Shadow's Son by Shirley Meier, S.M. Stirling and Karen Wehrstein ...

Generated by ABC Amber LIT Converter, http://www.processtext.com/abclit.html
use in the City anyway. The road behind the in-line of the tunnel had been backed up for hours, and she
could see why now. The commander of the troops checking those going in was a black; black cloth, this
time, with only helmet and breastplate. He barely glanced at the papers, examining the people instead,
with a slow methodical care and the meanest pair of eyes she had seen since leaving Stonefort, across the
great ocean, more than a decade ago. They were as mean as her own mother's eyes.Mahid … one of
the Imperator's special clan of spies, secret police and dirty-tricks enforcers, trained since birth. This one
for clandestine operations, obviously.He uses his eyes for something more than separating his brows
from his nose .
"Kill him," he said in a flat uninflected voice, pointing to a plumpfessas sweating before the soldiers. "He
does not have the infirmities specified in his papers. Clerk, note the official who issued them; they
conspire to thwart the will of the Imperator." The soldiers graobed thefessas with swift obedience and
professional skill, forcing him to his knees despite his protesting screams and thrashings, taking off his
head with two strokes of a longsword.
The regular officer working under the Mahid's supervision took Shkai'ra's papers. She let her head loll
slightly to one side, and mumbled without words.Don't overact , she thought.
The Mahid looked at her for an uncomfortably long time. Fear ran gelid into her belly, worse than
anything on a battlefield. There she knew the risks and exactly what she was doing; too much depended
on this—her life, Lixand, Megan's happiness—and this wasnot her best skill.
He made a small gesture with his sword-hand.He's seen through my injury disguise, but the detached
dutymeans some Arkan spook thing. Zaik Victory-Begetter, Mother of Death, be with me now , she
prayed. Not that she was very pious concerning the gods of her homeland anymore, but shit, it couldn't
hurt. Her gloved hands she kept immobile, except for the slight tremors she'd seen in warriors with head
injuries.
The Mahid nodded almost imperceptibly, as if congratulating her on her tradecraft, and signaled her
through; the officer commanding the regulars handed her back her papers. Relief washed through her,
stronger than an orgasm. All through the long corridor in the rock, she was barely conscious of her
surroundings; alertness returned only when she came to the gate, slabs of cast steel from the forges of
Temono seven man-heights wide and three high, raised out of the roadway by massive cables. She felt a
slight prickle as she walked under them, one twenty meters back from the exit and one on the verge. The
space between was lined with arrowslits and the muzzles of flamethrowers.
XVIII
Excerpt from a report by Irefas Agent code-name Jesas, "On the Device of Gliding in Use by the
Sun-forsaken Enemy, submitted to General Farras Magofen":
"Unlike the machines of ancient times, or the living avian creatures on which it was perhaps patterned,
the contraption provides no propulsion of its own, and has no means of gaining height except by skillful
riding of upward-traveling winds. Getting one into the air is done by one of two methods: a) running or
leaping off a suitable hill or cliff; or b) the use of a giant strap made of elastic material (rubber), by which
the flyer is pulled back by some forty pullers and literally shot into the air, through the same principle as a
sling-stone, this would explain the enemy's massive purchases of silk — the only fabric light and strong