Finished 28 July 2005
It's easy to underestimate Vincent Arthai. Fatally easy; people have died from it before. Vincent the showman, the incurable gentleman, the captain of an ostentatious ship with an ostentatious name. It's not even exactly for show: Vincent really does like his coffee and his coffee set, the way he looks in his dress uniform, and the colour cream.
Vincent also likes Alex Rowe. Nobody really knows why; Vincent is about as unlike Alex as it's possible to be – but he does. But because he's not just a showman and an incurable gentleman but also one of the best airship captains Anatoly has to offer, he's managed to get himself the unenviable task of trying to capture the Silvana.
It's impossible, of course. If Alex doesn't want his ship to be captured, then it simply won't be captured. But you don't tell kings that sort of thing, and now innocent men will die trying to accomplish the impossible.
It was foolish to give the job of finding the girl to Alex in the first place. So much power; did the king really believe that he would cheerfully hand it over? Alex, for whom allegiance was only a means to an end, and who hardly even bothered to pretend otherwise?
But they tell legends of the Silvana and of Alex Rowe, and it is useful to have legends in your service. Old Anatoly had let it go to his head.
Vincent shuts his eyes and sighs. Alex, Alex, Alex. Why do you have to make everyone's lives difficult?
He already knows the reason. It's not a good one, but it's Alex's reason.
You don't tell Alex that sort of thing, either. He'd just stare.
Alex's stare is something not even Vincent can face. It's the kind of stare that says that Vincent can ply him with coffee and banter and games of chess and Alex will even respond, but at the end of it all Alex is still an animated corpse, a walking dead man, nothing burning behind his eyes except revenge.
And now he'll have to pit the Urbanus against the Silvana, friend against friend – at least, insofar as Alex has friends – white ship against grey. He knows Alex won't be showing any mercy, this close to Delphine, nor expecting any.
Vincent's seen this coming for a long, long time. He's hoped that it wouldn't be him to have to try to take Alex down. He's hoped that, when the time came, Alex would be able to get out of it safely.
He still does. But that will have to wait, until he's done trying his damnedest to carry out orders.
