Fire Time by Poul Anderson

Author:Poul Anderson [ANDERSON, POUL]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Science fiction
ISBN: 978-1-5040-2438-9
Publisher: Open Road Media Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Published: 2011-09-14T16:00:00+00:00

XI

As Larreka and his escort neared the headquarters of Yakulen Ranch, a storm drove ponderously out of the west. Wind sighed cold through the heat which had brooded earlier, like a sword through flesh, and sun-scorched lia rippled and rustled across yellow-brown kilometers of range. Far off, a herder and his wo were bringing in a flock of owas; they seemed lost in that hugeness. Single trees tossed, brawled, threw splashes of russet at flying murky clouds. Between land and low heaven swept a hundred fleetwings; their cries creaked faintly in the whine and boom around. Where lightspears, fire or brass color, struck, they changed the look of the world. Westward stood a purple-black cliff down which lightnings torrented. The noise of those streams rolled steadily louder.

The trooper from Foss Island said, ‘If I was home and saw that weather coming at me, I’d haul my boat as high ashore as she’d go and cable her fast.’ Larreka could barely hear him.

‘Well, it’s not a twister, but I’d sure appreciate a roof over me when it gets here,’ the commandant agreed. ‘On the double!’ He flogged his tired body into a smart trot.

The familiar buildings made a clustered darkness to north. He saw that the sails were off the windmill and the flag was descending a pole whose horned bronze finial swayed in arcs above the hall. Letters from her, to him and Meroa in Valennen, had told how nobody took a chance any longer on a gale not turning into a hurricane.

The first raindrops lashed nearly level when he entered the courtyard. Long, low, half-timbered, peak-roofed in tile, the lesser structures of the ranch walled in its paved rectangle – barns, stables, kennels, mews, storehouses, granaries, workshops, bakery, brewery, cookhouse, laundry, surgery, school, ateliers, observatory, library – not everything a civilized community needed, but ample when it could trade with other ranches and the towns, Yakulen’s publishing linked to Nelek’s ropewalk and Sorku’s iron smelter and thus outward over South Beronnen and the whole Gathering. Folk scurried about, battening down. Just before a hireling closed the door, Larreka glimpsed a small flyer parked in a shed. Ng-ng, we’ve got a human visitor, he thought. I wonder who.

Hail whitened the wind, danced across flagstones, rattled on walls, bit at skin. He shielded his eyes with an arm and slogged to the hall.

It rose enormous at the middle of the court, stone, brick, and phoenix, many-windowed, many-balconied, gargoyles time-worn but mosaics still bright after ten sixty-four-years. That was at the east end, the oldest. As the Yakulen family grew in wealth, numbers, retainers, and guests, they added new units, each enclosing its own patio. Changing styles (the latest incorporated heraklite and armor glass from Primavera) flowed together as do bluff, crag, and canyon.

Somebody must have been watching out of the warm window-glow, for Larreka and his males had scarcely loped onto the verandah when the Founders’ Door swung wide for them. Beyond its copper-sheathed massiveness waited an entryful of servants who took their baggage and toweled them dry.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.