Lankar of Callisto

Glypto popped up behind me and steered me to a secluded alcove with a window seat. Under one scrawny arm he clutched a cobwebbed bottle of vintage quarra. This he opened with a practised twist of the wrist and sloshed two portions into goblets of cut crystal, winking and beaming, his clever black eye sparkling with excitement and mischief, his long nose fairly quivering with glee.

Just then little Taran came squirming through the crowd. Spotting me, the boy worked his way across the room to where we sat. His cheeks were flushed and his green eyes glistened.

“Oh, Lankar-jan, they sent me to find you―and I looked everywhere but her(,! Do you know what has happened? The airships from Tharkol have come at last―”

Glypto drank off his brandy with lip-smacking gusto, then clapped me on the shoulder and tousled the boy’s hair affectionately.

“Aye, friend Prince! We’re off on a mission of daring-do arid adventure! And you, small one, are you going with us on this voyage?”

The boy’s bright eyes shone; he gulped and nodded eagerly.

“Then with dawn tomorrow we sail for the world’s edge, and beyond,” the little thief crowed. “We’ll ride the great winds into an unknown world, aye, and fight like heroes, it well may be, to free Jandar o’ Callisto from captivity!”

My heart swelled within me at his words; my breath quickened. I was as thrilled of the prospect as was the lad at my side!

Cabin space was at a premium aboard the Xaxar, so I shared a tiny room with three others, and later, as you will read, with four. One of these was young Taran who was my squire, as you might say. The other sharers of our cabin turned out to be the dignified and pompous Dr. Abziz, the geographer whose knowledge of the other side of the world would serve greatly to facilitate our discovery of the country of the Mind Wizards.

And then there was Glypto! At the news that the villainous little guttersnipe would have the bunk beneath his own, Dr. Abziz groaned and rolled his eyes heavenwards as if entreating mercy of the gods. He was convinced that Glypto had applied to share our quarters only to torment him, for Abziz detested the thievish little Tharkolian, who delighted in making fun of him. I really think that Glypto wanted to share the voyage with Taran and me, for whom he had conceived a genuine affection, at least as much as he wanted to have Abziz at the mercy of his stinging jibes.

For Glypto took a merry, mischievous glee in puncturing the pretenses of the pompous, self-important little Soraban. There was something about Abziz that made you want to ruffle his temper and prick him in the overinflated ego. He was so vain and fussy, and held himself in such high esteem that the urge to deflate his pomposity was nigh irresistible.

Jandar has described how the gallant old swordmaster of Ganatol, Lukor, delighted in tormenting Dr. Abziz by calling him “cousin;” since the Doctor had a strain of Ganatolian blood in his ancestry which was like a thorn in his side (since Sorabans pride themselves on pure lineage, unmixed with the blood of “lesser” races) and a constant annoyance to him. Well, Glypto found, in the peevish little savant’s overweening vanity and sense of dignified selfimportance, a perfect target for his pranks and quips. The Doctor hailed from an ancient line, his house being one of the oldest and noblest in the Seraanship of Soraba. He treated Glypto with frosty disdain and shuddered at being forced to associate with such a disreputable and villainous-looking spawn of the back-alleys. Now, Tharkol and Soraba are neighboring cities, both inhabited by the red men or Perushtarians, so Glypto pounced upon this fact and delighted in tormenting the caste-conscious doctor by hailing him, with rough familiarity, as “neighbor.” It was all very amusing, and there was no real spite in it, but Abziz could hardly endure the company of the little prankster.

Our cabin, incidentally, had four bunks, two built one-atop-the-other on either facing wall, with a small low table running the length of the room between the rows of double-decked bunks, and a tiny desk at the further end, beneath a square porthole. This porthole, by the way, afforded us a rather cramped and narrow view of the terrain over which we were to fly. It was small enough, and pretty crowded, but snug and shipshape. I was quite looking forward to the voyage, and, as for little Taran, the boy was in ecstasy.

I had bade my servants rouse me an hour before dawn. My gear was all packed, but I wanted to feed Bozo myself and take the big fellow for one last uninterrupted walk, before bidding him goodbye. Bozo would miss me, I knew, but no more than I would miss his constant companionship.

I tried on my ship-clothes. These consisted of long, close-fitting sky-blue trousers and a pair of so-called “skyboots” which rose to mid-leg and folded over, like boots worn in a pirate movie. They had soles of some elastic, ripple-surfaced substance like crepe rubber, designed to cling to the slippery decks during a rain or sleet. A wide leather belt cinched in my waist, and a loose, full-sleeved white blouse was worn on the upper torso, with a baldric and scabbard. There was also a long woolen hooded cloak with armholes and wriststraps, to be worn against the chill winds of the great heights at which we would travel. Regarding my image in a long mirror, I felt rather like an extra in an Errol Flynn epic.