Chapter one

Handling a Valkan kite in any sort of breeze demands skill, nerve and strength. Young Inky had the first two in abundance; but the third... Well, now, young Inky was only a little lad, full of fire and spirit and years away from growing into his full strength. Every now and then I swear his feet left the ground.

He was laughing. The wind snatched his curls and tumbled them about his flushed cheeks. The breeze freshened and the kite swayed and rose and Inky really did go up.

That, I decided, was enough. I turned my back on the panorama spread out far below the clifftop. Valkanium’s new buildings gleamed in the light of the suns and the waters of the Bay spread in glittering magnificence. Up here the air held the combined perfumes of sea and land, the fresh salty tang mingling with the aromas of shrubs and flowers as the ruby and emerald lights of the twin suns mingled in streaming radiance upon the world of Kregen. Looking at Inky, I turned away, too, from the clifftop fortress and palace of Esser Rarioch, my home.

Inky stared up, fascinated. His bare feet trailed across the turf as the kite pulled. I hastened my stride. If he went over the cliff...!

“Look!” he called, hanging onto the line, staring up. “Look!” His feet touched the turf and his bare toes curled and dug in. The line slackened. I looked up.

With sharp talons hooked over the top bar of the kite, a superb bird, all gold and scarlet, turned his fierce head sideways to glare down upon me. I knew him. Oh, yes, I knew this splendid bird. Inky could see him too and this did not surprise me. The Gdoinye, the messenger and spy of the Star Lords, may sometimes be seen by the innocent at heart as well as crusty reprobates like me. When he spoke, cawing down his truculent message, I do not believe Inky heard anything other than the cry of a bird.

“Dray Prescot! You are requiredat once! The Star Lords in their wisdom afford you this, for their demands are not to be questioned, yet—”

I felt the breath rush from my lungs. A mist fell over my eyes.

“No!” I started to shout, hearing nothing, seeing nothing save an all-encompassing blueness. Above me, gigantic, reared the phantom Scorpion, enormous through the swathing mists, his blueness enveloping me in coldness, darkness and a fate I could not avoid.

Head over heels, spinning, the Star Lords hurled me from the high clifftop by Esser Rarioch in Valka, hurled me — where?

The Star Lords were in a hurry. As I felt the coldness bite into my bones I knew what that haste meant. Someone had fouled up. A Kregoinye, sent to do the bidding of the Everoinye, had failed. So the Everoinye hoicked out their expendable, their trouble-shooter, the fellow they’d used many times to patch over a hole in their careful plans. I felt heat.

Flames roared and coiled all about me and smoke stung my eyes and choked in my nostrils. The transition had been quick, deuced quick, by Vox! I stood in a burning building. Tha