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Updated: June 21, 2025
And if Weald thinks it finds proof that blueskins are in space again and caused the death of Wealdians, it won't be healthy! They're halfway set anyhow to drop fusion-bombs on Dara to wipe it out!" Maril said fiercely, "They might as well drop bombs. It'll be quicker than starvation, at least!" Calhoun looked at her, more exasperated than before. "It is a crop failure again?" he demanded.
He accepted eleven thousand pounds of gold, as the price of an endless or indefinite peace: some mutual exchanges were regulated; the Persian assumed the guard of the gates of Caucasus, and the demolition of Dara was suspended, on condition that it should never be made the residence of the general of the East.
He'd bossed them and taught them until they felt capable and glamorous and proud. Then he'd pinned their ears back. But if they returned to Dara with four enemy ships and unimaginable quantities of food with which to break the famine.... There was work to be done first, of course. Only one ship was so far warming up.
He set the wood afire by a blaster-bolt and then viciously sent other bolts all around the man it had sheltered when he fled from the flames. He could have killed him ten times over, but it was more desirable to open communication. So he missed intentionally. Maril had cried out that she came from Dara and had word for them, but they did not answer.
"When you left Dara," he said, "you were carried a long, long way, to some planet where they'd practically never heard of Dara, and where the name meant nothing. You could have settled there, or anywhere else and forgotten about Dara. But you didn't. Why not, since you're not a blueskin?" "But I am!" she said fiercely. "My parents, my brothers and sisters, and Korvan " Then she bit her lip.
It was entirely reasonable for some fanatic on Weald to consider that Calhoun must be killed lest he be of help to the blueskins Weald abhorred. In fact, it was quite possible that somebody had stowed away on the Med Ship to murder Calhoun, so that there would be no danger of any report favorable to Dara ever being presented anywhere.
Hundreds of thousands of tons of grain circled Weald in sealed-tight hulks, while the people of Dara starved and only dared try to steal it could be called stealing some of the innumerable wild cattle of Orede. The blueskins on Orede could not trust Calhoun, so they pretended not to hear or maybe they didn't hear. They'd been abandoned and betrayed by all of humanity beyond their world.
Dara might have gained time at least to build ships which could ram their enemies and destroy them that way. But Calhoun had made it impossible. If he told the truth and Weald already had a fleet of huge ships which only needed to be emptied of grain and filled with guns and men why Dara was doomed. But if he did not tell the truth it was equally doomed by his actions. So Calhoun would be killed.
In fact, in the Med ship hurtling through space, on the fourth day of his journey he thought of an improvement that could be made in the sum of all those happenings when they were put together. He landed on Dara. Maril came to the Med Ship. Murgatroyd greeted her with enthusiasm. "Something unusual has happened," said Maril, very much subdued.
It's getting some food for Dara. And driblets won't help. What's needed is in thousands of tons, or tens of thousands." Then he said; "Overdrive coming, Murgatroyd! Hold fast!" The universe vanished. The customary unpleasant sensations accompanied the change. Murgatroyd burped. A large part of the firmament was blotted out by the blindingly bright half-disk of Weald, as it shone in the sunshine.
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