The Farris Channel Read Online Free Page A

channel without question, and he had let them believe he was a refugee from Fort Faraway which had been completely wiped out.
    As far as he knew, he was indeed the last survivor of the Fort Faraway refugees who had been heading for Fort Rimon. He wasn’t about to watch Tanhara and Rimon go down too, not after leading these people all the way here.
    As one of Fort Tanhara’s channels, Solamar knew he had no business riding ahead like this. But none of the renSimes was mounted on a horse that could make it.
    Nearing the oncoming riders, he drew up and let his chestnut mare breathe while they approached. He manipulated the ambient nager to identify himself as a channel and turned his horse to face the Tanhara wagons.
    When the lead riders came abreast of him, Solamar leaned forward and whispered into the horse’s flickering ears, “All right, Trilli, time to run again.” His weary mount took heart and, still blowing hard, fell into the pace of the Fort Rimon defenders.
    Solamar went duoconscious, so he could see the renSimes around him as well as zlin for their leader. He found the one with the most disciplined and confident nager, a woman mounted on a fine black stallion— good thing Trilli isn’t in season!
    Moving in close, he shouted an explanation of the pack of Gen riders now approaching from the lumbering wagons of Fort Tanhara. The renSime gestured her understanding with three tentacles of her left arm and signaled her riders to spread out, leaving a gap in the middle of their line to allow the Fort Tanhara Gens through.
    Solamar noted how quickly the gap between Tanhara’s rear wagon and the lead Freeband Raiders pursuing them had narrowed.
    Freebanders had no allegiance to any junct town or government, no law governing their actions. All they wanted was to capture plenty of Gens. All they ever did with Gens was Kill them, savagely stripping the Gen of selyn until the Gen died of the shock.
    Freebanders craved nothing in life but the massive, fear-magnified deathshock of Gens. They didn’t Kill to live like the town juncts; they lived to Kill.
    The Fort Rimon formation split in a very crisp, disciplined drill. The leader yelled at Solamar gesturing, “We’ll delay the Raiders. You circle your wagons around our gate. Our people will cover you from the walls. Get your people inside. Sacrifice the wagons. Got that?”
    Solamar gestured his understanding with two tentacles, grazing her nager with an affirmative flick of his field.
    The renSime tossed him a ferocious grin that sizzled through his nerves igniting something wondrously warm deep in his belly.
    She shouted, “I do love ordering a channel around! Go!”
    With a hearty laugh, Solamar went, wafted on a nageric zephyr breeze of acceptance, admiration, and delighted interest. Every cell of his body returned that interest. He cast his eyes to the heavens. A renSime? Isn’t my life complicated enough already?
    The first of the Tanhara Gen riders, some with children mounted in front of them, several carrying infants, and one with a newborn, pounded through the gap in the renSime line. His own Companion, Losa, rode in the middle of the group carrying a baby in the crook of her arm, controlling the horse with her knees. His life might well depend on Losa’s survival.
    Solamar cleared the Tanhara Gens and pulled out in front of the Fort’s renSime contingent to race flat out for the wagons.
    Shouting and gesturing, he explained the plan with nageric emphasis as the wagons roared past him.
    Despite it being beyond his authority to give tactical orders, the Tanhara renSimes driving the wagons set to implementing the Fort Rimon plan.
    The cattle and sheep were cut loose. Now that they were inside the valley, the exhausted animals wouldn’t stray far, especially with the dogs herding them. That left the chickens, a few goats, more dogs and some cats, and a dozen geese, in the wagons.
    Most of their riding stock had gone ahead with the Gens, leaving all the