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“Didn’t have time to reload those either,” Morva called out by way of explanation.

Lizanne gave voice to some rarely spoken profanity and slammed the port engine back into a vertical angle before reopening the throttles. She drew back the main control lever as the Typhoon lurched forward, angling the craft to the left so Morva could fire at the Red with her mini-Growler. This drake, however, proved far more wily than most, folding its wings and slipping beneath the Typhoon, the stream of tracer missing by inches. Morva kept firing, tracking the drake as it passed underneath, then letting out a shout of surprise as the beast turned on its back and stabbed its talons into the hull. The mini-Growler was jerked from Morva’s grasp by the impact, the weapon tumbling from the hatch into empty space. She came close to following it, managing to grasp a handhold as her legs swung outside, then screamed as flame enveloped the gondola’s exterior.

Lizanne injected Black and used it to drag Morva inside, setting the automatic controls before leaping from the pilot’s seat. She let out another blast of Black to banish the flames licking at Morva’s legs, then lifted her from the gondola’s floor as the Red’s talons stabbed through the thin hull once more. Metal screamed as the talons tore at the hull, slicing open a large rent. Lizanne looked down, finding herself matching gazes with the Red and realising she had seen it before. An impressive scar marred the scales around its eye, left there by Lizanne’s exploding bullet. The beast’s gaze narrowed in obvious recognition and it renewed its efforts to tear open the hull, snout poking through and jaws widening. Lizanne threw Morva to the rear of the gondola, cast her gaze around until it alighted on her Smoker and used Black to pull it into her hands.

She unleashed all her Red as she trained the carbine on the Red’s gaping maw, scorching its eyes and jamming the barrel deep into its throat as the Redball ignited. The bullet must have met the onrushing combustible gas from the beast’s gut as it detonated, the explosion sending Lizanne into the gondola’s ceiling whilst filling the interior with a thick crimson vapour. Lizanne landed hard next to the rent in the floor, watching the Red’s talons lose their grip as it tumbled headless towards the earth.

Finding it hard to breathe and feeling the onset of unconsciousness, Lizanne pressed her Spider’s second button, flooding her veins with all her remaining Green. A certain grogginess still lingered as she regained her footing and clumsily leapt over the gaping hole in the floor to check on Morva. She was unconscious but still breathing; the burns visible through the scorched gaps in her overalls were bad but survivable. She might even walk again, Lizanne thought in bitter self-reproach. Going after Tekela without properly rearming had been a mistake driven by sentiment, not something any of them could afford at this juncture. She positioned Morva on her side and used the Spider on the woman’s wrist to inject a full dose of Green.

Making her way forward, she struggled into the pilot’s seat, resuming control and killing their forward speed. Both engines were smoking but somehow still operational, though she had no notion of how long they might last. She could see the Firefly several hundred yards off now, angling towards the hill-top. Turning her gaze south, Lizanne saw the Black and the White finally come together, both drakes spewing fire at each other as they closed so the subsequent struggle began in a nova of flame.

Lizanne pointed the Typhoon at the ball of flame and opened the throttles.

CHAPTER 53

Hilemore

The revolver jerked in his fist, sending a bullet into the head of the Green drake charging towards him. It didn’t die, however, falling onto its side and continuing to scrabble towards him, claws skittering on the deckboards until Steelfine stepped forward to bring a fire axe down on the beast’s neck, the blow sufficiently powerful to sever the head from the body. The Islander reeled back from the explosion of drake blood, teeth gritted in pain as he wiped it from his hands and neck.

A challenging hiss snapped Hilemore’s gaze to the left in time to see another Green charging towards him across the aft deck. He raised his revolver, finger repeatedly squeezing the trigger only to hear the dry click of the hammer on an empty chamber. A flurry of shots came from his right, scoring hits on the drake’s forelegs and shoulders, sending it into a thrashing halt. Loriabeth stepped past Hilemore, stamping a boot to the back of the Green’s neck, pressing it to the boards before putting her last bullet through its head.

A shout of triumph came from the stern where Lieutenant Sigoral was casting the bodies of two more Greens into the sea with the aid of Black, his Corvantine shipmates raising their weapons in celebration.

“Reckon that’s the last of them, Captain,” Loriabeth said, glancing up from reloading her revolvers. The Superior’s decks and upper works were liberally spattered with blood, most of it drake but they had suffered casualties of their own. Three of Colonel Kulvetch’s Marines had been roasted in the first Red assault and one of the gun-crews had fallen victim to the Greens dropped into their midst. Looking up at the many Reds still wheeling about the sky, Hilemore deduced their troubles were far from over.

“Mr. Steelfine,” he said.

Steelfine paused in the task of dousing his blood burns with water from a canteen and snapped to attention. “Sir?”

“Get any wounded below and remuster the riflemen. Have additional ammunition brought up for the guns. I’ll be on the bridge.”

“Very good, sir.”

Loriabeth followed him as he made his way to the bridgehouse, finding Skaggerhill and two of the riflemen carefully man-handling a Green corpse over the walkway railing. “Whatever else happens, Captain,” the harvester grunted as they heaved the beast over, “all the product soaked into this ship today is sure to make you a wealthy man.”

“Everyone will get equal shares in any prize money, Mr. Skaggerhill,” Hilemore assured him, extending his glass and training it on the shore-line. They were only two miles off but the amount of smoke from so many burning ships made it difficult to gauge the progress of the battle. He could make out numerous flashes indicating a sustained artillery barrage and even from this distance the shouts of thousands of people engaged in combat were audible. As to who might be winning he had no notion at all.

“Drakes ahead, sir!” Talmant called out. Hilemore found them an instant later, a pack of a dozen or more Reds swooping low out of a smoke bank to skim across the waves, heading for the Superior’s prow.

“Hard a-starboard!” he barked, Scrimshine spinning the wheel in response. The forward pivot-gun fired as the ship heaved to the right, cutting the lead Red out of the air with a well-aimed cannister shell. The remaining Reds split into two groups, wheeling about to assault the Superior from two sides. Hilemore saw the head of one drake jerk as it banked towards the port bow, the beast raising a curtain of water as it tumbled into the sea.

“That’s another one for the Preacher, I reckon,” Skaggerhill said. He slotted shells into his shotgun and snapped the breech closed before moving to stand ready in the hatch. Loriabeth took up position at the opposite hatch as the riflemen on the upper works commenced firing. The tactic of aiming at the wings paid dividends, two drakes plunging down with shredded wings before they could come close enough to cast their flames at the ship. The cannon on both sides accounted for three more, leaving four who managed to close the distance.