all the symptoms I had met before. This had happened on the inner sea. The Star Lords were forcing me back. I could not go on. The Star Lords were saying plainly: “You may not go to Vallia! Return to Valka, Dray Prescot, and perform there the work to your hands.”
CHAPTER FIVE
The true history of
The Fetching of Drak na Valka
I would not accept this dictate of the Star Lords.
What did I know of these mysterious and lofty beings then? Practically nothing of value, save their power. They had flung me back and forth between Earth and Kregen like a tennis ball. They could rouse the wind and the sea against me.
The boat grounded and waves sheeted over me, and I stood up and shook my fist at the sky and cursed the Star Lords, horribly and comprehensively. The wind slackened and the stars shone through the cloud wrack.
She of the Veils, the fourth moon of Kregen, drifted like a wan ghost, and against the pallid orb the shape of a giant hunting bird stretched like an accusing brand.
“The Gdoinye!” I yelled up, my head thrown back. “What do I care for you? It is Vallia and Vondium for me,” and I finished with a fine rattling series of foul oaths.
The raptor up there, black in the starlight, catching an occasional gleam from She of the Veils, was the messenger and spy of the Star Lords. A giant bird with, I knew, a scarlet coat of feathers and golden feathers about its eyes and throat, it circled above me now in wide planing hunting circles. That raptor had watched over many of the crises of my life on Kregen. Now I picked up a stone from the beach and hurled it aloft. Oh, yes, believe me, I was mad clean through.
And then — then something happened that had never occurred to me before on Kregen and was never likely to occur on Earth.
The Gdoinye folded its wings and stooped. It dropped like a shot from a tower straight toward my head. I shouted aloud in my glee and hauled out my sword and threw it up, the blade a pinkish-silver brand in the night.
“I’ll tickle your feathers for you, you kleesh of a bird! You won’t spy for the Star Lords when I’ve spit you and roasted you and thrown you to the vosks!”
With a harsh cry the bird spread those gorgeous wings all black in the moonlight and swooped over my head. It circled insolently low above me, contemptuous, out of my reach. At my side swung a main-gauche Tom had insisted I take, and I could have drawn it and hurled it fairly into that scarlet-feathered breast. But I continued to shake my sword and rave at the Gdoinye. Looking back, I know I had forgotten I carried the dagger. My rage was terrible and ludicrous, pathetic.
Then — then the thing happened that stunned my brain.
“Dray Prescot!”
I fell silent, numb, gaping.
The bird — the bird spoke to me!
“Dray Prescot, you are a fool.”
How could I argue that?
“Dray Prescot, we did not bring you to Valka. Had you a grain of common sense you would have understood. Was not the lad Hunter from the Savanti? Were you not brought to aid him?”
My sword felt as heavy as the chest of gold we dragged from Dorval the Render’s tower.
“Vallia!” I shouted up. “I must go to Vondium!”
“Not so, Dray Prescot. You have been selected. Therefore you must.”
“As I did in Magdag? When you dragged me away in the hour of victory?”
“If you presume, you will be put down.”
“Presume! I served you as I thought fit! Star Lords! You are less than rasts that crawl upon a dunghill!”
“We are what we are. The Savanti try to be what they are not. They brought you here untimely.” Then the bird emitted a shrieking squawk that might have been the laughter of the gods, or the gloating of demons. “Your Delia does not miss you, Prescot—”
I interrupted. “In that you lie!”
“Listen, fool. You remember that Delia saw you the very next day after her capture in the Esztercari enclave, yet you had wandered and adventured and swaggered like any ruffler for years?”
Now I understood, or
CHAPTER FIVE
The true history of
The Fetching of Drak na Valka
I would not accept this dictate of the Star Lords.
What did I know of these mysterious and lofty beings then? Practically nothing of value, save their power. They had flung me back and forth between Earth and Kregen like a tennis ball. They could rouse the wind and the sea against me.
The boat grounded and waves sheeted over me, and I stood up and shook my fist at the sky and cursed the Star Lords, horribly and comprehensively. The wind slackened and the stars shone through the cloud wrack.
She of the Veils, the fourth moon of Kregen, drifted like a wan ghost, and against the pallid orb the shape of a giant hunting bird stretched like an accusing brand.
“The Gdoinye!” I yelled up, my head thrown back. “What do I care for you? It is Vallia and Vondium for me,” and I finished with a fine rattling series of foul oaths.
The raptor up there, black in the starlight, catching an occasional gleam from She of the Veils, was the messenger and spy of the Star Lords. A giant bird with, I knew, a scarlet coat of feathers and golden feathers about its eyes and throat, it circled above me now in wide planing hunting circles. That raptor had watched over many of the crises of my life on Kregen. Now I picked up a stone from the beach and hurled it aloft. Oh, yes, believe me, I was mad clean through.
And then — then something happened that had never occurred to me before on Kregen and was never likely to occur on Earth.
The Gdoinye folded its wings and stooped. It dropped like a shot from a tower straight toward my head. I shouted aloud in my glee and hauled out my sword and threw it up, the blade a pinkish-silver brand in the night.
“I’ll tickle your feathers for you, you kleesh of a bird! You won’t spy for the Star Lords when I’ve spit you and roasted you and thrown you to the vosks!”
With a harsh cry the bird spread those gorgeous wings all black in the moonlight and swooped over my head. It circled insolently low above me, contemptuous, out of my reach. At my side swung a main-gauche Tom had insisted I take, and I could have drawn it and hurled it fairly into that scarlet-feathered breast. But I continued to shake my sword and rave at the Gdoinye. Looking back, I know I had forgotten I carried the dagger. My rage was terrible and ludicrous, pathetic.
Then — then the thing happened that stunned my brain.
“Dray Prescot!”
I fell silent, numb, gaping.
The bird — the bird spoke to me!
“Dray Prescot, you are a fool.”
How could I argue that?
“Dray Prescot, we did not bring you to Valka. Had you a grain of common sense you would have understood. Was not the lad Hunter from the Savanti? Were you not brought to aid him?”
My sword felt as heavy as the chest of gold we dragged from Dorval the Render’s tower.
“Vallia!” I shouted up. “I must go to Vondium!”
“Not so, Dray Prescot. You have been selected. Therefore you must.”
“As I did in Magdag? When you dragged me away in the hour of victory?”
“If you presume, you will be put down.”
“Presume! I served you as I thought fit! Star Lords! You are less than rasts that crawl upon a dunghill!”
“We are what we are. The Savanti try to be what they are not. They brought you here untimely.” Then the bird emitted a shrieking squawk that might have been the laughter of the gods, or the gloating of demons. “Your Delia does not miss you, Prescot—”
I interrupted. “In that you lie!”
“Listen, fool. You remember that Delia saw you the very next day after her capture in the Esztercari enclave, yet you had wandered and adventured and swaggered like any ruffler for years?”
Now I understood, or
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