The Kingdom Beyond the Waves

‘I know machines,’ said T’ricola. ‘I’ll take over from you when you tire.’

The commodore bent down to examine the lock, the sonar man and the chief engineer of the Sprite by his side. It was a race against time. Only a few hours remained until dawn splintered the star-filled night and ushered in their appointment with the thunder lizards in the fighting pit next door.

‘Oh, this is clever,’ said the commodore. ‘This lock is a work of art. The codes on this merciless thing are resetting themselves every few minutes — at random intervals, too, as best as I can see. You come up with a system to crack the lock and the wicked thing changes the game halfway through.’

‘What good will springing the doors do?’ said Ironflanks, pointing to the steaming oil below.

‘We can climb our cell’s tether,’ said Veryann, ‘or swing ourselves cage by cage to the edge.’

‘Let me try, let me try,’ the commodore muttered to himself, making wincing noises and grumbling as the lock matched its cunning with his. T’ricola observed his work while Billy Snow listened to the tumble of the mechanism inside, learning the clicks and clacks that preceded the apparatus resetting itself.

The commodore grew more frustrated, each small victory overturned as the lock altered its state. ‘Oh, you beast. You dark piece of work, built to play with my skill and break my hopes upon the sharp crags of your wicked construction.’ He was distracted by the distant howls from the arena next to their prison pit; a grim reminder of their fate if they failed to break the lock. ‘What are they, now? Blessed wolves howling at the moon, or thunder lizards? Can they not keep quiet? Must I crack this infernal device while listening to their song too.’

‘Their chains are fed with wild energy,’ said Ironflanks. ‘To torture the creatures and goad them into a killing fury before a contest. I saw many of my order sacrificed in such a way the last time I was held here.’

‘Are the odds not unequal enough already?’ moaned the commodore. ‘Poor old Blacky and his brave legs made slow by the years and what meagre crumbs of comfort I was able to salvage while living with my friends in Tock House. Thunder lizards do not need goading to feast on my weary bones … every mortal creature we’ve come across in Liongeli has already been clicking its jaws in fierce anticipation of the walking meal wearing the skipper of the Sprite’s uniform that they’ve found.’

Time was running out beneath their feet, an hour turning into two, then three. When the commodore’s hands were shaking and cramped, T’ricola took over and began to play the system, her bony craynarbian manipulator arms twisting and turning the mechanism with swift decisive strokes where the commodore had instead teased it like a musician playing his instrument. She was still attacking the lock when the cage heaved and began to rise out of the oil pit.

‘No!’ T’ricola cursed. ‘We’re so close. It’s still night, the sun hasn’t even broken the horizon yet.’

‘You would think that toad-faced prince would be a late riser,’ whined the commodore. ‘Soaking himself in the oil of his own people, a nice bath for his wicked steel bones before he takes it into his head to throw us into his deadly arena.’

Yet still their prison rose. Past the cages filled with rotting corpses and the bones of craynarbian tribesmen who had strayed too close to the siltempters’ territory. That was not to be their fate. They had a far more active demise than a slow starvation in the petrol mists awaiting them.

As soon as the package had been slid through the feeding hatch of their cell, the voice of one of their captors — not Robur, this time — came out of the speaking trumpet.

‘Open the box.’

Cornelius unbolted the lid of the crate. What choice did they have? A viewing slit in the cell door opened to ensure he and Septimoth were following instructions. Inside the crate there was a mess of leather straps and buckles and two large gloves, padded and oversized.

‘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