Chapter 19

Nineteen

Aboom jolted Pip awake, even as her bunk shook so violently that she might have fallen off if she'd been on the top bunk.

One of the other girls gave a shriek as another thunderous boom tore through the night. A window shattered, the glass smashing into the cement and scattering in a tide of sharp, glittering edges. Mak's miniature wooden train tumbled from the shutters to land on the cement floor with a sharp rap.

"What's that? Did the munitions bunker explode?" Across the barracks, one of the secretaries was sitting up, brushing hair out of her face.

Two more explosions erupted, even as shouting poured through the broken window. A bugle call cut through the din, one Pip had only heard during drills to teach all of them on base the meaning of the bugle calls.

Red alert. The signal of an attack.

A darker shadow passed over the window, black and sinister where there should be open sky, lit only by Fort Linder's one searchlight. The moon hadn't yet risen, a thick cloud cover creating a black, starless night.

For a moment, they all froze, too uncomprehending of the shadow, the bugle call. They'd all been living on this army base for weeks—months, in some cases—yet the possibility of war was just a figment of newspapers and hypothetical conversations.

Another boom tore through the night. The pressure of it pounded into Pip's chest so forcefully that she struggled to breathe for a moment. Her ears rang, even as something thunked against the outer cement wall of the barracks.

All she wanted to do was curl into a ball under the flimsy protection of her bunk, wishing with everything in her that she'd never come and instead remained safe at the western rail terminal, oblivious and sheltered.

But Pip forced herself to her feet. She called up her magic and pushed it outward, forming a protective shield around the small huddle of wide-eyed women.

Would her magic be enough? She was strong. Thirteen on the Marion Scale. But would that magical strength be enough in the face of whatever was causing those explosions?

Chelsea—the talkative, flirtatious nurse—clapped her hands together. "All right, ladies. This is what we've trained for. Hurry and get dressed. We need to get to our stations. There will be wounded to care for, orders to take in dictation, telephone calls to get out so that the rest of the kingdom knows what is happening."

Her words galvanized the others, as if being given direction broke the paralysis fear and uncertainty had on them.

Pip leapt to tug on her coveralls, throwing on clothes as quickly as she could while still holding that shield over their heads. The cement floor vibrated beneath their feet as the explosions blended one into the other, almost constant.

As she stuffed her feet into her boots, the laces tucked inside rather than taking the time to tie them, she faced Chelsea. "I'm holding a shield of magic over us at the moment. But…"

Chelsea nodded, a light of understanding in her eyes. "You need to get to the hangar. Get our flyers into the air. We'll be all right."

The words were an empty promise. As soon as they ran into the night, going their separate ways, there was no guarantee that any of them would be all right.

Pip still hesitated, her stomach twisting at the thought of leaving this group of women unprotected. How could she walk away, knowing they would be utterly vulnerable the moment she did?

Chelsea gave her a small push toward the door. "Go."

Pip turned and raced for the door, shrinking her shield so that it protected just herself.

As soon as she opened the door, she was nearly shoved back inside under the wave of noise and smoke and shouts that hurled at her through the night.

Silhouetted in the beam of the searchlight, the black shapes of six airships glided overhead. A brief flare of light came from one, then a faint whistling sound. Seconds later, a flash of orange erupted on the far side of Fort Linder near the river fortifications. The ground, the air, everything shook and heaved under the blast.

Bombs. Those airships were dropping bombs, likely rolling them out of an open cargo door.

As tempted as she was to try to extend her shield farther than just her own head, Pip held the shield in close as she sprinted through the fort, dodging around piles of rubble and other people also racing for their stations. She needed to save her magical strength to shield the hangar, assuming the Mongavarians—she could only assume those were Mongavarian airships overhead—hadn't hit it already.

Fieran bolted uprightat the blast pummeling his ears and chest. He gripped the bedframe as the bunk swayed beneath him. His magic sparked along his fingers, sizzling against his blanket until he yanked his magic back into his chest.

Voices came from the others in the barracks, even as another explosion nearly tumbled Fieran out of the bunk. He swung down, landing on his feet between the bunks, even as he reached for his gun. He already wore a set of fatigues, as army life didn't exactly lend itself to lounging around in pajamas, even for sleep. One never knew when a drill sergeant would wake the unit in the middle of the night for a surprise inspection or ruck march.

Or someone would set off bombs in the middle of the night.

Merrik dropped down next to him, poised and ready, looking to him as if he expected Fieran to give the orders.

Another explosion tore through the night, so close the pressure wave battered the building, popping against Fieran's ears.

Across the room, one of the recruits curled on the floor, whimpering, arms over his head. Others stood around in various states of shock, terror, or a strange sort of calm as they laced up their boots and reached for their guns.

Tiny and Stickyfingers appeared at Fieran's side, joining him and Merrik. Lije and Pretty Face both rolled off their bunks, stuffing their feet into their boots and grabbing their rifles. All of them, from Merrik to Pretty Face, turned to Fieran.

"We need to get to the flyers." Fieran sprinted for the rear door of the barracks, not having to look back to sense the others following at his heels.

As he opened the door, a blast of air hit him with the tang of gunpowder and the acrid scent of burned wood and melted metal. A bugle call rose into the night, piping out the red alert, even as Fieran jumped the stairs, landing lightly on the dirt.

Behind him, the other door to the barracks room banged open, and the drill sergeant barked orders.

Fieran didn't stop. Neither did the others following him. The sergeant was, after all, shouting the others into getting their butts off the floor and into the night to do what they had been trained to do. Fieran was just a little ahead of things there.

Another whistling sound, then a detonation roared into the night, staggering Fieran with the force of the blast that stole his breath for a moment.

Six dark shapes drifted overhead, almost lazy and ethereal in the wash of the searchlight. A brief flare of light opened on the bottom of one, square and orange against the darkness, before it slammed shut again. Seconds later, an explosion erupted, quaking the ground beneath Fieran's boots and ringing loud and painful in Fieran's ears, his hearing more sensitive from his elven heritage.

For a moment, all he could do was stand there, taking in the jets of flame burning against the night, sending up clouds of black smoke. Shouts rose into the darkness. Black shapes of men scurried between the buildings. The crews manning the three-inch guns that guarded the river scrambled to both swivel and crank the guns to their highest elevation to attempt to shoot upward at the attacking airships.

Over the central square of the base, the three flags of Tarenhiel, Escarland, and Kostaria flapped in the light breeze, silhouetted by the fires and wreathed with smoke.

The other flyboys from his barracks streamed around him and his small group, racing toward the hangar at the far side of Fort Linder.

"Fieran." Merrik was suddenly there in front of him, gripping his shoulders hard enough to hurt and giving him a solid shake. "You are a Laesornysh. You have your dacha's magic. Stop gawking and do what your dacha trained you to do."

Right. Fieran sucked in a lungful of smoke and gunpowder, searching for a single moment of calm amid the burning, tearing world all around him. Then he unleashed that tight, mental grip on his magic.

It blazed from his fingers and burst into the sky above him. He let the magic pour from him in a torrent, extending it in a brilliant, crackling dome that covered the entire base.

Something struck the magic from overhead, and he snatched it on instinct, nearly losing his magic grip on it as he felt its size. This bomb was so much larger than any of the artillery shells he and Dacha had practiced with at Fort Charibert.

Fieran growled, hurled his magic at the sky, and heaved the bomb over and away, changing its trajectory enough that it slammed into the open fields that surrounded Fort Linder. It exploded in a spray of dirt and shrapnel that were consumed in the hunger of Fieran's power.

Merrik tugged Fieran's arm, and together they sprinted into the night. The sharp raps of running bootsteps echoed behind them as Pretty Face, Tiny, Stickyfingers, and Lije stuck with them.

Fieran tripped on a block of cement that had been blown out of the wall of the nearest building, and he would have fallen if Merrik hadn't gripped his arm and hauled him onward.

Splitting his focus between his magic and his body's movements was all so much harder in real life than in morning practices with his Dacha. With the airships chucking bombs down onto him, it was all he could do to pay attention to his feet so he didn't take a tumble on the rubble blocking their way.

Another bomb plummeted into his magic, nearly slipping through before he managed to get enough of a grip on it to send it hurtling safely into the ground away from the fort.

Fieran skidded to a brief halt and hurled a spear of his magic upward as far as he could, reaching higher and higher into the sky.

As with his dacha's wall, the magic fizzled out before it reached the airships. While Fieran could—theoretically—stretch his magic for miles with the earth to ground him, he couldn't extend his magic far enough into the empty sky to swat at the attacking airships.

With a growl, Fieran added that magic to his overall shield and kept running.

The hangar was just ahead, huge and hulking in the firelit night. The doors gaped open like black mouths, only a few pinpricks of light showing inside rather than the blaze of the overhead lights.

As they neared, Fieran tasted another, metallic magic filling the air. A few stray bolts of his magic sizzled down from the sky to dance along the shield that arched over the hangar, its edges stopping just below the roof.

"Pip!" Fieran raced inside the hangar, then skidded as he nearly ran face-first into the wheel struts of the flyer the ground crew was wheeling toward the doors.

As the ground crew flung a few curses his way, Fieran scrambled out of the way, then cast about in the near darkness.

Utter chaos reigned. Lit only by the elven lights the mechanics used for shining into dark corners of aeroplane engines, ground crews wheeled the aeroplanes toward the hangar doors, even while others raced about, getting in their way. The men in Fieran's squadron stood about, as if not sure what to do or where to go. A few raced about, each doing their own thing.

In the center of the hangar, Capt. Arfeld cast about, gesturing vaguely with his hands, as if he wasn't any more sure what to do than his men.

This was the weakness of the current Escarlish military, despite their training, their modern weapons, and the structure Uncle Julien had formed in the past seventy years. While the armies of both Kostaria and Tarenhiel had a core of warriors who had fought in the previous wars, no one in the Escarlish military outside of Uncle Julien—thanks to his bond with his longer-lived troll wife Aunt Vriska—had any experience with war. No one at Fort Linder, from the lowliest private to the commanding general, had ever seen combat.

All the training in the world couldn't prepare for the shock of an attack like this.

Merrik and the others clustered around Fieran, waiting for orders.

"Fieran?" Pip appeared at his elbow, her hands spread and laced with her silver magic as she held her shield over the hangar. "What should we do?"

Fieran drew his shoulders straight, trying to think with the part of his brain that wasn't occupied with holding up his own shield over the fort. "I'm protecting the fort at the moment. Drop your shield and save your magic."

Pip nodded, and the metallic taste of her magic winked out. Fieran couldn't see it, but he could sense the tug of it on his magic disappear.

Another bomb—a smaller one, this time—struck his magic. He felt like his mind was stretching in opposite directions, as he tried to wield his magic with part of his mind while thinkingenough to give orders with the rest.

Right now, Fort Linder needed a Laesornysh, and Fieran's dacha wasn't here.

That left only Fieran.

"We need to get in the air." Fieran stared at one of the aeroplanes as it was wheeled past them. What would they need once they were in the sky? How could they take on an airship while in what was essentially an unarmed wooden box with wings, a propeller, and a tail stuck onto it?

"Merrik, Pip, Lije, see what you can do about arming the flyers." Fieran refocused on his friends around him, his stomach churning even as his voice remained almost bizarrely steady. "Pretty Face, start getting the others into aeroplanes. Tiny, grab whatever water you can find to take with you. Stickyfingers, help Tiny."

His friends nodded and scattered.

Fieran lifted his chin and marched toward Capt. Arfeld. Maybe Fieran was about to get himself court-marshaled for insubordination, but someone had to give Capt. Arfeld a good shake.

Fieran halted before the captain and saluted. "Capt. Arfeld, sir."

"Laesornysh." Capt. Arfeld returned his salute with a shaky, sloppy gesture that would have made a true military man cringe. The captain pointed upward. "Is that you?"

"Yes, sir." Fieran braced himself. It was now or never. He might end up in the stockade for this, but the consequences likely wouldn't be too dire, given the protection his high-ranking relatives gave him. "Permission to speak freely, sir?"

Capt. Arfeld's eyes were slightly wide and unfocused. The man had nerves of steel to do what he'd done as a pioneer of aeronautics. But now, facing battle, his lack of military training showed through. "Of course."

"The squadron needs their captain to lead them." Fieran held Capt. Arfeld's eyes, not letting his own panic slip through. "You need to get up there. You've at least flown at night before."

Everyone knew aeroplanes didn't fly at night. Even airships were considered risky to navigate in the dark, and instead often chose to descend into an anchorage for the night rather than risk losing their way. Lacking the instruments and gauges of an airship, aeroplanes were downright dangerous to fly at night. It was pitch black, with nothing to tell up from down. At night, one could fly straight down into the earth and never know it until it was too late. Only a few of the early pilots, like Capt. Arfeld, had flown at night as a stunt.

If only the military and political leadership had listened to Uncle Julien more. Then maybe instead of so much money being poured into building large airships, more energy would have been directed toward designing a flyer capable of taking on an airship. Perhaps someone would have figured out a way to mount a big enough gun or give them gauges to help them fly at night.

After tonight, perhaps the mindset would shift. But it would be too late to save them now.

Yet they had to go up. Never mind the danger. Never mind the fact that their training flyers weren't even armed, unless Pip, Merrik, and Lije could come up with something in the next five minutes. All they could do was take pot shots at the airships with their rifles and pistols.

And they were going to do it anyway. Because their kingdom was under attack, and it was their duty to fight back.

Capt. Arfeld gave himself a shake, his eyes finally sharpening. "What are the limits of your magic? Can you continue to protect the fort once you take off?"

Fieran hesitated, weighing his own capabilities. Despite his training in splitting his attention and magic, flight took too much focus. "No. Once I'm in the air, I won't be able to hold an effective shield over the fort any longer. Pip, one of the mechanics, can create a shield, but I don't know how large her shield is nor how it will hold up under bombardment."

Capt. Arfeld nodded as he absorbed that information. Around them, the chaos of before was slowly being tamed. Pip and Merrik stood next to a flyer, doing something to the side with their magic, while Lije and some of the mechanics hefted guns and ammunition rounds. Pretty Face had organized the other pilots so that each flyer now had a pilot either sitting inside or standing next to it as he hurriedly donned goggles and the leather outer gear.

The captain gestured to the waiting aeroplanes. "Can you shield our flyers as they take off?"

"Yes, sir. At least for most of their run." Fieran paused, not sure how to word this next part without sounding like he was just as dangerous as the airships dropping bombs. "They won't be able to fly through my magic any more than the bombs can penetrate through. I should be able to tell the difference between our flyers and the airships, but this far away and with this much of my magic unleashed, it would be best if I opened a gap in the magic instead."

"Understood." Capt. Arfeld nodded, his jaw set. "And in the air?"

"I can take down the airships." After spending several days on an Escarlish airship, Fieran had no doubts about that. But…Fieran shifted, something inside him twisting into knots. "I don't know how long it will take. I've never used my magic in the air like that. Always on the ground."

And never in a true battle, though he didn't say that out loud. Would he panic? Would he remember his training once he was in the sky? Would he even be able to focus enough to use his magic while also flying an aeroplane? He didn't even have enough solo hours in the cockpit to be fully certified. None of them did.

Capt. Arfeld nodded, his eyes going unfocused again as he weighed the options.

As much as Fieran had taken charge earlier, he was glad to leave this particular situation in the hands of his commanding officer.

If he went up first, he'd have the best chance of anyone to take down the airships. But it would leave the fort vulnerable until he'd taken all the airships down.

If he went up last and protected the fort as long as possible, Capt. Arfeld and the other pilots would be at greater risk trying to face the airships by themselves.

After an agonizing moment, Capt. Arfeld's chin tipped, his shoulders straightening. "You'll take off last. Keep things organized down here in the meantime."

"Yes, sir." Fieran let that weight settle on his shoulders. Orders, finally.

Capt. Arfeld had chosen the option that would protect the fort and the civilian contractors like Pip for as long as possible, putting only the pilots at risk.

With a final glance at Fieran, Capt. Arfeld spun on a heel, shouting orders even as he ran to catch up with the flyers waiting outside, their engines and propellers spinning up.

Fieran mentally peeled back the part of his shield by the end of the airstrip, creating an open space for the flyers to take off without being incinerated. Then he hurried to join Merrik and Pip by a flyer. "How is arming going?"

"As well as could be expected." Pip's mouth twisted with her concentration as she melded a piece of metal to a rifle's action, creating a swivel. "It'll be better than trying to take out an airship with a pistol, but not by much."

Merrik folded the flyer's wooden side over the base of her swivel, affixing the gun to the aeroplane's side. As he finished, he flicked a glance at Fieran. "But guns will not be all that necessary, will they?"

"Probably not. I think I can take out the airships. But Capt. Arfeld has ordered me to go up last so I can protect the fort as long as possible." Fieran gestured upward to indicate his magical shield. "So you'll need to keep the airships busy until I join you."

Merrik nodded as he and Pip moved to the next flyer in line. The pilot scrambled into the aeroplane they'd finished, and the ground crew wheeled it out to join the others spinning up at the end of the airfield. An aeroplane roared down the airstrip, taking off into the night sky, its wings lit by Fieran's blue magic.

Stickyfingers tottered out of the gloom of the rest of the hangar, toting a machine gun that must weigh nearly as much as he did. His grin gleamed almost manically in his eyes. "I'm keeping this bad boy for me. Pip, Merrik, think you can install it on one of the two-seaters? Lije will fly it; I'm going to man this puppy." Stickyfingers patted the machine gun lovingly.

"Sure." Pip's magic elongated a part of a rifle's action to attach it to the flyer, even as Merrik melded his magic with hers to keep the mounting in place. As soon as they finished, that waiting pilot climbed in.

As they turned toward the two-seaters waiting at the rear of the line of flyers, a commotion came from outside. Some of the ground crew were shouting and pointing, even as two more flyers roared into the sky. Someone cursed.

Fieran halted, checking his magical senses. His magical shield was holding. Yet, come to think of it, it had been a few minutes since the Mongavarians had tested the magic with a bomb. Were they leaving? Yet that didn't match with the pointing, cursing, and staring of those gathering by the doors.

Fieran dashed a few steps in that direction, then froze as he took in the view outlined by the broad hangar doors.

One of the airships remained almost directly over the airstrip, as if it poised to pounce on the next flyers that dared launch themselves into the sky. A few biplanes danced around the ship's black bulk and, even as they watched, a burst of flames erupted from one of the flyers as it spiraled toward the river.

But the flight crew weren't watching the falling flyer, the dying pilot. They were pointing at the five airships that had drifted farther upriver, coming to a stop directly over Bridgetown and Calafaren.

Fieran's stomach dropped to his toes, even as he pressed a hand to the hangar's wall to steady himself.

Capt. Arfeld had forgotten one important thing when giving his orders. They all had.

Fort Linder wasn't the only nearby target.