Changewinds 03 - War of the Maelstrom

by Jack L. Chalker

  The big man had considered it. "I am most troubled by that, and it is clearly the object," he admitted. "However, it might not be as clear-cut as you think. Do you really believe that Grotag and the King and all the high advisors are that dense? Or that the other kingdoms and Akhbreed sorcerers can't figure out the plot? They are scared—make no mistake about it. They are still unconvinced that it could occur on a global scale, though. Many see it as a basically localized fight between old rivals. Klittichom with his Storm Princess versus Boolean with his, if he can ever find her or she him. One on one. The greatest colonial rebel massing is against Masalur and the approaches to it; that is clear. Klittichom's ambassadors have been going around assuring everyone that it's a local fight, and that he is considering a preemptive attack with all his powers on Boolean before Boolean can attack the rest of them. The sorcerers and kings are mostly willing to sit it out, perhaps rooting a bit for Klittichom, seeing who wins— Then if the winner moves against any of the others the rest will take him on. Because of his views, they consider a Boolean victory more of a threat to them than a Klittichom one."

  "I don't know how the horned one is going to do it, but 1 am convinced that this will be no localized quarrel. If Klittichom can sit off safely with his Storm Princess in his remote northern citadel and still somehow draw and guide the Changewind through Masalur, then he already has the means to hit anyone, anywhere, that he wishes. Boolean may wish he could do that, but if he could, he would."

  "There is currently a wait-and-see attitude among the sorcerers," Halagar told him, "but once they see how things are developing they will most certainly mass on the victor to force him to share his new powers or be taken on."

  Dorion considered that. "But if they take him on, they will have to mass together to fight him. What a tempting target for a Changewind to blow through!"

  "Huh! I hadn't thought of that! I'm a fighting man, not a sorcerer. I take your word for it, though. You have convinced me, Dorion, although we would never convince the others. They are, as you say, too sure of themselves. As for me, I would rather die fighting than sitting here with the winds blowing." He thought for a moment. "The odds of getting a train towards Masalur are slim right now. Few are willing to risk ambush by the colonials, particularly with Mandan cloaks in such short supply and the colonials practically holding some roads hostage. Armed escorts would only be good to the Tishbaal Null. We could make better time going overland ourselves, avoiding the main roads and routes."

  Dorion's head looked up at the courier in surprise, " 'We?' "

  "Why not? With my gun and sword arm and your sorcery we ought to be able to stand up to any minor colonial backwater irregulars we might be unlucky enough to come across. And I can have the maps and learn the roads and routes straight to Masalur, particularly if you can navigate at the nulls. With any luck at all we might reach your Boolean in, oh, three weeks."

  "The King is not going to like your change of loyalties," Dorion noted, not at all enthused by the prospect of having Halagar along, nor all that happy that he might well be called upon to show how hollow his own boasts to the big man were about just what magical powers he might have. He wondered, too, if Halagar was that infatuated with Charley or if he was instead leading them into some sort of double-crass. "Nor am I that comfortable with someone who would shift loyalties so casually," he added bluntly.

  Halagar shrugged. "I am a mercenary, an employee. I have been such almost all of my life. I give my utmost loyalty while I am in anyone's employ, but this will not be the first time I've quit a job. I am sick of arguing myself hoarse for a solid and unified defense of the hub with fat generals who have never fired upon anyone who could fire back. When I must commit to dull and stupid minds, then it is time I sought a different employ."

  "Boolean or Masalur would certainly welcome your services, but I have nothing with which to buy your loyalty and arms."

  Halagar looked at the magician, a strange, crooked smile on his face. "You have command of Yssa," he noted. "Delegate that command to me."

  Dorion was shocked but not really surprised. "How can I do that? She and the other belong not to me but to Boolean personally. And she has an overriding compulsion to seek Boolean with or without me. I can not give what is not mine."

  "That is understood. The commission is to get the three of you to the sorcerer Boolean, and that I will do and in the most direct manner. My fee is that she will be mine absolutely during that period only. Once there I must negotiate a new commission with Boolean. Once there, she is of no more value either as decoy or lure. I have sufficient money spread around and reserves hidden for when I truly need them. I have no wish for political power; have seen what it does to men like me. I am certain that your Boolean will find my fee quite reasonable and affordable, and I will give my all for it."

  Dorion was amazed. "She attracts you that much? You who have all the women swooning over your every move? Are you certain that you are not under an enchantment?"

  "Sometimes I think so," Halagar replied. "And it is true that I can lie with most any woman I choose, although a few have eluded me. I have lost count of the number of women, free and slave, noble and common, that I have lain with, but she is, somehow, different. I have never married, not out of lack of suitable candidates, but rather because my life and chosen occupation would make it unfair to any woman and subject her to either far too much danger and strange places or force me to give up the life 1 love and settle down. Any such woman would also be a sword my enemies could use at my throat if all else failed. Courtesans of her caliber were always the best, but they always belonged to someone else and were heaven for merely a night, and not a one can hold a candle to her. She is blind, yes, but it hardly slows her, and she can see magic, which I cannot, and that gives me an advantage I did not have before."

  "How did you know that?"

  Halagar shrugged. "She remarked on the color of some charms I have carried for some protection that first night back in Quodac. I knew then that she could see the magic, although she did not understand what it was."

  "Oh." Dorion responded, interested that Halagar had still never seen or experienced, nor even suspected, the real Charley.

  "She would be always loyal, totally obedient, would be uncomplaining no matter what the conditions or situation, yet she would serve me in all ways and ease my loneliness. She is the best of her class that I have ever seen and the first within reach. She is a pretty jewel who can neither be purchased with money nor taken by force, and, with her, I need not compromise my lifestyle nor situation."

  Dorion nodded. "I see. And this period would be a sort of trial run, as it were." He only wished Charley could have heard the way Halagar was describing her. He envisioned a time when a lustful Halagar would bring another woman to his tent and order Charley to serve them both. Still, the deal wouldn't be made unless Boolean okayed it, and Boolean knew just who and what she really was. In the meantime, perhaps three weeks or so as Halagar's "property" might reveal his true nature to her. Either way, this seemed the only reasonable chance of reaching Boolean under current conditions. He just hoped he wouldn't go mad watching the two and listening to them from the next bed.

  "What occurs once we reach Boolean is your affair," he told Halagar. "I will accept your bargain as much as I can in the meantime, though, provided we leave as quickly as possible."

  "It is late now. and there are preparations to make," Halagar noted. "Still, if you all can be ready, we could leave just beyond first light tomorrow. I will have everything ready by men, and will have cleared things here as delicately as possible. Is that soon enough?"

  "I would as soon leave tonight," the magician told him, "but it will have to do."

  Boday was no longer the first destination. He turned and decided that he'd better inform Charley.

  She emerged from-the harem, where men were not permitted, into the anteroom where he waited for her, looking puzzled but expectant. She no longer looked merely gorgeous; after some time and a mak
e-over by the Imperial courtesans, she looked spectacular. Dressed in the light, gauze-like finery of the harem, with long, painted nails perfectly manicured and toenails to match, her hair streaked with blond, her lashes long and luxurious, she was the epitome of male fantasy. By the gods! How he wanted her, and how he hated himself for this!

  "We leave tomorrow, just past dawn," he told her in English. "Be prepared."

  "I am prepared," she replied. "I don't exactly have much to pack. They don't have riding outfits for people like me, but I'm sure I can find something that'll do."

  "Halagar is coming with us."

  That news excited her, "Really? I hoped against hope he would!"

  "He is leaving the service of Covanti and coming over to us. His fee for taking us all to Boolean is you."

  "Huh? How can that be?"

  "He wants me to delegate my authority over you to him for the journey, which will still take several weeks. Once there, he expects Boolean to give you to him permanently in exchange for his service in the defense of Masalur."

  She was intrigued by that. but not as delighted as he'd expected her to be. "I know this ring in my nose is kind of a turn-on, but I'd kind'a hoped that once we got to the old boy he'd at least neutralize it or something."

  "You object to this arrangement?"

  She thought it over. "No, not for a few weeks, I guess. But, you know, something funny happens to me every time he's around. I go bye-bye and Shari takes over. I love Shari when I can turn her on and off, but bein' her all the time isn't my idea of a future. I don't like the idea of being out there in the middle of nowhere without my brain in my head, either."

  "Well, I don't like what happens, either, and I can't explain it, but I don't see we have any choice." Quickly, he filled her in on the whole situation.

  "I get the picture." she told him. "I also get a real feeling that you don't like this arrangement much."

  "I don't," he admitted, "but he's just the sort of person we need to have a chance of making it."

  "Well," she sighed, "it's got to be. I don't have much choice these days anyway. At least it's kind'a flattering for me to find a guy with that much experience wanting me so much."

  "Uh, Charley, he doesn't want to marry you, he wants to own you. Or, rather, he wants to own Shari. I, uh, well, he doesn't think you're the perfect woman; he thinks you're the perfect slave."

  "Yeah, I figured it was something like that. And, as Shari, I am. I guess I should feel lucky. Very few people are ever perfect as anything. Still, it's not exactly been a burning ambition of mine to even discover that I'm the perfect slave. It's sort of like dreaming you're gonna be a great genius or something and discovering that you are really the world's greatest toilet cleaner. Still, it's in other people's hands now, really. If Boolean goes along with me, then I'll sure give Halagar his chance and see if he wants me anyway, but if Mister Green decides I'm no longer of any use then I guess I'll spend eternity washing his socks and loving it."

  "You've gotten so cynical and too fatalistic," he responded, a bit angry at her. "That's not like you. You're sounding more like the local women here."

  "Yeah, well, show me where I've had a crack at anything else. Seriously, though you worked with Boolean. How do you think he'll take me?"

  "It is hard to say," Dorion replied honestly. "Under normal conditions you would be free, liberated as much as he could, and treated extremely well, but these are not normal conditions. What's right and wrong under normal circumstances seems out the door now. Too much is at stake for ones like him to think much about an individual's rights."

  She nodded. "Yeah, sort'a like Bogart in Casablanca. That's what I figured."

  "All we can do is get there and see. Now, listen to me and obey my commands. Until I say otherwise and, I emphasize, until I say otherwise you will regard Halagar as your lord and address him as Master or however he commands. You will obey his every command as you would mine, as if your commands were from me or from Boolean—with a few exceptions. You will not obey any command that would betray us or our mission but will instead immediately report it to me. You will obey no command that would harm yourself or Boday or me, or cause us to come to harm, and you will report as soon as possible to me if any such command is given you by Halagar. Further, if anything happens to me, or we are separated, then you will be a free agent commanded still to reach Boolean as quickly as possible thereafter by any means you can find. And you will neither reveal nor repeat these conditions and exceptions to Halagar and you will deny to him that any such exceptions exist. Those are my commands. Obey them exactly."

  She heard herself responding, "I hear and obey. Master." At that moment, she felt a sudden, strange disorientation. Dorion, somehow, seemed to be less overpowering to her, more like Boday or anybody else she knew. He seemed, maybe for the first time, just kind of, well, ordinary. Her Master, whose voice must be obeyed, was elsewhere, and as of yet she had no commands from him. It was a weird sensation.

  "I have to go," he told her. "Boday still has to be told and we have to get packed and ready. That's if Covanti lets us leave. If not, all bets are off."

  She could hear the regret in his voice, and thought of saying or doing something, but she wasn't sure what to say or do. While she was still a bit confused, he left her standing there, alone, in the harem anteroom.

  Neither Dorion nor Boday got much sleep that night, not only from the nervousness at going on, but also because of Dorion's fear that Halagar was either pulling a fast one or that the powers that be in the Court would stop them as soon as Halagar made ready to leave with them. Boday, who had no real liking for Halagar at all, saying she'd seen a thousand like him in her time, slept uneasily within reach of a whip and a short sword, ready for any sort of late-night intrusion. However, when light began to creep into the windows, and they began to bear the first stirrings of life in the castle area, nothing had happened.

  Boday had agreed with Dorion that Halagar, if he were being straight with them, was an asset they couldn't afford to turn down, but she swore to Dorion that before she would let Charley be permanently given to the mercenary, she would kill either Halagar or Charley.

  It was difficult to tell if Halagar had gotten much sleep, either, but he seemed to be true to his word. Two household grooms came for Dorion and Boday and their things, most of which were replacements picked up in Covanti, and took them down to the courtyard, where Halagar was waiting. He was dressed now in a plain black riding outfit with leather jacket and broad-brimmed black hat (none of which were adorned with any symbol or insignia), matching boots, and a thick, black sword and pistol belt.

  Charley was with him, dressed in calf-length high-heeled black leather boots from which thin black leather straps came, interlaced up the leg and thigh and forming a cross-hatch pattern that led to a pair of black satin leather panties. Above die waist she wore an overlapping gold-braided neckpiece, matching gold bracelets and earrings, and a light, satiny black cape tied at the neck, but not much else.

  Boday leaned over and whispered in Dorion's ear, "You see? Boday said she knew his type."

  Dorion shrugged. It seemed an odd comment for Boday, who was rather fond of revealing leather outfits herself and, indeed, had one only slightly more modest on herself. "Seems like kind of an exposed riding outfit for so long a journey, but we're still in the warm latitudes. Still, it's in character with him and not as bad, I guess, as what she was forced to wear before." He frowned. "I see three horses, but one's a pack horse. Where's he expect her to ride?"

  The answer was the kind of leather saddle placed on Halagar's big, black stallion. It had smaller, independent, leather stirrups attached forward, and the saddle was a bit longer than the norm. A saddle built for two. Either Covanti had two riders common enough so that such saddles were made routinely or Halagar had had this fantasy of his for a long time.

  Charley was clearly in her Shari mode as well, servile and submissive and empty-headed. She always was around Halagar, something Boday a
nd Dorion had both noticed and which had confused and disturbed Charley for a while as well. None knew the cause but while Dorion didn't like not having Charley's quick mind and courage on hand, he certainly didn't want Halagar to see that part of her, either, nor anyone else. Shadowcat in her lap broadcast her thoughts; as Shari, those thoughts betrayed nothing.

  Still, Halagar's dominance and use of Charley disturbed the magician on a less practical and more emotional level. The idea of seeing her moon over Halagar and kiss him and maybe even make out with him on the trail raised emotional wounds in Dorion that he hadn't even suspected were there.

  Stilt, he consoled himself as best he could and hoped he could stand it, knowing that just as Charley was now a tool of Halagar's, so Halagar would be a tool of Dorion so long as it served his purpose to get them to Boolean. Once inside Boolean's circle of power, Halagar was going to find his dreams a bit harder to hold on to.

  It wasn't that Halagar was an evil man, it was just that he'd been, by benefit of being handsome and strong and the best at everything physical all his life, a spoiled and pampered center of attraction. Egotistical, self-centered, Halagar just wasn't the type to ever consider others as anything but tools or employers. Even now, he didn't really understand why he was lonely, or why he was so fixated on Charley even at this level; and he probably never would.

  "We want a minimum of sixty leegs a day," Halagar told them, "and more if we can get it. The packhorse is strong and will keep up the pace. With so much of the colonial country infested by rebels, I intend to keep off the main roads if possible and travel mostly by day. Dorion, if you can manage solid Navigation, I intend to pick worlds where there is little report of rebel massings and plentiful water and reasonable terrain. There are a few in each track we must follow. Still, we can't count on anything, and there have been reports of minor Changewinds in the least active colonial worlds. I've got Mandan cloaks for us on the packhorse, so don't let us lose him, but that could also make us a target. They've been gathering Mandan in great quantity on their raids and I can guess why. If you could do the impossible and actually predict a Changewind and have troops ready at its periphery, you'd want to carpet your people in Mandan gold."