Читать книгу Revenge of the Damned (Sten #5) - Allan Cole - Страница 13

CHAPTER EIGHT

KOLDYEZE CATHEDRAL HAD had not been constructed by the Tahn. Their only religion was a vague sort of belief, unworshiped, in racial identity and racial destiny.

Koldyeze had been the Vatican for the first settlers on Heath, monotheistic, agrarian communards. They had spent nearly two centuries building their church atop the highest hill in their tiny capital.

Those settlers stood less than no chance when the first Tahn, then more roving barbarians than the self-declared culture they later became, smashed down on them. They were forcibly absorbed by the Tahn, their language forbidden to be spoken, written, or taught, their dress ridiculed, and their religion driven underground and finally out of existence.

The Tahn might not have been religious, but they were superstitious. No one quite knew what to do with the looming cathedral, and so it was surrounded with barbed fencing and posted for hundreds of years. Seventy-five years before, an out-of-control tacship had smashed off the spire’s crown, and storms had battered the ruins.

But Koldyeze Cathedral was still a mighty work of man.

It was cruciform in design, stretching along its longer axis nearly two kilometers and along the shorter axis one kilometer. The center of the cross was the sanctuary and, above it, the remains of the bell tower. The shorter arms of the cross were roofed, but the longer arms held courtyards in their centers.

Koldyeze had been built as a self-sufficient religious community, even though the churchmen were not at all withdrawn from their society. When the Tahn had ordered Koldyeze abandoned, the pacifistic communards had systematically closed it down, sealing passageways and chambers as they went.

To the Tahn, Koldyeze seemed ideally suited to become a prison. Activating it required no drain on scarce building materials. The power drain from Heath’s grid should be minimal. The assigned prisoners would provide the work crews to make the complex livable.

The northernmost short arm, where the main entrance to Koldyeze had been located, was sealed off from the other wings, and the chambers around its courtyard were set up as guard and administration quarters. The passage from the guard courtyard into the center sanctuary was set with detectors and triple gates.

Four rows of fencing with mines and detectors between each row surrounded Koldyeze.

Then, even though the security precautions were not complete, Koldyeze was ready for prisoners. The outer perimeter, after all, was sealed—and none of the Imperials could fly. Further antiescape measures would be added as time went by.

The Tahn believed that Koldyeze was escape proof.

The Imperial prisoners straggling through the thick stone and steel gates looked about them and believed that somehow, somewhere, a clever being could manage to find freedom.

And there was no reason at all why it could not be one of them.