Contents
Part III New Babel — Chapter Seventeen
Overview
The Ararat seizes Goll’s port as Iren duels the Red Hand. Senlin’s booby-trapped crate releases White Chrom, sending the Red Hand into a murderous frenzy that shatters Pound’s forces. Edith returns, helps repel the assassin, and Senlin severs a mooring, blowing the Ararat away. The crew drags Iren aboard and launches the Stone Cloud, fleeing into the storm as Senlin vows, as Tom Mudd, to find Marya.
Summary
Harpoons from Commissioner Pound’s warship, the Ararat, seize Goll’s port as agents descend. Iren rallies terrified porters and carves through the invaders until the Red Hand arrives. Senlin orders Adam to ready the Stone Cloud and tries to reach Iren, admiring her ferocity and skill as she initially holds the field.
Iren and the Red Hand clash brutally. She impales him with a spike to no effect; he hurls her into a collapsing, charred crane that buries her. Agents seize Senlin and march him to Pound, who mocks him and reveals “Ogier” was a fraud. The Red Hand retrieves Senlin’s crate; opening it releases White Chrom hidden in the straw.
The drug overwhelms the Red Hand, who hallucinates and slaughters Pound’s men. In the chaos, Edith astonishingly returns and floors the assassin. Pound engages Senlin with a spiked-hilt saber; White Chrom visions of Marya distract Senlin, who is wounded. A misstrike severs a harpoon line, triggering a chain of breaks that tears the Ararat from the port; Pound tumbles back aboard as the ship is blown off into the storm.
Edith pins the Red Hand over the precipice; he cryptically appeals to her as “sister” and invokes the Sphinx, but her mechanical arm’s power dies and she drops him. Under blind cannon fire, Senlin and Edith recover the unconscious Iren from the wreckage. They haul her to the Stone Cloud, Edith commands the launch, and, dumping ballast, the ship rockets free, catching Senlin’s planned current and vanishing into the blizzard.
In the epilogue, Senlin adopts the alias Tom Mudd and inventories his strained crew: steadfast but secretive Edith; protective Adam; bold Voleta; formidable Iren. Low on supplies and fuel, they gamble on liberty. Haunted by lingering White Chrom visions of Marya, Tom sets their course for Pelphia to find her.
Who Appears
- Thomas Senlin (Tom Mudd)Protagonist; triggers White Chrom trap, duels Pound, frees Ararat’s moorings, leads the escape and vows to find Marya.
- EdithReturns heroically, decks the Red Hand, helps rescue Iren, commands the Stone Cloud’s launch; mechanical arm loses power.
- The Red HandCommissioner’s assassin; duels Iren, shrugs off wounds, is unhinged by White Chrom, massacres agents, and is dropped from the port.
- Commissioner PoundLeads the Ararat assault; taunts Senlin about Ogier, wounds him, then is forced back aboard as his ship blows free.
- IrenMaster-at-arms; devastates agents, is crushed under a collapsed crane, rescued unconscious, taken aboard as crew.
- AdamPrepares the Stone Cloud for launch on Senlin’s orders; reports readiness and helps bring Iren aboard.
- VoletaAssists Edith with lines during launch; agile crew member poised as lookout.
- GollPort boss who vanishes as the battle begins, abandoning the defenders.
- MaryaAppears in Senlin’s White Chrom visions, distracting him during the duel and haunting him afterward.