The Navigator of Rhada by Robert Cham Gilman Page B

Brother Evart to open the valve, knowing as he did so that, of course, the underpriest could hear nothing of what was being said outside the starship.
    “Nav Kynan!” the officer called, galloping nearer. “You must come with us! We want the Auroran girl--”
    At this moment Kynan saw with a flash of hope that Evart, within the ship, was rising from the First Pilot’s place at the consoles. Had he recognized him on the field below--a Navigator beset by a company of horsemen? What in the Star’s name was delaying him?
    Kynan turned in the saddle to look at the flank of the ship. A single point of darkness appeared amid the whorls of light. Yes, Evart was dilating the entry valve!
    Kynan hurled a command at the silver mare, and she responded with a swiftness that almost unseated him. At an extended gallop, he circled around the line of warmen toward the edge of the field. Kynan signaled to Baltus and Janessa to follow and, without waiting to see if they complied, put his mare directly at the nearest soldier.
    The valve was opening, extending a ramp like a dark tongue. The lines of force surrounding the ship shimmered and gleamed. Kynan hoped with all his heart that neither Baltus nor the girl would hesitate. The lights were harmless, but they were ghostly and frightening to laymen.
    He shouted, “Make way, soldier! Make way!”
    The warman, disciplined and trained as most Rhadans, would respond only to his own officer. The silver mare collided with the warman’s mount: a thunderous, jarring impact. She was shrieking with savage pleasure, slashing with her tigerish teeth at her rival.
    Behind him, Kynan had a momentary impression of thudding pads, and Janessa and the warlock flashed by, heading for the open valve. Kynan saw the Rhad officer’s mount go down before Baltus’s charge, and then they were past him. He wheeled the mare to follow, but his adversary was too well trained to permit him to escape. The Rhad moved in beside him, still not drawing a weapon. He was a large young man, massive in the arms and shoulders. He threw himself across and carried Kynan to the wet grass.
    As they fell, they twisted, and Kynan landed with his weight across his would-be captor. The young warman’s breath came out in a whooshing grunt, and he lay stunned. Kynan leaped to his feet and began to run toward the open valve of the starship.
    But it was hopeless. On foot he would never make it. The soldiers were closing in on him as he saw the warlock’s charger carry him up the ramp and into the ship.
    Then he saw Skua, carrying Janessa, pause on the ramp, wheel, and come pounding back toward him. He had no time to protest, no time to do anything but ready himself to catch Janessa’s stirrup iron as the old war mare came thundering by. The impact felt as though it would tear his arms from their sockets, but he held on, his feet half dragging, half running. With a great effort he swung himself up on the mare’s boney rump and yelled for her to “Go!”
    Sides heaving with the effort, the ancient animal scrambled up the retracting ramp and into the diminishing circle of the valve.
    The hidden machines sighed behind them, and suddenly the sounds of the rain and the shouts of the frustrated warmen were shut off. Skua stood, head down, flanks heaving, on the floor plates of the entry port.
    Janessa and Kynan dismounted and stood, scarcely believing that they were safely aboard, as the humming sound of the ancient engines grew louder and a slight pressure against their feet told them that the starship was lifting, rising into the rainy atmosphere of Gonlan.
     
     

11
     
    Divide and rule.
    Political maxim attributed to Niccolo Machiavelli,
Dawn Age philosopher and soldier
     
    --we imagined that the terror of our weapons was such that men would never again seek to settle their differences in warfare. That we were wrong is proved by the civil wars that are now upon us.
    Late Golden Age microfilm fragment found in the ruins of Station One,