an oil thrush thrust under the band on his colorless, floppy hat. But none of the true marines, with their fancy uniforms and accoutrements, seemed inclined to mock the leathery backwoodsman.

"If we land your combined forces south of the town, can you march up, march in, and take it?" William asked.

His distant cousin gave back a question of his own before anyone else could speak: "What'll you be doing in the meantime?"

"Cannonading," William replied.

Marcus Radcliffe considered that, then nodded. "Well, fair enough. If you knock down some of the sea wall, will you send in sailors to give us a hand?"

It was William's turn to hesitate. He was a seaman, first, last, and always. Sending in landing parties of sailors would mean coming very close-dangerously close-to shore-based defenders. In the end, though, he also found himself nodding. "If we possibly can. I understand that the distraction may help you."

Another marine officer said, "We ought to take a couple of four-pounders off one of our brigs and see if we can drag them up to their palisade down there. They'll give us the kind of door-knocker we need."

"Good," William Radcliff said. "Do it."

The marine blinked. "Just like that?"

"Just like that," Radcliff told him. "It sounds like a good idea. The worst that can happen is, the guns get left behind. If they do, you're no worse off than if you hadn't brought them. So give it a try."

"By God, sir, I wish every captain were like you," the marine said. "Too many of those buggers can't make up their minds, or else they haven't got any minds to make up."

"You don't know my coz." Marcus Radcliffe sounded sly. "He's always sure. He's not always right, but he's always sure." He got the laugh he must have hoped for, then went on, "If not for him, we wouldn't be here now, and the pirates wouldn't be in the mess they're in."

"For which I thank you. But, by the same token, we also wouldn't be in the mess we're in," William said dryly. "We have to beat them. We have to take Avalon away from them. If we do that, we redeem ourselves. If they hold us, they redeem themselves. How can it get any simpler?"

Nobody said anything. Maybe he'd made it as clear as he hoped. Maybe the men were even simpler than the situation. They were marines, after all, and the bullocks did not have a reputation for wit. They were human roundshot: you pointed them at a target, and you used them to smash it flat.

"Looting should be good," one of them remarked. "The corsairs have stashed their booty in Avalon for years now."

That might have inspired them more than anything William said. He didn't mind. As long as something did, he was content.

R ed Rodney Radcliffe woke with a warm, bare thigh draped over his and with the sound of thunder in his ears. He was used to the one or the other; both together were something new. He needed a moment to remember he wasn't at sea and another to remember he wasn't in a brothel in some distant port. This was Avalon. This was Jenny.