The opening page of CHAPTER ELEVEN imparts information that will be important later and is far from obvious. The Roidhunate offers to lend Abrams an airboat for use during his stay on Merseia. (It will be bugged and they would not want him to travel around unescorted.) Abrams says that he can borrow an auxiliary from Hauksberg's interstellar vessel, the Dronning Margrete. However, these auxiliaries have hyperdrive and Merseian law forbids non-Merseians to operate any vessel with that capability in the Korychan System. But the two largest auxiliaries each have an auxiliary with only gravitic, not hyperdrive, capacity. Abrams says that he could use one of those. However, the Roidhun would be disgraced if the Merseians did not show his guests full hospitality. Abrams accepts the hospitality - for his own reasons.
Later, Flandry will escape from the Korychan System in a hyperdive auxiliary and will use its auxiliary to ram a pursuing Merseian craft. If such auxiliaries of auxiliaries seem implausible, Poul Anderson has at least taken care to introduce then well in advance of their crucial role in the plot. The same remark applies to rogue planets, even more crucial but already introduced in CHAPTER THREE.
1 comment:
Kaor, Paul!
But I would expect really advanced and large spaceships to have such auxiliaries.
Ad astra! Sean
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