The grey, iron-ribbed hull of the Vanguard rolled heavily in the deep-water channel fifteen miles off the coast of northern France.
A freezing sea fog hung low over the choppy waters of the English Channel, shrouding the warship in a wall of cold white mist. On the quarterdeck, the heavy steel cables connected to the deep-sea grappling sledge hummed like guitar strings under tension, holding the thick underwater telegraph trunk suspended twenty fathoms below the surface.
Prince Bastian stood on the bridge wing, his heavy brass field glasses pressed to his eyes. Through the shifting fog, five miles to the east, the silhouette of an armed European coastal cutter drifted silently, its crew watching the sovereign warship with cautious, uneasy stillness.
"They aren't raising their battle flags, Prince," Foreman Haddon noted, stepping onto the bridge wing with his hand resting on the stock of his lever-action rifle. "Their gun ports are open, but nobody is loading the brass pieces."
