"This is Lana Cain speaking!” answered the girl's voice instantly. “I keep my promises."
A moment's silence. The scattered fire from the trapped freighters suddenly stopped.
The freight commander's answer came. “You've the reputation of not killing. We'll surrender."
Sual Av, his green eyes gleaming with excitement through his helmet, glanced swiftly at John Thorn.
"The girl's policy of mercy does pay dividends, John,” he muttered.
"Stand by to board the freighters!” crackled Lana's voice to her pirate followers. “Two ships in each division stand off to keep watch. Hurry, men!"
Like sharks eager for prey, thirty of the forty pirate cruisers one to each victim, dashed in at the helpless freighters. The lead-ship of each division, with one other, stood by ready to turn its guns on any freighter that might resist the boarding.
Thorn's cruiser, the Cauphul, was one of those that stood off to keep watch. He saw the pirate ships already hooking onto the freighters by means of the magnetic grapples they shot forth. The grapple-lines were winched in swiftly, the pirate and merchant ships were drawn close together, and the flexible metal catwalks run swiftly out between them by the corsairs. Then the space-suited pirate horde was pouring across the short, swaying catwalks, hammering at the doors of the freighters until they opened.
Back across the precarious catwalks staggered the helmeted pirates, laden with bales and cases, sacks of valuable minerals, bars of rare metals, crates of silks and wines and foods.
"Why can't we be in on this?” demanded Sual Av, twitching with excitement. “There's no fun to lying off here watching the others."