2566 A.D.!

A TALE OF ADVENTURE IN THE SECOND DARK AGE OF MAN

By Jerome B. Bigge

Chapter Thirty

      "We might be able to sneak on past Arsana at night," I sug- gested. The strait at this point was about a dozen miles across. "Especially if there is a bit of fog to help conceal us," I ad- ded. Sela nodding, her dark eyes meeting mine. Arsana had three heavy triremes in its harbor. Slow, heavy vessels. With any sort of a wind my ships would easily "show their heels" to such!

      "And Maris could easily `bottle us up inside'," Jers said, his wife's eyes glowing into mine as she sat there at his side. Bring up enough ships to deal with even forces like mine. Maris was a competent military commander. One could "rely" upon her.

      "Your original plan probably was best, Lorraine," Janice of the Huntress smiled. She had gotten to know me quite well now.

      "It is something that Maris won't be expecting us to do," Valerie of the Corsica said to me as she sat across the table.

      "I think we might be able to destroy Maris' triremes," Sela said. "A gallon jug of lamp oil, and an attack from the air with all three birds at the same time." Her two companions nodding.

      "I would assume that by now Maris has men with light ballis- tae and heavy crossbows just waiting for you three to come," Lara smiled. "That's what I'd do if I was in her place and I knew of the three of you." I suspected that the busty delight was right!

      "I'm sure that your Tarls can fly up higher than anyone can shoot, can't they?" Mark of the Squala ventured with a smile. I had no doubt that he was quite "stricken" with the Princess from what I had heard from others of the "relationship" between them!

      "Above a thousand feet we'd be safe, but hitting a ship from that distance might be difficult," Sela pointed out. I supposed that it might, considering that no one had ever used Tarls like that before. Given the birds' short range, we would have to al- most launch them in sight of Arsana, which also meant "trouble"!

      "Be better at night," I ventured. Sela shaking her head.

      "Tarls won't fly at night," the Princess then pointed out.

      "I think we'd better stick with our first plan," I smiled. I had no doubt that was I willing to risk the lives of Sela and her two bird girls that I could do a lot of "damage", but at the same time I could hardly justify "wasting" their lives for such! No doubt someone else like Princess Tara would have done so, but I am not the sort of a military commander who "throws away" the lives of those under her. It has never been my policy to do so! Especially in a "war" that I now considered a "mistake" to begin with, it being obvious to me at least that Maris wasn't really "asking" for that much, especially considering that the people who lived in the "disputed territories" now favored Maris anyway! *****************************************************************

      "There's an awful lot that needs to be `worked out'," Darla- nis said, considering what Sharon had suggested as she regarded the map of North America there before her. The teenage Princess smiled back, her eyes meeting those of the Empress of California.

      "Maris is pretty `reasonable' once you get to know her," the young Princess smiled. She had liked the young Queen a lot too! A whole lot more than that "creepy" husband of hers, who looked upon a woman like she was some sort of a sub-human form of life!

      "I suppose that Maris could help settle things with the Mon- tanas," Darlanis ventured, thinking. Perhaps there could be someday another "World Federation". Much depended upon the Priestesses of Lys and their willingness to allow Mankind to re- build again what once had been. Their hostility to such was something that Darlanis had often "wondered" about all her life.

      "And this time we won't repeat the `mistakes' Janet Rogers made," Sharon smiled, taking the Empress' hands in her own then. *****************************************************************

      "Don't `touch' me!" Maris snapped, Darl Jord's eyes burning into hers. The man disgusted her, especially the way that he leered at a woman. "Stripping" her with his eyes like he did! She was tired, and sleep was uppermost in her mind just then too!

      "You are still my wife," Darl now grumbled, standing there.

      "I don't want to make love to you!" Maris snapped back.

      "You're just a `cheap slut' with a crown," he snapped.

      "Damn it! Just Leave Me Alone!" the young Queen now begged.

      "My next Queen will `want' me," he growled, closing the door behind himself. A shudder going through the young blonde at the thought of what his words might "imply". Poison, a crossbowman, there were lots of ways of getting "rid" of an "unwanted" Queen!

      "He evil man, kill you if get chance to do so," the slave girl said, her dark eyes looking into Maris'. She was Nevada, a wench from the plains. Her english poor, her loyalty assured. Maris didn't like owning slaves, having been one herself, but as Queen of Dularn she had to do a number of things she didn't like!

      "A world full of enemies," Maris breathed, going to the win- dow that overlooked the harbor. "`Enemies' out `there', and now `enemies' here at `home'," she breathed softly to her slave girl.

      "Among my people if a man and woman can't live together they get the village council to make them `single' again," she spoke.

      "It's not that `easy'," Maris answered, aware of the laws. Getting a divorce wasn't the problem, but the "cost" was. She held her crown only as long as she remained married to Darl Jord! And if she continued to deny him her body long enough he would be able to divorce her even on those grounds, making it even worse!

      "You need to do much thinking," the slave girl spoke softly, touching her arm. The woman's dark eyes looking up into hers.

      "Inform the captain of my guards that I am leaving for Sana tonight, and ask her too to pick three women to escort me," Maris spoke, her eyes moist with tears. There would be orders for the first officer of the North Star. When the ship completed its re- fit he was to sail to Sana and pick her up there. She was of the Warrioresses. Death in battle was "better" than life with "HIM"!

      "Take me with you, mistress," the slave girl spoke softly.

      "You are much `safer' here than with me," Maris answered.

      "You are a `good mistress', not like others," she said.

      "Then La-ra, you shall come with me!" Maris laughed. ****************************************************************

      "An object falling from any height, ignoring the resistance of the air, falls at a velocity of sixteen feet per second adding sixteen feet per second velocity for every second it falls," I said to Sela and her two bird girls. "The flying speed of a Tarl in level flight is about fifty miles per hour. Thus to hit any object on the ground with anything dropped from a Tarl we need to merely calculate the time it will require to fall from a known alititude, allowing for the speed of the bird over the ground." The others there giving me the sort of a "look" that I recalled everyone gave me when we had discovered that computer last year. "In the first second the object falls sixteen feet, in the second second it will have fallen forty eight feet, in the third eighty feet, the fourth a hundred and twenty eight feet and so forth." Even my own mathematical abilities now requiring pencil and paper to figure out the time it would take for an object dropped from a Tarl flying at a thousand feet to strike the ground. "About sev- en seconds, according to my figures," I said, looking up. The look upon their faces making me smile a bit to myself. No doubt my already "awesome" reputation as a "thinker" had been added to!

      "And from a Tarl flying at fifty miles per hour at a height of a thousand feet you will have to `lead' your target by about five hundred feet," I smiled up at the lovely Princess of Talon.

      "That is why Tarls are not more `effective' than they are," one of the girls smiled. She was small, dark haired like most of the women of Talon are. "And why we always dive to `attack'."

      "Over two trireme lengths," Sela breathed softly, thinking.

      "Closer to three, my Princess," the other girl interjected. *****************************************************************

      Maris was tired, almost exhausted as she climbed up into the saddle of her unicorn, the armor of the three warrioresses with her gleaming there in the torch light. La-ra, her slave girl, a small figure huddled on a horse next to her. The Queen of Dularn throwing back her golden head, breathing deeply of the night air. The thought of long years ahead of being married to Darl Jord not something she enjoyed thinking about. Was being the Queen of Du- larn worth it? Once she had thought so, but no longer. Once the war with the Empire was "over" she would have no "excuse" as she had now for taking command of a ship, for being away from Arsana! "I was better `off' as a slave girl in Trelandar!" she muttered!! *****************************************************************

      I watched the sun rise there in the east over the wisps of fog that floated up from the waters, the ships close to shore, a careful watch having been kept during the night as we crept with- out lights towards Arsana. Sela and her two girls at my side. I wondered again if I had made the right decision. Destroying the three triremes would give me almost a free hand, as Dularn had nothing else available just then to oppose the forces I now had!

      "Be careful," I said to Sela, briefly taking the little Princess in my arms, crushing her to me despite the stares of the others there on deck. It was much like sending a daughter out to battle, knowing that there was always the chance she'd never re- turn! I would have liked to gone myself, leaving Sela behind, but the bird would have never flown with my weight, even if I did know how to fly one, which I did not. It taking months of train- ing to learn how to handle the great birds in flight. They are vicious unpredictable creatures, not to be "trusted", I knew.

      "I will, Lorraine," she said to me, stepping back. *****************************************************************

      "Good Morning, my Queen," the slave girl La-ra said to her golden haired mistress as Maris pushed back the blankets, she and her women having spent the night no more than ten miles from the capital city of Dularn. The misty strait there before them visi- ble through the trees, the sails of four ships gleaming with the ruddy light of the rising sun! Lorraine's deadly small squadron!

      "They are releasing those great birds!" one of the Queen's women spoke, viewing the ships through a small telescope as she stood there on the shore watching the ships half a mile off. The thought going through Maris' mind that despite what had happened to the Princess of Talon the day before Lorraine was still will- ing to use her new "air force"! Such told much of the woman, the golden haired Queen thought. Her "bulldog tenacity" well known!!

      "We must return to the city!" another of her warrioresses spoke, seeing the ships. Maris smiled, shook her head in the ne- gative. She doubted if it would do any good now. Lorraine was establishing her "command" of the seas surrounding Dularn. The awesome Warlady of the Empire proving to those of Dularn that as long as she was in "command" no Dularnian ship would be "safe"!!!

      "It is in the hands of Lys now," the Queen answered her.

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