The Rebel of Rhada Read Online Free PDF Page B

the post go to him as a member of the Veg clan.
    Torquas had long ago decided he disliked all the members of the Veg family, Landro most of all. Mariana insisted Landro was wise and brave, but what really seemed to impress her most was that Landro was handsome. And, Torquas thought bleakly, too ambitious by half. He was enough Glamiss of Vyka’s son to sense that. One day, he told himself, I’ll challenge him to the Three Encounters with sword, flail, and dagger. It was a brave but futile thought. He knew it would never happen.
     
    He could hear a flurry of activity in the outer chamber, and he wondered if someone was actually coming to see him. He hoped it would be Mariana, or at least the troupe of actors she promised.
    He sat up and opened the curtains. Immediately, everyone in the room stood up. At first he had enjoyed making people do things of that sort. But now it only made him sulky because he knew he couldn’t really make them do anything at all. Only Mariana or Landro could do that.
    The fat Avaric said, “How may we serve you, King?”
    Torquas scratched his pale face and blinked at the light. The day was silvery gray, and it was cold in the large, uncomfortable room. He signaled for Lady No to bring him a bed jacket. When she had settled it over his narrow shoulders, he asked, “What was Orrin crying about?”
    The equerry blinked and stared sullenly at his sovereign. “It was nothing, sir,” Lady No said. “Lord Avaric took a sweet from him.”
    The Lord Chamberlain, who was fifteen and had a bad complexion from overeating, looked daggers at the governess.
    “You’re far too fat already, Avaric,” the Galacton said. “If you don’t stop eating so, I shall have to send you back to the Western Sea.” Avaric’s family held the Oahu Islands in the center of Earth’s great Western Ocean, an isolated estate that Avaric loathed for its warm weather, disturbing to his plump constitution.
    “What’s happening outside?” Torquas asked. “Has someone come to see me?”
    “Soldiers, sir,” Lady No said. “Warmen.”
    “Of course there are warmen there,” Torquas said impatiently. “There always are.”
    “But a great many, sir,” Avaric said. “A full squadron.”
    “Outside my door?” Torquas said curiously. “Open. Let me see.”
    Avaric signaled to one of the pages, and the boy swung the heavy god-metal door. The draft from the gallery made the tapestries sway. Beyond the doorway stood two ranks of Vegan Imperials in full war gear. Their gilded conical helmets bore the mark of Landro’s own division.
    Torquas swung his bare feet over the side of the high bed.
    “Oh, sir. You shouldn’t,” Lady Constans exclaimed. “The doctors said most distinctly that you should stay in bed.”
    Torquas ignored her and said, “Bring the squadron officer to me, Avaric.”
    The fat Lord Chamberlain retired and presently returned with a hard-faced young warman, who knelt at the Galacton’s bedside.
    “Leader,” he said, using the formal Vegan title. Torquas felt a twinge of irritation. Vegans were a gritty lot, always preferring their own out-land ways to the manners of Nyor.
    “What’s happening,” Torquas demanded. “Why is your squadron outside my door?”
    “Orders, Leader,” the warman said.
    “The Galacton is addressed as King,” Lady No said severely. “Or Lord, if you prefer. Never as Leader.”
    The warman turned cold eyes on the governess. “I am a Vegan, Lady,” he said.
    Torquas made a gesture of impatience. “Never mind all that. I want to know what is happening. Are we being attacked?” He half hoped that the answer would be yes. To be attacked would be exciting. Maybe he could lead his own division into battle and make Mariana proud. “Is there trouble, warman?”
    “A precaution, sir.”
    “I don’t understand. A precaution against what?”
    The courtiers in the room began to murmur amongst themselves. The squadron officer and the armed men in the gallery made them