Mistress of the Ages (In Her Name, Book 9) by Michael R. Hicks

Author:Michael R. Hicks [Hicks, Michael R.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Michael R. Hicks

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

“Oh,” Keel-Tath gasped as she and her boarding party passed back through the veil from not-space to reality, only to find themselves on the frozen peak of a windswept and snow-covered mountain that towered above lesser peaks that extended out to the horizon. Far below were the tops of white clouds that spanned the lower reaches like the surface of a great frozen ocean. She felt as if she was standing atop the entire world, and the sight, far more than the freezing cold, snatched her breath away.

They stood upon a huge platform as large around as the coliseum at the Desh-Ka temple. Perfectly round, the gleaming surface was flat and smooth as polished glass. A waist-high wall, equally smooth and flawless, ran all the way around the circumference. Unlike the rock of the mountains around them, not a single flake of snow lay upon the platform.

“Living metal,” the armorer cried in astonishment as she stared at the mirror-like surface. “I have never seen the like.”

“This arena was built at the height of the First Age,” the priest told them as he stared at the heavens. The sun was well past its zenith, and even though its light still commanded the sky, the stars were already emerging. Some of those stars moved slowly, and it was those which drew his attention. “It is one of the few constructs that remain untouched from those times. Nothing so large as this has been built of living metal since then.”

“Someday I should like to return here,” the armorer said.

“Preferably with a set of warm skins,” Ka’i-Lohr added with more than a hint of sarcasm. That earned him a nervous chuckle from the others. Everyone but the priest and Keel-Tath was shivering from the biting cold.

“I have found a ship,” the priest said a brief moment later, his eyes still on the heavens. “When you are ready, my mistress.”

“Let us not delay,” she told him. Her heart was pounding now, driven by a heady mix of fear and anticipation.

“Hold on to one another,” the priest warned.

Then they were there, aboard the ship. More precisely, they were in the bowels of the ship in a large space filled with massive machinery and flowing energy that the keepers of the Books of Time had told them was called the engineering space. This was the heart of the ship, from which flowed the power for its engines, weapons, life support, and other systems. The brain, which was called the bridge, was in another section and would have to be taken to gain full control of the vessel. But without control of the heart, the brain could do little.

Voices rose in alarm around them, and the priest vaporized a shrekka that had been flung by a nearby warrior shortly before he did the same to the warrior himself.

“On your way, my priest,” Keel-Tath ordered, “with my deepest thanks.”

“May thy Way be long and glorious, my mistress.” With a bow of his head and a quick salute, he disappeared just as pandemonium erupted.

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