Agatha H and the Voice of the Castle

Captain Abelard drew in a sharp breath as the old stories roared through his mind, but before he could say anything there was the unmistakable sound of a gun being cocked. Silence fell instantly. The Duke pointed his weapon at Kraddock. “I will shoot any man who tries to move this ship,” he said coldly.

Fury filled Captain Abelard. “Get that gun off of my bridge,” he roared, shaking a fist.

Strinbeck stared back. “Don’t touch me. We stay here!”

This galvanized Kraddock, who again began to thrash against the men holding him. “Take us up!” he screamed. “We’ll all die!”

Strinbeck’s eyes narrowed and he placed the barrel against Kraddock’s temple. “You will die now unless you shut up.”

“And don’t threaten my crew,” the captain snarled.

The two glared at each other. The pause was broken by Mr. Owlswick’s shout. “Captain! The fires! They…Sir, they’re moving!”

Captain Abelard froze. “It is the torchmen,” he breathed.

Strinbeck rolled his eyes. “I don’t like your tone, hireling.”

Captain Abelard had seen military action, fought hand-to-hand against pirates, and was once the last man standing at the end of a glorious fight at Montgolfier’s Rest—the notorious airshipman’s bar in Paris—but the punch that he landed upon Strinbeck’s jaw was the most satisfying one he had ever thrown. The aristocrat went down like a cut sandbag and crashed to the deck, motionless.

“That’s Captain to you,” Abelard snarled. Then he grabbed the intercom. “All hands,” he roared. “Dump all ballast! Emergency climb! Engines ahead full! We are birds! Fly for your lives!”

Immediately the report came back. “Ballast dropped, sir!” They could feel it in their guts when the ship lurched beneath their feet.

The bridge crew took over.

“Engines to speed.”

“All hands rig for pressure loss!”

“Full speed ahead, Mr. Ajayi. What’s our bearing?”

“Due North, sir.

“Due North it is.”

Below, over a thousand fires burned. At the heart of each fire, a decorative gargoyle—one atop each of the town’s lampposts—shivered and swiveled its head upward, seeking until it found the rapidly climbing airship.

There was a great cracking sound across the town, and the burning figures stood atop their posts. There was another great snapping and hundreds of sets of flaming wings extended. They reached down in unison and, grasping the center light globe, drew it forth, revealing a long, steel lance. As one, they all pointed their lances at the little airship and launched themselves upwards.

Aboard the airship, the great flaming swarm of torchmen could be seen coalescing above the town and heading towards them in a tight spiral.

“They’re coming right at us!” Mr. Owlswick shouted.

“Engine’s in the yellow,” the engineer reported.

The captain stared at the advancing wave. He didn’t like what the trigonometry was telling him. He again grabbed the intercom.

“All hands! This is an Emergency Dump! Food! Fuel! Ammo! Everything!”

The bridge crew looked shocked. This was a desperate measure indeed. Reserved for those situations where every gram made a difference in weight and speed.

Behind him, Kraddock, now a model of professionalism, smacked the back of both wheelmen’s heads. “Hold your wheels!”

Hands that had gone lax snapped back to true North. One of the newer wheelmen, called out: “Kraddock! You know about these things. How far will they follow us?”

The old man’s eyes went distant. “If you’d live to see the end of day, from Mechanicsburg you’ll two leagues stay.”

Silverstein looked lost. “Two leagues? Um…whose leagues?”⁴⁶ He thought again. “And what’s that in kilometers?”

Kraddock stared at him. “How the freefalling hell should I know,” he roared. “We just stayed away from the damned place!”

Lieutenant Lorquis removed a set of earphones. “Sir! Chief says that he’s dumped everything but the bag!”

Mr. Owlswick piped up. “They’re still gaining, sir.”

The captain thumped a fist down on a bulkhead. “Blast! There’s got to be something we can toss!”

“You scum!” The voice caught everyone by surprise. It was Duke Strinbeck. He had pulled himself up to a sitting position. “You dare to strike my royal personage? I’ll have every member of your crew flayed alive! I’ll see to it that you never collect a pfennig of your pensions! You’ll never fly again!”

Lieutenant Lorquis exchanged a glance with the captain. Occasionally, problems solved themselves.

Less than a minute later, the two men returned to the bridge. Lorquis ran his tongue over a split lip. The captain fussed at a lost button.

“That did it, sir,” Mr. Owlswick sang out. “We’re pulling ahead.”

This announcement fell flat. The rest of the bridge crew was tense and silent. Lorquis took a deep breath. “So, uh, Captain…we pirates now?”

The captain froze, and then deliberately stood tall and brushed off his coat. “No. He didn’t count. I’ll log him in as ‘Lost Due to Own Stupidity.’”⁴⁷