HMS Gwylym Manthyr steamed straight for the center of East Gate Channel, gliding across the smooth, sun-gilded water under the vigilant white eye of her kite balloon while a banner of coal smoke trailed astern. A double trio of bombsweepers swept the waters ahead of her; HMS Bayport, HMS Cherayth, and HMS Tanjyr followed her; and four more bombsweepers flanked the slow-moving column of armored warships. The badly damaged Gairmyn, half her guns out of action, her casemate blackened by fire, her funnel bleeding smoke from dozens of splinter holes, listing four degrees to starboard, and riding well over a foot deeper than her design waterline, brought up the rear with the ammunition colliers … and the three crippled Dohlaran screw-galleys which had survived long enough to surrender.
Those screw-galleys had been Sarmouth’s greatest anxiety after the savagery of the Zhulyet Channel. They’d been slower, less maneuverable, and far more vulnerable than Manthyr or his remaining Cities, but if they’d been able to creep in close enough in the darkness.…
Fortunately, the ICN had evolved a doctrine to deal with them, and it had worked well. The combination of star shells and rockets had stripped away the darkness, and Manthyr’s 4-inch breechloaders had been absolutely lethal, far deadlier than the Cities’ slower firing 6-inch guns. Only three of the screw-galleys had gotten in close enough to engage with their own guns; none had managed a torpedo attack; and all their efforts had managed to sink only one bombsweeper.
He’d felt more like a murderer than an admiral, in many ways. Not one of the screw-galleys had tried to run. Every one of them had been sunk or crippled trying to close with their enemies with an unswerving gallantry which deserved far better than it had achieved. Their courage had won his ungrudging respect, but that hadn’t prevented him from crushing the attack, and if he’d regretted their deaths, at least it had been gratifying to find something working as planned.
He’d be a long time forgiving himself for what had happened to Eraystor and Riverbend, even though he still knew intellectually that Zhaztro had been right about which ships could be risked. The consequences if Mahntayl’s rockets had hit Manthyr instead of the Cities would almost certainly have been far worse, even just in terms of absolute casualties. No one could argue with that, but.…
But if you’re not cheating, you’re not trying hard enough, he thought. You forgot that one, Dunkyn, and now Hainz and all those other men are gone. His eyes hardened. Avoiding any appearance of “demonic intervention” had damned well better be worth it in the end.
That remained to be seen, but there was one thing he could do this morning, “demonic intervention” or not, and he really didn’t care if it compromised that political objective. He was through seeing his men die if it could be avoided.
Better get out from under, My Lord, he thought in Thirsk’s direction. You’re not supposed to be part of the body count today, but if it happens, it happens.
“I believe it’s about time, Halcom,” he said.
“Of course, My Lord,” Bahrns said after the slightest of hesitations, and Sarmouth hid a bittersweet smile. His flag captain had seemed a bit … bemused when he issued his instructions this morning. But whatever he might have thought, he hadn’t argued, and now he bent over the bridge pelorus and took a careful bearing on the observation tower upon which the Earl of Thirsk stood. Then he swung the pelorus and took a cross bearing on the flagstaff of Fishnet Island’s East Battery.
“All stop,” he said, still gazing across the pelorus.
“All stop, aye, Sir,” the telegraphsman acknowledged. He rocked the engine room repeaters’ big brass handles, moving the pointer in the engine room. “All stop,” he confirmed, and the pulse of Gwylym Manthyr’s engines stilled, as if some great sea creature’s heart had suddenly stopped beating.
“Prepare to anchor,” Bahrns said.
“Prepare to anchor, aye, Sir,” Lieutenant Bestyr acknowledged.
“Very good,” the captain murmured, still bent over the pelorus, as Manthyr’s momentum carried her silently onward, like some fourteen-thousand-ton ghost. He stayed that way for several more minutes, then raised his head as Manthyr reached exactly the correct bearing from East Point.
“Let go the stern anchor!” he said crisply, and Gwylym Manthyr’s stern anchor plunged into the water with a massive roar of anchor chain. Bahrns straightened and crossed to the forward edge of the bridge, then stood patiently, fingers of his right hand drumming against his thigh while Manthyr’s momentum sailed out the anchor chain and her speed bled away. Then—
“Let go the bow anchor!” he said, and Manthyr’s starboard bow anchor plunged. “Power on the after capstan,” he continued. “Veer cable forward.”
Gwylym Manthyr edged slowly backwards for two or three minutes as the after capstan sucked in anchor chain and the forward capstan paid it out. Bahrns watched critically, balancing her between the two anchors with finicky precision until, at last, she came to rest, the current of the outgoing tide raising a tiny ripple around her stem, exactly equidistant from the batteries on Fishnet and East Point.
“Secure the capstans,” he said then, and waited while the order was carried out. Then he turned to Sarmouth once more.
“Prepared to engage, My Lord,” he said simply.
* * *
The Earl of Thirsk stared in disbelief.
The Charisian ironclad’s captain had handled his enormous command with impressive skill, almost as if she’d been one of the ICN’s nimble schooners. That had been his first thought. He’d been a bit puzzled by how slowly she’d moved, but it had been obvious she meant to split the difference between East Point and Fishnet. That had suggested a lot more trust in the bombsweepers’ ability to protect her than he’d expected out of someone as experienced as Sarmouth.
He has to know I’d have laid as many sea-bombs as I could to cover the East Gate, and somehow I doubt those sweepers of his can guarantee to clear all of them out of his path! He can’t be going to deliberately take that ship straight into them!
The very thought had been insane, yet that had been exactly what was happening, and he’d felt himself tightening internally, waiting for the first explosion. But then his eyes had gone wide. She was anchoring—anchoring!—just over eleven thousand yards from East Point … and exactly the same distance from Fishnet. What struck him first was the fact that Sarmouth was anchoring at all, surrendering the mobility which would have made his flagship a far more difficult target. Then he realized Manthyr’s position allowed her gunners to engage with both broadsides at once, from an absolutely stable and unmoving platform, while simultaneously placing her at the very limit of his own range. Just reaching her would require his gunners to use dangerously heavy charges—the kind that led to burst guns and dead and mangled gunners—and even so, their shells would have precious little penetrating power when they got there.
And then the rest of it struck him.
She hadn’t just anchored, hadn’t just positioned herself perfectly to engage both batteries simultaneously. No, she’d also anchored when the bombsweepers in front of her had been a mere two hundred yards, less than half a cable, outside his sea-bombs. And Sarmouth hadn’t anchored because anyone had suddenly spotted the sea-bombs or because his sweepers had abruptly brought one to the surface. There’d been no haste, no urgency, to the maneuver. No, he’d anchored with slow, deliberate precision, exactly where he’d intended to anchor from the very beginning. And that meant—