Free Aethosphere Chronicles: Winds of Duty by Jeremiah D. Schmidt Page A

in shock at the Chimera’s glimmering core poking out from the airbladder
overhead. Then a tide of men came washing out around him like a
stirred up nest of ants. He shoved his prone attacker aside and
climbed back to his feet to avoid the worst of it, when he spotted
Captain Moore up on the quarterdeck. He was moving in Bar’s
direction, backwards down the ladder to the main deck, while his
marine guard formed a protective wall, holding back the angry mob
with swinging rifles. A second wave of Glenfinners appeared after
that, swarming in from the portside outdeck.
    All semblance of cohesion toppled after
that, mixing into a chaotic maelstrom of intra-kingdom warfare. Bar
tried to find an oasis near the rails, but the turbulent crowds
swept him up and forced him deeper to the fight. That’s when Moore
rose up as a pillar of rage at the main deck’s center, just below
the core, with a crashing wave of snarling Finnies converged
towards him, and all of them wrapped in atmium blue. Then the
captain’s gun appeared—instantly belching fire and smoke, but that
only spurred the mob to greater violence, and suddenly the ship’s
master fell beneath the tide.
    Pushing through flailing bodies, Bazzon
reached the site where Moore had last stood and found it empty.
Only a pool of smeared blood remained, and a greasy drag-mark that
led to the starboard railing. He searched the melee for any sign of
the captain, but Bar easily speculated what had probably happened.
The loathed master of the Chimera , no doubt, had been
pitched over the side and into the embrace of the Shrouded
Abyss.
    Cecil appeared after that with his fists
smeared in blood and a savage grin worn across his face. “Us
Kinglanders are making for the bridge, sir, we’re banding together
to retake this ship from this Finny uprising. Godsdamn snowploggering traitors! By the gods, we’ll put them right
back in their place!”
    “This is ridiculous,” roared Bar, pushing
the man out of his way, “This ain’t the Kingdoms War…this is just
self-inflicted lunacy rung out by fear and fueled by this violence!
We’ve got to calm the men, Temberly… So stand down!”
    But the truth was the Unity was fractured,
the strains of war had seen to that. Whatever fragile bond glued
the shattered pieces of the kingdoms back together after the civil
war was crumbling away. Island loyalty once again rose to trump
loyalty to the crown. Bar was a fool to think otherwise. Each man
tasted the end of the UKA in the gunpowder billowing from the Iron
Empire’s guns, in the constant stream of reports proclaiming the
Empire was drawing nearer and nearer, in the rumors of abandonment.
So why follow Kinglanders or Finnies when each cared nothing for
the other? Why follow either of those bitter rivals when the
Unified Kingdoms was near defeat anyway?
    “And you call yourself a Kinglander?” spat
Cecil in disgust before disappearing back into the battle.
    “That’s an order!” Bar called after him
impotently.
    Rat-tat-tat-tat. Glass and wood
rained down on the crowds. Rat-tat-tat-tat. The combatants
ceased their fighting and shuffled in unison back towards the
forecastle at the bow. Bar turned a wild eye up to the bridge where
Stowe appeared, standing alone on the quarterdeck with his smoking
clatterbolt pointing down into the hesitant crowds. Somehow the
master-at-arms had survived the airbladder, but his face was a
bloodied mess because of it. His nose looked to be bashed to a
pulp, and one eye hung swollen shut. The sagging walrus mustache
dripped blood along the hanging ends, and yet his one good eye
gleamed with that indelible malice he was so infamous for. And he
levelled his weapon on the crew to prove it.
    “Stowe!” bellowed Bar Bazzon, “Turn away
your gun! We need to take this opportunity to restore order now!”
But the master-at-arms just locked his one good eye on the
subordinate officer; on a man who only minutes ago was his
prisoner; and when their eyes