The Martian Circe
By RAYMOND F. JONES
Who was this sweet-voiced singer weaving a
spell of dreams and drugs that drove men mad
and threatened to smash the System? SBI
Captain Roal Hartford dared the death of the
Thousand Minds to learn her dreadful secret!
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from
Planet Stories Summer 1947.
Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that
the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
That's what they called her, Alayna, Queen of the Silver Stars, and she was singing when Roal Hartford stepped into the Starhouse.
The setting was the same—the swirling blue smoke from scores of zhema cigarettes, the odor of stale alcohol and penetrating Valcoso. The setting was the same as in a thousand other taverns hovering in the backwash of man's advancing conquest of the planets. Only Alayna made this Martian tavern any different from the rest.
The silence while she sang was tribute. The brawling and the laughter and the loud curses stopped for no other tavern singer but Alayna.
As Roal Hartford stood motionless in the doorway, listening, he knew why they called her the Queen of the Silver Stars. She was a queen to these men. Those who listened were men who had no home, and she sang of home to them. She sang of green fields and blue skies and of lovers and of children. Her voice was so low and deep that it was like a husky sob in her throat and they had to strain to hear.
Roal glanced at a table where bearded, drunken space miners listened to the dream of which she sang. One of them with a livid burn scar across his face turned away from his companions and ran a finger over his eye.