dose of pepper back in the battle of the Glorious First.’
‘I see her. Mr. Harley, pass the word to all the lookouts. Temeraire,’ he called, bringing up the speaking trumpet, ‘do you see the Flamme-de-Gloire? She is the one low and to the right, with the missing talon; she is weak in the right eye.’
‘I see her,’ Temeraire said eagerly, turning his head just slightly. ‘Are we to attack her?’
‘Our first duty is to keep her fire away from the Navy’s ships; have an eye on her as best you can,’ Laurence said, and Temeraire bobbed his head once in quick answer, straightening out again.
He tucked away the glass in the small pouch hooked onto the harness: no more need for it, very soon. ‘You had better get below, John,’ Laurence said. ‘I expect they will try a boarding with a few of those light fellows on their edges.’
All this while they had been rapidly closing the distance: suddenly there was no more time, and the French were wheeling about in perfect unison, not one dragon falling out of formation, graceful as a flock of birds. A low whistle came behind him; admittedly it was an impressive sight, but Laurence frowned though his own heart was speeding involuntarily. ‘Belay that noise.’
One of the Papillons was directly ahead of them, jaws spreading wide as if to breathe flames it could not produce; Laurence felt an odd, detached amusement to see a dragon play-acting. Temeraire could not roar from his position in the rear, not with Messoria and Lily both in the way, but he did not duck away at all; instead he raised his claws, and as the two formations swept together and intermingled, he and the Papillon pulled up and collided with a force that jarred all of their crews loose.
Laurence grappled for the harness and got his feet back underneath him. ‘Clap on there, Allen,’ he said, reaching; the boy was dangling by his carabiner straps with his arms and legs waving about wildly like an overturned tortoise. Allen managed to get himself braced and clung, his face pale and shading to green; like the other lookouts, he was only a new ensign, barely twelve years old, and he had not quite learned to manage himself aboard during the stops and starts of battle.
Temeraire was clawing and biting, his wings beating madly as he tried to keep hold of the Papillon: the French dragon was lighter-weight, and plainly all he now wanted was to get free and back to his formation. ‘Hold position,’ Laurence shouted: more important to keep the formation together for the moment. Temeraire reluctantly let the Papillon go and levelled out.
Below, distantly, came the first sound of cannon-fire: bow-chasers on the British ships, hoping to knock away some of the French merchantmen’s spars with a lucky shot or two. Not likely, but it would put the men in the right frame of mind. A steady rattle and clang behind him as the riflemen reloaded; all the harness he could see looked still in good order; no sign of dripping blood, and Temeraire was flying well. No time to ask how he was; they were coming about, Lily taking them straight for the enemy formation again.
But this time the French offered no resistance: instead the dragons scattered; wildly, Laurence thought at first, then he perceived how well they had distributed themselves around. Four of the smaller dragons darted upwards; the rest dropped perhaps a hundred feet in height, and Accendare was once again hard to tell from the decoys.
No clear target anymore, and with the dragons above the formation itself was dangerously vulnerable: engage the enemy more closely went up the yard on Lily’s back, signalling that they might disperse and fight separately. Temeraire could read the flags as well as any signal-officer: he instantly dived for the decoy with bleeding scratches, a little too eager to complete his own handiwork. ‘No, Temeraire,’ Laurence called, meaning to direct him after Accendare herself, but too late: two of the smaller dragons, both of the common Pêcheur-Rayé breed, were coming at them from either side.
‘Prepare to repel boarders,’ Lieutenant Ferris, captain of the topmen, shouted from behind him. Two of the sturdiest midwingmen took up stations just behind Laurence’s position; he glanced over his shoulder at them, his mouth tightening: it still rankled him to be so shielded, too much like cowardly hiding behind others; but no dragon would fight with a sword laid at its captain’s throat, and so he had to bear it.
Temeraire contented himself with one more slash across the fleeing decoy’s shoulders and writhed away, almost doubling back on himself. The pursuers overshot and had to turn back: a clear gain of a minute, worth more than gold at present. Laurence cast an eye over the field: the quick light-combat dragons were dashing about to fend off the British dragons, but the larger ones were forming back into a cluster and keeping pace with their convoy.
A powder-flash below caught his eye; an instant later came the thin whistling of a pepper-ball, flying up from the French ships. Another of their formation members, Immortalis, had dived just a hair too low in pursuit of one of the other dragons. Fortunately their aim was off: the ball struck his shoulder instead of his face, and the best part of the pepper scattered down harmlessly into the sea; even the remainder was enough to set the poor fellow sneezing, blowing himself ten lengths back at a time.
‘Digby, cast and mark that height,’ Laurence said; it was the starboard forward lookout’s duty to warn when they entered the range of the guns below.
Digby took the small round-shot, bored through and tied to the height-line, and tossed it over Temeraire’s shoulder, the thin silk cord paying out with the knotted marks for every fifty yards flying through his fingers. ‘Six at the mark, seventeen at the water,’ he said, counting from Immortalis’s height, and cut the cord. ‘Range five hundred fifty yards on the pepper guns, sir.’ He was already whipping the cord through another ball, to be ready when the next measure should be called for.
A shorter range than usual; were they holding back, trying to tempt the more dangerous dragons lower, or was the wind checking their shot? ‘Keep to six hundred yards’ elevation, Temeraire,’ Laurence called; best to be cautious for the moment.
‘Sir, lead signal to us, fall in on left flank Maximus,’ Turner said.
No immediate way to get over to him: the two Pêcheurs were back, trying to flank Temeraire and get men aboard, although they were flying somewhat strangely, not in a straight line. ‘What are they about?’ Martin said, and the question answered itself readily in Laurence’s mind.
‘They fear giving him a target for his roar,’ Laurence said, making it loud for Temeraire’s benefit. Temeraire snorted in disdain, abruptly halted in mid-air and whipped himself about, hovering to face the pair with his ruff standing high: the smaller dragons, clearly alarmed by the presentation, backwinged out of instinct, giving them room.
‘Hah!’ Temeraire stopped and hovered, pleased with himself at seeing the others so afraid of his prowess; Laurence had to tug on the harness to draw his attention around to the signal, which he had not yet seen. ‘Oh, I see!’ he said, and dashed forward to take up position to Maximus’s left; Lily was already on his right.
Harcourt’s intention was clear. ‘All hands low,’ Laurence said, and crouched against Temeraire’s neck even as he gave the order. Instantly they were in place, Berkley sent Maximus ahead at the big dragon’s top speed, right at the clustered French dragons.
Temeraire was swelling with breath, his ruff coming up; they were going so quickly the wind was beating tears from Laurence’s eyes, but he could see Lily’s head drawing back in similar preparation. Maximus put his head down and drove straight into the French dragons, simply bulling through their ranks with his enormous advantage in weight: the dragons fell off to his either side, only to meet Temeraire roaring and Lily spraying her corrosive acid.
Shrieks of pain in their wake,
