Jack Cloudie. Stephen Hunt

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СКАЧАТЬ alright, now that the Cassarabians have airships to take on the Royal Aerostatical Navy. The only question is when. And whatever the answer to that, you’d better hope that we’re not on board the ship when it breaks out. Not that you’ll hear such a view coming from Admiralty House. They think that because the RAN’s been sailing in the clouds for centuries, our tactics and experience will see the Cassarabians off like cheap whipped hounds if they dare to drift across our border with mischief in mind.’

      ‘You don’t think we will?’

      ‘I’ve never been privy to an easy victory, Mister Keats,’ said the old officer. ‘No, indeed, I don’t think I know what one of those even looks like.’

      Now Jack could see why the crew seemed so restless on board the airship, pressed men and the scrapings of the barrel, sailing on an unpopular scrapyard vessel towards trouble. Whatever their mission was, it was obvious that Admiralty House hadn’t wanted any part of it. And that meant politics. Army interference, or parliamentarians in the House of Guardians ramming it down the reluctant throats of the braided naval uniforms who thought they knew best.

      The three of them were meant to ensure that the chamber of thinking machines didn’t interfere with the running of the ship. But who is going to ensure that I return alive to keep Alan and Saul safe?

      Omar yelled as the great winged lizard, the drak that Farris Uddin had named as Quarn, banked and began to descend towards Bladetenbul. Never in all his years as a slave had Omar expected he would see Cassarabia’s capital city – and if someone had told him a week ago that his introduction to its immense spill of streets, souks and towers would be from a saddle at a hundred feet, he would have joked that the speaker had been exposed to the heat of the sun for too long.

      The light of Bladetenbul is the light of the world, ran the old saying, and from this high up Omar could see why. There was a great fortified wall running around the outside of the seven hills the city sprawled across, and behind the fortifications stood the capital’s sun towers, each fluted construction filled with boilers and capturing the reflected light of the thousands of great mirror arrays that circled Bladetenbul. Water into steam, steam to drive the city’s machines, and the steam caught again and fed back into the system of reservoirs and pipes – far too precious a resource to waste on the sky under god, as the heathen northern nations were said to.

      Light from the mirrors seemed to reflect off the drak’s green-scaled skin, dazzling Omar where he sat behind Farris Uddin, strapped above the base of the creature’s long sinuous neck. The rushing of the wind and the drumming of the drak’s wings made it hard to communicate with Farris Uddin – not that the taciturn killer had much to say to Omar. He really was an imperial guardsman, that much was certain. Sand dogs and bounty hunters did not ride such creatures as this, that Omar knew. As much effort as the womb mages of Omar’s old house had put into the breeding and nurture of salt-fish, it was child’s play compared to the skill and resources needed to create and raise something as large and complex as a drak.

      They whisked lower over the city, low enough for Omar to see the bazaars crowded with canopy-covered stalls selling silks and spiced rice, iced-water sellers weighed down with gas-cooled tanks on their backs, importuning the clients coming out of the great domed bathhouses. The drak followed the line of the stone pipe network that fed the capital with its precious water supplies, flying so near to the ground that Omar winced as they banked around minarets, the breeze from their passage ruffling the robes of the watermen at the major tap-points, officials inspecting the lines of those waiting for any sign of unpaid water taxes.

      On the drak hurtled, riding the thermals from the whitewashed city below and hardly beating a wing now, gliding up towards the tallest of the hills where the Jahan Palace waited. Not for nothing was this called the Jahan – simply, the world. A tower-tall crystal dome on the brow of the hill, ruby coloured and surrounded by smaller emerald green domes. World enough for the Caliph Eternal and his court. Sultans and emirs came here to renew their vows and the pledges of their nations to the mighty emperor of emperors, Akil Jaber Issman, blood descendent of the legendary Ben Issman himself, his name be blessed. What chance would the barely freed slave of an outlawed heretic house have when swimming in such perilous currents?

      Farris Uddin’s massive drak glided towards a series of fortifications sitting watchfully behind the massive central dome of the palace. Embedded on top of a rocky rise, it was the eyrie of the guardsmen that protected the caliph and his realm. Tilting back, the drak used its wings to break, two massive clawed feet touching down on the rock floor of a cave-like opening, then swinging forward to walk them into a hangar where jagged walls were hung with rows of colourful shields. A stableman emerged from a door in the wall and ran a cable through the drak’s harness, before receiving Farris Uddin’s instructions on the creature’s care. As the young stable hand led the drak away, Farris turned to Omar. ‘That is Boulous, my retainer. He is a slave, and though his blood is originally of Jackelian stock, his heart has been raised to be as stout as any guardsman that serves the order. I chose him for his keen mind. Let his caution, wisdom and loyalty become yours.’

      ‘I shall be at least twice as loyal as he; you have my word under the sight of god and Ben Issman, his name be blessed. Are they in the palace below, master? The priests of the new sect that had my house declared heretic?’ asked Omar.

      ‘Indeed they are,’ said Farris Uddin, splashing cooling water on his shaved head from a wall-mounted basin.

      ‘Do not sell me to them, master. I shall work harder for you than a dozen—’

      Farris Uddin raised his hand for Omar to stop and pulled out the young slave boy’s roll of indenture papers. He pointed to the sigils sitting in the bottom corner. ‘Can you read that?’

      ‘It is the code stamp of a transaction engine, master.’

      ‘I know what it is. I asked can you read it?’

      Omar traced his fingers across the embossed code of vertical bar shapes. ‘It is the date I became a freeman.’ Omar ran his fingers across the code again, confused. ‘But—’

      ‘Always read the small print, Omar Barir,’ instructed the guardsman. ‘Your papers as a freeman were drawn up by your father two months ago. Long enough for you to have travelled over the desert with a water caravan and made your way to civilized company on your own. Before, mark you,’ he raised a warning finger, ‘before the House of Barir was declared heretic.’

      ‘I do not understand, master?’

      ‘A slave cannot serve as the cadet of an imperial guardsman,’ said Farris Uddin. ‘But a freeman can. And in the service of the Caliph Eternal you become Centless. Those in military or civil service are not permitted to follow any one sect. Your oath is directly to the lawful descendents of Ben Issman, unifier of the one true god, and the empire, his name be blessed. No other loyalties are permitted. Not nation, not tribe nor house or sect.’

      ‘But why am I to be your cadet?’ Omar blurted out. Why did you venture all the way out to the western coast to spare me from a heretic’s fate?

      ‘Because my last one fell off a drak,’ said Farris Uddin. ‘And because it will annoy the keepers of the new sect endlessly to see the last blood of the House of Barir walking the palace wearing guardsman’s robes. And for many other reasons too, but they are not yours to know.’

      ‘What call did my father have on you?’ said Omar. ‘He sent for you, did he not? That is why you came to Haffa.’

      ‘Call enough,’ growled the guardsman. ‘Now hold your tongue and save your questions, boy. A cadet calls his guardsman master as well as a slave does.’

      ‘Yes, СКАЧАТЬ