Changewinds 03 - War of the Maelstrom

by Jack L. Chalker

  Waiting until it was as clear as it could be, he slipped around the back of the tent and into the rear of the stable area. The water troughs there had splashed all around, causing a nice mess of red mud, and there was other dirt around as well, although he decided to pass on the most obvious scent. Now, filthy, ringed with a spell that wouldn't read false, and looking lousy from his lack of sleep in any case, he got up and simply walked out into the mass and back up towards the tree line.

  There were loads of people around, Akhbreed and colonial alike, but none gave him more than curious glances and then ignored him. A couple of brown-robed magicians walked near and he felt their automatic probe for anything unusual, but he read true to them and it probably didn't even register in their minds that they'd done it.

  Normally his nerves would have given him away, but since the first activated items in the sensitizing spell for the rings was a compulsion to present yourself to your master, he had no choice. He had to find Charley, and that quieted all other fears and replaced them with wariness.

  He passed quite close to where Halagar's body had lain, and close, too, to many of the people who'd been there when he was, but, as usual, they had seen the brown robe more than him, and he looked quite different now. Before they had seen a magician; now they saw a slave moving with purpose and obviously carrying out a command. Not even the Hedum guards gave him a second glance. He headed for a likely spot—the field latrines just in the woods—but as soon as he was close to there he veered off to the right and doubled back behind the death scene.

  There were no obvious signs immediately behind, and he paused a moment. Think, Dorion, tired as you are! You're blind and you have to get away and be sure you do. You can't see, and you don't have the null reference after this point, so how can you be sure?

  Hearing. That assemblage out there made a constant, terrible racket that he'd gotten used to through the night. So you walk away from the noise. Well, that gave him a place to start.

  After several hours, he was beginning to panic, fearing that he'd made a dreadful mistake. The area, even assuming walking generally away from the noise, included a wide triangle, and there was almost certainty that she wouldn't have managed anything close to a straight line. Might there be something up there that would stop her? A wall or steep drop, perhaps? Go directly away and see it was the only thing he could think of that he hadn't already tried.

  About a third of a mile in the woods, he hit the creek, meandering peacefully through the forest. At first it was only welcome water, far too small and too shallow to be the kind of barrier he sought, but as he went down to it to drink, he lost his footing in the soft earth, and slid down into it. Now a bit bruised and mud-caked, he sat there in the water suddenly feeling like a fool and hoping it was only exhaustion. Sure he could see this thing and know it wasn't much, but she couldn't! To her this might be nothing, or it might be a great, wide river or sea. He drank, then picked a direction, and started walking.

  Now, for a change, the fates were with him. Less than a hundred yards from his starting point he found a part of the bank given way and signs that someone had done pretty much what he'd done. It was so broken he thought she'd fallen down and then clamored back up, and he did likewise and searched the area but could not find her. He returned to the break and looked across the stream and now could see what might be signs of somebody getting out the other side. That was discouraging, since it meant the creek hadn't stopped her after all, and he might have an even wider area to search. Driven by his self-imposed compulsion and against the protests of his body, he waded across to the other side and climbed up on the other bank, telling himself that no matter how wrecked he was, he was still in better shape than those poor wretches back at the border.

  Still, he knew that even to complete his compulsion he'd have to get some rest. He was feeling dizzy, had a hell of a headache, and was seeing things all blurry. He began searching along the creek bank for some kind of decent cover he could use to lie down just for a little bit, to get himself back into some kind of shape.

  And suddenly he saw her, lying there like some dirty, limp rag doll, unmoving behind the bushes. He ran to her, fearing that she might be dead, and knelt down beside her. He took her, shook her gently, and said, "Mistress! Mistress! Are you all right? Wake up and speak to me!"

  She stirred, mumbled something, then suddenly her eyes were open and she was aware first that she was in someone's grip and began to scream and push away, but then she saw him. Not Dorion, of course, but that magic aura whose distinctive shape she'd shared most of a long journey with.

  "Dorion?"

  He felt like crying. "Mistress, you live! You are all right'"

  She frowned, unable to see the shape he was in, reached out, and began to run her hand over his body. "Dorion why are you, oh my! Sorry! naked? And what's this mistress crap?"

  He lay down beside her and tried to relax, then told her the whole story. She had slept so hard that, while still exhausted, she felt wide awake and clear-headed, although her head was killing her when she moved. She listened, fascinated.

  "Let me get this straight. To get out of there without getting noticed, you made yourself my slave? Jeez! All the time I been here, I been somebody else's property. Will it wear off?"

  "No. Mistress. It can only be removed by two magicians of some skill. Third Rank, or a Second Rank sorcerer with some time and a lot of work. It's not supposed to be easy to undo."

  "Even if I gave you freedom?"

  "No, Mistress, that would be worse. Then I'd be a stave with no master, and the first free person who touched me would be my new master."

  "Well, I wouldn't, if I could. I don't want you away from me from now on, and this'll keep you close. You made your bed and you're stuck with me, but cut that Mistress crap. It sounds wrong when it's addressed to me. Just Charley is fine."

  That pleased him. "As you wish Charley."

  She suddenly came over and gave him the hug of his life, clinging to him, breaking out into tears. "I need you, Dorion. I need your eyes, your strength, and, most of all, I need your company."

  "Whatever you want, I'll try to do, Charley," he told her sincerely, "spell or no spell."

  "Just hold me," she sobbed. "Just hold me close until I can believe you're really real."

  He did so, and felt better and more important than he ever had in his whole life. It wasn't until much later, lying there, her head in his lap and him stroking her hair, that he suddenly was struck by a wrongness. Not from Coleel or that bunch, but something wasn't quite right. Looking down at her still angelic face, as dirty and scratched up as it was, he suddenly realized that he'd been looking at it all the time.

  Like Coleel, he'd assumed that the slave spell had neutralized when Halagar had died, making Charley temporarily free but only until someone, anyone, else touched her ring. Anyone but him, of course, since a slave could not be a master of his own mistress. But there wasn't just the sensitizing spell in her ring; it was complete. It was still Yobi's original—he knew her handiwork well enough. But that spell bound her not to Dorion—that was only temporary and had been neutralized by his own actions—but to Boolean. If Boolean had died, or been swept away, or had even been transformed into some four-armed, four-breasted plant girl, the spell would have been negated the same as Coleel's had been when Halagar died. The spell, however, was intact. Although Charley didn't seem to realize it, she, too, was still a slave.

  His own excited start bumped her head a bit and frightened her for a moment. ' 'What's the matter? You hear something?"

  "No, no, Charley, your ring! Yobi's spell's still on! Don't you see what that means?"

  She sighed. "You mean I'm still a slave after all?"

  "Yes, but it means a lot more than that. Charley—it means Boolean's still alive! Still alive and still unchanged." He gave a low chuckle. "It means either that he was as smart as I thought he was, or that, for all that, the bastards missed him!"

  She frowned. "That explains it
, then. Just lying here, feeling a little safe for the first time in a long time, I suddenly had this thing in the back of my head whispering that I should go to Masalur hub and find somebody. But if you're right, Boolean couldn't be there, not now. Jesus, Dorion! I'm gonna wind up with a full-scale compulsion to find Boolean, and I no longer have his address!"

  "Then you must use your head to fight it. You know he can't be in Masalur, so going there does not fulfill the command. You can not find him, not with things as they are. Your duty, then, is to simply remain free and alive and out of anyone else's hands until he can find you, or until some clue presents itself."

  She thought that one over. "I guess you're right. I guess that's why I can fight it, why it's not overriding everything. Why I didn't really know until you told me. But that means it could be a real long time. Out in the woods, naked, savages, really. Sort of caveman and cavegirl, only without the cave or the skins. And fugitives, too. We can never be seen or mix with others. Around here, Akhbreed's gone from being the highest to the lowest of the low."

  "I know. But it's a big world, a whole planet, and it's real warm here all the time, and it's thick forest around here. We'll be hard to spot or catch. If we can only find a source of food and water, we could make out okay." The fact was, Dorion didn't feel hesitant about it at all. Except for the food problem, which would have to be solved and soon, this came about as close to his private fantasies as he could ever come.

  She frowned, still thinking, although this wasn't one of her fantasies. "Dorion? How can you be my property if I'm still a slave to Boolean? Property can't own property."

  "That's what fooled me for a while. Because I wasn't bound to you—that would be beyond the spell—but because I bound myself that way, freely and of my own will. It's the only way possible."

  "And you gave the magician's life up and came after me to live like this for me." She said it like she couldn't get over it.

  "Yes, Charley," he replied, not adding that it was certainly the best of his possible alternatives.

  * * *

  It was well past noon when two high rebel officers and a sorcerer of the Second Rank sought out Coleel, who was beginning to think that the mop-up work from the night would be never-ending.

  The Second Rank sorcerer was one of only two on site during the whole battle; the rest had participated, somehow, remotely in a way only Klittichom knew. The rebels had a large number of acolytes, magicians, and adepts, but very few of the Second Rank. Their powers and egos did not in the main make them terribly cooperative with one another nor willing to be under one of their own.

  This one was a mean old fart with a face that looked like he'd died about three centuries past and refused to recognize the fact, but he had a fairly strong walk. His name was Rutanibir, and he was short-tempered, mean, and pissed off at the universe in general. What his motives were for working with Klittichom wasn't known, but he was a key man in the field.

  "You have this homosexual woman?" Rutanibir asked him in a shaky voice.

  "Yes, Master. I…"

  "Silence! Why wasn't I notified immediately of this? Take me to her at once!"

  Silence was one thing he didn't want to concede. "Master, this was reported, but so close to the start of the battle that word did not apparently get to you. She's under my control as a slave, though, and she was commanded not to move. Come. I will take you to her."

  They walked briskly along, the throng parting rapidly and averting its gaze from the wizened old man in the silvery robes. Because of the fear he generated, it took only a few minutes to find the coach and go up to it.

  "Boday!" Coleel cried out. "Come! Attend me!"

  There was no reply, and he frowned, suddenly nervous. He jumped up on top and saw that she wasn't in the seat or foot well, nor under the tarps. He climbed down, looked inside, under, and all around. She simply wasn't there anywhere.

  "Incompetent idiot!" Rutanibir snapped. "No wonder you never made Second Rank! Whoever gave you those black robes should be drummed from the Order! You knew she was important, even vital! Yet you let her sit here, unattended, all night, with all hell breaking loose, and didn't even think about her! Didn't think at all…."

  "Master, I" Coleel suddenly stopped and stood straight up, a tremendous look of confusion on his face. "Why in the name of the Seven Sacred Words did I do that? You are correct. Master, it makes no sense at all. And that magician Dorion. I gave him free run of the place! And parked right here, not two leegs from the rest of his party. And I spent five days in the coach and never even sensed the presence of an unwanted familiar. I admit to abject incompetence. Master, and throw myself at your mercy."

  Oddly, his talk calmed rather than enraged the old sorcerer, who waved off the comments with a casual hand gesture. "That son of a bitch," he muttered under his breath, more to himself than to any of the others. "Sixty-one-percent casualties and we still missed the old bastard. It has to be. All that, and he wasn't even home! He's been standing here, next to all of us, playing games with us and laughing at us all this time!"

  The two military men turned and stared at him. and it was finally Coleel who asked, "Pardon, Master, but do you mean I was bested by superior power? Who? Who would have such power and such audacity?"

  "Boolean, of course, you idiot!" the sorcerer snapped. "Son of a bitch!" He turned to one of the generals. "You said you had a man back in Covanti who thought he'd tracked the girl. At the time it didn't seem worth pursuing, but if Boolean's here then we still have a chance."

  "Yes, sir. Fellow's name is Zamofir, one of our best agents. He thinks that she got caught up in a move to give brides to a bunch of ex-convicts developing a valuable business in one of the Covantian colonies. He's got a band of men with him, loyal to our money if not to us, and he's willing to go. He's in Covanti still."

  "Good, good. It's no mean feat even for one of Boolean's skills to follow such a slender and nebulous thing as a marriage thread over three kingdoms and into colonies. It'll take time. Lots of time. I can reach some of my people planted in Grotag's office in a matter of hours. All I need is my kit and someplace quiet. Your Zamofir and his band can be riding to her before Boolean is even clear of Masalur." He put one wizened hand into a fist and gently struck his other palm with it. "Yes, indeed. So he's outsmarted us, has he? Escaped and all that. Well, precious little good it will do him if your man's right. And he'd better be right. General. He'd better be right…."

  * * *

  He was a small, thin man with long, thinning black hair just starting to turn gray; the most outstanding feature of his sharply angled face was its long moustache, which he usually, as now, kept waxed and perfectly shaped so that it stuck out from both sides of his face and curled up nicely. He would never be considered handsome, but he could be charming if he wished; still, no matter how he dressed or where he was, he always looked dapper and out of place beyond the casinos and social gatherings of the business set.

  Now he was dressed in casual riding clothes; a simple cotton shirt and tough denim pants with boots, all of which looked new and had some unnecessary fancy stitching. He took out a long, thin cigar from his pocket but did not light it; it was just a pacifier at this point. You didn't want to smoke, not in here.

  Several large, burly men dressed in the sort of clothes one knew instantly were not bought special but were the ones in which they lived and worked, entered the cave as well, all illuminated by magical hanging lanterns that had plenty of light but no heat or flame to speak of.

  Zamofir, their leader and employer, pointed to a carton. "There. Use the crowbar behind that box and get the lid off that one."

  One man got the crowbar and another assisted, and the lid broke open revealing a box full of large metallic guns packed in straw. One of the men reached down and picked one up and looked at it quizzically. "Looks like a rifle of some kind, but it's too fat to steady," he noted. "And where do you put in the bullet?"

  "Idiot!" Zamofir snapped. "Let me have that. This, gentlem
en, is what is known as an automatic rapid-firing gun, known where it came from as a submachine gun. These, and the cartons of ammunition around, were gotten with great skill by Lord Klittichom using his powers to extend to the out-plane. They use these big, fat clips, like this. You turn it over, press here, insert the clip so until it clicks in place, then throw the safety here and it's ready to fire. To reload, you just press here, the clip drops out, and you shove another in. Clear so far?"

  They all nodded, crowding around. "But how do you hit anything with it?" one asked. "I mean, it doesn't even have any decent sights and it's too square."

  Zamofir sighed. "Follow me, gentlemen. I do not want to demonstrate in here."

  They went outside with the loaded gun, and Zamofir picked a small, thin tree about thirty yards away. "Watch the tree. Each one of these clips holds a hundred carefully packed rounds. You just point the gun in the general direction, then pull the trigger. Even you can do that." And, with that, he demonstrated, and the rattling filled the air and smoke poured from the top of the machine gun, although nobody noticed.

  They were all watching as the tree was sliced almost in two and much of the surrounding area was also pockmarked.

  "The shells are ejected automatically. Don't bother with them, we have a sufficient number of clips here. Each man will take one of these and as many clips as is practical for him to carry. We'll practice on the way, although little is really needed once you leam how to keep the gun reasonably steady. Now, there are twenty-one men and four women there at the camp, but it's unlikely that more than half the men will be mere at any given time. Their big product is a key mineral found in certain kinds of ocean fish in that world, so they're out in shifts for days on end on small boats trawling, while the rest work the refining process back at the village. Twenty of us, with these should be more than enough."