Star Gate, page 19
He was borne along by the other from the top of the wall. They hit hard and rolled. Then he was punched into a ball half under the other's bulk as the ground under them rocked and broke. There was the clamor of mistreated metal, the rumble of a world coming to an end, and a flash so brilliant that it blinded him—to be followed by a clap of noise and a silence so complete that it was as if all sound had been reft away.
Broken lumps of stone rained noiselessly from the sky. There was no sound at all. Kincar struggled free^of a hold that was now only a limp weight. He sat up shakily, his head ringing, red and orange jags of light darting back and forth before his eyes when he tried to focus on his surroundings. His groping hands were on warm flesh, and then on stickiness that clung to his fingers. He rubbed impatiently at his eyes, trying to clear them. But, above all else, the dead silence was frightening.
He could see now, if only dimly. Red crawled sluggishly over a silver back beside his knee. Dazed, he rubbed his eyes again. A ringing began in his ears, worse when he moved, making it very hard to think-But he could move. Kincar bent over the quiet body beside him. There was a gash on the shoulder, a tear in both the silver clothing and the flesh beneath it. Already the bleeding was growing less. Cautiously he tried to move the other, exposing Lord Dillan's face slack and pale. The Star Lord was still breathing. Kincar steadied the heavy head on his arm and ripped open the sealing of the tunic. Under his fingers there was a steady heart beat, though it seemed too slow. The flier—if he could find the flier and the supplies on it—
Kincar settled Dillan's head back on the ground and stumbled to his feet. He had an odd sensation that if he moved too suddenly he might fly apart.
Before he could turn away, another silver figure hunched up from the ground. He could see Lord Jon's mouth open and shut in a grimed face, but he could not hear a word the other said. Then others ran toward them. Miraculously they had all survived the blast-off of the Gangee, though for long, anxious moments they were afraid that Bardon had been lost. He was discovered at last, stunned, but still alive, on the other side of a cracked and riven wall.
Kincar was deafened, unable to understand the others as they gathered at the flier. Dillan, revived, bandaged, and propped up against a heap of rubble, was giving orders. Both Jon and Bardon were unable to walk without support, and the rest were busy exploring the remaining ships and coming back to report to Dillan. Twice they brought boxes to be piled at the improvised camp site.
Lord Frans used the flier to ferry their spoil and the injured to a point well out in the waste, several miles from the ship-towers. Where the Gangee had formed the core of the queer structure, there was now a vast crater, avoided by the Star men, smoking in the morning air. And the walls that had tied it to its sister ships were riven, reduced to gravel-rubble in places. Studying the remains, Kincar marveled that any one of them had survived. He might have been even more deeply impressed by their good fortune had he possessed the information shared by the men around him.
"—took off to the mountains—"
He had been watching soundlessly moving hps so long, with a growing frustration, that at first he did not realize he had caught those words, faint as a whisper, through the din in his head. Lord Frans was making a report of some importance, judging by the demeanor of those about him.
Men scattered to the ships at a trot, and the flier returned. Lord Dillan and Kincar were motioned aboard her, to be transported to the mid-point camp. Then the others came in groups until they were all well away from the ship-towers. They must have triggered the other ships, all of them. Those slim silver towers would follow the Gangee out into space, untenanted and derelict.
Again his ears cleared, and he caught a sharp hail. A string of mounted men were riding out in the waste, the party from the hold. They rode at a full gallop, as men might go into battle, and Vulth spurred well ahead, a Vulth shouting news as he came. He threw himself from his mount and ran up, to skid to a stop before Lord Dillan, his aspect wild.
"That demon—the one with your form, Lord—he has turned the freed slaves against us!"
Kincar noted an empty saddle among the oncoming party.
Where was Jonathal? Two of the other men were wounded. "They will circle back to the hold—"
Lord Dillan cut through that crisply. "Aye, that is his wisest move. So we must get there speedily. Frans, you take the controls—Sim—"
"Not you, Dillan!" That was Lord Bardon's protest.
"Most certainly mel Who else can face him so successfully and reveal him to be what he is? And"—his eyes went to Kincar—"and you, Kincar. This may be the time, guardian, for you to use that powers"
Dillan's energy got them on the flier after a flood of orders had sent the mounted party around to come at the hold from the plains side with the remainder of the Star Lords in their company, leaving the wounded, Lord Bardon and Lord Jon to stay at the waste camp and check on the blast-off of the rest of the ships.
The flier lifted over the ridge, heading straight for the hold. Lord Frans pushed the limping motor to its utmost, and there was no talk among the men in her. A familiar peak cut the sky before them—they were almost to the valley.
"He'll use your face as his passport," Lord Sim commented.
"Asgar will know the truth."
Aye, the Lady Asgar would be able to tell true from false, but could she distinguish that in time? And how had the false Lord Dillan managed to get out of the Gangee before she blasted into space? Kincar speculated concerning that, but, having seen the preoccupation of his companions, thought it better not to ask for any explanations.
From the air the hold appeared to be as it always had been—until one marked a body lying before the door of the main hall in the courtyard. Save for that grim sight there was no other sign of life—or death.
Frans brought the flier down in the courtyard. Now the ringing in Kincar's ears could not blot out the clamor issuing from the hall. He was on his feet, his sword in hand, but he had not moved faster than Lord Dillan. And running side by Side they entered the core of the hold.
A handful of Gorthians, the women among them, were backed against the far wall—but they were aimed and waiting. Towering among them stood the Lady Asgar. And she faced a silver figure who was the duplicate of the man beside Kincar. Fan-wise behind the false lord was a rabble of ex-slaves. Kapal, writhing feebly as if he would still be on his feet to match blades, lay with the Lady Asgar's people. And beside her, half-crouched to spring at the false Dillan's throat, was Kathal s'Rud.
The hold people were at bay, held so by the weapon the false lord fingered—the blaster with which he had once threatened Kincar. One of the slaves in his tail caught sight of the new party. His mouth opened on a scream of undisguised terror, and he flung himself to the floor, beating his fists against the stone pavement and continuing the yammering screech, which-went on and on. His fellows cowered away, first from him, and then from their erstwhile leader as they saw the other Lord Dillan.
Even one with an iron will could not keep his attention from wandering at that interruption. The false lord glanced once to what lay behind him, giving those he held in check their chance. The Lady Asgar was at him in a fury, striving to wrest from him the blaster, while Kathal and Lord Jon's eldest son leaped to her support.
The rest of the party from the flier rushed in. Dillan, fresh stains of red seeping out on his bandaged shoulder, faced himself—but the likeness between them was no longer mirror-exact, for the Dillan of this Gorth snarled, his face awry in a grimace of rage. Asgar had torn the weapon from him. Now his bare hands reached for his rival's throat.
Kincar, as he had done to save Lord Bardon from the needle knife, clove through the distance between them, his left arm striking hard against the false lord's thighs, his sword tripping the other up. And they smashed down on the pavement as others of the half-blood piled upon them.
When the false lord was safely pinned by Kathal and two of the others, Kincar sat up.
"Who are you?"-' demanded the prisoner of his standing double.
"I am the man you would have been had history in Gorth taken another path—"
The false Lord Dillan lay rigid; his mouth worked as if it were a struggle for him to force out the words. "But who— where—?"
"We found a path between parallel worlds—" Dillan was alert to the Gorthians more than to his captive. Those of the ex-slaves who had followed the false lord were shrinking back. One or two whimpered. And the one who had howled and beat upon the floor was drooling as he stared vacantly at nothing. They were close to the breaking point.
It was the Lady Asgar who spoke to Kincar, drawing him to his feet with both hands and the urgency of her orders.
"This is a task for you, guardian. Give them something— a sign—they can fix upon. Or they may all lose their wits before our eyes!"
He tore open the sealing of his silver tunic and brought out the Tie. On his palm it emitted that soft glow of awakened power. And he began to chant, watching the glow brighten. Those of the half-blood took up his words. The sonorous sound filled the high vault of the hall. The stone warmed in his hold. He held it out to the Lady Asgar, and her larger hand cupped over it, sheltering the talisman with her alien flesh for a space as long as the chant of a line. There was no alteration in that glow, no harm to her.
Kincar turned to the Lord Dillan of the hold. In turn, that man's hand, broader, darker, arched without hesitation over the stone. Once more one of the Star blood passed that test.
Last of all the guardian stooped to the false lord. That Dillan, too, was not lacking in courage. His mouth set in a mirthless smile as the hand Kathal freed reached for the stone.
But in spite of his courage, his determination, he could not cup the Tie. It flared, pulsing not blue-green but a malignant yellow, as if some strange fire sent a tongue out of it at the encroaching hand.
"Demon 1"
A bow cord sang, and a feathered shaft stood from a broad chest. The man on the floor arched his back and coughed, tried to fling some last word at his double. It was Kapal, clasping his bow to him, who laughed.
"One demon the less," he spat. "I care not if all his fellows be on the trail behind him. There is one demon the less!"
"There will be none to follow him." The live Dillan spoke above the dead. "They have returned to the stars from which they came. Only this one broke from the ship just before it blasted—taking a flier. Gorth is now free of his breed."
From somewhere words flooded into Kincar's mind, began to pour from his tongue in a wild rhythm. He knew he had never learned them by rote, and together they formed a fearsome thing, a curse laid upon men in this .world and the Forest beyond, upon their coming and going, their living and dying. The very beat of those words upon the air invoked strange shadows, and as he uttered them the ex-slaves crept about his feet, drinking them in.
Then from curse the words turned to promise, a promise such as the Three- sometimes set in the mouths of those inspired by their wisdom.
"Lord—" It was Kapal who broke the silence that fell when he ended. "What is your will for us?"
"Not my will." Kincar shook his head. "Do you live like free men in an open land—" But that fey streak still possessed him. He had one more thing that he must do. The Tie was dead now, a lifeless stone. For him it would never again grow warm or live. His guardianship was at an end. It must pass to another, perhaps one better fitted to use it as it should be used. He was but a messenger, not a true wielder of the Threefold Power.
"I show you a man of your own to lead you—" He turned slowly to face that other who was also s'Rud.
Kathal's hands came up slowly, as if they moved by some will outside his own. Kincar tossed the talisman into the air. It flashed straight across the space between them into those waiting hands. And as the stone touched flesh once more, it glowedl He had been right—the Tie had chosen to go from him. He could not, if he wished, take it again.
A faint promise of the coming warm season mellowed the stone at his back. Kincar breathed the fresh air from the courtyard. Vorken squatted on his shoulder, chirruping now and again.
"Stay with us, Lords—we need you—"
They had heard that plea repeated so many times during the past months. And, as ever, the same patient answer came.
"Not so. Us you need least of all. This is your world, Kathal, Kapal; shape your own roads through it. We did not sweep away one set of alien rulers to plant another. Take your fortune in your two hands and be glad it is truly yours!"
"But—where do you go, Lords? To a better world?"
Out in the valley was the shimmer of the now complete gate, erected from materials looted from the vanished ships. Did they seek a better world through that portal when on the morrow they went into a second self-imposed exile? Kincar reached for his bow. Would they ever find a Gorth to fit their dreams? Or did that greatly matter? Sometimes he thought that an endless quest had been set them for some purpose, and that the seeking, not the finding, was their full reward. And it was good.
Here's a quick checklist of recent releases of ACE SCIENCE-FICTION BOOKS
400
F-174 FIRST THROUGH TIME by Rex Gordon F-178 MORE ADVENTURES ON OTHER PLANETS
Edited by Donald A. Wollheim F-183 THE DEFIANT AGENTS by Andre Norton F-185 THE FIVE GOLD BANDS by Jack Vance
and THE DRAGON MASTERS by Jack Vance F-187 ALPHA CENTAURI—OR DIE! by Leigh Bracken
and LEGEND OF LOST EARTH
by G. McDonald Wallis F-188 ARMAGEDDON, 2419 A.D. by Philip F. Nowlan F-195 BATTLE ON VENUS by William F. Temple
and THE SILENT INVADERS by Robert Silverberg F-197 WITCH WORLD by Andre Norton F-199 CAPTIVES OF THE FLAME by Samuel Delany
and THE PSIONIC MENACE by Keith Woodcott F-201 DOOMSDAY, 1999 by Paul MacTyre F-209 LET THE SPACEMEN BEWARE by Poul Anderson
and THE WIZARD OF STARSHIP POSEIDON
by Ken Bulmer
F-211 PLANET OF PERIL by Otis Adelbert Kline F-215 LISTEN! THE STARS! by John Brunner
and THE RESELLERS by Jane Roberts F-216 THE MAN WHO UPSET THE UNIVERSE
by Isaac Asimov F-217 BEST FROM FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION:
8th Series
F-222 FIRST ON THE MOON by Jeff Sutton F-225 SPACE VIKING by H. Beam Piper
If you are missing any of these, they can be obtained directly from the publisher by sending the indicated sum, plus 5# handling fee, to Ace Books, Inc. (Dept. M M), 1120 Avenue of the Americas, New York 36, N.Y.
Now . . . available for the first time in newsstand editions at newsstand prices:
EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS in ACE BOOKS
F-156 AT THE EARTH'S CORE
F-157 THE MOON MAID
F-158 PELLUCIDAR
F-159 THE MOON MEN
F-168 THUVIA, MAID OF MARS
F-169 TARZAN AND THE LOST EMPIRE
F-170 THE CHESSMEN OF MARS
F-171 TANAR OF PELLUCIDAR
F-179 PIRATES OF VENUS
F-180 TARZAN AT THE EARTH'S CORE
F-181 THE MASTERMIND OF MARS
F-182 THE MONSTER MEN
F-189 TARZAN THE INVINCIBLE
F-190 A FIGHTING MAN OF MARS
F-193 THE SON OF TARZAN
F-194 TARZAN TRIUMPHANT
F-203 THE BEASTS OF TARZAN
F-204 TARZAN AND THE JEWELS OF OPAR
F-205 TARZAN AND THE CITY OF GOLD
F-206 JUNGLE TALES OF TARZAN
F-212 TARZAN AND THE LION MAN
F-213 THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT
F-220 THE PEOPLE THAT TIME FORGOT
F-221 LOST ON VENUS
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best book yet. It's a complex tale of adventures on a remote planet in several alternate universes, so that the protagonists find themselves at times battling with their own evil selves-as-they-might-have-been - a concept that sounds confusing, but is crystal clear as Andre Norton sets it forth. Her inimitably vigorous storytelling and sense of high emprise are heightened here by a delicate touch of mysticism — and by the creation in the hero's pet mord, of the most fascinating alien animal since Heinlein's Star Lummox."
-NEW YORK HERALD-TRIBUNE
Andre Norton, Star Gate
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Broken lumps of stone rained noiselessly from the sky. There was no sound at all. Kincar struggled free^of a hold that was now only a limp weight. He sat up shakily, his head ringing, red and orange jags of light darting back and forth before his eyes when he tried to focus on his surroundings. His groping hands were on warm flesh, and then on stickiness that clung to his fingers. He rubbed impatiently at his eyes, trying to clear them. But, above all else, the dead silence was frightening.
He could see now, if only dimly. Red crawled sluggishly over a silver back beside his knee. Dazed, he rubbed his eyes again. A ringing began in his ears, worse when he moved, making it very hard to think-But he could move. Kincar bent over the quiet body beside him. There was a gash on the shoulder, a tear in both the silver clothing and the flesh beneath it. Already the bleeding was growing less. Cautiously he tried to move the other, exposing Lord Dillan's face slack and pale. The Star Lord was still breathing. Kincar steadied the heavy head on his arm and ripped open the sealing of the tunic. Under his fingers there was a steady heart beat, though it seemed too slow. The flier—if he could find the flier and the supplies on it—
Kincar settled Dillan's head back on the ground and stumbled to his feet. He had an odd sensation that if he moved too suddenly he might fly apart.
Before he could turn away, another silver figure hunched up from the ground. He could see Lord Jon's mouth open and shut in a grimed face, but he could not hear a word the other said. Then others ran toward them. Miraculously they had all survived the blast-off of the Gangee, though for long, anxious moments they were afraid that Bardon had been lost. He was discovered at last, stunned, but still alive, on the other side of a cracked and riven wall.
Kincar was deafened, unable to understand the others as they gathered at the flier. Dillan, revived, bandaged, and propped up against a heap of rubble, was giving orders. Both Jon and Bardon were unable to walk without support, and the rest were busy exploring the remaining ships and coming back to report to Dillan. Twice they brought boxes to be piled at the improvised camp site.
Lord Frans used the flier to ferry their spoil and the injured to a point well out in the waste, several miles from the ship-towers. Where the Gangee had formed the core of the queer structure, there was now a vast crater, avoided by the Star men, smoking in the morning air. And the walls that had tied it to its sister ships were riven, reduced to gravel-rubble in places. Studying the remains, Kincar marveled that any one of them had survived. He might have been even more deeply impressed by their good fortune had he possessed the information shared by the men around him.
"—took off to the mountains—"
He had been watching soundlessly moving hps so long, with a growing frustration, that at first he did not realize he had caught those words, faint as a whisper, through the din in his head. Lord Frans was making a report of some importance, judging by the demeanor of those about him.
Men scattered to the ships at a trot, and the flier returned. Lord Dillan and Kincar were motioned aboard her, to be transported to the mid-point camp. Then the others came in groups until they were all well away from the ship-towers. They must have triggered the other ships, all of them. Those slim silver towers would follow the Gangee out into space, untenanted and derelict.
Again his ears cleared, and he caught a sharp hail. A string of mounted men were riding out in the waste, the party from the hold. They rode at a full gallop, as men might go into battle, and Vulth spurred well ahead, a Vulth shouting news as he came. He threw himself from his mount and ran up, to skid to a stop before Lord Dillan, his aspect wild.
"That demon—the one with your form, Lord—he has turned the freed slaves against us!"
Kincar noted an empty saddle among the oncoming party.
Where was Jonathal? Two of the other men were wounded. "They will circle back to the hold—"
Lord Dillan cut through that crisply. "Aye, that is his wisest move. So we must get there speedily. Frans, you take the controls—Sim—"
"Not you, Dillan!" That was Lord Bardon's protest.
"Most certainly mel Who else can face him so successfully and reveal him to be what he is? And"—his eyes went to Kincar—"and you, Kincar. This may be the time, guardian, for you to use that powers"
Dillan's energy got them on the flier after a flood of orders had sent the mounted party around to come at the hold from the plains side with the remainder of the Star Lords in their company, leaving the wounded, Lord Bardon and Lord Jon to stay at the waste camp and check on the blast-off of the rest of the ships.
The flier lifted over the ridge, heading straight for the hold. Lord Frans pushed the limping motor to its utmost, and there was no talk among the men in her. A familiar peak cut the sky before them—they were almost to the valley.
"He'll use your face as his passport," Lord Sim commented.
"Asgar will know the truth."
Aye, the Lady Asgar would be able to tell true from false, but could she distinguish that in time? And how had the false Lord Dillan managed to get out of the Gangee before she blasted into space? Kincar speculated concerning that, but, having seen the preoccupation of his companions, thought it better not to ask for any explanations.
From the air the hold appeared to be as it always had been—until one marked a body lying before the door of the main hall in the courtyard. Save for that grim sight there was no other sign of life—or death.
Frans brought the flier down in the courtyard. Now the ringing in Kincar's ears could not blot out the clamor issuing from the hall. He was on his feet, his sword in hand, but he had not moved faster than Lord Dillan. And running side by Side they entered the core of the hold.
A handful of Gorthians, the women among them, were backed against the far wall—but they were aimed and waiting. Towering among them stood the Lady Asgar. And she faced a silver figure who was the duplicate of the man beside Kincar. Fan-wise behind the false lord was a rabble of ex-slaves. Kapal, writhing feebly as if he would still be on his feet to match blades, lay with the Lady Asgar's people. And beside her, half-crouched to spring at the false Dillan's throat, was Kathal s'Rud.
The hold people were at bay, held so by the weapon the false lord fingered—the blaster with which he had once threatened Kincar. One of the slaves in his tail caught sight of the new party. His mouth opened on a scream of undisguised terror, and he flung himself to the floor, beating his fists against the stone pavement and continuing the yammering screech, which-went on and on. His fellows cowered away, first from him, and then from their erstwhile leader as they saw the other Lord Dillan.
Even one with an iron will could not keep his attention from wandering at that interruption. The false lord glanced once to what lay behind him, giving those he held in check their chance. The Lady Asgar was at him in a fury, striving to wrest from him the blaster, while Kathal and Lord Jon's eldest son leaped to her support.
The rest of the party from the flier rushed in. Dillan, fresh stains of red seeping out on his bandaged shoulder, faced himself—but the likeness between them was no longer mirror-exact, for the Dillan of this Gorth snarled, his face awry in a grimace of rage. Asgar had torn the weapon from him. Now his bare hands reached for his rival's throat.
Kincar, as he had done to save Lord Bardon from the needle knife, clove through the distance between them, his left arm striking hard against the false lord's thighs, his sword tripping the other up. And they smashed down on the pavement as others of the half-blood piled upon them.
When the false lord was safely pinned by Kathal and two of the others, Kincar sat up.
"Who are you?"-' demanded the prisoner of his standing double.
"I am the man you would have been had history in Gorth taken another path—"
The false Lord Dillan lay rigid; his mouth worked as if it were a struggle for him to force out the words. "But who— where—?"
"We found a path between parallel worlds—" Dillan was alert to the Gorthians more than to his captive. Those of the ex-slaves who had followed the false lord were shrinking back. One or two whimpered. And the one who had howled and beat upon the floor was drooling as he stared vacantly at nothing. They were close to the breaking point.
It was the Lady Asgar who spoke to Kincar, drawing him to his feet with both hands and the urgency of her orders.
"This is a task for you, guardian. Give them something— a sign—they can fix upon. Or they may all lose their wits before our eyes!"
He tore open the sealing of his silver tunic and brought out the Tie. On his palm it emitted that soft glow of awakened power. And he began to chant, watching the glow brighten. Those of the half-blood took up his words. The sonorous sound filled the high vault of the hall. The stone warmed in his hold. He held it out to the Lady Asgar, and her larger hand cupped over it, sheltering the talisman with her alien flesh for a space as long as the chant of a line. There was no alteration in that glow, no harm to her.
Kincar turned to the Lord Dillan of the hold. In turn, that man's hand, broader, darker, arched without hesitation over the stone. Once more one of the Star blood passed that test.
Last of all the guardian stooped to the false lord. That Dillan, too, was not lacking in courage. His mouth set in a mirthless smile as the hand Kathal freed reached for the stone.
But in spite of his courage, his determination, he could not cup the Tie. It flared, pulsing not blue-green but a malignant yellow, as if some strange fire sent a tongue out of it at the encroaching hand.
"Demon 1"
A bow cord sang, and a feathered shaft stood from a broad chest. The man on the floor arched his back and coughed, tried to fling some last word at his double. It was Kapal, clasping his bow to him, who laughed.
"One demon the less," he spat. "I care not if all his fellows be on the trail behind him. There is one demon the less!"
"There will be none to follow him." The live Dillan spoke above the dead. "They have returned to the stars from which they came. Only this one broke from the ship just before it blasted—taking a flier. Gorth is now free of his breed."
From somewhere words flooded into Kincar's mind, began to pour from his tongue in a wild rhythm. He knew he had never learned them by rote, and together they formed a fearsome thing, a curse laid upon men in this .world and the Forest beyond, upon their coming and going, their living and dying. The very beat of those words upon the air invoked strange shadows, and as he uttered them the ex-slaves crept about his feet, drinking them in.
Then from curse the words turned to promise, a promise such as the Three- sometimes set in the mouths of those inspired by their wisdom.
"Lord—" It was Kapal who broke the silence that fell when he ended. "What is your will for us?"
"Not my will." Kincar shook his head. "Do you live like free men in an open land—" But that fey streak still possessed him. He had one more thing that he must do. The Tie was dead now, a lifeless stone. For him it would never again grow warm or live. His guardianship was at an end. It must pass to another, perhaps one better fitted to use it as it should be used. He was but a messenger, not a true wielder of the Threefold Power.
"I show you a man of your own to lead you—" He turned slowly to face that other who was also s'Rud.
Kathal's hands came up slowly, as if they moved by some will outside his own. Kincar tossed the talisman into the air. It flashed straight across the space between them into those waiting hands. And as the stone touched flesh once more, it glowedl He had been right—the Tie had chosen to go from him. He could not, if he wished, take it again.
A faint promise of the coming warm season mellowed the stone at his back. Kincar breathed the fresh air from the courtyard. Vorken squatted on his shoulder, chirruping now and again.
"Stay with us, Lords—we need you—"
They had heard that plea repeated so many times during the past months. And, as ever, the same patient answer came.
"Not so. Us you need least of all. This is your world, Kathal, Kapal; shape your own roads through it. We did not sweep away one set of alien rulers to plant another. Take your fortune in your two hands and be glad it is truly yours!"
"But—where do you go, Lords? To a better world?"
Out in the valley was the shimmer of the now complete gate, erected from materials looted from the vanished ships. Did they seek a better world through that portal when on the morrow they went into a second self-imposed exile? Kincar reached for his bow. Would they ever find a Gorth to fit their dreams? Or did that greatly matter? Sometimes he thought that an endless quest had been set them for some purpose, and that the seeking, not the finding, was their full reward. And it was good.
Here's a quick checklist of recent releases of ACE SCIENCE-FICTION BOOKS
400
F-174 FIRST THROUGH TIME by Rex Gordon F-178 MORE ADVENTURES ON OTHER PLANETS
Edited by Donald A. Wollheim F-183 THE DEFIANT AGENTS by Andre Norton F-185 THE FIVE GOLD BANDS by Jack Vance
and THE DRAGON MASTERS by Jack Vance F-187 ALPHA CENTAURI—OR DIE! by Leigh Bracken
and LEGEND OF LOST EARTH
by G. McDonald Wallis F-188 ARMAGEDDON, 2419 A.D. by Philip F. Nowlan F-195 BATTLE ON VENUS by William F. Temple
and THE SILENT INVADERS by Robert Silverberg F-197 WITCH WORLD by Andre Norton F-199 CAPTIVES OF THE FLAME by Samuel Delany
and THE PSIONIC MENACE by Keith Woodcott F-201 DOOMSDAY, 1999 by Paul MacTyre F-209 LET THE SPACEMEN BEWARE by Poul Anderson
and THE WIZARD OF STARSHIP POSEIDON
by Ken Bulmer
F-211 PLANET OF PERIL by Otis Adelbert Kline F-215 LISTEN! THE STARS! by John Brunner
and THE RESELLERS by Jane Roberts F-216 THE MAN WHO UPSET THE UNIVERSE
by Isaac Asimov F-217 BEST FROM FANTASY & SCIENCE FICTION:
8th Series
F-222 FIRST ON THE MOON by Jeff Sutton F-225 SPACE VIKING by H. Beam Piper
If you are missing any of these, they can be obtained directly from the publisher by sending the indicated sum, plus 5# handling fee, to Ace Books, Inc. (Dept. M M), 1120 Avenue of the Americas, New York 36, N.Y.
Now . . . available for the first time in newsstand editions at newsstand prices:
EDGAR RICE BURROUGHS in ACE BOOKS
F-156 AT THE EARTH'S CORE
F-157 THE MOON MAID
F-158 PELLUCIDAR
F-159 THE MOON MEN
F-168 THUVIA, MAID OF MARS
F-169 TARZAN AND THE LOST EMPIRE
F-170 THE CHESSMEN OF MARS
F-171 TANAR OF PELLUCIDAR
F-179 PIRATES OF VENUS
F-180 TARZAN AT THE EARTH'S CORE
F-181 THE MASTERMIND OF MARS
F-182 THE MONSTER MEN
F-189 TARZAN THE INVINCIBLE
F-190 A FIGHTING MAN OF MARS
F-193 THE SON OF TARZAN
F-194 TARZAN TRIUMPHANT
F-203 THE BEASTS OF TARZAN
F-204 TARZAN AND THE JEWELS OF OPAR
F-205 TARZAN AND THE CITY OF GOLD
F-206 JUNGLE TALES OF TARZAN
F-212 TARZAN AND THE LION MAN
F-213 THE LAND THAT TIME FORGOT
F-220 THE PEOPLE THAT TIME FORGOT
F-221 LOST ON VENUS
ONLY 40* EACH - PAY NO MORE
Ask your newsdealer for them. If he is sold out, any of the above books can be bought by sending 40#, plus 5
best book yet. It's a complex tale of adventures on a remote planet in several alternate universes, so that the protagonists find themselves at times battling with their own evil selves-as-they-might-have-been - a concept that sounds confusing, but is crystal clear as Andre Norton sets it forth. Her inimitably vigorous storytelling and sense of high emprise are heightened here by a delicate touch of mysticism — and by the creation in the hero's pet mord, of the most fascinating alien animal since Heinlein's Star Lummox."
-NEW YORK HERALD-TRIBUNE
Andre Norton, Star Gate
