'I said, I've seen worse,' Jez told him. 'You've never flown the Flashpan before?'
'Can't say I've had the pleasure.' Frey was trying to peer through the lashing rain that assaulted his craft. It was almost pitch black out there. Thick clouds cloaked the glow of the moon. They were flying without lights. 'I can't see for buggery, Jez.'
'Then they can't see us, either. I thought that was the point?'
'Just tell me if I'm going to fly into anything.'
'Will do, Cap'n.'
Frey wasn't enjoying himself one bit. People avoided the Flashpan for a reason. It was an area of boggy moorland that sat at high altitude just east of the Splinters and north of the Vardenwood. Innocuous enough, except for the near-constant storms that raged here. Some unlucky trick of the geography, apparently. Something to do with warm, moist air from the south mixing with freezing air coming the other way. Jez had explained it to him, but he hadn't listened very hard. He'd been too busy shitting himself at the prospect of the battle to come.
They were going up against the Delirium Trigger.
By the time Frey and Crake had got back from the Thade estate, they were already cutting it fine if they hoped to intercept Dracken and the barque she was escorting. Frey held a hasty discussion with Grist, and they headed off immediately afterwards. Their plan wasn't the tactical masterpiece Frey would have preferred, but it would have to do. They didn't have anything better.
The Storm Dog was a beast of an aircraft, but even so, Frey wasn't sure she could go toe-to-toe with the Delirium Trigger. What they needed was the element of surprise. Not easy when their targets would be flying across open grassland.
But if it was at night, in the middle of a terrific storm? It was possible to sneak up on them that way. But first they had to find them.
The problem was, the aircraft they were searching for would be running without lights. Nobody flew the Flashpan unless they didn't want to be found. According to the Grand Oracle, the Awakeners' lives were being made miserable by the Navy lately. Archduke's orders, no doubt. Awakener craft were boarded and searched wherever they were encountered. It wasn't that the Navy expected to find anything; it was just to piss them off. But the Awakeners couldn't risk their precious Mane sphere being found by the Navy, so they were sneaking across the Flashpan at night. In the dark and rain, they were all but invisible.
Not to Jez, though. If anyone could spot them, Jez could.
While she scanned the horizon, Frey concentrated on maintaining course and keeping a safe altitude. The wind jostled the Ketty Jay about, making her groan and rumble. He was flying by his instruments, since vision was almost zero except when a flash of lightning lit up the land. He kept a wary eye on the rock masses that hulked out of the moors below him, half-expecting one of them to loom up into his path.
To calm his nerves, he ran over what he'd learned from the Grand Oracle, hoping to get one step ahead of the game. Pomfrey had been forthcoming about the details of how the Awakeners intended to transport the sphere, but Frey had been left frustrated in other areas. When he asked the Grand Oracle what the Awakeners intended to do with the power source from a Mane dreadnought, Pomfrey had only looked confused.
Frey had prompted him. Were they planning to sell it? Perhaps they wanted to make a deal with the Archduke, a trade in return for freedom from further persecution? Or did they have designs on building an invincible fleet of their own?
The Grand Oracle had seemed mystified. 'What power source?'
At that moment, several people had entered the parlour, and Crake had been forced to wrap it up quickly, commanding the Grand Oracle to remember nothing of the conversation.
But Frey remembered.
What power source?
Grist had lied to him. It wasn't a power source at all. So what exactly was it?
Whatever that son of a bitch was up to, he still wasn't being straight with Frey. And Frey was damned if he'd be mucked around like that.
Once they located their targets, it would be the Storm Dog's job to deal with the Delirium Trigger. The Ketty Jay was far too small to handle her. Instead, she'd go after the Awakener barque, to capture its cargo. The Mane sphere.
As soon as they had that, Frey was going to run for it. Forget Grist and his secrets. Whatever that thing was, Frey was having it, and Grist could go hang. He'd work out later what to do with it.
Some things are worth riskin' every thin' for, Grist had said. But what was it he was after? What was worth that much?
'Doc!' he called through the cockpit door. 'Are they still with us?'
'Wait a sec!' Malvery called back from the gunnery cupola. There was a flash of lightning and a tearing sound overhead.1 Storm Dog's right on our tail, Cap'n!'
Frey stared out into the night. The cockpit lights had been doused, except for dim night-flying bulbs on the dash to illuminate the instruments. Another flash of lightning showed him the Firecrow and Skylance, flying some distance below them, as Frey had instructed. A lightning strike wouldn't affect the Ketty Jay or the Storm Dog, but smaller craft had a tendency to explode that way. The Storm Dog's outflyers were safely stashed in a hangar in her belly, but that wasn't an option on the Ketty Jay, which was less than a tenth her size. Instead, he used his craft to shelter his pilots as best he could, hoping it would soak up the lightning.
'Harkins. Pinn. Everything alright?' he asked.
'Darker than a miner's arsehole down here,' came Pinn's reply through his earcuff. 'Otherwise, fine.'
Jez had suggested that they might give an earcuff to Grist, to better coordinate the attack, but Frey had flatly refused. The earcuffs were a secret that only the crew of the Ketty Jay shared. A little stroke of genius from Crake. It gave them an advantage that other crews didn't have. He wasn't sharing that with an untrustworthy bastard like Grist.
He hunched forward in his seat, searching the darkness. 'Where are you, Trinica?' he muttered. 'Where'd you go?'
Trinica. In among all his other problems, there was Trinica. Why did she need to get involved? Why did it have to be her who robbed him on Kurg? If it had been anybody else he might have given up, cut his losses and parted company with Grist. But he couldn't take the humiliation, not from her.
He found himself thinking of this operation more and more in terms of Trinica. It was her he was beating. Maybe he couldn't take her on himself, but it was his plan, his effort that had set up the ambush. It would be him that ended up with the prize. Maybe the Storm Dog would shoot her down, or maybe she'd shoot down Grist. As long as they kept each other busy for long enough, he couldn't care less. But he'd like to see the look on her face when she realised who'd done her over.
'Cap'n,' said Jez. She craned forward and narrowed her eyes. 'Contact.'
Frey sat up. 'You see them?'
Jez looked for a few more moments. 'Bearing two-eighty-five, heading across us to the east.'
Frey thumped the dash in excitement. 'Alright, we're on!' he announced. 'Harkins, Pinn, hit the deck. Stay low, and listen to Jez for course corrections. We're heading up into the clouds.'
'Can we shoot at them this time, Cap'n?' Pinn asked. He was still sore about their last encounter, when they were bested by yokels flying mail planes and cropdusters.
'Unless you can think of some other way of blowing them out of the sky.' Frey replied.
Pinn whooped. 'Watch out, boys! It's dyin' time!' he yelled. Frey presumed he was addressing the enemy.
'Crazy idiot,' Harkins said under his breath, loud enough for everyone to hear.
'Meow,' said Pinn.
'Shut up! You shut your fat yap!' Harkins snapped. Dumb as Pinn was, he was very accurate when it came to hitting a nerve.
'Both of you shut up,' said Frey. 'I want you coming back alive. Remember, as soon as we've got the sphere on board, you break off and fly like your tails are on fire. We'll meet up at Osken's Bar in Westport. Got it?'
'Got it, Cap'n,' said Harkins.
'Meow,' said Pinn.
'That's it!' Harkins shrieked. 'I've had just about enough from you, you, you ignorant piece of—'
