His words were sincere, deeply earnest—deeply moving. Warm and secure in this underground haven, his belly filled with good Rilké fare and blood stirring with sharp wine, Raul listened sleepily to the Chieftain’s words. He was thinking of Jeanne d’Arc, and Boadicea of the Britons, who held out against the iron legions of Rome with a pitiful handful of wicker-work chariots and a band of loyal men, and also of Elizabeth Tudor who balanced her woman’s wit and empty purse against the world-shaking weight of Imperial Spain, with all the wealth of the Indies behind it.
Dreamily, he said, “… Should you be telling me all this? Of her hiding-place, and her plans, I mean?”
White teeth flashed in a frank smile.
“But why not, of honor! Since you are to join us, and be the Lord Shakar of all her force!”
“The war-leader . . . ?” Linton was jarred awake at the casual phrase. “So that’s the job you were going to offer me, eh? Well, I’ll need to do some thinkin’ about that, ere ever I accept… .”
A small red light flashed beside the door, and Sharl, who had been tensely awaiting it, relaxed.
“Think all you wish or need, kazar, but—of gentility—let us be gone from this place. The ship is waiting.”
“Ship? What ship?”
“The Kahani’s private space-yacht, kazar. To take us hence to Ophmar in the Rift.”
Linton came to his feet, swearing. “Now wait a minute, Sharl—I’m not jumping into anything with my eyes closed! I don’t know that I am at all interested in this lady’s fight —in fact, I am in the middle of a fight right now, to save my own name and honor, and can’t very well take on somebody’s else’s troubles, till I’ve cleared the board of my own—”
“But precisely, kazar! By now, Pertinax the Snake will have a warrant for your arrest and they will be searching the whole of Omphale City for you and your servant, and for myself as well, who aided in your escape. By now they have put two and three together—and made five of it. I am an agent of the Kahani. I aided you to escape. You are malcontent and insulter-of-officials and whipper-of-government- spies, and everything else the venomous imagination of Pertinax-Snake can think of—of course you are a traitor, and to be seized—or shot! Where can you go? What can you do—outlaw, exile, traitor? Where should you go, of honor, save to the planet of outlaws, and exiles, and traitors!”
“Aye, he’s got a point there, Commander,” Gundorm Varl muttered. “That sour-faced fella in green, the one I whipped, he won’t give y’ a chance to explain. Maybe we better jump while we got a ship waiting!”
“Yes … and the man behind him, that incompetent toad, Mather, won’t listen to an argument either,” Linton mused, fingering Asloth’s golden hilt grimly. “All right, Sharl. I’ll go with you. You offer me a haven, and I have naught else to do but accept.”
“Of honor, kazar, you will not regret it!”
“I’d better not,” Linton rasped, with all the insolent arrogance of a man pushed into a comer beyond human endurance, and aching to lash out at an enemy. “But I want one thing very clearly understood, between us two. I am not accepting the Kahani’s offer to become her Shakar and to lead her horde up against Valadon! There’s an Imperial Patrol garrison on Valadon, and I may be a traitor in name and repute, but I will not lead armed men against my own comrades. That’s definite.”
“It is understood, kazar! And agreed!”
“Understand this, then, as well, Chieftain. I will go with you to Ophmar, then, because I must go somewhere and have no other haven. But. If I decide not to join the Kahani— and I may very well decide not to—then I want it clearly understood that I will be granted safe and swift passage from the Rift to a planet of the Cluster that I will name later. This must be guaranteed me. In return, I vow on my honor never to reveal the planet upon which your Kahani is concealed from official search—not even if she wages war against my own people will I speak of her hiding-place.”
“Kazar, it is guaranteed. Even as you have stated it. Upon my name and the honor of my Clan—I vow it!” Sharl stood up and faced Linton eye to eye. And his voice rang with candor and frankness.
But something moved just below the surface of Raul’s mind—an intuition, perhaps, or merely an impulse. He slid Asloth from her scabbard and proffered her.
“Swear it upon this sword!”
Fire blazed in the yellow eyes—swiftly seen and just as swiftly concealed. He darted a keen, piercing look inquiringly at Linton. Then … a quiet smile.
“Kazar, of love, I swear. Upon thy sword!”
Gently he took the long blade from the terrestrial, kissed her gleaming steel just beyond the hilt where an old, worn sigil was graven in the clean cold metal—kissed Asloth reverently as if she were a Holy Relic—and returned her in salute-position. Raul slid the blade back into her scabbard.
“Then let’s get going.”
The ship had come down in a deep gully a few miles beyond the outskirts of the city. Raul was astounded, when he got a good look at the craft. He had expected—he knew not what, exactly, an old battered space-tramp, a converted freighter, something like that. But no.
She was a dream of a ship. Small, very compact, but sleek and trim and expensive. Easily worth 200,000 munits, if a single copper. Technically a Falcon-class speedster, Raul could see at a glance that she had been completely overhauled, with the addition of at least one set of dual drive-compensators, and fully equipped with the latest anti-detection gadgets from neutrino-leakage baffles to full 360° radar shields. She was a beauty. Until he spotted the shield-nodules along the sleek hull, Raul was puzzled how such a ship could land so close to the capital without being picked up on the scanners and raising an alarm; but the expensive, custom antiradar equipment answered his question. With such shielding, she could fly anywhere without being discovered.
Their pilot was a young, grinning Rilké boy who had seen cadet service with the Border Patrol. He wore a supple suede cloak, Border-fashion, over familiar gray space fatigues. He was an intelligent youth, Raul could see, and obviously in love with the Kahani’s delicious little yacht.
They entered swiftly and took their places in the tiny but beautifully-appointed little salon. It was paneled in rare incense-wood, with screens of native carving in the intricate and traditional geometrical patterns beloved by Rilké artisans. Everywhere Raul noted the sigil of the House of Valadon, a seven-pointed scarlet star with wavy rays: picked out in chip rubies on the center panel, and inset in stained glass in the epergne that stood as an ornamental centerpiece on the small dining taboret.
The imprint and token of the Kahani was all about them, as if her spirit hovered invisibly near. Like certain rare forceful men and women of extraordinary character, the essence of her personality seemed to permeate everything she touched … it was in the air, in the faint, lingering trace of candle- wood perfume which Raul intuitively guessed was her favorite scent … and in the furnishings, for he noted traces of a woman’s eye in the red-leather upholstery which contrasted boldly with the hues of the subtle lighting.