"2566-29" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jerome Bigge - Warlady 4 - 2566 Ad)2566 A.D.! A TALE OF ADVENTURE IN THE SECOND DARK AGE OF MAN By Jerome B. Bigge Chapter Twenty Nine "We should anchor and wait out this fog, your majesty!" the first officer of the North Star protested to his beautiful Queen as she stood there on the quarterdeck. The sails above them now dripping wet as the big schooner slowly crept through the heavy fog. The land ahead now invisible as the fog closed in around. Her beautiful golden hair now coated with fine droplets of mist. A man at the bow now casting the lead, reading off the "depths". "And if Lorraine's squadron is somewhere about?" Maris chal- lenged, her eyes blazing green fire into his. She was "nervous", "jumpy" now that the North Star was only a few miles from "home"! "They wouldn't dare be this close to Dularn!" he protested. "I'm not going to take that `chance'!" Maris snapped back. "Not with someone like Lorraine!" Maris thought then to herself. "By the mark six!" the man with the lead cried from the bow. Maris was now "feeling" her way through the fog with soundings. Relying on the charts, on her own guesswork as to their location. "Still plenty of water," Maris smiled, glancing at the com- pass. The North Star drew only three fathoms, or eighteen feet. The only danger was from uncharted rocks off the coastline now. ***************************************************************** "We've lost Sela!" I cursed, smashing my fist down on the oak of the Corsica's rail. I could see nothing now but the fog! The fog had come suddenly drifting in like a ghostly evil enemy. "There is still `hope'," Valerie said to me, putting her hand on my shoulder. I brushed it roughly off, limping over to the other side of the quarterdeck. What would I tell her mother? That I had sent her daughter off to die a horrible death at sea! ***************************************************************** Sela Dai took her exhausted bird as high as she could, the tired beat of the wings leaving no doubts now as to her own fate! There was no chance now of making it across the strait, and she dreaded to turn back to Dularn where only death or slavery waited for a woman like herself! Below her only the mists, the cold sea that would quickly take her young life should she not reach land! Then through the mists below there was a sudden brief glimpse of a ship. Of masts! The fog blanking out the view even before she could determine what sort of ship it was! Was it one of theirs? The Corsica, the Seahawk, the Squala, or the Huntress? Or per- haps the ship that had been sent up from Talon with their birds? ***************************************************************** "It's not your fault, Lorraine!" Valerie cried, shaking me. The mist cold, wet as it blew past our masts, the sails dripping wet. I could think only of Sela struggling in the cold waters! The horror in her eyes as the choking water now filled her lungs and she sank beneath the surface to sink to the dark depth below. Why? Why had I sent her instead of one of the other bird-girls? Why had I been so "eager" to risk Sela's young life on this task! ***************************************************************** "No!" Sela gasped, the ship suddenly looming out of the fog below her as her bird dived, the rake of the masts, the flag at the masthead leaving no doubt! The ship was a "North" class! An enemy ship! The North Star itself, Sela saw to her horror then! In its exhaustion the bird set its wings and extended its talons despite the frantic tugging on its reins by its beautiful rider, its only thought now to perch on the main mast crosstree! "What in the name of Lys!!" Maris gasped, seeing the awesome form of the Tarl come swooping down out of the fog and slam into the main mast crosstree, the great birds almost a legend to those of Dularn. Maris herself having never seen one outside of a zoo! "A Tarl!" the first officer breathed, seeing the rider, one of the bird-girls of Talon. And Talon was part of the Empire!!! "No!" Maris cried, one of her warrioresses setting arrow to her bowstring to shoot at the bird. The figure of a woman in leather on the bird's back looking down at them. A small dark haired woman that the Queen recalled seeing somewhere else then! The Princess Sela Dai of Talon! Gayle's own "sister-in-law"! Sela had no doubts that her bird would be "dangerous" once it recovered from its exhaustion and demanded meat for its belly! The Tarls of Talon being one of the most fearsome carnivores of all time, one that could even turn on and rend its own rider! A golden haired woman, clad in blue, now climbing the rigging to- wards her. Sela had no doubts that it was Queen Maris herself! The Princess of Talon slipped from the saddle, keeping one hand on the bird's trappings, the top of the cross tree being wet and slippery, with at least a fifty foot fall to the deck below! A foot rope, set about four feet below the mast, was designed to be used by anyone who needed to work up here. Sela, with her ex- cellent sense of balance, her "head" for heights, needed it not! Sela watched the Queen venture out on to the cross tree, her cautious fearful movements leaving no doubt in Sela's mind that Maris was not the sort that should be trying such things now! A scream of terror escaping from Maris' throat as she suddenly then slipped and fell! The beautiful blonde clutching with fingers like claws at the footrope there below the mast, hanging fifty feet above her own deck, her feet kicking helplessly in thin air! Without thinking Sela dashed along the top of the crosstree, then with a quick flip that a circus aerialist would had admired the little Princess dropped to the footrope beside the Dularnian Queen! The little brunette reaching down, clasping Maris' wrist! "Grab my leg!" Sela breathed. "You're too heavy for me to lift!" Sela explained, Maris outweighing her by twenty five pounds or so. The Princess of Talon then putting everything she had into drawing Maris up, the Queen grabbing at her as Sela drew her painfully up, the woman's weight almost tearing Sela apart! "Lys!" Maris gasped, clinging tightly to the little Prin- cess! Well aware that Sela had just doubtlessly saved her life! "You should be more careful," Sela smiled back. The men and women below cheering as they saw that their beloved Queen was safe! A sudden gust of wind suddenly blowing the fog on past! Revealing less than half a mile away a heavy three masted ship!!! The flag flying there at its mastheads the double barred cross!!! ***************************************************************** "Enemy in sight! Battle Stations!" I cried, pointing, the North Star drifting out of the fog there to port as the wind now blew it back towards Dularn. There was something "odd" about the ship. Some big dark object there in the rigging that puzzled me! "That's a Tarl perched in the rigging!" Valerie cried, roughly grabbing me, shaking me in her excitement. Forgetting I was her Queen, her Warlady as she saw the great bird up there!!! "Sela!" I breathed. "She's got Sela!" How Sela had found the North Star in the fog I didn't know, although considering the closeness of the ships it perhaps wasn't that surprising either! The thought going through my mind that Maris might use Sela as a hostage to insure her own safety! The very thought of "that" making a blood red haze of fury swim before my eyes like a fog!!! ***************************************************************** "Give orders! Run up a flag of truce!" Sela cried, shaking Maris. Seeing the activity aboard the Corsica, the ship already now turning, the jib having been momentarily "freed" to swing the ship around. There being no doubt that Lorraine was in command! "Deck!" Maris cried down, "Run up a truce flag!" The sweat wet beneath her tunic, the little dark eyed Princess beside her! ***************************************************************** "They're running up a truce flag," Valerie said to me. I saw it myself flying from the North Star's flag rope. It was the only thing that Maris could have done. She had Sela as hostage! "Stand down!" I cried to the men. There would be no fight today. I only hoped that I might be able to convince Maris to give me Sela. She could keep the Tarl if she wanted as a trophy! "Thank God you're safe!" I sobbed, clutching Sela to me as I would a child, crushing the little Princess to my bosom, stroking the dark damp hair as I regarded Maris, Queen of Dularn standing there. Overhead the flag of truce that I had now ordered flown. "She saved my life," Maris said to me, explaining in a few words how she had fallen from the main mast cross tree. I nod- ded, holding the little Princess in my arms. I had my Sela back! "We have to get my Tarl," Sela said, looking up at me then. "She's got a lot of `guts'," I said to Maris as we watched the Princess of Talon creep out to the end of the Corsica's main mast crosstree, holding a big piece of raw meat on a pike to en- tice the bird to jump from the North Star over to my own ship. The two ships now lashed together to hold them side by side now. "Your masts are even higher than mine," Maris breathed. "I'm not referring to that," I smiled, "But the bird." "Are they that `dangerous'?" Maris asked, looking up. "About like a lion or tiger," I answered, watching Sela. "There is a second trireme coming," Valerie interrupted us. "I'll take care of that," Maris spoke, barking swift orders. "There is more courage in that curvy little figure of yours than in a woman twice your size!" I told Sela Dai as Dularn now became just a bluish haze there on the horizon astern. I had seen Sela stand there on that cross tree of Corsica's sixty feet above the sea, and feed that horrible monster of hers by hand! Holding chunks of meat in her hand, letting it take them from her with a beak that could have taken her arm off with one snap! She would make Mark Berson an excellent wife, I mused privately too!! "A bird girl always feeds her bird," the Princess smiled. ***************************************************************** "I think that Lorraine is `right' and you are `wrong'," Sharon said to Darlanis as the two stood there looking at the map. "Although I think we need to do `more' than just give the `disputed territories' back to Dularn to insure a lasting peace." "And what you would suggest?" Darlanis challenged the girl, a tone of "annoyance" showing a bit in her silvery toned voice. "We need to extend the `Commonwealth' idea," Sharon said, looking up into the beautiful azure of the Empress' lovely eyes. "Bring together Dularn, Sarn, Trelandar, Talon, Baja, the Neva- das, even the Montanas into a union of nations working together." "It will not be `easy'," Darlanis answered, studying the map. There was a considerable distrust even now between those of Talon and those who supported her. Adding Dularn would be even worse, especially considering the hostilities that had existed. And the Nevadas and the Montanas had fought each other for cen- turies now. Then there were other groups like them further east! "But I think it could be done, if you wanted it done," Shar- on said, putting her arms around Darlanis, looking into her eyes. "You are the `second Janet Rogers' they talk about," Sharon said. 2566 A.D.! A TALE OF ADVENTURE IN THE SECOND DARK AGE OF MAN By Jerome B. Bigge Chapter Twenty Nine "We should anchor and wait out this fog, your majesty!" the first officer of the North Star protested to his beautiful Queen as she stood there on the quarterdeck. The sails above them now dripping wet as the big schooner slowly crept through the heavy fog. The land ahead now invisible as the fog closed in around. Her beautiful golden hair now coated with fine droplets of mist. A man at the bow now casting the lead, reading off the "depths". "And if Lorraine's squadron is somewhere about?" Maris chal- lenged, her eyes blazing green fire into his. She was "nervous", "jumpy" now that the North Star was only a few miles from "home"! "They wouldn't dare be this close to Dularn!" he protested. "I'm not going to take that `chance'!" Maris snapped back. "Not with someone like Lorraine!" Maris thought then to herself. "By the mark six!" the man with the lead cried from the bow. Maris was now "feeling" her way through the fog with soundings. Relying on the charts, on her own guesswork as to their location. "Still plenty of water," Maris smiled, glancing at the com- pass. The North Star drew only three fathoms, or eighteen feet. The only danger was from uncharted rocks off the coastline now. ***************************************************************** "We've lost Sela!" I cursed, smashing my fist down on the oak of the Corsica's rail. I could see nothing now but the fog! The fog had come suddenly drifting in like a ghostly evil enemy. "There is still `hope'," Valerie said to me, putting her hand on my shoulder. I brushed it roughly off, limping over to the other side of the quarterdeck. What would I tell her mother? That I had sent her daughter off to die a horrible death at sea! ***************************************************************** Sela Dai took her exhausted bird as high as she could, the tired beat of the wings leaving no doubts now as to her own fate! There was no chance now of making it across the strait, and she dreaded to turn back to Dularn where only death or slavery waited for a woman like herself! Below her only the mists, the cold sea that would quickly take her young life should she not reach land! Then through the mists below there was a sudden brief glimpse of a ship. Of masts! The fog blanking out the view even before she could determine what sort of ship it was! Was it one of theirs? The Corsica, the Seahawk, the Squala, or the Huntress? Or per- haps the ship that had been sent up from Talon with their birds? ***************************************************************** "It's not your fault, Lorraine!" Valerie cried, shaking me. The mist cold, wet as it blew past our masts, the sails dripping wet. I could think only of Sela struggling in the cold waters! The horror in her eyes as the choking water now filled her lungs and she sank beneath the surface to sink to the dark depth below. Why? Why had I sent her instead of one of the other bird-girls? Why had I been so "eager" to risk Sela's young life on this task! ***************************************************************** "No!" Sela gasped, the ship suddenly looming out of the fog below her as her bird dived, the rake of the masts, the flag at the masthead leaving no doubt! The ship was a "North" class! An enemy ship! The North Star itself, Sela saw to her horror then! In its exhaustion the bird set its wings and extended its talons despite the frantic tugging on its reins by its beautiful rider, its only thought now to perch on the main mast crosstree! "What in the name of Lys!!" Maris gasped, seeing the awesome form of the Tarl come swooping down out of the fog and slam into the main mast crosstree, the great birds almost a legend to those of Dularn. Maris herself having never seen one outside of a zoo! "A Tarl!" the first officer breathed, seeing the rider, one of the bird-girls of Talon. And Talon was part of the Empire!!! "No!" Maris cried, one of her warrioresses setting arrow to her bowstring to shoot at the bird. The figure of a woman in leather on the bird's back looking down at them. A small dark haired woman that the Queen recalled seeing somewhere else then! The Princess Sela Dai of Talon! Gayle's own "sister-in-law"! Sela had no doubts that her bird would be "dangerous" once it recovered from its exhaustion and demanded meat for its belly! The Tarls of Talon being one of the most fearsome carnivores of all time, one that could even turn on and rend its own rider! A golden haired woman, clad in blue, now climbing the rigging to- wards her. Sela had no doubts that it was Queen Maris herself! The Princess of Talon slipped from the saddle, keeping one hand on the bird's trappings, the top of the cross tree being wet and slippery, with at least a fifty foot fall to the deck below! A foot rope, set about four feet below the mast, was designed to be used by anyone who needed to work up here. Sela, with her ex- cellent sense of balance, her "head" for heights, needed it not! Sela watched the Queen venture out on to the cross tree, her cautious fearful movements leaving no doubt in Sela's mind that Maris was not the sort that should be trying such things now! A scream of terror escaping from Maris' throat as she suddenly then slipped and fell! The beautiful blonde clutching with fingers like claws at the footrope there below the mast, hanging fifty feet above her own deck, her feet kicking helplessly in thin air! Without thinking Sela dashed along the top of the crosstree, then with a quick flip that a circus aerialist would had admired the little Princess dropped to the footrope beside the Dularnian Queen! The little brunette reaching down, clasping Maris' wrist! "Grab my leg!" Sela breathed. "You're too heavy for me to lift!" Sela explained, Maris outweighing her by twenty five pounds or so. The Princess of Talon then putting everything she had into drawing Maris up, the Queen grabbing at her as Sela drew her painfully up, the woman's weight almost tearing Sela apart! "Lys!" Maris gasped, clinging tightly to the little Prin- cess! Well aware that Sela had just doubtlessly saved her life! "You should be more careful," Sela smiled back. The men and women below cheering as they saw that their beloved Queen was safe! A sudden gust of wind suddenly blowing the fog on past! Revealing less than half a mile away a heavy three masted ship!!! The flag flying there at its mastheads the double barred cross!!! ***************************************************************** "Enemy in sight! Battle Stations!" I cried, pointing, the North Star drifting out of the fog there to port as the wind now blew it back towards Dularn. There was something "odd" about the ship. Some big dark object there in the rigging that puzzled me! "That's a Tarl perched in the rigging!" Valerie cried, roughly grabbing me, shaking me in her excitement. Forgetting I was her Queen, her Warlady as she saw the great bird up there!!! "Sela!" I breathed. "She's got Sela!" How Sela had found the North Star in the fog I didn't know, although considering the closeness of the ships it perhaps wasn't that surprising either! The thought going through my mind that Maris might use Sela as a hostage to insure her own safety! The very thought of "that" making a blood red haze of fury swim before my eyes like a fog!!! ***************************************************************** "Give orders! Run up a flag of truce!" Sela cried, shaking Maris. Seeing the activity aboard the Corsica, the ship already now turning, the jib having been momentarily "freed" to swing the ship around. There being no doubt that Lorraine was in command! "Deck!" Maris cried down, "Run up a truce flag!" The sweat wet beneath her tunic, the little dark eyed Princess beside her! ***************************************************************** "They're running up a truce flag," Valerie said to me. I saw it myself flying from the North Star's flag rope. It was the only thing that Maris could have done. She had Sela as hostage! "Stand down!" I cried to the men. There would be no fight today. I only hoped that I might be able to convince Maris to give me Sela. She could keep the Tarl if she wanted as a trophy! "Thank God you're safe!" I sobbed, clutching Sela to me as I would a child, crushing the little Princess to my bosom, stroking the dark damp hair as I regarded Maris, Queen of Dularn standing there. Overhead the flag of truce that I had now ordered flown. "She saved my life," Maris said to me, explaining in a few words how she had fallen from the main mast cross tree. I nod- ded, holding the little Princess in my arms. I had my Sela back! "We have to get my Tarl," Sela said, looking up at me then. "She's got a lot of `guts'," I said to Maris as we watched the Princess of Talon creep out to the end of the Corsica's main mast crosstree, holding a big piece of raw meat on a pike to en- tice the bird to jump from the North Star over to my own ship. The two ships now lashed together to hold them side by side now. "Your masts are even higher than mine," Maris breathed. "I'm not referring to that," I smiled, "But the bird." "Are they that `dangerous'?" Maris asked, looking up. "About like a lion or tiger," I answered, watching Sela. "There is a second trireme coming," Valerie interrupted us. "I'll take care of that," Maris spoke, barking swift orders. "There is more courage in that curvy little figure of yours than in a woman twice your size!" I told Sela Dai as Dularn now became just a bluish haze there on the horizon astern. I had seen Sela stand there on that cross tree of Corsica's sixty feet above the sea, and feed that horrible monster of hers by hand! Holding chunks of meat in her hand, letting it take them from her with a beak that could have taken her arm off with one snap! She would make Mark Berson an excellent wife, I mused privately too!! "A bird girl always feeds her bird," the Princess smiled. ***************************************************************** "I think that Lorraine is `right' and you are `wrong'," Sharon said to Darlanis as the two stood there looking at the map. "Although I think we need to do `more' than just give the `disputed territories' back to Dularn to insure a lasting peace." "And what you would suggest?" Darlanis challenged the girl, a tone of "annoyance" showing a bit in her silvery toned voice. "We need to extend the `Commonwealth' idea," Sharon said, looking up into the beautiful azure of the Empress' lovely eyes. "Bring together Dularn, Sarn, Trelandar, Talon, Baja, the Neva- das, even the Montanas into a union of nations working together." "It will not be `easy'," Darlanis answered, studying the map. There was a considerable distrust even now between those of Talon and those who supported her. Adding Dularn would be even worse, especially considering the hostilities that had existed. And the Nevadas and the Montanas had fought each other for cen- turies now. Then there were other groups like them further east! "But I think it could be done, if you wanted it done," Shar- on said, putting her arms around Darlanis, looking into her eyes. "You are the `second Janet Rogers' they talk about," Sharon said. |
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