Fugitives of the Stars [The Two Thousand Centuries] Read online

  These were Federation ships. The power and authority of the Federation had come to Skereth in full force after the shattering revelation. And the people of Skereth had welcomed them, after learning of the things the Vellae had done, of the stealing of slaves and of the great brain inside the mountain that had been designed to give the Vellae weapons for war and conquest.

  "I wish,” said Fife to Horne and Yso where they stood on the edge of the Skambar spaceport, “that we did not leave so many dead behind. Lurgh..."

  Lurgh had died in the fighting in the tunnels. Other humanoids had perished in that battle, too many of them.

  But of the Vellae, only a handful had escaped. Most, of them, including Ardric's father, had stayed in the Administration Center in a frantic effort to save some part of the vast thing they had labored on for so long, and had been trapped in the spreading fires and falling rock that followed the explosion of overloaded generators.

  Horne said dryly, “I notice that you don't seem to include Ewan's death among your regrets."

  "He was a good man,” said Fife. “He fought with us well. It is not good that he died. But ... he was human."

  Horne nodded. “Yes. And the ones who are going to take you home again are human, too. Remember it."

  D'quar said in his slow, rumbling voice, “Horne is right. Not all humans are evil, Fife."

  His purple gargoyle face was solemn. Horne thought, he looks like something out of a fairy tale about ogres but damned if I haven't learned to like him.

  "True,” said Fife. “True. But whether they are good or evil I do not care. I only care that they leave me alone."

  "The Federation will see that they do,” Horne said. “And Fife, think about this in the long winter nights, if you have any on your world. In the Federation, human and non-human have managed to work together pretty well. The day may come when your world will want to join them."

  Fife's yellow eyes held a curious gleam as he answered. “Come and talk to me about it sometime, Horne. You and Yso. I may not listen, but I won't set the dogs on you, either."

  "That's a bargain,” Horne said.

  They went away toward the ships, with D'quar towering over Fife, and Horne looked after them and said, “They're not human but they're two damned good men."

  He and Yso were walking away when, out of the darkness, a tall grim man in the uniform of a captain came to them.

  "They told me you were here,” Wasek said. He jerked his head toward the looming row of hulls. “One of those ships is mine."

  Horne stood and looked at him and said nothing. The silence grew longer and finally Wasek said, “All right, all right, I'm sorry. But what the devil was I supposed to think?” He added, “Anyway, that punch you gave me ought to make up for it some. My jaw hurt for days."

  Horne said, “Good."

  Wasek muttered something. He said, “They tell me you're all cleared."

  "All but the papers,” Horne said. He had handed Ardric over to Federation authorities as soon as the first ship landed, and, in the meantime, the Morivenn faction on Skereth had been busy. Ardric was still stubbornly and vindictively refusing to admit anything, but the simple fact that he was still alive was in itself a pretty good confession. However, others of the anti-Fed party who had been rounded up by Morivenn's followers had been less iron-hard in their resolve. These included the two boys, Mica and Durin, who had confessed to their part in the plan to disable Vinson, and one of the men who had helped in the actual beating there in the Nightbirds’ quarter. “There won't,” said Horne, “be any trouble at all they tell me."

  "Well,” said Wasek, “that's fine. Be glad to have you serve with me again, Horne. Any time."

  He started to put his hand out and then hesitated, not knowing whether it would be taken, and stood there looking so uncomfortable that Horne held out his own hand.

  "I ought to slug you again, instead,” he said.

  "Hell of a way for a Pilot to talk to a Captain,” said Wasek, but there was no conviction in his voice.

  When he had gone, Yso looked at Horne. “How long before you go back to space?"

  "Not too long,” he said. “The Federation's investigation commission will soon have all my testimony, and the testimony of the anti-Feds who arranged to put Ardric in Vinson's place. My clearance should come through pretty quickly afterwards.” He looked at her and added, in quite a different tone, “But I'm coming back to Skereth, Yso."

  "If you didn't, I would come after you,” she said.

  He took her hand and they went on. Behind them, after a time, the rumbling roar of a great starship cleaving the atmosphere and setting the echoes flying as it took off, bound out for distant suns. Again and again the sound rocked across Skambar and the dark sea and in distant Rillah the ears of Skereth heard it and knew that the children of the Fringe were going home.

  THE END

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