Homepage
Login
Profile
BookClubs
dmBox
Read Ebook: The Measurement of Intelligence An Explanation of and a Complete Guide for the Use of the Stanford Revision and Extension of the Binet-Simon Intelligence Scale by Terman Lewis M Lewis Madison Cubberley Ellwood Patterson Editor
Font size:
Background color:
Text color:
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page Prev Page
Ebook has 1771 lines and 127282 words, and 36 pages
The girl slid along the wall, keeping space between her and the creature.
Vydys' lips parted, peeled back over sharp white teeth. Her fingers wrapped tight around the throne-arm.
The roller swerved sharply. Gathering speed, it hurtled towards the girl.
She darted sideways.
The roller struck the wall with a meaty thud. Then, rotating so rapidly its pad-facets blurred, it raced along the pitside, close on its victim's heels.
The girl gave a small, shrill cry of panic, and fled across the center of the ring.
Again the roller spun; lanced after her.
The girl threw herself aside barely in time. The roller missed her by scant inches. Racing on, once more it struck the ring-wall, even harder than before ... caromed off like a huge ball bouncing ... hurtled back, straight at the girl.
She stumbled to the left, seeking desperately to dodge it.
The roller veered.
The girl screamed; twisted.
But not quite far enough, nor fast enough. One side of the speeding roller ticked her; knocked her backward. She sprawled in a heap on the ring's floor.
The crowd roared; strained forward.
Up on the dais, the Baemae youth surged to his feet--fists clenched, face working.
Vydys laughed aloud ... a throaty chortle, somehow hideous, more befitting fiend than woman. "Ah, Zenaor! Was that not well turned?" Her features shone with strange, evil radiance.
The chief of barons shrugged, face wooden.
Down in the ring, the roller came to rest. Panting, shaking, the Baemae girl scrambled to her feet.
Vydys' smooth brow furrowed. Slowly, the roller began to move again--in a spiral, this time, circling and converging on its fear-straught prey.
Sobbing, the girl tottered backward.
Swiftly, the roller changed course ... spun towards her.
The girl fled, running off wildly at right angles, not even pausing to look behind her.
Veering once more, the roller raced to intercept her. Too late, the girl threw a mad glance back over her shoulder.
The crowd shrieked its delight.
Only then a new voice slashed through the uproar: "No--! No!"
The roller thudded against the wall; lay still. Heads came round, searching for the shouter.
They found him on the dais, with Vydys and Zenaor. It was the Baemae youth, the downed girl's brother. "Curse you!" he shouted, face white with fury. "Curse you all, you vermin!"
He turned as he yelled; started towards Vydys.
She went rigid. Beside her, the Lord Zenaor brought up his hand in a quick, tight gesture.
Guards lunged forward, weapons drawn and ready.
The youth whipped a knife from beneath his livery. Slashing, he leaped back, eyes rolling wildly.
But there was no escape ... only the closing circle of hard-faced guards with their leveled fire-guns.
The youth's face set in a sort of feverish desperation. Whirling, he charged down from the dais, straight for the walled ring.
Curses rang from the barons, shrieks from their ladies. Bellowing, trampling, they threw themselves clear of the flashing blade.
The youth reached the ring-wall. For an instant he poised atop it, wavering. Then, tight-lipped, he leaped down into the pit itself and stumbled to the side of his fallen sister.
The crowd breathed again.
On the dais, Vydys tensed and gripped the throne-arms till her knuckles gleamed white as djevoda ivory. The scarlet lips quivered in a grimace of hate.
Below, the roller lurched into motion. A thousand crushing, crippling pounds of flesh and gristle, gaining momentum with every second, it spun across the ring.
The youth leaped to meet it. Savagely, he slashed at the thing's leathery outer hide.
But the pads turned away his blade. Ball-like, not even slowing, the sphere knocked him aside as, moments earlier, it had the girl.
Then, while he still fought for balance, it was past him, hurtling ever faster ... thundering towards the spot where his sister lay in a huddled heap upon the floor.
She tried to rise. Failed.
The rocketing roller cut short her scream.
Then the creature was bowling to a stop on the ring's far side. A hush fell over the great vaulted hall.
Stiffly, the rawboned Baemae youth dragged himself up from the place where he had fallen. Wordless, shambling, he crossed the pit to where the crumpled, broken thing that had been his sister lay; he knelt there beside her for a moment.
Then he arose again and stared up at the packed, engulfing mass of Kukzubas barons and their ladies ... looked on beyond and above them to the dais--to Vydys and to Zenaor.
The silence echoed.
Thick-voiced, he spoke, then: "You've killed her, curse you--you filth that call yourselves Kukzubas barons!"
"True, carrion." This from dark Vydys. "And now you die beside her!"
She concentrated. The roller turned, wending its blood-trailing way out from the wall once more.
But incredibly, the youth who wore Vydys' black-and-silver livery gave the gore-drenched thing no heed. Slowly at first, then faster and faster, his shoulders shook till he burst out in a wild gale of laughter.
"So I die!" It was the mirth of a madman. "Go on, you fools! Kill me! But I die holding a secret that spells your doom, also!"
Add to tbrJar First Page Next Page Prev Page