The Crimson Campaign(The Powder Mage Trilogy)(93)

He hoped that Josep would forgive him.

No sign of ships on the river to the north. Perhaps Ricard had oversold it. Surely the Trading Company merchantmen couldn't sail all the way down the Ad River so quickly?

Yet still he waited. Ricard had not given an estimate of when Lord Claremonte's ships would arrive, and Adamat did not want to miss it. He had no plans, no grand schemes to throw Lord Claremonte from his goals. Adamat could only watch. Something told him that this day would be one to live in his mind forever.

By eleven o'clock, the crowd had thickened to the point that carriages could no longer navigate the streets. Noise filled the air as people shouted among themselves. No one really seemed to know what was going on. Their only information came from the newspaper article that Ricard had run the night before.

There was certainly excitement in the streets, and the police were out in full force. More than one old veteran wore faded Adran blues and sported a fifty-year-old musket on his shoulder. Other men had brought their whole families out and were picnicking on the old city wall. Pastry bakers and meat pie vendors were hawking their snacks to the crowd.

Adamat bought a newspaper from a newsie lad and perused Ricard's front-page article. It was a rousing speech that called the people out to defend their city against the oppressions of foreign invasion and tyranny. Adamat lowered the newspaper to watch a pair of children splashing in the muddy water of the Ad like it was a carnival day.

He flipped through the newspaper while he waited for Claremonte's ships. Unsubstantiated rumors out of Kez that Field Marshal Tamas was still alive. Fresh news from Deliv that an Adran army was besieging one of their cities  –  preposterous.

The slow rise of shouts throughout the throng brought Adamat's nose out of his newspaper.

Ships on the horizon.

They began as white dots slowly creeping down the river and steadily drew closer as the afternoon went on. They were moving at an almost reckless pace, especially for merchantmen navigating a freshwater river. They came on at full sail with the current, the wind at their backs.

It was two o'clock before the ships finally reached Adopest. Adamat had never sailed on an oceangoing vessel and had only been to ocean port cities a handful of times in his life. Most of his knowledge of them came from books, but he could tell the lead vessel was a fourth-rate ship of the line, and he counted twenty-three gun ports on just one side. It seemed to be the biggest of the ships, and it waved the green-and-white-striped flag, in the center of which was a laurel wreath, that was the emblem of the Brudania-Gurla Trading Company.

The ships furled their sails and drifted downriver. Adamat could see sailors rushing about the deck, and Brudanian infantry staring passively back at the crowd awaiting them in Adopest. The gun ports were open.

If Claremonte was invading, his ships could destroy most of the city without even disembarking crews and soldiers.

There was no motion among the longboats. The infantry seemed content to stand on the ships and do nothing, and the sailors were …

Adamat watched them carefully. What was going on? He cursed his limited knowledge of seafaring. Crossbeams were lowered, sails unhooked and stowed, and very soon it dawned on Adamat that they were taking down the mast.

He didn't even know that ships could do that. It made sense, though. While the bridges along the northern Ad had been replaced for the passage of masted ships, the ones in downtown Adopest had not. If Claremonte wanted to get his fleet onto the Adsea, where it would be most effective, he'd have to drop the masts completely, float down the river, and reinstall them on the open water.

Adamat desperately wanted to do something. This immense crowd of people seemed to have no direction. Like him, they simply watched while the masts were lowered. What more could they do? The ships sat at anchor out in the river, and they were heavily armed. It would have taken the Adran army to stop them.

He was surprised at how quickly the masts were removed, and Adamat gave up his seat on the edge of the wall to walk with the ships as the anchors were raised and they headed downriver.

He was even more surprised when the ships weighed anchor once more between the bridges, coming to stop just a half mile from the outlet to the Adsea.
 
 

 

They'd stopped, he noted, next to the towering Kresim Cathedral in the new city.

Adamat descended the old city wall and fought his way through the throng to cross the bridge and head toward the Kresim Cathedral. He cast his gaze toward the ships every so often, but nothing had changed. Still a flurry of activity on board. Still no sign of lowering the longboats or firing the cannons.

Between the Kresim Cathedral and the Ad River was an amphitheater where the Diocels of the Church could address significant crowds. By the time Adamat reached it, the amphitheater was overflowing with people trying to get a better look at the tall ships.

It was a death trap. Adamat cursed everyone inside that amphitheater for their stupidity. Hundreds would die if Claremonte opened up with a single salvo.

Adamat thought he spied a familiar face nearby, and muscled his way toward the river. There was Ricard, surrounded by his assistants and the other union    bosses, Fell at his side.

"Ricard, what the pit is going on?" Adamat demanded.

"No idea," Ricard said. He seemed just as confused as the rest of the crowd, and regarded the ship with caution. "I've got my boys out in force, armed to the teeth with whatever they could find, but if Claremonte opens fire, there's not a damn thing we can do about it. We can only stop him if he tries to come ashore."

"And who would be stupid enough to do that?" Adamat asked.

"Look," one of the union    bosses said, "they're lowering a longboat."

Adamat peered toward the ship. Sailors scurried about the deck, and suddenly a longboat swung out and was lowered into the river. A rope ladder was dropped, and men began to descend onto it.

"Give me a looking glass," Adamat said. Fell handed him hers.

He found the longboat and examined it for a few moments. There were a half-dozen Brudanian soldiers. Some rowers. A few men in top hats.

Adamat stopped and focused on one face in particular.

"He's here," Adamat said. "In the longboat."

"Who?"

"Claremonte."

"How the pit would you know?"

"I saw his likeness once. A small portrait at a Trading Company stock house, back before he rose to be head of the company."

"Let him come, the bastard," Ricard said. "We'll be ready for him."

Claremonte looked anything but worried. He laughed at something one of the rowers said, then clapped a soldier on the back. He was a striking man, with high cheekbones that contrasted with a body grown soft with age and wealth. His eyes were alive and happy, nothing like his late lackey, Lord Vetas.

The longboat rowed away from the ship, Lord Claremonte standing in the bow like a commander leading the invasion of a foreign land.

Which, unless Adamat was completely wrong, was what he was.

But where were his men? Why would he come to land practically alone, into the teeth of a waiting mob who'd been told he was coming to take their homes from them?

The longboat stopped about some distance from the shore and threw down an anchor. Lord Claremonte stood up straight, facing the amphitheater, and spread his hands.

"Citizens of Adopest," he began, a smile on his face, the words booming inhumanly across the river.





CHAPTER




41




Tamas watched from the vantage of an old church tower as rain fell in thick sheets across Alvation.

The early morning was dim and cloudy, and Tamas didn't think that it would get much lighter outside as the day went on. Tamas couldn't even see the Charwood Mountains, though they rose less than a mile from his current position.

An excellent day for his army to sneak up on the city.

A terrible day for a battle.

Powder would be wet, the ground muddy, and with the Kez wearing Adran uniforms, neither side would be able to tell friend from foe.

The street below was full of Kez soldiers moving supplies.

He watched them work with no small amount of trepidation. If he was right, and he feared he was, Nikslaus's last act when he pulled out of the city would be to put it to the torch, slaughtering civilians and leaving enough chaos behind that no one would bother to question who was behind the attack.

The Mountainwatch above Alvation was about twenty-five miles away. Early this morning, Tamas had heard the faint report of cannon fire from that direction. Nikslaus had the Mountainwatch under siege.

It wasn't a strong Mountainwatch. Not a bastion like South Pike; more of a fortified toll road. It wouldn't hold long against two brigades of Kez soldiers.

Tamas had sent Vlora back to the Seventh and Ninth hours ago.

He missed her now. No one to watch his back. The Deliv partisans didn't trust him, so he spent most of his time watching the Kez soldiers  –  watching for patterns, waiting for Nikslaus to make his move. One eye always on the road, on the chance Tamas would see Gavril among the prisoners being forced to do hard labor for the Kez.

Tamas heard a noise in the chapel beneath the tower. The large main door opened and closed again. A moment later, a set of footsteps rang on the stone stairs. Tamas brushed his fingers along the grip of one pistol and then took a powder charge between his fingers. He opened it carefully, only taking the tiniest pinch, and sprinkled the black powder on his tongue.