Captive of the Centaurianess

 A Novel of Primitive Future Worlds

By POUL ANDERSON

The entire System was after Ballantyne. Earth wanted him. The Jovian war-fleet jetted on his trail. But mainly Ballantyne feared his big-bosomed, sword-swinging space-mate—Dyann the Amazon from man-starved Alpha C3.

[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from Planet Stories March 1952. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]

The hero is the child of his times, in that his milieu furnishes him with motives and means, and yet the hero seizes the time and shapes it as he will. And he remains an enigma to his contemporaries and to the future.

Nowhere is this better illustrated than in the strange story of the three whose discoveries and achievements determined the whole course of history. The driving idealism and bold military genius of Dyann Korlas; the mighty wisdom, profound and benign, of Urushkidan; above all, perhaps, the transcendent clarity of mind and inspired leadership of Ballantyne—these molded our century and all centuries to come, and yet we will never understand them, they are too far beyond us and their essential selves must be forever a mystery.

—Vallabbhai Rasmussen, History of the Twenty-third Century, v. 1

I

The tender loomed above the crowd of passengers and leave-takers, a great shining bullet caught in floodlights against the dark, and Ray Ballantyne quickened his steps. By Heaven, he'd made it! The flight from San Francisco to Quito, the nail-biting dawdle as he waited for the airbus, then the flight out to Ecuador Spaceport, the last walk through the vast echoing hollowness of the terminal, out onto the field—and there it was, there the little darling lay, waiting to carry him from Earth up to the Jovian Queen and safety.

He kissed his fingers at the tender and shoved rudely through the swarm of people and Martians. He'd already missed the first trip up to the liner, and the thought of waiting for the third was beyond endurance.

"Hey, chum."

As the heavy hand fell on his arm, Ballantyne whirled, his heart slamming against his teeth and his spine dropping out. The thick-set man compared his thin sharp features with the 

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