(eng) Alan Burt Akers - Dray Prescot 36 by Omens of Kregen

Author:Omens of Kregen [Kregen, Omens of]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter ten

Nath the Impenitent

When I recall that aerial battle I am filled with horror and revulsion, and scathing self-contempt, and also a foolish fatuous pride.

Our thirty-eight had the beating of their fifty, there was no doubt of that.

Supreme though they might be on the seas, the Fish Heads had nothing like our experience in the air.

Their ships were very good; most — not all — of ours were better.

We could see the Shanks crowding their upper decks, helmets and tridents arrayed in ranks. Their catapults hurled. They were far more reckless with fire than they were at sea. I saw one black-bottomed ship in the midst of the melee sling a blazing firepot at one of our vessels, and miss, and the missile smashed full into one of their own. She burned.

We lost ships. But for every one of ours lost they lost four. And, it was clear, they did not like the outcome. They were used arrogantly to winning all their sea battles. So now they fought as only Shanks can fight, vicious and deadly and without mercy. Well, and Opaz forgive us, we fought back in the same way.

To interpolate now what I afterwards discovered, as is not my wont in this narrative, I will say that the silver boxes powering the Shank vollers contained a different mix of minerals from those supplied by Hamal and Hyrklana and other nations of Paz. The Shanks used up the power of some of the minerals, and they therefore had to carry spare silver boxes to replace those exhausted. They had, in fact, to operate their power source with a fuel supply backup.

So, as I say, we were doing all right. Seg and I kept shooting anxious glances at Rose of Valka . Delia and Milsi were aboard her. She lashed out all around her and saw off her four Shanks. Then, just as we were congratulating ourselves on a smashing victory, one of the Shank vessels, ablaze from stem to stern, flew full tilt into Pride of Vondium .

I saw that awful flame-spitting mass hurtling down on us. There was absolutely no time to drag our ship out of the way.

Wearing their aerial safety belts, men and women threw themselves overboard.

Seg hitched his bow up his back and yelled to me: “Overboard with you!”

Pride of Vondium, enveloped in flame, was falling headlong through the air. The flames had burned through some control ropes, and the silver boxes must have been jolted apart. We were dropping at a frightful speed, and the flames and heat blew blisteringly about us.

I saw Ortyg Thingol sprawled on the deck in the line of the advancing flames. Blood smeared his brown curls. Seg yelled again, leaping forward: “I’ll grab young Ortyg! Over with you, Dray!”

Flames spouted up from the deck around our feet.

“And leave you!” I jumped forward to assist Seg with our young cadet.

A wall of fire burgeoned directly before me. Beyond that hellish heat Seg and the lad must be trying to fight their way back to the bulwarks.

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