No Foreign Sky by Rachel Neumeier

Author:Rachel Neumeier [Neumeier, Rachel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-05-14T16:00:00+00:00

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Gerstner started to lead the way forward, only to discover that Kaamharaa had a decided opinion about that, and his opinion was that centaurs went first. Gerstner found his objections comprehensively ignored. Obviously there was no possible way he could make Kaamharaa do any damn thing. Ludicrous even to try. So he gave in and followed the turun, who advanced along the wide corridor-like space with commendable caution. His golden eyes flared with reflected light whenever the swooping illuminated ribbons passed overhead, his ears twitched and swiveled. He put his huge feet down so delicately his blunt claws made almost no sound, though he was moving fast enough that Gerstner had to jog to keep up. Every step jolted his shoulder. He finally stuffed his left hand into his waistband to help stabilize his arm. It didn’t really help, but it made the problem a little easier to ignore.

The centaur strode along so smoothly it was easy to forget he’d been injured as well. His hind legs had to hurt where he’d broken his bonds; and a creature that size had to need plenty of food. Probably water, too. But he showed no sign of suffering. He seemed completely focused on the mission. Though it was iffy to describe a nebulous hope of getting the arrowpoint launched as a mission.

But Gerstner found himself reevaluating the turun. For some reason he’d been thinking of Kaamharaa as a peaceable sort, probably a herbivore. The alien’s kindness ... or maybe it was the alien’s sheer size ... had made Gerstner assume his people were peaceful herbivores.

Now he thought again. Kaamharaa’s tusks certainly looked like they were meant for business, when you came right down to it. Hadn’t he thought immediately of pig tusks when he’d seen the aliens? He dimly recalled once hearing someone from Haven comment that wild pigs could be nasty customers. Come to think of it, any Terran-native animal that managed to go wild on Haven had to be pretty tough.

Any way you sliced it, the way Kaamharaa was behaving, Gerstner had to think that this wasn’t his first sortie into enemy-held territory. That was reassuring in one way, though it raised definite questions about his kind when you thought of them as possible allies.

Where the interior of the saucer had been wide open, everything about this place was narrow. The damn lights were the same, coming and going in painfully bright streamers, too fast for Gerstner’s eyes to adjust properly. Kaamharaa didn’t seem to have nearly as much trouble with the lights. The turun might be inwardly cursing the illumination as fervently as Gerstner himself, but he moved with purpose. If he could actually handle this insane lighting system, that was another reason to be just as glad he was in front.

Gerstner knew exactly how big arrowpoints were: ninety-one point three one meters from nose to stern, twenty-eight point three one meters across at the widest point, seven point three one meters high. They were all exactly the same.

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