Tarrano the Conqueror, page 180 by Raymond King Cummings
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of twenty girls, was assigned to a portion of the line some helans from me. My own place, with a hundred men under me, was near a tower almost on the opposite side from the power house.
It was a solemn parting from Elza. I wrapped her in my arms, tried to smile. "Be very--careful, Elza."
She kissed me, clung to me; then cast me off and was gone.
With the city invested, we rested idly for another time of sleep. Occasionally we made a tentative tower attack which came to nothing. Tarrano waited; his barrage remained the same. We tried to provoke a move from him, but could not.
The snow-plain where I was stationed here was similar to the other side, save that there were no mountains. From the power house to Tarrano's wall there was a dip, so that the wall stood upon higher ground. On my side, however, the reverse was true. The wall lay in a hollow in one place, with a steady upward slope back from it to uplands behind us, as though in some better day a broad watercourse had flowed down here, now long since buried in solid ice and snow.
I mention this topography because it had a vital bearing upon what so soon was to transpire.
Rhaalton desired that Tarrano come out and attack us; but Tarrano would not. We thought perhaps that his offense was inadequate and the one move that he made strengthened that belief. From the city beside the palace, a rectangle of black metal some fifty feet square, rose slowly up. In aspect it was a square, windowless room--a room without a ceiling, open at the top. It rose to a height of five hundred feet and hung level. And from it depended dangling power cables connecting it with the ground.
It was the presence of these cables that made us feel Tarrano was offensively weak. He could not aerially transport his power; hence, for offense he could only rely upon individual batteries which, unless permanently stationed within the city, we knew would have a short range at best. We watched this thing in the air for hours. It did not move; it was s