Napoleonic Witches Ch. 1

JUNE 20, 1808
WOOLWICH, ENGLAND

“Remember the vows that you made to your Mary,” Lieutenant Audie White hummed, oblivious of the world save the six-pounder cannon she knelt behind. Deliberately, she wound the elevation screw with her hands, her mind mulling over the turn-to-elevation ratio the whole while. Feeling that the time was ripe, she let go and inched her face towards the cannon’s base ring, squinting through the quarter sight scale etched on its unmarred brass surface. The scale almost lined up where she wanted it: just a hair below the three degrees mark.

She continued winding.

“Remember the bow'r where you vowed to be true.” Another fine adjustment made, Audie squinted through the sight once more: now just a hair over. She clicked her tongue and began undoing her work. “Oh, don't deceive me. Oh, never leave me. How could you use a poor maiden so?”

At last, she was satisfied: a perfect three degrees elevation. Pleased with herself, Audie stood and smacked the gun’s breach for good measure.

“You know, that song is a bit appalling if you think about it,” she mused while trudging away from the gun, patting the dirt off her pant legs. “Is the portfire ready, Sergeant Hull?”

“Yes ma’am,” he replied dryly, his arms cradling a stack of loose papers and a dog-eared book. Hull nodded to a glum corporal who took his place beside the cannon, the blazing portfire raised high in his hand. Hull fell in beside Audie and stood stiffly at attention, casting one last appraising glance at the rest of the crew before declaring, “The gun is ready to fire, ma’am. On your order.”

“Let’s get to it, then.” Audie plugged her ears with her hands, glaring at a tall stake driven at 850 yards’ distance as if willing her aim to be true. Her voice pregnant with enthusiasm, she shouted, “Make ready! And FIRE!”

The corporal dipped the burning match towards the cannon’s vent, his head turned away from the impending blast. Audie leaned forward with bated breath, gripped by an anticipant silence which loomed briefly before shattering into a bone-jarring roar. A billow of white smoke enveloped her, forcing her to blink away tears from her stinging eyes. She focused on her mark still, her eyes unwavering as the smoke slowly started to dissipate. Her vision clearing, Audie’s heart pounded excitedly as she inhaled in anticipation—

A disappointed sigh escape her lips.

“Too short, ma’am,” Hull noted, rubbing salt into the wound.

“I see that,” Audie replied, putting her hands on her hips with a surly huff. “How far do you reckon was the first graze? Four, five hundred yards?”

“I’d hazard a four forty, ma’am. Looked to be between shots two and four—can’t be far off.”

Another disappointed sigh escaped Audie’s lips. Clicking her tongue in frustration, she thrust a hand towards the sergeant’s general direction. “Give me my ballistic table and the Pocket Gunner.”

It was a meaningless exchange. Audie practically knew both by heart—especially the ballistic table, which she had painstakingly derived last week. She flipped through it now, her eyes glazing over sloppy handwriting whose conclusion was already burned into her memory: one pound charge, three degree elevation, 848.427 yards first graze. The five shots she had fired that afternoon, however, had all consistently fallen in the vicinity of 500 yards.

The fact that her table turned out to be wrong didn’t irritate Audie too much. The fact that she had no clear idea of *where* her math went astray, however, did. There were too many unknown variables involved in deriving a ballistic table—even something as basic as her gun’s muzzle velocity was a mystery. As far as she was aware, there wasn’t a ballistic pendulum in all of Britain heavy enough to gauge a six-pounder’s muzzle velocity. With few alternatives available, Audie had had to make due by adapting Robin’s solution for that of a musket to arrive at a figure. With something as fundamental as muzzle velocity being an educated guess at best, the inclusion of complicated variables such as gravity and air resistance only served to multiply the strands in the Gordian Knot of Gunnery. Mathematic ballistics had eluded greater minds than hers in the past for a reason.

“Well, the results might end up being useful for figuring out what went wrong. The day’s not a complete loss… probably,” She muttered quietly, trying to put her frustrations behind her. At any rate, it was best not to dwell on it while there was still work to be done. “Sergeant, get Atkinson out there to take the measure. And fetch the…”

She paused midsentence, puzzled by what she saw from the corner of her eye. She leaned past her sergeant to get a better look at the still-smoking gun, whose crew stood about instead of at work as they should. “Why hasn’t the gun been wheeled back into position yet?”

The men jumped like frightened rabbits at her words, two gunners and a corporal rushing to grab hold of the cannon’s carriage wheels and block trail. With a collective heave, the trio laboriously wheeled the gun forward Inch by inch, their eyes scrutinizing the ground lest they failed to place the gun *exactly* where it had been moments before.

Hull watched them work, his expression sour. “I take it you aren’t going to call it a day, ma’am?”

“The day’s still young; I reckon at least four more shots.” Audie began to pace with Sergeant Hull in tow, her mannerism akin to that of a schoolteacher admonishing an inattentive student than that of an officer. “Honestly, I expected the men to know what I want done by now. But from the looks of it, it seems I need to remind you. Insure the gun is lying horizontal, then take the ball’s circumference, recalibrate the powder scale… actually, where is Atkinson? I—oh, he’s on his way. Good. Let’s see, where was I—”

“Ma’am,” Hull interjected tepidly, stopping Audie in her tracks. Gathering his hands before him, Hull leaned closer and whispered, “A word with you?”

Audie turned and looked at him with a quizzical expression, really seeing him for the first time that afternoon.  She noted the pensive look on Hull’s rugged face, its gravity magnified by three long jagged sabre scars running down the right side of his scalp. He stood with a nervous air: interrupting an officer was an excellent way to get any sergeant’s name noted for lashings. He blinked twice before cautiously clearing his throat, raising his brows as if silently repeating his request.

“Of course you may, sergeant. What is it?” Audie said gently, somewhat put off by the thought of having the man stand there so uneasily. Her permission given, she expected her sergeant to relax.

Hull’s face settled into the very visage of solemnity.

“With all due respect, ma’am,” he said evenly, “we’ve been out here for the better part of the afternoon. We’ve fired only five rounds in the meantime.”

Although he left much of his complaints unsaid, Audie knew what the sergeant was driving at—and promptly dismissed it.

“The men were fine going through the drills two days ago; I don’t think taking a break from all that will be too big of a problem.” She swept her hand across the field, which was dotted with pickets and various gunnery and surveying instruments. “Besides, I think something like this is a nice change of pace for them—and educational. So you’re going to have to bear with me for a bit today.”

“Doing their job is all the education they need, ma’am. How to lay a gun, for instance.”

“That’s certainly out of the question,” Audie immediately replied. “I’ve seen them lay the gun before—no precision at all. That might pass for muster, but not for running an experiment. Doing it haphazardly would be contrary to the scientific method.”

Hull shrugged with indifference. “In all honesty, ma’am, a couple minute arcs won’t make that much of a difference. It’s only that I would be far less concerned with all this…” he paused, grasping for a suitable word to substitute for what he really thought, “with all this… science, if it didn’t interfere so much with training. Atkinson hasn’t even been near the gun since the beginning of the day.”

“Again, that can’t be helped.” Audie’s voice remained patient in the face of Hull’s repeated badgering. “How am I supposed to take measurements of the first graze if someone doesn’t go out there with a perambulator and pickets?”

“Well, ma’am,” Hull answered with finality, “perhaps you could just eyeball it.”

Audie blinked. “Excuse me?”

“Ma’am, I said—”

“I heard you,” she snapped, massaging her temple with her left hand. Audie had never expected her sergeant to be thrilled about her little experiment—but eyeball it? An urchin could do that. “I heard you, and no, we are not going to ‘eyeball it.’ You are going to have to accept that fact. And besides,” she added in a conciliatory tone, “I let the men handle the powder. It’s compromise.”

“I keep telling you, ma’am, that’s no compromise. I just don’t want you to accidently blow yourself up.” Hull sighed wearily. “I know you want a one-pound powder load, but charging the gun with a ladle is an extremely dangerous business. It could blow while it’s being put in, not to mention loose powder from the cartridge is just sitting there in the open—”

“The powder? The powder!” Audie gasped in sudden epiphany, cutting her sergeant off with a sharp raise of her hand.

Wordlessly, she strode briskly towards the caisson, her steps falling faster the closer she came. A gunner who had been detailed to powder work backed away hastily as she approached, dropping an open cartridge bag in his hurried retreat. Audie reached for it and brought a small sample closer to her eyes. The individual grains were caked together into irregular lumps: a sign of moisture or age—or both. Audie’s fingers stained black as she rolled the powder calks between them.

“Sergeant, this powder...” She slowly turned towards him and opened her mouth as if to say more, only to sigh instead. She shook her head, nestling her right hand on her throbbing temple. “I’ve never seen service grade powder this badly stored. What are the quartermasters doing?”

Audie limply tossed the recorded results over her shoulder. Her distress was clearly evident—and Hull was poorly equipped to deal with it. He chose to stand in uneasy silence as Audie continued to mope.

“Here I am, trying to conduct an experiment and they supply with damaged service powder. The whole day, wasted just like that. Worst powder I’ve seen.” An iron edge entered her voice. “Why, I ought to take the quartermasters to task and lodge a formal protest. Maybe then they’ll better appreciate proper powder storage!”

“It’s my fault, ma’am,” Hull said in response, the tiniest hint of nervousness tinged in his voice.

“But—”

“I should have checked before bringing them out here.” He exhaled. “It’s my responsibility. I’ll take care of it.”

“I… alright, I’ll leave that in your hands, then.” Audie acquiesced, nodding slowly with a puzzled look on her face. “It’s just… well, you said you’ll deal with it. For now, just send someone down to the armoury and fetch some proper powder. I don’t care who. I would like to get just one—one—good shot in before the day’s out.”

“Ma’am, I—” Hull paused, hesitating. “Perhaps it might be best to call it a day, try again later?”

“Sergeant, just *one* good shot. Is that really too much to ask?”

Hull cleared his throat, his uneasiness building as Audie’s sky-blue eyes bored into him. He dared not fidget, save for his emerald eyes which darted about furtively. “No, ma’am, it’s just… I—”

“Good afternoon, Miss White.” A voice cut through the air, delivering Hull from his bed of nails.

Audie blinked in a start, and after a moment’s hesitation, turned graciously to flash a courteous smile to Captain James Spencer Rothe, who was mounted on a fine chestnut hackney. She snapped off a crisp salute. “And a good afternoon to you, captain. How are you on this fine day?”

“Fine, miss lieutenant.” He replied with a curt bow. “I see you and your sergeant are a bit distant from your gun. I hope there aren’t any problems.”

“No problems, captain.” She reported, casting a brief sideway glance at her sergeant. “None at all.”

“Uh huh,” Captain Rothe replied after a moment’s silence, his expression knowing.

“Captain, while this is a pleasant surprise,” Audie continued in an attempt to change the topic. “I believe my gun is the only one supposed to be out for exercise. Is there something you need of me?”

“Yes, Miss White. Yes indeed,” Rothe replied, suddenly recalling his purpose. He seemed to briefly consider the words he had just spoken. “A slight correction. Not me—it’s your mother.”

Audie heart skipped a beat. “Oh no...”

“Her valet delivered her letter to the colonel scant an hour ago. She is kindly requesting that you return home immediately in order to prepare for the night’s soiree.”

“Captain, I am out on exercise.”

“Miss, the issue is out of your hands,” Rothe said with a curt nod. “The colonel strongly advises you that it would be in your—and the regiment’s—best interest to fly home now, and not incur the wrath of so fearsome an opponent.”

Audie suppressed a quiet groan as her last refuge crumbled to the ground. A superior officer’s ‘advice’ to a witch was but an order dressed in social decorum. Like it or not, Audie had no excuse to do anything but what her mother wanted of her.

“Has the colonel’s message been delivered?” Rothe prompted.

“It has, captain.” She replied, snapping off a disheartened salute.

“Then the best of luck to you, miss.” Rothe returned the salute as he wheeled his horse around, a slight grin on his lips. “I hope you remember your French. Hiyaaaah!”

Audie closed her eyes as Rothe galloped away, in a foul enough mood to want to shoot the messenger. A letter to the colonel? She would have come home in time regardless—a letter, really! Audie needed to have a word with mother one of these days: she had a reputation to keep in front of her brother officers and the enlisted, after all.

But it seemed that day was definitely not going to be today.

“Sergeant, fetch my broom. This exercise is over.”