Victory of Eagles (15 page)

little of it, and tried to persuade himself perhaps Temeraire had heard, somehow, of the main body of the

Army, and gone there. They might find him in Woolwich waiting—but no, that passed the limits of

optimism. Temeraire was not
waiting,
anywhere, if he knew where Laurence was, and likely even if he

had not the slightest idea. He had crossed half of Africa without the least notion and found Laurence in

the middle of an unfamiliar continent; he would certainly not be discouraged by the need to search all of

Britain if need be, even in the middle of a war; and as like as not get himself hurt thereby.

They flew much-interrupted, stopping at any farm with a herd of moderate size, and at any towns with a

clearing large enough for a courier; but they got no news, or at least none they wanted. “Lost twenty of

my sheep, but not to any dragons; to the French, damn they eyes,” one angry herdsman informed them.

“They are so close?” Laurence said, in dismay; they were yet west of London, much farther than he

would have imagined the French had come even in small parties.

The man spat. “Came through here yesterday, pillaging buggers; begging your pardon sir, but it is enough

to make a saint swear. Three of my best ewes going into their bellies, and a stud, all because of that

lunkhead boy of mine didn’t get them into the hills in time. But there, who thought they would be here so

soon?”

The mayor of Twickenham confirmed the French presence. “We have heard from Richmond they were

dropped in,” he said, “dragon-back, and they have been all up and down this countryside thieving. Our

lads are gone to fight them, north of here; there has been a militia mustered up round Richmond. There

are some dragons with them there, sir; was a courier came here to fetch out our boys, as they had heard

nothing yet of what to do. But of any loose dragons not a thing have I heard. We will be sure and keep

our cattle under cover, though, you may be sure.”

He gave them dinner, very kindly, and waved away Hollin’s offer of payment, if he accepted it for the

goat which went to feed Elsie. The mayor’s wife and oldest girl, a few years out of the schoolroom, ate

with them, and Laurence was occasionally recalled to his manners enough to make some little

conversation, but he was too burdened to be fit company. This fresh intelligence meant they must go

back, at once; the generals must know the French had penetrated this far.

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“There were some eagles, I hear,” the young woman ventured. “Georgie said, afore he went, the boys

from Ham saw two of them.”

That was bad, very bad; two French regiments, and so far from the bulk of Napoleon’s army, that likely

meant a Marshal somewhere in the area. The worst of the Marshals were competent alone; acting as the

hands of their chief they were dangerous as vipers. There was nothing strategic to be won here, in the

west of England, but a great deal of food; food which would keep those French dragons in the air. “Had

they cavalry?” he asked abruptly, raising his head. “I beg your pardon,” he added, realizing belatedly he

had interrupted a conversation which had moved on without him; Hollin and the young lady had been

talking about the places which he saw on his route.

“Oh—I am sorry, sir, I don’t remember Georgie saying so,” she said, abashed at being addressed.

“But I think they do not, Captain,” the mayor said. “They came on foot here, anyway.”

If Napoleon had thrown all his lot onto air power—Laurence was not sure what it might mean. It

disregarded all established wisdom about modern warfare, which held that a properly organized force of

cavalry and infantry together, supported by pepper guns and artillery, could repel virtually any dragon

attack. But no-one had ever heard of a dragon attack of more than fifty dragons before Napoleon’s first

attempt at crossing the Channel in the year five; Laurence remembered their general astonishment at his

managing to bring together a force of a hundred beasts.

He went outside after the meal, and waited politely and dully while Hollin took Miss—the name had

already escaped Laurence—to see Elsie, by her nervous request; the dragon was interested to meet her,

ladies not common company for dragons but for the female captains, who rarely dressed for their natural

station; and Elsie was quite willing to be petted and offered a blancmange the young lady had made,

which she politely licked up from the serving plate in a couple of swipes.

“Why, what a lovely plate,” she said after, with much more enthusiasm, and was visibly sorry to see it

drawn back, as it had a gaily painted border in red and blue with a few small touches of silver. “I have

never seen anything so pretty,” Elsie added, stretching her head to look at it again.

“Why, it is only an old—” the girl said, and then quickly swallowed the rest, and added, “which I have

painted over; I am sure you may have it, if you like it so.”

“Oh,”
Elsie said, and said urgently to Hollin, “Will you keep it for me? And perhaps it might be washed,

and packed away safe?”

This took another half-an-hour to be done to her satisfaction, with much bobbing of heads and

exchanges of compliments on both sides, a happy conversation which went past in a buzz of noise for

Laurence, until at last he made an effort, and forced himself to say abruptly, “Hollin, we had better be

going.”

“Oh,” the girl said. “But, shan’t you wait for him?” She pointed; and they looked to see another dragon

in the sky, coming in their direction.

“A fine thing,” Miller said, “a fine thing. Expected four days ago in camp and I find you here, Captain

Hollin, wandering around where you oughtn’t be, and taking a convicted felon into good society.”

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Hollin flushed and said sharply, “If I have done wrong, Captain Miller, you may be sure I will explain

myself to those as has the right to ask me to account for it. We have been looking for the dragon we was

sent to fetch, seeing as how those fellows in the breeding ground have forgot their duty and gone, and the

beasts all scattered.”

“What?” Miller said, forgetting to be pompous in his alarm. “All of them gone, out of the grounds?

Where have they got to, what have they been eating—”

Miller’s courier beast, Devastatio, was markedly smaller than Elsie, who was big for a Winchester.

Hollin had known better than most new young courier-captains how to see about the proper feeding of a

dragon, and he had already been on friendly terms with most of the herdsmen around the bigger coverts,

a further advantage. Devastatio had landed showily, nearly strutting the last few strides into the clearing,

and having realized too late he was outweighed, was now trying his best to puff out his chest, and

surreptitiously to climb upon a hillock. Elsie eyed him puzzledly, and then offered, “Would you like to see

my plate?”

“Gentlemen,” Laurence said sharply, seeing Miller dragging Hollin through all the narrative of their

search. “We have no time for this. The French have been sighted nearby, and we must go and bring the

intelligence to camp at once.”

“We already know about the French being here, there has been some fighting,” Miller said. “Some bright

militia-officer has raised the countryside and beat them properly over at Wembley, and at Harlesden last

night. That is why we are here: I am carrying a colonel’s commission for him.”

“Oh!” the young lady said, having hung back a little from their conversation. “Have they beat, at

Harlesden? Georgie will have been there—I must go tell Mother—” She half-turned, then turned back

and curtseyed, and then hesitantly raised her hand a little, and Hollin stepping towards her brought it to

his lips, also a little hesitantly, and said, “Your servant, Miss Jemson, and I hope my rounds might bring

me again—”

“I hope so, too,” she said, pink, and having dared so far, turned and fled.

“Sir, if the news is in, and Miller will tell them where we are, we might keep looking—” Hollin said,

turning back, his own cheeks a little ruddy.

“Oh, no; no, thank you, there’ll be none of that,” Miller said. “Your orders is not to be wandering over

all Creation, it is to go and get the dragon and come back; well, if you haven’t got the dragon, you can

do what is left, and that is to come back. If they want you to keep looking, they will tell you so. We will

fly in company, like we ought when there is news like this to be bringing back, in case one of us is

brought down. A hundred dragons out wild, eating people as like as cows? I don’t know what you was

thinking not to return at once, except to save the neck of one as don’t deserve—”

“Captain Miller—” Hollin said.

“Enough,” Laurence said. “I do not intend to be the subject of quarreling in circumstances such as these.

Captain Hollin, we had some rational hope of finding Temeraire quickly, having arrived so shortly after

the dispersal of the breeding grounds; now we can have none. I am very sensible of your generosity, but

will not trespass upon it further. Let us go at once.”

He had steeled himself to it, and now wanted nothing more than to have it over. The quicker he returned,

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the less damage would be done by his having kept them out, selfishly, further contrary to his duty;

success only could have made it forgivable. Even then he ought to have been reproached. Granby was

right, all along. His discipline had been wholly corrupted, Laurence saw now. Perhaps the effects were all

the worse because he had not been brought up properly within the Corps, and had let the sudden liberty

of the service, looser by necessity than the Navy, go to his head completely and become license.

He swung himself up and over onto Elsie, after Hollin had climbed up, and silently strapped himself in,

heavy with self-reproach. He had no attention for their surroundings, or the journey, and let the cold wind

coming in their faces make him dull. Devastatio flung himself ahead far of Elsie, by way of further

self-puffery, which he was able to manage as she was burdened by two instead of one. It was all that

saved them: because of the distance, the Petit Chevalier could not come at them together, and so he bore

down on Devastatio alone in the lead.

The little Winchester squalled and tumbled straight down, blood streaming from his wing and side where

he had been savagely clawed. He managed to right himself with great hissing gulps of breath, puffing out

his sides until his fall slowed enough for him to gain purchase, but he was not flying properly, only able to

limp half-skewed to the ground. Satisfied that he had been grounded, and might be retrieved at leisure,

the Petit Chevalier wheeled about, and turned his attention to Elsie.

The name of the French breed was appropriate only by comparison with the Grand Chevalier; the

heavy-weight coming towards them was some eighteen tons, his claws already stained with Devastatio’s

blood, and he roared threateningly as he came on. Elsie gave a small desperate gasp and dived out of his

way. She twisted nearly upside down to evade, setting Laurence and Hollin both dangling from their

straps, and shot forward with all her might past the great dragon’s belly, rifle-shot from the bellmen

whistling like wasps past their heads.

But she was too weighted down to get her full speed. The Petit Chevalier doubled back on himself and

set in steady pursuit: over distance his strength would tell, and he would have them, if she could not

escape before then. And he was fast enough to keep her in his sights an hour, Laurence judged, looking

down over Elsie’s side to watch the dragon’s shadow flashing by over the ground.

It came chasing after Elsie’s smaller shadow like a racing cloud, pouring up and down the curves of the

hills, darkening slopes and sending deer bounding away through the trees. The outline of the dragon

remained steady as the ground rolled away beneath them with blazing speed, at least twenty-five knots

with the wind howling and tearing at their clothing, no matter how low they crouched against Elsie’s neck.

The Petit Chevalier roared behind them. Laurence could not lift his head up into the wind to look back,

but they were over a broad stretch of farmland, fields in neat snow-powdered squares bordered by

roads, so the dragon-shapes made perfect silhouettes upon white, and as Elsie’s first desperate sprinting

failed, the distance between the two shadows began slowly and inexorably to narrow.

And then, sliding into place behind the Petit Chevalier’s shape, a third shadow joined the line: beginning

first as a small speck and rapidly growing, larger and larger and larger, until at last it swallowed up the

other, and with a dreadful shattering roar a tremendous Regal Copper came thundering down from

above. The enormous red-and-gold beast pounced directly upon the Petit Chevalier, serving him out with

the very trick he had used on Devastatio, and without any restraint bowled him over and down.

The two heavy-weights went tumbling, head-over-heels, snarling and snapping wildly, uncontrolled; a

couple of men went flying wildly off the French dragon’s back, and munitions, bombs, and rifles tumbling

loose towards the countryside. Laurence had no idea how the Regal Copper’s crew were managing, and

then he realized the dragon had no harness at all.

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Elsie was panting as she slowed, curving in a wide arc so they could look back at the titanic struggle.