Tekela shifted, drawing her shoulder clear of Lizanne’s grip. “I won’t do that,” she stated, sitting straighter in her seat. “And I don’t want to talk about this any more,” she added in a familiar but now rarely heard tone, rich in all the truculent stubbornness Lizanne recalled from those first days in Morsvale.
“You might as well sleep,” Tekela went on, shifting the main lever as the compass-needle strayed a little from the heading. “It’ll be hours before we see anything but ocean.”
The weather remained kind and the aerostat made swift progress on its westward flight, aided by the wind for much of the way until the first Varestian islands came into view a day and a half later. Tekela had managed barely two hours’ sleep, slumping in her seat with one hand on the control lever and the engine set to its slowest speed. Nevertheless she seemed fresh enough today, one of the advantages of youth, Lizanne supposed.
“The captain wasn’t wrong about the wind,” Tekela commented, grunting a little as she hauled on the controls to keep the craft on the correct heading.
Lizanne peered down at the small specks of land passing by below. These were the mostly uninhabited outer islands that formed the Sabiras Archipelago, a natural barrier on the eastern fringe of the Varestian region that served as an unofficial border between the Orethic Ocean and the Red Tides. From here on the only ships to sail these waters were Varestian, either traders or pirates. Even before the Corvantine Empire had been forced to forsake its sovereignty over the region, the Red Tides had mostly been shunned by both Imperial and corporate ships. Despite a reputation as the finest and most wide-ranging mariners in the world, the Varestians had always been hostile to intruders into their own waters.
Lizanne read through Captain Trumane’s letter once more. She had felt no compunction about breaking the seal and was quite prepared to discard it should the contents prove counter-productive. In fact she found the letter’s diplomatic phrasing to be elegant and effective, containing nothing their potential hosts could take offence at and striking the right balance between solicitation and conciliation. What would interest them most, she knew, was the offer of ten million in Syndicate scrip or stock of equivalent value in return for safe harbour, an offer far beyond Trumane’s authority to make. And far beyond mine for that matter, she thought, folding the letter away. It was clear that in order to secure Varestian co-operation she would have to engage in some spectacular lies.
They saw their first Varestian vessel once they were over the larger islands a dozen miles farther west. It was a large three-paddle freighter easily identified by the broad wake it left on the ocean. Lizanne used the riflescope to scan the ship. A flag she didn’t recognise flew from the mast, making it an Independent as was the case with most Varestian ships. And pirates, she added inwardly. She doubted that this vessel was engaged in piracy, being too large for the kind of swift manoeuvring required of that trade. It did, however, turn out to be armed.
A flash appeared on the freighter’s fore-deck, followed a second or two later by the faint crump of a cannon-shot. The gunners were clearly untrained in firing at aerial targets because the shell was both wide and short, its fuse causing it to explode about fifty yards below and a hundred yards behind the aerostat. Even so, it was close enough for Tekela to open the throttle and increase the angle of the ailerons, taking them up to the craft’s maximum ceiling in another gut-disturbing lurch.
“Could you warn me when you’re going to do that?” Lizanne requested.
“Sorry.” Tekela glanced out of the starboard port-hole at the ship below. “That wasn’t very friendly, was it?”
“No.” Lizanne saw several more flashes flaring on the freighter’s deck as it brought all its guns into play, though none of the shells it launched came any closer than the first. “They have no idea who we are,” she went on as the cluster of small black clouds left by the exploding shells drifted away and the freighter shrank into the distance. “Or any notion what this craft is. Troubled times makes for nervous hands.”
“And when we get to the Seven Walls?”
Lizanne turned to Tekela, finding her doll’s face tense with worry. Easy to forget how young she is sometimes, Lizanne chided herself. She resisted the impulse to lie, offer some bland reassurance. But a co-operative mission required trust between agents. “I don’t know,” she said. “They may fire on us as soon as they see us. Or they may not. They may allow us to land and immediately arrest us.”
Tekela nodded, small worry lines creasing her forehead. “Or worse,” she said.
“Yes. Or worse.” She gestured at the small clock Jermayah had set amongst the cluster of dials in front of the pilot’s station. “How much longer?”
Tekela straightened and turned, taking a firmer grip on the control lever. “In this wind, at least another ten hours.”
“Which means we’ll be arriving in darkness.”
“I can circle through the night, begin the approach at dawn.”
“No. You’ll be too fatigued.” Lizanne rose into a crouch and shuffled forward to the viewing tube that sat alongside the central strut. “Time to fire up the blood-burner, I think.”
“The professor said it has only one charge. And once started the only way to stop it is to flush the plasma from the combustion chamber. It might be better to save it for emergencies.”
“We can recharge it when we land, assuming we’re allowed to take off again. If not then it won’t matter.” She flipped open the cover on the viewing tube and put her eye to the socket. “Besides, I should like to see just how fast this thing can go. Ready?”
“One second. Need to level the ailerons; otherwise, the slip-stream will tear them off.” Lizanne heard a snick as Tekela locked one of the levers into place. “Ready.”
Lizanne took her wallet from the pocket of her jacket and extracted a vial of Red, taking a small sip before returning her eye to the viewing tube. Her father had placed a little luminescent disc inside the plasma valve so it was easy to make out the small pool of viscous liquid it held. A brief flare of Red and the product immediately burst into an eye-wateringly bright fire-ball. She was about to opine that adding tinted glass to the eyepiece might be a good idea when the aerostat surged forward with enough force to send her sprawling. She heard Tekela let out a startled but delighted giggle and blinked the moisture from her eyes to see that she now had both hands on the control lever. Over her shoulder Lizanne could see the needle on the speedometer swiftly ascending to its maximum reading, where it stayed.
“Must be over a hundred miles an hour at least,” Tekela said with an appreciative laugh. “Looks as if the professor underestimated his invention.”
“Co-invention,” Lizanne corrected, glancing through a port-hole to see the wispy cloud beyond passing by at a greatly accelerated rate. “When we get back to the ship, remind me to draft a proper patent and a contract to cover distribution of future profits.”
They cleared the Sabiras Archipelago in what seemed like minutes, bringing them into the Red Tides proper. They were low enough to make out the waves passing below, the ocean surface blurring thanks to their speed. Several more ships came into view, most much smaller than the freighter, though none felt the need to fire on them. Lizanne suspected this was due more to their increased speed than any lack of hostility. In all it took just under four hours before Tekela reported land in sight. The thermoplasmic engine had exhausted its supply by then, forcing Tekela to combat the winds once more, though she proved adept at keeping the approaching land-mass firmly in the centre of the forward window.