David Weber by The Excalibur Alternative

Author:The Excalibur Alternative
Language: eng
Format: epub

-VII-

The starship's lander was less than a tenth the size of its mothership, little more than eight hundred feet in length, and made out of the same bronze-tinted alloy. Despite its smaller size, its main cargo hold was a vast and empty cavern, for it was configured to lift heavy loads of cargo out to the starship . . . and to deliver loads of English soldiers to the surface of the worlds they were sent to conquer. Those same soldiers had seen far too much of the hold's interior over the years, but at least this deck didn't pitch and dance like the decks of those never to be sufficiently damned cogs.

The thought wended through a well-worn groove in Sir George's mind as he leaned forward to pat Satan's shoulder. The destrier shook his head, rattling the mail crinnet protecting his arched neck, then stamped his rear off hoof. The shoe rang like thunder on the deck's alloy, and Sir George smiled thinly.

He and the stallion had been through this all too many times. By now both of them should be accustomed to it, and he supposed they were. But neither of them was resigned to it.

The warning gong sounded, and Sir George rose in the stirrups and turned to regard the men behind him.

A score of orange-skinned, wart-faced Hathori stood beyond them, clad once again in their heavy plate armor and armed with their massive axes, lining the holder's inner bulkhead, but their function wasn't to support the Englishmen. As always, it was to drive them forward if they hesitated, and to strike down any who attempted to flee.

Not that any of Sir George's men were likely to flee . . . or to require driving.

The baron and his company were completely adrift in time. Father Timothy had been forced to concede that it was impossible for him to truly know what the day or date was back on long-banished Earth, despite how long and hard he had attempted to maintain some sort of accurate reckoning. Sir George had attempted to ask Computer to keep track of that for them when the priest had finally been driven to admit defeat. Surely such a task would not have been impossible for the mysterious, all-knowing creature invisible at the other end of the voice that whispered in his ear. Not compared to all of the other impossible things Sir George had seen Computer do, at any rate.

But Computer had refused. More than refused, for Computer had informed the baron that he was expressly forbidden to tell the humans how long they had been unwillingly in the service of the demon-jester's guild.

That in itself told Sir George a great deal. The demon-jester had been almost careless in regard to many of the things Computer was allowed to share—or, at least, not specifically prohibited from sharing—with the English. Much of the information which Computer had let slip had been useful to Sir George in the subtle bargaining he'd done with the demon-jester on planet after planet.

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