Allies of Antares Read Online Free PDF Page B

would send not enough forces to help in defense. We had done little for Hammansax. Prince Tyfar, we were told by the landlord of what had been The Jolly Vodrin — now a pile of rubble and burned timbers — had taken what the Empress Thyllis had left him of his army to a high pass in the mountains called the Jaws of Laca.
    “How do you know that for certain?” demanded Jaezila.
    She looked splendid, fierce and radiant and burning with anger and anxiety.
    The landlord, half of whose hair had burned away, wiped blistered hands gently on an ointment rag. He was Hamdal the Measure.
    Seg said, very gently, “He will know, Lela.”
    What Seg did not say, what I did not say, was that Jaezila would also know why a landlord of an inn popular with the soldiers would be aware of their orders. This is a fact of military life in certain quarters. Cautious generals must legislate against it by counter-cunning.
    “Where is the Lacachun?” asked Jaezila.
    Hamdal the Measure held up one blistered hand, pointing to the southwest. “Between the two tallest peaks within view from that peak, the Ivory Cone. You can’t miss it.”
    I said, “How many men did Prince Tyfar take?”
    Hamdal made a face, and winced. “Two regiments? I do not know. Perhaps more. A lord came asking these questions just before the wildmen attacked—”
    “Another lord?”
    “Aye, notor. Another great lord. He sought Prince Tyfar with great urgency — just as you do.”
    Seg looked across at me, questioning.
    “Thank you, Hamdal the Measure,” I said. “We must leave you. But help will reach you soon—”
    “Aye,” said the landlord. “Aye — too late, as usual.”
    We went back to our flier.
    “Another lord—” said Seg.
    “Prince Nedfar,” said Jaezila. “It must have been.”
    “Yes.” The coaming of the voller struck warm under my hands. “Probably.” The twin suns burned down. “Possibly. Let us hope that it was Prince Nedfar.”

Chapter three
    Concerning Shooting Wagers
    From the Ivory Cone the two distant peaks looked very much like the jaws of a dinosaur, head upturned, gaping at the sky. That was why they were called the Lacachun.
    “If they’ve crunched down on Ty—” Jaezila gripped the rail and her voice was unsteady. I did not touch her.
    “You know Tyfar.”
    “As I said — I do!”
    The Ivory Cone passed away to the side, sleek and pointed and shining white, with long gray falls between the snow slopes. We all wore thick flying furs. Our faces glowed, nipped by the chill. On we drove and we looked keenly ahead, ready to sight whatever of peril lay before us.
    This airboat — she had no name, only in the Hamalian way a number — carried us over the snow sheets and down past the saddle. We corkscrewed between sheer rock faces. A fear that we were entering a massif took hold of us and had to be resisted. We sped along over gulfs and soared up over slopes of scree and so whirled out again into space. We three were old campaigners. Not one of us even considered rising into the higher levels and simply flying over the top.
    We wished to arrive unseen and unheralded.
    The wildmen who had trapped the voller below were not so careful. These were their mountains and here they ruled.
    The situation was laid out for us as we hovered in the rock of a striated rock cliff. A ledge protruded from the crumbled rock face, perhaps halfway up from the stream below, a mere silver thread. The lip high above threw shadows over us. The wildmen circled and shot at the stranded airboat on the ledge. Others had alighted and crept up between boulders tumbled on the ledge. They approached from each end, yet they hesitated, and we saw shafts lifting from the airboat and the stones about her.
    “It is just a matter of time,” said Seg. He reached for the longbow that was never absent for long from his side.
    Jaezila had the controls.
    “Can you—?” Seg started to say, and then stopped. Jaezila deftly brought the voller in among the shadows