Fury

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white builders, not fighters. Well, they needed builders to colonize
Venus.
At present, however, he was fighting the Keeps.
He began to worry, a little, over Hale. He wasn t sure about the Free
Companion. If it came to a final showdown, would Hale actually drop a
bomb on Delaware? Would he himself?
He mustn t let matters go quite that far.
* * *
By now Kedre must be on her way to the Harker stronghold. She
would have learned what had happened; the televisors all over the Keep
were carrying the news. She would be hurrying to Zachariah s side.
Zachariah, whom she had loved for hundreds of years, not with the
unflickering glow of a radium lamp, but as a planet inevitably swings
toward the sun at perihelion, swinging away toward other planets, but
returning whenever the orbit took her close. Yes, she would want to be
beside Zachariah in this crisis.
Another bomb, Sam said.
Again the telefocus shifted. Again a bomb dropped. This time it struck
rock. The explosion came in long, rolling thunders through the public
visors, and the crowds swayed with the tides and currents of vibration, as
seaweed moves in water.
Again the roar continued as underwater sound waves moved in the
track of televised sound waves.
And this time men were surer. Delaware Keep shivered slightly.
Silence dropped. The Ways hummed. The people of the Keep waited,
in greater throngs than had gathered in the Ways since man first reached
Venus, a herd that always, until now, had been guided by the Immortals
watching the duel between Zachariah Harker and the pirate.
Sam said, Suppose you surrender? The Families may lose a little, but
the common people won t. Are you afraid of letting the short-termers go
landside? Afraid you won t be able to rule them out there?
Any man who wishes to volunteer for your colony is free to do that,
Zachariah said. Just as every man in the Keeps is free. You re trying to
get slaves. Men won t go landside yet; it isn t time. It s too dangerous just
now. You can t get volunteers. You say you want korium. But I think that
will be only your first demand. Later you ll want colony conscription
peonage.
The time s past for abstruse arguments, Sam said, knowing his voice
was heard in every Keep on Venus. Listen! Pay us the korium we want or
we ll bomb Delaware Keep!
You won t bomb the Keep. Half a million people would die.
A cheap price for you to pay if you can stop the colony is that it?
Perhaps you re willing to die with Delaware, but what about the other
Delaware Immortals? There s a rumor all the Harkers but you have
already left the Keep and that you ve got a getaway ship waiting. Where
are you vising from?
Zachariah dared not let that challenge drop. Beside him, too, as Sam
knew, was a scanning screen that showed the throngs in the Keep. All the
Harker prestige the Immortal prestige depended on keeping the trust
of the commoners. And they would not follow rulers who were not
leaders.
Zachariah turned his head and spoke briefly. He said to Sam, and to
the Keeps, No Immortal has left Delaware. I m speaking from the
Harker Council Room. As you see.
The image on the screen changed; it showed the well-known Council
Room, empty except for Zachariah, who was seated at the head of a long
table before a broadcasting unit.
But now the door opened, and men and women began to come in.
Sam recognized Raoul. He was watching for another face he knew.
Was his timing correct?
The other Families Zachariah said. We ll scan them quickly.
Other Council Rooms showed on the screen the sanctums of the
great Families of Delaware Keep. They were all filling rapidly, the
Randolphs, the Wood clan, the Davidsons and Mawsons but the
Harkers were the real rulers of Delaware, as everyone knew. The focus
returned to Zachariah. It was the long view, showing Geoffrey and Raoul
and a few others seated at the table. Sam looked for Sari and saw her. He
wished he could get a closer view. Had she taken the hopped-up narco-
dust?
She sat motionless. But suddenly her hands moved together on the
table top and clenched violently, and Sam knew.
Your bluff won t work, Zachariah said. No Immortal has left the
Keep. [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]

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