by Roland Green
But those who saw Figul say he looks as if he'd taken a flux, or seen a ghost. Also, he was close-mouthed as a miser's purse, when he can usually talk the ears off a bugbear.
If this is true, the quarrel with Mongo must have been worse than we thought. Better keep watch on both of them. We couldn't ignore Mongo's attacking Figul, or the captain hiring bravos to deal with Mongo ... if there's enough money to hire anybody to face that big brute.
The monks up at the temple and every wandering prophe t have been telling people that dire things are going to happen, and everyone should behave themselves. I wish the people crowding into town would listen.
At least our soldiers are keeping their wits and discipline, thank the Shade of Ironarm!
Torgia sprinkled sand on the parchment, wiped off the quill, and corked the ink bottle. Then she walked over to her bed and lay down, fully clothed except for armor and boots.
For each of the last ten days now, something had happened to get her out of bed in the middle of the night. She had taken to retiring early, and letting the lieutenant and sergeants take the evening roll call. That way she had a chance for some sleep before wine-flown witlings or comet-mad fools dragged her out onto the streets.
• • •
The glow on the horizon would have told Jazra that Fworta was about to rise, even if her computer hadn't. In less rugged terrain, with a flatter and farther horizon, the dying ship would already be blazing against the stars.
This was the last full night Fworta would be in the sky. Unless Jazra's computers were all malfunctioning, the ship would strike tomorrow night. And if she had no functional computer, she faced problems above and beyond the crash of Fworta.
Meanwhile, Jazra was facing other problems. She had brought her pod down in the mountains north of what seemed to be the only settlement on this side of the big lake. A primitive road, for pedestrians, animal-mounted riders, and animal-drawn vehicles, wriggled like a panic-stricken worm through the valleys and passes, sometimes coming too close to the landing site.
However, any place else would have been too far from where
Fworta was certain to crash. She had drained the pod all but dry to reach the planet ahead of the ship, and had to measure distances by what she could cover on foot.
If she had landed south of the town, in the more rugged terrain there, she might still be walking out of the wilderness. That is, if she hadn't first fallen off a cliff or been swept away in a mountain stream. It would have been unlikely for her to have encountered enough of the native population for her decryptor to acquire a working knowledge of their language.
As it was, she could not yet pass as a native in heavily populated areas, even hidden within the holographic projection of a native's body. But she could listen to them to some purpose.
She knew that the folk around the wagon at the foot of the hill would not even live long enough to see the ship's fall. Richer pickings than usual must have drawn bandits to the hills along the road. Jazra had seen two bands of them already, and heard a band of men and women who called themselves soldiers say that they were going to have to ask for reinforcements.
She hoped that they did ask, and that their wish was granted. The soldiers were armed with bows, spears, and swords, with armor of animal hide or poor-quality metal. They either walked or rode the backs of long-headed, long-tailed, hoofed quadrupeds. Surely they could do precious little against the Overseer's creations, but if there were enough of them, and their discipline held, they might evacuate some of their folk from the danger area. That might at least buy them time.
Meanwhile, the six bandits were slipping through the brush toward the disabled wagon, showing reasonable fieldcraft in the way they had spread out and were trying to move silently. Not that Jazra expected them to encounter much resistance from the family in the wagon. The principal male—the "father"— and one male offspring—"son"—were repairing the broken wheel. The principal female—the "mother"—with two "daughters" (female offspring) was preparing a meal in crude metal vessels over an open fire of wood, ignited with flint and steel. Another daughter held a specimen of native so immature that it was impossible for the Rael to determine its gender. Jazra had heard such specimens called "babies."
The family structure of the natives—those she had seen so far, at least—seemed to resemble that of the Rael. This was not uncommon. Such family units were useful for socializing young over a long maturation period. Therefore, she expected the two adults and perhaps the son to fight fiercely in defense of their kin, who would most likely try to hide or flee.
Against six armed bandits, it would be a futile fight. Unless the family had help. Jazra's hand strayed to the blaster on her hip.
She had done that twice before, and both times jerked her hand away as if the blaster was about to explode. Now her long fingers rested lightly on the butt.
Reveal herself—reveal Rael technology—to natives already shaking in their footwear over the portent in the sky, and risk causing a panic that would end all chance of organizing resistance, or even an orderly evacuation?
Quite unacceptable.
But so was watching children die when she could have saved them.
Now Jazra's fingers touched the control pad of her holographic projector. Perhaps there was, after all, a way to strike at
the bandits without leaving a trail.
• • •
Fedor Ohlt climbed the road up the hill to the west of the town, the one that overlooked the main trail leading into the wilderness. By the light of the Fire to Come, he could see that the wilderness had already been trimmed back several hours' walk, by logging for timber to build Aston Point and, of late, to export. Ohlt had spent the last seven years in Skandiria, where a single street would hold more people than Aston Point and the temple put together.
There were no tracks that he could see, not even by the bloody glare from on high, nor any other sign or sound of human presence. The one he sought was somewhere else, perhaps already on her way into the wilderness in search of the other elves.
A clattering like a pile of logs falling over, and the human sounds of heavy breathing and footfalls, slapped Ohlt's ears. He drew his dagger, but left the weighted cudgel slung across his back where it was. Interrupting a lovers' tryst was seldom as fatal as looking like a cutpurse could be.
It was a man and a woman whom Ohlt found, inside a stand of second-growth saplings some twenty paces down the other side of the hill. Or, rather, a girl and a youth.
At first glance he thought he had found M'lenda after all. Then he saw that the girl was fully human, considerably younger, and fairer-haired than M'lenda. The youth wore tunic and trousers, with stains and chafing that looked to Ohlt like they had been worn under armor. Probably a soldier. From his height and the way he moved, he was a good one already, and would be a formidable one when he filled out some more.
The two were holding wooden practice swords, and staring at Ohlt with almost as much confusion on their faces as if he had found them in a passionate embrace amid the mushrooms. He forced civil speech.
"Your pardon. Someone told me that Seldra Boatwright had a house on the hill, but this is the third hill I've been on. Can you tell me the truth?" he asked. "Oh, and my name is Fedor Ohlt." '
"Did you come in on Fairy Rose.7" the youth asked, ignoring Ohlt's question. "Is it true that Captain Figul fell ill?"
"Erick," the girl said indignantly. "You're not on duty, and you don't have to spy for Captain Mel every minute, even when you are. She doesn't have to know everything that goes on in town, either."
Erick's face took on a mulish cast that promised a quarrel that Ohlt decided to head off. "No harm in telling the truth. He had a fainting spell, and was senseless for an hour or two. Then he was up and about, if a bit shaky on his feet. If I were he, I would see a healer, but he is neither friend, nor kin to me, so he has to do as he pleases."
"Thank you," the young man said. "I am Erick Trussk, and this is my—the lady is Gre
din Hundsmund. Her father owns the town's livery stable. 1 help buy horses for the garrison, and met her that way. She asked me to teach her swordsmanship, and she is very good."
It was certainly carved in stone to Ohlt that there was more than that between the young folk, but he held his tongue. Also, Gredin spoke before Ohlt could.
"That's not what you told me after the first few bouts," she said. "You said I held the sword like Little Bilton holding the tongs when she helps her father at the forge."
"Perhaps I did, but then I might have been wrong," Trussk said, with a wry grin. "I am wrong most of the time, by what Sergeant Finlaysdotl says.
"Be that as it may," Erick continued, turning back to Ohlt, "someone was having a joke with you. Seldra lives in a cottage just up Mill Lane from the waterfront—far enough to be away from the noise and smell, close enough to walk to the harbormaster's office."
Trussk looked at the sky. Ohlt noted how he tried not to look at the Fire to Come, hard as that was. "By this time Seldra's gone from the office. She'll either be on her way to the Grinning Gar, or already drinking there."
"Thank you," Ohlt said. He started to turn away, then looked at Gredin. If Marfa had grown to, oh, sixteen or so, she would have looked—
Ohlt cursed himself for a sentimental fool. His daughter would have had her mother's dark hair and high cheekbones, and she would have been broader across the shoulders, and thicker of limb. What he had really sought was an excuse for being honest with these two agreeable young folk, who were indeed young enough to be his children.
"I will seek out Seldra, and I thank you for your help, but what brought me up here was a woman I met on the ship. She said we were going to travel inland together, and she would meet me at the Fox and Feather. But she wasn't there at noon, nobody had seen her at supper, and I am curious."
"Not worried?" Gredin asked.
"Compared to that—" he jerked a thumb at the sky "—a mislaid traveling companion is nothing. But if she changed her mind because of my offending her in some way, I would like, at least, to apologize."
"Even with the end of the world as we know it at hand?" Trussk asked. He sounded more curious than alarmed.
"Is that what you think?" Ohlt replied.
"1 don't know what to think. But whether it's the gods coming to reward us, or demons coming to punish us, or a piece of the sky coming to make a big hole in the ground, life—around here at least—will never be the same again."
"I believe you," Ohlt said. He described M'lenda without giving her name or mentioning that she was half-elven. Not everyone thought well of half-elves. He concluded, "So if you see her, I will be at Uncle Nisul's Rest on Harbor Road. Please don't noise it about that you're seeking her, either. I realize that your kin and comrades are trustworthy, but who knows who else has wandered into town lately? Look at me."
That allowed him to leave them with smiles on all faces, even though on Ohlt's it was more like a traveling jester's face paint. What had driven M'lenda to go to ground like a badger chased by hounds, in a strange town full of people from the gods knew where?
Ohlt started downhill, swearing once more that he and his companions would pay their debt to M'lenda by seeing her safe, if they had to fight the whole town of Aston Point, its monks,
its visitors, and anyone who might fall out of the sky.
• • •
Jazra's holographic projector ran off the memory of her computer, and she had extensively augmented that memory with images of the natives. One in particular had struck her fancy: a man with flowing black hair, wearing mostly animal hides and furs, with a sword nearly as long as he was tali slung across his back. A mighty weapon indeed, for the man had been as tall as the average Rael, which was a head and more taller than the majority of the natives.
She set up the projector to people the hillside with half a dozen images of this black-haired giant. As they sprang into life, she made a further adjustment—and her helmet radio began pouring out a sound like the agonized bellowing of a thousand huge beasts, with the crumbling of a mountain as an undertone.
The bandits could not have moved faster without first sprouting wings. Four of them ran downhill, in plain sight of their intended victims, but both ignoring them, and being ignored by them.
By ill-chance, or ill-will, the others ran uphill, bearing away from the half-dozen giants on a course that took them straight toward Jazra. She could not disguise herself without breaking up the giants' images. A chill touched her spine as she knew that she would have to fight.
The Rael were not the greatest experts at unarmed combat among intelligent races. Certainly none of them were equal to Tizeemi priests, who had to fight for their advancement in bloody, bare-handed duels. But Rael marines were taught to handle themselves if surprised on the ground, and Jazra was an ex-marine who had kept up her training.
So Jazra wheeled on one foot, and lashed out with the other at the first bandit. The moving foot took him in the stomach and he flew over backward, landing, with a craaack, to lie still.
The second bandit was now too close for the same move, and he thrust his sword ahead of him. Jazra darted aside, drawing her blaster as she did, and fired at the bandit's weapon.
The sword flew out of his hand in one large piece, and many small ones. Jazra heard fragments of hot metal biting into the trees and bouncing off her armor. The bandit looked at her, then at his blackened hand, then ran, screaming and waving the hand as the pain of the burns struck home.
She could hear him screaming for quite a while.
Long before he stopped, she shut the sound out of her mind and examined the bandit she'd kicked. His head had struck a rock when he fell, and more blood and brain matter was oozing out of his skull than Jazra had ever seen from any living being.
She also discovered, after she turned off the images and regained her night-vision, that the people she had tried to help had also fled. They had fled so quickly that they had knocked over their cooking pot and left their tools and other goods. Also, their hauling-beasts had joined the panic, breaking their harnesses and overturning the wagon.
Jazra had to wonder if she had really helped these people, beyond saving them from the bandits. They might keep running. They should, until they were beyond danger from Fworta's crash, or even from the first attacks by the Overseer.
She thought briefly of hiding the dead bandit's corpse, but it had been the latest of several long and wearying days, the planet's gravity was an additional burden, and altogether, Jazra did not feel like taking on the work of a burial attendant tonight.
Out of respect, she pulled the native's ragged shirt up over his face and laid him out with his limbs as straight as nature allowed them to be. Feeling the heavy bones and muscles under the flesh, she realized that she had been lucky with her kick, and reminded herself never to grapple close-in with one of these folk.
Then she turned and started back for her escape pod, and camp.
® * ®
Jazra's fight was too far north to be heard in Aston Point itself, but not from the road or the lake. Travelers heading both north and south on the road halted, and either retraced their steps, or made armed camps for the night. On the water, several ships put hastily out and clawed into open water as quickly as oars or sails could take them.
Some who had retraced their steps as far as the town spread tales of horrors unleashed on the northern road, a further sign that the Fire to Come was a dire portent. The tales sent a fair number of people out of town to the south, hoping to find a path through the wilderness, or a trail along the shore of the lake, to lead them away from this place of evil happenings.
The stories also caused Torgia Mel to be awakened, precisely as she had anticipated. She had slept sufficiently, however, that she was able to personally lead the mounted patrol north along the road. When they had neither found nor heard anything, save frightened travelers and mist, they contented themselves with making camp alongside the northernmost travelers. If anything did co
me south, mist or not, comet or not, the Grand Duke's soldiers would do their duty.
So, when two dwarves marched out of the forest onto the hillside in a tepidly gray dawn, they had the battlefield to themselves. The dwarves' names were Chakfor and Ithun Stone-breaker, and they were prospecting for the Stonebreaker clan, that counted among its members nearly every dwarf within several days' travel of Aston Point.
Actually, Chakfor was prospecting, being the best prospector and assayer among the dwarves; he was also a canny toolmaker, even for a dwarf. What he was not was a finished woodsman, hence the presence of Ithun, who had almost a ranger's skill in crossing rough and wooded ground.
This talent was rare among dwarves, but then some wondered if Ithun was entirely a dwarf. He looked more like a short human than a dwarf, being both taller and slimmer than most of the forge-folk. It was said that his father had been human, or perhaps even elven. Certainly he had been adopted into the clan after journeying from no-one-knew-where, leaving behind who-knew-what-kin.
Khramil Stonebreaker had done the same himself, founding the clan after leaving his homeland, a veteran warrior of many seasons' service against the hobgoblins. He had no quarrel with Ithun over a mystery in his past, and was happy to see that he and Chakfor made a potent team for exploring beyond the previous bounds of the dwarves' land.
"It is simple enough," Khramil had told the pair some days before, when they had gathered their packs, tools, and weapons. "More humans coming to Aston Point means more need for metal. That will aid us, until the humans grow weary of paying our prices.
"Then some shrewd human—"
"Big Bilton the smith?" Ithun put in.
"I accuse no one," Khramil said piously. "But someone among the humans will realize that they must command their own sources of metals. They will seek far and wide, they will find it, and then they will have their claims secured by the Grand Duke."
"Or the Prince Regent."
"Or His Grace King Luitzol,"
