Read Gravedigger 01 - Sea Of Ghosts Online
Authors: Alan Campbell
One wonders if it is possible for enough knots of super-compressed Space to gather together and thus provide an overwhelmingly powerful force of attraction? Such an object would become progressively larger as it sucked more and more of the cosmos into itself – stabilizing only when it reached a point of true invariance.
Is it possible to release the energy within these knots – within the heart of matter itself? The sudden expansion of Space must surely be absorbed by the particles around it, radiating outwards over time until equilibrium is achieved once more. If this assumption is correct, then these radiation waves created by the birth of the universe itself must still be detectable. Indeed, the universe must continue to expand wherever knots of super-compressed Space are split apart. To an observer at any point of expansion, it would seem that that point was itself the heart of the cosmos. Ultimately, variance might only exist between a few massive knots of ultra-compressed Space. Space will thin as the universe dies. But as long as a trace of variance remains between the last dark leviathans, then a breath of Space remains. Like massive ships sailing a vaporous and ever-diminishing sea, it is not inconceivable to imagine a collision between them. Were such a collision to occur, these ships might break apart, spilling their holds and thus creating a new sea through which the remaining vessels might continue to sail.
Maskelyne set down his pen and rubbed his temples. He was making too many assumptions, sailing down too many channels without stopping to look around him. How did any of this account for the electrical fluids used by the Unmer? Were they merely the propagation of variance? And what about the expansion of heated gas? Did adding energy to a system expand Space only when there
was
Space to expand? He lacked any mechanism aboard this vessel with which to test his theories. Such sorcery belonged only to the Unmer.
He gazed out of the window at the setting sun, marvelling at the ferocity of its fires, which now turned the sky and sea to blood. It was just one of countless stars in a cosmos he could not understand. The universe was so vast and unknowable, so far beyond imagination. Had the Unmer even fully understood what they were doing?
Lucille didn’t come to bed that night. Maskelyne lay in his bed and could not sleep. Whenever he closed his eyes he saw Unmer warships in a harbour that no longer existed. The old wooden ship pitched and growled, as gales whipped rags of spume from the Mare Lux and flung them against the cabin windows. It was growing cold.
At some point he must have slept, because he woke in the dark before dawn, gasping and terrified, certain that someone had placed the Unmer spectacles over his eyes. He could not shake the feeling that someone had been watching him.
Had he been dreaming?
He recalled something . . .
Adrift in the vacuum, spheres of starlight expanding into dead
vacuum.
He had dreamed of an explosion in the darkness, a great fuming bubble of energy, its edges uncertain. It grew larger than imagination. He realized that the particles of light were separating as they flew apart, leaving waves of energy in their wake, leaving variance. There could be no space between them because it had not yet been created. Space and Time existed only in the great froth of energy they left behind. The shortest distance between different particles was a wave. Space itself was merely the potential between any two points. He saw the universe as ripples of energy expanding across a pond and bouncing back, but the pond did not really exist, only the ripples.
The dull glow of morning shone through the windows. Maskelyne sat up and shivered. He must have fallen asleep again. He got up and got dressed and then took a long draught of water from his personal supply. Then he glanced at his journal.
At the bottom of the page he spotted a paragraph that he didn’t recognize. He sat down slowly, and picked up the journal. The passage was undoubtedly written in his handwriting, but he had no recollection of ever doing so. It was a riddle.
Two brothers were separated at birth. They lived in the same house, and often spoke to one another at the supper table, although they never met. Each married the same two women, who bore them the same two sons. The world perceived them as mad, and yet they themselves perceived the world as quite normal. What quality did the brothers lack?
Maskelyne felt queasy and woolly-headed, as though the lenses had given him a hangover. Was he now writing things in his sleep? How on earth had Ianthe managed to wear them for so long?
He called for Kitchener to inquire about their progress and was told that the stocks had been built and bolted to the midships deck. Maskelyne instructed him to assemble the crew. He did not ask about his wife. He did not want to know where she was.
He went back to his journal.
My experiences with the lenses lead me to believe that Unmer sorcery is concerned with variance. If our universe is an expanding sea of variance, and if it does indeed conglomerate in places to form knots of ultra-compressed Space, thinning the remaining cosmos, then might our universe be only one of such spatial reactions? Should invariance not exist between separate universes, even if it is nothing more than a slender thread? Have the Unmer found one or more of these threads? Are they somehow able to manipulate them, to transfer energy and matter between them? Is there a network, a series of hidden tunnels that reach beyond our own universe?
One wonders if a map of such paths exists. Is this the object I have been looking for? Is this what the deranged Drowned wish me to find? A human man with knowledge of such pathways could wield the same terrifying powers as the Unmer, while remaining immune to the Haurstaf.
Compared to Unmer sorcery, the Haurstaf’s mental powers seem crude and simple. And yet they are devastatingly effective. If the Unmer are the wizards of a thousand wavelengths, the Haurstaf are the masters of one. That the latter should have so much power over the minds of the former cannot be a coincidence. The Unmer have disturbed the natural order of the cosmos, and the cosmos has reacted to restore equilibrium.
It occurs to me that the Unmer, so used to wandering the halls of infinity, perhaps perceive this tiny world with indifference. And yet, for Jontney’s sake, I cannot afford to do the same.
Ianthe had been secured in the stocks. The men stood around in silence. Maskelyne closed the sterncastle hatch behind him and walked over. Ianthe was staring absently at the deck, breathing heavily. He looked around for Lucille, but she was nowhere in sight.
‘Strip her,’ he said to Mellor.
The first officer nodded.
‘Wait.’
Maskelyne turned to see his wife, now pushing through the crowd of men. She was carrying Jontney in her arms.
‘I thought your son could learn something from this,’ she said.
Maskelyne just glared at her.
‘He ought to know what sort of man his father is.’
‘Take him inside,’ Maskelyne said.
Lucille didn’t move.
‘Take him inside!’
She stared at him defiantly. Jontney began to cry, his sobs the only human sound upon that deck.
Maskelyne was losing respect with every passing moment. He couldn’t allow himself to be humiliated like this, not now – when their very survival depended on it. Lucille was forcing him into a situation where he’d have to hurt her to protect her. Didn’t she realize how self-destructive her actions were? And then in a flash of inspiration he saw the truth. She
wanted
to push him. She wanted him to hurt her. Nothing else made sense. She was trying to help him. He was almost overwhelmed with a feeling of love for her.
‘Mellor,’ he said breathlessly, ‘Take my son inside.’
The first officer hesitated for a heartbeat, then stepped towards Lucille.
‘No,’ she said.
Mellor reached for the boy.
Jontney shrieked.
Lucille turned away, but Mellor already had a grip of the child’s jumper.
‘Don’t,’ she said.
She tried to get away. Mellor scuffled with her, trying to pull the child free from her arms. She struck out at him repeatedly with her free hand, scratching his face, but Mellor did not retaliate. Jontney howled.
And suddenly Mellor had the boy in his arms. He broke away, walking swiftly towards the sterncastle.
Lucille was sobbing now. ‘Don’t do this, Ethan, please. I know you think you have to, but you don’t.’
She was playing her part perfectly. At that moment this poor sobbing wretch of a woman looked more beautiful to him than ever before. His heart swelled with love. He made a fist and swung it at her head, punching her across the temple. She staggered but didn’t fall, and then looked up at him with wide, stunned eyes. He smiled and hit her again, much harder.
This time she went down. She clamped a hand to her nose and it came away bloody.
‘You coward!’ she cried.
He kicked her in the chest, and heard her gasp. He felt the weight of her body move against his boot. She began to wail. Snot and blood bubbled from her nose. She beat the palms of her hands against the rolling deck. ‘You’re a coward, Ethan,’ she said again. ‘That’s why you do these things. You’re afraid of your men, of me, of everyone you’ve ever met. You’re afraid because you don’t understand them. All these foolish
theories
you make up to justify everything . . . the truth is, you’re just a coward.’
Maskelyne recognized every word she spoke for the sacrifice that it was. She was trying to make it easier for him to punish her. The thought made his heart shudder with pain and love. Each blow he administered hurt him more than it hurt her. He wanted to pick her up and carry her away, and yet by doing so he would be betraying her. He wavered for an instant. He didn’t know if he could match her courage.
She spat at him.
He was about to respond when he heard Mellor shouting. ‘Ships to port.’
The first officer stood by the sterncastle hatch, gazing out to sea. Maskelyne realized that every man of the crew was looking in the same direction or moving to the port side to get a better view.
‘Men-o’-war,’ someone shouted. ‘Two of them.’
Maskelyne could see them now: two old, Irillian tall ships, their hulls clad in red dragon scale. They were three-masted, with foretops on their bowsprits and silver cutwaters. The fire-power from any one vessel’s triple gun decks would be enough to reduce the Unmer icebreaker to toothpicks. They were running near to full sail, despite the gales, and they were headed this way.
‘It’s the Haurstaf,’ Ianthe said.
CHAPTER 13
Granger had been standing at the wheel for most of the night, and yet he hadn’t spotted the lights he’d been hoping to see. Dawn had come and gone, and still nothing. He was red-eyed and edgy with exhaustion, but nothing could tempt him to sleep now. The Whispering Valley lay nor’-nor’-west of Scythe Island, and Briana Marks’s vessel,
Irillian Herald
, had been steaming out of Ethugra in that general direction when he’d had last seen it, which meant that it seemed likely the Haurstaf witch had received some intelligence about Ianthe’s position. Granger’s detour to Scythe Island had cost him valuable time. Now he wasn’t just chasing Maskelyne, but Marks herself.
There were two sextants and two chronometers on the bridge. An elaborate gold- and platinum-plated sextant sat in a special mount on the navigation console beside a matching chronograph. Both bore the Imperial seal along with the engraving:
Excelsior, His Majesty Emperor Jilak Hu
. But Granger found an old brass Valcinder-made set of instruments in a metal box behind the pipe-housing hatch. He took noon sight with these latter devices. From the worn look of them, this particular set had been much favoured by the
Excelsior
’s own navigator.
Granger located the almanacs, sight tables and charts in a drawer under the console. He calculated his position. He drew a pencil line across the map, stared at it and then rechecked his figures. The
Excelsior
had covered more distance than he would have believed possible. At this rate of knots he certainly faced no danger from the pursuing Ethugran fleet. Furthermore, he would reach the Whispering Valley in another six days, half the time it would have taken Maskelyne in his heavy dredger. But was he moving fast enough to overtake the
Herald?
Just how many ships would he encounter?
And how could he hope to meet them in battle?
Granger leaned back against the navigation console, thinking. He couldn’t ram another vessel. The dragon-hunter’s sleek, lightweight hull would not fare well against an iron dredger or a scale-plated man-o’-war. If he encountered his enemy at night, he might try a drift-and-jump or even a raft flank in order to board the other ship unseen. But then Maskelyne and Banks both maintained full crews, while Granger was alone. The
Excelsior
had enough broadside to represent a serious threat, but he couldn’t effectively man her cannons single-handedly. That was the root of his problem. Hu’s imperial yacht had not been designed to be sailed by a single man. She required forty-eight men on her gun deck to operate her cannons alone, with another twenty or so to carry up powder and shot.