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There was vegetation there, stubby and stained dark blue by Trellwan's copper sulfide-based analogue of chlorophyll. A single, wide, rust-crusted pipe brought water down from the mountains to the north, irrigating the patchwork of blue vegetation alternating with low, dull silver agrodomes that stretched into the desert beyond the city. Humans could not eat the local vegetation, and so grew fields of imported grains and vegetables inside the temperature and light-controlled shelter of the agrodomes. Local crops adapted to Trellwan's cyclical climate provided the spices (safe if ingested in small quantities) and the shrub-grown mineral-dense hardwoods that were the staples of Trellwan's offplanet trade.
Grayson guided the skimmer across the fields, opening up the little craft's considerable full speed, angling toward the glacier nesting in its V-shaped notch in the mountains to the north. There were a few people about, mostly field workers urging scaly-humped la
There were switchback paths up the face of the mountains, but eventually he had to leave the skimmer among a jumble of boulders. From there, he plunged into a network of low-ceilinged caverns that would lead him into the mountain's heart, and then into the vault of the main Rift.
Grayson was aware first of the sound of the Rift, a dull thunder audible across ten kilometers even in the streets of Sarghad. In the caverns, the booming roar rang and pounded through rock cha
There was a ledge, the remnant of some age-old convulsion of the planet's crust, which ran along the riftwall halfway up between the translucent glow of the ice ceiling and the shadowed dimness of the spray-shrouded lake below. On that ledge, he was surrounded by the mountain's exultant roar and intense vibration. The air was cool, heavy with moisture and alive with the thrumming waves of sound from the cataracts of water. The central void of the Rift was filled with water fu
Grayson made his way along the ledge to the left. There, to the south, the Rift opened up to air and light, and the ice ceiling gave way to clear sky framed by the surrounding cliffs. Through the opening, he could see the helicopter pad on the roof of the Castle five kilometers out and down. Beyond and below that was the wheel-shaped sprawl of Sarghad. At his feet, the Rift wall dropped straight down 100 meters to the edge of the lake.
That lake was very deep and quite long. Several kilometers farther into the mountain, it fell by cascades and steaming waterfalls through the northern opening of the Rift, flowed by deep and winding cha
Surrounded by sound, Grayson sat down on a mist-slick boulder. From this vantage point, he could see people on the roof of the Castle, though it was impossible to tell what they were doing or to make out details. As the spaceport lay behind and below the Castle, not much of it was visible from here. Grayson did manage to distinguish part of the control tower, a ground station communication dish, and what might have been the blunt prow of the Invidious'DropShip. He wished he had his electronic binoculars so that he could spy on workers moving among the gantry scaffolding near the ship.
Grayson studied the Castle roof. There were several helicopters there, light scouting machines that he recognized from the Commandos' vehicle depot. As he watched, one of the machines lifted into the air and swung like a huge, gleaming insect toward the port. With their acquisition of the Castle and all the equipment the Lance had not had time to move or destroy, the pirates had made out quite well.
Grayson's thoughts slipped back to his need, his burning desire for revenge. Right now, it seemed like a hopeless quest. Scarcely tried in battle, unarmed, what chance did he have against a Marauder?For vengeance, he would need a heavy 'Mech at least, one that could stand up against that 75-ton machine. He'd also need a 'Mech Lance to go with it — or a small army trained and equipped to fight 'Mechs. After all, that Marauderwas not alone. There were other pirate 'Mechs on Trellwan, and how many hundreds of pirate troopers?
Grayson thought about this for a moment. The attack on the Castle had been so methodical, so carefully timed and pla
There'd been dozens of them, a company at least, and probably more. It seemed they'd been divided into numerous small units, each assigned a different target within the Castle. Grayson remembered the sight of them entering the Control Center, and knew with cold certainty that those were not native troops. They must have been brought in from elsewhere, probably on another freighter DropShip that had grounded at the port some hours before. That part of the operation had demanded careful preparation and precise timing to allow it to be carried out just as the Carlyle's Phoenix Hawkapproached the Individous'DropShip. The entire scheme suggested a major military operation — and an expensive one. Grayson was sure there was more to it than a mutiny against Oberon by a handful of his own pirate warlords.
Unbidden, the memory of his attacker's face returned to Grayson. That lean, dark face with the trim mustache and beard. The too-bright eyes, the eyes of a fanatic. Grayson believed he had seen that face before, but where?
An important part of any apprentice MechWarrior's training required him to become familiar with other MechWarriors. Not all of them, of course, but the important ones, the brilliant ones, the successful mercenaries and warleaders who had carved names for themselves across the battlefields of a thousand war-torn worlds. Was it in the computer files of known warriors he'd studied in Trellwan that Grayson had seem that dark face? Was it that of a MechWarrior? A ground forces officer? He covered his eyes with one hand. Think... think!