Chapter four
Jak the Drang Encounters the Iron RidersTo be perfectly honest, as I leaped up I felt my nakedness, felt it terribly. My hand went to my waist. My little arsenal had become a part of my daily round, the Sharps to hit ’em as far off as I could, the Winchester to cut ’em down as they charged, the Remington to finish those that wouldn’t go down and the Bowie to take out the last, obstinate i***t who insisted on closing to close quarters.
All this was a long way away from the Sea Service pistol of my youth, the cutlass or boarding pike, and a very long way away from the rapier or thraxter, the spear or the longsword I needed on Kregen — and needed right now, by Zair!
I was on Kregen, right enough, there was no mistaking that. All the agony I had experienced as I’d realized just
