Scorpio Invasion [Dray Prescot #40]

by Alan Burt Akers

  Oh, well, that dreadful Devil Face of Dray Prescot sometimes comes in handy, I suppose.

  All the same, I was not fool enough not to change vessels when the next sizeable town hove up around a wide curving bend. The place looked not too dissimilar from Changwutung at a distance; as is the nature of places, I expected many differences of detail. I was wrong.

  This town of Ternantung was the twin of Changwutung.

  Just about all that the outside world now knew of Walfarg in Loh were its mysterious walled gardens and veiled women. Perhaps, the notion occurred to me, perhaps after the fall of the empire, those were all there were.

  Now it is not my intention to go into great detail concerning my journey down The River of Glinting Charm. There were the smells, rich and fruity close to the shore, surprisingly fresh in midstream. There were the never-ending delights of wild animals, and birds and fish. There were settlements along the banks and here my new vessel, Garrus, pulled in to buy and sell the goods she carried. The master, an apim called Nath Hsienu, known as Nath the Bollard, ran a much tighter ship than the ineffectual Tsien-Ting. There was no trouble aboard Garrus. In addition, Nath the Bollard was addicted to the game of Jikalla, and we had a number of interesting games, although, as you know, my main interest in that department is Jikaida.

  Nath the Bollard warned me that finding a ship going south would be difficult.

  “I've heard rumors of a great deal of nasty business going on along the coast there. My cousin twice removed, Naghan the Omurdour, sailed out with a fine crew of fellows. They were never seen again."

  “And the rumors?"

  “Those devil ships that helped destroy the empire. They've been seen again flying over the coast.” He looked at me meaningfully. Because of his work as a vessel's master he was nowhere near as apathetic to events as the majority of his countrymen. “Over the west coast. You know what that means."

  I knew—or assumed I did. Those would be the Shank vollers. But it was clear Nath the Bollard was referring to the vollers of Havilfar and Hyrklana, the airboats that had contributed to the defeat of Loh.

  “You've not seen them?"

  He shook his head. “And don't want to. Some poor devil was fished out of the sea clinging to a stump of mast. He'd seen ‘em. Oh, no, if you see them ships flying through the air that's about the last thing you'll see, by Lingloh!"

  This news was really more than rumor. The chances of finding a ship to sail south were looking more remote by the minute.

  “Cheer up,” said Nath the Bollard, setting up a new game. “We're sailing all the way to Sardanar at the mouth of the river. If you manage to find a ship and sail out to get yourself killed, well, then, dom—at least you'll have had the time between then and now to play Jikalla!"

  * * *

  Chapter five

  As it turned out, fate or chance took a hand. Take your pick of those two imposters; one or t'other will trip you up when you least expect it. In the event I didn't get to Sardanar on that trip; the place is not so much dire as lacking interest. It does have massive sea walls and fortifications dating back to the early days of the Walfargian empire. Those sea walls would prove of little use against an aerial armada.

  On the succeeding days as we glided down the River of Glinting Charm we passed a considerable traffic going upstream. Nath said there were more vessels of all kinds breasting the current than usual at this season.

  “I think,” I said, as I hauled my sweep to steer clear of a lopsided craft packed with people and bundles lolloping along and zigzagging wildly as the helmsman sought the westerly breeze, “I really do think I can guess why there are all these vessels going upstream."

  “Aye,” said Nath the Bollard, taking his straw hat from his red hair and bashing it against his thigh. “Aye, by Hlo-Hli!"

  The bosun, a lively fellow with a meaty jaw and a meaty fist, said: “You reckon it's them Fish Head devil worshippers?"

  “Practically certain, Larghos."

  Larghos the Bosun spat overside. “Reckon they're running too far."

  I agreed with him. The plan of campaign the Shanks were probably following would call for their complete domination of the coastal seas. Only after that would they gather their forces for a push inland. The continent of Loh was so vast that they were likely to be swallowed up in its immensity, so they'd plan with Fish Headed cunning. Mind you, for the poor folk of Loh who happened to inhabit the areas chosen for invasion by the Shanks the invasion would mean the end of normalcy.

  We hailed a passing craft and heard a garbled shout about fires.

  “The devils are probably raiding up and down to strike terror as far as they can.” My own thoughts were that the already existing invasion of Tarankar would form the locus for their main thrust.

  The next day not a single vessel plied upstream; on the next another bunch appeared, and the day after that only a trickle.

  “The faint-hearts,” said Larghos the Bosun with large contempt.

  I did not say: “Have you met a Shank yet, Larghos?” for that would have been insulting and cruel. But the thought persisted.

  Other riverine craft sailed downstream and we generally kept a nice convoy distance between vessels for safety's sake. Looking ahead as I came on deck for a breath of air, having been soundly thrashed by Nath the Bollard with one of his favorite Jikalla tricks, I saw a vessel ahead closer than I liked. I mentioned this to the helmsman, Chang-So, and he snarled out: “They're luffing and hauling like a pack of famblys."

  Nath and Larghos joined me on deck and we watched the movements of the vessel ahead.

  “Ah!” said Nath. “There's the reason!"

  A dark bundle flipped up from the deck, turned over in the air, and came down splash into the river.

  Immediately the vessel picked up speed, spreading more canvas, and glided along to resume a safer distance. I craned overside to see what had been thrown overboard. A man was thrashing about in the water, going under and then rising in a spouting bubble. I threw off my tunic and dived in.

  There was no need to knock him unconscious. I got a grip on him, said: “Hold still, dom,” and then as he instantly lay limply, swam back to Garrus. They'd swung the yard to back the course and there was no difficulty seizing the line and looping a bight around this young fellow. He went up streaming water, his red Lohvian hair plastered to his skull. I followed and shook myself like a dog. The radiance of the Suns would soon dry us off.

  When he'd recovered, with a tot inside him, Nath the Bollard asked the obvious questions.

  “Lahal, all,” the young lad said. He was young, at that, with a glint of fuzz on cheeks and chin. “My name is—Nath the Ready."

  Instantly I disbelieved that. There are very very many Naths on Kregen and the name is so often used when it does not belong to the giver of the name that it's almost a totally useless pseudonym.

  “Why'd they chuck you overboard?” demanded Larghos.

  “They said I was unlucky."

  “Oho! Then perhaps we'd better return you to the river!"

  The lad flinched back, and then I saw in his face and eyes a defiant flash of anger, as though he was sick of being pushed around.

  “Hold hard,” I said. “Just why are you unlucky, dom?"

  “Oh, I threw the slops against the wind—"

  “Ha!” burst out Nath the Bollard. “A menace!"

  “Chuck him over again,” counseled the helmsman, Chang-So.

  I caught the lad's eye and tried to give him an encouraging smile. What kind of expression I'd put on I wasn't sure; he gave me a hard stare but there was no more flinching back.

  Nath the Bollard decided to keep this Nath the Ready aboard. As he said: “When we reach Hinjanchung around the next but one bend we will put ashore. That lot ahead will be there, too. We can ask them then."

  For a moment I fancied the lad was going to speak out with the truth against certain discovery; he remained silent. I guessed he was hoping to slip ashore and make his escape. He wor
e a simple yellow tunic girt by a narrow belt from which hung an empty dagger scabbard and a scrip. His legs were bare. He wore a red breechclout which predisposed me in his favor.

  As to his face, clearly it was as yet unformed by adult problems. There was a clarity in his skin, a breadth to his forehead most pleasing. Yet, at the same time there was a rebellious set to his jaw, a recklessness in his bearing. I fancied his history, short though it must necessarily be, would prove of interest.

  In the event we went ashore in Hinjanchung. Nath the Bollard had Larghos the Bosun confine the lad to his locked cabin. When we'd found the crew of the vessel from which the lad had been thrown—in a sleazy tavern of dubious delights, the Zinul and Queng—the mystery was rapidly explained.

  “A damned Wizard of Walfarg!"declared Hwang, the master. “We got rid of him the moment we found out the truth."

  “In that case—” said Nath the Bollard, doubtfully.

  Chang-So burst out: “Chuck him in!"

  At that point the workings of fate, or chance, became more apparent to me. Had that unpleasant rast, Pondro the Pin, not been so unpleasant and I had been able to stay aboard Quaynt's Fortune, then I would have been well down the river, and would not have fished this young Wizard of Loh out of the water.

  Not for a single moment did I believe the Star Lords or the Savanti had anything to do with this meeting.

  I said: “Let me have a word with him."

  No one objected. Back aboard Garrus I let the lad out of the bosun's cabin. I frowned at him, and he remained still.

  Now if you are already way ahead of me in this my newest design I am not surprised. When I'd been counting up the ways of reaching Tsungfaril, far down in the south of Loh, I'd completely overlooked this obvious way.

  “You are a Wizard of Loh.” He flushed up at this, but kept his mouth shut. I decided to test him. “Why didn't you turn the people who threw you overboard into little green frogs?"

  “Oh,” he began airily, with all a spirited young man's arrogance. “I would have done so; but—” He saw my face and stopped speaking. He took a breath, and then in an entirely different tone of voice said: “I believe you know why I did not."

  “Yes."

  “So what do you want of me?"

  “That is simple for a Wizard of Loh. If you would be so kind as to oblige me, I would ask you to go into lupu and contact a friend."

  He made a face. “Lupu. That was an exercise I always—"

  “Was?"

  There were as I knew a number of ways a sorcerer could go into lupu, that magical trance-like state in which they could communicate and spy over vast distances. What did he mean, ‘was'?

  He looked down at his feet. “They threw me out."

  “Threw you out?” I repeated like a loon. “What do you mean, they threw you out?"

  “What I say. I didn't pay enough attention to the lessons. I failed to pass an interim exam.” He looked up, hotly. “It was all the fault of that Pynsi! She promised me and then she gave her favors to that lout, Ul-ga-Sorming!"

  “By the disgusting despicable deliquescing bowels of Makki Grodno! You mean you're a damned Wizard of Loh and you can't get into communication with a brother or sister wizard?” I fairly howled with mortification.

  “Not really. Anyway, I've given it all up. I am going for a Bowman of Loh."

  “And I suppose you failed in an examination to hit the Chunkrah's Eye!” I flamed out bitterly.

  “No! I can shoot in my bow with the best!"

  “And a fat lot of good that'll do me now!"

  “Well, if that's the way you feel, I suppose you'd better throw me in the water again!"

  I controlled my breathing. “Anyway, what's your name?"

  “Nath the Ready."

  “Yes, yes. Your real name, fambly."

  Again he gave me that appraising glance. I suppose I was a trifle wrought up. Just as I thought I had a capital scheme to reach my friends, this jackanapes ruined it all because instead of studying his lessons he'd been mooning after a girl. I didn't have a hat on; if I had I'd have ripped it off and thrown it down on the deck and jumped on it. Too true, by Vox!

  “I am Ra-Lu-Quonling."

  “Ha!” I was already working out what to do with this fine fellow. “D'you know Deb-Lu-Quienyin?"

  “Not personally. He left Whonban long before I was born."

  “Ah—then you're related."

  “All Wizards of Walfarg are related.” That was said with a little sniff, not so much of contempt as of recognition of my ignorance.

  “I suppose so, more or less. D'you know Khe-Hi-Bjanching, or Ling-Li-Lwingling?"

  “They were arriving in Whonban as I was leaving."

  Quite seriously I said: “Are they both well?"

  “As far as I know. You know them, then?"

  “I do. Deb-Lu-Quienyin is at the moment somewhere in Vallia. You've heard of Vallia?"

  Again that little touch of arrogant contempt. “Of course."

  “Well, if he's too far away, you'll have to reach Khe-Hi or Ling-Li.” I reconsidered. “Better make it Khe-Hi. If Ling-Li's heavily involved with reproduction at the moment she won't want a fambly like you breaking in."

  Icily, he said: “They have twins, a boy and a girl."

  “My Val!” I felt the pleasure. “I have been out of circulation."

  “I told you. I don't do lupu very well.” He was verging on the petulant. “Anyway, even if I was as good as Khe-Hi-Bjanching, I told you, I've given up being a wizard. Thaumaturgy and I have parted company. I'm going for a Bowman of Loh."

  “I'll break your damn bow over your head, you ingrate! Didn't I fish you out of a watery grave?"

  And he laughed.

  And I laughed with him.

  “Well, now,” I said, presently. “Come on, Ra-Lu-Quonling. It's vitally important I get a message through."

  “We-ell, I suppose I could try. You know, I heard the stories concerning the mages of whom you speak. I know what they do these days."

  “Oh?"

  “They are among the most successful. They have as clients the royal and imperial house of Vallia."

  That was the way a Wizard of Loh would see the relationship, and, as I never forgot, it was the correct way. Khe-Hi and Deb-Lu were true comrades, that is so; but they remained Wizards of Loh.

  “So I believe,” I said, casually.

  “As I said, we are well-educated in Whonban. Even if I skipped some lessons, I never skipped current history. And I read widely."

  “Good for you, Ra-Lu. Now, you did say you would try—?"

  “Yes. I will try to contact Khe-Hi-Bjanching. What message would you like me to give him, Dray Prescot?"

  * * *

  Chapter six

  “Ouch!” I said. Then: “My name is Drajak ti Zamran, known as Drajak the Sudden. I would esteem it a favor if you could remember that. Anything else could prove embarrassing.” I added, menacingly: “For those who found out."

  “Very well. If you remember that I am Nath the Ready."

  “Oh, come on! Find a better name than that."

  “Well, yes, perhaps."

  “As to the message, ask Khe-Hi to contact Deb-Lu and arrange to send a voller—an airboat—down here. Send two so the pilot of the one I use can fly home. Have you got that?"

  “Airboats,” he said, and the disgust dripped.

  “You'd better also recommend that they don't tell anyone apart from the Lord Farris. Otherwise we'll have an invasion down here."

  “I don't quite—"

  “Never mind. Now, my lad, do your stuff—and you have my thanks."

  “I shall need a little more room."

  “Of course.” The clean crisp air of Kregen, only partially sullied by the smells of the river, whiffled up my nostrils most beautifully as we came up on deck. I breathed in. By Vox! This young feller-me-lad of a Wizard of Loh was going to fix my ticket, was going to arrange passage back to Tsungfaril, Mevancy, Llodi and all the others, back to
intrigue and danger and death. Now he had committed himself he was spry about it.

  We found a clear space at the rear of a ramshackle godown where the mud was not too thick. No one was about or could spy on us without being detected. Ra-Lu-Quonling squeezed his eyes shut, opened them wide, flexed his fingers, took three deep lungfuls of air, said: “Right."

  He squatted down and lifted his hands to his eyes, threw his head back, remained silent and unmoving. I watched him gravely. He began to tremble, his lithe young body vibrating under the yellow tunic. Slowly he drew his hands down his face. His eyeballs were completely rolled up so that his eyes were mere white blots in that tanned young face. His breathing slackened. Quietly I waited for the next stage in this process. With a strangled cry, a gasp almost of physical pain, Ra-Lu-Quonling staggered to his feet. The shaking of his body ceased. His arms lifted until they were horizontal and like a scarecrow caught in a wind he began to revolve, faster and faster, a whirling dervish spinning in the mud. Abruptly, his whirlwind motion stopped. He flopped down onto his haunches and put his hands flat on the mud. His head tilted back.

  Both of Ra-Lu-Quonling's eyes opened, not together, but one after the other. He stared balefully at me. I recalled the first time I had seen this process by which a Wizard of Loh went into lupu, when I had derided the whole notion, back then when with good old Seg I'd searched so desperately for Delia. The frail and not very competent Wizard of Loh Lu-si-Yuong had been unable to find her for me—and I struggling against what everyone said, that she was dead!—but he had warned us about Thelda's danger. He had been an old man; this young whippersnapper was young. Yet both used almost identical methods of attaining lupu. Deb-Lu or Khe-Hi would go into lupu and wander around Kregen through the various planes as you or I might open a door and walk from one room to another.

  That very expertise in thaumaturgy ought not to disguise the weirdness of it, the spine-tingling uncanniness of what these mages could perform.

  Although, to be sure, Deb-Lu had been experiencing difficulty in getting through down in South Loh. Still, I had every confidence that this self-named Nath the Ready could reach Khe-Hi. After all, although I'd no idea where Whonban was situated in Loh, it couldn't be all that far away from here, could it?