Shadow of the Well of Souls watw-2

by Jack L. Chalker

  The lousy weather, even for Hakazit, was something of a blessing to him. He brushed wet snow from his beard and walked along an alley about a block from the docks, heading west toward the commercial fleet and the shipbuilding area.

  Just beyond was Pulcinell, a water hex whose dominant race, he gathered, was a bottom-living species that somewhat resembled lobsters with tentacles and that tended vast undersea farms and built vast, strange cities out of coral, sand, and shell. The higher, lighter layers were inhabited by various kinds of the usual sort of sea life, including a kind of jet-propelled swimming clam called a zur that was considered a delicacy by many land races and by a species of water-dwelling mammals called kata, who, in carefully rationed numbers, were used for fur, leather, and meat. A delicacy and quite limited in the allowable catch, the creature was a high-profit item. The Pulcinell had been known to somehow punch large holes in the bottoms of poachers’ boats. A nontech hex, they had some needs that required trading, and they wanted their share of the carefully managed harvest.

  A kata boat was a bit too large for him to manage alone, but a small zur trailer was generally a two-person craft and could, with its single mast, be handled by one man. It would be no picnic to cross an ocean in it, even at a narrow point, but he’d sailed halfway around the world alone in something not much better, and if he could move down the coast or use some of the small islands to get water and provisions, it might not be a dangerous trip.

  Still, he fervently wished that he could somehow communicate with the girl and teach her how to set a sail and otherwise handle a boat. It would make life a lot simpler.

  There were a lot of the small craft in. Small wonder, considering that the weather visible just beyond the hex barrier didn’t look all that much better than the weather here. He didn’t care. There were no conditions he could imagine that he hadn’t already faced at one time or another in almost any type of craft.

  Of course, he’d sunk quite a few times, too, but he preferred not to think about that.

  And there they were, down the small street through the dock buildings, bobbing in the water between two long warehouses, “parked” in diagonal slots on both sides of three long piers.

  Although the design of the small boats differed markedly, as would be expected considering the number of races that built and sailed them, there were certain basic similarities to all of them, and none looked so bizarre as to be unmanageable. The physics of floating objects didn’t change all that much, either. At least, if it did, then more was wrong here than he suspected.

  The trick was to steal the one owned or operated by a race that ate what he could eat and would be likely to have palatable supplies aboard.

  He walked down the alley, crossed the main street, and walked out onto the center pier, where a large number of the boats were tied, the girl following. He was not worried about being spotted; for one thing, the sleet was turning to steady, fine snow and starting to lie on the street, piers, and boats, and the dock area was nearly deserted.

  Experience had also taught him that one of the best ways to be barely noticed was to go where one wanted and act like one belonged there. With so many different races in at this ocean port, it was unlikely anybody would even figure out his species—or care.

  A number of the small boats could be rejected out of hand. For one thing, about twenty percent of them had people aboard, and that disqualified them. He had no stomach for a fight if it could be avoided, particularly not against creatures that might have nasty natural defenses or firearms, and he was never big enough to win even a fair fight with his own kind.

  Of the rest, about half could be dismissed as being too alien either to run efficiently or to have a chance of containing useful supplies. A winch was a winch, it was true, and a wheel was a wheel, but the designs were very different if one was using tentacles or suckers or something other than hands.

  He was getting cold, wet, and somewhat snow-covered himself by the time he found what he was looking for. It was an attractive little sloop, sleekly built and designed to take heavy weather at a good clip under sail. The creatures who had sailed it here definitely had hands, and the design was in many ways quite conventional for Earth circa, perhaps, the early 1800s. There was no sign of a stack, so either it was built from the ground up as a no-frills sailing craft or it came from a nontech hex and did much of its business in similar places. That suited him, since the passage between Hakazit and Agon was either nontech or semitech and the useful high-tech navigational aids would be of no use anyway in those waters. He would in fact have little problem staying out of high-tech hexes entirely if he made a direct crossing and then proceeded along the coast.

  Something inside him just told him that whatever these people were, they ate what he could eat. More of his “intuition,” he supposed, drawn from the Well’s own catalog.

  Looking around and seeing no one obvious, he climbed down onto the trim little craft, and the girl followed, eyes darting around, ears alert for any signs of danger.

  There were no tides to speak of on the Well World, but there were many currents, and ports in general were designed to take advantage of them. The diagonal bloat slips were the first step; each was basically a small canallike lock which filled when the ship was docked and raised it a few meters above the surrounding sea. If he triggered the lock mechanism, it would open, and, casting off at the precise moment, the ship would float out into the harbor on the outflowing water. Then he could turn, raise a single sail by that winch over there, and make his way out and into Pulcinell. The wind wasn’t entirely favorable in the storm, and it would mean moving quickly, but he thought it was possible.

  Not for the first time did he wish he could at least tell the girl how to do something. It would be very useful if she could take the wheel, trigger the sail winch, or even push the damned lock button. He sighed. Well, he was on his own, and that was that. He checked the mechanical winch on the small sail he would need, figured out the safety and the release, and decided it would work. Then he walked over to the outside wheel aft of the mast and removed the blocks and wheel lock, testing it to ensure that it was free.

  Gesturing for her to stay aboard, he then climbed back on the dock, found a small metal pole with a rectangular box on it, opened it at the hinge, and found two large buttons there, one depressed. He pushed the other one, cursed as it rang a very loud bell that seemed to echo over the entire harbor area, then ran back and jumped onto the deck from the pier, slipping and falling in the snow as he did so. The lock was opening pretty fast—a lot faster than he’d figured—and he let go of the bowline and rushed back, let go of the stern line, and almost slipped again as the small sailing vessel lurched free and then began to move with more speed than he wanted backward into the channel. He climbed up and grabbed the wheel, feeling out of breath, then worried that the damned lock wouldn’t be completely out of the way by the time he passed the wall. It almost wasn’t; he felt a bump, and the ship lurched and groaned, but it continued out into the channel.

  There were several yells, curses, and threats from behind him as the bell and the launch had made it clear to some of those still aboard other boats that this one was leaving in the storm and probably not with its owners, but he didn’t care. He spun the wheel for all it was worth, turning the little craft so its bow faced the inner marker buoys, then locked it with the latch and ran forward to trigger the sail. He barely noticed that the girl was watching him, fascinated, and it was probably a good thing. He would have been furious had he seen her just sitting there on a hatch cover when he was so frantic.

  The winch jammed when he pushed the release; he cursed, then started hitting it and banging on it for all it was worth. The damned thing was frozen! He looked up and saw that the ship was turning slightly on its own and was beginning to drift sideways out of the docking area and back toward the other boats, many of which now had very nasty-looking creatures on them just waiting for him to drift near.

  The girl sensed the danger and s
aw what he was trying to do. She got up, came over to him, and put her hand on the stuck lever. There was a sudden electrical crackle, and steam actually rose from the winch mechanism. The lever moved back, releasing the sail.

  He was far too busy and too worried even now to consider what he’d seen. Two ropes came down from either side of the sail, and they had to be grabbed and tied to the pulley mechanism on either side of the boat. He grabbed one and tied it off as she watched, then the girl went over and caught the other and handed it to him when he reached her. It was a big help; he wouldn’t have expected most people to know how to tie into the remote mechanism.

  By this point they had drifted very close to the pier. At least a half dozen angry shapes were atop the various lock gates just waiting for him, and he wasn’t at all sure he could get out of there in time to keep from bumping into one of the gates and giving whatever was there an open invitation to board.

  He ran forward again, expertly engaging the intricate system of levers, pulleys, and gears that allowed a single pilot to handle the steering and sail adjustments, and brought the craft under some control. Momentum, however, wasn’t that great, and he felt a mild bump as the ship’s side struck the closest lock door. Something screamed and cursed at him, and a large black shape jumped aboard and fell to the deck.

  By this time he had things under control and was working the ship back out into the docking area and toward the inner markers. That, however, had allowed the unwanted newcomer to regain its footing, and it now stood there, almost in front of and just below him, glowering menacingly.

  It was two meters tall and covered in thick black fur, and its huge eyes glowed yellow; when it opened its mouth, it showed more teeth than a shark, all very large and very pointy. Although something of a shapeless mass with no clear waist, it had huge, thick, fur-covered arms ending in clawed hands. On its feet was the only clothing it apparently wore or needed—an outlandish pair of what could only be galoshes, size twenty, extra wide. It did, however, have one other thing that was even more intimidating. In its right hand it held what looked very much like some kind of humongous pistol.

  “Turn this ship around!” it thundered menacingly. “This is a Chandur ship, and you’re no Chandur, thief!”

  “And neither are you!” he shouted back, thinking fast and still steering for the markers. “I know very well whose ship this is! I was hired to repossess it for failing to make payments for much of this past season!”

  “Repo—! That’s worse than a damned thief!” the creature roared. “I ate the last repo agent who tried it on my ship! We watermen stick together!” It looked around and saw that they were still headed out. “I said turn this boat around! Now!”

  “If you ate the last repo agent, then I’ve nothing to lose, do I?” he responded, trying to sound as cool as possible. “If I’m going to die, I guess I might as well take you with me. That barge over there looks solid enough to crack us up and put us under.”

  The creature raised the pistol. “Get away from that wheel or I’ll blast you where you stand! Move away, I say! Down here! I’ll take her in! Don’t think I won’t shoot, either. It’ll blow your wheel, but I can use the other one in the wheel shack amidships!”

  Nathan Brazil sighed and stepped back from the wheel and over to the right as directed. Well, I almost got away with it, he thought glumly.

  Suddenly a dark shape moved from the center deck behind the creature forward to where it could sense something moving. It whirled and immediately faced the girl.

  It towered over her, and the mouth opened, revealing the very nasty teeth, but she did not seem intimidated. Instead, she looked up at the thing and right into its huge oval eyes.

  “You! You get over with your friend—” it began in the same deep, threatening tone it had used on him, but suddenly it stopped. The big eyes seemed to squint, and the huge mouth took on a look of undeniable surprise and confusion. “You—you get—I—uh…” it tried, then stopped, seemingly frozen to the spot, unable to move.

  Brazil didn’t wait to find out what was going on. With the gun no longer aimed at him, he went back to the wheel and began adjusting the course. Still, one eye was on where they were heading and the other was on the drama unfolding just below.

  Slowly, jerkily, as if fighting something that was making the creature move against its will as if it were some sort of giant marionette, the right arm was coming up to the face, the gun still firmly in its hand, and when it was at mouth level, the wrist trembled and began to turn the barrel inward, toward that mouth.

  “No!” Brazil yelled at her, trying to project as much emotion as he could that she should not go through with what she was obviously doing. What he particularly didn’t like was what he was getting back from her.

  Nothing.

  A cold, empty nothing, devoid of pity, hesitation, question.

  Devoid of humanity.

  She felt his revulsion, though, and hesitated, as if waiting for instructions.

  They weren’t very far from the barges. The water was icy cold, but with that kind of insulation the creature shouldn’t have any trouble making it to them before he froze to death. Frantic to try to communicate with her and upset by this terrible, almost machinelike coldness he felt inside her, he tried mental pictures of the thing jumping overboard and said aloud, “Splash! Swish!”

  For a moment nothing happened, then she seemed to get the idea. The big creature turned, walked stiffly to the side of the boat, bent over the rail, then dropped into the water, still holding the gun.

  He spun the wheel back toward the center channel and then shouted, “Let go of it! Let. Go. Of. It!”

  She again seemed to get the message, and from perhaps ten meters behind he heard the creature break to the surface and roar with fury. When the curses and threats came, Brazil relaxed. The big thing would be okay.

  The girl seemed to be back to normal now. The feelings he got were the basic ones, of satisfaction at dealing with a threat, of a job properly done. That deep, abiding coldness he’d felt was now once again hidden, but he would not forget it.

  That would-be hero was too much like himself, a fellow sailor doing what honor required him to do. He would kill such a man in a fair fight if he had the chance and no other choice, but always out of necessity, never coldly and never without profound regret.

  She either didn’t understand that or had discounted it. It was almost as if she’d observed the situation, done a cold, mathematical calculation, and taken the easiest route. No regrets, no second thoughts, no recrimination, nothing. The fact that she had a kind of mental power that could do this at all was scary enough, but to do it so damned coldly was… scary.

  He had never been this frightened of something. Not in a very, very long time. If she could do that to the sailor, then she could do that to him and might well do so. He tried very hard to suppress the fear, but it was there, niggling, and that was the worst of it; he knew she could feel it inside him as surely as if it were inside her. The only thing that gave him some comfort was that she had acted only for his protection, and she had listened to him when he had insisted that the sailor should live.

  The truth was, he could sense in her no danger to himself, but that wasn’t what scared him so much.

  What if they can all do this? What kind of game is the population of Glathriel playing, and with how much of this world?

  He was out into the full channel now and approaching the hex barrier, and he turned to a more practical concern. At least the weather had prevented the other sailors from pursuing them; now he had to prove he was enough of a sailor to get through it himself. The snowstorm wasn’t a big deal, but the dark, swirling clouds in Pulcinell right ahead didn’t promise anything better.

  He passed through the barrier, feeling the very slight tingle that was all anybody felt when going through one of the energy walls, and he was suddenly in tropical heat and a roaring wind. For several minutes he was again frantically working for control of the boat in ankle-dee
p snow on the deck while sweating from the heavy clothing he wore.

  He estimated the winds at gale force, no worse, but it meant trimming sail to the minimum, heading upwind, and battling the sea with a wheel that had a mind of its own. He only hoped that the girl didn’t suffer from seasickness; this was going to be one rough time.

  No rest for the weary,he thought glumly, but if he could hold out, it would be very much to his advantage. He didn’t care how far he went or if he went very far at all; if the storm grew no worse and if he maintained his current heading, it would put a lot of water between him and any pursuers. He fully expected to use this wind once it slackened off enough to trust.

  For now, though, it was a matter of keeping the damned boat afloat. He watched wave after wave crash into the bow and engulf it and then felt that bizarre sensation only those who had sailed into a large storm knew, that of the deck shifting suddenly both horizontally and vertically at once as the bow came up and broke free to await another wave.

  There was a lashing post, and he considered tying himself to the wheel station, but he’d sailed worse-handling craft than this in even rougher weather over thousands of years and countless endless seas. Once he got his sea legs and the rhythm of the ship, he would feel fairly comfortable with it. Still, it would be nice to sit down, strapped to a fixed chair rather than having to stand through the storm for who knew how long. Still, he dared to lock the wheel long enough to slip off the heavy coat he was wearing and noted for the first time that he’d lost his hat somewhere along the way.

  Finding himself pretty well soaked anyway, he slipped off his shirt and was just deciding if he could go any farther when the small boat gave a sudden, violent lurch to one side, throwing him to the deck.

  “What the—?” he asked himself, getting up and looking around. It was still pretty rough, but it wasn’t that rough. Must have hit a reef or something, he decided, shaking his head and turning back to the wheel.