The Firestorm burned south-south-eastward, skirting along the edge of the great western range and following the mighty Crown river. They were currently passing over a large stretch of swirling Aether. Here and there, something massive and serpentine stirred within the shifting, glinting banks of fog, and through the occasional breaks in the fog Adeena could see, where there should have been the wide river, a dizzying, milky-white star field, extending out into infinity. Here and there were cracks in reality, shattered portals that led deeper into the star-like realm. They grew and shrunk, seemingly at random.
Adeena was up on the mid-deck, enjoying the ever warmer Dawning air and watching as the Wyrd passed beneath them. Here and there she spotted ruins of towns and villages poking through the mists, but it had been so very long since she had taken the Elfroad, as the northern path had been known, that she couldn’t really identify any of them from above.
They’d been travelling for two periods, and according to what she’d heard from one of the crew, they were approaching Elfwater, which was the furthest south any Imperium expedition had ever penetrated. They weren’t planning on stopping, which was good because, as far as she understood it, the Aether was one of the worst of the planes to enter during an expedition. It was the realm of dreams and spirits, and although not as bad as the realm of nightmares that was the Unseeming, it was still exceedingly dangerous, with the power to warp the mind, reshape the past, and alter the flow of time. It was better to wait for the Wyrd to shift the area into the Feywilde, Shadowmeere, Elysium, or even Pandemonium than risk an expedition into an area of the wastes aligned with the Aether.
Although, judging by the cloud of volcanic smoke on the horizon that was sweeping in from the western planes, perhaps they would be flying over a section affected Pandemonium aligned land when they reached Elfwater.
She very much hoped that when they got to the southern city of Crowncourt it wasn’t aligned with the sprawling, fiery wastes of her homeland though. She hadn’t set foot on any part of Pandemonium since she’d fled as a girl, although given ‘her people’s’ skill with interplanar transit, she’d had to deal with dozens of its hellish denizens here and there over her many cycles. Demons were ever trying to gain footholds in Ruvera, and con mortals into signing away their souls in exchange for trinkets or boons or powers.
“Hello, Captain!” said Heidi, coming up beside her.
“Hey Heidi,” she said.
“I wanted to ask,” said Heidi. “You don’t call me Private or Hammerschmidt anymore?”
“Two life or death fights together is my usual rule,” said Adeena. “You’ve done well. Better than I expected.”
Heidi beamed.
“Why did you sign up, anyway?” asked Adeena, taking out one of the many cigars she’d bought from all her bonus pay. She snapped her fingers, and used the rekindled warmth in her heart to produce a small jet of golden flame. “I don’t know anything about arteficing, but you seem very good at it – I can’t believe you wouldn’t go far in Althaea.”
Heidi shrugged. “I wanted to go on an adventure,” she said. “I was going to catch a boat from Everhearth and go onto the Shattered Sea, I wasn’t thinking a expedition into the Wyrd… but then I saw your advertisement! A chance to go on an expedition with the Captain Yassin!”
Heidi’s tan cheeks grew red.
“I, um, read all the books about you, growing up,” she said. “You were, um… my hero.”
“Heidi, most of that stuff didn’t happen,” said Adeena.
“Some of it did,” said Heidi defensively. “I mean, I know some of them are fictionalised accounts, but…” The gnome trailed off. “Captain, is that cloud changing course?”
Adeena followed the gnome’s gaze, frowning as she saw the massive volcanic cloud had indeed changed course, and now seemed to be streaming out over the Aether towards them.
“That’s… that doesn’t seem good,” said Adeena.
“Why?” asked Heidi, following Adeena as she made for the stairs leading down into the hold.
“Because Pandemonium has sky-ships,” said Adeena, rushing down the stairs, and past the armoury onto the bridge. “Captain Bloodmoon?”
The bridge was laid out in large semi-circle, with a reinforced door at the back, a slightly raised section near the door with the helm – a traditional wheel arrangement, but with several additional levers, and a lower section filled with various desks and stations and… stuff that Adeena didn’t know the purpose of, and where the Captain was speaking with one of her crew, a tall, young Orcish man who seemed to be the navigator. The entire room was ringed by large panes of glass, giving a stunning view of the land beneath the ship.
“Aye, Captain Yassin?” said Bloodmoon, looking up from some kind of report.
“There, dead starboard, you seen it?” asked Adeena, pointing at the cloud.
“We have,” said the Goblin. “Some kind of sulphurous thunderstorm, we’ll be rising in a few minutes to avoid it.”
“It’s changing direction,” said Adeena. “Looks like it’s intercepting us.”
Bloodmoon frowned and turned towards the cloud, bringing out a telescope and raising it to her eye for a moment. “You’re sure?” she said, putting it down a moment later.
“It has altered trajectory by approximately 14.5 degrees in the past minute,” said Heidi, who had her goggles down and was seemingly reading information from them.
“Could be a Wyrd thing,” said Adeena. “But Pandemonium has sky-ships…”
They weren’t, technically speaking, sky-ships. Pandemonium’s airborn vessels were more like ‘sky-forts,’ and were powered by infernal magic and bound souls rather than the elemental magi-tek of the Imperium. There was probably some reason that they never approached the Wardline, and she’d never heard of any expeditions encountering them before, but there were a lot of expeditions, both Imperium sky-ship based and to the coastal cities with regular ships that had never been heard from again…
“It does? Hmm,” said Bloodmoon, before moving over and grabbing some kind of box with a grill on it that presumably had been used to make the ‘ship-wide announcements’ that were piped through the entire ship – some new-fangled device that the Firestorm had. “Aft, do we have anyone in the rigging?” she said, holding a button for a moment and releasing.
“Negative, Captain,” came the tinny reply.
“Good. Aft, prepare to rise,” she said.
“Aye. Aft ready to rise, Captain.”
Bloodmoon flicked a switch and spoke into the box again. “All hands, prepare for expedited ascent in thirty seconds. Hands on deck, brace.” She put the device away and brought out a brass pocket-watch. “Helm, on my mark, rise to eighteen thousand feet.”
“Aye, Captain,” said the human helmswoman. “Fourteen and a half to Eighteen. Ready to rise.”
The seconds ticked by. “Mark.”
The ship shuddered as it began to ascend at a rapid rate, pushing everything down and making the entire bridge shake, angling a few degrees upward as the engines at the back of the ship combined with however they manipulated the air elemental in the containment chamber at centre of the hold to induce weightlessness to raise the vessel higher into the sky.
The storm crept downward across the large, panoramic windows, and Adeena relaxed for a moment, before it began to move upward.
“It’s following us!” said Heidi, tapping the side of her goggles. “Rising to match our trajectory!”
“Those goggles show how long until it hits?” said Bloodmoon.
“Thirteen point four minutes,” said Heidi.
“And can we outrun it?” said Bloodmoon.
“Not at current speeds,” said Heidi.
“Captain Yassin, you said Pandemonium has sky-ships?” said Bloodmoon. “What do you know about them?”
“Not a whole lot,” said Adeena. “They don’t use the same principles as these ships, I know, and they’re probably a lot tougher – they’re more like floating fortresses than anything else.”
“Top speed? Manoeuvrability? Armaments?” asked Bloodmoon. “Flight ceiling?”
Adeena shrugged. “Sorry, no idea,” she said. “I haven’t seen one in a very long time, and never in combat.”
Bloodmoon swore softly before reaching for her talkie-box. “All hands to battle-stations. Officers to the bridge,” she said, before putting it back in its cradle. “Helm, level off and adjust course to… two fifty-five.”
“Aye Captain, levelling off, course to two fifty-five,” said the helm.
The downward pressure faded, and instead the vista changed as the scene outside shifted, the vessel swinging away from a southward course, and instead began heading westward towards the mountains, where Adeena could see the twisting, cloying darkness that denoted an area of the wastes afflicted by the Shadowmeere.
“Ms. Hammerschmidt, please take those goggles of yours and go aft – I want updates on the farspeaker on the cloud’s position,” said Bloodmoon.
Heidi looked at Adeena, who nodded. She raced off, passing the oncoming Ser Samara, who was followed by a curious looking Aeviexisitrixia, and a moment later Melicende with what seemed to be the ‘Captain’ of the made up ‘mercenary company’ of sea elves who were all priests and priestesses, a man with brown hair streaked with metallic gold pulled back.
“We’ve changed course?” said Aeviexisitrixia brightly, peering out. “Did you see something interesting?”
“Alas, no, my Lady,” said Bloodmoon. “We’ve got some kind of storm following us, Captain Adeena thinks it may be a Pandemonium ‘sky-ship.’ Closing on us, it’s faster than we are. I’ve changed our course towards the mountains, I thought perhaps we might be more manoeuvrable, able to lose them in the peaks, but if not, then when the cloud hits us, we’ll need to rise and cut speed.”
“Oh…” said Aeviexisitrixia, biting her fingernails.
“Pandemonium has sky-ships?” sniffed Melicende. “How does a mercenary Captain know something the Imperium does not?”
“It doesn’t matter how she knows,” said Ser Samara, cutting in. “I trust Captain Adeena’s expertise on the matter. Armaments? Complement?”
“I don’t know – it has been a very long time since I saw one,” said Adeena. “They probably carry a large complement of troops, and demons tend to try and capture their prey. Souls are what they are really after, and souls cannot be taken by force.”
“I see,” said Ser Samara. “In that case, we will have to deal with boarders – we’ll position troops at the two entrances to below, with the majority toward the prow to protect the bridge. My Lady, you should remain here, it will be the most defended area.”
“Oh, um… OK,” said the worried looking dragon.
“What about weak points? Anything the gunnary crews can target?” said the sea-elf ‘captain,’ looking at Adeena.
Despite the fact that he’d been part of a conspiracy to kill her, he seemed genuinely interested in her assessment.
“I’m not familiar with how powerful modern Imperium cannons are,” said Adeena. “But Pandemonium has shields, I’ve no idea how they compare to yours either.”
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“The Firestorm has prototype aether-cannons – cutting edge, a hundred cycles off being rolled out across the fleet,” said Bloodmoon confidently. “We’ll pierce them. What keeps it aloft? An elemental?”
“No,” said Adeena, shaking her head. “Pandemonium magi-tek runs on fundamentally different principles. It’s not even really… magi-tek as such. It’s more brute-force enchanting, and uses ritual circles powered by soul crystals. Mostly.”
She considered for a moment.
“There is also a symbolic component that’s important,” said Adeena. “I’m no warlock, but it needs authority… it will be located on the fortresses’ highest level.”
“Not a warlock, perhaps, but you seem to be something of an expert,” said the sea-elf captain.
Adeena shrugged.
“Then we have our target,” said Bloodmoon. “Focus fire on any kind of obvious tower, or the top level, and repel boarders long enough for our cannons to cut through.”
“I will hold the bridge entrance with Adeena’s company, and three of your priests,” said Ser Samara, addressing Melicende.
“You do not command my people,” said Melicende. “And I should be the one to hold the bridge, protect Lady Aeviexisitrixia.”
“I am her bodyguard,” said Ser Samara.
“And I am more powerful, even you cannot deny that. Are you really willing to jeopardising her safety because of your ego?” said Melicende.
Ser Samara’s jaw flexed. “I will not leave her,” she said. “And we must hold both entrances to below-decks.”
“Then have Captain Adeena’s company hold the other entrance,” said Melicende. “I will even provide some of my people to assist her.”
“And I suppose these ones won’t try and shank me when my back is turned?” said Adeena. “That would be novel.”
“Very droll, half-elf,” said Melicende.
“Sorry, was it two, or three times your people have tried to kill me now?” said Adeena. “I’ve lost count-”
“Guys, no fighting!” said Aeviexisitrixia. “We all need to work together!”
“Of course,” said Melicende, turning to her Captain. “Laurent, pick two of our best to accompany you, and aide the good Captain.”
The sea-elf captain bowed his head. “Yes, High Priestess.”
“I take direction from Ser Samara, not you,” said Adeena, crossing her arms and regarding the sea elf man warily.
“Naturally, you will be in command,” purred Melicende. “As Lady Aeviexisitrixia says, we must all work together.”
“See! It isn’t so hard, is it?” said Aeviexisitrixia.
***
“So, what are your strengths?” asked Adeena, looked over the three sea elves she’d been given to help her hold the aft entrance to the ship’s lower decks – Laurent and a man and a woman who’d been introduced as ‘Anne and Claude.’ They were all wearing plate armour, had pole-axes in their hands, swords at their belts, shields on their backs, and judging by their holy symbols, they were all priests.
“We are all trained in the blade, and can channel the power of Holy Lassia,” said Laurent.
“Then you’ll join me at the front,” said Adeena. “Xavier, you’re on support; Clawdia, I don’t want any projectiles getting near any of us; Heidi, there are demons with wings, I want you to focus on bringing them down. Can you manage that?”
“Yes ma’am,” said Heidi, half-way to making a salute before she remembered that she wasn’t supposed to.
From a purely tactical point of view, she should have had Xavier on the front with her. She knew how he fought, he knew how she fought, and the priests could cast support and offensive spells probably better than they could fight in melee. But she didn’t trust them to be behind her, and she could see by the way that Laurent flicked his eyes at the three spell-casters directly behind him that he wasn’t that happy at the deployment either. Still, he didn’t complain, and they took up position either side of her as the black, rumbling storm began to overtake the ship.
She heard the faint roar of the ship’s engines fade as they decelerated. The familiar smell of brimstone that brought her back to her childhood tickled at her nostrils, and visibility plummeted to next to nothing. She could just about make out the other group, led by Melicende, at the other end of the main deck through the swirling smokey air, but couldn’t see much past that.
Lightning flashed around them, and a stray bolt hit the shields, activating a shimmering honeycomb of energy in a rolling wave that washed over the ship before fading.
They waited, and waited, and waited, until finally, just as Adeena was thinking that maybe it was some very strange and disconcerting phenomenon a towering, rectangular shadow loomed from the gloom.
Sitting atop a large, jagged piece of rock that had clearly been ripped out of the ground with the tower, the ‘sky-ship’ was of a neo-modern Pandemonium design, which had been all the rage when she’d left. Vaguely rectangular, but with one of the corners higher than the others, it was constructed from roughly textured, thick black metal inscribed with demonic runes that pulsed with viridian light. There was a large foyer at the base of it, and a sign that declared this fortress to be part of an infernal house that to a mortal would have sounded like a bunch of hard, jagged syllables, but to Adeena was intelligible as ‘Interplanar Labour Solutions,’ ILS, and whose house words were ‘Sourcing Pandemonium’s Workforce For a Better Tomorrow.’
It was a new house, not one Adeena had heard of, although it was clearly one specialised in raiding – or, to use the ever obtuse Pandemonese, engaging in ‘aggressive workforce recruitment’ of ‘undocumented guest workers’ from both Ruvera and the other planes. It was technically illegal under the United Infernal Houses Charter of Commerce to abduct and violently coerce any being to sign a contract, but Pandemonium ran on ‘technically illegal’ and the appeals process for a coerced contract was so convoluted that no non-demon had any hope of navigating it.
The ILS skyfort dwarfed the Firestorm a dozen times over. Sickly, glowing green lanterns lit up the dozens and dozens of demonic figures on the rooftop, red eyes burning and white teeth flashing in the light as they hefted a veritable cornucopia of weaponry: maces and morningstars and halberds and claymores and spiked chains and more.
The dress, however, was all remarkably uniform, despite the many and varied body-shapes of the dozens of different types of demons on display. Sharply cut black jackets, crisp starched white shirts, bow-ties or cravats, shiny black leather shoes, and either pressed trousers or calf length skirts that was virtually the uniform of the infernal realm. She spotted a particularly daring succubus, who was probably an officer, dressed in a lighter charcoal suit beneath which there was a glint of a breastplate, but for the most part there was very little differentiation.
The succubus in the charcoal suit raised some kind of voice amplification artefact to her mouth, and her words rang out through the air.
“Mortals aboard the unregistered sky-ship,” boomed the demoness’ voice, speaking in Pandemonese, which no one except Adeena, Clawdia, and perhaps the little dragon, understood. “Please be advised that a salvage claim on this vessel has been registered by House ‘Interplanar Labour Solutions,’ and has received preliminary pre-approval under ILS House Charter: chapter 3, section 4, paragraph twelve. As such, you are required to vacate the ship immediately and turn the vessel over to the nearest Interplanar Labour Solutions representative.
“Failure to comply with this legal salvage claim will result in the ILS taking authorised measures to protect its property, as outlined in the ILS House Charter: chapter 3, section 7, paragraph three. We await your surrender within the next few standard minutes. Thank-you for your attention!”
It was nonsense, but exactly the kind of nonsense that demons loved. Pandemonium was, according to demons, a ‘society of laws,’ and ‘a true meritocracy:’ where, rich or poor, immortal or mortal, everyone was free to make contracts, agreed to by both parties and backed up by natural, infernal Law itself. Everything was there in black and white, they said, which was obviously far better than the hated Gods and Godlings of Elysium whose actions were guided by arbitrary, capricious and ever-changing ideals of ‘honour’ and ‘virtue.’
The norms for how actions taken outside of mystically binding contracts were rewarded or punished, however, was much more opaque, and not something evangelising demons tended to play up when describing the ‘wonders’ of their system of economics and, something that was regarded as very much secondary and not that important, ‘governance.’
There were many Houses, the largest and most wealthy of which created various bodies of ‘regulations’ that in theory worked as a code of behaviour for actions and conduct not regulated by the binding contracts, even outside the House. These could, theoretically, be enforced in the House Courts. But those were exorbitantly complicated, expensive, and the words ‘conflict of interest’ were not in the Pandemonese dictionary – with the executives of the Houses ruling whatever way favoured their interests.
But they loved how offical everything sounded, so the fact that the regulations they had invoked had never been seen by Adeena or anyone else, let alone agreed to by them, was utterly irrelevant. The important thing was that the succubus would be able to say that she had followed all the relevant regulations, and that they had acted ‘totally legally’ in their attack on the Imperium’s sky-ship.
The Firestorm’s response was a volley from the dozen turreted cannons on the port side, which opened fire, releasing blasts of pulsing blue energy that shot between the two vessels. Lurid green shields flashed into being in front of the demonic ship, but Adeena noted that at least part of every shot broke through, blasting and scorching and ripping at the stone and metal facade and lacerating several of the arrayed demons.
The demons responded with catapults and trebuchets armed with burning green ammunition which smashed into the Firestorm’s shields, making the ship shake and tip a few degrees before it righted itself, but failing to breach the powerful defences.
The draconic shields, however, did nothing to stop the wave of winged demons as they took flight from the battlements and streaked towards the ship, passing straight through the barriers.
They were wild and varied, some hulking pit fiends with their massive arms and reptilian faces; arachnoids with their spider-like heads atop humanoid bodies with lanky, scrawny limbs connected by membranes; a bloated plague demon whose suit could barely contained its pulsing, undulating, pustulent flesh; and commanded by the succubus wearing the charcoal suit, and who also wielded a large fiery battleaxe.
Behind her Heidi and Xavier opened fire, and one of the demons screamed as a shard of ice tore it from the sky and another lost a wing as a beam of starlight that severed it from its body, plummeting from view a moment later. Across the deck there was a surge of magic, and an entire platoon of demons was swept from the sky as Melicende waved her golden trident in an arc and a tidal wave of water surged into existence.
But then the first of the demons landed, and Adeena’s attention was drawn by a hulking pit fiend with a viciously spiked mace. Adeena’s blade blazed with golden fire as she stepped forward to meet them, dancing to the side to avoid their overhead swing that bit deep into the decking and then slashing at the demon’s hand.
The demon shrieked in pain as the golden fire burned at them, and they jerked back, leaving the mace. Power surged through Adeena’s arm as she grabbed the demon’s massive weapon and span, heaving it up and around before releasing it at the demon. It struck them in the stomach and sent them flying back through the gunwale and then out of view.
Two more demons raced to meet her, an arachnoid and another pit fiend. Adeena swiped her hand to the side, and the arachnoid’s smaller body jerked to follow it under her rekindled, growing power. Their many limbs tangled up the pit-fiends’ legs and sent them both slamming to the ground. A lance of divine light shot past her a moment later, close enough that Adeena hissed and jerked away. The beam struck the pair, and they both screamed as the holy light burned at them.
“Why are there so many priests on this stupid ship!?” shouted the succubus in the charcoal suit, hefting her axe.
She was a little taller and had skin a few shades lighter and whiter than Adeena, along with large, swept back horns, batlike wings, and the same kind of black, arrow-headed tail that Adeena kept behind a glamour and had gotten very good at not using in ways that might cause the illusion to break.
Still muttering to herself the succubus swiped her axe towards Adeena and released a crescent of fire. Adeena didn’t bother shielding, and used it to cover her charge, emerging from the flames to the surprise of the demoness, who didn’t manage to avoid Adeena’s stab. Her blade cut into the demonesses’ suit, and a good two inches into her breastplate above her right heart.
Unfortunately, like Adeena, full-blooded succubi had two hearts, and all the sizzling blade did was annoy the woman, who forced Adeena back with a vicious swipe of her axe. Unlike the other demons, who had clearly been poorly trained, the succubus was very skilled with her weapon, and as a full-blooded demon, very strong. What was more, she could use magic, so when Xavier tried to blast her with a jet of starlight he nearly got his head blown off when she conjured a shimmering shield to reflect it back at him.
Down the decking Melicende was doing a little better, her powerful divine magics keeping the horde of demons at bay. Still her people looked tired, and they had a few injuries, and more demons were arriving every minute.
Sweating, Adeena unleashed a blast of force at the demoness to create some space and stole a glance at the demons’ flying fortress. It was battered and scarred from where the Firestorm’s cannons had over-penetrated the shields, but the flight ritual showed no signs of being disrupted, and more demons were landing on the Firestorm’s deck every moment. What was more, some of the demon’s artillery strikes seemed to be penetrating their shields now, and sections of the decking were ablaze with green flame from not-entirely blocked shots.
This was a losing strategy, they needed to find something else or they were going to be overwhelmed by the demons or perhaps destroyed when the Firestorm’s shield’s failed.
Her distraction nearly cost Adeena her head as the succubus came back with a horizontal axe-swing. She parried and kicked the demon, driving her back again.
“Clawdia!” shouted Adeena. “Do you remember Highrose?”
“Meow! Of course we do,” said Clawdia, flicking a claw to release a barrage of soapy bubbles that coated a section of the decking and sent a bunch of demons trying to flank them toppling to the ground.
“Strong as you can then!” said Adeena.
“You can’t be serious Captain,” said Xavier, grimacing as he healed a hit he’d taken to a shoulder.
“Just make sure they actually pick me up,” said Adeena, blocking a strike and then disengaging. “Xavier, you’re in charge, and cover me!”
The succubus saw what they were doing, and conjured another shield that absorbed Xavier’s wisely chosen non-reflectable cutting wind spell. Adeena took the opportunity and bolted sideways, rushing towards the gunwale as behind her a deep, cherry red glow built. She launched herself off the side of the ship and out into space, conjuring the strongest shield behind her she could manage, making it flatter and angling it slightly more downwards than she normally would.
Adeena had fought alongside Clawdia and Xavier for a long time, and was immortal, which meant that she had tried a whole host of very stupid tactics and manoeuvres with them. ‘Highrose’ had been a city in the Old World, and had had a famously impenetrable fortress. Shortly after the successful Huxbridge revolt, and shortly before the coming of the Wyrd, the Republic had laid siege to it, and Adeena’s company had fought alongside the Army of Freemen.
This was before sky-ships had even been conceived of, the walls were too well shielded to break with artillery, and all attempts at siege towers and ladders had been repulsed. What they were not protected against, however, was Adeena being launched like a blast from a cannon over the back of the castle in the middle of the night, sneaking into the gatehouse, and letting down the drawbridge.
There was a roar as from behind her the largest and most explosive fireball Clawdia could manage was hurled straight at her.
A wave of heat rolled over her as the flames spilled past her shield, and her barrier screamed and cracked, but didn’t entirely collapse as the explosive force sent her rocketing forward, across the gap between the two ships, passing through the flickering viridian shields, and managing, with a few meters to spare, to land on the enemy ship in what she hoped wasn’t the worst idea she had ever had.
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