Chapter Three Hundred and Sixty-Six — The Storm Tower
Chapter Three Hundred and Sixty-Six -The Storm Tower The first sight of the Storm Tower wasn’t the tower itself. That was because Stormtower and the Storm Tower were two different things, confusingly named the same thing. Stormtower-one word-was a city. The Storm Tower was the big tower in its centre.As our second night away from the fleet progressed, I could slowly make out an oasis of light in the darkness of night, a spot of red and orange in the distance.My watch ended, I took a long nap, and when I woke up and returned onto the deck, the sun had risen, and that distant spot had grown much larger, but still, that wasn’t the Storm Tower. Instead, it was a small city, maybe half the size of Goldenalden with a sprawl of small homes with big gardens around them and big, wide roads crisscrossing each other.The city was without walls, though there were small towers all around it, each one thin and narrow and quite tall, with a capped roof of green copper over a lookout post.What was most interesting of all though, at least to me, was the road leading away from the city and towards the actual Storm Tower.It was a wide road that wove between large hills which could have been a six-lane highway back on Earth. On either side of it was a thin strip of homes and businesses and all sorts of buildings.It was like a long, extended city reaching out and away from the first larger city and all the way over the hills and to the coast.That’s where the Storm Tower was, right on the edge of a bay that I couldn’t see the other side of.The Storm Tower... kind of just took my breath away.A monument of stone, iron, and glass, the tower dominated the horizon. The base of it was perhaps twenty times as wide as the Beaver Cleaver was long, occupying an area best measured in dozens of acres. From this foundation, the tower soared up in a cascade of terraces and monolithic walls, rising beyond the lower wispy clouds that drifted in off the bay. Above that cloudy mantle, the tower gathered itself into a dome, which was further crowned with a narrower tower that could've rivaled Big Ben.It was practically a manmade mountain, but the sprawling complex that radiated out from its base was just as stunning. Countless interlocking buildings flooding out a kilometer in every direction, every one of them no less than ten stories in height, many of them stretching up to skyscraper level in their own right. Roads entered the complex and vanished into vaulted passages like tunnels. The original ground was long since built over, but the wooded courtyards hundreds of feet in the air felt like slabs of hills had been installed in place of some of the roofs.Buildings had been built on top of other buildings, reinforced, and then built on top of again. It all combined into an organic layer-city with no defined edge, seeming to be bursting apart at the seams. Some buildings of castle-like stone, others of glass and wrought iron, some still only shells of new construction, surrounded by a forest of scaffolding.It was clear, at a glance, that this place hadn’t been built in a day. The tallest of the towers, to the north of the Storm Tower’s main... tower part, had a skeletal structure and walls of glass. It almost looked like a modern skyscraper except this was made of wrought iron with decorative curves and its base was all interlocking stone.Further along the coast, to the south of the tower, was a second city. This one seemed less built for people and more for industry. Big factories sat next to the bay, spewing coal smoke into the air from long chimneys, and a huge port extended over the water where more traditional ships were docked.Was the reason this city was so far from the others to keep the smoke and smog away? Or were the two cities inhabited by dwarves and elves? What about that big road, with all of the homes built alongside it? And the tower! Oh, I had so many questions, but no one to ask.The air was filled with ships. Little zippy ones that flew past at blazing speeds and bigger, lumbering giants that barely looked like they were moving at all. Most of the ships circled the main tower, but a number of them hovered over the more industrial area, where I could see airship docks where stuff was being loaded on and off of waiting ships.We flew past a ship whose entire side was made of two bulbous, glass-covered cars filled with little figures on seats. At a glance it looked like they were reading newspapers or chatting. Were those air-buses?Our approach was noticed soon enough, and a small ship not much bigger than the Redemption came to a hover nearby. A small figure stood on its deck and pulled out semaphore flags to signal us.I raced to our second deck to reply, of course. They wanted to know if we had a transceiver, and when I said that we didn’t, they asked if we were there on business or Tower business.After a very quick conference with Caprica, we decided on Tower business, and the ship told us to follow them and that our berth was five-zero-one.I relayed that to Clive, but he didn’t know what it meant any more than I did. Still, we did as instructed and followed what was clearly some sort of air-traffic-direction ship closer to the tower.There was a system in place that decided who could approach and when, but we weren’t privy to whatever that system was, so we had to wait and do as told.“Whoa,” Awen said. She’d been on deck ever since we could see the city, a magic-made spyglass in hand the entire time so that she could better see what was going on and take a look at the ships we passed. Her attention, and mine, was now on the main tower. The dome at the top could slide open.It revealed that the whole of the massive tower was hollow, and the interior was lined by a circle of docks and gantries and catwalks and big cranes that could unfold from the walls to grab onto ships.I imagined that maybe the largest airships around couldn’t fit into the tower, but most of those we saw weren’t much bigger than the Beaver. And with ships of our size... Well, I imagined that the tower could hold hundreds.Ensure your favorite authors get the support they deserve. Read this novel on the original website.I couldn’t just stare with my jaw slack though, there was piloting to be done, and even with Clive at the wheel and everyone in top form, it wouldn’t do for the captain to slack off.As we approached the tower, a signal must have been sent by our pilot boat because a magical beam of green light appeared before the Beaver, tracing a route through the tower’s doors and into its depths.“I guess we follow that,” I said. For some reason, I hadn’t expected there to be magic around such an industrious city, but of course, there was no reason for them to abandoned magic.We moved in, going perhaps a lot slower than we could have, but slow was safe and the inside of the tower, even if it was so grand it probably had its own weather, was still a busy place.Ships were moored against the walls, loading and unloading cargo, being repaired, or just sitting and waiting. The tower’s interior was lit by big searchlights and a thousand torches hanging above the catwalks, but the space was still relatively dark compared to the bright morning sun outside. Actinic splashes of light flared up every so often, and when I looked for the source I found a team of workers with what looked like welding equipment working on a ship to one side.The space was cacophonous. Clangs of metal on metal, distant shouts, even a lot of music of a few different genres competing for loudness. Combined with all of the moving parts, and the many strange and new scents, it made for something of a sensory overload, and I found myself fighting back dizziness, so I refused to take it all in and instead focused on what was ahead of me.The various berths had numbers above them, but it wasn’t organised all that easily. The numbers seemed to correspond to a space, and that space was obviously somewhat changeable since some ships were bigger than others, and it looked as if the landing areas could change size, with the clamps and gantries and cranes all being built on huge rails pressed up against the walls that let them shift from side to side.Eventually though, the green line ahead of us led us down, and five levels off the ground-or at least the ground within the tower-floor. Clive did a bit of expert flying, spinning us around so that we could enter the berth back-first.I saw figures on the sidelines, both short and squat and tall and lithe and those inbetween, all working to adjust the space where the Beaver eventually came in for a landing. Clamps thumped gently against the ship’s hulls and Clive set the engine to idling and we pulled in all of our sails, letting the retreating clamps pull us into our mooring.Finally, once we were properly locked in place, a catwalk unfolded from the side and came to rest a pace above the rightmost deck. The end of the catwalk had a ramp which the Scallywags hurried to drop.We had arrived at Stormtower.Someone walked across the catwalk, each step eliciting a clang and a bang, so I rushed to meet them at the end of the ramp while tugging my captain’s hat on straighter.The person was... someone. I couldn’t tell if it was a dwarf or an elf. They were a bit shorter than I was, and rather on the stalky side, but they had a thin face and pointy ears, as well as thick but long hair tied up in a ponytail dangling out the back of their hardhat. He, of course, had a beard. It was a rather neatly trimmed one that only went down to his sternum, but it was clean and had a few little beads woven into it. “Greetings!” he said with a deep bass of a voice. “And welcome to the Storm Tower. Permission to come aboard?”“Hello,” I replied. “And permission granted. Welcome aboard the Beaver Cleaver.”He grinned and stepped up onto the ship. “Thank you. Are you the captain of this strange vessel?”“Oh? Yeah, that’s me. I’m captain Broccoli Bunch, this is my crew and friends,” I said with a gesture to everyone, because no one was staying below deck and missing this. “Pleased to meet you, ah, sir?”“Thorin Rootbreaker, Clerk of Landing Floor Five, at your service, captain. Now, I know my records like I know my beard, and I don’t recall a ship called the Beaver Cleaver heading to my docks today or any other day.”“Ah, that’s because we haven’t told anyone,” I said.Amaryllis stepped up and curtsied to Thorin Rootbreaker. “I’m the one who usually cares for the ship’s paperwork. I’m Amaryllis Albatross, the first mate.”Amaryllis was my first mate? I supposed she was!“Which forms do we need to fill for an impromptu landing and how much are the standard docking fees?” Amaryllis asked.“Before all that,” Thorin said. “I’m mighty curious to know what brings you here? Your ship doesn’t look fat with cargo, and that there’s a tower-made skiff you’ve got grabbed in your midships.”Amaryllis made a disgusted face. “We’re here on political business, I’m afraid. One of the Beaver’s guests is a noble who has affairs to take care of here. You know how it can be.”“Ah, I do, I do,” Thorin said. “Well, in any case, no one will be calling a Rootbreaker a penny pincher. Standard fare’s good enough. Your ship’s unusual, but not stranger than some of the hulls we see here, and besides, the berth wasn’t going to be filled for another week. That does mean you’ll be needing to find accommodations elsewhere for this ship of yours between now and then, can’t be giving away promised places.”“I’ll be sure to keep that in mind,” I said.“Good as iron then,” Thorin said. “The administration’s at the tower’s base.”“Thank you,” I said. “Um, Mister Rootbreaker, if we wanted to find out about another ship? Like a ship that might be docked at the tower, is there any place we could ask about it?”Thorin frowned, big bushy eyebrows meeting in the middle of his brow like two blind caterpillars bumping into each other. “Oh, sure, administration ought to be able to do that for ya. Looking for a friend?”I wouldn’t call Vonowl a friend unless his personality improved a fair bit. “Not quite. I’m just looking for someone.”“Well, good luck to ya, then. Now, will your ship be needing fuel? Provisions? Some elbow grease to get it up to snuff?”
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Chapter Three Hundred and Sixty-Seven — Hustle, Bustle, Toil, & Trouble
Chapter Three Hundred and Sixty-Seven — Hustle, Bustle, Toil, Trouble
Initially, I thought finding the baron would be somewhat easy. I don’t know why I thought that, it just felt like the kind of thing that wouldn’t be too hard.Whatever city he hid in, he’d probably insist on being in the nicest part of it. That seemed to match his personality.The problem was that I couldn’t have expected Storm Tower to be... the way it was, really.While the outer wall of the tower wasn’t all that thick, it was still filled with curving corridors, staircases that climbed up and down, and plenty of storage spaces, offices, and little break rooms.What caught my attention the most though wasn’t the strange verticality of the space, but the people within it.Dwarves were all over. Short men and women (maybe? The beards made it hard to tell. I’d have to find a way to politely ask about dwarven genders at some point) stomped about like busy bees. Next to them, and usually moving with both more speed and grace, were elves.They were tall and lithe, with chiselled, noble features and very nice chins on average. The elves weren’t in a class of their own though, or if they were, I didn’t notice it right away. Dwarf and elf worked together, and there didn’t seem to be that big of a difference in their jobs. Sure, I saw more dwarven mechanics, but there were some elves in overalls covered in grease stains as well, and while the elves looked more comfortable in their office attire, plenty of dwarves had button-up shirts open at the front so that they could stuff the tips of their beards away.“Awa, there’s so much to look at,” Awen said. Which really summed up my problem, even if she was talking more about all the ships parked away around us.“I know,” I said. “This place is enormous. And it’s not the entire city or anything, I bet the rest of the complex is even more packed with stuff and people and things.”“As far as I’m aware, the tower complex is where most of the governance is,” Caprica said. “The satellite cities are for housing and industry, respectively. Though what I read about the Storm Tower and what I’m seeing now... well, my history books didn’t do the scale of this place justice. This is a wonder of engineering.”“It’s pretty big, yeah,” I agreed. I bet someone could fit a whole Eiffel Tower in the middle of this place and still have room to park a few ships. “Where do we even start?”Amaryllis hummed. “I think we start with the obvious. We’ll go pay our docking fees, then ask about the baron’s ship. If it’s here somewhere, then all the best.”Spending time in an administration building while visiting a whole new place didn’t sound super fun, but Amaryllis was probably right about its effectiveness. So the five of us (Amaryllis, Awen, Calamity, Caprica and me) all headed out of the docks and with a few helpful directions from some locals and some time spent trying to understand the local signage, we bustled our way into a big administrative centre just off the main tower but still within the same building.There were windows overlooking a pretty view of the sea and the industrial sector just to the south of Storm Tower, but mostly we weren’t there for the view but to talk to the admin.Amaryllis took the lead, bringing out a few papers and permits which a young elf man looked over quickly. She managed to convince him that the Beaver didn’t need an inspection and that we weren’t carrying any cargo to sell, so we obviously didn’t need a cargo manifest. We were here on business, not to sell stuff.Finally, the question I was paying attention to came up. “We’re also looking for someone while we’re here,” Amaryllis said. “A harpy noble by the name of Baron Vonowl. He might have arrived here on a skiff, perhaps a day or two ago.”“Do you have any more details than that?” the admin asked. “We have skiffs aplenty here.”“It was a Snowlander ship,” Awen added. Then she rattled out a few specifications. Its balloon-size, approximate tonnage, the propeller and engine model. I didn’t know she’d gathered that much information about his ship just at a glance.Unfortunately, that didn’t really help much, at least, not until we got lucky. The admin turned as a dwarf in a suit trundled by. “Hey, have you heard of a harpy crew coming in on a Snowlander skiff lately?” he asked.The dwarf paused. “Yeah, sure, yesterday morning?”We all perked up. “Did you see them, mister dwarf?” I asked.“Mhm,” the dwarf said. “They parked in the morning and only bothered to send someone to pay the docking fees in the afternoon. Not wrong, but certainly annoying.”“What did the person who came in here look like?” I asked.“Harpy,” The dwarf said. He rubbed at his beard. “Hmm, lots of feathers. Some wings. Looked a mighty lot like that harpy sir right there.” he said while pointing to Amaryllis.“Sir? I’ll have you know I’m a woman,” Amaryllis huffed.“Ah, my pardons. Hard to tell, what with, you know.” He gestured vaguely towards his lower face, and I took it to mean that Amaryllis didn’t have a very womanly beard.“You can tell by the hips and the breasts,” the other admin said.“I’ll keep that in mind,” the dwarf replied. “In any case, just a normal harpy. Looked mighty nervous and sweaty about it though.”That didn’t sound like baron Vonowl. I suspected that if he had come here to take care of his own paperwork, he would have made sure to have everyone here knew who he was. He was... maybe not memorable, but certainly loud. “Do you know where the ship’s crew is now?” I asked. “Did they leave an address or something? They can’t be staying in their ship like we are, it’s just a skiff.”Reading on this site? This novel is published elsewhere. Support the author by seeking out the original.The admin and the dwarf talked for a bit, then the admin wandered off. We had to wait a couple of minutes, but he returned with a file that he was leafing through. “Your friend is staying at the Grand Mami Hotel," he reported, before very nicely giving us some directions.“Thank you,” I said once everything was done. “Um, one more thing, did you happen to hear anything about someone called Rainnewt?”“Rainnewt?” the admin asked. He squinted, then his eyes widened and he smiled. “Yes, he’s on that poster over there.”We all turned to see a wall off to one side that was covered in posts, local ads, and official reports for everyone to see. One of those had a rather well-drawn image of Rainnewt on it.It was right under a large label that said WANTED.I walked over to the wall and read the whole poster. Under the wanted part was the image of a serious-faced Rainnewt, and below that, the list of crimes he was wanted for. Conspiracy, theft, impersonating an officer of the law, kidnapping.There was a nice reward for his capture too.I wondered if I could cash that in. We did capture him, after all. Sure, it was across the continent from here, and he got away after, but technically...“What did he do?” I asked.The administrator shrugged. “That poster has been up there for months. I don’t know.”It seemed as if we had another little mystery on our hands. Something else to discover about Rainnewt, and probably more stuff to add to his long list of misdeeds.“We can ask more about that later, after we’ve confronted the baron,” Amaryllis said.“Maybe before,” Caprica said. We turned to her, and she crossed her arms. “We don’t have any authority here. If we walk up to the baron to confront him, there’s quite literally nothing we can do. At least legally. This isn’t like our last... legally dubious situation either. This is the capital and heart of the Snowlands. They won’t take kindly to any hostile actions.”“That makes sense,” I said. “But then, what do we do?”“Kidnap the baron?” Calamity suggested. “I’m quick with a rope. I can have him hog tied in a second or less. Then nya just have to carry him back to wherever.”“That... isn’t how it works,” Caprica said.Calamity shrugged, as if to say ‘well, I tried.’“Any options then? Other than something so evidently criminal?” Amaryllis asked.“Ask nicely?” I tried.“Yes Broccoli, but who do we ask nicely?” Amaryllis asked. “We don’t really have any connections here, do we?”“Um,” Awen said.We all turned towards Awen whose cheeks took on a cute shade of pink at the sudden attention.“I think I know someone here. Well, someone who knows someone I know. Awa, what I mean is...” she took a deep breath to recentre herself while we listened. “My uncle came here a few times, starting a long time ago, when the tower wasn’t finished being built yet. His airship is very, very old, like... one of the first, probably, and it was partially built here, though it’s had so many parts replaced that... well, nevermind. My point is, he had a bunch of friends in the Snowlands. He told me stories.”“And those friends might be willing to assist?” Caprica asked.“Maybe?” Awen tried. “There is an exploration guild here. And they probably have a club for old people.”“That isn’t a bad idea,” Amaryllis said. “It’s a place to start, at least. And the kind of old person that hangs around at the Exploration Guild is exactly the kind of person that likes getting into a bit of trouble.”“That doesn’t sound like what I envisioned at all,” Caprica said.Amaryllis sniffed. “You were expecting us to go through all the right and proper channels? Caprica, this isn’t Sylphfree, and we’re not diplomats. We don't know what the proper channels would be, or if they even exist.”“We’re troublemakers,” Calamity said with a devilish grin.I shook my head. “We’re nothing like that. Just friends trying to fix a few little problems and see some amazing stuff while we’re at it. I think Awen’s idea is the best one so far. We’ll get to meet some people who can help and then figure out where we want to go from there.”Finding the exploration guild proved surprisingly easy. I flagged down an unhurried looking dwarf in the halls outside the dock administration place, then asked them where we could find the guild.It turned out to be at the top of what locals called the ‘little tower’ which was a smaller tower built closer to the coast. That was still a very long walk away though, not that anyone minded. We got to tour the Storm Tower and play tourist as we crossed the entire massive complex.I just wished the place was a little more tourist-friendly. They really needed more signs explaining things. Like the main complex had an interior train system where people who needed to get around could hop aboard one of the moving platforms (they had benches and rails to grab onto) so that they could move around without having to walk, but we didn’t know which platform to ride on so we had to just hoof it.I didn’t mind, it meant I got to see all the strangely dressed people moving around, many of whom paused to look at us as we passed by. Also, we discovered that the locals had a thing for street food.It didn’t taste very good. Everything from the sausages they had to their drinks was super bitter and smokey. I imagined the dwarf palate wasn’t anything like a human one because I saw plenty of them enjoying their snacks.Finally, after a good bit of wandering around, we made it to the Exploration guild.
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