Rebel Skyforce (Mad Tinker Chronicles) by J.S. Morin

Author:J.S. Morin [Morin, J.S.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Magical Scrivener Press
Published: 2014-05-22T04:00:00+00:00

By noontime, it took no special lens or vantage to spot the grey stretch of rock that jutted from the Katamic in their path. It was the largest of several now visible from the Darksmith’s deck. For all appearances some ancient god had waded north from Khesh to build Takalia, and his bag of rocky shorelines had torn and spilled in the middle of the sea. The way was dotted with flotsam from the Fair Trader like trail signs. Whatever current was dragging them along had made better time with lighter debris than the hulking steel hull of the steamship.

Captain Toller made a few attempts to alter their course, in an effort to put some word in as to where they ran aground. The bait sail was in tatters, but by makeshift rigging the crew had managed to raise it and catch a wind; the Katamic deigned not to notice the effort, and pulled them along in spite of the tiny, ragged bit of cloth that tugged at the ship like a puppy biting at a trouser hem. An attempt at rowing lasted all of perhaps five minutes. A wooden ship the size of the Darksmith would take a hundred men or more at the oars. The steamship was far heavier than a wooden ship its size, giving it both more mass to push and a deeper draw to force aside in their path, plus they had no proper oars. Even a crew of landfolk would have soon realized that rifle butts and steel-sheet wreckage from the lower decks were no way to move a vessel.

Thus they waited for the Katamic to be done with them, and see where they ended up.

Madlin kept her vigil at the aft castle, starboard side. “I’ve been watching the path of the debris field in front of us,” Madlin said to Captain Toller when he happened to pass nearby. “We’ve got a good chance to miss that large island. Only the leftmost part of the swath of wreckage seems to be washing up.”

“I’ve already done all I can think of to move the ship under power—wind, steam, muscle—we’ve got nothing to do but wait,” said Toller. “And pray, I suppose.”

“You’re missing the obvious one, I think,” Madlin said.

“How’s that, now?”

“Swim.”

Toller’s face went slack and his eyes darted off in the direction of the island. “No, we can’t just leave the ship adrift. What if someone salvaged it?”

“That one should be even more obvious,” Madlin replied.

Toller shook his head. “No. We’re better off seeing where the currents take us. We should reach Takalia within a week.”

“And we’ve got two days of food. Four if we ration like misers,” said Madlin. “My father had the world-ripper running last night, nearly got it to open a hole. If his flywheel trick works out, we’ll tell him where we are and get picked up.”

“If we stay on the ship, we get those same four days, except we won’t be surrounded by whatever crew of the Fair Trader survived. And Cadmus had a dozen dullards with guns blast holes in his machine.

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