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Mountains.
Static burst from the radio. "This is the Dahl RCt Come in, Skytreader."
"Don't answer," Kelric said. T Below them, the
mountains unrolled in a jagged »B>ininm«l In his side mirror, Balv saw a flock
of craft rising from the air-1 field. They looked like specks against the
cliffs towering Vi Dahl. *
"Skytreader." Hacha's voice crackled on the co. "Land now or we'll force you
out of the air." f "Outrun them," Kelric said. "I can't,"
Balv said. A fist of wind grabbed Skytreader and i tossed it upward like a
child playing with a dice cube. "This is crazy. We have to land."
_ The Last Hawk 85
Kelric touched his gun to Balv's temple. "We're going to the starport you all
claim doesn't exist."
"You can't shoot that thing in here. You'll destroy the rider."
"No. Just you."
"I won't fly." Balv swallowed, wondering if he were about to die.
For a moment there was silence. Then Kelric said, "Get up"
Balv stared at him. "What?
Kelric flipped over his gun and held it like a club. "Get up."
"You'll kill us both."
"You have five seconds. Then you go to sleep."
It only took Balv an instant to imagine lying unconscious in a craft flown by
someone who had never handled a rider, let alone battled the winds of the
Teotecs. Then he slid out of the pilot's seat. As Kelric took his place, the
rider lurched ike a drunk gambler.
"Let me take us down." Balv motioned to a cluster of cloudwreathed crags
below. "I know places we can land."
"The only place I'm going is home."
"We can't make it." As Balv slid into the copilot's seat he looked back
through a window. Painted eyes and wings showed on the pursuing riders. "You
know they'll catch us."
Kelric made a fast scan of the controls. Then, with no warning, he pulled
Skytreader into a nearly vertical climb. Pressure built in Balv's ears and he
had to yell to be heard over the straining engines. "You're going too high!"
Kelric ignored him, taking the rider up in a dizzying half loop, the horizon
careening past the windshield as the craft turned upside down. Just when Balv
began to fear altitude would finish them as surely as a crash in the Teotecs,
Kelric rolled the rider right side up and angled into a descent, headed the
opposite way from their previous direction. Skytreader streaked into the upper
ranges of the Teotecs, leaving their pursuers far behind.
They landed high in the mountains, in a pocket of rock fenced by crags and icy
patches of snow. Balv stared through the windshield at a finger of basalt
thrusting into a cobalt sky. "I thought we were going to the port."
86 Catherine Asam ,j|
Kelric cut the engines. "So did Hacha. Once she gets turned |t :
around, she won't have any idea where to find us." . t.
It almost made sense; locating a craft up here was virtually | impossible
unless the pilot wanted to be found. But Kelric had | missed one "minor"
fact the starport was in the desert. . "You're going to fly me there,"
Kelric said. "When it gets f dark."
J "Fly you where?" 1. "To the
starport." % A chill ran down Balv's
back. How did Kelric always know | what he was thinking? "And if I refuse?"
'" 9. "You won't." t'l
"Why not?" '!jl "Because you want to
live." Balv had no answer for that. | Kelric
loosened the collar of his shirt. "Does this craft carry
oxygen?"
"Oxygen?" 3 'Air"
| Balv knew a weapon might be stored in the cabin
locker He
stood up. "I'll check in back." j
" Kelric raised his gun. "Sit down." | Balv sat.
| "No pilot stores emergency air out
of reach." Kelric's voice | rasped. The air. Now."
Balv heard the edge of desperation in his voice, recognized the danger in it.
"The panel is above your head."
Kelric ran his fingers along the hull until he found the catch. When he
clicked the panel open, a mask dropped out, hanging by a hose. He clamped it
over his face and drew n huge lungfuls of air.
When Kelric finally lowered the mask, his tension had visibly eased. He spoke
in a calmer voice. 'The air is so thin up here."
Thin?" Balv had never heard of thin or fat air. "The concentration of oxygen
is low for me." "Air is an element. Its composition can't vary." "It's a
mixture of elements, Balv. Oxygen and nitrogen, with traces of other gases."
The Last Hawk 87
Balv had no intention of arguing. "All right."
"I don't get it." Kelric's voice was growing hoarser. "Your science is only in
the rudimentary stages, yet you people can build machines as sophisticated as
these riders."
"You sound terrible. You need a doctor."
"What I need is the starport."
Balv had no response to that. So they sat silent, Kelric periodically
breathing from the mask.
After a while Balv said, "Can I ask you something?"
"What?"
"You are a soldier, yes?"
"That's right."
"Who do you fight?"
"Eubian Traders."
"Why?"
"We have something they want."
"Why not trade?" Balv wondered what ISC considered worth more than the lives
lost to keep it Wealth? Power? What pushed them, that they ruled so much and
still wanted more?
"You think it's greed?" Kelric said. "If the Traders had found Coba before we
did, your life would be a lot different now. I'll tell you what we have that
they want. People."
"People?"
"They sell them. You want to be a slave? I'd rather die."
That made Balv pause. It had never occurred to him that the Imperialate lived
with its own nightmares. He chose his words carefully. "During our Old Age,
the Estates were always at war. Managers made their captives into slaves.
Calani were bought and sold like prized goods." He grimaced. "I am glad I live
now and not then."
"I had the impression there wasn't much warfare here."
"Now, yes. But in the Old Age, Managers were warriors. They nearly fought one
another into extinction. Now we fight with Quis."
Unexpectedly, Kelric smiled. "Political hostilities submerged into a dice
game. That's quite an accomplishment." He glanced at Balv's wrist. "Is that
your kasi band?"
Bav looked down. He had pulled the gold out from under
88Catherine Asaro -
his cuff and was twisting it around his wrist. "Yes." He won-1 dered if he
would ever see his wife again. |
Kelric touched his own shirt where the outline of an arm-1 band showed under
the cloth. "Why are yours on your wrists? |
"It's not the same thing. The armbands mean you are a;
Calani." Balv stopped twisting his band. "Of course, nowadays some kasi refuse
to wear these."
Why?"
"In the Old Age a kasi was his wife's property. He wore. wrist guards with her
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