“Child of the Gods,” a 1946 short story written by A. E. van Vogt

Thanks to the website baenced at the Fifth Imperium, you can read “Child of the Gods”, a short story written by Sci-Fi author A. E. van Vogt, for free online. Originally published in the August 1946 issue of Astounding Science Fiction magazine, the story opens with the education of a mutant boy born into a powerful royal family that dominates Earth and has allies on Venus, but quickly shifts backward a few years to recount an allied invasion of a green, canalled Mars. Here are the opening lines:

By the time the boy was four, the scientist Joquin realized that drastic action was necessary if his mind was to be saved. Somewhere between three and four, Clane had realized that he was different. Enormously, calamitously different. Between four and six, his sanity suffered collapse after collapse, each time to be slowly built back again by the aging scientist. ...

This is a fairly interesting story, as the invasion of Mars involves not only spaceships, but horses, spears and swords!

[via Tinkoo Valia of Variety SF]