by Jack Castle
“No. This is as far as they go. Besides Mooks can’t go on the ship,” Asha said.
“Ship? What ship?” Harry asked. He hadn’t seen anything larger than ponds filled with glacier run off, let alone anything to sail a boat onto.
The princess smiled at him and leaped nimbly off the ore cart.
Asha ran toward a wooden promenade deck about thirty yards off the main road. When Harry didn’t immediately follow, she turned back and yelled, “C’mon, Harry!”
Harry stepped off the cart as fast as his sore, trail-worn muscles would allow and walked off the dirt road after her. When he caught up with her, she was standing on the deck, which overlooked open air.
She pointed downward.
Harry knew that their caravan had been running parallel to the island bluffs for the past day or so. Once during their journey they had passed over a swaying bridge where he had seen a ten-thousand-foot drop on either side. Partially prepared for what he would see, he carefully peered over the windy side.
Far below a lush green mainland was just floating into view.
“That’s Joppa-Cal?” Harry asked. He pointed, left handed this time, at the vast jungles below that contrasted sharply with the arctic tundra through which they had been traveling for weeks.
“No, but we must go down there to get to Joppa-Cal.”
“Well, how the heck are we gonna do that?”
As if in answer, an enormous vessel suddenly hovered into view. It came up from below the balcony on which they stood and silently rose above them. Then it turned sharply to its port side and proceeded toward the town. The ship passed so near to them that it startled the young princess and sent her into Harry’s arms. Harry instinctively hugged her and shielded her from the wind with his back.
“That’s how,” she said. Her voice was muffled by his chest.
“What is it?” Harry shouted to be heard above the torrents of wind. He gazed at the ship’s carved stone underbelly and deduced that it was made of the planet’s floating ore.
“It’s an ore ship,” she said happily. She braved the winds to look up at him but still didn’t let go.
Harry hoped that the Awumpai knew that he wasn’t hurting the Dan-Sai. He wanted to live so he could ride in one of those magnificent hovering ore ships.
#
Shortly thereafter, the Mooks turned their oxen around and headed back the way they had come. Aside from a few supplies, the Mooks took everything in the caravan with them, even the Awumpai’s ostrich mounts. Asha, Harry, and the three Awumpai were to continue on alone.
Harry hiked his rucksack onto his shoulder, and they headed toward the town. He checked his sidearm, which was set up cross-draw fashion in a holster on his right hip. Much to the Awumpai’s displeasure, he had done a little target practice on the trail one day and found that he was rusty as hell with his offhand but his early years on the range training with both hands hadn’t faded entirely through disuse. At least he wouldn’t be completely useless in a fight. The revelation made him happier than he’d felt in days. With one magazine loaded, two clips in the magazine pouch on his belt, and another three clips in his rucksack, Harry had a total of sixty rounds of ammunition. He would’ve liked to continue with his practice but he knew better than to waste those bullets. All in all, until he had something worth shooting, it was as good as it was going to get.
As they approached the town, Harry saw that Millwood Junction was little more than two rows of buildings with a paved dirt road between them. Covered plank walkways ran along both sides of the street and reminded Harry of photos he had seen of frontier gold-rush towns in Alaska.
What made this town unique, however, was the enormous building at the far end of the main street. The large, heavily lumbered building dominated all the other buildings in town. It was crowned with numerous wooden stairways and platforms that seemed to branch out from the huge building in no particular order. The individual platforms varied in size but most were large enough to receive the enormous ore ships. Seeing all the marvelous wood construction, it was little wonder that the forests were all but gone.
As Harry looked at the structure, he saw the ore-ship that had flown over them earlier pull up to one of the station’s platforms. Lines were tossed to waiting Mook longshoremen, and after the ship was tendered, gangways were lowered, and passengers and crew began to disembark.
This wasn’t the only ship docked at the busy hub. Harry saw a variety of ships, in many different styles, embarking and disembarking. One large ore ship circled the docks, waiting for an open tender.
The ore ships were basic in their design and resembled old sailing ships. As a pilot, Harry was curious about how the ore ships’ pilots controlled the vessels’ yaw and pitch. Once they were on board, he vowed to speak with the pilot, or the equivalent, and see for himself.
#
Entering the town, Harry was surprised to see other humans. Elated, he ran up behind a short fellow dressed in a tunic, leather pants, and knee-high boots. Harry tapped on the man’s shoulder and said, “Hi, I can’t believe it! I thought I was the only human on this miserable …” Harry stopped short when a half-human/half-alien hybrid turned to face him. He pulled back in revulsion at the sight of the alien’s bulbous head and black, soulless eyes and fought the urge to draw his pistol.
The creature blinked at him a few times and shrugged its shoulders before spinning on its heel and walking away.
Looking at the other citizens on the streets around him, Harry saw that the town was comprised primarily of Mook slaves and human/alien hybrids. Some of the hybrids looked more human than others, but the black eyes were a dominant trait. Harry remembered the touch of long blue fingers, and the memory nauseated him.
“Friend of yours, Harry?” Asha caught up to him and hung on his elbow.
Harry’s face had turned grim. “No, Asha. That thing will never be a friend of mine.”
Asha frowned. She searched out his eyes, staring him squarely in the face. Suddenly Harry had a quick review of all his memories regarding his abduction.
She’s reliving my memories.
The flash of memories was over in seconds and Asha patted him on the arm in understanding.
“Harry, you should never judge the many by the actions of the few.”
Harry glanced away, feeling suddenly foolish.
They watched the hybrid townsperson duck into what Harry guessed was the equivalent of a general store. Harry saw what looked like farm tools, feed, and coarse woven bags amongst other miscellaneous goods for sale inside.
He identified other buildings, too, and was amazed at how similar this frontier town was to ones back home. He saw a hybrid sheriff standing out in front of a building that had bars on it, which he assumed was the local jail. The sheriff was a bit larger than most of the other hybrids, and he cradled a large rifle that resembled a musket. A thick but short deputy, who wore a bandolier loaded with enormous shells, stood nearby.
Directly across the street, music and laughter emanated from a large open-air building, which he figured to be some sort of saloon. Harry gave the saloon a wide berth; he had seen too many western Bs. The last thing he wanted to do was get into a bar fight — not that it would be much of a fight with the three Awumpai in tow.
Before they reached the ore-ship station, they stopped at what served as a post office, so Asha could send word to her father.
The post office in no way resembled the mail-carrier hubs with which Harry was familiar. First, the structure had no back wall. Second, instead of counters, the building had individual booths, like those in a shooting range. A colorful three-foot tall bird sat on a perch in each booth.
A hybrid clerk sat near one of the sidewalls, and Asha carried a sack of coins to him. Harry noticed that the patrons stood before the birds and talked. Once done, the patrons fed the birds morsels of food they got from slots in the
booths’ walls — slots that the birds couldn’t get into with their talons. The birds then recited the patrons’ messages back to them while mimicking their voices perfectly.
After having paid the ‘postage’, Asha took Harry by the arm and led him to a cherry-red bird that had flames of orange on the backs of its wings.
“Now you have to be quiet while I do this, or it may confuse the poor thing,” she said.
“Okay, but what is it?” Harry asked.
The princess made a face at Harry’s ignorance. “It’s a messenger bird. Don’t they have them on your planet?”
“No.” Harry shook his head. “Well, not really.”
“Then how do you communicate with one another?”
“Huh? Oh, the telephone and sometimes the telegraph.” Realizing that she didn’t know the meaning of such words, he added, “We send our voices over wires strung over vast distances.”
Asha shook her head. “And you find my world strange?” She lifted the soft velvet blind that covered the messenger bird’s eyes and began singing a message to her father.
Her voice was too lovely for words.
The other patrons in the busy mail office must have thought so, too, for they stopped reciting their own messages just to listen.
Chapter 16
Ore-Ship Station
When Harry, Dan-Sai Asha, and the Awumpai entered the crowded ore-ship depot, he was reminded of a train station he had visited in Amsterdam during the war. Both hubs had many seats lining the walls and vendors selling food and wares. However, in Millwood Junction, Harry saw hybrids with humanesque faces moving about the hub with many different types and sizes of luggage. Passengers stood in long lines before several ticket booths to buy heavy, eight-sided tokens about the size of a pancake. Each token had a strange symbol on it that Harry was unable to decipher.
Just as he and Asha got behind one of the shorter lines, the depot’s double doors far behind them were violently thrown open. Harry and everyone else turned to look and saw a tall, slender, black-furred creature, wearing a white tunic, step from the brightly lit street into the building’s darker interior. The creature carried a dangerous-looking scythe and reminded Harry of images he had seen on an Egyptian temple walls in National Geographic magazines.
The beast, which walked upright on two thick, dog-like legs, probed the immediate area with all its senses: its curved snout sniffed the air; its erect, square-tipped ears turned as if on a swivel, and its golden eyes scanned the crowd.
The jackal-like guard then raised one arm and said in a deep, thunderous voice (in Awumpai), “Make way for Queen Apsu!” He roughly shoved aside a passing hybrid to allow room for an elaborately festooned litter that was carried by a dozen Mook slaves.
As the litter entered the depot and moved to the line one over from Asha and Harry, more jackal guards, about half a dozen, appeared and encouraged other hybrid patrons to vacate to another line, which they did.
The litter’s bejeweled gossamer curtains parted just enough for Harry to see the royal traveler riding Cleopatra-style within. The lone occupant was a humanoid female, who wore the brightly colored robes and gaudy jewelry of a rich queen. When the queen turned toward him, Harry got a good look at her hairless head, floppy ears, and long face, which was marked by oversized lips and a heavy brow.
She and her entourage of servants and guards stopped in front of the ticket counter. A short hybrid, who Harry guessed was the equivalent of her valet, seemed to have a difficult time with the ticket master in the booth. After arguing with the clerk in hushed tones, the well-dressed hybrid darted back to the queen’s litter and whispered in her ear.
Upon hearing the valet’s report, the queen swung her long legs over the side of the litter and walked down an improvised Mook stairway to speak with the ticket taker personally.
Before the ticket master could utter so much as a word, the aristocrat held up a long six-fingered hand and silenced him. “Ticket master, are you aware of who I am?” she asked in a crisp, concise tones that, to Harry, sounded vaguely British.
“Yes, your eminence,” the unhealthy-looking hybrid behind the counter replied in a tiny voice. “You are Queen Apsu of the Southern providence of Skandaha.”
“That is correct. So why did you tell my valet that the deckhouse has been booked?”
The hybrid swallowed and replied, “I’m sorry Queen Apsu, but, as I told your royal valet, the last rooms have already been taken. But, we still have plenty of room on the outside deck.”
“On the deck? On the deck? This is an outrage. My valet booked this passage over seven hunter’s moons ago.”
The ticket master leafed through his reservations and tried to answer, but Queen Apsu cut him off. “And do you think it will do for Queen Apsu to sleep out in the open and ON THE DECK?”
The ticket master seemed to shrivel before her like a slug showered in salt. “No ma’am.” He rapidly flipped through more pages. “If you like, I can put you in the deckhouse on a flight two moons from today.”
“Two hunter’s moons from today?” she roared. “The gods will have come and gone from Joppa-Cal in two hunter’s moons!”
When Harry realized that she was heading for the same destination they were, he rolled his eyes. The aristocratic giraffe would probably behave like this the entire voyage.
Just then, another hybrid clerk climbed up on a platform, picked up a cone-shaped, metallic bell, and clanged it with a rod several times. Hearing this, the majority of the waiting passengers below departed the depot and headed for their waiting ships. The depot was nearly empty, except for the tall queen, her slaves, and her bodyguards. The ticket booths began closing one by one, and Harry saw that it was growing dark outside the hub windows.
“I’m sorry, your highness, but the only room that still isn’t occupied was booked eight hunter’s moons ago.”
The queen raised her painted eyebrows when she realized that there might be a stateroom available after all.
“And who, may I ask, is this patron?” she said.
The ticket master adjusted the writing utensil behind his ear, coughed, and pointed toward Dan-Sai Asha. “Well, your highness, it is she.”
The queen turned and looked at Asha, who stood quietly in line at a different ticket booth. When Asha realized that the towering queen glared at her, she simply waved and said, “Hello.”
Harry noticed that Queen Apsu immediately took note of the formidable Awumpai flanking Asha and appeared to size them up against her jackals. She seemed to decide that the barbaric beasts would be little match for her honor guard.
Ignoring Asha’s greeting, the queen turned back toward the ticket taker. “I will not have this common rabble shedding their mounds of disgusting hair all over my new robes for the entire voyage. Why, what would the gods think?” She shook her robes haughtily.
This comment received a heavy growl from Hu-Nan, but Asha held up a small hand to silence him.
Hearing the growl, Queen Apsu spun toward Dan-Sai. “You! Call off your dogs, little one, before my honor guards take them out into the street and teach them how to conduct themselves before royalty.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t do that if I were you,” Asha said innocently. She shook her head, a worried frown on her face. Harry was amused to realize that her concern was for the queen’s safety.
Queen Apsu was turning away from Asha but whipped her head again toward the princess after hearing this comment. “You wouldn’t do that if you were me?” the queen sputtered. “You wouldn’t …” she sputtered.
Harry had dealt with enough high-society types to know that Queen Apsu was up to something. The queen probably figured that if her guards beat Asha’s protectors into submission, it might open up her room in the deckhouse. Before Harry could warn Fu-Mar, the queen turned to the jackal guard nearest her.
“Ghanta,” the queen said.
; “I’m Chephren, your highness,” the guard replied with a slight nod of respect.
Queen Apsu dismissed him with a wave. “Take these curs outside and teach them how to behave in a manner that is befitting respect of my station.”
Hearing this order, Fu-Mar stepped forward and took point. He carefully ushered the princess back to Hu-Nan, who, in turn, guided her behind his back.
Chephren gave the queen a nervous look. He leaned in close and whispered, “My Queen, those are Awumpai …”
“And you are a royal bodyguard!” she snapped, cutting off any further discussion. “Remove these peasant vermin from my sight!”
Hu-Nan and Ba-Tu quickly moved the princess near one of the sidewalls, out of the way. Only Fu-Mar remained in the center of the room.
Harry could see the royal bodyguards were easily twice his size; he knew he would be instantly broken in half the moment the fighting started. Despite this, Harry took his place next to Fu-Mar.
The battle-scarred warrior took note of this and Harry thought he detected a small upturn at the corner of the Awumpai’s lips.
Did Fu-Mar just grin at me?
Fu-Mar grunted something under his breath and suddenly Harry felt Ba-Tu’s large paw on his shoulder. She pulled him backwards until they were standing against the wall next to Hu-Nan and the Princess.
Hu-Nan took up a position protectively in front of the princess and Harry could see the big red Awumpai grinning with delight. Asha grabbed her protector from behind, putting her frail arms around his waist, and peered through the crack between the crook of his elbow and his side.
Harry watched the eight royal jackal guards encircle Fu-Mar. Their confidence seemed to build as they realized that Hu-Nan and Ba-Tu would not join the fight.
“I’m worried about Fu-Mar,” Harry said to Asha as he watched the older Awumpai pant heavily in the heat. “He looks overheated.”
“Oh, he’s fine,” the princess said. She seemed surprisingly unconcerned for the well-being of one of her Awumpai.
