Orion Shall Rise Read Online Free PDF Page A

except for them and local generators here and there, the Domain had no electricity; metal for conductors was too costly. Most of the sun cells waited idle, against a day of war or of tempest.
    Now circuits closed, shutters opened, a tide of current flowed into the great accumulators and thence to the outsize lasers. Fiercer than lightning, the beams leaped off to battle.
    They were not random thrusts of wrath. Cool minds aimed them, guided by those data the Stormriders had snatched out of destruction’s self. Their energy was small compared to that which drove their target. Its intensity, focused on well-chosen spots, was something else.
    What Iern saw were firespears out of heaven. Air blazed and thundered around them. Where they struck the darkness, brilliance fountained. Without his goggles, he would have been blinded for at least a while, maybe for always. As was, his vision quickly filled with dazzle and he dared watch no longer.
    Again and again accumulators discharged and collectors refilled them. Some beams held steady, drilling, eroding; others flashed briefly, upsetting the balance at single places, turning the hurricane’s own force upon it. Pitiless, Skyholm stabbed, slashed,ripped, while Iern and his comrades fled.
    The struggle fell behind him, and he flew above a Franceterr darkling beneath stars. The aerostat still shone bright, catching rays of a sun he could no longer see, but would soon fade. He wondered if that would happen before the task was done.
    Incandescence winked out. Triumph bawled in his earphones: ‘That’s it! The pattern’s broken!’
    ‘Prediction?’ asked tones that remained dry. Iern recognized Colonel Tess.
    ‘Ah-h-h … a preliminary evaluation, madame. We’ve dissipated the fringes. The core continues active, but much reduced in force and veering northwest. Strong winds and heavy rains along the coast, trending north, for the next two or three days. But nothing disastrous, and further energy input would too likely drive the core against Eria.’
    ‘Which would be inhumane, as well as angering little countries that bid fair to become good trading partners of ours. Aye, we’ll let well enough alone. … Weather Command to all Stormriders, congratulations, thanks, and welcome back!’
    Iern flew on. At his altitude, on his left he glimpsed a piece of Brezh – Ar-Goat, not Ar-Mor, yet Brezh. A sudden wish to see his mother tugged at him.
    Skyholm rose and waxed in his view. With only starlight upon it, it was a moon vast but ashen, save where electric lamps sparkled. And now, also before him, the Loi River hove in sight, a silver thread looped across rich lowlands. He began his descent.
    3
    Originally Tournev was an outgrowth of Old Tours, some of its material quarried from abandoned parts of the latter. Folk settled thereabouts to get not simply protection, but the comforting nearness of Ileduciel. They rebuilt because most former structures were either fallen into ruin or had been taken over for the special uses of the Aerogens. They made it a distinct town because those early Clanspeople-to-be, few in numbers and badly overworked, did not want the day-to-day responsibility of governing it. Time passed, industrial plants wore out or grew obsolete; the easy and sensible thing was to start new ones in the thriving new city. By degrees, Tournev became the lower capital of the Domain, as Ileduciel wasthe higher. Old Tours was an enclave, a cluster of piously restored buildings where none but caretakers and shopkeepers lived and none but the curious visited.
    Nevertheless it was a romantic setting. Iern stood on a tower at twilight, a young woman by his side, and felt himself falling in love.
    The air held a chill, breath smoked, but hooded cloaks kept them warm and likewise did hand linked with hand. Beneath them lay roofs and darkened streets. Beyond, windows throughout Tournev were coming aglow, and gas lamps along the boulevards. Elsewhere lanterns bobbed like fireflies as