Tags:
Fiction,
General,
Science-Fiction,
adventure,
Fantasy fiction,
Space Opera,
Interplanetary voyages,
Life on other planets,
Women,
Space ships,
People With Disabilities,
Interplanetary voyages - Fiction,
Space ships - Fiction,
Women - Fiction
had run
hell-for-leather back toward their cavern, but Brannel was
still only a few meters away from Keffs body. Carialle read
his infrared signal and heartbeat: he was ten meters from
Keifs body. She opened a voice-link through IT and
routed it via the contact button.
"Brannel," she called, amplifying the small speaker as
much as she could without distortion. "Brannel, pick up
Keff. Bring Keff home." The IT blanked on the word
home. She spun through the vocabulary database looking
for an equivalent. "Bring Keff to Keffs cave, Brannel!" Her
voice rose toward hysteria. She flattened her tones and
increased endorphins and proteins to her nutrients to
counter the effects other agitation.
"Mage Keff?" Brannel asked. He raised his head cautiously from the shelter of his hiding place, fearing another
bolt from the mountains. "Keff speaks?"
Keff lay in a heap on the ground, mouth agape, eyes half
open with the white showing. Brannel, knowing that sometimes bolts continued to bum and crackle after the initial
lightning, kept a respectful distance.
"Bring Keff to Keffs cave," a disembodied voice
pleaded. A females voice it was, coming from underneath
the mages chin. Some kind of familiar spirit? Brannel
rocked back and forth, struggling with ambivalent desires.
Keff had been kind to him. He wanted to do the mages
wishes. He also wasn't going to put himself in danger for
the sake of one of Them whom the mage-bolts had struck
down. Was Keff Klemays successor and that was why he
had come to visit their farm holding? Only his right to succeed Klemay had just been challenged by the bolt.
Across the field, the silver cylinder dropped its ramp,
clearly awaiting the arrival of its master. Brannel looked
from the prone body at his feet to the mysterious mobile
stronghold. Stooping, he stared into Keffs eyes. A pulse
twitched faintly there. The mage was still alive,
if
unconscious.
"Bring Keff to Keffs cave," the voice said again, in a
crisp but persuasive tone. "Come, Brannel. Bring Keff."
"All right," Brannel said at last, his curiosity about the
silver cylinder overpowering his sense of caution. This
would be the first time he had been invited into a mages
stronghold. Who knew what wonders would open up to
him within Keffs tower?
Drawing one of the limp arms over his shoulder, Brannel hefted Keff and stood up. After years of hard work,
carrying the body of a man smaller than himself wasn't
much of an effort. It was also the first time he'd laid hands
on a mage. With a guilty thrill, he bore Keffs dead weight
toward the silver tower.
At the foot of the ramp, Brannel paused to watch the
smooth door withdraw upward with a quiet hiss. He stared
up at it, wondering what land of door opened without
hands to push it.
"Come, Brannel," the silky persuasive voice said from
the weight on his back.
Brannel obeyed. Under his rough, bare feet, the ramp
boomed hollowly. The air smelled different inside. As he
set foot over the threshold into the dim, narrow anteroom,
lights went on. The walls were smooth, like the surface of
unruffled water, meeting the ceiling and walls in perfect
comers. Such ideal workmanship aroused Brannels admiration. But what else would one expect from a mage? he
chided himself.
In front of him was a corridor. Narrow bands of bluish
light like the sun through clouds illuminated themselves.
Along the walls at Brannels eye level, orange-red bands
flickered into life, moving onward until they reached the
walls' end. The colored lights returned to the beginning
and waited.
"I follow thee. Is that right?" Brannel asked in mage-speak, cautiously stepping into the corridor.
"Come," the disembodied voice said in common Ozran
and the sound echoed all around him. Mage Keffwas certainly a powerful wizard to have a house that talked.
Carialle was relieved that Brannel hadn't been frightened by a disembodied voice or the sight of an
interplanetary ship. He was cautious, but she
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