The Rebel of Rhada by Robert Cham Gilman Read Free Book Online Page A

said, “There is no better ship handler among the Navigators. I have no fear.”
    Kalin swallowed the dryness in his throat and said formally, “It shall be done, King.”
    From the shadows came the thrumming of Gret’s music. “If Ariane is there, so will Erit be. I should like to meet with one of my own kind again. So shall I have to stay here without you, King, while you go adventuring?”
    “What is your pleasure, Master Gret?” Kier asked with half a frown.
    “I might be useful,” said the Vulk.
    “So you might,” Kier said speculatively. “On a journey into the unknown, the unknowable may serve.”
    “You do me honor, King,” Gret said with a secret smile.
    One of the novice Navigators appeared with a position report. “We are through the cloud deck, sir.”
    “Are we over the Eastern Sea?” Kalin asked.
    “Yes, Brother Kalin.”
    Kalin said to his cousin. “I will go now.” Kier watched him go, thinking that the lives of all might soon depend on the young priest’s skill and piety. He accepted his helmet from an armorer and smiled at his lieutenants. “Then, gentlemen, I think it is time.”
     
    The Rhadan starship hovered for a time low over the southern tip of Manhat Island, above a section of the tel that covered much of the ancient city of Nyor. The ground was level here, dropping steeply to the shores of the confluence of the two rivers. To the north, no more than three kilometers from where the great ship would touch ground, two battalions of Vegan Imperials were issuing in battle order from the gate of the wall that cut across the island. The wall, useless now for defense, had been built in the last years of the Interregnum. It was falling into decay, but it served to divide the spaces left open for star-ship landings from the tangled streets and alleyways of Imperial Nyor.
    Normally, starships landed closer to the walls. But Kalin allowed his huge hull to settle slowly to Earth at a point so near the steep talus of the tel that it would be virtually impossible to surround her. On the crumbling wall, he could see arbalests and catapults, but he was reasonably certain that even the huge and cleverly designed Imperial machines had not the range to reach his chosen landing site with missiles.
    A rain was falling as the starship actually touched ground. The nicker of ionization in the air around her faded, and the god-metal keel sank deeply into the soil.
    The port-side valve dilated, and from the dark opening galloped two wings of Rhadan cavalry, short lances set in holders, god-metal flails ready across the rider’s saddlebows. The horses wore no headgear, for they were guided by their sensing of their riders’ wills. They moved silently and with great precision and far more swiftly than the Vegan troops issuing from the city, who were mounted on scaly Vegan animals that had been mutated to grow armor and had thus sacrificed speed for virtual impervious-ness to attack.
    The Rhadans quickly established a defensive perimeter about the starship. At a command from Nevus, now stationed in the center of the circle, Rhadan engineers rolled forth two missile casters consisting of five oversized crossbows loaded with god-metal quarrels. These were emplaced ten meters on either side of the starship’s open portal.
    The commander of the Vegan warmen watched these hostile activities and made a tactical decision. He deployed his troops in attack columns, advanced them to within half a kilometer of the waiting Rhadans, and halted them there.
    His orders had been to take Kier of Rhada into his custody and escort him, without delay or public display, to the citadel. Clearly, this would now be impossible without a bloody encounter--and his orders did not cover this possibility. The Nyori had seen the starship landing, and they were gathering in great numbers about the wall, even pouring out onto the landing ground. Kier of Rhada was a great favorite among the people of Nyor; they remembered him as a trusted