Into the Void

maneuverability, and the Unquenchable isn't in any shape for a fight, not now.'

'But it's sailing right to them!' Teldin yelled.

'Sure she is.' It was Dana who snapped back the answer. 'In a stern chase, at that range, we'd lose. They'd rake us, and we couldn't return fire until they chose to approach.'

'Maybe they haven't the stomach for a foe that wants to close,' Miggins added.

'What do we do?' asked Teldin.

'Nothing,' Horvath told him. 'They can't retrieve a boat in a battle. We stay back.' The gnome grinned, but to Teldin it looked forced. 'It won't be long. We've got enough air to hold out until this is over. Even now, the Unquenchable can give a good accounting of herself. Right?'

'Right,' Miggins answered heartily, a little too heartily, Teldin thought.

'I wish I were aboard,' Dana mumbled.

Teldin had never seen a space battle from this perspective, and being in one wasn't the same thing at all. At first it seemed like a stately dance. From his vantage, the four ships seemed to be moving virtually at a crawl, maneuvering to get the advantage on their foe. The approaching wasps initially held to their line-abreast formation while the Unquenchable brought its bow to bear on the center pirate vessel. The dreadnought's stern was now pointing directly at the longboat. The line of wasps began to lengthen noticeably as the ships loosened up their formation.

It looked like the illustrations of naval skirmishes that Teldin had seen in his grandfather's books, but then everything changed and he realized for the first time exactly how complex a space battle could be. Suddenly, the two flanking wasps tipped their noses down and dived sharply. The line became a triangle, and suddenly another dimension had been added to the tactical picture.

'Classic tactics,' Horvath muttered.

'What?'

Horvath shot an exasperated look at Teldin… then relented. 'You can't know,' he said tiredly. 'Look you. It's the classic move for three ships engaging one. Form a triangle. If the enemy commits to attacking one ship, the other two maneuver to parallel the enemy, or 'cross its T' and rake it from astern. Whichever ship the Unquenchable goes after, the others have clean shots at her. And if the attackers have superior maneuverability and speed-which they do-all the Unquenchable can do is go after one ship. Unless…'

'Unless?'

The gnome grinned wolfishly. 'Unless Wysdor remembers those dusty books we read a century or so back.'

'But what can they do, anyway? They don't have any weapons left,' Teldin exclaimed.

'They didn't' Horvath corrected him. 'But we do have some members of the Weapons Guild aboard, and I doubt that even my brother could keep them from making some modifications over the last few hours. Now watch.'

The dreadnought held its course, as though to drive straight through the center of the expanding triangle of wasp ships. Then the gnomish vessel's complex rigging shifted, and the bow started to come up until the stubby bowsprit was pointing directly at the wasp forming the triangle's apex. Teldin could almost feel the strain in the massive ship as it settled on its new course.

'I thought you said they shouldn't commit to one ship,' Teldin said accusingly.

'Just watch,' Horvath told him, 'and learn something.'

The dreadnought kept its bow pointing directly at the apex wasp. For the first time, Teldin started to sense the immense speed of closure as the ships hurtled head-on at each other. He reached back and took the glass from where it lay, forgotten, on Miggins's lap, and focused it on the pirate vessel.

The angular ship seemed to jump closer as Teldin focused through the clumsy device. It really did look like a wasp. The body was wide where the two sets of wings were mounted, but then tapered to a sharp point at the tail. The head-maybe the bridge, or maybe a fire platform-was cantilevered forward and down, giving the whole vessel a slightly hunchbacked, and decidedly evil, appearance. Six legs sprouted from the lower hull near the wing roots-probably landing gear of some kind, or maybe part of the ship's rigging, Teldin presumed. The whole ship, apart from its pale and slightly iridescent wings, was painted night black, making it difficult to focus on against the backdrop of space.

As he watched, two of the four wings shifted their angle and the vessel began to maneuver. Teldin tracked the glass over to the dreadnought, but the two vessels were too far apart to fit in the device's narrow field of view. He lowered the tube from his eye, understanding why Miggins had given up on the device: the naked eye was the only way to get a sense of the overall battle.

'The wasp's changing course,' Miggins shouted.

'Aye,' Horvath growled. 'Getting edgy, as well it might.' Teldin nodded. It must be more than slightly unnerving to have the huge bulk of a gnomish dreadnought bearing down on you.

The wasp changed course again-slight corrections only, but obviously to get it out of the Unquenchable's path. Captain Wysdor was shifting his course, too, keeping his bow pointed directly at his foe. Collision course was maintained. A projectile hurtled from the small ballista in the bow of the wasp, to slam and shatter harmlessly against a metal hull plate.

With an effort, Teldin tore his gaze away from the apparently imminent collision. The other two wasps were changing course, too, just as Horvath had predicted. Their bows were coming up and turning inward, as they maneuvered to close with the dreadnought. Finally Teldin saw the wisdom of the pirates' tactics: even if the Unquenchable destroyed its single target, the other two ships would be maneuvering into position below and behind it, masked by the dreadnought's own hull from any weapons it might be carrying. Presumably the gnomish ship could roll, but by then the wasps could already have landed several damaging shots. And, according to Horvath, the dreadnought was in no condition to sustain prolonged fire from two fully armed wasps.

'Look!' Miggins yelled.

The closing ships were almost on top of each other. Again the wasp fired a ballista bolt-a dean miss this time. The gunner must have been distracted, Teldin mused, grinning wryly. Wonder why. The pirate captain tried a last- ditch move-a hard turn to port-but the Unquenchable matched the maneuver perfectly. There was no chance that the wasp could avoid a collision….

Then the dreadnought's bow dropped into a steep dive beneath the still-climbing wasp. The gnomish ship's heavy mast smashed into the pirate ship's underside, tearing away two of its legs. At the same instant, a barrage leaped upward from the sterncastle, but a barrage such as Teldin had never seen before. Catapult stones and ballista bolts were one thing, but this fusillade seemed to consist of virtually anything that wasn't bolted down: a table and several stools, replacement lengths of spar, lanterns and flasks of oil, boxes and crates of supplies, even a barrel of ale. Teldin couldn't even begin to imagine what contraption the Weapons Guildsmen had fabricated to loft all those projectiles.

Whatever it was, it was certainly effective. The volley rocketed straight into the underside of the wasp. High- velocity foodstuffs tore through fragile wings; furniture smashed into the wooden hull. Something struck the root of the port wings and burst into flame.

The gnomes in the longboat roared their approval. 'Good shooting!' bellowed Horvath in a voice three times his size. 'And they're away. Look.'

Sure enough, the dreadnought was accelerating again along its new course-down and away from the scene of battle. The two wasps that had been climbing to engage the gnomes were now well behind their target and heading the wrong way. They immediately began to come about, but even to Teldin's untrained eye it was obvious they'd be at a grave disadvantage by the time they completed their turn. It would be a stern chase, but this time the range would be much greater. He added his voice to the cheers of the gnomes….

Then he stopped as a thought struck him. 'What about us?' he asked.

'Aye,' Horvath replied in the sudden silence. 'That is a question. Oars, I think we-'

'Wasp ho!' Miggins's cry cut him off.

In the excitement of the Unquenchable's escape, they'd forgotten the third wasp. Seriously damaged-virtually crippled-with sullen red fire licking from a hole in the hull, the vessel was still under