Jack Cloudie

EPILOGUE

‘Now then, laddies,’ said the gruff lieutenant on the desk at the front of the queue snaking across the airship field. ‘Being two nice honest boys, I am sure you both have your state work records with you.’

Handing over the tattered punch cards, the eldest of the brothers shifted uncomfortably in his boots. ‘I thought the navy took anybody on.’

‘Did you now?’ said the lieutenant, his voice half a growl as he fed the cards into a portable transaction engine and inspected the results rotating across the beads on his abacus-like screen. ‘Well, you’re not on the constabulary’s wanted list, which’s a start. But I see a lot of concerns’ names on your cards. Aye, can’t settle down to a trade, eh? What makes you think you can settle with the Royal Aerostatical Navy, I wonder? Good scores on your letters, but it’s not clerks we need. Not now the Cassarabians have found a new way to produce those little arse-farting gas monsters of theirs without offending the great sky gods or whatever fancy they’re worshipping this month. We need men-of-war; we need Jack Cloudies. You two lanky laddies think that’s you?’

They nodded in a non-committal way.

The lieutenant stamped their punch cards with the official navy recruitment pattern, jerking a thumb towards the airship hangars where a short steamman appeared to be addressing the assembled crewmen. ‘Over there to take the oath and look lively about it. Master Cardsharp Shaftcrank is officiating today and if you slouch like that in front of him, I can guarantee you laddies’ll be stuck stoking in his transaction-engine chamber for the first six months of your service.’ They went to walk over, but the lieutenant stuck an arm out first, blocking their passage. ‘Being such fine readers, you two no doubt peruse a copy of the Middlesteel Illustrated News of a morning, maybe buy a penny-dreadful or two to read?’

Again the pair nodded in a non-committal way.

‘Are the pensmen still writing about the youngest captain of the fleet’s latest exploits; you know the one, boys, the hero of the Battle of the Mutantarjinn Flats?’

The oldest brother grunted in the affirmative.

‘I thought they might be.’ The lieutenant dropped his arm. ‘On your way, Messrs Alan and Saul Keats. Welcome to the Royal Aerostatical Navy.’ He glanced up at the next man in the queue, a grizzled old sailor with a wooden leg. ‘Pete Guns. I had an inkling you might have been more than a wee bit deceased by now. Has the navy, by chance, stopped paying you your pension?’

‘Not dead yet, Lieutenant McGillivray. Maybe another tour might do for me — if not, living on the admiralty’s pauper generosity surely will.’

The lieutenant stuck his hand out for the sailor’s work record, punching it through with the recruitment code. ‘Aye well, nobody could tie a fuse quite as well as you, Mister Guns. Welcome back to the Royal Aerostatical Navy.’

Coppertracks curiously trundled to the front door of the tower-like mansion that was Tock House. One of the sage steamman’s drones had reached the door before him in answer to the chimes of the bell pull, and Coppertracks hadn’t recognized the image of the black-suited gentleman on the steps sent back by the drone, the man’s stovepipe hat held ever so tight in his hand.

‘Can I help you, dear mammal?’ asked Coppertracks.

‘This is the residence of Jared Black?’

Coppertracks hesitated before answering. This softbody looked like a parliament man. From the Customs and Revenue Department of the civil service, perhaps. They were always probing and poking into the poor old commodore’s esoteric sources of wealth. Items such as the ridiculously expensive large ivory wheel that the steamman had helped transport to the auction rooms the summer before.

‘That is correct,’ said Coppertracks, a little loop of energy circulating through the crystal dome topping his head as he dismissed the opportunity to dissemble. ‘Are you perhaps calling from the treasury?’

The dark-suited softbody inclined his head and then stepped aside, revealing a pile of wooden crates scattered along the lawn as if someone had tried to lay a path with them. He tapped the nearest box with a smart silver cane. ‘Indeed not. Foreign and Colonial Office.’

Coppertracks thoughtfully scratched the side of his skull dome. ‘This is most irregular.’

‘On that, sir, I believe we can concur,’ said the official, tipping his hat before replacing it on his head. ‘For the commodore. Good day to you.’

‘And these crates?’ spluttered Coppertracks.

‘What passes for diplomacy these days, courtesy of the Cassarabian embassy,’ called the official, walking briskly back through the steamman’s gardens.

Coppertracks’ artificial servants had just levered the lid off the nearest of the crates when the commodore came to the door and, rushing down the steps, seized a bottle from the drone’s metal fingers before it could attempt to brush off the wood shavings that had come out of the box.

‘Jared,’ said the steamman, ‘could you kindly explain what this is?’

The commodore gleefully held the bottle of red wine up to the sun, running his hands lovingly over the elaborate alien script of the label. ‘As rare a vintage as has ever graced a Jackelian’s table. From the sultan of Fahamutla’s private estate unless my poor blessed eyes are mistaken.’

‘This is all wine!’ The steamman’s voicebox trembled somewhere between astonishment and annoyance. ‘There must be the best portion of a vineyard’s worth littering our lawn here.’

‘What’s the matter, old steamer, have you never seen the gratitude of kings before?’

When the rider came out of the sandstorm his eyes were red and his throat sore, despite the gauze filter mask that covered his face. The sandstorms were as bad this season as they had ever been, but even the drifting wall of dust could not disguise the works of construction being carried out in front of him. After the work was completed, the occupant would have a fine view of the beaches and harbour below the cliffs.

The rider’s camel snorted uncertainly. It had caught the scent of something it did not like, but what? Most creatures with any sense would be sitting out this filthy hell-sent storm for the rest of the day in whatever shelter they could find or burrow into for themselves.

With the strength of the whipping winds, the rider almost missed the figure squatting on the ruins of a stone desalination pipe, a strong cape pulled tight around him, an ornate filter mast protecting his face from the fury of the gale.

The figure’s voice carried across on the gusts. ‘You are a long way from the sands of the Mutrah, nomad.’

That voice, there was something oddly familiar about it.

‘Curiosity has carried me here on the storm,’ shouted the rider. ‘What else is there to do in such filthy weather?’

‘Yes. What else?’

‘Who rebuilds here?’ demanded the rider. ‘The ones who destroyed the town are no more, that much I know.’

‘Those who have title to the land build here,’ called the figure.

‘And who has granted such title?’

‘The Caliph Eternal.’

Snorting, the rider turned his camel towards the ruins of a line of water farms. ‘We are a long way from the court. Who rebuilds here?’

‘Filthy townsmen,’ laughed the figure. ‘Filthy civilized water farmers, Alim of the Mutrah.’

The rider’s camel stumbled, snorting in alarm as it caught sight of the massive long neck of the creature half buried by sands in front of the ruins. A drak, one of the great flighted works of imperial sorcery; just the sight of it enough to chase away the shock the nomad felt at this strange devil appearing to conjure his name out of the very gale itself.

‘There will be a large pipeline,’ called the figure, rising and leaping onto the saddle behind the drak’s neck. ‘It will run water all the way from here to the capital. It would be a good thing for the bandits and vagabonds of the dunes to avoid while out raiding.’

‘And why would that be?’ challenged the nomad.

‘Because it would sit badly with me, killing a dog who I still owed a fat purse full of tughra to. Rascals might say that I killed him so I wouldn’t have to repay the debt, and what would that do for a great man’s reputation?’

Alim grunted as the drak powered into the air and disappeared into the twisting wall of dune dust, taking the visitor along with it. So, it is you! Alim started to shake, his grunt transforming into a monstrous shuddering laugh that bounced around the dunes like an artillery barrage. He reached out to scratch the back of the camel’s head reassuringly, then turned it back into the face of the storm. ‘Oh, that’s a good one. Did you mark his sand mask? Jewels and filigree silver filters fit for a sultan. And on a bloody great drak too. Oh yes.’

Alim’s laughter echoed around the roar of the storm, swirling with the wind, until the camel and its rider were swallowed by it.

And then only the desert was left.