: Alan Burt Akers
: Avenger of Antares Dray Prescot 10
: Mushroom eBooks
: 9781843194095
: 1
: CHF 3.90
:
: Science Fiction
: English
: 165
: DRM
: PC/MAC/eReader/Tablet
: ePUB

For a brief but wonderful moment it seemed as if Dray Prescot was on the road to victory, for he was aboard a Vallian ship bound for home with the secret of Vallia's enemies in his possession. But Dray, the Earthman sent to the planet Kregen of the double-star Antares in Scorpio, has not fulfilled the mission of the unseen Star Lords, and until he does there can be no escape from peril! And peril arrives in the form of hideous sea raiders, in the sharp edges of the dueling blades of a swordsman enemy, and in the horrid rites of the underground cult of the Silver Leem.
Avenger of Antares is the tenth book in the epic fifty-two book saga of Dray Prescot of Earth and of Kregen by Kenneth Bulmer, writing as Alan Burt Akers. It followsBladesman of Antares and the series continues inArmada of Antares.

Chapter two


How Wersting Rogahan split the chunkrah’s eye


The rush of bare feet upon the planking, the urgent shouts of the petty officers, the creak and rattle of blocks and the squeal as the braces hauled, the ponderous swinging of the yards and the firm heel of the vessel as she swung and then straightened up on her new course, all these old familiar sights and sounds and sensations brought a powerful pang of memory upon me. I, Dray Prescot, of Earth and of Kregen, had been for many years a salt-water sea officer, sailing down into the smoke and flame of battle. Then I had been a swifter captain upon the inner sea of Turismond, the Eye of the World. And then a render with Viridia up along the Hoboling Islands. Oh, yes, as the saying has it, the sea was in my blood. But the Star Lords, those mysterious beings who had summoned me here to this planet of Kregen in the constellation of the Scorpion four hundred light-years from the world of my birth, had given me orders, or so it seemed to me, that I must not set foot upon a vessel, must not sail the seas again.

Well, by Vox! Here I was upon a Vallian galleon and that through no design of my own, save at the end when I had smashed the confounded Hamalese skyship down and had to swim toOvvend Barynth.

Maybe the Star Lords had repented a little in their interdiction.

As we heeled to the breeze and, with our proud Vallian flags stiff and our canvas pouting, went hurtling down on the leem lover, I looked up at the sky and around in the empty air.

There was no sign of that gorgeous scarlet and golden hunting bird, messenger and spy for the Star Lords, planing in wide circles up there. Maybe I was more of a free agent now that I had begun to suspect.

“The shant sees us!” bellowed the first lieutenant. He had leaped into the shrouds and was halfway up the ratlines, pointing, his bronzed face rapturous with the impending battle. He was a waso-Hikdar and his name was Insur ti Fotor.[1] He struck me as a fine officer, one who ran his ship tautly and relieved his captain of mundane concerns, as any good first lieutenant should. One day, Opaz willing, he would command his own vessel. “She’s massing men for’ard!” shouted Insur ti Fotor. “The shant means to make a fight of it!”

“Then let their own pagan gods look out for them,” growled Captain Lars Ehren.

“May Opaz curdle their livers and their lights!” came a yell from the waist. I looked down over the quarterdeck rail. The men clustered in the protection of the palisades down there, barricades of scantlings and wicker-work. As they glared up I saw the gleam of teeth. These sailors of Vallia are a hardy, independent race of men. Habitually bare-chested, clad only in loose breeches cut to a generous size, and tight leather skullcaps, they carried boarding spears or thick cut-and-thrust blades. My heart warmed to them; they are capital men in a gale or an action. With men like these — and they were almost all apims — I felt my people of Va