Back
in April, I posted a draft of the first page for Grenadiers and Dragon’s Fire.
It’s a steampunk-themed story with just a bit of fantasy thrown in for
fun. Depending on how you butter your bread, steampunk is a subgenre of either fantasy or historic fiction (or both) with a retro twist. I’ve finished up the story, and here’s
the final version of the first page.
Enjoy!
Screams crossed
the sky, spitting sparks and fire until they slammed into the lower slope of Bourgogne
Hill. Explosions erupted a moment later
with a shower of dirt, bloody limbs and two unfortunate Imperial soldiers.
“Lieutenant!” a
voice screamed down the line. Panic
broke the soldier’s voice.
“Don’t you
move,” Lieutenant Aubrey Hartmann yelled back.
She didn’t use his name. There
was no need to shame him when everyone was equally scared. “Don’t you dare. Keep your heads pressed into the dirt until
you’re kissing rock.”
The Imperial
advance had been stymied. Their right
flank along the wide River Raglan was covered by a combination of air platforms
and naval ships of the line. The heavy
and light guns had made it impossible for the enemy, the Glorious Republic of
Hamill, to mount a counterattack and encircle them on that side. But on the left, they’d needed at least a
division to hold the wing. The support
came from the Light Division under Sir Heinz de Lutz. The Light Division had angled as they came up
Bourgogne Hill, straight into Aubrey’s company and half of the 4th
Division. De Lutz either hadn’t realized
it, or hadn’t seen it in time. The mix
of the two divisions was now such a thorough jumble that they’d lost any
cohesion. The officers had halted the Imperial
advance and were trying to divide the two divisions. The Hamills had taken advantage of the
confusion and started the mortar bombardment.
Another volley
screamed over her head. The Hamill
cannons had a poor angle from the top of the fortified redoubt. Their mortar crews, on the other hand, had
nearly perfected the range. Aubrey took
her own orders to heart and pressed her body against hill’s hard-packed dirt
and scrub. She turned her face left to
breathe. Sergeant Simmons looked back at
her and gave a grin.
“I hate you,”
Aubrey said.
Simmons grinned
wider. The mortars began to scream and
fall again with explosive roars. The
Sergeant said something to her, but it was completely lost in the noise.
Overhead, two
Imperial air platforms thundered into position, their bulky Simm-Daimlers
driving them into position and holding them in place. Some of the soldiers called them airships,
but that was incorrect. They were
nothing more than a flat platform slung under a dirigible frame, crowded with
two mounted guns, five crew members, and the stinking, smoking, thunderous
engines. They couldn’t travel any real
distance without support for refueling and riding on the platform was
uncomfortable for any length of time.
Even with all their faults, the looming presence of the air platforms
made the heavy mortars stop. The Hamills
had learned early that most of their light firearms couldn’t reach the air
platforms or do more than superficial damage to the dirigibles’ battle
membrane. Exposed mortar and cannon
crews were a target for the air platform gunners operating the two mounted Agar
repeating guns. The twin guns on each
platform started their tat-tat-tat of sustained fire. Every tenth shot was a Fae-spelled tracing
round that drew a blue streak through the air as it lined down to the
target. The Fae didn’t participate in
human wars, but they liked to dabble.
They enjoyed the little mischiefs they could cause. Those mischiefs, like the tracing rounds,
made the air platforms deadly accurate in seconds, rather than spray-and-pray
from the early days.
I
don’t have a definite release date for this anthology. I’m told it’s this year, so stay tuned for
more information.
No comments:
Post a Comment