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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..b96ffc0 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #65813 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/65813) diff --git a/old/65813-0.txt b/old/65813-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 72b695c..0000000 --- a/old/65813-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,3320 +0,0 @@ -The Project Gutenberg eBook of Citadel of the Star Lords, by Edmond -Hamilton - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and -most other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you -will have to check the laws of the country where you are located before -using this eBook. - -Title: Citadel of the Star Lords - -Author: Edmond Hamilton - -Release Date: July 9, 2021 [eBook #65813] - -Language: English - -Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed - Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net - -*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CITADEL OF THE STAR -LORDS *** - - - - - - CITADEL OF THE STAR LORDS - - By Edmond Hamilton - - Out of the dark vastness of the void came a - conquering horde, incredible and invincible, - with Earth's only weapon--a man from the past! - - [Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from - Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy - October 1956 - Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that - the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.] - - -As he gunned his plane northward through the night, Price thought of -the roller-coaster when he'd been a kid, of how you went faster and -faster until you hit the big plunge. - -Well, he was on the big plunge now. And what would end this -roller-coaster ride--prison, or escape, or a crash? It had to be one -of those. - -_He was to remember that, later. He was to think later that it was well -he didn't dream the fantastic fate he was really racing toward...._ - -He looked down, and there was only blackness. The deserts of California -and Nevada are dark and wide, and he was keeping well away from the -airways beacons and the main highways. - -He kept the Beechcraft as high as he could. He was flying without -lights, but with what they already had against him, that minor -infraction wasn't important. He kept looking back, expecting every -minute to see the red-and-green winglights of Border Patrol planes -coming up on his tail. - -If he was lucky, if he slipped them long enough, if he crossed north -without being sighted by the passenger planes that shuttled between Las -Vegas and Los Angeles, he might just make it to Bill Willerman's and -get the Beechcraft under cover. If--if--if-- - -There was another if, Price thought bitterly. If he'd had any brains, -he wouldn't be in this spot at all. - -He turned on the radio. He flipped the dial around, getting loud music -from a Vegas hotel, then a political speech, then more music--and then -a news broadcast. As he'd expected, he was at the top of the news. - -"--so that even while Arnolfo Ruiz, firebrand revolutionary exile, -is under arrest by Mexican police, United States authorities are -conducting an intensive air-dragnet search for the American pilot who -smuggled Ruiz across the border. That unknown pilot is known to have -returned across the border an hour ago, and police of three states have -been alerted. - -"The AEC announces that its next test will be that of an experimental -small new H-bomb whose effects will be studied for--" - -Price savagely cut the radio. He damned the announcer, and Ruiz, and -himself. Most of all, himself. - -He'd acted like a halfwit. Because a smooth talker had given him -a phony story about a secret business trip, he had smuggled the -most dangerous trouble-maker in the hemisphere down into a friendly -republic. Who would believe he hadn't known? He _had_ done it, and -pressure from Washington would make sure that he got full pay for his -folly. - -He might as well look the truth in the face. If it hadn't been this, -it would have been something else. He'd been playing the fool for -years, ever since Korea. Other fliers had come home from there and -taken up their jobs again, but a job had been too dull for him; he'd -drifted along with the fast-buck fly-boys out for fun and excitement, -hauling hunting and fishing parties, spending the profits in bordertown -bars, going broke and starting over again--and now finally this. His -roller-coaster ride was about over. - -It would be over for good if he didn't reach Willerman's ranch before -daylight. Bill would hide the plane for him. He'd saved Bill's neck a -couple of times in the old days, and he could depend on him. But he had -to reach him, first. - -He saw the glow in the sky that came from the lights of Las Vegas, and -he kept warily wide of it. He looked back again. No Patrol planes yet. -As he rushed on, Price began to feel that he was going to make it. - -Then, suddenly and disastrously, everything happened at once. - -He saw lights on the ground ahead--an oddly scattered pattern of lights -too thin to be a town, too wide-spread to be a ranch. - -At the same moment, two fast jets screamed down from the upper darkness -and nearly tore his wings off. They curved around for another pass at -him. - -"Air Force planes!" thought Price. "Hell, that tears it--" - -It seemed crazy that the government was _that_ hot to catch him. But -the jets were making another lightning pass to him, trying to scare -him, to force him down. - -He had less than a chance in a million to lose them, and he knew it. -But he was going to be a long time in jail, and he might as well give -them a run for it. Just possibly, the slower Beechcraft could get away -in the dark the next time they overshot him. - -He gunned the plane wide open, rushing high over the scattered lights. -And then, incredibly, he was free of his pursuers. He looked over his -shoulder and saw them drawing back. - -It didn't make sense. Why would they suddenly draw back? Anyway, with -those jets off his tail, he still had a chance. - -Price looked down. Among the lights down there he saw lights on a queer -steel tower. He'd seen pictures of a tower like that somewhere. It -wasn't an oil-rig, but something he couldn't remember. - -And then, suddenly, he remembered, and a terrible coldness choked him -and his flesh flinched as he saw a door into nightmare opening. - -That tower, and the announcement of a new H-bomb test, and the distance -he was from Vegas, and the way those frantic jets had drawn back.... - -"Oh, no," said Price. "Oh, no, oh no, oh no--" - -He was still saying it when the bomb went off and the universe cracked -wide open under his racing plane. - - - - - CHAPTER II - - -The cataclysm that hit Price was without light or sound. That, when he -thought of it later, was the most awful feature of it. - -He felt a shock, but not the shock of ultimate annihilation he -expected. This was a shuddering impact as of the plane, himself, -hitting some barrier and forcing through, a rending, tearing, dizzying -thing that was like no sensation he had ever experienced. - -He yelled, naked terror forcing the air from his lungs. His weight -flung against the straps, and he knew from that that the plane was in -a spin. Mechanically, his hands reached to the controls. He levelled -off.... - -_But he wasn't dead. He was alive, undestroyed, and how could that be -if the raving energies of a hydrogen bomb had been unloosed beneath -him?_ - -Price's mind was a mad turmoil. What had happened? - -He had blundered right over the bomb test-area, right over the -bomb-tower. And the jets guarding the area had tried to stop him. -Probably, if his radio hadn't been off, he would have heard them -screaming frantic warnings to him. - -But had the bomb really gone off? If it had, he would surely have been -instantly annihilated. - -He hadn't been. He was alive. The plane was ticking along through the -night. The instruments functioned. - -But _something_ terrific had happened. That ghastly, wrenching shock -that had seemed to outrage the very atoms of his body--his flesh still -crawled with the memory of it. Something had happened. But what? - -Price couldn't think. The mind just could not grapple with a thing like -this. He sat, mechanically touching the controls, and the Beechcraft -roared on and on. - -Gradually, his mind came alive. He shakily swung the plane around. He -was going back to Las Vegas. Right now, arrest and prison looked good -to him compared to what had happened, or nearly happened. - -If he hadn't been so tensely trying to escape, he thought, he would -have remembered about the bomb-tests coming up. There had been -newspaper stories. Guarded stories about a radical physical effect -detected during explosions of the new-type H-bombs, and mention of -elaborate preparations being made to study these unusual effects. - -Price's thoughts leaped suddenly. He recalled a scientist's statement -that the center of explosion of the new-type bomb might be like the -eye of a hurricane, a focus of inconceivable forces but affected in a -radically different way by those forces. - -_Had_ the bomb gone off under him, then? Had his plane and himself, -at the "eye" of the tremendous explosion, been hurled somehow through -spatial barriers into safety before the light and sound and destruction -could even reach him? - -It seemed an insane speculation. Yet everything about this was insane. -He would be himself, if he didn't get down to Earth soon. - -He could not see the glow of Las Vegas anywhere in the night. He cut -his radio in and spoke hoarsely into it. - -"Beechcraft 4556 calling Las Vegas Airport! Come in, Las Vegas!" - -There was no answer. The radio seemed operative--but when he turned the -receiver dials, not a sound came out. - -"Knocked out," Price muttered. "And no wonder, if--" - -He couldn't finish the thought, it was too soul-shaking a thing to -speculate on, the thing that might have happened to him. - -He curved the plane around, looking for highway lights, for an airways -beacon, anything. - -Nothing. Nothing but the darkness and the stars. - - * * * * * - -A little frantically, he swung the plane around and started eastward -again. He must have missed Las Vegas. But if he kept going east, he'd -surely cut the main highways. There were always lots of cars on them at -night, in the summer. - -He flew on and on. And the darkness continued. No lights at all, not -even the glimmer from a lonely ranch. - -Nothing. - -He would have landed, gladly now, but he did not know where he was or -what was under him. The Beechcraft was equipped with extra fuel tanks -for long flights away from any source of supply, and they had been full -when he started. He could fly a long time yet. - -He flew. - -After a while he began to think that there was only one explanation. He -was dead, and flying in limbo. - -And limbo, it seemed, went on forever. - -Finally, after many hours there began to be a light in the blackness -ahead of him, and his heart leaped up, thinking that at last he had -raised the glow of a big town. But it was only the dawn. He watched it -creep cold and gray across the world, and now he understood that he was -alive. But he was not cheered. Now he could see what was underneath him. - -Forest. Rolling like a dark green sea from north to south, from east -to west. He had left the desert far behind. He figured that he was -over Missouri now, and there should have been towns, villages, farms, -cultivated fields. - -There was forest. - -The light turned rosy, then golden. The sun sprang up and it was day. -Far ahead the Mississippi gleamed. Price sent the Beechcraft at full -throttle, toward St. Louis. He could not see any smoke from the great -complex of city and industry that sprawled there over both banks of the -river, and he could not see any bridges. But St. Louis had to be there. - -It was. But it had changed since he saw it last. The high buildings -were brought low, and the low buildings were mounds, shells covered -with brush and fox-grape, and trees grew in the public streets and -through the broken windows. The river, vast and placid, was empty -except for a floating log. Obstructions along the shores might once -have been docks, but were so no longer. And there was a great stillness. - -For one wild moment Price thought, _The bomb did it last night, the -new-type bomb with energies they didn't even dream about._ Then he -realized that that was hardly possible. You can destroy a city with an -H-bomb in a matter of seconds, but you can't grow an oak tree sixty -feet high in the rubble of the City Hall in much under a century. - -Time had passed since last night. - -This was too much to take in all at once. Price didn't even try. He -looked for a place to land, but there wasn't any, so he kept on flying, -eastward across the river. - -Time had passed, and he had passed with it. Slowly it began to come -to Price, the dreadful and incredible truth of what had happened. The -wrenching, tearing shock he had felt in the eye of the blast was not -physical but temporal. The uncomprehended powers of the bomb had been -mightier than anyone had guessed. They warped the ordered fabric of the -space-time continuum itself, and acting on the matter of himself and -his plane at the "eye" of the explosion, had warped them too--into the -future. - -The Beechcraft went droning through the empty sky. Price looked down -on desolation, green and peaceful and as unproductive as it had been -before men ever came with axe and plow to tame it. - -How far in the future? - -He did not know. - -Were there still men, surviving somewhere in this wilderness? Or had -humanity destroyed itself in a final act of atomic madness? Were all -the cities dead and dust? - -He did not know that either. - -He only knew that he was too numb and exhausted to go much farther. He -had to have water and food and sleep. He had to have a place to land. - - * * * * * - -He found it well beyond the river, a natural prairie in the midst of -trees. He tried to gauge the way the wind was blowing by the ripple of -the grass, and then he circled in a long curve to the north to head -it. As he did so he thought he saw an iron glinting to the northeast, -something very vast and strange as of the sun reflecting from a face of -metal mountain-high and wide. Then he dropped low over the tree-tops, -and whatever the glinting was he could not see it any more. - -The Beechcraft bumped and bounded to a stop. Price sat for a moment -watching his hands shake on the controls, and then some last measure -of caution made him taxi the plane back, to the extreme edge of the -prairie and nose it into the wind, ready to take off again with no -delay. - -He had a sporting rifle and revolver in the plane. He buckled on the -revolver, stuffed his pockets full of cartridges for the rifle, and -climbed down to the ground. He stood for several minutes in the shelter -of the plane's wing, looking around, but he could not see any signs of -life except a pair of crows flapping over his head with rusty cawing. -It was late summer, and the wind was dry and hot. He began to walk -toward the woods. - -He looked a little dazedly, as he walked, toward the northeast. What -was it, the incredible iron vastness he had glimpsed far away there? - -About thirty yards from the plane Price stopped suddenly, his heart -pounding and a sudden sweat breaking on his skin. The grass was -trampled here in an irregular circle, with scars of bare earth ripped -in the ground. There was a large quantity of blood, scarcely dry. A -wide flattened track led to the woods. Something had been killed here, -something big, like a horse or a cow, and the carcass dragged in among -the trees. - -Men. Hunters. An animal would have devoured its kill where it lay. - -But what kind of men? - -Price stood half crouched over the bloody ground, his rifle ready, -looking this way and that and seeing nothing. The hot wind went running -over the prairie and the encircling trees bowed to it and tossed their -branches, but there was no other motion, no other sound. Even the crows -had gone. - -Price shouted. "Hello! Hello! Is anybody there? I'm lost. I need help. -Hello!" - -His voice was shocking in the stillness, loud and impolite. - -There was no answer. - -He went on down the flattened track toward the trees. He was afraid, -and desperately tired. - -"Hello?" he said, and now his voice was pleading. "Please. Where are -you? Help me--" - -_Help me, you men of an unknown future, you hunters in impossibility, -you lurkers in nightmare. Help me, or I die._ - -The shadows were heavy under the trees. The prairie grass did not grow -here, but there were briars and other things to show a crushed trail. -It was not a long one. He saw the carcass lying in a little glade. -It was a black-and-white cow, already partially butchered. He moved -toward it, and then from the branches overhead and the underbrush on -either side short ropes of braided leather came flying, weighted at -their ends with stones. Price fell down helpless and floundering, -painfully bruised, his arms and legs wrapped in the tough bolo-like -ropes, and one around his neck cutting off his breath so he could not -even cry out. - -In a swift and furious rush six men sprang from among the trees and -stood about him. One snatched his rifle, another his revolver. They -wore sketchy garments of tanned leather, and they were as dark and wild -as the Shawnees and Wyandots who had hunted these woodland prairies -long ago, except that some of them had light hair and all of them were -bearded. - -One of them, a tall lean wide-shouldered man with a shock of -sun-bleached brown hair and eyes more blue, more blazing and filled -with hate than any Price could remember seeing in his life, crouched -beside him and tore the strangling rope ungently from his neck. Price -tried to speak, but before he could do more than gasp for breath the -brown-haired man whipped out a knife and drove the point of it straight -for Price's throat. - -"Now," he said, "you star-spawn--we'll see if your blood is any redder -than the kind we breed on Earth!" - -The steel bit hard. Price screamed. - - - - - CHAPTER III - - -The brown-haired man withdrew the knife with a nice dexterity, its tip -reddened for perhaps a quarter of an inch. Price looked at it and at -him in dumb horror. The six wolfish faces collected in a close circle -above him and peered down, smiling. - -"It's the same color, Burr. Who'd have thought it?" - -"Just blood. Hah! And I always thought they'd bleed hard and shiny, -like quicksilver." - -"Stick him again, Burr." - -"I wish we had time," said Burr, and licked his lips with a red tongue. -"But they know where we are." He sighed and raised the knife again. "We -got to get out of here. Fast." - -Price found his voice. "For God's sake," he cried. "For God's sake, -what are you doing? I ask you for help, and you--" He struggled -furiously against the ropes. "You haven't any right to kill me. I -haven't done you any harm." - -"Star-spawn," said Burr softly, using that word for the second time. He -prodded Price above the belt with the knife-point. "If I had time I'd -do this slowly, very slowly. Be glad we don't have time." - -"But why?" Price shouted. "What for?" He glared up at the circle of -hairy faces. "I only got here today. I couldn't have done anything to -you. I came from--" - -_From yesterday? A hundred years ago? Through time? Tell them, and ask -them to believe it. Maybe they will. I don't._ - -"--from the West," he said. "From Nevada. I haven't anything to do with -stars." - -Burr laughed. He raised the knife. But another man, with a shrewd dark -eye and gray hairs in his beard, caught his wrist. - -"Wait a minute. Look at his hair. It's as dark as mine." - -"Dyed," said Burr. "Look at his clothes. Look at the flier he came in, -at his weapons. Look where he is--in the Forbidden Belt. If he isn't -from the Citadel--don't be a foolish man, Twist. Let go." - -"Why would he dye his hair to look like a human and then come to us in -a flier? Is that reasonable? Now hold on, Burr. You hear me? There's a -way to tell." - -Burr grumbled, but he relaxed, and Twist let him go. He caught Price by -the collar and dragged him into the glade by the butchered cow, where -the sunlight fell in strong shafts. Then he rolled Price's head back -and forth, studying it with intense interest. The others looked over -his shoulder. - -"His eyes are dark too," said Twist. "You can't dye eyeballs. And look -here. See that, Burr? Feel it. He's got the sproutings of a beard. Now -we all know the Starlords don't grow hair on their lovely faces." - -"Hey," said the others. "That's right. Twist is right." - -"Of course he's right," said Price. "I'm human." He knew that much. The -rest of the talk was a mystery, but that didn't matter. Not right now. -"I come from the West. I'm a friend." - -Burr looked sullen. "Humans don't fly. Only Starlords do that." - -"Maybe he's a collaborator?" said a yellow-haired boy, all bright and -eager, and Burr smiled again. - -"Maybe. Anyway, he's none of us. Stand by, Twist." - -But Twist did not stand by. He faced the others in fatherly anger at -their stupidity. - -"You're almighty anxious for a killing Burr. Now what's the Chief going -to say when we come back and tell him that a human man came in an -airplane, and asked us for help, and we stuck him like a pig and left -the plane for the Star Lords?" - -For some reason the word "plane" sobered them down and made them -thoughtful. Twist pressed his advantage. - -"You've all seen the old pictures. You know this flier isn't from the -Citadel. It ain't the same shape and it don't make the same noise. It's -a plane. Maybe the last one on Earth, and this man knows how to fly it. -And you want to cut his throat?" - -There was a short silence, during which Price thought he could hear the -drops of sweat trickling down his forehead. Then Burr said, without -rancor, - -"I guess you're right. We'd better take him to the Chief." - -"All right," said Twist. He crouched down and began unwrapping the -bolo ropes. Price said, "Thanks." It seemed a very small word, and -inadequate. Twist grunted. - -"If you prove out to be a collaborator," he said, "you'll wish I'd let -you die an easy death." - -"I'm not," said Price. His brain had been working with abnormal speed. -"This is an--an _old_ plane. The papers are still in it. It's been -kept hidden, except--" He groped desperately for explanations. "It's a -tradition in my family to fly. We're taught, father to son." - -That was true enough. Price's father had taken to the air in World War -I, and for years afterward had run a flying service. The rest of it he -had to play by ear, and God help him if he guessed wrong. - - * * * * * - -Twist helped him to his feet. "Now," he said to the others, "I want to -know what about that plane." - -"Get it under cover," Burr said. "Hide it." - -"We might do that," Twist said. "And the first flying-eye that happened -along would find it. They do more than see, you know. They smell, too. -They smell metal, if it's much bigger than a knife." He held out the -stone-weighted ropes and shook them. "That's why we use these when we -hunt in the Belt. Remember?" - -"Now, there's no call to be jeering, Twist," said Burr. "If you got a -better idea, we'll listen to it." - -"Fly it out," said Twist sharply. "How else are we going to get it -to the Chief? On our backs? Cut up and packed on the horses? No." He -turned to the man who had taken Price's pistol. "Give me that, Larkin. -And you, Harper, hand that rifle to Burr. Larkin, you're in charge of -the party. Get the beef back to the camp, and as soon as you've smoked -it load up and head home. Keep an eye out for trouble--this is liable -to poke up the Citadel like you'd poke a beehive." - -Larkin, a short powerful man with a curly poll like a certain type of -bull Price had once seen, asked in a mild high voice, "Where are you -and Burr going?" - -Twist pointed a thumb sky-ward. "Up there," he said, and his eyes shone -with excitement. He looked at Burr and grinned. - -Burr was scared. It showed in his eyes, in the way his mouth tightened. -But he wouldn't say so. Instead he reached out and grabbed Price by the -shirt and shook him fiercely. - -"There'll be a gun at your head every minute, and don't you forget. You -do anything wrong, and you're dead." - -Price forebore to explain what would happen to Burr and Twist if they -shot him in mid-air. He only nodded and said, - -"Don't worry. I'm as anxious to get to your Chief as you are." He took -a deep breath and plunged. "That's what I came for." - -Burr said, "You're a long way out of your way." - -"This is new country to me. I got lost." - -_You don't know how lost. You don't know how alone._ - -"Come on," said Twist. "There's been too much yattering already." - -He led the way back to the edge of the trees. Price and Burr followed -him. The others were already working on the carcass. Presently they -were hidden from sight. At the verge of the prairies the three men -stopped and examined the visible world before they left cover. Price -looked around and did not see anything and was ready to go on. Burr -and Twist not only looked at earth and sky, they sniffed the wind and -seemed to _feel_ the quality of the air, like animals. - -Twist gave a kind of shrug and said, "Well, we're in it now, whole -hog." He began to run through the long grass toward the plane. Burr -went fleetly after him. Price, oppressed with many things of which -physical exhaustion was the least, ran heavily behind them. - -When they were within perhaps fifteen feet of the plane a glittering -thing came over the tops of the trees and hesitated, making a couple -of short spirals in the air. Then it centered over the plane and hung -there, high above. It was a disc-shaped object maybe three feet across, -with a big lens on its underside. - -Twist and Burr had stopped. Price came panting up to them. They were -looking up at the disc, and Price saw in their faces a wild mingling of -rage and hate and the despairing fear of men faced with an enemy that -no amount of bravery or physical strength can prevail against. - -"What is it?" he asked, and Twist said hoarsely, - -"You must be from a long way west if you've never seen a flying-eye." -His hands dropped to his sides. "Well. That's finished." - -Burr began to curse at the thing. He looked as if he wanted to cry. - -"What will it do?" asked Price. - -"It'll hang there, right where it is, to guide the fliers from the -Citadel. They can see us here where we stand, right now, in the -Citadel." Burr's face was getting whiter by the second, like a man who -has been stung by some venomous thing and realizes that in this present -moment, between strides as it were, he must die. "They'll be starting. -It's forbidden to come into the Belt. They'd kill us for that alone. -But with the plane--God knows what they'll do." - -"We can try and dodge them in the woods," said Twist, without hope. -"Come on." - -He started away, but Price said, "Can't we outfly it?" - -"The flying-eye? It'll follow us like a hungry hound." - -Some kind of television-scanner, Price thought, with a metal-detection -unit and a signal relay to alert the main control in the Citadel. And -what was the Citadel, and who or what within it was now watching him as -he stood, and preparing for his death? - -He said, catching the sudden terror from the others, "Shoot it down." - -"Shoot it?" - -"Smash the lens. Then it can't see us. Here, give me the rifle." - -Burr said, "You crazy? No gun will carry that far." - -"What kind of guns have you got?" said Price. "Damn it, give me the -rifle." - -Twist said, "Let him have it." - - * * * * * - -Price was a good shot. Not brilliant, just good. But today he was -phenomenal. He blasted the lens and whatever insides there were behind -it as fast as he could pump the cartridges into the chamber and fire -them. He didn't miss once. And the disc flopped and slipped and crashed -down sideways in the woods. - -Price leaped for the plane. "Come on," he said. - -The others were staring at him, with their jaws hanging open. "Did you -see that? Did you see that _gun_?" - -"Come on," Price yelled, "or I'm going without you!" - -They tumbled in. Price started the motor, gunned it savagely, and took -off as though the devil was on his tail. One of the men, he didn't know -which, yelled out in sheer fright, once. Then they were clear of the -tree-tops and climbing fast. - -Price looked over his shoulder, and once again he thought he saw that -dark metallic gleaming in the northeast. - -"Which way?" - -"Back across the river. And then," said Twist slowly, "I don't know. -They've seen the plane. They'll come looking for it, and the first -place they'll look is the Capitol, and after that the villages. They'll -find it if it's anywhere near, and you can figure what they'll do to -the people. They let us have our guns and our hunting knives, so we can -kill game and even each other if we feel like it, but artillery, no. -Explosives, no. And planes, no, no, no. Especially not planes. I don't -suppose there's been one in the air for almost a century." - -Twist shivered, his eyes shining, his hands gripping the seat. - -"I'm glad I got to do this before I die. It's--" He fumbled for a word -and gave up. "I can't say. But it makes you think what we were once, -what we could have been today if it hadn't been for _them_." And he -jerked his head back to indicate the direction of the Citadel. "The -star-spawn. The damned Star Lords." - -Burr looked out the cabin window. "It's an awful long way down." Then -he asked Price, "Why'd you say you came to find the Chief?" - -A suspicious man, Price thought, and so is Twist. Careful, careful. -But how can you be careful when you don't know what's going on in the -world, and you don't dare ask? - -Price said, "I came to give him the plane. I'm the last of my family. I -wanted to join up with somebody, and--there aren't many in the desert." -This, he thought, was a safe assumption. "Life's too hard. I wanted to -come where there are trees and water." - -It was a good story. He didn't know whether they believed it. - -The Beechcraft left a fleeting shadow on the river and passed on. Twist -peered anxiously into the sky behind. - -"Can you go any faster?" - -"I'm wide open now." - -"Not fast enough. They come like lightning. _Whoom!_" Jets, thought -Price, and began to look for a hole in the forest. Twist said, "And if -they don't find us the first time, they'll send the flying-eyes." - -"And they can smell metal," Price said. "So we've got to find a place -away from any town and not only out of sight from above but also -screened from a magnetic detector. Say in a cave, under a rock ledge, -or close to some heavy concentration of metal they're already used to. -Can you think of any place?" - -There was a total silence, and he realized that they were looking at -him with cold and bitter eyes. - -"How do you know so much?" asked Burr. - -"Isn't it obvious?" said Price impatiently. - -"Not to us. What's all this about magnetic detectors and screens--and -where did you learn it if you're not working for the Citadel?" - -Twist laid the muzzle of the revolver casually against his neck. - -"I wouldn't shoot me now," said Price, and explained why, very quickly. -"Besides, that's a hell of a way to act. Just because I happen to know -a little elementary science--how else do you suppose the flying-eyes -find metal? By some supernatural method?" - -"Hm," said Twist, and withdrew the revolver. "Maybe he's right, Burr. -After all, we're hunters. We never studied much into those things." -Burr grunted derisively, but he sat still, apparently convinced that -there was nothing to be done about Price now. Twist thought hard for a -minute. Then he said, "I know a place. There's a kind of a secret cave -there, and room enough for you to land, I guess, figuring by what you -took before." - -He squinted out the window, confused by the differentness of how things -looked from above. But finally he picked out a direction and told -Price, "There." - -After some low-level circling and searching Price found the place, -a fairly flat stretch of bottomland in a little valley, beside an -overhanging wall of granite. Twist's estimate of the room was hardly -generous, but he made it, and taxied over bumpy sod as close as he -could to the cave-mouth Twist pointed out. Then he sent the others to -clear away some rocks and dangling creepers, and with a final heave and -roar he managed to lurch into the cave itself. He cut the motor. He had -about four hours' flying time left in the tanks. - -He got out of the Beechcraft and dragged stones under the wheels to -chock it. Then he helped Burr and Twist rearrange the hanging vines -over the entrance. - -A high shrill screaming in the sky gave them less than ten seconds' -warning. They ducked back under the overhanging ledge and peered -motionless from under it. And Price saw close above him, skimming the -rolling land like an eager hawk, an ovoid craft that was not like any -jet he had ever seen, wingless, leaving no trail, but tearing with a -mighty shriek of power through the sky. - - - - - CHAPTER IV - - -Trapped in a strange dream, Price looked down from the forested ridge -into a shallow green valley. Burr pointed and said, - -"There it is. The Capitol of the Missouris." - -He said it with pride. He and Twist had talked of this place, in the -two days since they had hidden the plane and headed north. And they had -talked of it proudly. Their home, the city of their people, the focus -of a shadowy government that ruled the forest-lands which once had been -two great states. - -Price looked at it, and he felt pity. Pity, and a wrenching regret for -what the world had once been, and what it had become during the lost -years. - -In the valley, straddling a clear little river, lay a half-dozen -streets of wooden houses and workshops and smithies. The buildings -were neat enough, of massive squared timbers. But the streets were -unpaved and dusty, and their only traffic was loaded wagons from the -surrounding tilled lands, and pack-horse trains from the forest trails, -and men, women, children in drab leather and wool. A faint sound of -creaking axles drifted up through the drowsy afternoon air. - -"The Capitol of the Missouris," Price thought. "And oh God, why did it -have to happen to our world?" - -He had listened, on the way here, to everything Burr and Twist said. -Bit by bit, the jigsaw fragments of information had fallen into place, -and a few casual questions had completed the apocalyptic picture. - -It had happened long ago in the lost years, the years that Price had -been hurled _through_. As near as he could make out the date had been -1979, sixty years ago. - -That had been the year of doom. That had been the year when they had -first come from outer space. - -The Star Lords. The Vurna, as they called themselves. The accursed -star-spawn, as men called them. Their tremendous cruisers had come out -of the blue, had poised above the Earth, and then had struck. - -Every city, every big town, every atomic power-plant, every arsenal, -every important bridge, viaduct, dam and factory. In one week of -holocaust, they had been smashed by the remorseless cruisers that went -round and round the planet. Millions died, that week. And the Star -Lords' cruisers went away. - -Quickly, they had returned. This time, not to destroy but to seize. -What had been the fat, smiling lands of Illinois and Indiana, they had -made their domain. In it, they built their Citadel. - -The Citadel was a fortress, a city, above all, a base. The Star Lords -contemptuously refrained from attacking the dazed Earth peoples who -had been thrown back to near-primitive conditions. To the lords of the -Citadel, Earth was only the site of an important base. Or so they said. - -Was it any wonder, Price thought, that these men of the Missouris would -kill anyone, anything, from the Citadel? Just hearing of it all had -kindled his own rage. These men's fathers had lived it, and they were -still living it. - -He looked down at the wooden town, as he and Burr and Twist went down a -trail, and he thought, - -"Careful, though! They still think I _may_ be from the Citadel--Watch -every word!" - -Two hours later, Price sat in a wooden-walled room in the biggest of -the houses, facing the Chief of the Missouris. - -His name was Sawyer, and he was old. But he looked formidable as an -old panther in his buckskins. His leathery face held deep pride, -intelligence, and a brutal ruthlessness. Behind him stood the Chiefs -of the Indianas and of the Illinois, those scattered peoples on whose -lands the Citadel now stood. - - * * * * * - -Sawyer listened without a word to Price's story, and all the time Price -told it he thought how thin and far-fetched it sounded. But, looking at -these faces, he knew he could never convince them of the truth. - -"Two days ago," said Sawyer finally, "the Vurna were here. They were -almighty hot and bothered. They were looking for a plane. _I_ never saw -a plane in my life, and I said so." - -He paused, his swarthy, wrinkled face brooding, and no one, least of -all Price, dared speak. - -He went on. "Since then, the sky's been lousy with their flying-eyes, -hunting and hunting. You must have seen them." - -Burr took that as an opening. "We did. We kept ducking them, all the -way." - -Sawyer looked out the doorway at the dusty, sunlit street and then back -again to Price and he said with sudden blazing fierceness, - -"You tell me you heard of us Missouris way out in your mountains, that -you wanted to bring your plane to us--why?" - -Price floundered. "Why, I wanted to help you--" - -"_To help us do what?_" A garnet light was in the old man's eyes now. -"What did you hear we were doing that you wanted to help on?" - -Price sensed from the other's fierceness that he was in imminent -danger, that something he had said had deepened suspicion. - -He almost welcomed the interruption that saved him from answering now, -though it was a sound that raised the short hairs on his neck. - -The sound of shrieking power across the sky, the sound of the -sky-hunters from the Citadel.... - -"That's the damned star-spawn coming down here again!" said one of the -men behind Sawyer. - -The old man got to his feet with amazing alacrity. He rapped an order -to Twist and Burr, pointing to Price. - -"Take him upstairs. If he makes a peep, cut his throat--but do it -quiet." - -Little more than a minute later, Price was in a hot, dusty little room. -It had gun-slots in its heavy wooden shutters, and they let level bars -of golden light into the room. - -He heard the whine of the flier, coming down fast. He went to the -gun-slot. - -"No," said Burr. - -Price turned and looked at him. He kept his voice low. "The hell with -you," he said. "You can stand behind me with your knife. I'm not going -to yell. But I'm going to see." - -He heard Burr and Twist come up close behind him, as he peered out the -wide slot. - -Out in the green square, a white craft marked with a curious insigne -was making a vertical landing. He thought it was a type of aerodyne. -He had never seen one in flight, back in that strangely far-off and -quickly-fading time from which he had come, but he had seen sketches -and a working model. This seemed to be a refinement of the same -principle, faster than a jet and maneuverable as a toy balloon. His -hands itched to fly it. - -He saw the insigne on its side--a golden sunburst with what looked like -a many-colored, many-faceted globe at its heart. He did not know what -it signified but he knew what it was. The mark of the Star Lords, of -the Vurna. And even as he looked, four of them came out of the craft. - -They came along the street to where Sawyer and the other Chiefs and a -little crowd of leather-clad men silently waited. No one had a gun, no -one made a motion. Yet that dusty street was electric with a hatred so -deep and strong and quivering that it made Price shiver. - -Yet the four Vurna came straight on. The Star Lords, they from -unguessable spaces who had smashed Earth like a child's toy, to make it -their footstool. Price pressed closer to the gun-slot. He wanted to see -them very clearly indeed. - -Especially one of them. - - * * * * * - -The star lords were tall and well-formed, and they looked much like -Earthmen except that they wore tight-fitting garments of various -colors, but all cut to the same pattern. Price guessed that they were -uniforms, with the colors indicating rank or branch. The other chief -difference was the coloring of the Star Lords themselves. They were -bronzed as though by radiations fiercer than any known on Earth, and -their hair was silver. Not white, and not pallid, but a rich silver. -The men--three of the four were men--wore their hair short. - -The woman wore hers long, rippling onto her shoulders. It caught the -sunset light and gleamed like hot metal. Her uniform was a deep -crimson, duskier than flame, molding her long thighs and her high, -just-full-enough breasts. - -Sawyer was speaking to them now, his voice rolling out harshly in the -silence. "If you're still hunting for that plane, my answer's the same. -I've never seen one." - -One of the Vurna men, who seemed to have the authority, stepped a pace -in front of the other two men and the woman. - -The woman had raised her head and was looking restlessly at the blank -or shuttered windows of the timber houses. Price felt uneasily that -she knew he was there and was looking at him through the gun-slot. But -that, of course, was ridiculous. - -"Sawyer, listen to me," said the man of the Vurna. He spoke clear -but stilted English, with strong tones of some alien tongue in its -unaccustomed rhythms. He wore a black uniform with a small gold -sunburst at the collar. It was impossible to guess his age. And while -he kept his voice quiet and his manner calm, there was anger in him. - -There was anger in Price too, a deep rage growing in him as he looked -at the men and the woman who stood here like conquerors on the planet -they had ruined, indifferent to the hatred they faced. - -"Here is no time and no place for stubborn obstructions," the Vurna -man was saying. "Things move quickly now. We have an enemy before us -so vast and powerful that we dare not have one also at our backs, -no matter how weak. I ask you to believe that, Sawyer. I ask you to -understand that if we Vurna fall, you perish--" he made a sudden -chopping gesture of the hand "--utterly." - -"I ask _you_," said Sawyer, "to look at my white hairs, and not insult -them by talking to me like I was a child." His voice was strong, and -anything but servile. "You can forget that old tale of the 'enemy'. I -laughed at it when I was in my cradle. There's been only one enemy seen -on this Earth, and that was you." - -The crowd muttered, _Yes_. - -"Your starships," Sawyer said, "smashed our cities and broke our nation -and our world down to where it is. My own father saw it happen. One day -a free world, the next--nothing. So fast there was hardly even a blow -struck back. You did it." - -The crowd muttered louder. Price felt Burr and Twist move beside him, -breathing in the dark. Breathing hate. - -"Don't come to me, an old man," Sawyer said, "and ask me to believe -foolishness. As for the plane you say you saw, I tell you again I -haven't got it. And if I did have I wouldn't give it up to you, nor the -man either. And you know it, Arrin." - -The woman spoke briefly in her own language to Arrin, her tone and -gesture seeming to say that they were wasting their time. Her voice -was low and clear, as beautiful as the rest of her, but there was an -impatient contempt in it that made Price bristle. The same thing was in -her eyes when she looked at the old Chief of the Missouris. - -Arrin shook his head. "Sawyer, I tell you once more, as you have been -told for two generations, it was not the Vurna who destroyed your -world, but the Ei. And I tell you that the Ei may even attack the -Citadel, and that the fate of Earth would be decided in that battle, -just as much as ours." - - * * * * * - -His voice rose suddenly in very human anger. "There is a war, you -stubborn old man! A war vast--huge--" His arm swung in a wide -circle that seemed to include the whole sunset sky. "Beyond your -comprehension. Earth is nothing in it. A forward base, an observation -post, that is all. But if we lose it, the Ei will sweep this part of -the galaxy and you will regret it more than we. We can withdraw. You -cannot. You think you are cruelly treated now. You will weep to have us -back!" - -Sawyer remained unbending and unimpressed. Arrin sighed. His voice was -quiet when he spoke again, but it had a ring of iron in it. - -"I feel pity for your barbarism, until I remember that it continues -because of your own proud stupidity. If ever you people of Earth had -been willing to work with us--but let it be. And now I warn you, -Sawyer." - -He seemed to grow tall, grim, alien, the spokesman of inhuman forces. -Price felt the skin grow cold along his back, and his belly knotted -tight with the pricking of fear. - -Arrin said, "If you are planning an attack upon the Citadel, forget -it. We will slaughter you without mercy--not because we wish to, but -because we must--" - -Price caught the sharp intake of breath from the men beside him, and -suddenly he understood many things he had not understood before. - -Arrin was still speaking. "I will give you three days in which to -deliver to me the plane and the man who flew it. If this is not done, -we will be forced to use harsher measures. You understand?" - -Sawyer said, in a tone as cold as Arrin's, "Is that all?" - -"One more thing. Keep your hunters out of the Belt. It is a military -zone, not a game preserve. Any more incursions will be regarded as a -possible invasion--" - -Again Twist made a sharp, harsh sound in the darkness. - -"--and we will make of it a blasted barren where not even a mouse or a -beetle can survive. Consider that, Sawyer." - -Arrin turned and walked away, the two men and the woman falling in -behind him. Price watched the dark-crimson figure with the bright hair -until he could see it no longer, and it dawned on him, as though the -two things had a connection, that he was alive and living in this crazy -world of Sawyers and Citadels and invaders from the stars, that these -were his realities now and he had better wake up and grapple with them, -or he would die--and the death would be for real, and not any portion -of a dream. - -The aerodyne took off with a scream and a whistle. The crowd in the -square began to break up. Sawyer turned and came into the house, the -chiefs and the sub-chiefs following him. - -Burr opened the shutters, and a welcome breath of air came into the -stifling room, with a last gleam of dying sunlight. Price looked at -his companions. They were watching him, their eyes sharp and hostile. - -"So that's why you were so frantic for the plane," he said. "You're -planning an attack." - -Burr said fiercely, "You should've let me kill him when I wanted to, -Twist. And we should've left the plane where it was. Then they wouldn't -have got suspicious." - -"Maybe so," said Twist, and nodded. "Maybe so. On the other hand, if he -_is_ telling the truth, it might make all the difference." - -There was a clattering on the loft stair, a man running up the steps. -He came in and nodded to Burr and Twist. - -"Sawyer says, bring the prisoner down--and hurry!" - - - - - CHAPTER V - - -Sawyer was standing in the middle of the room, talking rapidly to the -chiefs of the Indianas and the Illinois. The Indiana chief was old and -fat and lazy, but the Chief of the Illinois was young, heavy-jowled and -hard-eyed, the type that is born suspicious and never gets over it. - -Sawyer turned to look at Price. He was intent and wire-drawn, a man -poised on the brink of great happenings, at that crucial point from -which he may still choose whether to advance or retreat. Price bore -his gaze steadily, and it was not easy to do, because the eyes of this -tough old man seemed to be laying bare everything within him. - -"But you can't take him _there_," said the Illinois Chief violently, -looking also at Price. "The biggest secret on Earth, and if he's a -spy--" - -"If he's a spy," Sawyer interrupted harshly, "he'll never live to tell -what he sees there." - -He spoke to Price. "We're going on a journey. You're going too. And you -two--" to Burr and Twist "--will guard him." - -Burr and Twist nodded silently, and got their guns. The rifle and -revolver had been handed over to Sawyer for safe hiding, and these -guns were the clumsy, short-range bolt-action rifles of their own -handcrafting. - -Price said, "This is a hell of a way to treat a man who comes to you as -a friend. I hate the Vurna as much as you do, for what they've done to -Earth, and--" - -Sawyer stopped him, saying ominously, "Save your words, you'll need -them later. We've got a hard ride before morning. Let's go." - -They all went out through a back door, except the old chief of the -Indianas who was not going. In the twilight outside, there were horses -ready. - -Sawyer and Oakes of the Illinois led off, and Price followed with Burr -ahead of him and Twist behind him. One man rode ahead of the whole -party with a lantern made to shine down but not up. The flying-eyes -watched of night, too. - -The six horses went all night at a steady pace, single file along a -narrow track that dipped and wound through the forest. Price felt sure, -from what he had overheard, that they were riding toward some great -secret council. He guessed that his fate would be decided there, and -probably the fate of the rest of mankind too. - -There was nothing he could do about it till he got there. Meanwhile -he thought about a long-thighed girl in crimson, with her bright hair -swinging on her shoulders as she walked. He wished he could have had a -closer look at her face. It had seemed beautiful, a clear forehead and -a fine chin, but it was the eyes that told you what a person was, and -he had not been able to study them. Could she be as heartless as all -the Vurna were supposed to be? - -He thought she must be. His hate of the conquering Star Lords was -rapidly growing. Before they had come, this dark, wild forest he was -riding through had been rich farmland and pleasant towns. And when they -had smashed all that, and built the Citadel to hold the ruined Earth, -they had tried to make men willing captives by telling them that story -of the Ei. It was the old Big Lie technique, but this lie had been too -big for anyone to believe. - -The woman might not be cruel. Arrin might be only a decent officer in a -hard position. But all the same, they were aliens, despoilers of Earth, -and he was an Earthman. These were his people--Sawyer, Burr, Twist, -even the hateful and suspicious Oakes. These were the ones he would -fight for, and with. - -If they let him. - -But they had to let him. He was the man with the plane. And as he rode -wearily through the dark, he thought he knew the argument to use. - - * * * * * - -Just before dawn, when the world was at its blackest and most silent, -there was a challenge in the woods ahead, and the man with the lantern -answered. Here and there among the trees other shielded lanterns -flickered, widely scattered, and the woods were full of quiet sounds, -the creak of leather and jingle of bridle-chains, the soft thump of -hoofs, the somnolent blowing of picketed horses. What men there were -spoke in low voices. - -Price's party dismounted and walked quietly among the picket lines. In -a few minutes they reached the edge of the sheltering woods. The man -with the lantern gave a low whistle, and another man materialized out -of the blank dark ahead. - -"This way," he said. "And watch your foot." - -Now the man with the lantern followed him, the others coming after -in Indian file. And Price began to see that the darkness was not as -blank as he had thought. There were pale areas that gathered the faint -starlight to themselves on flat, broken surfaces. He realized presently -that these were walls, or had been once, and that he was walking on the -shattered fragments of a city street. The feel of gritty concrete was -unmistakable. - -They went for quite a long way, apparently on some known path through -the ruined city, and the sky began to pale before they reached -their destination. Price could now make out the ghostly looming of -building-fronts on both sides, high fronts with nothing behind them, so -that the window-holes looked like a kind of elaborate pierced-work. It -was deathly still, so still that their own breathing and the stealthy -padding of their feet woke furtive echoes from the stone. - -Their guide stopped beside a small black hole no different from all the -other small black holes that lurked under fallen masonry and flattened -girders. "Down there," he said, and left them. - -They climbed down a wide steel stairway, bent and twisted, but -mostly intact. A great wave of warmth from close-packed and steaming -humanity rolled up the stair to meet them, mingled with the smells of -candle-grease, smoke, leather, sweat and the lingering overtones of -horse. - -Beyond the bottom of the stair there was a comparative blaze of light. -Price knew they were in the basement of what had been a public building -or department store, a space foreshortened by a mass of rubble and -hanging steel where part of it had caved in. It was crammed with men, -and their voices growled in that low enclosed space like the growling -of a great animal too long caged. - -There was a small group of men sitting somewhat apart, and Sawyer -joined them, with Oakes. Chiefs, thought Price, and realized that this -was a very big council indeed, and planned for long ahead. Burr and -Twist stood close on either side of him, but he forgot them for the -moment, looking around in fascination at these his countrymen. - -Forest-runners and hunters, like Burr and Twist, in greasy buckskins. -Men from the lower river, from the swamp and bayou country, -soft-spoken, hard-handed, dressed in coarse cotton dyed in bright -Indian colors, yellow and red and green. Gaunt hill-farmers in hickory -homespun, with their rifles between their hands. Boatmen down from -the northern lakes, with a faint smell of fish about them, and long -lean riders up from the southwest, leather-skinned and dangerous as -rattlesnakes. Men from the black cornlands of Iowa, following their -chief to talk of war. America, Price thought, basically unchanged, -basically recognizable, but with all the fat sweated off it and all the -luxuries stripped away, fined down to the ruggedness and strength of an -earlier day, when men like this made a nation out of a wilderness. - -He had a feeling they could do it again, in spite of the overwhelming -power of the Star Lords. And if they couldn't, they would go down -fighting like wildcats to the last. - -The Chiefs were talking among themselves. Twist knew some of them, -leaders of the Iowas, the Michigans, the Arkansas, the Mississippis. -Others they could guess at, Nebraska, Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana. The -two Missouri hunters were as excited as hounds before a hunt. Twist -said there had never been a council this big in his memory. It would -go on until the issue was decided, the men staying under cover in the -ruins, the horses hidden in the surrounding woods. - - * * * * * - -Price realized suddenly that the assembled chiefs were all looking -at him with an intense and largely hostile interest. Sawyer's news -seemed to have upset them badly. The Chief of the Michigans, a huge -black-bearded man with an enormous voice, bellowed suddenly for -silence. In seconds the place was absolutely quiet, except for the -shuffle of men closing in to see and hear a little better. - -"Sawyer of the Missouris has something to tell you," shouted Michigan. -"You listen hard. Because what he's got to say will make the difference -whether we fight or hold our peace." - -An astounded and angry roar broke out. Michigan jumped up on a -makeshift stand and cursed them till they fell quiet. - -"Do your howling afterward," he said. "This isn't just a whim on -Sawyer's part. Something's happened. Shut up and listen." - -Now they were alarmed and uneasy. They watched Sawyer climb the stand, -their faces dark-bronze in the smoky light, their eyes glistening. - -Sawyer said, "Twist--come up here." - -Twist pushed his way to the stand and got on it. Burr moved closer to -Price, his hand curled lightly around the haft of the knife in his belt. - -Sawyer said, "Tell them." - -Perfectly at ease, aware of his importance but not impressed by it, -Twist told the story of the landing of Price's plane in the Forbidden -Belt, and what had been done with both of them afterward. He told only -the simple facts, scrupulously avoiding any attempt to incite his -listeners for or against Price. - -The simple facts were enough. They heard them, the men of the Great -Lakes and the southern bayous, the plains riders and the hillmen and -hunters and farmers, and their reactions were various and wonderful -after the first shock of incredulous amazement. Twist had to stop to -let the tumult die down, and when he could make himself heard again he -said, - -"Yes, it was just what I said, a plane, and I flew in it. Not one of -those whistling fliers, but a plane--so." He made a graphic pantomime -with his hands and a remarkably accurate motor sound. "Now I guess -that's all," he said, and stepped back. - -Sawyer said, his words carrying clearly to the farthest man, "The Vurna -have turned our lands upside down to find the plane. They haven't -found it. Last night Arrin--" A furious snarl greeted that name, so -apparently it was well known, "--Arrin gave me three days to surrender -the plane and the man who flew it. I've brought him here, instead." - -He held up his hands, to quell the rising voices. "Listen! I'm not -finished yet. Arrin had some other things to say. He said, _if you -are planning an attack on the Citadel, forget it. He said, We will -slaughter you without mercy._" - -"Now," said Sawyer, "here is what we have to decide. Two things. Is -this man Price a friend offering us a weapon, or a spy of the Vurna -offering us death? And shall we fight, or let it go until another year? -They're big questions, the biggest you'll ever have to answer in your -lives. Don't come at them like hasty boys, all feeling and no sense. -Come at them man-like, slow and careful." - -Michigan rumbled, "Those are good words. Heed them. And now let's have -the man up here." - -Burr gave Price a shove. "That's you." - -Price shouldered forward through the pack and climbed the stand. As he -did so Twist whispered in his ear, "You'd better make this good, boy. -You won't get another chance." - -His voice sounded friendly. Price was glad of it. - -He stood on the platform and faced the chiefs and the representatives -of the people. - -Michigan said, "You tell your side of it. And speak up so everyone can -hear." - -Price spoke up, loud. But he said, "What's the good of that? I've told -my side of it a dozen times already, and nobody believes me." He glared -around the close-packed circle of men. "If I'd known you'd treat me -like this, I'd have smashed the plane and left it for the coyotes." - -"Just the same," said Michigan, "tell it again." - - * * * * * - -Price told it. "I didn't know you were up to anything in particular: it -just seemed obvious that a plane might be useful to you sometime, now -or later, and it wasn't doing any good where it was." He had coached -himself so carefully in the story that it was beginning to seem like -truth to him, gathering little embellishments and embroideries. "I -brought guns, too, better than anything you have. And does anybody say, -Thank you? The hell they do. They accuse me of being a spy for the -Vurna." - -A low animal grunt from the listeners. Their faces were as hard as -flint. - -Price shouted, "Would the Vurna be so anxious to get me back if they'd -just sent me out as a spy? You heard Sawyer." - -The Chief of the Louisianas said, "It would be a very smart trick for -them to say so, for just that reason." - -"And how is it," cried the Chief of the Arkansas, "that right away -the minute you turn up, Arrin says that about attacking the Citadel? -Doesn't that show they know something, and want to know more?" - -"I should think that was obvious," said Price. "There hasn't been a -plane in the air for two generations. All of a sudden there is one. -Wouldn't the Vurna want to know where you got it, and whether you're -building more like it? And do you suppose they'd figure that with a -weapon like that you _wouldn't_ be planning an attack of some kind on -them?" - -That was good sense, and they thought it over, muttering among -themselves. Price began to feel he was getting somewhere, and -marshalled his words for the final argument. Then the Chief of the -Oklahomas spoke up and said, - -"My word would be to kill this man and hand his body, and the plane, -to Arrin. That way we comply, but not to his advantage. Arrin knows no -more than when he started, but we look innocent. We look as though we -have no use for a plane. And when their backs are turned, we go ahead -as we planned all along." - -And that sounded better yet, even to Price. Especially since he knew -better than any of them the relative usefulness of one Beechcraft as a -weapon against the kind of forces the Star Lords had. - -But he knew if they began to think of that he was finished. So he said, -"Listen, you need that plane. It can reconnoiter, it can carry bombs--" - -"Shut up," said someone fiercely. "Shut up, all of you. I hear -something." - -They quieted, and listened. Price could not hear anything but the tense -mass breathing of the men. Then on the far side of the room first one -man and then several began to dig like dogs after a rabbit into the -heaped-up rubble. - -"Here it is! Here it is--look!" - -"What is it? Let's see." - -"Ain't nothing but a little bitty box--" - -"No! It's one of _their_ contraptions! Let me through!" - -A man in a linen shirt of green and yellow came bursting through the -crowd, carrying something high over his head in one hand. He put it -down on the stand, where it lay buzzing gently. - -"Is that Vurna, or ain't it?" - -Everyone drew back and away from it, as though fearing it might -explode. It was a little metal box no bigger than a cigarette case, but -Price knew what it was. He stepped forward and smashed it underfoot. - -"You'd better clear out of here," he said. "Fast. That was a radio -transmitter, broadcasting a steady guide signal to bring the Vurna -right here." - -There was one stunned moment of absolute silence, and then the place -erupted into sound and movement. In the midst of it, in the heart of -it, the Chief of the Michigans and the man in the linen shirt were -possessed of the same idea. Crying "Spy!", they flung themselves at -Price with their knives drawn. - - * * * * * - -Remembering a trick or two the Army had taught him, Price stepped -inside the chief's rush, caught his wrist, and flung him into the -other, who had been slowed by the necessity of climbing onto the stand. -And Price yelled at them furiously, - -"Are you crazy? I wasn't near that side of the room. _I_ didn't bring -it and plant it here." - -Twist stepped between him and the two men, drawing his own knife. "He -wasn't, and that's a fact. Besides--" - -"Get out of my way!" roared Michigan. - -Unexpectedly, Burr leaped up and pulled him back. "I was close to him -as his own skin, every minute," he said. "He didn't move, and he didn't -have that thing on him to drop if he'd wanted to." - -"We searched him," said Twist, "days ago. Personal." - -"Then you're traitors too," said Michigan, clinging to his single idea. -He started to charge again, and now there were others swarming up onto -the stand after him, screaming for Price's blood. - -Sawyer moved like a big cat. Michigan stopped in mid-stride, with the -point of Sawyer's knife touching his heart-ribs. - -"These are my men," said Sawyer mildly. "I don't like having their -loyalty called in question any more than they do." - -Price leaned over and grabbed a rifle out of somebody's hands. He -clubbed it and began to swing, scattering men like ten-pins off the -edge of the stand. - -"Get out of here, you fools!" he howled at them. "Can't you get it -through your thick skulls? The Vurna are coming. Get out!" - -Numbers of them were already streaming up the stairs. Now more and -more took up the cry, seeming to understand suddenly that someone's -treachery had made this place a trap. Sawyer said to the Chief of the -Michigans, - -"Go on, take that hot head back to the lake and cool it. Hurry up, -before they get you." - -Michigan snorted like an angry bull, but he turned and jumped down -into the crowd. The man with the linen shirt was gone. Price was about -to follow when he saw the muzzle of a rifle, upflung, glinting darkly -in the lamplight. He shouted to Burr and Twist to look out, and then -flung himself upon Sawyer. The shot was stunning in that closed space. -He heard the slug go whistling overhead and then ricochet from the -low concrete roof. Someone on the far side of the room cried out in -rage and pain. "I thank you," said Sawyer, "and now let's get off this -damned target." - -They got off, the four of them sticking close together. Price did -not see Oakes, nor the man who had carried their lantern. Most of -the lights were going out, knocked over and trampled. The dark surge -of running men carried them to the stair and up and out into full, -blinding day. - -Somebody pointed to the sky and yelled, "There they come--the Vurna!" - - - - - CHAPTER VI - - -They were still a long way off but coming fast, whistling down the sky. -Price could make out about a dozen bright dots flashing against the -blue. Sawyer said, - -"We'd better run for it!" - -They fled, along the twisting path through the ruins. All around them, -ahead and behind, other men were running, bolting away like wild -creatures into the shadows of the broken walls. - -And this was once their city, Price thought. A place of streets and -homes and schools and churches, a good place, built with long hope and -striving. What right did the Vurna have to break it? - -He looked up at the fliers. They were larger now, moving swiftly above -ragged crenellations that showed stark white in the hot summer sun. -He looked down, and there was desolation. He ran in it, leaping and -stumbling over the bones of a city, driven like the rest. - -Sawyer swept a lean arm out in a commanding gesture. "Take cover!" - -They dodged into the crevices of an unidentifiable mass half grown with -creepers and rank grass. The old bricks tottered and threatened to fall -as they pressed past them. They lay panting and listened to the Vurna -fliers go over. - -"They've broken formation," Price said. He had listened to hostile -craft before. "Spread out. They'll sweep back and forth--" - -A section of wall collapsed, close by them, with a rumble and a great -puff of white dust. They leaped back, and Sawyer said, "That makes a -beacon for them. Well, come on." - -They ran out, crouching low, scurrying along the ravaged streets where -their grandfathers had walked in peace. Price could see the green -woods in the distance, but the air was full of the power-scream of the -searching aerodynes, and he did not think that they would make it. He -was right. - -One of the ships shot down to hover three feet off the ground ahead of -them, and another dropped behind. Sawyer turned to the right. A third -ship came down. He turned to the left. A fourth one blocked him. He -stopped where he was, too proud to look farther for escape where he -knew there was none. Burr and Twist stood with him. All three lifted -their rifles and prepared to die. - -Price had nothing in his hands. The bright hovering ships mocked him, -their noise deafened him, the wind of their air-blasts tore at him with -vicious force. He hated them. He had never hated anything so much in -his life, not even the enemy he had fought in Korea. He groped among -the rubbish around his feet, half-blinded by dust and a red haze that -was of his own making. - -A very loud metallic voice spoke to them from one of the ships. "Put -down your weapons and stand together with your hands high. You will not -be harmed." Sawyer laughed. He hunched the rifle to his shoulder and -fired. The slug went _splat!_ on the skin of the aerodyne, and dropped. - -"Put down your weapons and stand together. We will count six. At that -time we will fire. Six. Five. Four." - -Sawyer laid his rifle into the dust at his feet and straightened, -folding his arms. Twist and Burr did the same. Tears stood in Burr's -eyes, tears of outraged anger. - -And this was their city, Price thought. My city. Ours. - -Men began now to jump out of the hovering aerodynes, Vurna with cropped -silvery hair. They wore uniforms of dark green. This was not their -city, it was not their world. Price's fingers closed over the end of an -iron bar in the rubbish. - -He sprang forward, holding the iron bar. - - * * * * * - -A beam of cold light, hardly visible in the sunshine, flashed out from -the nearest ship. Price was running, and then he was not running, he -was face down on the ground with the white dust in his hair. The bar -spun out of his hand and fell with a faint clatter. - -The Vurna closed in. They escorted Sawyer and Burr and Twist each -into one of the ships. Two of the green-clad soldiers bent and picked -up Price and carried him to the fourth. They clambered in, and the -aerodynes rose whistling into the air. - -Over the place from which the Earthmen had fled, roughly in the center -of the city, several of the ships were gathered. They circled slowly, -but nothing moved in the streets. At length all but one of them rose -up, and that one made brief lightnings flicker from its underbelly. -Down below a volcano erupted, thundered, burned, and died, sinking -into ash and dust. That gathering-place would not be used again, and -any store of arms or powder concealed in it would not be used either. - -The ships of the Vurna raced away toward the east. Behind them the -forest was full of men and horses, moving out. - -After a while a remote and disoriented consciousness returned to Price. -He opened his eyes and saw a blur of red and silver and flesh tones. A -little later he opened them again, and the blur had become a woman with -silver hair and a uniform of dark crimson. - -The woman. - -She said, "You will be normal again in an hour or so. The shock-ray -does no permanent damage." - -He looked at her, not caring very much about how he would feel an hour -from now. He felt pleasantly languid, forgetful of his cares. Her eyes -were a curious color, not like Earth eyes at all. They were like little -bits of sky and moonglow and the far-off fires of stars, cool and -strange and lovely. He said, - -"They're not cruel, after all." - -"What are you talking about?" - -"Your eyes. They're beautiful. Like you." - -A faint flush touched her cheeks. But she only said, "How are you -called?" - -He told her, and she wrote it down. He saw now that she held a kind of -clipboard on her knee. Just beyond her was a cabin window. Streamers -of torn cloud whirled by it so fast that he was startled. Then other -things began to impinge on his senses, air-scream, a smooth rush of -speed. He sat up. - -The man beside the pilot turned abruptly, his hand reaching for a -weapon at his belt. The woman spoke to him in her own tongue, and then -said to Price, - -"We do not wish to stun you again. You will not make it necessary." - -"No," said Price. He leaned forward, staring in fascination at the -controls of the aerodyne, watching the pilot's movements. - -"You are interested? As a pilot?" - -"Yes." The controls seemed surprisingly simple. These controlled the -force of the air-flow, those the angle of the blast--"It's so much more -maneuverable than a jet, and so much more powerful than any 'copter. -I--" - -He shut his mouth, abruptly conscious that he had made a bad slip. -But the woman did not seem to have noticed it. He asked her hastily, -changing the subject, "What's your name?" - -"Linna," she said. "Of Vrain Four. That's the planet of a star you -never heard of, in the Hercules Cluster. I have some other identifying -words, a patronym much like yours and a set of code-numbers such as -have been used on this world also." - -"You seem to know a lot about us, for a girl from--uh--Vrain Four." - -"That's my business. I'm a specialist in Earth cultures. Section 7-Y, -Social Technics. Where is your home?" - -She was friendly, almost too much so. Price was wary now, his mind -shaking off the lethargy of the shock. - -"Nevada." - -She wrote on the clipboard, some kind of shorthand. "I have not been -that far west. What is Nevada like?" - - * * * * * - -He told her, leaving out any mention of cities. The aerodyne raced -forward, and he watched the controls avidly. So simple. So beautifully, -functionally simple. His fingers twitched with eagerness. - -"You have flown a great deal?" - -"My father taught me." Careful, Price thought. These people are -probably no brighter or shrewder than my own, but they're better able -to investigate and check on things. "Tell me, what's it like on Vrain -Four?" - -"We eat and sleep, make love and die," she said, "very much like you. -The sky is very beautiful at night. The stars are close and burning, -not cold and far-away like yours." She paused. - -"Where did your father learn to fly?" - -"From his father. It's a family tradition." - -"And the plane had belonged to your family since the Ei destroyed the -atomic cultures of your Earth-year 1979?" - -"Since the _Vurna_ destroyed it--yes." - -She did not argue the point. "How old was the plane then?" - -Sneaky little question, quietly asked. What was she driving at? Price -began to feel that he was in a trap, but he could not quite see the -shape of it. Then, before he was forced into an answer that might very -well be the wrong one, he saw something that gave him the perfect -excuse to ignore it. - -The thing he saw was a starship. - -He had never seen a starship before in his life, but he knew this could -not be anything else. He judged that they must be back across the river -now and well within the Forbidden Belt. The ship stood like a tower of -white metal, enormous, slim, delicate, a thing of slumbering power that -caught the throat with awe and wonder. There were no trees anywhere -near it, and the earth underneath was fused and hardened to a substance -more durable than iron or concrete. - -Linna said, "That is one reason we do not want men in the Belt. There -is danger of being caught in a take-off or a landing." - -The aerodyne flashed past, and Price looked back as long as he could -at the dwindling shape, splendid but curiously lonely in the middle of -nowhere. - -"I would have thought you'd have a port, close in. By the Citadel, I -mean." - -Linna shook her head. "Dispersal is much safer. That is why the Belt is -so wide. We have a number of ships." - -The man beside the pilot spoke, and Linna touched Price's shoulder, -pointing ahead. "In a minute you will see the Citadel." - -What he saw first was that iron blinking in the low air that he had -seen from the plane. It grew with fantastic speed, taking shape, -acquiring height and substance. Price had been prepared for something -tremendous. In spite of that, he was wide-eyed and astonished as any -tribesman. - -The Citadel rose from a level barren, swept clear of every living -thing. It was round, a vast flat-topped tower stunning in its stark -hugeness. It did not fit on Earth at all. This monstrous, man-made -metal mountain belonged to another world. - -Around it as far as he could see were launching-pads for a species -of missile that looked more deadly than any of the ICBM'S they had -been dreaming up in his own day. Atop the Citadel, on the vast plain -of metal that was its roof, there were installations that looked -like radar, and others he could only guess at--something in the -radio-telescope line, perhaps, with elaborate grids. Set around the -perimeter of the roof, and looking ominously out across the Belt, -were hooded emplacements that made Price think of Arrin's warning: We -will make of the Belt a blasted barren, where not even a beetle can -survive.... - -"You see how helpless," Linna said, quietly echoing his own thoughts. -"Men with knives and little guns--they would be throwing their lives -away." - - * * * * * - -The old anger came back to Price, and he said sullenly, "The Siegfried -Line was supposed to be impregnable, too." - -But he knew she was right, and he looked down with a sinking heart as -the aerodyne swept in for a landing on the roof. How could Earthmen -ever hope to throw this mighty power from their backs? - -He stepped down to the iron deck, still a little slow and shaky when he -moved. Other aerodynes were dropping down one by one. He looked around -for Sawyer and Burr and Twist, but he did not see them. Vurna guards -fell in on either side and Linna said, - -"I think your friends have already landed, and are with Arrin below. -Come on." - -The invitation was pure rhetoric. He had no choice. The guard took him -toward a circle painted bright red for the guidance of pilots, and -about eight feet across. He asked, "Is Arrin the big boss?" - -"The Supreme Commander of this base. You see how important you are to -us--you and your plane?" - -They stood on the red circle, and it dropped with them smoothly down -a gleaming metal shaft. It did not drop too far. They stepped from it -into a corridor, brightly lighted by tubes sunk into the low ceiling. -There were many doors on either side, and Vurna in uniforms of various -colors passed back and forth. - -The office of the Supreme Commander was as austere and functional as -everything else Price had seen. Narrow windows with flush shutters -of steel looked out across the sunlit Belt. One wall was a maze of -screens and dials, communicator devices, and another had rows of -tube-mouths with vari-colored tabs. Arrin stood facing Sawyer, with -Burr and Twist behind their chief. There were several guards. As Price -came in with Linna, Sawyer was saying, - -"I told you I wouldn't give the man up, nor the plane. As for the -meeting, your paid traitor can tell you all about it. And now you can -go ahead and kill me." - -Arrin said impatiently, "It isn't your life I want from you, but only a -little cooperation." He looked up at Price, his eyes narrowing. "This -is the man?" - -Linna spoke to him in the Vurna tongue. A look of surprise showed for -an instant on Arrin's face. He questioned Linna. Sawyer, meantime, said -to Price, - -"We thought they'd killed you." - -Price shook his head. He was worried about what Linna was saying to the -Commander. Once more he had the feeling of a trap he could not see. - -Arrin nodded curtly, and gave some order to Price's guards. Linna said -in English, "You are to come with me." - -Price said, "I'd rather stay with my friends." - -"Perhaps later." - -There was no use arguing. Price went where he was told. On another and -much lower level, which might have been underground for all he knew, he -was ushered into a small, neat, impersonal cubicle with no window and -with a lock on the outside of the door. Obviously, a cell. - -Linna said, "I would like your shirt, please." - -He stared at her. "What?" - -"Give me your shirt." - -Again there was no use arguing with her. He took it off and handed it -to her. - -"Food and drink will be provided," she said. "You will be quite -comfortable." - -She went away, with the guards. Securely locked in the cubicle, Price -sat and brooded. Food and water came, packaged, through a slot device -in the wall. He ate and drank, and brooded again. - -Finally, Linna came back. She handed him his shirt and watched him -soberly while he put it on. And then she dropped her bomb. - -"You have been lying to me," she said quietly. "I know _now_ where you -came from." - - - - - CHAPTER VII - - -Price stood stone still, meeting her gaze. But his thoughts were racing -like startled deer. How could even the super-scientific Vurna have -guessed his incredible origin? It was a freak, a fluke that wouldn't -happen once in a million years.... - -Linna was saying, "Take your plane. Obsolete in model as it was, -it would require extensive machine shops to fabricate it. And your -clothing. Your shirt is of synthetic fabric, and so is the dye. It was -woven on machines. And these are _new_--not relics preserved for a -century." - -Price managed to keep his voice level as he said, "So--" - -"So," Linna said, "there is somewhere a hidden community big enough to -keep the old technologies of your people alive. A community we've known -nothing about." - -She regarded him in stern triumph, as though she had gained a victory. - -Price sat down on the narrow bed. He had an hysterical desire to laugh, -but he did not do that. Instead, he turned his head away from Linna as -though to hide his dismay, but actually he was trembling with a sudden -realization. - -She had just given him his chance, if he kept his head and played it -right. In her wholly mistaken, if quite natural, deduction of his -origin, she had given him a chance for escape. - -She misread his silence. "Further lies will not do you any good." -Astonishingly, there was pity in her voice. "I see now what you -intended. You wished to share your community's knowledge with other -tribes, to give them new weapons in their fight against us. And now you -hope still to keep your secret, so someone else may succeed where you -failed. Believe me, Price, I understand--" - -"Do you?" he said savagely. - -"Yes," she said, her voice hardening. "And I understand better than -you what would have happened to your army if they had attacked, armed -with pitiful little planes like yours and only slightly more powerful -rifles." She spoke swiftly to the guard outside, and then snapped at -Price, "Come, I want to show you something." - -She led Price out between the green-clad guards. They went down the -echoing corridor of the cell-block, and into a lift that took them -swooping up a long way, and then into another corridor and eventually -into a medium-sized room circular in shape, completely surrounded -by a double row of screens. The lower screens gave a fixed view of -the terrain within eyeshot of the Citadel itself. The upper screens -reflected a roving, ever-shifting view of the remoter Belt, the woods -and prairies, herds of wild cattle grazing, deer bounding with their -white flags up, the lonely starships waiting on their isolated fields. -Four men in uniforms of dull gold watched the screens and checked a -series of clicking recorders. Beneath each screen was a battery of -studs. - -"You see how much chance you would have of approaching unseen? And do -you see what would happen to an army? One man here, touching those -firing studs, and the whole Belt would become in seconds like the -barren outside the walls. Nothing would be left. Nothing." - -In Linna's eyes now there was the same impatient contempt for his -stupidity that he had seen there before, when Arrin had talked to -Sawyer in the square. - -"And this is how you would help them--to their destruction." - -If the situation had been what she imagined it to be, that would have -been the truth. Price allowed a sullen doubtfulness to show in his -face. But he said, - -"What about your starships? You wouldn't destroy them." - -"They can be flown on auto-pilot at a moment's notice, out of harm's -way. Oh, for heaven's sake, Price, can't you see that I'm trying to -help you? I don't want your people slaughtered. We, the Vurna, don't -want them slaughtered. But if you persist in battering your stubborn -heads--" - -"All right, all right," he said crossly. "You've got the weight and -weapons. Let's get out of here. It makes me sick to think how helpless -we are." - - * * * * * - -They went outside into the corridor again. At its end there was a -window, and Price stood by it, looking out. He pretended to be sunk in -bitter reflection, but his brain was spinning furiously, trying to see -all ways at once. He said, - -"If I show you where our hidden colony is, you'll only smash it up. -There's a lot there that isn't weapons, things that could help build up -a civilization again. Why should I show you?" - -"To keep some other idiot from trying to do what you have done. We -won't destroy anything that's useful, only control it as to the -production of weapons." She sighed, and added, "I hate to put it this -way, Price, but if you don't show me willingly it will have to be -another way, and I don't want that." - -There was a real ring of sincerity in her voice. Price grumbled around -a bit, permitting himself to be beaten. - -"All right," he said at last. "I guess there's nothing for it. I'll -show you." - -"Good. I'll arrange for a flier--" - -Her voice was drowned out by a sudden hooting of sirens all through the -Citadel. For a moment no one moved. Linna's face became drained of all -color. The guards stiffened, staring in a kind of wonder. The steel -shutter of the window clanged to with a ringing snap, and Price could -feel in that vast building a stirring and buzzing as of a menaced hive. - -"What is it?" he asked, his feeling of triumph beginning to slip away -almost before he had had time to enjoy it. - -Linna's voice was quite steady when she answered. "Possibly nothing. -You must return to your cell now. We'll discuss the trip later." - -The sirens stopped. - -The guards hustled Price along urgently now, as though they had more -important things to attend to. The Vurna were shifting rapidly from -places to other places, but all in good order. Only their faces were -tense and they did not talk except to pass an order or ask for one. -It was obvious that there was an alarm, that the Citadel was taking -up battle stations, and that everyone was, if not afraid, at least -severely uneasy. Price began to be uneasy too. Nevertheless, he noted -the symbol that identified the floor, and studied the life-controls as -he was dropped down to the prison level again. - -In perfect silence they stepped from the lift and started down the -corridor toward Price's cell. Then the sirens screeched again, but on a -different note. Linna gave a little sigh. Without thinking about it he -put his arm around her. - -"All clear?" - -"Yes. What a relief. I'm technically a soldier, but I'm afraid a -technicality is all it is. I--shh! Listen." - -A clear metallic voice had begun to speak over some communicator system -that apparently reached every corner of the Citadel. Linna drew away -from him without seeming to notice his familiarity, listening intently. -The guards listened too, and so did three or four other Vurna visible -in the corridor. Price could understand nothing, except that the word -"Ei" occurred several times. The Vurna's favorite bogeyman. He wondered -if the Vurna powers-that-were used it to hoodwink their own people, -too. It would explain Linna's sincerity, Arrin's honest annoyance, if -they themselves believed in a menace called the Ei. - -The window at the end of the corridor had reappeared as the safety -shutter slid back. Through it, tantalizingly small and far away, Price -watched the landing of a starship, and it was disappointingly remote -and unreal as a scene done with models for an old film. - -Until he felt the mighty fabric of the Citadel, man-made mountain of -steel and iron, quiver underneath him with the shock-wave of that -landing. Then he knew. - -The voice stopped speaking. There was a moment of dead quiet, as though -what the voice had said was more momentous than the alarm. Linna's face -was pale again, and the guards looked both excited and apprehensive. -One of them spoke to Linna, and she shook her head, apparently giving -him a reassuring answer. - -Price said irritably, "Can you tell me what's going on?" - -"There was a skirmish," she said, "out there. That's what the alarm -was, to tell us there was fighting going on, but of course it was -already over. There was only one Ei ship, a scout." - -"Oh," said Price, and almost smiled. Scramble them once in a while, -keep them on their toes. Remind them of the menace. It was a simple -technique. Earthmen had evolved it quite early. - -People were talking now. He could hear their voices echoing down the -metal halls, excited, fearful. Several went to the window to crane -their necks at the distant starship. And then the metallic voice began -to speak again, very crisp and clipped. - -"Maximum security," Linna said. "All corridors cleared, all doors and -safety bulkheads locked. All off-duty personnel in quarters. Go in, -Price." She pointed to his cell door. "I have to hurry." - -The corridor was clearing like magic. Price hung obstinately in the -doorway. "What now?" - -"They captured the scout. They're bringing in two of the Ei--alive." - -One of the guards shoved him in, and the door slammed shut on its -magnetic lock. - -Price lay down on the bunk. So they had captured a scout, and they -were bringing in two Ei, alive. And everybody in the Citadel was -ordered behind locked doors. Handy. Very. He was beginning to feel -less hostility toward at least some of the Vurna. They were not so -hard-headed and skeptical as the Earthmen. They believed, and the -belief was keeping them here to man an outpost fort when they would -doubtless much rather return home. - -He found himself unaccountably pleased that he had an excuse to stop -hating Linna. - -He thought about the plan he had in mind until he went to sleep. - - * * * * * - -It was difficult, in that windowless and practically sound-proof place, -to judge the passage of time. To Price it seemed like centuries. He -slept, and woke, and ate, and paced around, and fretted between hope -and a despairing certainty that Linna had forgotten all about him. He -slept again, and was awakened from that sleep by the deep shuddering -of the Citadel as a starship either landed or took off. He lay -drowsily wondering what it was like to fly one of those mighty craft, -traitorously wishing he was a Vurna so he might have a chance to find -out, and dreaming of space and stars and foreign worlds. - -The Citadel shook again, and yet again, and Price came wide awake. He -counted twenty-one, and there was no way of knowing how many landings -or take-offs had occurred before he woke, or too far out in the Belt to -be noticed here. - -Certainly some large movement was underway. He took to pacing again, in -a sweat of worry over what this meant, not to the Vurna, but to him. - -After what seemed an eternity the door opened and Linna stood there, -looking pale and grave. There were no guards with her. She was alone. - -"The flier is waiting, Price," she said. "Let's go." - -He joined her. And now he saw that the aspect of the corridor had -changed. A sliding bulkhead had closed off part of it behind a wall of -iron. - -"What's that for?" he asked. - -"Our--prisoners," said Linna, as though the word stuck to her tongue. -"Come on." - -She seemed in a great hurry to get away from that bulkhead. Price said, -"What's the matter, aren't they human, or something?" - -She gave him a look. "You still think it's all a great joke." - -"I didn't say that." - -"You mean it, though. You still believe the Ei are something we made up -to shift the blame from ourselves. Probably you believe we are staging -this whole matter to impress you and your chief, so that you will go -back and assure your tribesmen it is all true." - -This was so uncomfortably close to what Price was thinking that he said -involuntarily, "You're entirely too smart for such a pretty girl." - -"Sometimes I think," she said between her teeth, "that there is no hope -for you people, no hope at all." - -Price nodded toward the bulkhead. "The solution is simple enough, -isn't it? Let me see them. Then I'll have to believe you." - -"Simple enough," said Linna, echoing his words. "Do you think _you_ -could stand against them? We have fought them for generations, we have -knowledge and experience, and even for us, with all our safe-guards, it -is difficult. Only a few, like Arrin, would attempt it, and I saw him -this morning. He looks like a ghost." - -"And that's why you've never let any Earthmen see an Ei--because -they're too dangerous." - -"No. It's more simple than that. We have had none to show. These are -the first Ei we have captured for a century, at least in this sector of -the galaxy. I have never seen one, either. And I don't want to." - -She strode off, away from the iron wall across the corridor. Price -shrugged and followed her. - -"Where are my friends?" - -"They're here," she said, indicating the row of doors they were -passing. "Quite safe--or as safe as any of us. They'll remain here -until--" She hesitated, and Price realized for the first time that she -was deeply, genuinely afraid. "Until we see what happens," she finished. - -"After that, what?" - -"If they're still alive, and we're still alive, and there's still a -world, they'll go free, and perhaps they'll be wiser men than they are -now." - -She would not say any more. - -The lift swept them up to the roof. It was late afternoon, intensely -hot, with storm-clouds banking in the west. The roof area seemed -almost deserted, and only one flier was visible. Linna motioned him -into it and climbed in herself. She spoke to the pilot, and he took -off immediately. There was no co-pilot. Only Price, and Linna, and one -man. Price felt a secret surge of assurance, of power, like when you're -riding a streak of luck and the dice can't fall any way but right. He -sat quietly, looking out the cabin port. - -He saw almost at once that the starships were gone. The whole Vurna -fleet must have taken off, shaking the Citadel with their leaving. -Probably most of the men had gone with it. The deserted appearance of -the Citadel, the lack of guards, the lack of a co-pilot, all pointed to -a skeleton force. _If we're still alive, and there's still a world_, -Linna had said. Battle, somewhere out in the far reaches of space? -Perhaps. Or maneuvers, or a show of force connected with some galactic -game he would probably never know about. It was not really important. -What was important was the fact that for the present the defenses of -the Citadel were weaker, much weaker. - -He sat looking out the port and covertly watching the pilot's hands -on the controls. Linna had some kind of a side-arm strapped around -her slender waist. Probably a shocker. The pilot had one, too. He -considered the problem, and the woods and prairies rolled back -underneath. - -Linna spoke suddenly, out of a long and somber silence. - -"This mission is more important than ever now, Price, or I wouldn't -have been allowed to divert even one man from our defences. I beg you, -for the sake of your own people, to play fair with me. If there's -either help or hindrance in our rear, we must know it. The Ei--" - -_Now_ said something in Price's mind. He did not stop to question it. -When you're riding a hot streak, let it ride. Never stop to question. - -He rose and hit Linna on the point of her pretty chin. - - - - - CHAPTER VIII - - -She dropped in her seat without a sound. Price clawed for the weapon -she had at her waist. But the abrupt cessation of her voice had alarmed -the pilot. He turned around and then shouted something imperative in -Vurna, his hand going swiftly to his own belt. - -Price beat him by a fractional second. His hand pressed the trigger and -the unfamiliar weapon crackled in his hand, and the pilot fell over, -letting his own shocker go skittering to the deck. The aerodyne had not -swerved from its steady westward flight. He had been sure, from what -he'd seen of its automatic stability, that it wouldn't. - -Price straightened up, breathing heavily with excitement. So far, so -good. - -He tied Linna's hands and feet securely with her own belt and his -handkerchief, and then attended to the pilot. Linna was already -beginning to stir, and he propped her up as comfortably as possible, -smoothing her hair back from her forehead. He smiled suddenly and said, -"I'm sorry. I really am. If there had been any other way, I wouldn't -have done it." - -He kissed her on the mouth, rather swiftly because he did not have much -time, but with a full measure of feeling even so. She sighed, and he -thought her lips answered his, but he doubted if that would be so when -she came to. - -He slipped into the pilot's chair and studied the controls, erasing -every other thought from his mind as he remembered what he had learned -from watching. The aerodyne was humming straight and steadily on. He -had plenty of altitude. - -He began to experiment, gingerly, and by the time he was across the -river he was satisfied that he could control the craft well enough to -get by. It was considerably simpler than learning to drive a car in -the old days, and he had a lifetime of flying behind him to give him -air-sense. The craft itself was a thing of beauty, topping anything he -had ever flown. He angled southward and westward, away from the river, -traveling like a bullet. - -Linna spoke from behind him. Her voice was very cold and very hard, the -voice of a stranger. - -"Arrin told me I should have you bound. I left you free on my own -responsibility." - -Price felt bad about that, and he said so. "Try to look at it from my -side, Linna. I have to do what I can for my own people. If you were in -my shoes--" - -"Go ahead," said Linna. "Talk is obviously useless. I shan't waste any -more of it, except to tell you--" - -She told him, vividly, what kind of a fool he was, and what she -hoped would happen to him before he led all of his fellow-fools to -destruction. Then she shut up and would not speak again, no matter how -he tried to soften her rage. - -The dark green forest, rough-textured like a wool rug, rolled back and -away around him, and the sun was swallowed up in clouds. He strained -his eyes for the clearing that would mark the Capitol of the Missouris. -He was flying by dead reckoning. He had no compass bearing to begin -with, and the Vurna instruments were useless to him. The pilot was -beginning to come round, but Price knew better than to ask him for -instructions. - -It was a red light of fires burning on the edge of night that guided -him down at last toward the timber-built Capitol. And now at last Linna -spoke, because the pilot, looking out, began to yell frantically in -Vurna. She translated. - -"He says do not cut the down-blast so sharply, or you will crash. That -lever--there, under your left hand--ease it back." - -Price eased it. He settled down to a rough and ragged landing, just -about where the Vurna craft had settled before, when he had been -Sawyer's prisoner. Men came out of the houses and along the streets, -to stand as they had stood then, to greet their hated over-lords with -silence and contempt. - -Price jumped out of the craft and approached the fires. - - * * * * * - -There was a startled cry, and then his name echoed back and forth, and -the men closed around him. They were inclined to be hostile, demanding -to know where Sawyer was, and what had happened, and how he came to be -piloting a Vurna flier. Price shouted for quiet. - -"Sawyer's alive. He's a prisoner in the Citadel. So are Burr and Twist. -You want to rescue them?" - -That startled them. "Listen," Price started, and then he saw Oakes -pushing toward him with a small determined-looking group of men. - -"Stand back," Oakes demanded. "Stand back, there. This man is a -traitor. He betrayed the council, he betrayed Sawyer. If you listen to -him, he'll betray you." He turned to Price. "You get back to your Vurna -masters. Tell them we're not going to--" - -"Oh, shut up," said Price impatiently. "You're not chief here, and you -never will be, no matter if you do leave Sawyer to rot in the Citadel." -He took the shocker from his belt where he had thrust it. "I stole that -flier from the Vurna, and I stole this, too. I'll use it on you if I -have to." - -Oakes looked ugly, but he hesitated, and Price said, "Some of you, if -you want proof of what I say, go look in the flier. Go on." - -Several men detached themselves from the crowd and went off at a trot -toward the flier. Presently they began to whoop and halloo. They came -back carrying the pilot and Linna, who looked at Price with the utmost -hatred. - -"It looks like a trick to me," said Oakes. "They could have been bound -on purpose." - -Price said, "Does it look like a trick that every starship of the -Citadel fleet took off last night? You must have heard or seen them, -even at this distance." - -"Yes," said a lean farmer, "streaks of fire in the sky before dawn. I -was milking." - -Others had seen them, too. And now a note of excitement crept into -their voices. - -"What's it mean? What's happened there? What are you after?" - -"The Citadel is stripped," he said. "And I know where the fire-control -is that commands the Belt. With this flier I can land right on the -Citadel without being challenged. I can take some of you with me, and -we can knock out those weapons. You can walk right in, with no more -opposition than brave men ought to be able to handle. You--" - -"Price," said Linna, in a voice of absolute horror, "you don't know -what you're doing. The fleet has gone out to fight the Ei. Arrin forced -some information out of the captives--the Ei fleet is somewhere outside -this solar system, and our fleet's out to intercept it." - -The terror in her voice increased. "But if the Ei forces evade our -fleet and strike directly at our base here--don't you see, only our -great missile-batteries around the Citadel can defend Earth! If you -storm the Citadel, there'll be no defenses at all." - -He said, "Linna, I know you believe in the Ei. Probably most of your -people do. But you've never seen one, in a century no one on Earth has -seen one. They're a myth, a political stratagem, that's all." - -She shook her head, groping desperately for words. "Don't follow him!" -she cried out to the men. "Don't listen to him. We're fighting for your -lives and safety too. Don't be so mad as to stab us in the back now!" - -They looked at her in the firelight, the flint-faced men who were weary -of Star Lords. Then, without paying Oakes any attention at all, they -looked at Price. - -"He's right," drawled one of them. "The star-spawn have given us the -lie about the Ei too long. Ain't a kid on Earth believes it." - -Linna's head bent hopelessly forward, and she turned away. She still -believes it, every word, thought Price. Poor Linna. He would have given -anything to comfort her. - -But there was no time for comfort, no time for anything but planning. -He said, - -"You've heard, you know this chance may never come again--are you with -me?" And they answered, _Yes!_ - -"All right," said Price. "All right, we've got to have a council, to -make plans, and then we'll have to move fast to strike before the fleet -comes back. Who are your leaders after Sawyer?" - -Five or six men came forward, district sub-chiefs. One of them nodded -his head toward the two Vurna. - -"What'll we do with them?" - -"Treat them well," said Price sternly. "They're your assurance of -Sawyer's life." He didn't know whether they were or not, but he didn't -want Linna to suffer even discomfort because of him. He added, "Make -sure they don't talk to anyone, though. And remember, there was a -traitor at the big council. You'd better all keep a look-out, for -signals and communication-devices. And now let's talk." - - * * * * * - -The council lasted far into the night. Price's biggest problem was to -persuade the tribesmen not to bring their guns. - -"The metal-detector units on the flying-eyes would spot you before -you'd gone ten miles into the Belt, and I can't take the control-room -that far ahead. It couldn't possibly be held that long, and no matter -how we might smash the weapon-controls they'd have time to patch them -up and use them on you. You'll have to infiltrate the Belt on all -sides, keeping under cover, and get within striking distance before I -land on the Citadel. Besides, against the Vurna shockers, your guns -aren't much more use than your hunting bolos. We'll try and give you -better weapons, once we're inside." - -"Of course," said one leathery-faced sub-chief, "when you've got us and -the Ohios and Kentucky's and the rest all in the Belt, it would be a -mighty easy thing for you to give them word at the Citadel, and have us -all wiped out at once, like that." - -Price said harshly, "It's up to you, whether you want to take the -gamble or not. If I'm on the level, you can take the Citadel and get -the Star Lords off your back. If I'm not, you're dead. But you won't -get a chance like this again. Make up your minds." - -They made them up. - -"How shall word be sent in time to the other tribes? It'd take days for -a man on horseback to get around to the east and north." - -"I'll take the word," said Price. "In the flier. By sundown tomorrow, -there'll be men from every tribe ready to move into the Belt. And pick -me half a dozen seasoned men to go along, under a sub-chief. Half a -dozen men you can trust for the fate of the whole attack." - -The leathery old chief, whose name was Sweetbriar, said quietly, "I'll -pick you six, and I'll go along." - -His gaze locked with Price's, and Price smiled. - -"I'll give you the shocker," he said. "You can use it any time you see -fit. And _that_ should convince the other tribes they can count on me." - -"Should," said Sweetbriar, nodding. "Now we'd better reckon up our -distance. As I see it, this'll work out something like a big beat, and -if we don't all get there together, we might better have stayed home." - -They settled all the details, the forced marches by night, the meager -weight of food each man was to carry. Price managed to get an hour's -sleep before he took off in the pre-dawn gloom to rouse the other -tribes. When he slept he dreamed of an iron mountain, impregnable, -crowned with destruction, watching incessantly with a thousand eyes. In -the dream, he knew that no mere men could ever take it. - - - - - CHAPTER IX - - -The aerodyne flew high in the black night, toward the Citadel. Above -there were clear stars. Below there were heavy clouds laced with -lightning, hiding the earth. Hiding the Belt, and the lines of men who -moved in it, among the dark trees, in the wind and the rain. - -One full night had passed, and another was drawing to its close. Before -the sun went down again it would be all over, one way or the other. - -Price was in that state of exaltation that comes at a certain point -of prolonged tension without rest, where you move a little bit -outside your body and above the ground, detached from every normal -consideration, and everything seems to go with a clear headlong rush, -as though a single initiating act has set an inevitable series of -reactions going, and all you have to do is keep pace with them. He -had not slept much, but he was not tired. The aspect of the Citadel -roof, the round red circle of the lift and the controls thereof, the -symbol marking the proper level, the shape and size and position of the -fire-control center, burned brightly in his mind. Their set and proper -sequence did not permit of any obstacles. - -Sweetbriar sat beside him in the co-pilot's place. He held the shocker -in his gnarly hands, and from time to time he turned it over or stroked -its smooth and unfamiliar shape. So far he had not had any occasion -to use it. He had stood beside Price in a dozen wooden-built towns, -helping him harangue a dozen doubtful chiefs, or sub-chiefs, around the -perimeter of the Belt. He had not slept much, either, but his eye was -brilliant and steely as a hawk's. If the sensation of flight frightened -him, he had not shown it in any way. - -The six men of his picking sat quietly in the cabin. They might have -been the same six men Price had first met when he landed in the Belt, -woods-rangers, hunters of deer and wild cattle, all speed and muscle, -born fighters. They were as lax as idle hound-dogs now, when there was -nothing to be done. They, too, had mastered whatever fear they had had -of flying. - -The storm below was moving rapidly toward the east, over a broad -front. Price could easily have outflown it, but he did not, only -keeping high enough above it to get a sighting on the Citadel when it -came into visual range. He was grateful for the storm. It seemed like -an omen of good fortune. It would cover the advance of the tribesmen -from the west, and it would cover his own landing, if he paced it -properly. A thick night would make it easier to get his attacking party -onto the lift, and perhaps even below, before it was realized that they -were not Linna's party returning. - -Poor Linna. He had seen her for just a minute before he left the -Capitol of the Missouris. He had wanted to make sure she was safe and -comfortable, and he had wanted to try once more to make her understand -how he felt. - -"I'm not your enemy, Linna," he had said. "Believe that. After this is -all over--" - -"If you take the Citadel," she had answered, "it won't matter who is -anybody's enemy. You and I will both be victims of the Ei. If you don't -take it--you'll be dead, and so will your crazy army, and how long will -they let me live after that? Either way, both of us lose." - -And she had sounded so quietly despairing, that he had almost lost -heart. - -But not quite. - -Starshine and the lower flarings of lightning showed him a gleam of -dark metal far down in the night. He spoke to Sweetbriar and pointed. -The old man peered, squinting, and the six hunters roused themselves -and peered also. - -"Don't look like much from here," one of them said. - -Price did not dispute him. Perhaps it was just as well for his army of -seven not to have too clear a look at the fortress they were planning -to invade. - -He hung for a little time in the high quiet air, watching the storm -front roll like a wave. When it had almost reached the distant gleam of -metal he said sharply, - -"All right, _now_!" - -And he dropped the aerodyne whistling down the sky. - - * * * * * - -The wild air-currents caught him, boiling ahead of the storm and over -it. For one horrible moment he thought he had lost control of the -aerodyne. It pitched and skittered and tossed, throwing him against -his seat-belt until his ribs cracked and his flesh felt as though it -was cut through. The tribesmen were now frankly and vocally terrified. -Then the built-in stabilizers and Price's own flier's brain took hold -again, and the whirling-leaf motion steadied to a rough and racking -but controlled descent. - -He could not see anything now but the solid blackness of the -storm-clouds, until the lightning flared and lit the rain-swept barren -below with a vivid light, brief but enough to guide him. He had judged -carefully, and he let the main wind-drift carry him until the wall of -the Citadel showed up huge and startling in the glare of a striking -bolt. He hung rocking over the roof until another one showed him the -painted circle of the lift. Then he set the aerodyne down hard right -beside it. - -There was no need for any talking. The instructions had all been -thoroughly discussed before. Price and the seven tribesmen were out and -across the intervening few feet of roof and onto the lift and going -down before the next flare of lightning broke. - -The men breathed heavily, their throwing ropes in one hand, their -knives in the other. Sweetbriar glanced at the shocker. Then he gave it -to Price and unhooked the weighted bolo from his own belt, swinging it -gently. - -There had been no alarm. - -Price watched the symbols gliding past on the guide-strip. When the -right one showed he pushed the proper stud and waited. The lift -stopped. The automatic door slid back. They moved fast, out into the -corridor. - -Only one man was in sight, going somewhere with a sheaf of papers in -his hand. He stopped, and his eyes widened, and his mouth opened. Price -fired the shocker. The man fell down and the papers scattered all -over the floor. Price began to run. His own shoes made a quick sharp -patting on the plastic surface. The moccasins of the hunters made no -sound at all. He counted the doors, and then turned for a last glance -at Sweetbriar and the men. Their eyes were very bright and the edges of -their teeth showed. Sweetbriar nodded. - -Price flung open the door. - -And it was easy, easier than he had dreamed. The four technicians in -their uniforms of dull gold turned and stood startled and staring for -as long as a man might catch his breath, and that was time enough. -Bolos wrapped around three of them like flying snakes and brought them -down, and the fourth fell under the shock-beam. - -"Shut the door," said Price, and one of the hunters shut it. - -Price knocked out the other three with the shocker, and the hunters -bound them. There was a rack of side-arms in one wall, with several -shockers in it. Price handed them out and then turned his attention to -the batteries of firing-studs. The hunters stood staring at the moving -pictures of the stormy Belt reflected in the scanner screens, until -Sweetbriar sent them to guard the door. - -There were service-hatches below the waist-high control panels. Price -got one open and studied the wiring, panting more with excitement -than exertion. It was only a few minutes until the pre-arranged time -of attack. But he must not trip the firing relays accidentally in -trying to de-activate them. He was afraid to start pulling wires -indiscriminately. - -But where the individual leads ran back to join the primary cable they -passed through a series of switches. It seemed logical to Price that -these were safety cut-offs to be used during maintenance, and that they -would cut off the nameless destructive engines on the roof. - -He had nothing better to go on, and time had almost run out. He opened -one of the switches, and glanced swiftly at the screens. Nothing -happened. He flipped open the others fast, and ripped the wires loose -from the board. Then with a metal chair he smashed the studs. - -As he finished, Sweetbriar shouted suddenly. "There they come--and -right on time!" - -Price, sweating, looked up. Sweetbriar and the hunters were eagerly -gazing at the screens. - -They showed the storm-swept Belt and they showed small dark figures in -it--hundreds of them--thousands--tribesmen running toward the Citadel. - -An alarm-bell rang somewhere in the Citadel. Instantly other bells -echoed it, a distant confusion of alarms. - -"Out of here fast," Price cried. "This is the first place the Vurna -will be coming. If we can get down through, we can help the others." - -They ran back out of the room, back down the corridor past the -unconscious man who still lay on the floor. Whatever happened now, the -tribesmen pouring across the Belt were safe from the weapons on the -roof. - -Without warning the lift-door opened right in front of them and five -green-clad Vurna came spilling out of it. - -There was no chance to use shockers or bolos either--they were so close -to each other that it was hands and fists. They struggled, gripping and -striking at each other, their feet slipping on the smooth floor, with -the clamor of bells in the background. - -A new note was added to that clamor. A dim sound of yelling voices, -many of them surging up from the lower part of the Citadel. - -"The tribes are in!" shouted Sweetbriar. "By God, I--" - - * * * * * - -He was knocked back by a flailing green arm. His Vurna antagonist -scrabbled to get his shocker out of his belt. Price desperately kicked -out at his own personal foe and banged him back against the metal wall. -He saw the silver head bang the wall, and the man sagged at the knees. - -Price rushed and knocked up the shocker now levelled at Sweetbriar. The -hunters yelped, their eyes blazing. It was their kind of a fight. They -liked it. After a sullen lifetime, they were using their fists on the -Star Lords and they liked that. - -The surge of sound from levels underneath told of a far bigger melee -down there, spreading through the Citadel. And then that sound, and the -small, personal noises of their own staggering fight, were cut across -by a brutal authoritative new sound. - -A hooting, loud and commanding, getting louder by the second, braying -like the voice of doom through the vast iron pile. - -The two Vurna still left on their feet tried to turn and run down the -corridor. The hunter's bolos brought them down quickly. - -Sweetbriar's leathery old face was wild and startled as he got to his -feet. "What the hell--" - -"That's the Vurna's big battle-stations siren!" Price said. "They're a -bit late with it. Come on!" - -He and the hunters began to look for stairs, racing swiftly along the -deserted corridors. They found some at last, and sped downward, level -after level. - -Bellowing, deafening in volume now, the siren kept hooting. - -It could not drown out the tumultuous uproar that filled the lower -levels. Price and the hunters were met suddenly by a mass of tribesmen -boiling up from the ground level. They were screaming, laughing, -capering in the halls, dragging with them one or two captured -Vurna--triumphant victors, dancing down a hated power under their -moccasined feet. Their hair and beards and their clothing were still -dripping wet with rain. - -They swept up Price and Sweetbriar and the six others in their -advancing front, pounding their shoulders, hugging them. - -"We did it! We got 'em!" they cried. "We took the Citadel!" - -"Is it all over?" asked Price incredulously. "So soon?" - -"That mighty caterwauling did it," said a red-bearded man. "All of a -sudden they quit fighting and began to run, like it was a signal, but -they couldn't get away from us. I heard they got old Arrin hisself -down there, in a big room, cussing and crying fit to bust." - -"Where's Sawyer?" somebody shouted, and Sweetbriar took up the cry. -Price said, - -"Somewhere on this level, I think. Get a Vurna that speaks English and -make him show you. It'll save time." - -He pushed on through them to the stairs, and fought his way down. He -wanted to see Arrin. He wanted to see the pride of the Citadel humbled, -broken. - -Tribesmen rioted through the corridors, smashing things like happy -children. They directed him to a vast sunken room that Price knew must -be the very heart and soul of the Citadel, its reason for being. It -was an overpowering place of screens and towering panels and complex -equipment. But these screens looked far beyond Earth, showing starry -spaces, burning suns and unimaginable dark abysses. From here the -Vurna had watched the whole sector of outer space, and these complex -controls must be the triggers of the mighty missile-batteries outside -the Citadel, the weapons that could strike fast and far into the void. - -Here there was a guard to keep out the roisterers. The soberer of -the tribesmen had a sensible concern for the possible results of -tampering with these incomprehensible but obviously mighty powers. -They were afraid the whole Citadel might blow up with them in it. A few -technicians were still being hustled out as Price entered. - -A number of the chiefs were in here, and Arrin was with them, but he -was neither cursing nor crying. He was standing between two muscular -tribesmen, facing the chiefs, and his face held such an agony of -despair and terror that Price was shaken by it. - -"_What must I do_," he was saying, "_to make you understand?_ That -warning came from our fleet. The Ei have evaded it in the Centaurus -Gulf, and are sweeping in toward Earth. If we don't defend the -Citadel--" - -He broke off as he saw Price come up. Then he said bitterly, "I -congratulate you. Few men can say that practically single-handed they -destroyed a world." - -One of the chiefs asked Price, "Is Sawyer with you?" - -Price shook his head. "They've gone to free him now. He'll be here in a -few minutes." - -"Oh my God," said Arrin softly. "Don't let them free the Ei. Even two -of them at large here--we'd have no hope at all, with their fleet -coming." He looked at Price and Price's confident scorn drained -slowly out of him leaving a nasty void. Nobody, Vurna or not, could -counterfeit what he saw in Arrin's eyes. - -"Do you wish me to go on my knees and beg?" whispered Arrin. "I'll do -it. Only go up and stop them from opening that bulkhead." - -And Price knew suddenly that he must do that. - - * * * * * - -He turned and ran back along the hall and up the stairs, pushing and -kicking his way past the knots of tribesmen who wanted to congratulate -him for what he had done, and all the way there was a chill unpleasant -thing riding his back, and its first name was Doubt, and its second, -Fear. - -_Was it possible, just barely possible, that the Vurna had been telling -the truth all the time?_ - -Uproar on the prison level guided him through a maze of corridors, -to an obligato of breaking doors. He turned a corner. Burr and Twist -and Sawyer were free. They formed part of the fore-front of a group -that was swarming down the hall systematically breaking down the cell -doors. Two Vurna guards lay prone, and a third man, probably the -English-speaking guide, was trying to crawl away unnoticed, his face -ashen with fear. - -The bulkhead was open. - -A man's voice neighed suddenly in terror. Then another, and another, -and the tribesmen were rolled back upon themselves as by the blow of a -great hand, as the fore edge of the group turned and burst its way to -the rear. There was a moment of wild panic. Price stood flat against -the wall and watched brave men run by him sobbing. And then a wave of -force, so cold and alien that it revolted the last small atom of his -human self, hit his mind like the back-blast of a bomb. - -Two dark forms stood in the corridor. - -They were taller than men. At first Price thought they were shrouded in -black like old monks, with cowls over their heads. But as they moved -he saw that the cowls and the floating draperies edged with a thin -translucent gray were their own substance, quivering, shifting, gliding -around some unguessable central core of being. He could not see whether -they had faces under the black folds, and eyes in the faces, but he -could feel them watching him. He could feel their minds stripping him -and tearing away his feeble defenses, leaving his own mind naked and -helpless before them. - -And these were the Ei. These were the Big Lie of the Vurna. - -_Only they were real!_ - -He could not stand them any longer. He ran. - -They all ran. It was a compulsion. Run. Cry panic. Clear the Citadel -and get away! - -He looked back and the Ei were behind them, gliding soundlessly along -the hall. - -Run. Get away.... - -And then Price and the others, fleeing in the next corridor collided -with the chiefs who were hurrying to find out what had happened. They -still had Arrin with them, a prisoner. - -"Out," said Sawyer thickly, his voice a hoarse croak. "Get out, fast--" - -Arrin's voice cracked like a silver whiplash. "Yes, run. Because -they're making you, because their minds are too much for you! Run, and -let them have the Citadel, and when their fleet comes, let them have -the Earth!" - -That stopped them. The horror they felt at that thought surged up -so strong that the frantic compulsion to flee lessened a little. -But behind them, somewhere back in the corridors, they would be -following.... - -Arrin raged and mocked them. "_We_ saved you from the Ei two -generations ago, when Ei ships had smashed your defenses and they were -ready to move in. We moved in first, we've held them back, but now -you've let them in! So run!" - -"Good God!" said Sawyer, his face stricken. "Then it was all true, what -you told us about the Ei. It was true all the time!" - - * * * * * - -Price did not, like the other Earthmen, have a lifetime's thinking to -revise. He grabbed Arrin's shoulders. - -"Can we face them?" he cried. "Can we kill them?" - -"They can be killed," Arrin said. "Their minds can hold many--but -not an unlimited number. If we all rush them, many of us, there is a -chance...." - -Price yelled down the corridors, "What are you running from? There's -only two of them. We're going back! We're going to pull them down!" - -The tribesmen, their first horror a little abated, by sheer reaction -from shame of their own terror, exploded into sudden rage. - -"There's only two of them--come on!" - -And then of a sudden they were all of them running back down the -corridors, jostling, crowding, screaming, Price with Arrin beside him, -with old Sweetbriar ahead, with Sawyer shouting in hoarse anger. A mob, -not an army, a mob urged forward by its own horror. - -Around the corner, and into the corridor where the two black shapes -came gliding fast. And it was like walking into night and death, into -bitter black winds and the stabbing of cruel swords, as the might of -alien minds blasted at them. - -Tribesmen screamed and fell, clawing at their own heads. The mass -behind forced over them, forced the reeling first wave right into the -unimaginable shapes. - -"Pull them down!" - -Price was in the screeching fore-front now and he closed his eyes and -struck with his knife at the cloudy darkness of a cowl. - -A cold like that of outer space struck through him and he staggered, -fainting and falling, and his mind closed on the awful sight of packed -men swaying and pulling and striking at the two tall cowled shapes, -mobbing them, beating them down. - -When Price opened his eyes he was in another corridor and old Sawyer -was slapping his face with rough hands. - -"Yes," said Sawyer thickly. "They're dead. And a good many men dead -with them, and some others that act like their brains are dead." - -He shook his head, a little wildly. "To think it was true all the -time--" - -_Whoom!_ came a deep sound from outside the Citadel. And then more of -them, in quick succession. _Whoom! Whoom! Whoom!_ - -"Arrin--" said Price, getting weakly to his feet. - -"He's down in that room, with his men," said Sawyer. "And they're -turning loose on that Ei fleet out in space." - -And now the great missiles from the launchers outside the Citadel were -going out so fast that the sounds of them could not be counted. - -Price said, "Then you let him--" - -"Let him?" repeated Sawyer. "We _asked_ him! Do you think we want a -whole fleet of--of _them_--reaching Earth?" - -By the time Price and Sawyer got down to the missile-control room, the -deadly messengers were all on their way. - -Arrin and his men watched the screens, and would not turn from them. -Price, and the tribesmen, saw only burning stars and dark space in -those screens--and then, finally, a little crackling of pin-prick -flares running like a swarm of fireflies in the dark void. Then nothing. - -Arrin turned. - -Sawyer said, painfully, "Did they--?" - -"Yes," said Arrin. "We caught them--but none too soon. Our fleet out -there will mop up any Ei ships that survived." - -He added, with slow weariness, "We've won a battle--not a war. The Ei -are many. But this outpost world is safe. And we'll press them back and -back--" - -Sawyer looked at Price. Price said, "Don't be so damned proud. Go ahead -and say it." - -Sawyer said to Arrin, "Seems like we were wrong about some things. -About you Vurna. We're hoping things'll be different between us, now." - -"They can be," Arrin said. - -"They will be, if you want it." - -The old Chief of the Missouris asked, "Now it's all cleared up, just -who _was_ the traitor among us? Was it Oakes?" - -For the first time, a little smile touched Arrin's face. "Do you really -want to know, now it's over?" - -Sawyer grunted. "Guess not." He looked around the other chiefs, and -then stuck his gnarled hand out in the oldest gesture of Earth, and -Arrin took it. - - * * * * * - -Price and Linna stood next day on the roof of the Citadel and watched -the tribesmen going home. - -There was, there had always been, a stiff-necked pride in the men of -Earth. They went away with their heads up, not looking back. But, at -the edge of the distant forest, there was a face turned and the flash -of a handwave before they went into the trees. - -"They'll come back," Price said. "A few of them at first--then more and -more, to learn. A few years will make all the difference." - -He thought that the sons of Earth and the sons of the stars would -together stand upon many far worlds. The long war against the Ei would -end some day, that dark and alien tide would be rolled back, and -Earthmen would do their share. But that was all to come. - -Linna was saying earnestly, "And the people of your own hidden colony -in the west--they will join us too?" - -Price looked at her. "There is no colony, Linna. I came alone from the -west." - -"But your clothes--your plane--where _did_ you come from?" She was -startled, her eyes wide and wondering. - -"I'll explain all that later. You won't believe it, at first. I hardly -do myself." - -And, thinking of the strange freak of force and chance that had -snatched him from the older Earth, Price felt a last pang of nostalgia -for that lost world of long ago. That time when, safe on their cozy -little planet, men had dreamed of space and stars--it seemed now like -a long-dead idyll of youth. - -The Earth of those days could never come again. The wider galaxy -had crashed in upon it, and terrible and magnificent realities had -shattered the youthful dreams, and it was a different and sterner -planet that was joining the community of star-worlds. Who knew what -awaited it on that wider, cosmic stage? His hand tightened on Linna's. -Of their own tiny part in that vast future, he felt suddenly very sure. - -*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CITADEL OF THE STAR LORDS *** - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the -United States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. Special rules, set forth in the General Terms of Use part -of this license, apply to copying and distributing Project -Gutenberg-tm electronic works to protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm -concept and trademark. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms -of the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online -at <a href="https://www.gutenberg.org">www.gutenberg.org</a>. If you -are not located in the United States, you will have to check the laws of the -country where you are located before using this eBook. -</div> - -<p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:1em; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Title: Citadel of the Star Lords</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em'>Author: Edmond Hamilton</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Release Date: July 9, 2021 [eBook #65813]</p> -<p style='display:block; text-indent:0; margin:1em 0'>Language: English</p> - <p style='display:block; margin-top:1em; margin-bottom:0; margin-left:2em; text-indent:-2em; text-align:left'>Produced by: Greg Weeks, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net</p> -<div style='margin-top:2em; margin-bottom:4em'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CITADEL OF THE STAR LORDS ***</div> - -<div class="figcenter x-ebookmaker-drop"> - <img src="images/illusc.jpg" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="titlepage"> - -<h1>CITADEL OF THE STAR LORDS</h1> - -<h2>By Edmond Hamilton</h2> - -<p>Out of the dark vastness of the void came a<br /> -conquering horde, incredible and invincible,<br /> -with Earth's only weapon—a man from the past!</p> - -<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br /> -Imagination Stories of Science and Fantasy<br /> -October 1956<br /> -Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that<br /> -the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]</p> - -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>As he gunned his plane northward through the night, Price thought of -the roller-coaster when he'd been a kid, of how you went faster and -faster until you hit the big plunge.</p> - -<p>Well, he was on the big plunge now. And what would end this -roller-coaster ride—prison, or escape, or a crash? It had to be one -of those.</p> - -<p><i>He was to remember that, later. He was to think later that it was well -he didn't dream the fantastic fate he was really racing toward....</i></p> - -<p>He looked down, and there was only blackness. The deserts of California -and Nevada are dark and wide, and he was keeping well away from the -airways beacons and the main highways.</p> - -<p>He kept the Beechcraft as high as he could. He was flying without -lights, but with what they already had against him, that minor -infraction wasn't important. He kept looking back, expecting every -minute to see the red-and-green winglights of Border Patrol planes -coming up on his tail.</p> - -<p>If he was lucky, if he slipped them long enough, if he crossed north -without being sighted by the passenger planes that shuttled between Las -Vegas and Los Angeles, he might just make it to Bill Willerman's and -get the Beechcraft under cover. If—if—if—</p> - -<p>There was another if, Price thought bitterly. If he'd had any brains, -he wouldn't be in this spot at all.</p> - -<p>He turned on the radio. He flipped the dial around, getting loud music -from a Vegas hotel, then a political speech, then more music—and then -a news broadcast. As he'd expected, he was at the top of the news.</p> - -<p>"—so that even while Arnolfo Ruiz, firebrand revolutionary exile, -is under arrest by Mexican police, United States authorities are -conducting an intensive air-dragnet search for the American pilot who -smuggled Ruiz across the border. That unknown pilot is known to have -returned across the border an hour ago, and police of three states have -been alerted.</p> - -<p>"The AEC announces that its next test will be that of an experimental -small new H-bomb whose effects will be studied for—"</p> - -<p>Price savagely cut the radio. He damned the announcer, and Ruiz, and -himself. Most of all, himself.</p> - -<p>He'd acted like a halfwit. Because a smooth talker had given him -a phony story about a secret business trip, he had smuggled the -most dangerous trouble-maker in the hemisphere down into a friendly -republic. Who would believe he hadn't known? He <i>had</i> done it, and -pressure from Washington would make sure that he got full pay for his -folly.</p> - -<p>He might as well look the truth in the face. If it hadn't been this, -it would have been something else. He'd been playing the fool for -years, ever since Korea. Other fliers had come home from there and -taken up their jobs again, but a job had been too dull for him; he'd -drifted along with the fast-buck fly-boys out for fun and excitement, -hauling hunting and fishing parties, spending the profits in bordertown -bars, going broke and starting over again—and now finally this. His -roller-coaster ride was about over.</p> - -<p>It would be over for good if he didn't reach Willerman's ranch before -daylight. Bill would hide the plane for him. He'd saved Bill's neck a -couple of times in the old days, and he could depend on him. But he had -to reach him, first.</p> - -<p>He saw the glow in the sky that came from the lights of Las Vegas, and -he kept warily wide of it. He looked back again. No Patrol planes yet. -As he rushed on, Price began to feel that he was going to make it.</p> - -<p>Then, suddenly and disastrously, everything happened at once.</p> - -<p>He saw lights on the ground ahead—an oddly scattered pattern of lights -too thin to be a town, too wide-spread to be a ranch.</p> - -<p>At the same moment, two fast jets screamed down from the upper darkness -and nearly tore his wings off. They curved around for another pass at -him.</p> - -<p>"Air Force planes!" thought Price. "Hell, that tears it—"</p> - -<p>It seemed crazy that the government was <i>that</i> hot to catch him. But -the jets were making another lightning pass to him, trying to scare -him, to force him down.</p> - -<p>He had less than a chance in a million to lose them, and he knew it. -But he was going to be a long time in jail, and he might as well give -them a run for it. Just possibly, the slower Beechcraft could get away -in the dark the next time they overshot him.</p> - -<p>He gunned the plane wide open, rushing high over the scattered lights. -And then, incredibly, he was free of his pursuers. He looked over his -shoulder and saw them drawing back.</p> - -<p>It didn't make sense. Why would they suddenly draw back? Anyway, with -those jets off his tail, he still had a chance.</p> - -<p>Price looked down. Among the lights down there he saw lights on a queer -steel tower. He'd seen pictures of a tower like that somewhere. It -wasn't an oil-rig, but something he couldn't remember.</p> - -<p>And then, suddenly, he remembered, and a terrible coldness choked him -and his flesh flinched as he saw a door into nightmare opening.</p> - -<p>That tower, and the announcement of a new H-bomb test, and the distance -he was from Vegas, and the way those frantic jets had drawn back....</p> - -<p>"Oh, no," said Price. "Oh, no, oh no, oh no—"</p> - -<p>He was still saying it when the bomb went off and the universe cracked -wide open under his racing plane.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER II</p> - - -<p>The cataclysm that hit Price was without light or sound. That, when he -thought of it later, was the most awful feature of it.</p> - -<p>He felt a shock, but not the shock of ultimate annihilation he -expected. This was a shuddering impact as of the plane, himself, -hitting some barrier and forcing through, a rending, tearing, dizzying -thing that was like no sensation he had ever experienced.</p> - -<p>He yelled, naked terror forcing the air from his lungs. His weight -flung against the straps, and he knew from that that the plane was in -a spin. Mechanically, his hands reached to the controls. He levelled -off....</p> - -<p><i>But he wasn't dead. He was alive, undestroyed, and how could that be -if the raving energies of a hydrogen bomb had been unloosed beneath -him?</i></p> - -<p>Price's mind was a mad turmoil. What had happened?</p> - -<p>He had blundered right over the bomb test-area, right over the -bomb-tower. And the jets guarding the area had tried to stop him. -Probably, if his radio hadn't been off, he would have heard them -screaming frantic warnings to him.</p> - -<p>But had the bomb really gone off? If it had, he would surely have been -instantly annihilated.</p> - -<p>He hadn't been. He was alive. The plane was ticking along through the -night. The instruments functioned.</p> - -<p>But <i>something</i> terrific had happened. That ghastly, wrenching shock -that had seemed to outrage the very atoms of his body—his flesh still -crawled with the memory of it. Something had happened. But what?</p> - -<p>Price couldn't think. The mind just could not grapple with a thing like -this. He sat, mechanically touching the controls, and the Beechcraft -roared on and on.</p> - -<p>Gradually, his mind came alive. He shakily swung the plane around. He -was going back to Las Vegas. Right now, arrest and prison looked good -to him compared to what had happened, or nearly happened.</p> - -<p>If he hadn't been so tensely trying to escape, he thought, he would -have remembered about the bomb-tests coming up. There had been -newspaper stories. Guarded stories about a radical physical effect -detected during explosions of the new-type H-bombs, and mention of -elaborate preparations being made to study these unusual effects.</p> - -<p>Price's thoughts leaped suddenly. He recalled a scientist's statement -that the center of explosion of the new-type bomb might be like the -eye of a hurricane, a focus of inconceivable forces but affected in a -radically different way by those forces.</p> - -<p><i>Had</i> the bomb gone off under him, then? Had his plane and himself, -at the "eye" of the tremendous explosion, been hurled somehow through -spatial barriers into safety before the light and sound and destruction -could even reach him?</p> - -<p>It seemed an insane speculation. Yet everything about this was insane. -He would be himself, if he didn't get down to Earth soon.</p> - -<p>He could not see the glow of Las Vegas anywhere in the night. He cut -his radio in and spoke hoarsely into it.</p> - -<p>"Beechcraft 4556 calling Las Vegas Airport! Come in, Las Vegas!"</p> - -<p>There was no answer. The radio seemed operative—but when he turned the -receiver dials, not a sound came out.</p> - -<p>"Knocked out," Price muttered. "And no wonder, if—"</p> - -<p>He couldn't finish the thought, it was too soul-shaking a thing to -speculate on, the thing that might have happened to him.</p> - -<p>He curved the plane around, looking for highway lights, for an airways -beacon, anything.</p> - -<p>Nothing. Nothing but the darkness and the stars.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>A little frantically, he swung the plane around and started eastward -again. He must have missed Las Vegas. But if he kept going east, he'd -surely cut the main highways. There were always lots of cars on them at -night, in the summer.</p> - -<p>He flew on and on. And the darkness continued. No lights at all, not -even the glimmer from a lonely ranch.</p> - -<p>Nothing.</p> - -<p>He would have landed, gladly now, but he did not know where he was or -what was under him. The Beechcraft was equipped with extra fuel tanks -for long flights away from any source of supply, and they had been full -when he started. He could fly a long time yet.</p> - -<p>He flew.</p> - -<p>After a while he began to think that there was only one explanation. He -was dead, and flying in limbo.</p> - -<p>And limbo, it seemed, went on forever.</p> - -<p>Finally, after many hours there began to be a light in the blackness -ahead of him, and his heart leaped up, thinking that at last he had -raised the glow of a big town. But it was only the dawn. He watched it -creep cold and gray across the world, and now he understood that he was -alive. But he was not cheered. Now he could see what was underneath him.</p> - -<p>Forest. Rolling like a dark green sea from north to south, from east -to west. He had left the desert far behind. He figured that he was -over Missouri now, and there should have been towns, villages, farms, -cultivated fields.</p> - -<p>There was forest.</p> - -<p>The light turned rosy, then golden. The sun sprang up and it was day. -Far ahead the Mississippi gleamed. Price sent the Beechcraft at full -throttle, toward St. Louis. He could not see any smoke from the great -complex of city and industry that sprawled there over both banks of the -river, and he could not see any bridges. But St. Louis had to be there.</p> - -<p>It was. But it had changed since he saw it last. The high buildings -were brought low, and the low buildings were mounds, shells covered -with brush and fox-grape, and trees grew in the public streets and -through the broken windows. The river, vast and placid, was empty -except for a floating log. Obstructions along the shores might once -have been docks, but were so no longer. And there was a great stillness.</p> - -<p>For one wild moment Price thought, <i>The bomb did it last night, the -new-type bomb with energies they didn't even dream about.</i> Then he -realized that that was hardly possible. You can destroy a city with an -H-bomb in a matter of seconds, but you can't grow an oak tree sixty -feet high in the rubble of the City Hall in much under a century.</p> - -<p>Time had passed since last night.</p> - -<p>This was too much to take in all at once. Price didn't even try. He -looked for a place to land, but there wasn't any, so he kept on flying, -eastward across the river.</p> - -<p>Time had passed, and he had passed with it. Slowly it began to come -to Price, the dreadful and incredible truth of what had happened. The -wrenching, tearing shock he had felt in the eye of the blast was not -physical but temporal. The uncomprehended powers of the bomb had been -mightier than anyone had guessed. They warped the ordered fabric of the -space-time continuum itself, and acting on the matter of himself and -his plane at the "eye" of the explosion, had warped them too—into the -future.</p> - -<p>The Beechcraft went droning through the empty sky. Price looked down -on desolation, green and peaceful and as unproductive as it had been -before men ever came with axe and plow to tame it.</p> - -<p>How far in the future?</p> - -<p>He did not know.</p> - -<p>Were there still men, surviving somewhere in this wilderness? Or had -humanity destroyed itself in a final act of atomic madness? Were all -the cities dead and dust?</p> - -<p>He did not know that either.</p> - -<p>He only knew that he was too numb and exhausted to go much farther. He -had to have water and food and sleep. He had to have a place to land.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He found it well beyond the river, a natural prairie in the midst of -trees. He tried to gauge the way the wind was blowing by the ripple of -the grass, and then he circled in a long curve to the north to head -it. As he did so he thought he saw an iron glinting to the northeast, -something very vast and strange as of the sun reflecting from a face of -metal mountain-high and wide. Then he dropped low over the tree-tops, -and whatever the glinting was he could not see it any more.</p> - -<p>The Beechcraft bumped and bounded to a stop. Price sat for a moment -watching his hands shake on the controls, and then some last measure -of caution made him taxi the plane back, to the extreme edge of the -prairie and nose it into the wind, ready to take off again with no -delay.</p> - -<p>He had a sporting rifle and revolver in the plane. He buckled on the -revolver, stuffed his pockets full of cartridges for the rifle, and -climbed down to the ground. He stood for several minutes in the shelter -of the plane's wing, looking around, but he could not see any signs of -life except a pair of crows flapping over his head with rusty cawing. -It was late summer, and the wind was dry and hot. He began to walk -toward the woods.</p> - -<p>He looked a little dazedly, as he walked, toward the northeast. What -was it, the incredible iron vastness he had glimpsed far away there?</p> - -<p>About thirty yards from the plane Price stopped suddenly, his heart -pounding and a sudden sweat breaking on his skin. The grass was -trampled here in an irregular circle, with scars of bare earth ripped -in the ground. There was a large quantity of blood, scarcely dry. A -wide flattened track led to the woods. Something had been killed here, -something big, like a horse or a cow, and the carcass dragged in among -the trees.</p> - -<p>Men. Hunters. An animal would have devoured its kill where it lay.</p> - -<p>But what kind of men?</p> - -<p>Price stood half crouched over the bloody ground, his rifle ready, -looking this way and that and seeing nothing. The hot wind went running -over the prairie and the encircling trees bowed to it and tossed their -branches, but there was no other motion, no other sound. Even the crows -had gone.</p> - -<p>Price shouted. "Hello! Hello! Is anybody there? I'm lost. I need help. -Hello!"</p> - -<p>His voice was shocking in the stillness, loud and impolite.</p> - -<p>There was no answer.</p> - -<p>He went on down the flattened track toward the trees. He was afraid, -and desperately tired.</p> - -<p>"Hello?" he said, and now his voice was pleading. "Please. Where are -you? Help me—"</p> - -<p><i>Help me, you men of an unknown future, you hunters in impossibility, -you lurkers in nightmare. Help me, or I die.</i></p> - -<p>The shadows were heavy under the trees. The prairie grass did not grow -here, but there were briars and other things to show a crushed trail. -It was not a long one. He saw the carcass lying in a little glade. -It was a black-and-white cow, already partially butchered. He moved -toward it, and then from the branches overhead and the underbrush on -either side short ropes of braided leather came flying, weighted at -their ends with stones. Price fell down helpless and floundering, -painfully bruised, his arms and legs wrapped in the tough bolo-like -ropes, and one around his neck cutting off his breath so he could not -even cry out.</p> - -<p>In a swift and furious rush six men sprang from among the trees and -stood about him. One snatched his rifle, another his revolver. They -wore sketchy garments of tanned leather, and they were as dark and wild -as the Shawnees and Wyandots who had hunted these woodland prairies -long ago, except that some of them had light hair and all of them were -bearded.</p> - -<p>One of them, a tall lean wide-shouldered man with a shock of -sun-bleached brown hair and eyes more blue, more blazing and filled -with hate than any Price could remember seeing in his life, crouched -beside him and tore the strangling rope ungently from his neck. Price -tried to speak, but before he could do more than gasp for breath the -brown-haired man whipped out a knife and drove the point of it straight -for Price's throat.</p> - -<p>"Now," he said, "you star-spawn—we'll see if your blood is any redder -than the kind we breed on Earth!"</p> - -<p>The steel bit hard. Price screamed.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER III</p> - - -<p>The brown-haired man withdrew the knife with a nice dexterity, its tip -reddened for perhaps a quarter of an inch. Price looked at it and at -him in dumb horror. The six wolfish faces collected in a close circle -above him and peered down, smiling.</p> - -<p>"It's the same color, Burr. Who'd have thought it?"</p> - -<p>"Just blood. Hah! And I always thought they'd bleed hard and shiny, -like quicksilver."</p> - -<p>"Stick him again, Burr."</p> - -<p>"I wish we had time," said Burr, and licked his lips with a red tongue. -"But they know where we are." He sighed and raised the knife again. "We -got to get out of here. Fast."</p> - -<p>Price found his voice. "For God's sake," he cried. "For God's sake, -what are you doing? I ask you for help, and you—" He struggled -furiously against the ropes. "You haven't any right to kill me. I -haven't done you any harm."</p> - -<p>"Star-spawn," said Burr softly, using that word for the second time. He -prodded Price above the belt with the knife-point. "If I had time I'd -do this slowly, very slowly. Be glad we don't have time."</p> - -<p>"But why?" Price shouted. "What for?" He glared up at the circle of -hairy faces. "I only got here today. I couldn't have done anything to -you. I came from—"</p> - -<p><i>From yesterday? A hundred years ago? Through time? Tell them, and ask -them to believe it. Maybe they will. I don't.</i></p> - -<p>"—from the West," he said. "From Nevada. I haven't anything to do with -stars."</p> - -<p>Burr laughed. He raised the knife. But another man, with a shrewd dark -eye and gray hairs in his beard, caught his wrist.</p> - -<p>"Wait a minute. Look at his hair. It's as dark as mine."</p> - -<p>"Dyed," said Burr. "Look at his clothes. Look at the flier he came in, -at his weapons. Look where he is—in the Forbidden Belt. If he isn't -from the Citadel—don't be a foolish man, Twist. Let go."</p> - -<p>"Why would he dye his hair to look like a human and then come to us in -a flier? Is that reasonable? Now hold on, Burr. You hear me? There's a -way to tell."</p> - -<p>Burr grumbled, but he relaxed, and Twist let him go. He caught Price by -the collar and dragged him into the glade by the butchered cow, where -the sunlight fell in strong shafts. Then he rolled Price's head back -and forth, studying it with intense interest. The others looked over -his shoulder.</p> - -<p>"His eyes are dark too," said Twist. "You can't dye eyeballs. And look -here. See that, Burr? Feel it. He's got the sproutings of a beard. Now -we all know the Starlords don't grow hair on their lovely faces."</p> - -<p>"Hey," said the others. "That's right. Twist is right."</p> - -<p>"Of course he's right," said Price. "I'm human." He knew that much. The -rest of the talk was a mystery, but that didn't matter. Not right now. -"I come from the West. I'm a friend."</p> - -<p>Burr looked sullen. "Humans don't fly. Only Starlords do that."</p> - -<p>"Maybe he's a collaborator?" said a yellow-haired boy, all bright and -eager, and Burr smiled again.</p> - -<p>"Maybe. Anyway, he's none of us. Stand by, Twist."</p> - -<p>But Twist did not stand by. He faced the others in fatherly anger at -their stupidity.</p> - -<p>"You're almighty anxious for a killing Burr. Now what's the Chief going -to say when we come back and tell him that a human man came in an -airplane, and asked us for help, and we stuck him like a pig and left -the plane for the Star Lords?"</p> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<div class="figcenter"> - <img src="images/illus.jpg" alt=""/> -</div> - -<hr class="chap" /> - -<p>For some reason the word "plane" sobered them down and made them -thoughtful. Twist pressed his advantage.</p> - -<p>"You've all seen the old pictures. You know this flier isn't from the -Citadel. It ain't the same shape and it don't make the same noise. It's -a plane. Maybe the last one on Earth, and this man knows how to fly it. -And you want to cut his throat?"</p> - -<p>There was a short silence, during which Price thought he could hear the -drops of sweat trickling down his forehead. Then Burr said, without -rancor,</p> - -<p>"I guess you're right. We'd better take him to the Chief."</p> - -<p>"All right," said Twist. He crouched down and began unwrapping the -bolo ropes. Price said, "Thanks." It seemed a very small word, and -inadequate. Twist grunted.</p> - -<p>"If you prove out to be a collaborator," he said, "you'll wish I'd let -you die an easy death."</p> - -<p>"I'm not," said Price. His brain had been working with abnormal speed. -"This is an—an <i>old</i> plane. The papers are still in it. It's been -kept hidden, except—" He groped desperately for explanations. "It's a -tradition in my family to fly. We're taught, father to son."</p> - -<p>That was true enough. Price's father had taken to the air in World War -I, and for years afterward had run a flying service. The rest of it he -had to play by ear, and God help him if he guessed wrong.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Twist helped him to his feet. "Now," he said to the others, "I want to -know what about that plane."</p> - -<p>"Get it under cover," Burr said. "Hide it."</p> - -<p>"We might do that," Twist said. "And the first flying-eye that happened -along would find it. They do more than see, you know. They smell, too. -They smell metal, if it's much bigger than a knife." He held out the -stone-weighted ropes and shook them. "That's why we use these when we -hunt in the Belt. Remember?"</p> - -<p>"Now, there's no call to be jeering, Twist," said Burr. "If you got a -better idea, we'll listen to it."</p> - -<p>"Fly it out," said Twist sharply. "How else are we going to get it -to the Chief? On our backs? Cut up and packed on the horses? No." He -turned to the man who had taken Price's pistol. "Give me that, Larkin. -And you, Harper, hand that rifle to Burr. Larkin, you're in charge of -the party. Get the beef back to the camp, and as soon as you've smoked -it load up and head home. Keep an eye out for trouble—this is liable -to poke up the Citadel like you'd poke a beehive."</p> - -<p>Larkin, a short powerful man with a curly poll like a certain type of -bull Price had once seen, asked in a mild high voice, "Where are you -and Burr going?"</p> - -<p>Twist pointed a thumb sky-ward. "Up there," he said, and his eyes shone -with excitement. He looked at Burr and grinned.</p> - -<p>Burr was scared. It showed in his eyes, in the way his mouth tightened. -But he wouldn't say so. Instead he reached out and grabbed Price by the -shirt and shook him fiercely.</p> - -<p>"There'll be a gun at your head every minute, and don't you forget. You -do anything wrong, and you're dead."</p> - -<p>Price forebore to explain what would happen to Burr and Twist if they -shot him in mid-air. He only nodded and said,</p> - -<p>"Don't worry. I'm as anxious to get to your Chief as you are." He took -a deep breath and plunged. "That's what I came for."</p> - -<p>Burr said, "You're a long way out of your way."</p> - -<p>"This is new country to me. I got lost."</p> - -<p><i>You don't know how lost. You don't know how alone.</i></p> - -<p>"Come on," said Twist. "There's been too much yattering already."</p> - -<p>He led the way back to the edge of the trees. Price and Burr followed -him. The others were already working on the carcass. Presently they -were hidden from sight. At the verge of the prairies the three men -stopped and examined the visible world before they left cover. Price -looked around and did not see anything and was ready to go on. Burr -and Twist not only looked at earth and sky, they sniffed the wind and -seemed to <i>feel</i> the quality of the air, like animals.</p> - -<p>Twist gave a kind of shrug and said, "Well, we're in it now, whole -hog." He began to run through the long grass toward the plane. Burr -went fleetly after him. Price, oppressed with many things of which -physical exhaustion was the least, ran heavily behind them.</p> - -<p>When they were within perhaps fifteen feet of the plane a glittering -thing came over the tops of the trees and hesitated, making a couple -of short spirals in the air. Then it centered over the plane and hung -there, high above. It was a disc-shaped object maybe three feet across, -with a big lens on its underside.</p> - -<p>Twist and Burr had stopped. Price came panting up to them. They were -looking up at the disc, and Price saw in their faces a wild mingling of -rage and hate and the despairing fear of men faced with an enemy that -no amount of bravery or physical strength can prevail against.</p> - -<p>"What is it?" he asked, and Twist said hoarsely,</p> - -<p>"You must be from a long way west if you've never seen a flying-eye." -His hands dropped to his sides. "Well. That's finished."</p> - -<p>Burr began to curse at the thing. He looked as if he wanted to cry.</p> - -<p>"What will it do?" asked Price.</p> - -<p>"It'll hang there, right where it is, to guide the fliers from the -Citadel. They can see us here where we stand, right now, in the -Citadel." Burr's face was getting whiter by the second, like a man who -has been stung by some venomous thing and realizes that in this present -moment, between strides as it were, he must die. "They'll be starting. -It's forbidden to come into the Belt. They'd kill us for that alone. -But with the plane—God knows what they'll do."</p> - -<p>"We can try and dodge them in the woods," said Twist, without hope. -"Come on."</p> - -<p>He started away, but Price said, "Can't we outfly it?"</p> - -<p>"The flying-eye? It'll follow us like a hungry hound."</p> - -<p>Some kind of television-scanner, Price thought, with a metal-detection -unit and a signal relay to alert the main control in the Citadel. And -what was the Citadel, and who or what within it was now watching him as -he stood, and preparing for his death?</p> - -<p>He said, catching the sudden terror from the others, "Shoot it down."</p> - -<p>"Shoot it?"</p> - -<p>"Smash the lens. Then it can't see us. Here, give me the rifle."</p> - -<p>Burr said, "You crazy? No gun will carry that far."</p> - -<p>"What kind of guns have you got?" said Price. "Damn it, give me the -rifle."</p> - -<p>Twist said, "Let him have it."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Price was a good shot. Not brilliant, just good. But today he was -phenomenal. He blasted the lens and whatever insides there were behind -it as fast as he could pump the cartridges into the chamber and fire -them. He didn't miss once. And the disc flopped and slipped and crashed -down sideways in the woods.</p> - -<p>Price leaped for the plane. "Come on," he said.</p> - -<p>The others were staring at him, with their jaws hanging open. "Did you -see that? Did you see that <i>gun</i>?"</p> - -<p>"Come on," Price yelled, "or I'm going without you!"</p> - -<p>They tumbled in. Price started the motor, gunned it savagely, and took -off as though the devil was on his tail. One of the men, he didn't know -which, yelled out in sheer fright, once. Then they were clear of the -tree-tops and climbing fast.</p> - -<p>Price looked over his shoulder, and once again he thought he saw that -dark metallic gleaming in the northeast.</p> - -<p>"Which way?"</p> - -<p>"Back across the river. And then," said Twist slowly, "I don't know. -They've seen the plane. They'll come looking for it, and the first -place they'll look is the Capitol, and after that the villages. They'll -find it if it's anywhere near, and you can figure what they'll do to -the people. They let us have our guns and our hunting knives, so we can -kill game and even each other if we feel like it, but artillery, no. -Explosives, no. And planes, no, no, no. Especially not planes. I don't -suppose there's been one in the air for almost a century."</p> - -<p>Twist shivered, his eyes shining, his hands gripping the seat.</p> - -<p>"I'm glad I got to do this before I die. It's—" He fumbled for a word -and gave up. "I can't say. But it makes you think what we were once, -what we could have been today if it hadn't been for <i>them</i>." And he -jerked his head back to indicate the direction of the Citadel. "The -star-spawn. The damned Star Lords."</p> - -<p>Burr looked out the cabin window. "It's an awful long way down." Then -he asked Price, "Why'd you say you came to find the Chief?"</p> - -<p>A suspicious man, Price thought, and so is Twist. Careful, careful. -But how can you be careful when you don't know what's going on in the -world, and you don't dare ask?</p> - -<p>Price said, "I came to give him the plane. I'm the last of my family. I -wanted to join up with somebody, and—there aren't many in the desert." -This, he thought, was a safe assumption. "Life's too hard. I wanted to -come where there are trees and water."</p> - -<p>It was a good story. He didn't know whether they believed it.</p> - -<p>The Beechcraft left a fleeting shadow on the river and passed on. Twist -peered anxiously into the sky behind.</p> - -<p>"Can you go any faster?"</p> - -<p>"I'm wide open now."</p> - -<p>"Not fast enough. They come like lightning. <i>Whoom!</i>" Jets, thought -Price, and began to look for a hole in the forest. Twist said, "And if -they don't find us the first time, they'll send the flying-eyes."</p> - -<p>"And they can smell metal," Price said. "So we've got to find a place -away from any town and not only out of sight from above but also -screened from a magnetic detector. Say in a cave, under a rock ledge, -or close to some heavy concentration of metal they're already used to. -Can you think of any place?"</p> - -<p>There was a total silence, and he realized that they were looking at -him with cold and bitter eyes.</p> - -<p>"How do you know so much?" asked Burr.</p> - -<p>"Isn't it obvious?" said Price impatiently.</p> - -<p>"Not to us. What's all this about magnetic detectors and screens—and -where did you learn it if you're not working for the Citadel?"</p> - -<p>Twist laid the muzzle of the revolver casually against his neck.</p> - -<p>"I wouldn't shoot me now," said Price, and explained why, very quickly. -"Besides, that's a hell of a way to act. Just because I happen to know -a little elementary science—how else do you suppose the flying-eyes -find metal? By some supernatural method?"</p> - -<p>"Hm," said Twist, and withdrew the revolver. "Maybe he's right, Burr. -After all, we're hunters. We never studied much into those things." -Burr grunted derisively, but he sat still, apparently convinced that -there was nothing to be done about Price now. Twist thought hard for a -minute. Then he said, "I know a place. There's a kind of a secret cave -there, and room enough for you to land, I guess, figuring by what you -took before."</p> - -<p>He squinted out the window, confused by the differentness of how things -looked from above. But finally he picked out a direction and told -Price, "There."</p> - -<p>After some low-level circling and searching Price found the place, -a fairly flat stretch of bottomland in a little valley, beside an -overhanging wall of granite. Twist's estimate of the room was hardly -generous, but he made it, and taxied over bumpy sod as close as he -could to the cave-mouth Twist pointed out. Then he sent the others to -clear away some rocks and dangling creepers, and with a final heave and -roar he managed to lurch into the cave itself. He cut the motor. He had -about four hours' flying time left in the tanks.</p> - -<p>He got out of the Beechcraft and dragged stones under the wheels to -chock it. Then he helped Burr and Twist rearrange the hanging vines -over the entrance.</p> - -<p>A high shrill screaming in the sky gave them less than ten seconds' -warning. They ducked back under the overhanging ledge and peered -motionless from under it. And Price saw close above him, skimming the -rolling land like an eager hawk, an ovoid craft that was not like any -jet he had ever seen, wingless, leaving no trail, but tearing with a -mighty shriek of power through the sky.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER IV</p> - - -<p>Trapped in a strange dream, Price looked down from the forested ridge -into a shallow green valley. Burr pointed and said,</p> - -<p>"There it is. The Capitol of the Missouris."</p> - -<p>He said it with pride. He and Twist had talked of this place, in the -two days since they had hidden the plane and headed north. And they had -talked of it proudly. Their home, the city of their people, the focus -of a shadowy government that ruled the forest-lands which once had been -two great states.</p> - -<p>Price looked at it, and he felt pity. Pity, and a wrenching regret for -what the world had once been, and what it had become during the lost -years.</p> - -<p>In the valley, straddling a clear little river, lay a half-dozen -streets of wooden houses and workshops and smithies. The buildings -were neat enough, of massive squared timbers. But the streets were -unpaved and dusty, and their only traffic was loaded wagons from the -surrounding tilled lands, and pack-horse trains from the forest trails, -and men, women, children in drab leather and wool. A faint sound of -creaking axles drifted up through the drowsy afternoon air.</p> - -<p>"The Capitol of the Missouris," Price thought. "And oh God, why did it -have to happen to our world?"</p> - -<p>He had listened, on the way here, to everything Burr and Twist said. -Bit by bit, the jigsaw fragments of information had fallen into place, -and a few casual questions had completed the apocalyptic picture.</p> - -<p>It had happened long ago in the lost years, the years that Price had -been hurled <i>through</i>. As near as he could make out the date had been -1979, sixty years ago.</p> - -<p>That had been the year of doom. That had been the year when they had -first come from outer space.</p> - -<p>The Star Lords. The Vurna, as they called themselves. The accursed -star-spawn, as men called them. Their tremendous cruisers had come out -of the blue, had poised above the Earth, and then had struck.</p> - -<p>Every city, every big town, every atomic power-plant, every arsenal, -every important bridge, viaduct, dam and factory. In one week of -holocaust, they had been smashed by the remorseless cruisers that went -round and round the planet. Millions died, that week. And the Star -Lords' cruisers went away.</p> - -<p>Quickly, they had returned. This time, not to destroy but to seize. -What had been the fat, smiling lands of Illinois and Indiana, they had -made their domain. In it, they built their Citadel.</p> - -<p>The Citadel was a fortress, a city, above all, a base. The Star Lords -contemptuously refrained from attacking the dazed Earth peoples who -had been thrown back to near-primitive conditions. To the lords of the -Citadel, Earth was only the site of an important base. Or so they said.</p> - -<p>Was it any wonder, Price thought, that these men of the Missouris would -kill anyone, anything, from the Citadel? Just hearing of it all had -kindled his own rage. These men's fathers had lived it, and they were -still living it.</p> - -<p>He looked down at the wooden town, as he and Burr and Twist went down a -trail, and he thought,</p> - -<p>"Careful, though! They still think I <i>may</i> be from the Citadel—Watch -every word!"</p> - -<p>Two hours later, Price sat in a wooden-walled room in the biggest of -the houses, facing the Chief of the Missouris.</p> - -<p>His name was Sawyer, and he was old. But he looked formidable as an -old panther in his buckskins. His leathery face held deep pride, -intelligence, and a brutal ruthlessness. Behind him stood the Chiefs -of the Indianas and of the Illinois, those scattered peoples on whose -lands the Citadel now stood.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Sawyer listened without a word to Price's story, and all the time Price -told it he thought how thin and far-fetched it sounded. But, looking at -these faces, he knew he could never convince them of the truth.</p> - -<p>"Two days ago," said Sawyer finally, "the Vurna were here. They were -almighty hot and bothered. They were looking for a plane. <i>I</i> never saw -a plane in my life, and I said so."</p> - -<p>He paused, his swarthy, wrinkled face brooding, and no one, least of -all Price, dared speak.</p> - -<p>He went on. "Since then, the sky's been lousy with their flying-eyes, -hunting and hunting. You must have seen them."</p> - -<p>Burr took that as an opening. "We did. We kept ducking them, all the -way."</p> - -<p>Sawyer looked out the doorway at the dusty, sunlit street and then back -again to Price and he said with sudden blazing fierceness,</p> - -<p>"You tell me you heard of us Missouris way out in your mountains, that -you wanted to bring your plane to us—why?"</p> - -<p>Price floundered. "Why, I wanted to help you—"</p> - -<p>"<i>To help us do what?</i>" A garnet light was in the old man's eyes now. -"What did you hear we were doing that you wanted to help on?"</p> - -<p>Price sensed from the other's fierceness that he was in imminent -danger, that something he had said had deepened suspicion.</p> - -<p>He almost welcomed the interruption that saved him from answering now, -though it was a sound that raised the short hairs on his neck.</p> - -<p>The sound of shrieking power across the sky, the sound of the -sky-hunters from the Citadel....</p> - -<p>"That's the damned star-spawn coming down here again!" said one of the -men behind Sawyer.</p> - -<p>The old man got to his feet with amazing alacrity. He rapped an order -to Twist and Burr, pointing to Price.</p> - -<p>"Take him upstairs. If he makes a peep, cut his throat—but do it -quiet."</p> - -<p>Little more than a minute later, Price was in a hot, dusty little room. -It had gun-slots in its heavy wooden shutters, and they let level bars -of golden light into the room.</p> - -<p>He heard the whine of the flier, coming down fast. He went to the -gun-slot.</p> - -<p>"No," said Burr.</p> - -<p>Price turned and looked at him. He kept his voice low. "The hell with -you," he said. "You can stand behind me with your knife. I'm not going -to yell. But I'm going to see."</p> - -<p>He heard Burr and Twist come up close behind him, as he peered out the -wide slot.</p> - -<p>Out in the green square, a white craft marked with a curious insigne -was making a vertical landing. He thought it was a type of aerodyne. -He had never seen one in flight, back in that strangely far-off and -quickly-fading time from which he had come, but he had seen sketches -and a working model. This seemed to be a refinement of the same -principle, faster than a jet and maneuverable as a toy balloon. His -hands itched to fly it.</p> - -<p>He saw the insigne on its side—a golden sunburst with what looked like -a many-colored, many-faceted globe at its heart. He did not know what -it signified but he knew what it was. The mark of the Star Lords, of -the Vurna. And even as he looked, four of them came out of the craft.</p> - -<p>They came along the street to where Sawyer and the other Chiefs and a -little crowd of leather-clad men silently waited. No one had a gun, no -one made a motion. Yet that dusty street was electric with a hatred so -deep and strong and quivering that it made Price shiver.</p> - -<p>Yet the four Vurna came straight on. The Star Lords, they from -unguessable spaces who had smashed Earth like a child's toy, to make it -their footstool. Price pressed closer to the gun-slot. He wanted to see -them very clearly indeed.</p> - -<p>Especially one of them.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The star lords were tall and well-formed, and they looked much like -Earthmen except that they wore tight-fitting garments of various -colors, but all cut to the same pattern. Price guessed that they were -uniforms, with the colors indicating rank or branch. The other chief -difference was the coloring of the Star Lords themselves. They were -bronzed as though by radiations fiercer than any known on Earth, and -their hair was silver. Not white, and not pallid, but a rich silver. -The men—three of the four were men—wore their hair short.</p> - -<p>The woman wore hers long, rippling onto her shoulders. It caught the -sunset light and gleamed like hot metal. Her uniform was a deep -crimson, duskier than flame, molding her long thighs and her high, -just-full-enough breasts.</p> - -<p>Sawyer was speaking to them now, his voice rolling out harshly in the -silence. "If you're still hunting for that plane, my answer's the same. -I've never seen one."</p> - -<p>One of the Vurna men, who seemed to have the authority, stepped a pace -in front of the other two men and the woman.</p> - -<p>The woman had raised her head and was looking restlessly at the blank -or shuttered windows of the timber houses. Price felt uneasily that -she knew he was there and was looking at him through the gun-slot. But -that, of course, was ridiculous.</p> - -<p>"Sawyer, listen to me," said the man of the Vurna. He spoke clear -but stilted English, with strong tones of some alien tongue in its -unaccustomed rhythms. He wore a black uniform with a small gold -sunburst at the collar. It was impossible to guess his age. And while -he kept his voice quiet and his manner calm, there was anger in him.</p> - -<p>There was anger in Price too, a deep rage growing in him as he looked -at the men and the woman who stood here like conquerors on the planet -they had ruined, indifferent to the hatred they faced.</p> - -<p>"Here is no time and no place for stubborn obstructions," the Vurna -man was saying. "Things move quickly now. We have an enemy before us -so vast and powerful that we dare not have one also at our backs, -no matter how weak. I ask you to believe that, Sawyer. I ask you to -understand that if we Vurna fall, you perish—" he made a sudden -chopping gesture of the hand "—utterly."</p> - -<p>"I ask <i>you</i>," said Sawyer, "to look at my white hairs, and not insult -them by talking to me like I was a child." His voice was strong, and -anything but servile. "You can forget that old tale of the 'enemy'. I -laughed at it when I was in my cradle. There's been only one enemy seen -on this Earth, and that was you."</p> - -<p>The crowd muttered, <i>Yes</i>.</p> - -<p>"Your starships," Sawyer said, "smashed our cities and broke our nation -and our world down to where it is. My own father saw it happen. One day -a free world, the next—nothing. So fast there was hardly even a blow -struck back. You did it."</p> - -<p>The crowd muttered louder. Price felt Burr and Twist move beside him, -breathing in the dark. Breathing hate.</p> - -<p>"Don't come to me, an old man," Sawyer said, "and ask me to believe -foolishness. As for the plane you say you saw, I tell you again I -haven't got it. And if I did have I wouldn't give it up to you, nor the -man either. And you know it, Arrin."</p> - -<p>The woman spoke briefly in her own language to Arrin, her tone and -gesture seeming to say that they were wasting their time. Her voice -was low and clear, as beautiful as the rest of her, but there was an -impatient contempt in it that made Price bristle. The same thing was in -her eyes when she looked at the old Chief of the Missouris.</p> - -<p>Arrin shook his head. "Sawyer, I tell you once more, as you have been -told for two generations, it was not the Vurna who destroyed your -world, but the Ei. And I tell you that the Ei may even attack the -Citadel, and that the fate of Earth would be decided in that battle, -just as much as ours."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>His voice rose suddenly in very human anger. "There is a war, you -stubborn old man! A war vast—huge—" His arm swung in a wide -circle that seemed to include the whole sunset sky. "Beyond your -comprehension. Earth is nothing in it. A forward base, an observation -post, that is all. But if we lose it, the Ei will sweep this part of -the galaxy and you will regret it more than we. We can withdraw. You -cannot. You think you are cruelly treated now. You will weep to have us -back!"</p> - -<p>Sawyer remained unbending and unimpressed. Arrin sighed. His voice was -quiet when he spoke again, but it had a ring of iron in it.</p> - -<p>"I feel pity for your barbarism, until I remember that it continues -because of your own proud stupidity. If ever you people of Earth had -been willing to work with us—but let it be. And now I warn you, -Sawyer."</p> - -<p>He seemed to grow tall, grim, alien, the spokesman of inhuman forces. -Price felt the skin grow cold along his back, and his belly knotted -tight with the pricking of fear.</p> - -<p>Arrin said, "If you are planning an attack upon the Citadel, forget -it. We will slaughter you without mercy—not because we wish to, but -because we must—"</p> - -<p>Price caught the sharp intake of breath from the men beside him, and -suddenly he understood many things he had not understood before.</p> - -<p>Arrin was still speaking. "I will give you three days in which to -deliver to me the plane and the man who flew it. If this is not done, -we will be forced to use harsher measures. You understand?"</p> - -<p>Sawyer said, in a tone as cold as Arrin's, "Is that all?"</p> - -<p>"One more thing. Keep your hunters out of the Belt. It is a military -zone, not a game preserve. Any more incursions will be regarded as a -possible invasion—"</p> - -<p>Again Twist made a sharp, harsh sound in the darkness.</p> - -<p>"—and we will make of it a blasted barren where not even a mouse or a -beetle can survive. Consider that, Sawyer."</p> - -<p>Arrin turned and walked away, the two men and the woman falling in -behind him. Price watched the dark-crimson figure with the bright hair -until he could see it no longer, and it dawned on him, as though the -two things had a connection, that he was alive and living in this crazy -world of Sawyers and Citadels and invaders from the stars, that these -were his realities now and he had better wake up and grapple with them, -or he would die—and the death would be for real, and not any portion -of a dream.</p> - -<p>The aerodyne took off with a scream and a whistle. The crowd in the -square began to break up. Sawyer turned and came into the house, the -chiefs and the sub-chiefs following him.</p> - -<p>Burr opened the shutters, and a welcome breath of air came into the -stifling room, with a last gleam of dying sunlight. Price looked at -his companions. They were watching him, their eyes sharp and hostile.</p> - -<p>"So that's why you were so frantic for the plane," he said. "You're -planning an attack."</p> - -<p>Burr said fiercely, "You should've let me kill him when I wanted to, -Twist. And we should've left the plane where it was. Then they wouldn't -have got suspicious."</p> - -<p>"Maybe so," said Twist, and nodded. "Maybe so. On the other hand, if he -<i>is</i> telling the truth, it might make all the difference."</p> - -<p>There was a clattering on the loft stair, a man running up the steps. -He came in and nodded to Burr and Twist.</p> - -<p>"Sawyer says, bring the prisoner down—and hurry!"</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER V</p> - - -<p>Sawyer was standing in the middle of the room, talking rapidly to the -chiefs of the Indianas and the Illinois. The Indiana chief was old and -fat and lazy, but the Chief of the Illinois was young, heavy-jowled and -hard-eyed, the type that is born suspicious and never gets over it.</p> - -<p>Sawyer turned to look at Price. He was intent and wire-drawn, a man -poised on the brink of great happenings, at that crucial point from -which he may still choose whether to advance or retreat. Price bore -his gaze steadily, and it was not easy to do, because the eyes of this -tough old man seemed to be laying bare everything within him.</p> - -<p>"But you can't take him <i>there</i>," said the Illinois Chief violently, -looking also at Price. "The biggest secret on Earth, and if he's a -spy—"</p> - -<p>"If he's a spy," Sawyer interrupted harshly, "he'll never live to tell -what he sees there."</p> - -<p>He spoke to Price. "We're going on a journey. You're going too. And you -two—" to Burr and Twist "—will guard him."</p> - -<p>Burr and Twist nodded silently, and got their guns. The rifle and -revolver had been handed over to Sawyer for safe hiding, and these -guns were the clumsy, short-range bolt-action rifles of their own -handcrafting.</p> - -<p>Price said, "This is a hell of a way to treat a man who comes to you as -a friend. I hate the Vurna as much as you do, for what they've done to -Earth, and—"</p> - -<p>Sawyer stopped him, saying ominously, "Save your words, you'll need -them later. We've got a hard ride before morning. Let's go."</p> - -<p>They all went out through a back door, except the old chief of the -Indianas who was not going. In the twilight outside, there were horses -ready.</p> - -<p>Sawyer and Oakes of the Illinois led off, and Price followed with Burr -ahead of him and Twist behind him. One man rode ahead of the whole -party with a lantern made to shine down but not up. The flying-eyes -watched of night, too.</p> - -<p>The six horses went all night at a steady pace, single file along a -narrow track that dipped and wound through the forest. Price felt sure, -from what he had overheard, that they were riding toward some great -secret council. He guessed that his fate would be decided there, and -probably the fate of the rest of mankind too.</p> - -<p>There was nothing he could do about it till he got there. Meanwhile -he thought about a long-thighed girl in crimson, with her bright hair -swinging on her shoulders as she walked. He wished he could have had a -closer look at her face. It had seemed beautiful, a clear forehead and -a fine chin, but it was the eyes that told you what a person was, and -he had not been able to study them. Could she be as heartless as all -the Vurna were supposed to be?</p> - -<p>He thought she must be. His hate of the conquering Star Lords was -rapidly growing. Before they had come, this dark, wild forest he was -riding through had been rich farmland and pleasant towns. And when they -had smashed all that, and built the Citadel to hold the ruined Earth, -they had tried to make men willing captives by telling them that story -of the Ei. It was the old Big Lie technique, but this lie had been too -big for anyone to believe.</p> - -<p>The woman might not be cruel. Arrin might be only a decent officer in a -hard position. But all the same, they were aliens, despoilers of Earth, -and he was an Earthman. These were his people—Sawyer, Burr, Twist, -even the hateful and suspicious Oakes. These were the ones he would -fight for, and with.</p> - -<p>If they let him.</p> - -<p>But they had to let him. He was the man with the plane. And as he rode -wearily through the dark, he thought he knew the argument to use.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Just before dawn, when the world was at its blackest and most silent, -there was a challenge in the woods ahead, and the man with the lantern -answered. Here and there among the trees other shielded lanterns -flickered, widely scattered, and the woods were full of quiet sounds, -the creak of leather and jingle of bridle-chains, the soft thump of -hoofs, the somnolent blowing of picketed horses. What men there were -spoke in low voices.</p> - -<p>Price's party dismounted and walked quietly among the picket lines. In -a few minutes they reached the edge of the sheltering woods. The man -with the lantern gave a low whistle, and another man materialized out -of the blank dark ahead.</p> - -<p>"This way," he said. "And watch your foot."</p> - -<p>Now the man with the lantern followed him, the others coming after -in Indian file. And Price began to see that the darkness was not as -blank as he had thought. There were pale areas that gathered the faint -starlight to themselves on flat, broken surfaces. He realized presently -that these were walls, or had been once, and that he was walking on the -shattered fragments of a city street. The feel of gritty concrete was -unmistakable.</p> - -<p>They went for quite a long way, apparently on some known path through -the ruined city, and the sky began to pale before they reached -their destination. Price could now make out the ghostly looming of -building-fronts on both sides, high fronts with nothing behind them, so -that the window-holes looked like a kind of elaborate pierced-work. It -was deathly still, so still that their own breathing and the stealthy -padding of their feet woke furtive echoes from the stone.</p> - -<p>Their guide stopped beside a small black hole no different from all the -other small black holes that lurked under fallen masonry and flattened -girders. "Down there," he said, and left them.</p> - -<p>They climbed down a wide steel stairway, bent and twisted, but -mostly intact. A great wave of warmth from close-packed and steaming -humanity rolled up the stair to meet them, mingled with the smells of -candle-grease, smoke, leather, sweat and the lingering overtones of -horse.</p> - -<p>Beyond the bottom of the stair there was a comparative blaze of light. -Price knew they were in the basement of what had been a public building -or department store, a space foreshortened by a mass of rubble and -hanging steel where part of it had caved in. It was crammed with men, -and their voices growled in that low enclosed space like the growling -of a great animal too long caged.</p> - -<p>There was a small group of men sitting somewhat apart, and Sawyer -joined them, with Oakes. Chiefs, thought Price, and realized that this -was a very big council indeed, and planned for long ahead. Burr and -Twist stood close on either side of him, but he forgot them for the -moment, looking around in fascination at these his countrymen.</p> - -<p>Forest-runners and hunters, like Burr and Twist, in greasy buckskins. -Men from the lower river, from the swamp and bayou country, -soft-spoken, hard-handed, dressed in coarse cotton dyed in bright -Indian colors, yellow and red and green. Gaunt hill-farmers in hickory -homespun, with their rifles between their hands. Boatmen down from -the northern lakes, with a faint smell of fish about them, and long -lean riders up from the southwest, leather-skinned and dangerous as -rattlesnakes. Men from the black cornlands of Iowa, following their -chief to talk of war. America, Price thought, basically unchanged, -basically recognizable, but with all the fat sweated off it and all the -luxuries stripped away, fined down to the ruggedness and strength of an -earlier day, when men like this made a nation out of a wilderness.</p> - -<p>He had a feeling they could do it again, in spite of the overwhelming -power of the Star Lords. And if they couldn't, they would go down -fighting like wildcats to the last.</p> - -<p>The Chiefs were talking among themselves. Twist knew some of them, -leaders of the Iowas, the Michigans, the Arkansas, the Mississippis. -Others they could guess at, Nebraska, Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana. The -two Missouri hunters were as excited as hounds before a hunt. Twist -said there had never been a council this big in his memory. It would -go on until the issue was decided, the men staying under cover in the -ruins, the horses hidden in the surrounding woods.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Price realized suddenly that the assembled chiefs were all looking -at him with an intense and largely hostile interest. Sawyer's news -seemed to have upset them badly. The Chief of the Michigans, a huge -black-bearded man with an enormous voice, bellowed suddenly for -silence. In seconds the place was absolutely quiet, except for the -shuffle of men closing in to see and hear a little better.</p> - -<p>"Sawyer of the Missouris has something to tell you," shouted Michigan. -"You listen hard. Because what he's got to say will make the difference -whether we fight or hold our peace."</p> - -<p>An astounded and angry roar broke out. Michigan jumped up on a -makeshift stand and cursed them till they fell quiet.</p> - -<p>"Do your howling afterward," he said. "This isn't just a whim on -Sawyer's part. Something's happened. Shut up and listen."</p> - -<p>Now they were alarmed and uneasy. They watched Sawyer climb the stand, -their faces dark-bronze in the smoky light, their eyes glistening.</p> - -<p>Sawyer said, "Twist—come up here."</p> - -<p>Twist pushed his way to the stand and got on it. Burr moved closer to -Price, his hand curled lightly around the haft of the knife in his belt.</p> - -<p>Sawyer said, "Tell them."</p> - -<p>Perfectly at ease, aware of his importance but not impressed by it, -Twist told the story of the landing of Price's plane in the Forbidden -Belt, and what had been done with both of them afterward. He told only -the simple facts, scrupulously avoiding any attempt to incite his -listeners for or against Price.</p> - -<p>The simple facts were enough. They heard them, the men of the Great -Lakes and the southern bayous, the plains riders and the hillmen and -hunters and farmers, and their reactions were various and wonderful -after the first shock of incredulous amazement. Twist had to stop to -let the tumult die down, and when he could make himself heard again he -said,</p> - -<p>"Yes, it was just what I said, a plane, and I flew in it. Not one of -those whistling fliers, but a plane—so." He made a graphic pantomime -with his hands and a remarkably accurate motor sound. "Now I guess -that's all," he said, and stepped back.</p> - -<p>Sawyer said, his words carrying clearly to the farthest man, "The Vurna -have turned our lands upside down to find the plane. They haven't -found it. Last night Arrin—" A furious snarl greeted that name, so -apparently it was well known, "—Arrin gave me three days to surrender -the plane and the man who flew it. I've brought him here, instead."</p> - -<p>He held up his hands, to quell the rising voices. "Listen! I'm not -finished yet. Arrin had some other things to say. He said, <i>if you -are planning an attack on the Citadel, forget it. He said, We will -slaughter you without mercy.</i>"</p> - -<p>"Now," said Sawyer, "here is what we have to decide. Two things. Is -this man Price a friend offering us a weapon, or a spy of the Vurna -offering us death? And shall we fight, or let it go until another year? -They're big questions, the biggest you'll ever have to answer in your -lives. Don't come at them like hasty boys, all feeling and no sense. -Come at them man-like, slow and careful."</p> - -<p>Michigan rumbled, "Those are good words. Heed them. And now let's have -the man up here."</p> - -<p>Burr gave Price a shove. "That's you."</p> - -<p>Price shouldered forward through the pack and climbed the stand. As he -did so Twist whispered in his ear, "You'd better make this good, boy. -You won't get another chance."</p> - -<p>His voice sounded friendly. Price was glad of it.</p> - -<p>He stood on the platform and faced the chiefs and the representatives -of the people.</p> - -<p>Michigan said, "You tell your side of it. And speak up so everyone can -hear."</p> - -<p>Price spoke up, loud. But he said, "What's the good of that? I've told -my side of it a dozen times already, and nobody believes me." He glared -around the close-packed circle of men. "If I'd known you'd treat me -like this, I'd have smashed the plane and left it for the coyotes."</p> - -<p>"Just the same," said Michigan, "tell it again."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Price told it. "I didn't know you were up to anything in particular: it -just seemed obvious that a plane might be useful to you sometime, now -or later, and it wasn't doing any good where it was." He had coached -himself so carefully in the story that it was beginning to seem like -truth to him, gathering little embellishments and embroideries. "I -brought guns, too, better than anything you have. And does anybody say, -Thank you? The hell they do. They accuse me of being a spy for the -Vurna."</p> - -<p>A low animal grunt from the listeners. Their faces were as hard as -flint.</p> - -<p>Price shouted, "Would the Vurna be so anxious to get me back if they'd -just sent me out as a spy? You heard Sawyer."</p> - -<p>The Chief of the Louisianas said, "It would be a very smart trick for -them to say so, for just that reason."</p> - -<p>"And how is it," cried the Chief of the Arkansas, "that right away -the minute you turn up, Arrin says that about attacking the Citadel? -Doesn't that show they know something, and want to know more?"</p> - -<p>"I should think that was obvious," said Price. "There hasn't been a -plane in the air for two generations. All of a sudden there is one. -Wouldn't the Vurna want to know where you got it, and whether you're -building more like it? And do you suppose they'd figure that with a -weapon like that you <i>wouldn't</i> be planning an attack of some kind on -them?"</p> - -<p>That was good sense, and they thought it over, muttering among -themselves. Price began to feel he was getting somewhere, and -marshalled his words for the final argument. Then the Chief of the -Oklahomas spoke up and said,</p> - -<p>"My word would be to kill this man and hand his body, and the plane, -to Arrin. That way we comply, but not to his advantage. Arrin knows no -more than when he started, but we look innocent. We look as though we -have no use for a plane. And when their backs are turned, we go ahead -as we planned all along."</p> - -<p>And that sounded better yet, even to Price. Especially since he knew -better than any of them the relative usefulness of one Beechcraft as a -weapon against the kind of forces the Star Lords had.</p> - -<p>But he knew if they began to think of that he was finished. So he said, -"Listen, you need that plane. It can reconnoiter, it can carry bombs—"</p> - -<p>"Shut up," said someone fiercely. "Shut up, all of you. I hear -something."</p> - -<p>They quieted, and listened. Price could not hear anything but the tense -mass breathing of the men. Then on the far side of the room first one -man and then several began to dig like dogs after a rabbit into the -heaped-up rubble.</p> - -<p>"Here it is! Here it is—look!"</p> - -<p>"What is it? Let's see."</p> - -<p>"Ain't nothing but a little bitty box—"</p> - -<p>"No! It's one of <i>their</i> contraptions! Let me through!"</p> - -<p>A man in a linen shirt of green and yellow came bursting through the -crowd, carrying something high over his head in one hand. He put it -down on the stand, where it lay buzzing gently.</p> - -<p>"Is that Vurna, or ain't it?"</p> - -<p>Everyone drew back and away from it, as though fearing it might -explode. It was a little metal box no bigger than a cigarette case, but -Price knew what it was. He stepped forward and smashed it underfoot.</p> - -<p>"You'd better clear out of here," he said. "Fast. That was a radio -transmitter, broadcasting a steady guide signal to bring the Vurna -right here."</p> - -<p>There was one stunned moment of absolute silence, and then the place -erupted into sound and movement. In the midst of it, in the heart of -it, the Chief of the Michigans and the man in the linen shirt were -possessed of the same idea. Crying "Spy!", they flung themselves at -Price with their knives drawn.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Remembering a trick or two the Army had taught him, Price stepped -inside the chief's rush, caught his wrist, and flung him into the -other, who had been slowed by the necessity of climbing onto the stand. -And Price yelled at them furiously,</p> - -<p>"Are you crazy? I wasn't near that side of the room. <i>I</i> didn't bring -it and plant it here."</p> - -<p>Twist stepped between him and the two men, drawing his own knife. "He -wasn't, and that's a fact. Besides—"</p> - -<p>"Get out of my way!" roared Michigan.</p> - -<p>Unexpectedly, Burr leaped up and pulled him back. "I was close to him -as his own skin, every minute," he said. "He didn't move, and he didn't -have that thing on him to drop if he'd wanted to."</p> - -<p>"We searched him," said Twist, "days ago. Personal."</p> - -<p>"Then you're traitors too," said Michigan, clinging to his single idea. -He started to charge again, and now there were others swarming up onto -the stand after him, screaming for Price's blood.</p> - -<p>Sawyer moved like a big cat. Michigan stopped in mid-stride, with the -point of Sawyer's knife touching his heart-ribs.</p> - -<p>"These are my men," said Sawyer mildly. "I don't like having their -loyalty called in question any more than they do."</p> - -<p>Price leaned over and grabbed a rifle out of somebody's hands. He -clubbed it and began to swing, scattering men like ten-pins off the -edge of the stand.</p> - -<p>"Get out of here, you fools!" he howled at them. "Can't you get it -through your thick skulls? The Vurna are coming. Get out!"</p> - -<p>Numbers of them were already streaming up the stairs. Now more and -more took up the cry, seeming to understand suddenly that someone's -treachery had made this place a trap. Sawyer said to the Chief of the -Michigans,</p> - -<p>"Go on, take that hot head back to the lake and cool it. Hurry up, -before they get you."</p> - -<p>Michigan snorted like an angry bull, but he turned and jumped down -into the crowd. The man with the linen shirt was gone. Price was about -to follow when he saw the muzzle of a rifle, upflung, glinting darkly -in the lamplight. He shouted to Burr and Twist to look out, and then -flung himself upon Sawyer. The shot was stunning in that closed space. -He heard the slug go whistling overhead and then ricochet from the -low concrete roof. Someone on the far side of the room cried out in -rage and pain. "I thank you," said Sawyer, "and now let's get off this -damned target."</p> - -<p>They got off, the four of them sticking close together. Price did -not see Oakes, nor the man who had carried their lantern. Most of -the lights were going out, knocked over and trampled. The dark surge -of running men carried them to the stair and up and out into full, -blinding day.</p> - -<p>Somebody pointed to the sky and yelled, "There they come—the Vurna!"</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER VI</p> - - -<p>They were still a long way off but coming fast, whistling down the sky. -Price could make out about a dozen bright dots flashing against the -blue. Sawyer said,</p> - -<p>"We'd better run for it!"</p> - -<p>They fled, along the twisting path through the ruins. All around them, -ahead and behind, other men were running, bolting away like wild -creatures into the shadows of the broken walls.</p> - -<p>And this was once their city, Price thought. A place of streets and -homes and schools and churches, a good place, built with long hope and -striving. What right did the Vurna have to break it?</p> - -<p>He looked up at the fliers. They were larger now, moving swiftly above -ragged crenellations that showed stark white in the hot summer sun. -He looked down, and there was desolation. He ran in it, leaping and -stumbling over the bones of a city, driven like the rest.</p> - -<p>Sawyer swept a lean arm out in a commanding gesture. "Take cover!"</p> - -<p>They dodged into the crevices of an unidentifiable mass half grown with -creepers and rank grass. The old bricks tottered and threatened to fall -as they pressed past them. They lay panting and listened to the Vurna -fliers go over.</p> - -<p>"They've broken formation," Price said. He had listened to hostile -craft before. "Spread out. They'll sweep back and forth—"</p> - -<p>A section of wall collapsed, close by them, with a rumble and a great -puff of white dust. They leaped back, and Sawyer said, "That makes a -beacon for them. Well, come on."</p> - -<p>They ran out, crouching low, scurrying along the ravaged streets where -their grandfathers had walked in peace. Price could see the green -woods in the distance, but the air was full of the power-scream of the -searching aerodynes, and he did not think that they would make it. He -was right.</p> - -<p>One of the ships shot down to hover three feet off the ground ahead of -them, and another dropped behind. Sawyer turned to the right. A third -ship came down. He turned to the left. A fourth one blocked him. He -stopped where he was, too proud to look farther for escape where he -knew there was none. Burr and Twist stood with him. All three lifted -their rifles and prepared to die.</p> - -<p>Price had nothing in his hands. The bright hovering ships mocked him, -their noise deafened him, the wind of their air-blasts tore at him with -vicious force. He hated them. He had never hated anything so much in -his life, not even the enemy he had fought in Korea. He groped among -the rubbish around his feet, half-blinded by dust and a red haze that -was of his own making.</p> - -<p>A very loud metallic voice spoke to them from one of the ships. "Put -down your weapons and stand together with your hands high. You will not -be harmed." Sawyer laughed. He hunched the rifle to his shoulder and -fired. The slug went <i>splat!</i> on the skin of the aerodyne, and dropped.</p> - -<p>"Put down your weapons and stand together. We will count six. At that -time we will fire. Six. Five. Four."</p> - -<p>Sawyer laid his rifle into the dust at his feet and straightened, -folding his arms. Twist and Burr did the same. Tears stood in Burr's -eyes, tears of outraged anger.</p> - -<p>And this was their city, Price thought. My city. Ours.</p> - -<p>Men began now to jump out of the hovering aerodynes, Vurna with cropped -silvery hair. They wore uniforms of dark green. This was not their -city, it was not their world. Price's fingers closed over the end of an -iron bar in the rubbish.</p> - -<p>He sprang forward, holding the iron bar.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>A beam of cold light, hardly visible in the sunshine, flashed out from -the nearest ship. Price was running, and then he was not running, he -was face down on the ground with the white dust in his hair. The bar -spun out of his hand and fell with a faint clatter.</p> - -<p>The Vurna closed in. They escorted Sawyer and Burr and Twist each -into one of the ships. Two of the green-clad soldiers bent and picked -up Price and carried him to the fourth. They clambered in, and the -aerodynes rose whistling into the air.</p> - -<p>Over the place from which the Earthmen had fled, roughly in the center -of the city, several of the ships were gathered. They circled slowly, -but nothing moved in the streets. At length all but one of them rose -up, and that one made brief lightnings flicker from its underbelly. -Down below a volcano erupted, thundered, burned, and died, sinking -into ash and dust. That gathering-place would not be used again, and -any store of arms or powder concealed in it would not be used either.</p> - -<p>The ships of the Vurna raced away toward the east. Behind them the -forest was full of men and horses, moving out.</p> - -<p>After a while a remote and disoriented consciousness returned to Price. -He opened his eyes and saw a blur of red and silver and flesh tones. A -little later he opened them again, and the blur had become a woman with -silver hair and a uniform of dark crimson.</p> - -<p>The woman.</p> - -<p>She said, "You will be normal again in an hour or so. The shock-ray -does no permanent damage."</p> - -<p>He looked at her, not caring very much about how he would feel an hour -from now. He felt pleasantly languid, forgetful of his cares. Her eyes -were a curious color, not like Earth eyes at all. They were like little -bits of sky and moonglow and the far-off fires of stars, cool and -strange and lovely. He said,</p> - -<p>"They're not cruel, after all."</p> - -<p>"What are you talking about?"</p> - -<p>"Your eyes. They're beautiful. Like you."</p> - -<p>A faint flush touched her cheeks. But she only said, "How are you -called?"</p> - -<p>He told her, and she wrote it down. He saw now that she held a kind of -clipboard on her knee. Just beyond her was a cabin window. Streamers -of torn cloud whirled by it so fast that he was startled. Then other -things began to impinge on his senses, air-scream, a smooth rush of -speed. He sat up.</p> - -<p>The man beside the pilot turned abruptly, his hand reaching for a -weapon at his belt. The woman spoke to him in her own tongue, and then -said to Price,</p> - -<p>"We do not wish to stun you again. You will not make it necessary."</p> - -<p>"No," said Price. He leaned forward, staring in fascination at the -controls of the aerodyne, watching the pilot's movements.</p> - -<p>"You are interested? As a pilot?"</p> - -<p>"Yes." The controls seemed surprisingly simple. These controlled the -force of the air-flow, those the angle of the blast—"It's so much more -maneuverable than a jet, and so much more powerful than any 'copter. -I—"</p> - -<p>He shut his mouth, abruptly conscious that he had made a bad slip. -But the woman did not seem to have noticed it. He asked her hastily, -changing the subject, "What's your name?"</p> - -<p>"Linna," she said. "Of Vrain Four. That's the planet of a star you -never heard of, in the Hercules Cluster. I have some other identifying -words, a patronym much like yours and a set of code-numbers such as -have been used on this world also."</p> - -<p>"You seem to know a lot about us, for a girl from—uh—Vrain Four."</p> - -<p>"That's my business. I'm a specialist in Earth cultures. Section 7-Y, -Social Technics. Where is your home?"</p> - -<p>She was friendly, almost too much so. Price was wary now, his mind -shaking off the lethargy of the shock.</p> - -<p>"Nevada."</p> - -<p>She wrote on the clipboard, some kind of shorthand. "I have not been -that far west. What is Nevada like?"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He told her, leaving out any mention of cities. The aerodyne raced -forward, and he watched the controls avidly. So simple. So beautifully, -functionally simple. His fingers twitched with eagerness.</p> - -<p>"You have flown a great deal?"</p> - -<p>"My father taught me." Careful, Price thought. These people are -probably no brighter or shrewder than my own, but they're better able -to investigate and check on things. "Tell me, what's it like on Vrain -Four?"</p> - -<p>"We eat and sleep, make love and die," she said, "very much like you. -The sky is very beautiful at night. The stars are close and burning, -not cold and far-away like yours." She paused.</p> - -<p>"Where did your father learn to fly?"</p> - -<p>"From his father. It's a family tradition."</p> - -<p>"And the plane had belonged to your family since the Ei destroyed the -atomic cultures of your Earth-year 1979?"</p> - -<p>"Since the <i>Vurna</i> destroyed it—yes."</p> - -<p>She did not argue the point. "How old was the plane then?"</p> - -<p>Sneaky little question, quietly asked. What was she driving at? Price -began to feel that he was in a trap, but he could not quite see the -shape of it. Then, before he was forced into an answer that might very -well be the wrong one, he saw something that gave him the perfect -excuse to ignore it.</p> - -<p>The thing he saw was a starship.</p> - -<p>He had never seen a starship before in his life, but he knew this could -not be anything else. He judged that they must be back across the river -now and well within the Forbidden Belt. The ship stood like a tower of -white metal, enormous, slim, delicate, a thing of slumbering power that -caught the throat with awe and wonder. There were no trees anywhere -near it, and the earth underneath was fused and hardened to a substance -more durable than iron or concrete.</p> - -<p>Linna said, "That is one reason we do not want men in the Belt. There -is danger of being caught in a take-off or a landing."</p> - -<p>The aerodyne flashed past, and Price looked back as long as he could -at the dwindling shape, splendid but curiously lonely in the middle of -nowhere.</p> - -<p>"I would have thought you'd have a port, close in. By the Citadel, I -mean."</p> - -<p>Linna shook her head. "Dispersal is much safer. That is why the Belt is -so wide. We have a number of ships."</p> - -<p>The man beside the pilot spoke, and Linna touched Price's shoulder, -pointing ahead. "In a minute you will see the Citadel."</p> - -<p>What he saw first was that iron blinking in the low air that he had -seen from the plane. It grew with fantastic speed, taking shape, -acquiring height and substance. Price had been prepared for something -tremendous. In spite of that, he was wide-eyed and astonished as any -tribesman.</p> - -<p>The Citadel rose from a level barren, swept clear of every living -thing. It was round, a vast flat-topped tower stunning in its stark -hugeness. It did not fit on Earth at all. This monstrous, man-made -metal mountain belonged to another world.</p> - -<p>Around it as far as he could see were launching-pads for a species -of missile that looked more deadly than any of the ICBM'S they had -been dreaming up in his own day. Atop the Citadel, on the vast plain -of metal that was its roof, there were installations that looked -like radar, and others he could only guess at—something in the -radio-telescope line, perhaps, with elaborate grids. Set around the -perimeter of the roof, and looking ominously out across the Belt, -were hooded emplacements that made Price think of Arrin's warning: We -will make of the Belt a blasted barren, where not even a beetle can -survive....</p> - -<p>"You see how helpless," Linna said, quietly echoing his own thoughts. -"Men with knives and little guns—they would be throwing their lives -away."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The old anger came back to Price, and he said sullenly, "The Siegfried -Line was supposed to be impregnable, too."</p> - -<p>But he knew she was right, and he looked down with a sinking heart as -the aerodyne swept in for a landing on the roof. How could Earthmen -ever hope to throw this mighty power from their backs?</p> - -<p>He stepped down to the iron deck, still a little slow and shaky when he -moved. Other aerodynes were dropping down one by one. He looked around -for Sawyer and Burr and Twist, but he did not see them. Vurna guards -fell in on either side and Linna said,</p> - -<p>"I think your friends have already landed, and are with Arrin below. -Come on."</p> - -<p>The invitation was pure rhetoric. He had no choice. The guard took him -toward a circle painted bright red for the guidance of pilots, and -about eight feet across. He asked, "Is Arrin the big boss?"</p> - -<p>"The Supreme Commander of this base. You see how important you are to -us—you and your plane?"</p> - -<p>They stood on the red circle, and it dropped with them smoothly down -a gleaming metal shaft. It did not drop too far. They stepped from it -into a corridor, brightly lighted by tubes sunk into the low ceiling. -There were many doors on either side, and Vurna in uniforms of various -colors passed back and forth.</p> - -<p>The office of the Supreme Commander was as austere and functional as -everything else Price had seen. Narrow windows with flush shutters -of steel looked out across the sunlit Belt. One wall was a maze of -screens and dials, communicator devices, and another had rows of -tube-mouths with vari-colored tabs. Arrin stood facing Sawyer, with -Burr and Twist behind their chief. There were several guards. As Price -came in with Linna, Sawyer was saying,</p> - -<p>"I told you I wouldn't give the man up, nor the plane. As for the -meeting, your paid traitor can tell you all about it. And now you can -go ahead and kill me."</p> - -<p>Arrin said impatiently, "It isn't your life I want from you, but only a -little cooperation." He looked up at Price, his eyes narrowing. "This -is the man?"</p> - -<p>Linna spoke to him in the Vurna tongue. A look of surprise showed for -an instant on Arrin's face. He questioned Linna. Sawyer, meantime, said -to Price,</p> - -<p>"We thought they'd killed you."</p> - -<p>Price shook his head. He was worried about what Linna was saying to the -Commander. Once more he had the feeling of a trap he could not see.</p> - -<p>Arrin nodded curtly, and gave some order to Price's guards. Linna said -in English, "You are to come with me."</p> - -<p>Price said, "I'd rather stay with my friends."</p> - -<p>"Perhaps later."</p> - -<p>There was no use arguing. Price went where he was told. On another and -much lower level, which might have been underground for all he knew, he -was ushered into a small, neat, impersonal cubicle with no window and -with a lock on the outside of the door. Obviously, a cell.</p> - -<p>Linna said, "I would like your shirt, please."</p> - -<p>He stared at her. "What?"</p> - -<p>"Give me your shirt."</p> - -<p>Again there was no use arguing with her. He took it off and handed it -to her.</p> - -<p>"Food and drink will be provided," she said. "You will be quite -comfortable."</p> - -<p>She went away, with the guards. Securely locked in the cubicle, Price -sat and brooded. Food and water came, packaged, through a slot device -in the wall. He ate and drank, and brooded again.</p> - -<p>Finally, Linna came back. She handed him his shirt and watched him -soberly while he put it on. And then she dropped her bomb.</p> - -<p>"You have been lying to me," she said quietly. "I know <i>now</i> where you -came from."</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER VII</p> - - -<p>Price stood stone still, meeting her gaze. But his thoughts were racing -like startled deer. How could even the super-scientific Vurna have -guessed his incredible origin? It was a freak, a fluke that wouldn't -happen once in a million years....</p> - -<p>Linna was saying, "Take your plane. Obsolete in model as it was, -it would require extensive machine shops to fabricate it. And your -clothing. Your shirt is of synthetic fabric, and so is the dye. It was -woven on machines. And these are <i>new</i>—not relics preserved for a -century."</p> - -<p>Price managed to keep his voice level as he said, "So—"</p> - -<p>"So," Linna said, "there is somewhere a hidden community big enough to -keep the old technologies of your people alive. A community we've known -nothing about."</p> - -<p>She regarded him in stern triumph, as though she had gained a victory.</p> - -<p>Price sat down on the narrow bed. He had an hysterical desire to laugh, -but he did not do that. Instead, he turned his head away from Linna as -though to hide his dismay, but actually he was trembling with a sudden -realization.</p> - -<p>She had just given him his chance, if he kept his head and played it -right. In her wholly mistaken, if quite natural, deduction of his -origin, she had given him a chance for escape.</p> - -<p>She misread his silence. "Further lies will not do you any good." -Astonishingly, there was pity in her voice. "I see now what you -intended. You wished to share your community's knowledge with other -tribes, to give them new weapons in their fight against us. And now you -hope still to keep your secret, so someone else may succeed where you -failed. Believe me, Price, I understand—"</p> - -<p>"Do you?" he said savagely.</p> - -<p>"Yes," she said, her voice hardening. "And I understand better than -you what would have happened to your army if they had attacked, armed -with pitiful little planes like yours and only slightly more powerful -rifles." She spoke swiftly to the guard outside, and then snapped at -Price, "Come, I want to show you something."</p> - -<p>She led Price out between the green-clad guards. They went down the -echoing corridor of the cell-block, and into a lift that took them -swooping up a long way, and then into another corridor and eventually -into a medium-sized room circular in shape, completely surrounded -by a double row of screens. The lower screens gave a fixed view of -the terrain within eyeshot of the Citadel itself. The upper screens -reflected a roving, ever-shifting view of the remoter Belt, the woods -and prairies, herds of wild cattle grazing, deer bounding with their -white flags up, the lonely starships waiting on their isolated fields. -Four men in uniforms of dull gold watched the screens and checked a -series of clicking recorders. Beneath each screen was a battery of -studs.</p> - -<p>"You see how much chance you would have of approaching unseen? And do -you see what would happen to an army? One man here, touching those -firing studs, and the whole Belt would become in seconds like the -barren outside the walls. Nothing would be left. Nothing."</p> - -<p>In Linna's eyes now there was the same impatient contempt for his -stupidity that he had seen there before, when Arrin had talked to -Sawyer in the square.</p> - -<p>"And this is how you would help them—to their destruction."</p> - -<p>If the situation had been what she imagined it to be, that would have -been the truth. Price allowed a sullen doubtfulness to show in his -face. But he said,</p> - -<p>"What about your starships? You wouldn't destroy them."</p> - -<p>"They can be flown on auto-pilot at a moment's notice, out of harm's -way. Oh, for heaven's sake, Price, can't you see that I'm trying to -help you? I don't want your people slaughtered. We, the Vurna, don't -want them slaughtered. But if you persist in battering your stubborn -heads—"</p> - -<p>"All right, all right," he said crossly. "You've got the weight and -weapons. Let's get out of here. It makes me sick to think how helpless -we are."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>They went outside into the corridor again. At its end there was a -window, and Price stood by it, looking out. He pretended to be sunk in -bitter reflection, but his brain was spinning furiously, trying to see -all ways at once. He said,</p> - -<p>"If I show you where our hidden colony is, you'll only smash it up. -There's a lot there that isn't weapons, things that could help build up -a civilization again. Why should I show you?"</p> - -<p>"To keep some other idiot from trying to do what you have done. We -won't destroy anything that's useful, only control it as to the -production of weapons." She sighed, and added, "I hate to put it this -way, Price, but if you don't show me willingly it will have to be -another way, and I don't want that."</p> - -<p>There was a real ring of sincerity in her voice. Price grumbled around -a bit, permitting himself to be beaten.</p> - -<p>"All right," he said at last. "I guess there's nothing for it. I'll -show you."</p> - -<p>"Good. I'll arrange for a flier—"</p> - -<p>Her voice was drowned out by a sudden hooting of sirens all through the -Citadel. For a moment no one moved. Linna's face became drained of all -color. The guards stiffened, staring in a kind of wonder. The steel -shutter of the window clanged to with a ringing snap, and Price could -feel in that vast building a stirring and buzzing as of a menaced hive.</p> - -<p>"What is it?" he asked, his feeling of triumph beginning to slip away -almost before he had had time to enjoy it.</p> - -<p>Linna's voice was quite steady when she answered. "Possibly nothing. -You must return to your cell now. We'll discuss the trip later."</p> - -<p>The sirens stopped.</p> - -<p>The guards hustled Price along urgently now, as though they had more -important things to attend to. The Vurna were shifting rapidly from -places to other places, but all in good order. Only their faces were -tense and they did not talk except to pass an order or ask for one. -It was obvious that there was an alarm, that the Citadel was taking -up battle stations, and that everyone was, if not afraid, at least -severely uneasy. Price began to be uneasy too. Nevertheless, he noted -the symbol that identified the floor, and studied the life-controls as -he was dropped down to the prison level again.</p> - -<p>In perfect silence they stepped from the lift and started down the -corridor toward Price's cell. Then the sirens screeched again, but on a -different note. Linna gave a little sigh. Without thinking about it he -put his arm around her.</p> - -<p>"All clear?"</p> - -<p>"Yes. What a relief. I'm technically a soldier, but I'm afraid a -technicality is all it is. I—shh! Listen."</p> - -<p>A clear metallic voice had begun to speak over some communicator system -that apparently reached every corner of the Citadel. Linna drew away -from him without seeming to notice his familiarity, listening intently. -The guards listened too, and so did three or four other Vurna visible -in the corridor. Price could understand nothing, except that the word -"Ei" occurred several times. The Vurna's favorite bogeyman. He wondered -if the Vurna powers-that-were used it to hoodwink their own people, -too. It would explain Linna's sincerity, Arrin's honest annoyance, if -they themselves believed in a menace called the Ei.</p> - -<p>The window at the end of the corridor had reappeared as the safety -shutter slid back. Through it, tantalizingly small and far away, Price -watched the landing of a starship, and it was disappointingly remote -and unreal as a scene done with models for an old film.</p> - -<p>Until he felt the mighty fabric of the Citadel, man-made mountain of -steel and iron, quiver underneath him with the shock-wave of that -landing. Then he knew.</p> - -<p>The voice stopped speaking. There was a moment of dead quiet, as though -what the voice had said was more momentous than the alarm. Linna's face -was pale again, and the guards looked both excited and apprehensive. -One of them spoke to Linna, and she shook her head, apparently giving -him a reassuring answer.</p> - -<p>Price said irritably, "Can you tell me what's going on?"</p> - -<p>"There was a skirmish," she said, "out there. That's what the alarm -was, to tell us there was fighting going on, but of course it was -already over. There was only one Ei ship, a scout."</p> - -<p>"Oh," said Price, and almost smiled. Scramble them once in a while, -keep them on their toes. Remind them of the menace. It was a simple -technique. Earthmen had evolved it quite early.</p> - -<p>People were talking now. He could hear their voices echoing down the -metal halls, excited, fearful. Several went to the window to crane -their necks at the distant starship. And then the metallic voice began -to speak again, very crisp and clipped.</p> - -<p>"Maximum security," Linna said. "All corridors cleared, all doors and -safety bulkheads locked. All off-duty personnel in quarters. Go in, -Price." She pointed to his cell door. "I have to hurry."</p> - -<p>The corridor was clearing like magic. Price hung obstinately in the -doorway. "What now?"</p> - -<p>"They captured the scout. They're bringing in two of the Ei—alive."</p> - -<p>One of the guards shoved him in, and the door slammed shut on its -magnetic lock.</p> - -<p>Price lay down on the bunk. So they had captured a scout, and they -were bringing in two Ei, alive. And everybody in the Citadel was -ordered behind locked doors. Handy. Very. He was beginning to feel -less hostility toward at least some of the Vurna. They were not so -hard-headed and skeptical as the Earthmen. They believed, and the -belief was keeping them here to man an outpost fort when they would -doubtless much rather return home.</p> - -<p>He found himself unaccountably pleased that he had an excuse to stop -hating Linna.</p> - -<p>He thought about the plan he had in mind until he went to sleep.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>It was difficult, in that windowless and practically sound-proof place, -to judge the passage of time. To Price it seemed like centuries. He -slept, and woke, and ate, and paced around, and fretted between hope -and a despairing certainty that Linna had forgotten all about him. He -slept again, and was awakened from that sleep by the deep shuddering -of the Citadel as a starship either landed or took off. He lay -drowsily wondering what it was like to fly one of those mighty craft, -traitorously wishing he was a Vurna so he might have a chance to find -out, and dreaming of space and stars and foreign worlds.</p> - -<p>The Citadel shook again, and yet again, and Price came wide awake. He -counted twenty-one, and there was no way of knowing how many landings -or take-offs had occurred before he woke, or too far out in the Belt to -be noticed here.</p> - -<p>Certainly some large movement was underway. He took to pacing again, in -a sweat of worry over what this meant, not to the Vurna, but to him.</p> - -<p>After what seemed an eternity the door opened and Linna stood there, -looking pale and grave. There were no guards with her. She was alone.</p> - -<p>"The flier is waiting, Price," she said. "Let's go."</p> - -<p>He joined her. And now he saw that the aspect of the corridor had -changed. A sliding bulkhead had closed off part of it behind a wall of -iron.</p> - -<p>"What's that for?" he asked.</p> - -<p>"Our—prisoners," said Linna, as though the word stuck to her tongue. -"Come on."</p> - -<p>She seemed in a great hurry to get away from that bulkhead. Price said, -"What's the matter, aren't they human, or something?"</p> - -<p>She gave him a look. "You still think it's all a great joke."</p> - -<p>"I didn't say that."</p> - -<p>"You mean it, though. You still believe the Ei are something we made up -to shift the blame from ourselves. Probably you believe we are staging -this whole matter to impress you and your chief, so that you will go -back and assure your tribesmen it is all true."</p> - -<p>This was so uncomfortably close to what Price was thinking that he said -involuntarily, "You're entirely too smart for such a pretty girl."</p> - -<p>"Sometimes I think," she said between her teeth, "that there is no hope -for you people, no hope at all."</p> - -<p>Price nodded toward the bulkhead. "The solution is simple enough, -isn't it? Let me see them. Then I'll have to believe you."</p> - -<p>"Simple enough," said Linna, echoing his words. "Do you think <i>you</i> -could stand against them? We have fought them for generations, we have -knowledge and experience, and even for us, with all our safe-guards, it -is difficult. Only a few, like Arrin, would attempt it, and I saw him -this morning. He looks like a ghost."</p> - -<p>"And that's why you've never let any Earthmen see an Ei—because -they're too dangerous."</p> - -<p>"No. It's more simple than that. We have had none to show. These are -the first Ei we have captured for a century, at least in this sector of -the galaxy. I have never seen one, either. And I don't want to."</p> - -<p>She strode off, away from the iron wall across the corridor. Price -shrugged and followed her.</p> - -<p>"Where are my friends?"</p> - -<p>"They're here," she said, indicating the row of doors they were -passing. "Quite safe—or as safe as any of us. They'll remain here -until—" She hesitated, and Price realized for the first time that she -was deeply, genuinely afraid. "Until we see what happens," she finished.</p> - -<p>"After that, what?"</p> - -<p>"If they're still alive, and we're still alive, and there's still a -world, they'll go free, and perhaps they'll be wiser men than they are -now."</p> - -<p>She would not say any more.</p> - -<p>The lift swept them up to the roof. It was late afternoon, intensely -hot, with storm-clouds banking in the west. The roof area seemed -almost deserted, and only one flier was visible. Linna motioned him -into it and climbed in herself. She spoke to the pilot, and he took -off immediately. There was no co-pilot. Only Price, and Linna, and one -man. Price felt a secret surge of assurance, of power, like when you're -riding a streak of luck and the dice can't fall any way but right. He -sat quietly, looking out the cabin port.</p> - -<p>He saw almost at once that the starships were gone. The whole Vurna -fleet must have taken off, shaking the Citadel with their leaving. -Probably most of the men had gone with it. The deserted appearance of -the Citadel, the lack of guards, the lack of a co-pilot, all pointed to -a skeleton force. <i>If we're still alive, and there's still a world</i>, -Linna had said. Battle, somewhere out in the far reaches of space? -Perhaps. Or maneuvers, or a show of force connected with some galactic -game he would probably never know about. It was not really important. -What was important was the fact that for the present the defenses of -the Citadel were weaker, much weaker.</p> - -<p>He sat looking out the port and covertly watching the pilot's hands -on the controls. Linna had some kind of a side-arm strapped around -her slender waist. Probably a shocker. The pilot had one, too. He -considered the problem, and the woods and prairies rolled back -underneath.</p> - -<p>Linna spoke suddenly, out of a long and somber silence.</p> - -<p>"This mission is more important than ever now, Price, or I wouldn't -have been allowed to divert even one man from our defences. I beg you, -for the sake of your own people, to play fair with me. If there's -either help or hindrance in our rear, we must know it. The Ei—"</p> - -<p><i>Now</i> said something in Price's mind. He did not stop to question it. -When you're riding a hot streak, let it ride. Never stop to question.</p> - -<p>He rose and hit Linna on the point of her pretty chin.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER VIII</p> - - -<p>She dropped in her seat without a sound. Price clawed for the weapon -she had at her waist. But the abrupt cessation of her voice had alarmed -the pilot. He turned around and then shouted something imperative in -Vurna, his hand going swiftly to his own belt.</p> - -<p>Price beat him by a fractional second. His hand pressed the trigger and -the unfamiliar weapon crackled in his hand, and the pilot fell over, -letting his own shocker go skittering to the deck. The aerodyne had not -swerved from its steady westward flight. He had been sure, from what -he'd seen of its automatic stability, that it wouldn't.</p> - -<p>Price straightened up, breathing heavily with excitement. So far, so -good.</p> - -<p>He tied Linna's hands and feet securely with her own belt and his -handkerchief, and then attended to the pilot. Linna was already -beginning to stir, and he propped her up as comfortably as possible, -smoothing her hair back from her forehead. He smiled suddenly and said, -"I'm sorry. I really am. If there had been any other way, I wouldn't -have done it."</p> - -<p>He kissed her on the mouth, rather swiftly because he did not have much -time, but with a full measure of feeling even so. She sighed, and he -thought her lips answered his, but he doubted if that would be so when -she came to.</p> - -<p>He slipped into the pilot's chair and studied the controls, erasing -every other thought from his mind as he remembered what he had learned -from watching. The aerodyne was humming straight and steadily on. He -had plenty of altitude.</p> - -<p>He began to experiment, gingerly, and by the time he was across the -river he was satisfied that he could control the craft well enough to -get by. It was considerably simpler than learning to drive a car in -the old days, and he had a lifetime of flying behind him to give him -air-sense. The craft itself was a thing of beauty, topping anything he -had ever flown. He angled southward and westward, away from the river, -traveling like a bullet.</p> - -<p>Linna spoke from behind him. Her voice was very cold and very hard, the -voice of a stranger.</p> - -<p>"Arrin told me I should have you bound. I left you free on my own -responsibility."</p> - -<p>Price felt bad about that, and he said so. "Try to look at it from my -side, Linna. I have to do what I can for my own people. If you were in -my shoes—"</p> - -<p>"Go ahead," said Linna. "Talk is obviously useless. I shan't waste any -more of it, except to tell you—"</p> - -<p>She told him, vividly, what kind of a fool he was, and what she -hoped would happen to him before he led all of his fellow-fools to -destruction. Then she shut up and would not speak again, no matter how -he tried to soften her rage.</p> - -<p>The dark green forest, rough-textured like a wool rug, rolled back and -away around him, and the sun was swallowed up in clouds. He strained -his eyes for the clearing that would mark the Capitol of the Missouris. -He was flying by dead reckoning. He had no compass bearing to begin -with, and the Vurna instruments were useless to him. The pilot was -beginning to come round, but Price knew better than to ask him for -instructions.</p> - -<p>It was a red light of fires burning on the edge of night that guided -him down at last toward the timber-built Capitol. And now at last Linna -spoke, because the pilot, looking out, began to yell frantically in -Vurna. She translated.</p> - -<p>"He says do not cut the down-blast so sharply, or you will crash. That -lever—there, under your left hand—ease it back."</p> - -<p>Price eased it. He settled down to a rough and ragged landing, just -about where the Vurna craft had settled before, when he had been -Sawyer's prisoner. Men came out of the houses and along the streets, -to stand as they had stood then, to greet their hated over-lords with -silence and contempt.</p> - -<p>Price jumped out of the craft and approached the fires.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>There was a startled cry, and then his name echoed back and forth, and -the men closed around him. They were inclined to be hostile, demanding -to know where Sawyer was, and what had happened, and how he came to be -piloting a Vurna flier. Price shouted for quiet.</p> - -<p>"Sawyer's alive. He's a prisoner in the Citadel. So are Burr and Twist. -You want to rescue them?"</p> - -<p>That startled them. "Listen," Price started, and then he saw Oakes -pushing toward him with a small determined-looking group of men.</p> - -<p>"Stand back," Oakes demanded. "Stand back, there. This man is a -traitor. He betrayed the council, he betrayed Sawyer. If you listen to -him, he'll betray you." He turned to Price. "You get back to your Vurna -masters. Tell them we're not going to—"</p> - -<p>"Oh, shut up," said Price impatiently. "You're not chief here, and you -never will be, no matter if you do leave Sawyer to rot in the Citadel." -He took the shocker from his belt where he had thrust it. "I stole that -flier from the Vurna, and I stole this, too. I'll use it on you if I -have to."</p> - -<p>Oakes looked ugly, but he hesitated, and Price said, "Some of you, if -you want proof of what I say, go look in the flier. Go on."</p> - -<p>Several men detached themselves from the crowd and went off at a trot -toward the flier. Presently they began to whoop and halloo. They came -back carrying the pilot and Linna, who looked at Price with the utmost -hatred.</p> - -<p>"It looks like a trick to me," said Oakes. "They could have been bound -on purpose."</p> - -<p>Price said, "Does it look like a trick that every starship of the -Citadel fleet took off last night? You must have heard or seen them, -even at this distance."</p> - -<p>"Yes," said a lean farmer, "streaks of fire in the sky before dawn. I -was milking."</p> - -<p>Others had seen them, too. And now a note of excitement crept into -their voices.</p> - -<p>"What's it mean? What's happened there? What are you after?"</p> - -<p>"The Citadel is stripped," he said. "And I know where the fire-control -is that commands the Belt. With this flier I can land right on the -Citadel without being challenged. I can take some of you with me, and -we can knock out those weapons. You can walk right in, with no more -opposition than brave men ought to be able to handle. You—"</p> - -<p>"Price," said Linna, in a voice of absolute horror, "you don't know -what you're doing. The fleet has gone out to fight the Ei. Arrin forced -some information out of the captives—the Ei fleet is somewhere outside -this solar system, and our fleet's out to intercept it."</p> - -<p>The terror in her voice increased. "But if the Ei forces evade our -fleet and strike directly at our base here—don't you see, only our -great missile-batteries around the Citadel can defend Earth! If you -storm the Citadel, there'll be no defenses at all."</p> - -<p>He said, "Linna, I know you believe in the Ei. Probably most of your -people do. But you've never seen one, in a century no one on Earth has -seen one. They're a myth, a political stratagem, that's all."</p> - -<p>She shook her head, groping desperately for words. "Don't follow him!" -she cried out to the men. "Don't listen to him. We're fighting for your -lives and safety too. Don't be so mad as to stab us in the back now!"</p> - -<p>They looked at her in the firelight, the flint-faced men who were weary -of Star Lords. Then, without paying Oakes any attention at all, they -looked at Price.</p> - -<p>"He's right," drawled one of them. "The star-spawn have given us the -lie about the Ei too long. Ain't a kid on Earth believes it."</p> - -<p>Linna's head bent hopelessly forward, and she turned away. She still -believes it, every word, thought Price. Poor Linna. He would have given -anything to comfort her.</p> - -<p>But there was no time for comfort, no time for anything but planning. -He said,</p> - -<p>"You've heard, you know this chance may never come again—are you with -me?" And they answered, <i>Yes!</i></p> - -<p>"All right," said Price. "All right, we've got to have a council, to -make plans, and then we'll have to move fast to strike before the fleet -comes back. Who are your leaders after Sawyer?"</p> - -<p>Five or six men came forward, district sub-chiefs. One of them nodded -his head toward the two Vurna.</p> - -<p>"What'll we do with them?"</p> - -<p>"Treat them well," said Price sternly. "They're your assurance of -Sawyer's life." He didn't know whether they were or not, but he didn't -want Linna to suffer even discomfort because of him. He added, "Make -sure they don't talk to anyone, though. And remember, there was a -traitor at the big council. You'd better all keep a look-out, for -signals and communication-devices. And now let's talk."</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The council lasted far into the night. Price's biggest problem was to -persuade the tribesmen not to bring their guns.</p> - -<p>"The metal-detector units on the flying-eyes would spot you before -you'd gone ten miles into the Belt, and I can't take the control-room -that far ahead. It couldn't possibly be held that long, and no matter -how we might smash the weapon-controls they'd have time to patch them -up and use them on you. You'll have to infiltrate the Belt on all -sides, keeping under cover, and get within striking distance before I -land on the Citadel. Besides, against the Vurna shockers, your guns -aren't much more use than your hunting bolos. We'll try and give you -better weapons, once we're inside."</p> - -<p>"Of course," said one leathery-faced sub-chief, "when you've got us and -the Ohios and Kentucky's and the rest all in the Belt, it would be a -mighty easy thing for you to give them word at the Citadel, and have us -all wiped out at once, like that."</p> - -<p>Price said harshly, "It's up to you, whether you want to take the -gamble or not. If I'm on the level, you can take the Citadel and get -the Star Lords off your back. If I'm not, you're dead. But you won't -get a chance like this again. Make up your minds."</p> - -<p>They made them up.</p> - -<p>"How shall word be sent in time to the other tribes? It'd take days for -a man on horseback to get around to the east and north."</p> - -<p>"I'll take the word," said Price. "In the flier. By sundown tomorrow, -there'll be men from every tribe ready to move into the Belt. And pick -me half a dozen seasoned men to go along, under a sub-chief. Half a -dozen men you can trust for the fate of the whole attack."</p> - -<p>The leathery old chief, whose name was Sweetbriar, said quietly, "I'll -pick you six, and I'll go along."</p> - -<p>His gaze locked with Price's, and Price smiled.</p> - -<p>"I'll give you the shocker," he said. "You can use it any time you see -fit. And <i>that</i> should convince the other tribes they can count on me."</p> - -<p>"Should," said Sweetbriar, nodding. "Now we'd better reckon up our -distance. As I see it, this'll work out something like a big beat, and -if we don't all get there together, we might better have stayed home."</p> - -<p>They settled all the details, the forced marches by night, the meager -weight of food each man was to carry. Price managed to get an hour's -sleep before he took off in the pre-dawn gloom to rouse the other -tribes. When he slept he dreamed of an iron mountain, impregnable, -crowned with destruction, watching incessantly with a thousand eyes. In -the dream, he knew that no mere men could ever take it.</p> - - - -<hr class="chap" /> -<p class="ph1">CHAPTER IX</p> - - -<p>The aerodyne flew high in the black night, toward the Citadel. Above -there were clear stars. Below there were heavy clouds laced with -lightning, hiding the earth. Hiding the Belt, and the lines of men who -moved in it, among the dark trees, in the wind and the rain.</p> - -<p>One full night had passed, and another was drawing to its close. Before -the sun went down again it would be all over, one way or the other.</p> - -<p>Price was in that state of exaltation that comes at a certain point -of prolonged tension without rest, where you move a little bit -outside your body and above the ground, detached from every normal -consideration, and everything seems to go with a clear headlong rush, -as though a single initiating act has set an inevitable series of -reactions going, and all you have to do is keep pace with them. He -had not slept much, but he was not tired. The aspect of the Citadel -roof, the round red circle of the lift and the controls thereof, the -symbol marking the proper level, the shape and size and position of the -fire-control center, burned brightly in his mind. Their set and proper -sequence did not permit of any obstacles.</p> - -<p>Sweetbriar sat beside him in the co-pilot's place. He held the shocker -in his gnarly hands, and from time to time he turned it over or stroked -its smooth and unfamiliar shape. So far he had not had any occasion -to use it. He had stood beside Price in a dozen wooden-built towns, -helping him harangue a dozen doubtful chiefs, or sub-chiefs, around the -perimeter of the Belt. He had not slept much, either, but his eye was -brilliant and steely as a hawk's. If the sensation of flight frightened -him, he had not shown it in any way.</p> - -<p>The six men of his picking sat quietly in the cabin. They might have -been the same six men Price had first met when he landed in the Belt, -woods-rangers, hunters of deer and wild cattle, all speed and muscle, -born fighters. They were as lax as idle hound-dogs now, when there was -nothing to be done. They, too, had mastered whatever fear they had had -of flying.</p> - -<p>The storm below was moving rapidly toward the east, over a broad -front. Price could easily have outflown it, but he did not, only -keeping high enough above it to get a sighting on the Citadel when it -came into visual range. He was grateful for the storm. It seemed like -an omen of good fortune. It would cover the advance of the tribesmen -from the west, and it would cover his own landing, if he paced it -properly. A thick night would make it easier to get his attacking party -onto the lift, and perhaps even below, before it was realized that they -were not Linna's party returning.</p> - -<p>Poor Linna. He had seen her for just a minute before he left the -Capitol of the Missouris. He had wanted to make sure she was safe and -comfortable, and he had wanted to try once more to make her understand -how he felt.</p> - -<p>"I'm not your enemy, Linna," he had said. "Believe that. After this is -all over—"</p> - -<p>"If you take the Citadel," she had answered, "it won't matter who is -anybody's enemy. You and I will both be victims of the Ei. If you don't -take it—you'll be dead, and so will your crazy army, and how long will -they let me live after that? Either way, both of us lose."</p> - -<p>And she had sounded so quietly despairing, that he had almost lost -heart.</p> - -<p>But not quite.</p> - -<p>Starshine and the lower flarings of lightning showed him a gleam of -dark metal far down in the night. He spoke to Sweetbriar and pointed. -The old man peered, squinting, and the six hunters roused themselves -and peered also.</p> - -<p>"Don't look like much from here," one of them said.</p> - -<p>Price did not dispute him. Perhaps it was just as well for his army of -seven not to have too clear a look at the fortress they were planning -to invade.</p> - -<p>He hung for a little time in the high quiet air, watching the storm -front roll like a wave. When it had almost reached the distant gleam of -metal he said sharply,</p> - -<p>"All right, <i>now</i>!"</p> - -<p>And he dropped the aerodyne whistling down the sky.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>The wild air-currents caught him, boiling ahead of the storm and over -it. For one horrible moment he thought he had lost control of the -aerodyne. It pitched and skittered and tossed, throwing him against -his seat-belt until his ribs cracked and his flesh felt as though it -was cut through. The tribesmen were now frankly and vocally terrified. -Then the built-in stabilizers and Price's own flier's brain took hold -again, and the whirling-leaf motion steadied to a rough and racking -but controlled descent.</p> - -<p>He could not see anything now but the solid blackness of the -storm-clouds, until the lightning flared and lit the rain-swept barren -below with a vivid light, brief but enough to guide him. He had judged -carefully, and he let the main wind-drift carry him until the wall of -the Citadel showed up huge and startling in the glare of a striking -bolt. He hung rocking over the roof until another one showed him the -painted circle of the lift. Then he set the aerodyne down hard right -beside it.</p> - -<p>There was no need for any talking. The instructions had all been -thoroughly discussed before. Price and the seven tribesmen were out and -across the intervening few feet of roof and onto the lift and going -down before the next flare of lightning broke.</p> - -<p>The men breathed heavily, their throwing ropes in one hand, their -knives in the other. Sweetbriar glanced at the shocker. Then he gave it -to Price and unhooked the weighted bolo from his own belt, swinging it -gently.</p> - -<p>There had been no alarm.</p> - -<p>Price watched the symbols gliding past on the guide-strip. When the -right one showed he pushed the proper stud and waited. The lift -stopped. The automatic door slid back. They moved fast, out into the -corridor.</p> - -<p>Only one man was in sight, going somewhere with a sheaf of papers in -his hand. He stopped, and his eyes widened, and his mouth opened. Price -fired the shocker. The man fell down and the papers scattered all -over the floor. Price began to run. His own shoes made a quick sharp -patting on the plastic surface. The moccasins of the hunters made no -sound at all. He counted the doors, and then turned for a last glance -at Sweetbriar and the men. Their eyes were very bright and the edges of -their teeth showed. Sweetbriar nodded.</p> - -<p>Price flung open the door.</p> - -<p>And it was easy, easier than he had dreamed. The four technicians in -their uniforms of dull gold turned and stood startled and staring for -as long as a man might catch his breath, and that was time enough. -Bolos wrapped around three of them like flying snakes and brought them -down, and the fourth fell under the shock-beam.</p> - -<p>"Shut the door," said Price, and one of the hunters shut it.</p> - -<p>Price knocked out the other three with the shocker, and the hunters -bound them. There was a rack of side-arms in one wall, with several -shockers in it. Price handed them out and then turned his attention to -the batteries of firing-studs. The hunters stood staring at the moving -pictures of the stormy Belt reflected in the scanner screens, until -Sweetbriar sent them to guard the door.</p> - -<p>There were service-hatches below the waist-high control panels. Price -got one open and studied the wiring, panting more with excitement -than exertion. It was only a few minutes until the pre-arranged time -of attack. But he must not trip the firing relays accidentally in -trying to de-activate them. He was afraid to start pulling wires -indiscriminately.</p> - -<p>But where the individual leads ran back to join the primary cable they -passed through a series of switches. It seemed logical to Price that -these were safety cut-offs to be used during maintenance, and that they -would cut off the nameless destructive engines on the roof.</p> - -<p>He had nothing better to go on, and time had almost run out. He opened -one of the switches, and glanced swiftly at the screens. Nothing -happened. He flipped open the others fast, and ripped the wires loose -from the board. Then with a metal chair he smashed the studs.</p> - -<p>As he finished, Sweetbriar shouted suddenly. "There they come—and -right on time!"</p> - -<p>Price, sweating, looked up. Sweetbriar and the hunters were eagerly -gazing at the screens.</p> - -<p>They showed the storm-swept Belt and they showed small dark figures in -it—hundreds of them—thousands—tribesmen running toward the Citadel.</p> - -<p>An alarm-bell rang somewhere in the Citadel. Instantly other bells -echoed it, a distant confusion of alarms.</p> - -<p>"Out of here fast," Price cried. "This is the first place the Vurna -will be coming. If we can get down through, we can help the others."</p> - -<p>They ran back out of the room, back down the corridor past the -unconscious man who still lay on the floor. Whatever happened now, the -tribesmen pouring across the Belt were safe from the weapons on the -roof.</p> - -<p>Without warning the lift-door opened right in front of them and five -green-clad Vurna came spilling out of it.</p> - -<p>There was no chance to use shockers or bolos either—they were so close -to each other that it was hands and fists. They struggled, gripping and -striking at each other, their feet slipping on the smooth floor, with -the clamor of bells in the background.</p> - -<p>A new note was added to that clamor. A dim sound of yelling voices, -many of them surging up from the lower part of the Citadel.</p> - -<p>"The tribes are in!" shouted Sweetbriar. "By God, I—"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He was knocked back by a flailing green arm. His Vurna antagonist -scrabbled to get his shocker out of his belt. Price desperately kicked -out at his own personal foe and banged him back against the metal wall. -He saw the silver head bang the wall, and the man sagged at the knees.</p> - -<p>Price rushed and knocked up the shocker now levelled at Sweetbriar. The -hunters yelped, their eyes blazing. It was their kind of a fight. They -liked it. After a sullen lifetime, they were using their fists on the -Star Lords and they liked that.</p> - -<p>The surge of sound from levels underneath told of a far bigger melee -down there, spreading through the Citadel. And then that sound, and the -small, personal noises of their own staggering fight, were cut across -by a brutal authoritative new sound.</p> - -<p>A hooting, loud and commanding, getting louder by the second, braying -like the voice of doom through the vast iron pile.</p> - -<p>The two Vurna still left on their feet tried to turn and run down the -corridor. The hunter's bolos brought them down quickly.</p> - -<p>Sweetbriar's leathery old face was wild and startled as he got to his -feet. "What the hell—"</p> - -<p>"That's the Vurna's big battle-stations siren!" Price said. "They're a -bit late with it. Come on!"</p> - -<p>He and the hunters began to look for stairs, racing swiftly along the -deserted corridors. They found some at last, and sped downward, level -after level.</p> - -<p>Bellowing, deafening in volume now, the siren kept hooting.</p> - -<p>It could not drown out the tumultuous uproar that filled the lower -levels. Price and the hunters were met suddenly by a mass of tribesmen -boiling up from the ground level. They were screaming, laughing, -capering in the halls, dragging with them one or two captured -Vurna—triumphant victors, dancing down a hated power under their -moccasined feet. Their hair and beards and their clothing were still -dripping wet with rain.</p> - -<p>They swept up Price and Sweetbriar and the six others in their -advancing front, pounding their shoulders, hugging them.</p> - -<p>"We did it! We got 'em!" they cried. "We took the Citadel!"</p> - -<p>"Is it all over?" asked Price incredulously. "So soon?"</p> - -<p>"That mighty caterwauling did it," said a red-bearded man. "All of a -sudden they quit fighting and began to run, like it was a signal, but -they couldn't get away from us. I heard they got old Arrin hisself -down there, in a big room, cussing and crying fit to bust."</p> - -<p>"Where's Sawyer?" somebody shouted, and Sweetbriar took up the cry. -Price said,</p> - -<p>"Somewhere on this level, I think. Get a Vurna that speaks English and -make him show you. It'll save time."</p> - -<p>He pushed on through them to the stairs, and fought his way down. He -wanted to see Arrin. He wanted to see the pride of the Citadel humbled, -broken.</p> - -<p>Tribesmen rioted through the corridors, smashing things like happy -children. They directed him to a vast sunken room that Price knew must -be the very heart and soul of the Citadel, its reason for being. It -was an overpowering place of screens and towering panels and complex -equipment. But these screens looked far beyond Earth, showing starry -spaces, burning suns and unimaginable dark abysses. From here the -Vurna had watched the whole sector of outer space, and these complex -controls must be the triggers of the mighty missile-batteries outside -the Citadel, the weapons that could strike fast and far into the void.</p> - -<p>Here there was a guard to keep out the roisterers. The soberer of -the tribesmen had a sensible concern for the possible results of -tampering with these incomprehensible but obviously mighty powers. -They were afraid the whole Citadel might blow up with them in it. A few -technicians were still being hustled out as Price entered.</p> - -<p>A number of the chiefs were in here, and Arrin was with them, but he -was neither cursing nor crying. He was standing between two muscular -tribesmen, facing the chiefs, and his face held such an agony of -despair and terror that Price was shaken by it.</p> - -<p>"<i>What must I do</i>," he was saying, "<i>to make you understand?</i> That -warning came from our fleet. The Ei have evaded it in the Centaurus -Gulf, and are sweeping in toward Earth. If we don't defend the -Citadel—"</p> - -<p>He broke off as he saw Price come up. Then he said bitterly, "I -congratulate you. Few men can say that practically single-handed they -destroyed a world."</p> - -<p>One of the chiefs asked Price, "Is Sawyer with you?"</p> - -<p>Price shook his head. "They've gone to free him now. He'll be here in a -few minutes."</p> - -<p>"Oh my God," said Arrin softly. "Don't let them free the Ei. Even two -of them at large here—we'd have no hope at all, with their fleet -coming." He looked at Price and Price's confident scorn drained -slowly out of him leaving a nasty void. Nobody, Vurna or not, could -counterfeit what he saw in Arrin's eyes.</p> - -<p>"Do you wish me to go on my knees and beg?" whispered Arrin. "I'll do -it. Only go up and stop them from opening that bulkhead."</p> - -<p>And Price knew suddenly that he must do that.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>He turned and ran back along the hall and up the stairs, pushing and -kicking his way past the knots of tribesmen who wanted to congratulate -him for what he had done, and all the way there was a chill unpleasant -thing riding his back, and its first name was Doubt, and its second, -Fear.</p> - -<p><i>Was it possible, just barely possible, that the Vurna had been telling -the truth all the time?</i></p> - -<p>Uproar on the prison level guided him through a maze of corridors, -to an obligato of breaking doors. He turned a corner. Burr and Twist -and Sawyer were free. They formed part of the fore-front of a group -that was swarming down the hall systematically breaking down the cell -doors. Two Vurna guards lay prone, and a third man, probably the -English-speaking guide, was trying to crawl away unnoticed, his face -ashen with fear.</p> - -<p>The bulkhead was open.</p> - -<p>A man's voice neighed suddenly in terror. Then another, and another, -and the tribesmen were rolled back upon themselves as by the blow of a -great hand, as the fore edge of the group turned and burst its way to -the rear. There was a moment of wild panic. Price stood flat against -the wall and watched brave men run by him sobbing. And then a wave of -force, so cold and alien that it revolted the last small atom of his -human self, hit his mind like the back-blast of a bomb.</p> - -<p>Two dark forms stood in the corridor.</p> - -<p>They were taller than men. At first Price thought they were shrouded in -black like old monks, with cowls over their heads. But as they moved -he saw that the cowls and the floating draperies edged with a thin -translucent gray were their own substance, quivering, shifting, gliding -around some unguessable central core of being. He could not see whether -they had faces under the black folds, and eyes in the faces, but he -could feel them watching him. He could feel their minds stripping him -and tearing away his feeble defenses, leaving his own mind naked and -helpless before them.</p> - -<p>And these were the Ei. These were the Big Lie of the Vurna.</p> - -<p><i>Only they were real!</i></p> - -<p>He could not stand them any longer. He ran.</p> - -<p>They all ran. It was a compulsion. Run. Cry panic. Clear the Citadel -and get away!</p> - -<p>He looked back and the Ei were behind them, gliding soundlessly along -the hall.</p> - -<p>Run. Get away....</p> - -<p>And then Price and the others, fleeing in the next corridor collided -with the chiefs who were hurrying to find out what had happened. They -still had Arrin with them, a prisoner.</p> - -<p>"Out," said Sawyer thickly, his voice a hoarse croak. "Get out, fast—"</p> - -<p>Arrin's voice cracked like a silver whiplash. "Yes, run. Because -they're making you, because their minds are too much for you! Run, and -let them have the Citadel, and when their fleet comes, let them have -the Earth!"</p> - -<p>That stopped them. The horror they felt at that thought surged up -so strong that the frantic compulsion to flee lessened a little. -But behind them, somewhere back in the corridors, they would be -following....</p> - -<p>Arrin raged and mocked them. "<i>We</i> saved you from the Ei two -generations ago, when Ei ships had smashed your defenses and they were -ready to move in. We moved in first, we've held them back, but now -you've let them in! So run!"</p> - -<p>"Good God!" said Sawyer, his face stricken. "Then it was all true, what -you told us about the Ei. It was true all the time!"</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Price did not, like the other Earthmen, have a lifetime's thinking to -revise. He grabbed Arrin's shoulders.</p> - -<p>"Can we face them?" he cried. "Can we kill them?"</p> - -<p>"They can be killed," Arrin said. "Their minds can hold many—but -not an unlimited number. If we all rush them, many of us, there is a -chance...."</p> - -<p>Price yelled down the corridors, "What are you running from? There's -only two of them. We're going back! We're going to pull them down!"</p> - -<p>The tribesmen, their first horror a little abated, by sheer reaction -from shame of their own terror, exploded into sudden rage.</p> - -<p>"There's only two of them—come on!"</p> - -<p>And then of a sudden they were all of them running back down the -corridors, jostling, crowding, screaming, Price with Arrin beside him, -with old Sweetbriar ahead, with Sawyer shouting in hoarse anger. A mob, -not an army, a mob urged forward by its own horror.</p> - -<p>Around the corner, and into the corridor where the two black shapes -came gliding fast. And it was like walking into night and death, into -bitter black winds and the stabbing of cruel swords, as the might of -alien minds blasted at them.</p> - -<p>Tribesmen screamed and fell, clawing at their own heads. The mass -behind forced over them, forced the reeling first wave right into the -unimaginable shapes.</p> - -<p>"Pull them down!"</p> - -<p>Price was in the screeching fore-front now and he closed his eyes and -struck with his knife at the cloudy darkness of a cowl.</p> - -<p>A cold like that of outer space struck through him and he staggered, -fainting and falling, and his mind closed on the awful sight of packed -men swaying and pulling and striking at the two tall cowled shapes, -mobbing them, beating them down.</p> - -<p>When Price opened his eyes he was in another corridor and old Sawyer -was slapping his face with rough hands.</p> - -<p>"Yes," said Sawyer thickly. "They're dead. And a good many men dead -with them, and some others that act like their brains are dead."</p> - -<p>He shook his head, a little wildly. "To think it was true all the -time—"</p> - -<p><i>Whoom!</i> came a deep sound from outside the Citadel. And then more of -them, in quick succession. <i>Whoom! Whoom! Whoom!</i></p> - -<p>"Arrin—" said Price, getting weakly to his feet.</p> - -<p>"He's down in that room, with his men," said Sawyer. "And they're -turning loose on that Ei fleet out in space."</p> - -<p>And now the great missiles from the launchers outside the Citadel were -going out so fast that the sounds of them could not be counted.</p> - -<p>Price said, "Then you let him—"</p> - -<p>"Let him?" repeated Sawyer. "We <i>asked</i> him! Do you think we want a -whole fleet of—of <i>them</i>—reaching Earth?"</p> - -<p>By the time Price and Sawyer got down to the missile-control room, the -deadly messengers were all on their way.</p> - -<p>Arrin and his men watched the screens, and would not turn from them. -Price, and the tribesmen, saw only burning stars and dark space in -those screens—and then, finally, a little crackling of pin-prick -flares running like a swarm of fireflies in the dark void. Then nothing.</p> - -<p>Arrin turned.</p> - -<p>Sawyer said, painfully, "Did they—?"</p> - -<p>"Yes," said Arrin. "We caught them—but none too soon. Our fleet out -there will mop up any Ei ships that survived."</p> - -<p>He added, with slow weariness, "We've won a battle—not a war. The Ei -are many. But this outpost world is safe. And we'll press them back and -back—"</p> - -<p>Sawyer looked at Price. Price said, "Don't be so damned proud. Go ahead -and say it."</p> - -<p>Sawyer said to Arrin, "Seems like we were wrong about some things. -About you Vurna. We're hoping things'll be different between us, now."</p> - -<p>"They can be," Arrin said.</p> - -<p>"They will be, if you want it."</p> - -<p>The old Chief of the Missouris asked, "Now it's all cleared up, just -who <i>was</i> the traitor among us? Was it Oakes?"</p> - -<p>For the first time, a little smile touched Arrin's face. "Do you really -want to know, now it's over?"</p> - -<p>Sawyer grunted. "Guess not." He looked around the other chiefs, and -then stuck his gnarled hand out in the oldest gesture of Earth, and -Arrin took it.</p> - -<hr class="tb" /> - -<p>Price and Linna stood next day on the roof of the Citadel and watched -the tribesmen going home.</p> - -<p>There was, there had always been, a stiff-necked pride in the men of -Earth. They went away with their heads up, not looking back. But, at -the edge of the distant forest, there was a face turned and the flash -of a handwave before they went into the trees.</p> - -<p>"They'll come back," Price said. "A few of them at first—then more and -more, to learn. A few years will make all the difference."</p> - -<p>He thought that the sons of Earth and the sons of the stars would -together stand upon many far worlds. The long war against the Ei would -end some day, that dark and alien tide would be rolled back, and -Earthmen would do their share. But that was all to come.</p> - -<p>Linna was saying earnestly, "And the people of your own hidden colony -in the west—they will join us too?"</p> - -<p>Price looked at her. "There is no colony, Linna. I came alone from the -west."</p> - -<p>"But your clothes—your plane—where <i>did</i> you come from?" She was -startled, her eyes wide and wondering.</p> - -<p>"I'll explain all that later. You won't believe it, at first. I hardly -do myself."</p> - -<p>And, thinking of the strange freak of force and chance that had -snatched him from the older Earth, Price felt a last pang of nostalgia -for that lost world of long ago. That time when, safe on their cozy -little planet, men had dreamed of space and stars—it seemed now like -a long-dead idyll of youth.</p> - -<p>The Earth of those days could never come again. The wider galaxy -had crashed in upon it, and terrible and magnificent realities had -shattered the youthful dreams, and it was a different and sterner -planet that was joining the community of star-worlds. Who knew what -awaited it on that wider, cosmic stage? His hand tightened on Linna's. -Of their own tiny part in that vast future, he felt suddenly very sure.</p> - -<div style='display:block; margin-top:4em'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK CITADEL OF THE STAR LORDS ***</div> -<div style='text-align:left'> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Updated editions will replace the previous one—the old editions will -be renamed. -</div> - -<div style='display:block; margin:1em 0'> -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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