Aethosphere Chronicles: Winds of Duty (5 page)

“Mr. Bazzon, please, take a seat,”
eventually offered the captain with a polite gesture, before
bothering to glance up through the trimmed hairs of his wooly gray
eyebrows. After Bar seated himself, Moore leaned back and folded
his hands over his round belly, seeming to take in the young ensign
as he scratched at the stubble shadowing his cheeks. After a moment
in thought, he gave the guards a single nod that sent them from the
room. “Quite an interesting day,” remarked Moore as the door latch
closed with a click. Somehow the captain’s perfume seemed to
intensify.

Bar responded with a nod, not sure his voice
could work in the captain’s suffocating scent.

“I’ve been looking over your record here and
I was very impressed to see that you were only recently promoted to
the rank of ensign. Even more impressive considering you’re not of
noble birth, or even from an affluent merchant family for that
matter. You must excuse me for being so blunt, but a common born
obtaining the rank of a commissioned officer is
highly
unusual. You must have impressed our esteemed former captain,
Bernard Lockney…though in truth, I find the man more trouble than
he’s worth…and the worth of his family held in higher esteem than
is perhaps warranted, but such is the way of the principalities
outside King’s Isle these days, I suppose.”

“On that, I have only your word to go on,
sir.” Bristling, Bar had found his voice, but he could taste the
captain on his tongue now, and it made him feel ill. “I assure you
the rank was earned. I’ve been aboard for nearly two decades now,
and I’ve striven to perform my duty to the best of my abilities
over the course of that time.”

“Some of the men on this ship have been
skyman for twice that without such a notable promotion…as it should
be; after all, this is the Royal Air Navy and not some Pantheon
charity institution. We have social rank for a reason. So for one
such as you, to go from skyman to ensign, is quite a leap indeed. I
can only assume you must be something
special
.”

“Nay, sir, just a flyer who knows how to
obey orders.”

“
Hmm
, ‘obey orders’,” pondered Moore
aloud. His tone seemed to suggest the opposite of pleased. “At
times like this that’s exactly what we need. You know I’m something
of a stickler for orders myself. It’s why I was placed in command
of the
Chimera
in the first place, after Lockney’s
promotion
—though in truth the man should’ve been
court-marshaled. Regardless, I digress; my point being, in these
dire days—what with the Empire pushing into the Ascella—we need
every men to adhere to their oaths…and to follow their orders
without
question. It’s the only way we’ll ever push through
this conflict—especially in light of recent
political
events. It may mean tough choices are coming in the days ahead, but
such is our lot, I suppose. After all, ours is not to
question.”

“I understand, Captain.” Bar wished he could
spit out the tangy taste of that over-pungent perfume. A bank of
pristine clouds, kissed red by a setting sun, passed outside,
promising fresh air just beyond the cabin’s hull. He only needed to
finish this discussion and freedom was his.

“It also says here, in your file, that
you’re a Kinglander orphan, says you requested special enlistment
under the Orphan Placement Initiative.”

“That I did.”

“A bold move…considering you lied.”

Bar coughed in the cloying atmosphere. “With
all due respect, sir, I didn’t lie.” He had to fight back the urge
to get angry, or to start yelling even though his word, and his
honor, had been called into question. It was enough to stir any
good man’s blood towards boiling, and Bar was no different. “My
father died in a scaffolding collapse while restoring the old Opera
House on Silver Star Avenue, and my mother died of the fever years
before that, while I was still just a child.”

“And yet, according to this report, it says
you have an aunt
and
a grandmother, both of whom reside on
Glenfindale
Isle.” Bar noted the way the man almost spat out
the word “Glenfindale”, and it reminded him of a thing his father
once told him:

“
There are people in this world that will
hold it against you…the place your mother came from. It’s not fair,
and it’s not right, but it’s the way of things. It’s not my place
to tell you what to think about it, or what to say to people around
you, but just watch yourself. The civil war’s still fresh on
everyone’s mind—nothing but a few brief years between us and that
terrible era—but regardless, your mother was here on King’s Isle
long before the rebellion started…though some will hardly care
about that. You keen on what I’m saying, son
?”

“Aye, that’s true enough, captain,” admitted
Bar, pausing to choose his words carefully; wishing he could sit
down for this; wishing he had a breath of fresh and clean air taken
from the outside world. “I’ve an aunt from my mother’s side, and a
grandmother as well. But, when my aunt said she was taking me and
moving to Glenfindale, to live with my maternal grandmother—and a
woman I’d never met—well…I ran off.

“The prospect of moving to that dismal place
conjured up nothing but images of poverty and desolation in my
young mind, sir. I grew up hearing the tales told on the streets;
how Finnies were nothing more than grubby beggars who lived in
crude stone huts, eating sod and potatoes racked from the muck and
the mud.” What he left out, however, was how at the time he was too
young to know that those were only stories traded by intolerant
crownies
, and that he’d learned the truth of matters later
on, but he continued his tale in a placating manner. “At that
tender age there was simply no way I was going to allow myself to
be taken to Glenfindale,” stated Bar. “So two days after they’d
cremated my father Cuthbert Bazzon, I climbed out of my bedroom
window, and stole away in the dead of night along Throughway Street
to the dock shelters.

“I’m a child of King’s Isle,” he reaffirmed
for the captain’s sake, “born and raised beneath the Gods’ Bind…and
I’d no intention of becoming a frozen…
snowplogger
. My aunt
abandoned me shortly after, didn’t have the coin or wherewithal to
survive in Throne, not without my dad’s purse to see her along. So
once she was gone, I qualified for the Initiative more than ever.
The naval recruiters had no qualms over the technicality, nor did
Lockney. So you see, ain’t no lie…sir.”

“
Hmm
…an
overwrought
technicality if you ask me.” Moore looked up from his telling
documents and narrowed his gaze, much like a shadowhawk sighting an
easy meal in the form of a balloon guppy. “Tell me, do you travel
to Glenfindale often?”

Bar clenched his jaw.
Just what is he
getting at? Why these probing questions about my past?
His
father’s words of caution seemed more pertinent than ever as he
watched the captain. Moore’s face remained a stern blank revealing
nothing of his intentions, and Bar felt the room darken, even
though the skies outside remained as bright as ever. “In truth,
only once.” And Glenfindale had not been that horrible place he’d
heard ridiculed so often before joining the Royal Air Navy either.
In his years aboard ship, as the Kingdoms War marched further and
further into the past, Bar formed a bond with the good servicemen
from Glenfindale—tough and hardworking men, quick to laugh and
quick to fight. In time, he’d even worked up the courage to spend a
shore leave on the isle, with every intention of tracking down his
grandmother and making right by her. Though a week spent wallowing
in one seedy tavern after another had sapped away the courage to
confront her. In the end, he’d stumbled back onto the
Chimera
, reeking of ale.

Somehow Nana Hazel caught word that her
wayward grandson was aboard, and she came marching onto the airship
in search of
him
. Captain Lockney was only too willing to
indulge the elderly widow, and arranged the meeting in the galley.
Al served them brunch while—like any good Finny woman—she chastised
Bar fiercely…right before embracing and forgiving him. After that,
the brief time he spent nestled in the rolling green hills of his
grandmother’s land left its impression, and so had she, and he
began to feel something like a wild and free Glenfinner himself.
There was something that stirred his blood being on that ancestral
isle, like it spoke…spoke to his soul. But the sideways glances,
and the murmuring of
crowny swine
made it a bittersweet
experience.

“In truth…
psh
, are you sure about
that?” asked Moore, his intrusive and invasive questions were more
unwanted than ever; his scent more stifling than ever. Bar was
certain that, like any good King’s Isle noble, this man despised
all Finnies, and as a proxy, any man with a drop of their blood.
But his vitriol seemed especially poignant, more concentrated then
just mere prejudice. Shadows of the argument that led to Hastings’s
death came whispering back:
“It’s not up for negotiation! The
King’s rule has been usurped, and the admiralty has deemed that
ship a priority target.”
And the first officer’s rebuttal came
back to him as readily as it had beneath the core housing.
“I
thought we were at war with the Empire…not with each
other.”

‘
At war with each other’…? What had
Hastings meant by that? Does it have something to do with the
rumors of abandoning the north?

“Well,” barked Moore, and with a start,
Bar’s distracted gaze fell on the man seated across from him. It
seemed the captain’s hand had disappeared under the beveled lip of
the desk, and that brought back the terrible memory of Hastings’
murder; his death now smelling of sugar and flowers.

“Of course I am, Captain.” Bar was careful
to sound firm, yet respectful. Now, more than ever, he realized
this wasn’t an interview, this was an interrogation.
Something’s
happened within the UKA,
he realized,
something involving
Glenfindale, I think, but the crew’s been under a communication
blackout since Moore took command. Nothing but rumors now. The war
could be lost and we’d never know it, not if the captain chose to
withhold the information.
Bar trembled with dread, knowing
full-well he was at the mercy of this man.

“Tell me, do you support the
Finny-Witch.”

“Queen Yulara?” replied Bar, taken off guard
by the sudden change in topic. In truth, he thought very little of
the queen, and only knew her as something of an eccentric, as
someone who followed the old religions common before the Sundering.
“Only in so far as I support the entire royal family under King
Brahnan,” he finished. “Why do you ask?”

“I’m the one asking the questions here,
Bazzon, and don’t you forget it.” The captain’s tone was grave, but
at least both of his well-manicured hands were now resting in
plain-view atop the massive ledger and its flowing script. “Now
have you ever sympathized with the Finny nationals? Ever spoken out
in support of their so called
plight
? Ever believed they
were being treated
unfairly
.”

There is an issue with Glenfindale…have
they rebelled once more? But that doesn’t make sense, not with the
whole country under threat by the Empire. We all stand to lose if
that’s the case, and yet this interrogation concerning
Glenfindale…
.
The captain is flushing out traitors,
and
of that, Bar was more certain than ever, and that put his heritage
into question. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he tried
to reason.

“Perhaps you believe in self-rule?”

“No.”

“Really?” Moore threw back his chair and
snapped to his feet. “Are you telling me that a mongrel like you,
with that Finny blood flowing through your veins, has never
harbored a secret sympathy for that rebellious spit of land.” The
captain’s face had gone red, the veins in his neck had slithered
their way up along his bald crown and were now bulging to the point
of bursting at his temples. There was the look of a wild animal
about him too.

“I’m a born Kinglander—”

“Don’t lie to me Bazzon!” roared the captain
with savage fury, and suddenly his hand slipped beneath the desk
and produced that terrible pistol. “Your father’s father was from
the Giedi Cluster, and your mother’s family…all Finnies for ages
enumerable. So that makes you about as Kinglander as dragon’s piss
as far as I’m concerned!”

“Sir, I don’t know what any of this has to
do with my role aboard the
Chimera
. I’ve sworn my oath to
the Royal Air Navy; to this ship; questions of my heritage
notwithstanding.”

“To this ship, you say? So then you believe
in the chain of command?”

“Or course,” stated Bar through clenched
teeth, between heaving breaths of hot nauseating air. His skin felt
like it was a thousand degrees, and his face felt ready to burst
into flames. He hated this captain, hated the sight of him, and
most of all, the very smell of him.

“Then you’ll follow my orders without
question?”

“Absolutely,
sir
,” he spat back more
out of reflex than conviction.

“Good.” And just like that Moore tucked away
his gun and returned to his chair. The wildness—the veins—it all
vanished. “Stowe assured me you were a decent enough officer, but I
had my doubts given your background.” He resumed penning into his
ledger. “I’m glad to see he’s proven me wrong on this matter. I’ll
need all the qualified men I can get in the days to come, so I’m
glad I can count on you, Mr. Bazzon. Now, that will be all. You
are
dismissed.”

“Captain,” dared Bar, even though he wanted
nothing more than to be away from the captain’s mawkish aura, “if
it’s not out of line, sir, may I ask what’s going on?”