And then they waited.
Above them, every inch of canvas strained against the wind. Rigging whipped and jiggled, and the masts, with their cross-spars outstretched like arms, creaked under the load. To port and starboard, thick black smoke belched from the array of funnels atop the great engine-houses; and projecting from the sides, the enormous propellers were spinning as fast as they could. Even so, the marauding city rumbled closer by the second.
Ten minutes later, the predator city came alongside, moving into Quentaris’ wind shadow. Immediately, they dropped sails, and Quentaris shuddered as the two land masses ground into one another, prow to prow. On each side, magicians cushioned the impact with spells that exhausted them almost at once. Despite this, masts shook and rigging twanged. Two sailors dropped to their deaths as the jolt unseated them.
Then came grappling irons, looping through the air, snagging onto battlement and rigging. Within minutes, hundreds of Tolrushians had leapt across to Quentaris.
‘All hands, repel boarders!’ Verris screamed.
The fighting was fierce, mainly concentrated a long the portside perimeter wall and in the rigging above. Verris was not fool enough to pull all the defences from other key spots though. Tolrushians were known for their devious tactics: they might just take it into their heads to send a lifeboat, charmed to float, under Quentaris and up onto the other side. This meant that fully a fifth of his forces were doing nothing, but it couldn't be helped.
Nor did he have much time for regrets. Within moments of the two cities joining battle, he was in the thick of it. A mid-sized mountain troll leapt at him wielding a great battleaxe. Verris ducked beneath the arcing blade and thrust his sword up into the troll. The troll gasped, staggered back, and flipped over the parapet, dropping out of sight.
Then two Tolrushians came at him, trading blow for blow, trying to pierce his defensive swordplay. He parried, thrust, feinted, and parried again. One of the Tolrushians made a misstep, overbalanced, and Verris cut him down then turned all of his attention to the remaining foe.
A moment later the other Tolrushian was down too.
Up and down the battlements, the fighting ebbed and flowed. There were screams, cries and hoarse gurgling shrieks, some fading slowly as Quentarans and Tolrushians fell overboard, plummeting thousands of feet to their deaths.
The air wasn't just full of cries and grunts, it was also full of arrows. Verris saw one man with an arrow in his thigh, another in his shoulder, and a shield with six more sprouting from it. The magicians did their best to take care of aerial missiles, scorching some into flame in mid-flight, or else diverting them so that they fell harmlessly to the ground.
The frenzied fighting went on for another hour.
Verris rallied his men, ordered them to weak spots, and made sure the wounded were pulled from the thick of the battle and taken to the healers at the hospital. More than once he praised good fortune that some of Quentaris’ best fighters like Hulk Duelph and Commander Storm had been in a War Cabinet meeting with the Archon at the time of the Upheaval. Their very presence inspired many a Quentaran that day.
‘Keep at them!’ yelled Verris. ‘We have them on the run!’
This was something of an exaggeration, but Verris had seen what few others had spotted so far: that the two cities were drifting closer and closer to the cloud bank. Just a little further…
At the first clammy embrace of cloud he put his fingers to his lips and blew a shrill whistle.
Immediately, a horn sounded.
Everywhere his men disengaged from the enemy and set about hacking at the grappling lines that bound the two cities together. Sails creaked as they tacked to take full advantage of the wind. Spars cracked and cordage thrummed as the land masses pulled slowly apart. Bodies fell screaming into the chasm between the rumbling monoliths.
The Tolrushians were taken by surprise.
As the last grappling lines were cut, Quentaris yawed two points to starboard. Everyone braced themselves as the city righted then surged forward. There were brief cheers, but the fighting hadn't stopped. There were still a couple of hundred Tolrushians on board, and the clash of cutlasses, battleaxes and pikes, and the screams of the wounded and dying, continued for some time before dwindling completely.
A conch sounded. Every lantern in the city was extinguished; every fire doused.
Except for the creaking of sail and mast, and the wind in the rigging, there was no other sound, unless counting the far-off muffled shouts of enraged Tolrushians as the floating city searched through the pea-soup fog for Quentaris.
Verris turned to find Borges standing beside him. He had a bloodied bandage strapped across his forehead. ‘Accursed cloud,’ said Borges grumpily. ‘Just when I was reaching my stride. Why, I could have sent a dozen more Tolrushians to meet their ancestors!’
‘Sheathe your sword, friend,’ said Verris. ‘For now, we are safe. So let us find out the damage. There will be little enough time to mend things if Tolrush runs us to ground.’
Running blind, Quentaris drifted deeper and deeper into thick cloud. A chill clamminess invaded every corner of the city, and sounds took on an odd quality, as though the whole city was underwater. Captain Bellgard ordered the all-clear sound and a thunderous cheer went up from soldier and citizen alike. Quentaris was safe. For now. Even the Archon stood on his balcony and waved languidly to any citizens interested enough to look up.
‘A narrow escape,’ Verris said to Borges the day after the battle as he sat in the new and hastily appropriated Marine Guildhouse, not far from the Square of the People. ‘For which we're in debt to that young girl for discovering Tolrush.’ He signalled two of his men, Baldrear and Cafferty. ‘Find the youngling, if she's still alive.’
An hour later, someone knocked on the door. Lord Verris looked up from his desk. ‘Come!’ He placed the quill in its inkwell and smiled when the door opened. ‘Young Tab Vidler. Where have you been hiding?’
Tab glared at him. She had a cut on her cheek and her left arm was in a makeshift sling.
‘Ah,’ said Verris. ‘I see that you were in the thick of it. I might have known. Here, please take a seat.’ He offered Tab his own chair, carrying it around the desk and depositing it in front of her.
Verris had food and drink brought and Tab wolfed it down. In all the excitement and danger, she hadn't eaten anything substantial since the battle. When she was finished, Verris asked if she had had any more visions.
Tab was tempted to tell him the truth, as she had to Philmon. She believed that she could trust this man, this pirate and thief, probably more than most of the so-called honest citizens of Quentaris.
Yet still something held her back. As they said in Quentaris, you can't unscramble an egg.
Just then Captain Bellgard was shown in. Tab leapt to her feet, but the captain smiled kindly and waved her to sit down again. He seated himself nearby. Verris gave Tab a nod to speak.
Tab frowned, trying to remember everything. ‘I saw a big youth, a Tolrushian. He wasn't much more than a boy, but everybody took orders from him. He was very cruel, with fox-like eyes.’ Tab thought for a moment. ‘He had an advisor, someone called Genkis. Oh, and last night I couldn't sleep because my arm hurts. I had another vision.’
Verris nodded for Tab to continue.
‘There's a horrible, black creature – like a kind of big wolfhound. It kept hissing and spitting.’ Tab shivered at the memory of watching it. ‘Anyway, the boy-leader was yelling at some people, telling them they were imbeciles for letting Quentaris get away. He had two of them killed on the spot by a magician who vaporised them into a dark mist. He's… I think he's in desperate need of icefire.’
‘That's Kull Vladis you're describing,’ said Verris. ‘He's the blood-thirsty boy-king of Tolrush. His pet's name is Sherma. The Tolrushians use animals as slaves and fighters. What else did you see?’