Condor Squadron had been equipped with new Camels. Tricky birds to tame, but on a par with any machine the Boche could put in the air.
Allard favoured a barbed arrow formation: taking the tip position himself, ranks falling back above and below and to both sides. Winthrop kept steady immediately above and behind the flight commander, with the high man, Dandridge, immediately above and behind him.
Without fuel, the shape-shifted Boche were not vulnerable to the most common killing shot of aerial combat. They could not go down in flames. But they were still vampires: silver in the head or the heart should do the trick. Every other bullet in the drums of the Camel's twin Vickers guns was silver. A twenty- second burst of fire cost a hundred guineas. Both sides were reduced to recovering silver from the amputated limbs or smashed corpses of casualties.
Winthrop carved crosses into the tips of all his bullets, silver or lead. Nothing to do with the supposed allergy of vampires to crucifixes, it ensured the bullets fragmented on impact, bursting inside a wound. In the course of a dozen daytime patrols over the last week, he had qualified as an ace, shooting down six of the enemy. He was happiest with the ones who had gone down in flames. He had a taste for the fray and Albert Ball's instinct for it. Now, he wanted to fight by night. He wanted to add a Richthofen to his bag. Then, perhaps. Ball would be assuaged.
His stomach spasmed again. He'd learned to live with the stitches of pain, not to let them show. Kate had tried to tell him his course was dangerous. He would make things right with Kate when it was all over. No, he would make things right with Kate if it was all over. No, he could not think of Kate, or Catriona, or Beauregard. Only the moment, only now.
He gripped the stick and kept level. The pain-burst faded. The night sky was alive. Without turning in his cockpit, he knew where the other Camels were. A picture of the arrowhead stayed in his mind.
Down below, a column of vehicles advanced along a road, feeding men and materiel to the Boche lines. He ignored it. This was not an observation flight. This was an offensive patrol, a hunting party.
A tiny noise. A lone Hun on the ground fired a futile shot upwards, at the Camels. Winthrop's thumbs almost depressed firing buttons. Albert Ball told him to be a cool hand. Ball sat on one shoulder, Kate on the other. Not a comfortable arrangement.
The patrol flew the course Winthrop had flown with Courtney. Up ahead was the newly named Schloss Adler. This was where the Bloody Red Baron lived.
Reports were in from the lines. JG1 were out of their nest tonight, towards Amiens, attacking a row of patched-up balloons suitable only for hauling aloft Guy Fawkes dummies. They'd return frustrated to find a fight waiting for them. No one had ever attacked the shape-shifters before. That was a tiny advantage, a surprise.
Before he saw them, he sensed them. His ears thrilled. A silent formation returning to the castle. They flew like bats, gliding between wing-flaps, riding unmapped currents.
Allard saw the Boche too. He raised his hand. The arrowhead expanded. The Camels let distance grow between them, but kept in formation.
Remember, short bursts. Accurate fire, not hosepipe spray.
His mind stripped down, surplus thought and feeling done away with. He was a new person, unencumbered. A purpose behind Vickers guns.
They saw the Camels.
Allard was close to the flank of the enemy formation. He fired first. Silver flashes appeared in the wings of one of the creatures. The horribly human scream was louder than an elephant's bellowing. The injured monster fell out of formation. His wings were torn but bullets passed through. He'd have to be hit in the torso or head to be seriously damaged.
Winthrop watched the flier tumble, wings like an umbrella reversed by a sudden wind. He recovered and cruised downwards. Severin was on the wounded vampire's tail, whooping and firing like Broncho Billy. The elder had a killing thirst and was ignoring tactics. When his guns were empty, his enemy would recover and come for him.
The formations passed through each other. Winthrop smelled the shape-shifters' musk and felt the cold rush of their wings. Wheeling in the air, he tried to draw a bead on a black shape darting past. He nearly fired, but managed not to waste precious bullets.
The Boche weren't firing either. They would have used up most of their firepower on the dummy balloons. It was often the habit of fliers to get rid of the extra weight of ammunition by emptying guns into enemy trenches on the way home.
A wing filled his whole field of vision and he squeezed the firing-buttons. White flashes seared his eyes as his guns discharged. The wing was gone and he let up the pressure on the buttons.
The burst, only a few seconds' worth, jarred his ears. On instinct, he fired again, moments before another wing passed in front of his prop. This time, the shape-shifter flapped into his burst, and was twisted, screeching, in the air. A row of holes appeared in a curtain of wings. He was sure he had sunk a few into the furry barrel of the flier's body.
He tasted blood in his mouth. His own, mingled with Ball's and Kate's. His teeth were coral razors. This was as near to the vampire condition as he wished to come.
Another burst. Another miss. The bat-creature executed a perfect Immelmann and swooped towards the slice of moon. Dandridge was on his tail, firing scientific bursts. The Boche came out of his turn and spread wings wide. Dandridge had hit him. Red gobbets dripped in black fur.
With a sinking motion, the shape-shifter got beneath Dandridge's climb and latched like a lamprey on to the underside of the Camel, wings wrapping upwards, tail lashing. The Camel's frame buckled and its engine stalled. The prop sliced into the Boche's face but jammed.
Winthrop was appalled.
The Camel came apart. Dandridge's upper plane ripped off and disappeared like a kite in a storm. The shape-shifter detached from the aircraft. Dandridge's crushed wreck plunged, wind shrieking in the wires. As he went down, Dandridge emptied his guns.
The creature that had killed Dandridge struggled to stay aloft. He had taken many hits and the propeller slice was severe. His wings were ragged and torn. Ribbons of dark blood flew from wounds.
Was this the Red Baron?
Winthrop had the mutilated monster in his sights. He fired, pouring out silver and lead. He swooped down and over the creature, briefly worried that he might latch on to his Camel, repeating the manoeuvre that had defeated Dandridge.
His blood thrilled. There would be a reckoning. Turning for another pass, he saw Allard diving on the same prey. The monster struggled upwards to meet Allard. With what seemed a single shot, Allard put a lump of silver into the monster's skull. Instantly dead, the flier dwindled to human size, weighted by heavy guns, and fell towards black ground.
The creatures could be beaten.
His victory stolen, Winthrop wheeled, searching. He was at the heart of the dog-fight. Shape-shifters and Camels whirled around, firing guns, tearing wings. There was an explosion as a Camel (Rutledge's, Winthrop thought) burst into a fireball. An expanding ball of hot air hit his wings and forced him back.
Down below was the castle. And above was an immense dark shape that laid a shadow on the land.
Rutledge had not been killed by one of JG1. There was Archie all around. The Schloss Adler was defended by gun emplacements. Archie exploded below Winthrop, a carpet of fire in the night. Smoke smeared the lenses of his goggles and stung his eyes.
A bat came at him, and he turned the Camel's nose away. Detaching one hand from the stick, he wrenched off his blinded goggles, unmasking his face to the icy dash of open air.